"Gin," Martha said triumphantly.
"You win," Lois sighed. "Again."
"Don't be so sore." Martha shrugged. "You beat me at Scrabble."
"Well, that wasn't for money."
Martha giggled and swept the quarters off the table and into her hand. "Good thing, too."
Lois wished it had been and that she'd had Oliver in on it somehow. She made a mental note to challenge him on that as she shook her head. "You're a hustler, Martha Kent. And now I'm out two bucks."
"I know what'll cheer you up." Martha pocketed her stash and moved into the living room. "More relaxing."
Lois followed her. "More relaxing?" She snorted.
But she wasn't averse to it. Last night, she hadn't slept well. She was still trying to figure things out, despite the fact that she didn't want to think of it. She still felt this vague embarrassment over whatever she and Clark were, but some of Linda's words were racing through her mind.
I still don't even get it. Okay? It was you and him, but not him, and the red meteor rocks and the memory lapses and you said he didn't know, but then he did and the red rocks were gone...
What red rocks? There were now red meteor rocks? And what memory lapses? She thought the memory issues were just because of Grady. Was this something she dealt with before? And what the hell did "him, but not him" mean?
She'd call Linda to clarify, but, from Linda's messages on Martha's machine, the phone call would start with a lengthy trust game from Doctor Melcher's handbook or something equally exhausting. And considering Linda "still didn't get it," she felt she'd leave the conversation even more confused. It was best to let Linda cool down and send her a nice, long email about how she loved and trusted her completely to assuage her hormonal tailspin.
And it wouldn't be a lie. Her talk with Lana, which still made her uncomfortable, had really put things in perspective. Linda may have hid things, but it was out of love and concern. It was something that came off her in waves. It was something Lois felt instinctively. It was family. As for Lana...
She wasn't going to think about it. Not Lana. Not Clark. Not red rocks or memory lapses.
"I don't think I could possibly do more relaxing," she lied, throwing herself on the couch.
"Sure you can." Martha moved to the box near the TV. "It's morning movie marathon time," she nearly sang. "And this is the one," Martha said firmly, taking a DVD out of the box. One with a couple embracing.
Lois recoiled instantly. Romance. That was another thing she wasn't thinking about. "You picked the last two movies."
"Well, you liked them."
"That's not the point." Lois lifted her chin and moved to the box. "Of course I'd like them. Apparently, I bought them. But they were all new to me. I want something familiar." She rifled around and held up her DVD of choice. "Seven. See, this one I kind of remember. It's..."
"Awful," Martha cut in. "A terrible movie."
"It is?" She looked at the case. "But Roger Ebert said it was intelligent." And she'd sworn she'd agreed, but Martha had shot it down twice already.
"Trust me. My friend Ellen said it was disgusting."
"Uh-huh. So you haven't seen it."
"Well... no. But I know of it." Martha tapped her box. "But I did see Random Harvest on TCM once. It's beautifully romantic."
"I gathered that." The picture of the couple embracing was enough to make Lois pass it by. She was off romance at the moment. "Eh. I think we should compromise with this nice detective thriller. You love mysteries."
"Don't try to hoodwink me. I am not watching Seven. I heard it's gory and violent and... and we're having spaghetti for lunch."
Lois frowned, thinking she had a point. There was actually something involving spaghetti in this movie, if she thought about it. "We're not going to agree on this." She took her movie and Martha's and put them on the coffee table. She held up the box of movies and shook it slightly. "Just grab one and we stick with whatever it is," she said to Martha, holding it higher. "And don't peek," she added.
Martha sighed and moved to the box. "But I saw A Christmas Story in there and, if that comes up, I'll scream." She reached a hand over and in. "It's been on TNT all week and I can't... Darn it."
Lois held the box down. "Christmas Story?"
"Worse. Citizen Kane. The most boring movie in the history of movies." She tossed it on the coffee table. "Can I pick again?"
Lois wanted to say yes because... What was the point? why even bother watching it? Anywhere you looked, you knew that Rosebud was a sled. It was just out there like Norman Bates dressing up as his mom or Bruce Willis was a ghost.
I just remember being bored out of my mind and you kept pausing it, explaining to me why I shouldn't be bored out of my mind. Clark seemed to have the same reaction as Martha.
It must be a terrible movie. She wondered what she'd seen in it. She really did wonder...
"I want to see it," Lois found herself saying.
*****************************
"So you aren't going to be able to train?" Victor's voice echoed in the increasingly dilapidated warehouse.
"I didn't say that."
"Jesus, Clark," Victor growled. "It's bad enough you're bringing civilians into your training..."
"I guess he told you?" He'd told Bart he'd take care of it. And he had. He told Lana that this was guy time and that he really needed to hang out with some normal people who didn't know about him. He lied through his teeth, basically.
"Bart thinks Yoko is out to break up the band," Victor said, quoting with his fingers.
"Lana," he said firmly, "doesn't even know about the band... or the gang."
"League. The Justice League," Victor said slowly. "I'm putting it to a vote and I'd appreciate your support. Bart still wants us codenamed 'Team Awesome' and he's already got AC behind him."
"Justice League. That actually sounds pretty cool. If we..."
"Don't change the subject," Victor suddenly barked.
"I didn't. You..."
"The point is that you're letting civilians in. It's one thing when it's Linda and Lois. They're... different, but Lana Lang..."
"It won't happen again. I didn't know Lana was going to show up. I told her I was jogging with a friend. I didn't think..."
"Clark, it's a Saturday morning. You think I want to be here? You think Bart does? When you let ex-girlfriends tag along and blow off training..."
"I'm not blowing off training. I swear. I just don't know when I'll be able to train."
"Well, with you working all day, nights are the only..."
"I'm taking some time off work," Clark said. "My days might be available."
"Might be?" Victor folded his arms.
"I'm not sure yet. We just have to play it day by day and..."
"Okay. Out with it. What's going on?"
"I can't tell you," Clark mumbled.
Victor pursed his lips. "You might have to speak up, Clark, because I think it sounded like you said you couldn't tell me."
"Victor..."
"Considering how much I've been working my ass off to train you, I'd hate to think that you didn't trust me."
"It's not like that. I can't tell anyone. I signed a confidentiality agreement."
Victor squinted at him. "You're serious. A confidentiality agreement about what?"
"I can't say."
"What? Are you going undercover?"
"I can't say."
"Is it a reality show?"
"Don't be ridiculous."
"So you can say that much."
"Yes. But not much more."
Victor stared hard at him. "This is about Intergang, isn't it?"
"I can't say." And it sucked. Because he really wanted to talk to someone about this, but he'd gone too far even letting himself in, from a Superman perspective. He needed to stay in Sawyer's good graces.
"It is," Victor said firmly. "And if there was ever a time you needed us..."
"Vic, I really can't talk about it."
"This is every criminal mind in your city against you."
"I know that," Clark snapped. "But I can't talk about it."
"Well, you just admitted it there."
"Well... Victor, this isn't something Superman's doing. This is something Clark Kent is doing and it has to be just Clark Kent. You get me?"
"No. Not at all. Considering you are Superman..."
"Not all the time. This isn't something Superman can do because... Damn it! I really can't talk about it."
"Clark," Victor said slowly, taking him by the shoulders, "we are trying to help you, here."
Clark stared back resolutely. "If you want to help me, you'll skip the ice breath and pull out whatever trick you're saving up to help me fly again. I think I'm going to need every power I have for this."
"And why exactly do you think..."
"Can't say," he said tiredly.
Victor stared back, breathing heavily through his nose. "Fine." He moved to the remaining warehouse door and pulled it open. "Let's go. This place is beat, anyway." It flopped to the ground as if proving his point.
"Where are we going?"
"Can't say," Victor threw over his shoulder.
******************
It was a revelation. She turned to Martha.
Martha was asleep. Again. Why was it Martha was allowed to sleep through her cinematic revelations, but she had to be nudged all through My cousin Vinny so she wouldn't miss "the funniest parts"?
But she didn't mind. Not really. For the first time in days, she wanted to think. And about herself, wonder of wonders. Her mind was racing through then and now and it was all due to Clark, strangely.
Without him, she might not have bothered to watch this movie. She'd supposed the movie was groundbreaking in its day, but Rosebud was a sled and everyone and their grandmother was spoiled on that, so she doubted she'd have even given it a second glance if he hadn't told her what she'd seen in it before.
She supposed she could see why a young, hopeful journalist would be so horrified at the burning of that sled, the burial of truth. But she was older now. She saw new things that she wouldn't have understood then. She knew what that burning meant and what that "no trespassing" sign had told her - that no one could ever know someone fully.
And it really was a revelation.
She laid a blanket over Martha, thinking about Kane, holed up in Xanadu, trying to hold on to a past and a person that was long gone. A happy young boy with a sled that didn't exist anymore.
Strangely, she also thought of Lex, so obviously injecting himself with his formula, trying to recapture memories that she knew were gone with Grady. She felt for him, despite what she knew of what he'd done in the past. Maybe she should clue him in that he should just forget it, be happy now. Be grateful for what he had.
Maybe she should clue herself in on that, too.
She climbed the stairs slowly and thought of Susan, that poor songbird of a second wife, trying to meet expectations she never could, didn't even want to, all for his ambition.
Of course, she didn't completely identify. Still, she moved into what had become her room and thought of them. Clark, Linda, Victor, Bart, Ollie... All of them staring at her so wistfully, telling her all she'd been. Peering at her so closely as they did, as if saying the words had some magic power to make her be that person again.
Her suitcase was open, having been hastily packed. She hadn't unpacked again, knowing she was leaving tomorrow. The trappings of Lois Lane mixed with the bits of Chloe Sullivan, spilling onto the floor. Clothes, movies, books, a cell phone wrapped in its cord...
She moved to pick it up. It was the phone Ollie sent. She hadn't bothered with it, so afraid of all of them at the time, as if even turning it on would have them all at her door. Diana must have packed it, thinking she might want it now. And she did. She was done hiding away.
She unraveled it and plugged it in, taking a deep breath as she turned it on. She smiled as she saw all their names already programmed in. She'd keep them there. They weren't like Kane, they weren't someone she had to leave behind. But, if she wanted to keep them, some things had to change. She pressed a button, calling the first name in her contacts.
"Hello, Arthur... Yes. Using the phone. I thought it was time... Yeah. I'm sorry if that was weird for you guys, but I really just needed some time... Don't want to go into it now. Could you just do me a favor?"
**********************
"Could you just..." Clark spat out a mouthful of dirt and a few small rocks. "Could you try to drop me over the water or something?" He'd love to fall into something that wasn't a rocky ravine or dirty trail just once. They were near Winfield City Lake, but Victor just had to keep pushing him out right over the woods.
"Sorry. Can't hear you," Victor yelled from Justice Two. He jumped out. "You could try landing in the lake for a change," he said more quietly as he passed the propeller blades.
"I would if you'd fly me over it," Clark growled, sitting up and brushing off the dirt and wet leaves from all the trees he hit on the way down.
"This isn't some fun free-fall adventure. If you want to land in the damned lake, then you try to make that happen. I'm not supposed to make it easy on you." Victor crouched down. "You obviously don't want it enough." Victor slapped his shoulder and stood. "Tell you what? We'll fly to the other side where the dump is. If that doesn't get you into that lake, I don't know what will."
Clark glared at him, but stood to follow him back to the chopper. He had a feeling Victor would be a whole lot easier on him if he let him in on Intergang. It didn't change the fact that he couldn't. He had to get to whatever they had from Lionel and that was best done quietly and that meant, the less people involved, the better. But Victor had a point. He wasn't even trying to fly, to the lake or otherwise. It seemed all his energy seemed bent on falling more softly. He needed to concentrate.
"...sure we can cut it short," Victor was saying into his headset as Clark got back in. "But did she say why?"
"What's going on?"
Victor waved him away and turned back to the front. "Fine. We'll be there."
"We'll be where?"
Victor shushed him. "Okay. Six. Got it. Thanks, AC." He pushed a button near his ear, then fastened his seatbelt. "Okay. West side of the lake. Winfield Dump."
"Um, Victor?"
"What?" he said impatiently as they started moving up. "I'm trying to maneuver, here."
Clark waited until Victor cleared the trees. "Where are we going?" he asked quickly.
"Over the dump. I just said..."
"I mean later." He'd been too tired to listen to the other end of the conversation. "You told AC..."
"Oh, that." Victor smirked. "Can't say."
"Oh, come on! I'll just call AC myself and..."
"Fine. We're going to your mom's house."
"Why?"
"Because Lois has, apparently, called a meeting. Usually, these things are cleared with Oliver, but she seems to not want Oliver to know... or Linda, more likely. Anyway, we're supposed to be there at six."
"She couldn't mean me." Or could she? "Could you call and ask AC if he's sure I'm supposed to..."
"You're supposed to be there. She said for everyone to clear their night, including you." Victor turned to him with narrowed eyes. "But it's interesting you think she doesn't want you there. You didn't seem very surprised when she called off all..."
Clark considered carefully how to phrase this. "Victor, there are some things that are between me and Lois."
"Just like some things are between you and the Metropolis PD?"
"No. And I'm not answering if that's... This is... It's just different."
Victor nodded. "Fair enough." He stayed silent as they flew west. "Just so you know, this dump also boasts the largest compost heap in the county," he said after a while.
Clark swallowed hard. Screw falling softly. He really needed to fly.
********************************
"We really need a cheese tray. Is there time to get to the store before..."
"Martha, we don't need any of this." Lois shook her head at the dining room table, covered in chips, dips, pigs in blankets, chicken wings, and cookies. "It's just six people coming over and one of them doesn't even eat. I'm only talking to them for a few minutes."
"But one of those people is Bart."
Lois shrugged. "True."
"It's been so long since I've entertained. I hardly know what to put out. I mean, I've had the book club over, but the only thing they touch is the wine, so... I'd better check on the brownies."
Lois backed away as she rushed past her to the kitchen. Lois had shook her awake a few hours ago just to see if it was okay if the gang came over for a little meeting. She'd groggily said yes and Lois had hardly left the living room when Martha was grabbing her keys and yelling that she was off to the grocery store from the porch.
"It's enough you're letting me do this," Lois tried again from the doorway. "Why don't you just relax? I really don't expect you to..."
"Oh, nonsense," Martha said, pulling the brownies out and giving them a sniff. "Nobody is coming to my house and walking away hungry and that's that." She smiled and wiped her forehead with an oven mitt. "Besides, as I said, I hardly ever entertain."
"I'm sure you'll get enough of that at Christmas."
Martha gasped. "Thank you for reminding me." She threw off her mitts and moved to the fridge, writing on a white board. "That's eleven people now, with Lana coming. I think I'm going to need a bigger turkey. I'll just put the one I have in deep freeze and have Clark get me..."
"Martha..." Lois moved to her and grasped her shoulders, trying to rub lightly. "Calm down. Why don't you have a seat and I'll take care of..."
"Oh, no." Martha seemed to tense further. She turned with a smile, taking Lois's hands and patting them. "I have this covered. Why don't you go over your speech? I really want you to get your point across. That's the point of this night anyway."
"But I don't have a speech. I just thought..."
"Well, you should," Martha said, nearly pushing her out of the kitchen. "You can't expect to take this group on with nothing prepared, so you just work on that and leave the cooking to me. Go on."
Lois had a sneaking suspicion that Martha was not so much concerned about her preparedness as rejecting her offer of help. She supposed she didn't blame her. She had tried to "help" at other times this week with disastrous results. The cooking gene didn't exactly run in her family. Linda had only just mastered eggs and she herself was lucky to get her own coffee on.
Besides, she might be right. This was a tough crowd, a mostly super-powered crowd, even. It might be best to carefully plan out what she wanted to say. She didn't want them to think she didn't respect their work. She didn't want them to think she wasn't grateful to them.
Maybe she should start off with that.
"I'm..." She cleared her throat and stared at the empty chairs around the table. "I'm very grateful to you. To all of you. I appreciate what you're trying to do. And I wasn't trying to push you away these last few days. I really did need time to rest. To process these changes... um... on an internal level," she said, damned near repeating Martha's speech to her the other night. She decided to go with it as it was really coming in handy. "It's important to know who you were, but to just... study it this way gets in the way of something more important. Who you are..."
****************
... and I don't quite know that. I think, right now, what I need to do is step back and figure out who I am. Not who I was then. Not even who I was before I knew all this. But now. All this new information changes everything and I need to figure out exactly how on my own."
She glanced toward Clark and he found himself sitting up straighter. She hadn't looked at him since he'd come in. But her gaze passed him, seeming to land on each of the others in turn.
He slumped back into his chair in the front hall. There was this part of him that hoped her asking for him to be there meant something. That she might want to talk to him specifically. That she might want to talk to him at all. But he seemed to just be part of the group... though a little away from all of them.
Victor had left him to run back from the dump as "encouragement to fly home" and, with it getting dark so early now, there was no sun. And with the low cloud cover, there was no visible North Star and... Suffice it to say, he got a little messed up on direction, ended up buzzing around New Mexico and didn't get the chance to shower or change before rushing to be here by six.
If that wasn't enough, he'd been unsuccessful in flying or even falling anywhere near the lake and the run here did nothing to lessen the stench of the dump or -- he shuddered and took another sip of his coffee, tempted to gargle it -- the taste. His last minute attempts to fly had left him landing face first more then once, even more than a dozen times. And his mouth wasn't always closed.
Everyone had loudly agreed he should sit in the hall, practically at the front door, far away from the rest of them... and the food. And there were brownies.
He glared at Victor, but carefully. He didn't want to scorch him... much.
He turned his attention back to Lois as she sighed and leaned against the hutch. "I'm staying here one more night and I'm going back to the city tomorrow. I'm going back to work on Monday. That's been the plan all along. I only took two weeks and I'm sticking to it."
Clark saw Victor's nod from his glaring vantage point. "That sounds reasonable. You just rest up till then and we can work around your schedule during the work week. If we keep it light..."
"I think we should keep it more than light," Lois cut in. She stood straighter. "As in no more appointments. No more sessions or classes or... whatever this is." She shook her head with a small smile. "A wise woman once told me that there wasn't going to be a test." She looked to her left and winked. Clark followed her gaze to his mother in the kitchen doorway, who winked back. "And there isn't." Clark's eyes moved back to Lois as she shrugged. "I don't see why I need to work this hard. I don't want anymore drills and long tales. I don't want to be quizzed or fussed over or watched. If I need to know something, then tell me. If I ask, be honest and, please, be completely honest. I'd rather know than be blindsided again." Her eyes landed on Clark and he wondered if she'd confront this here and now, in front of everyone. If it was what she needed, then he would take it.
But her eyes left him again and moved over the rest. "I want to repeat that I am grateful for what you're all trying to do, but I don't think I can spend another day living in the past." She took a deep breath and nodded to herself. "I'm going back to my life and I'm... I'm going to live it. I'm going to live my life now. Not some life I had before." She shrugged. "Even if I had remained Chloe Sullivan, I don't think I would be the same person today." Her eyes landed on Victor. "I just... I can't live my life trying to be what other people expect me to be. I can't be some super hacker or run some underground publication. I have a real, above-ground job and a real purpose and, from what I know, it's something that would have made me, the old me, very happy." She smiled. "I doubt even my old self would be my old self, given that. I'm not saying I wouldn't help you all in whatever way I could if it came down to it, but I have to think of what I want in life. And what I want is to be a journalist." She glanced down. "It seems to be the one constant in my life."
Clark squeezed his eyes shut, knowing he had no right to it, but the feeling pushed at him all the same. He'd meant to be a constant in her life. He'd followed her into this one with that hope. But, he supposed, with what he'd done, it hardly mattered what he did now.
Victor stood. "Lois, I..." He looked around. "I think I speak for all of us here when I say that we respect your wishes." He sighed. "I personally don't agree, but I respect your wishes. But there are a few more people that should know..."
"I'm calling Linda tomorrow," Lois cut in. "And I'm sure she'll give Ollie more than an earful about it." She rubbed her eyes and sat down in the empty chair at the head of the table. "Listen, I didn't want this to be some kind of hero pow-wow. I just wanted a gathering of friends. And I wanted those friends to know that... " She grasped Bart's hand and he started. He'd been uncharacteristically silent all this time. And not even eating. "See, that's why I wanted to tell you this in the first place. I don't want to be some project you're all working on. I want us all to be friends." Her gaze landed on Clark again. Even stayed a while. "Just friends and nothing more... or less," she added, glancing over the rest of them with a slight laugh.
Nothing more. He got the message. It was one he tried to give himself since this started. He was still waiting for it to take.
Lois stood and Bart followed suit. "Babe, I'll be whatever you want me to be. Friend, errand boy, restaurant guide, love slave..."
She laughed and hugged him. "Friend is good."
"Always worth a shot," he said, pulling back and kissing her hand. "So can I be there when you call Linda? I'm thinking of getting a pool going on the initial reaction. I think she's going to be speechless for at least ten seconds, then..."
"Please," AC cut in. "This is Linda. I call a loud screaming of the word 'what,' then incessant babbling that is more about her than you and..."
"I call stuttering," Diana said, grabbing up a snickerdoodle.
"I meant to add stuttering," AC said quickly.
"We'll clarify the pool later," Bart said with a wave of his hand. "Now when you say to be honest about things you want to know... Do you mean we should only tell you if you ask? Because there are quite a few things you might not think to ask that are very necessary. Like you should stay away from whiskey. There was this one time..."
"I have to say, I'm a little disappointed."
Clark turned to his right, surprised to see anyone within speaking distance of him. "Well, it's her decision," he told Murray. And he wasn't sure he disagreed. Maybe what was in the past should be left in the past for both of them. She'd wanted to start over as friends this week. Maybe that was for the best. Of course, if she'd wanted to start over as something more, he'd go along with that, too. So maybe he wasn't so much in reasoned agreement as a slave to what she wanted. "She should have what she wants," he said with assuredness.
"I suppose," Murray sighed. "But her particular situation tied in so well with my own research. It's selfish to even say, but I rather hoped a study of her situation, with anonymity, of course, might help me break new ground in the study of phantom limbs and..." He shook his head. "Well, I'd never ask it, of course. But I really thought we'd be in this together."
"So did I," Clark whispered, staring as she giggled at whatever Bart was saying now. He tried to remember the last time he'd made her giggle and couldn't. It was another reason to keep away. He was no good if he couldn't even give her a laugh.
"Really?" Murray was saying. "I had no idea you understood the tie-ins of memory loss and the sense memory of a lost... Oh, dear. Clark, I'm so sorry, but that smell is really putting me off my plate." Murray backed away.
Clark did as well, moving to the door. "Understood." He should get out of here, anyway. He was dead weight, and smelly dead weight, and he never felt it so keenly as he did now. He looked around at all of them as they milled around, eating or talking. Bart was faster, Victor was nearly as strong, AC was just as impervious. Murray was a million times smarter, and Diana... Well, from what he heard, she could put him to shame on her worst day.
The only thing he brought to the table was flight and he couldn't even get that right now. He suddenly felt completely unnecessary -- and even more so every time they made Lois laugh. He didn't do that. He made her angry. He made her cry. He really was no good right now. Not to anyone and especially not to her. He should leave her well alone.
He moved to the door he'd been all too near all along. It was just as well. He had things to do. Things that involved no one but him, not even Superman.
Maybe this time away would help. He wouldn't have to see her at work. He wouldn't have to see her at all, except for Christmas dinner and he could handle a few hours.
"You're not going to eat?"
He stopped with his hand on the doorknob and turned to his mother.
She smiled. "I made you a plate."
"Thanks. But..."
"You've hardly said a word tonight. I don't think I even got a hello."
"Hello, Mom," he said sheepishly. "But you might want to keep your distance." He gestured at his clothes.
She shrugged. "I'm immune to compost after years on a farm." She moved closer. "Victor said it didn't go very well."
"Then he was being too nice." Clark laughed bitterly and took the plate. "It didn't go at all." He stared down at the plate with a grimace. "And I, apparently, didn't develop your immunity. I think I'm ruining my own appetite."
She took it back. "Then why don't I keep this warm for you." She nudged him toward the stairs with her elbow. "There just might be some of your old clothes in the bathroom with some fresh towels."
"Just might?"
"Why don't you go look and see before you run off to mope?"
"I wasn't going off to mope. I was just... going."
"Clark, I know that thousand-mile stare. I also know that the worst thing for you to do when you're wearing it is be alone. Besides, you and I haven't had a good talk in a while and I think we're due."
"Mom, not tonight. I'm just..."
"You're just uncomfortable. Now get yourself cleaned up and have something to eat. I know you'll feel better."
"But..."
"No buts. March." She nudged him again.
He groaned, but moved up the stairs, figuring he'd heard the final word.
"Clark?"
Or not. He turned back.
"I love you. You know that, right?"
He nodded. "Love you, too, Mom."
She nodded. "Remember that when we talk," she said before moving away.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
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