"I thought you should know that my marriage to Matymbou is about our concern for Romaric, our friendship, and our deep mutual respect," Lois said. "It's not … It doesn't have to be a barrier to ... what I … what we might want in the future."
Clark stared into the darkness, unable to decide if this were the best news of his life or the worst. No, it wasn't the worst - Lana had captured that place in his memory. But being with Lois. Being with available Lois. He would love her. He didn't have the strength to resist. He would love her.
The silence droned between them, heavy with possibilities too big, too intimidating, too overwhelming to grasp.
"Do you have any other questions?" Lois asked.
Clark shook his head, unable to pluck anything coherent from a mind in meltdown.
Lois lightly touched his shoulder. "Goodnight, Kent," she said. "Thank you for listening."
And then, she turned and walked into the hut.
Part 18
Clark finished painting the second coat on the truck. He tightly secured the lid on the pot of linseed oil. He methodically washed the brush, dislodging all the flecks of sawdust and gummed-up oil. He left the pot and brush on the table, next to the drying truck.
Then, he slumped into the dirt and leaned back against a sapelli tree.
He could no longer deny the truth that had been pecking at his conscience since last night.
He had thought he loved Lana, his wife, with all of his heart.
But the reality - sobering and shameful - was that his feelings for Lana seemed shallow when measured against his feelings for a woman he'd known for only four days.
If he stayed, he would fall in love with Lois.
He was probably already beyond where he could exert any control over his feelings for her.
He had always questioned his worth as a husband, and those questions had increased a thousand-fold since Lana had left him. Had he loved her enough? Had he been considerate enough? Had he been understanding enough?
He had tried. Lana had been the centre of his life. He had done everything she'd asked - even turning away from people who'd needed his help because she had been terrified that someone might discover his freaky strength and weird abilities.
His commitment to her, to their life together, to their marriage, to their future, had been absolute.
But it hadn't been enough.
During their time together, there had been occasional moments of profound honesty when Clark had allowed himself to wonder if there was more.
But he'd smothered the moments quickly, swamping them with the obvious and easy explanation.
He was an alien.
He was incapable of loving a human woman as she needed to be loved.
But Lois …
His feelings for her were powerful. Strong. Real. Intense. Overwhelming. Undeniable.
He hadn't known love could feel like this.
Love?
Was this love? Real love?
Is this what love felt like? The dragging hollowness whenever he thought of a life without her? The way she brightened his world with one smile? The way her concern and understanding had the power to cut through pain he'd thought would never diminish? The way she'd refused to give in to his desire to die?
The way she made his differences seem less important?
No one - no one - had ever made him feel like that.
What was he going to do?
Stay with Lois? Or run away?
Initially, he hadn't wanted to stay. Then he'd stayed because he hadn't wanted to leave her. Then he'd stayed because she was married and couldn't threaten his heart.
But now …
If he stayed, her marriage need not be a barrier. Lois - a beautiful and caring woman - could become single. She could do it without betraying her husband. She could do it without breaking her vows.
If he stayed, he could experience the full realm of what, so far, had only been a taste.
He could know acceptance.
He could bask in the exquisite beauty of her love.
It would be so easy. Stay. Force himself to forget. Move on. Accept that his life with Lana had finished. Begin a life with Lois.
He would be happy. He would have everything he had ever wanted.
A wife. A child. A family.
Belonging.
He would be right back where he was a week ago.
But this time, it would be different.
Wouldn't it?
Lois … Lois was very different from Lana.
But he would still be the same.
He still wouldn't be human. And he would still be racked with fear.
Fear of losing everything.
What if Lois left him?
What if something happened to her? Illness? Or injury?
They were living in the African jungle, beyond the reach of Western medicine.
And Clark, although long past feeling any effects from Tempus's green rock, hadn't recovered his inhuman strength and abilities.
All his life, he had yearned to be normal. But now, he would welcome his strange abilities because they would provide protection for Lois.
If he were to lose her - after having believed her love was his to keep - that would be intolerable.
He couldn't do it.
It would be better not to know than to know and lose.
Clark stood from the ground and went to the gate.
He opened it quietly and stepped out of the quarantine area. Ahead and to his right, some branches were leaning against a trunk.
His heart thumping, Clark crept past the makeshift shelter. After ten yards, he turned around, checking the shelter, but refusing to look at the gate. There was no sound to indicate he had disturbed Romaric. Clark turned and jogged away.
Away from the village. Away from the Bangala.
Away from the woman who would hold his heart in her hands forever.
~|^|~
As Lois surfaced from the depths of sleep, she searched for the sound of Diddi's breathing. She smiled. She'd missed his closeness when she'd been separated from him during the quarantine.
But something wasn't right.
She rolled over.
Kent's bed was empty. Was he still working on the truck?
She sprang from between the blankets and looked outside. It wasn't yet dawn, but the darkness seemed on the verge of giving way to daylight.
The little table was still positioned in the patch of moonlight. Lois walked over to it. The truck was upside-down, signifying Kent had painted the underside. The pot was closed. The brush was lying across the lid.
Where was he now?
Lois stood still, listening.
The air was full of the never-silent chorus of the rainforest, but she detected nothing to suggest the presence of a human.
"Kent?" she called softly.
There was no reply.
Lois went to the gate. "Romaric?'
A few seconds later, she heard the rustle of branches. "Yes, Lois?"
"Did you see Kent leave the quarantine area?"
"No. I didn't hear anything."
"OK. Wait a moment. I'll be back soon."
Lois ran around the entire quarantine area, checking the amenities, the trees, and behind the hut. Inside the hut, Diddi hadn't stirred. She picked up the lantern, stopped at the fire to light it, and ran to the gate. "Romaric, I need to go and find Kent," she said, opening the gate. "Look after Diddi; when he wakes up, tell him to wait here for me to return."
"Where are you going?" Romaric asked. "You can't go into the forest alone."
"I won't be alone for long. I'll find Kent."
The flickering light of the lantern captured the concern on Romaric's face. "I can't follow you and stay here for Diddi," he said.
"I want you to stay here," Lois said. "If Diddi wakes up, he'll be alone. He'll wonder where I am."
"Wait. I'll go and get Tsumbu to guard the quarantine area, and I'll come with you."
"No, Romaric," Lois said firmly.
"Lois." His tone conveyed a throng of unspoken protests. You'll be in danger. I won't be there. Are you sure you can trust him? How can you be sure you'll find him? I'm not happy about this. I worry about you.
"Everything will be all right," Lois said. "I just need to talk to Kent."
"I don't want you to go alone."
"I have to go alone."
The jolt of comprehension in Romaric's dark eyes felt like a dagger to her heart. "Kent?" he asked. "Kent and you?"
Lois nodded. "Kent and me."
Romaric looked down. "Are you sure he is a good man?"
"Yes," Lois said. "I know he's a good man."
"Does Matymbou know?"
"Not yet. But he will be happy for me."
Romaric squared his shoulders and looked up. "Why did you marry him?"
"It seemed like the right thing to do."
"Because of me?"
"Romaric …" Lois stepped right up to him and put her hand on his forearm. "I owe you my life. What I have with you, I will never have with another person. But it's not love. Not a married kind of love."
"What you have with Kent? What kind of love is that?"
"The kind that means half of me is missing when I'm not with him."
Under her touch, the muscles of Romaric's arm flinched. "Why did he leave? Doesn't he feel for you?"
"I don't think he knows what he's feeling right now," Lois said. "That's why I have to go and find him."
"Say you won't leave Bangala land," Romaric said. "Tell me you'll come back if you can't find him. I'll help you look for him."
Lois swallowed down her tears. Romaric had always been the most loyal of friends. "I won't cross the river," she promised.
Romaric nodded and stood aside. "Shout if you need me," he said. "I'll be listening."
"Thanks, Romaric." She squeezed his arm slightly and then hurried past him and ran into the dark forest.
~|^|~
Clark stared ahead as the sounds of the gurgling water washed over him. The river had halted his progress. As he'd been trying to decide whether to cross here or follow the bank in search of a better place, sharp realisation had razed his ability to think clearly.
He was standing among the littered branches of the corkwood tree, just a few yards from where he'd landed after being pushed out of the airplane.
The place where Lois had found him.
The place where she had dug the green rock from his body.
The place where she had dragged him back to life, riding roughshod over his obvious preference to be allowed to die.
Clark crumbled to the ground, bogged in indecision.
Three paths stretched before him. One represented his past life and the memories that were still seared with shock and disappointment. One represented the future life Lois seemed to be offering him.
And the third point was the path he had chosen.
The path he thought he had chosen. Over and over again. To be alone. To be immune from disappointment and invulnerable to loss.
But he couldn't do it.
He couldn't run away.
It wasn't possible to go back to Lana. A small part of him wished he could see her again, to ask the questions he'd been too stunned to ask. To try to acquire some measure of understanding. To secure closure.
To feel free to move on.
But moving on - to Lois - terrified him.
He wanted forever.
But forever was flaky.
Forever was the dream of the naïve.
When forever failed, hearts were shattered and lives were crushed.
He dropped his head into his hands, a passive and powerless bystander as the battle raged on inside his heart.
Then he heard a sound behind him.
And he felt a presence.
Her presence.
She slipped to the ground beside him. He kept his head down, refusing to acknowledge her presence.
"Are you OK?" she asked with such gentleness and concern that tears squeezed into his eyes.
He nodded.
"I'm sorry," she said.
"It's not you," he rasped through a tightly constricted throat.
"Then what is it?"
"I feel ... I feel as if I'm being blocked by a huge mountain of confusion and whenever I try to find the way over it, I just end up going round and round until I'm hopelessly lost."
"That's normal after all you've been through."
"This isn't about Lana." He pulled in a breath. He released it, long and tattered. "It's you."
Her hand touched his elbow, but she said nothing, gifting him space and time.
"I feel …" Clark swallowed roughly. "What I feel is so strong and so intense … and I'm petrified that if I allow myself to feel just a trickle of it, it will explode and I'll lose control of everything."
"I feel it, too," she said, her hand still on his elbow. "That's why I told you about my marriage."
"Is that what why you're sorry? For telling me about your marriage?"
"I'm not sorry you know. But my timing was wrong. You weren't ready to hear about it yet. I'm sorry I was impatient."
"Lois," he said, addressing the dirt under his feet. "The only reason I stayed was because there couldn't be anything between us." It sounded ungrateful and mean, but it was the truth.
"I think I suspected that," she said. "When you saw the shirt, you looked so guilty and ashamed. After what Lana did, I thought it was important you knew that, whatever you were feeling, it was OK."
But running away wasn't OK. After all she had done for him, it was cowardly and weak. He tried to formulate an explanation. "I … I never want … never again. I couldn't …"
"You're scared I will leave you."
He nodded, clamping his eyes shut as hot salty tears pressed against them.
"I won't leave you, Kent."
"How can you say that?" he demanded brokenly.
"I've never felt like this before," Lois said. "I've never felt this way about anyone. I know I want to be with you. Always. Forever."
He didn't trust forever.
"You and Lana …" Lois said.
Clark swiped at his eyes with his left hand. "I've gone over it so many times," he said. "I don't know whether it was something I did or whether it was just me. Perhaps there is something about me that meant she could never be happy with me."
"Lana made her choices. It doesn't necessarily follow that her choices were the result of something you did."
"You think it was her fault?"
"When you first told me, I did," Lois said.
"Now you think it was my fault?"
"No. Perhaps it wasn't anyone's fault. Perhaps you and Lana were just not right together."
"I thought … I was so sure that I loved her absolutely. I would have done anything to make her happy. She was my whole world - our marriage …" He gulped down the scorching flames of grief. "… our child."
Lois's arm slid around his back. "I think Lana knew how committed you were. She understood that you couldn't do any more. Maybe she believed she was doing the right thing for both of you."
"She married me," Clark said bitterly. "She made promises."
"Were you happy? Really happy in your marriage?"
"It was all I ever wanted. To be married. To have a family." To belong with someone.
"Were you happy with her?" Lois said. "Did you heart leap every time she walked into the room? Did you smile just because your eyes met?"
"She was everything to me. I just wanted her to be happy."
"Were you happy?"
"I … I wanted her to love me. She was beautiful. I always felt so incredibly fortunate that she had married me. I felt as if I owed her everything."
"That sounds more like obligation than love."
Defence of his marriage flew to his tongue, but Clark bit down on it. He had loved Lana. He had. But … "I thought I loved her," he said. "But …"
"But?"
If he told Lois the truth, there would be no going back. He would open the door that would inevitably lead to torment so great, his heart withered at the thought of it.
"Don't be afraid," Lois said. "You're incredibly strong. I could see your strength right from the start."
He'd felt weak ever since Lana had walked out of his life. Weak and helpless. But even before that, he hadn't felt strong.
In his mind, Clark reached for the door handle. "I thought I loved Lana," he repeated. He grasped the handle and turned. "But what I feel for you, after just a few days, is stronger than anything I ever felt for Lana."
The volcano erupted inside him like a fuming dragon, making Clark want to flee from the consequences of his admission.
Lois's head rested against his arm. "We'll be all right," she said softly. "This is new and scary and wondrous and overwhelming, but we'll be together."
It wouldn't be all right. He should tell her now. I'm not what you think. I'm not human. I can't be what you need.
But he no longer had his strange abilities. He was less different than he'd been for most of his life.
You have to tell her, his conscience insisted.
But he couldn't.
Already, the fear had begun. Fear that he would lose the most precious thing in his life.
He grappled for a parallel path. "Are you happy with Matymbou?"
Lois paused long enough that the thumping of Clark's pulse ricocheted through his ears. "If anyone had asked me that last week, I would have said I was completely content with Matty," she said.
"But?"
"But now I see the things I didn't have. Things I didn't think I needed. Things I was happy to live without … until I met you."
"Do you believe I can give you those things?"
"Yes," she declared. "Yes." Her head lifted, and she swung onto her knees. She cupped his chin, tipping his face to meet hers. "I believe you are man who completes me, Kent," she said. "But I can't tell you if I'm the right woman for you. Only you can decide that. You can take as long as you need. I will wait for you."
His throat had seized up, denying him the ability to speak.
She smiled down at him as her thumb caressed his jaw. "It's going to be all right," she said. "We're going to be just fine."
He wanted to believe her. He wished he were strong enough to share her conviction.
"Lois," he murmured. Please help me. I don't want to be scared anymore. If I lost you …
The cry of his heart reverberated through the jungle, and Lois responded. "I won't leave you," she said. "I promise I won't leave you."
His arms circled her, clinging to her and pulling her into his chest. He laid his head on the top of hers as a tear spurted from his eye. He brushed his cheek against his arm, wiping it away.
Her physical closeness felt like a balm. But it was more than physical closeness. It felt like two people, two minds, two lives, melding together.
Clark had never experienced 'together' like this.
All he wanted was to stay here forever, but around them, the first rays of sunlight had begun to dissolve the darkness, and too soon, Lois unfolded from him. "Ready to go back?" she asked, her smile soothing the rough edges of his heart.
"Back to what?" he asked dully.
"We have two more days of quarantine," she said. "Let's just enjoy them. Enjoy being together. Enjoy being with Diddi. When the quarantine is over, I'll go to Matymbou and explain everything to him."
"Are you sure about …"
"Yes. Matymbou is an honourable man. When we married, he promised me he would give me to the man of my choice at any time."
Clark wanted to know more about their 'marriage'. "You said 'Laka' means 'pledged to'."
"Yes, it does."
"But there can be children, so …" Clark stopped, run aground in his awkwardness.
"I have never slept with Matymbou," Lois said. "If we had wanted that, we would have committed to a bomoi-marriage."
"You've never …"
"No, we've never."
"You didn't ever feel …"
"Tempted?" She chuckled. "No."
"I can't imagine …"
"Being married but not being together like that?"
Actually, Clark had been going to say he couldn't imagine being married to Lois and not wanting the fullness of intimacy. "Yes."
"Matymbou is very direct. He says what he thinks, which can take some getting used to, but you always know exactly where you stand. He made it clear that he doesn't find me attractive."
Clark sucked in a breath of disbelief.
"It's OK," Lois said. "It dented my ego a little at first, but I quickly realised that marriage to Matymbou was exactly what I needed. It gave me a place in the Bangala, it gave me a safe platform to be friends with Romaric, and it gave me a confidante whom I could trust - all without any pressure."
"If … we're … you … me …"
"After I've talked with Matymbou, it will be up to us to decide what we want. We can have a laka-marriage if you want. You will be Kent Laka-Lois. I will be Lois Laka-Kent."
"I want …" He wanted far more than 'pledging'. Clark swallowed, trying to moisten an impossibly dry throat.
"You can have as much time as you need to decide what you want," Lois said. She rose to her feet and offered him her hand. "Come on," she said. "Diddi will be awake soon."
Clark took her hand and rose to his feet. "Thank you, Lois," he said. "Thank you for everything."
"Thank you for not running away," she said. "Thank you for giving me a chance."
He had to be honest. "I'm still scared."
"That's all right. I can be strong enough for both of us for a while." She squeezed his hand. "Let's go and find Diddi. I'm sure he'll have hundreds of ideas for fun things to do today."
"Fun?" The word tasted strange on his tongue.
"Yes. Fun. No pressure. No heavy decisions. Just three people enjoying the sunshine, the beautiful African rainforest, and the privilege of being together."
"OK," Clark agreed, taking a step and allowing Lois to lead him forward.
There was no sign of Romaric as they passed the shelter. Lois opened the gate, and Clark followed her through it, feeling as if he'd just sealed his destiny.
For better or worse, he was no longer Clark Kent, pseudo-American, husband of Lana, budding big-city reporter.
He was Kent ...
Pseudo-Bangala.
Still not with people of his own.
But with Lois.
And for now, nothing else mattered.
