Almost Lovers (Chapter Thirty)

Another gorgeous banner by Summerstar882

Here it is! There will be one more chapter after this and before the epilogue. 

There's one bonus flashback here as I had started writing this into the Lanavision chapter before I realized I really wanted this to be from Lois' POV.

Hope you enjoy!

PREVIOUS CHAPTER


Chapter Thirty

“Good evening, Miss…” Lex trailed off and smiled as she sat down across from him. It wasn’t at all reassuring. “So what should I call you?”

“You can call me Miss Lane,” she said stiffly.

“Sticking with that?” He chuckled and sat back, his chains stretching from the floor. “I can’t believe, all this time, I thought you were a victim. Like me.”

“Is that seriously how you see yourself?” she asked in measured tones.

“Is this an interview?”

“No. I think you’ve had enough press this week.”

“Thanks to you,” he muttered.

“If you believe that, then you belong here.”

“So you’re admitting I don’t?” he asked, eyes narrowed.

“I think you belong somewhere where you can’t hurt anyone,” she said carefully, “including yourself.”

He laughed, suddenly and loudly in the small room. “You sound like him. Then again, the two of you started sounding startlingly alike after a few years. Like owners and pets and how they look alike after…”

“I don’t want to do this.”

He smiled again. “Do what?”

She sighed. “I’m supposed to be affronted and ask who the pet is in this scenario of yours. You’ll be vague and insulting. We’ll go back and forth and waste a lot of time neither of us has.”

“I have nothing but time,” he said with as grand a gesture as he could make with the chains binding him.

“I don’t. They’ll close this visit down in five minutes and I won’t be coming back.”

“I’m trying to figure out why you came in the first place. Afraid of what I might…”

“I’m not afraid of you, Lex.” She shrugged. “You’re out of money and out of allies. I just wanted to know for sure.” She nodded.

“And what is it you think you know?” he sneered.

“That you know,” she said softly. “But you don’t know everything. Contrary to what you might think, no one was conspiring against you except the obvious party. That story that’s out?” She shook her head. “I’m not part of that.”

“I’m supposed to believe that?”

“Believe what you like, but just know that, if I believed a word of it, it would be my name on that byline. But it wasn’t and I couldn’t stop it. I was too busy being hospitalized with sudden, unexplained convulsions.” She nodded to him. “I heard you had the same problem.”

“Me? You mean my obvious ruse to get lower security?” he finished on a yell at the door behind her. “As you can see, it worked out,” he said more quietly, lifting his chained hands as much as he could.

“Grady took his own life, you know.” 

“I hardly care.”

“You should care a little. He actually gave you what you wanted in the end. I didn’t want this.”

“So you did choose…”

“No. I was a victim, as you put it, but I choose not to see it that way. I chose to go on with my life before and now… now I guess I’ll work with this. I choose living. You should try it some time.”

“Oh, you’re so well-adjusted.” He narrowed his eyes. “Am I supposed to feel unworthy?”

“Yes,” she said honestly. “You’ve done horrible things. You killed someone you loved. You killed someone I loved. You meant to kill me. The fact that I can even speak to you after that should tell you something.”

He laughed bitterly. “Just like him. You think you can impress me with your supposed piety or…”

“You should be in jail, Lex. You should be paying for the crimes you committed. But you’re here. In a treatment facility,” she sneered. “Maybe you should stop acting like the wronged party and realize that you have an opportunity. You can take the professional help. Because I think you need it.” She stood.

He stood as well, pulling at the chains looped to the floor. “And you can tell your boyfriend to….”

“What?” She didn’t even flinch. “Stop saving lives? Stop actually helping people?”

“Stop lying and deceiving the world about who he really…”

“When are you going to look back on this and see what you were actually fighting against?” She moved to the door. “Get help, Lex.”

He was still yelling after her as she moved down the hall, but it was just white noise about deceit and revenge and how he’d show them… Yet she wasn’t scared. It was true. He was out of money and out of allies and, in the end, just a shell of a man, so much more so than he thought he’d been before.

Still, she was shaking as she pulled out her keys. It took her several tries to open her door. But she did it. She was behind that wheel.

“What now?”

She’d packed a bag and drove away and… that was it. She didn’t have a plan. She just let her memories lead her this far, like some sort of therapeutic walk-about, trying to find that moment of calm and clarity. 

It would come, wouldn’t it? People got through things just fine if they just worked at it. She’d taken the coward’s way out once already, whether she’d have followed through or not. Not anymore. She’d just keep following those memories, those loose ends.

Lex. That was done. Now for… No. She found she just plain didn’t want to contact Lana. Even before this, she’d heard all she ever wanted, or didn’t want, from Lana. After that much bald truth, more lies would just be an irritant. Besides, what could Lana say that would make it better?

*
***
******
*********
*************
******************

"I don't like who I've become. Sometimes I think I've just turned into this hard shell. And everything seems so shiny and new on the outside. But inside, I'm still this mess. I've always wondered if, with what I've seen and done and been, if I could ever be happy again. And, I... I don't think I can." She looked at the ceiling, feeling the couch beneath her, her tears seeped down the side of her face to her ears. "I'm stupid if I think I can just work, just have my job and it will be enough. I want... no. I need help." She laughed sadly. "Lately, I've had trouble asking for help, but you... You never stopped offering. I want you to help me now." She looked up at him, wondering if it was too late to take him up.

She thought of the letters. One she'd faxed, the other she'd put in the mailbox on her way. He had to say yes. Her decision had been made.

Kevin Grady sat on the coffee table at her side. "I want to help you."

She sniffled and smiled at him. "Okay. So... How does this work? Do you just grab at them?"

He took her hand. "It helps if you talk. I don't want you to lose what matters. I want you to lose what hurts."

She let out a sob. "Where do I start?"

"I can't tell you that. What hurts the most?"

She closed her eyes and sat back. Lucy, Daddy, Uncle Sam and the... "Clark," she breathed in the end because, right now, that was what hurt the most. And that... Well, wouldn't she be better off forgetting that first? Maybe the rest of it would be unnecessary if... 

"Okay," she heard Grady say softly. "So think of your first memories of Clark and..."

Her mind went to that first kiss. She'd only just moved to Smallville and it was such a hick town, but then there was that boy with the messy hair and the... "No," she found herself saying, not even meaning to.

"No?"

"That was my first kiss." It may seem silly, but... if it didn't hurt, then couldn't she keep it? "The day I met him was... To take that would... That's a part of me." 

"Okay. I won't take that. So... what?"

She took a deep breath. His secret? Hadn't it caused so much pain? If she didn't know that, then all the painful memories that came with it would... no. Because they weren't all painful, were they? Welcome to the Daily Planet, kid. Her first step into the basement the right way after that ridiculous vampire sorority... that wouldn't have happened without him, without working with him, without writing that story. 

Almost everything she wrote had something to do with investigating with Clark and... Of course, everything she hid did as well. She took another deep breath. The missions, the river, the bodies, Daddy, Lucy, Ruby Ridge... No! Maybe there was pain, but look at what she'd done, the things she knew how to do. How many ordinary people tagged along with a team of heroes and lived to tell about it? Even with the pain, she wouldn't wish it away -- wouldn’t wish Lucy or her father away.

She sucked in another breath, keeping a wary eye on Grady, hoping he wasn't starting. He wouldn't start without her say-so, would he? But he was just smiling, waiting... Damn it, she had to say something! 

"The sex," she finally said. "Maybe that part," she went on. 

She could do without that. That was the whole problem. Not the friendship, not the secret, not the gang or the experiences. That's what had her in a guilty, hungover haze after using him last night, thinking she was getting some of her own back. And she hadn't felt better. She felt worse. So much worse that... Well, here she was. If it hadn't been for the sex, she wouldn't have had years of conflicting, painful feelings for that damned man. Yes. She could lose that easily. 

She nodded. It was decided. "Maybe just take the first time and... that's how it works. right?" God! What the hell was she doing with this if she didn't kow how it worked? 

"If I take the source event," Grady began...

That first time, hard hands and harsh voice and her insides clenching as he pumped away inside at the side of a dumpster with noisy beats from the nightclub... Could something feel amazing and awful at once? She could lose that one and then...

"...then all events springing from it will..."

"No! Not all of it," she cut in, her mind rushing over the years since.

Alone in her house after Alicia...

She smiled. "You slept with me."

He grinned back. "That's new?"

"Well, you actually slept."

"Shut up," he whispered.

"You were very sweet," she said, giggling.

He closed his eyes. "Seriously, shut up." 

The day she saw her mother after so many years with Clark's words ringing in her ears. "What if you wait too long and you never get the chance to look into her eyes again?" Then there was Kal...

...he found her outside her dorm, holding a sleeping bag. She'd known he'd come. It was a warm, balmy kind of spring night and he sped them to Crater Lake.

They made love wordlessly.

They made love.

Perhaps she shouldn't think of it in those terms. But there was something in the way he touched her, just a little gentler than any other time. There was something in all he didn't say...

It wasn't always mingled with pain, was it?

... she'd followed a string of dirty notes to get to him. He was in The Torch office, of course. It was the only room with its own airmat and a darkroom Kal just loved with its subtle red light. And even knowing that was where he was, she had to follow the notes, anyway. That and tear each one down. They mentioned her by name.

He was funny sometimes. "Not the... You see, it was sometimes... gentle with Kal." And Kal didn't even exist. It was only Clark minus about a thousand inhibitions. But, still... "There were times," she went on softly, "that I wouldn't want to forget." She laughed. "See... maybe it wasn't perfect, but there was something so true in it." Sometimes it was hard to find the line between them. It disappeared more every year. She swiped at her eyes and took another breath. "So maybe not everything. That's all."

"Lois?"

"Huh?"

"What do you want me to take?"

"Just the..." There had to be something. Why was she here if she couldn't think of one thing to lose? That was the problem, though. Grady said he could take the source event and everything else that sprang from it would go away. And what would that mean? Everything in her life had sprung from something else and... "Nothing," she finally said on a breath, surprised to hear it.

"But you said Clark..."

She shook her head. "Don't you see? You take Clark out of the equation and... that's half of my life. How can I let that go?" Who would I even be? So much of her life was tied up in him. And maybe it hurt, but...

"But I make it so it doesn't affect you. If it hurts..."

"It's supposed to hurt," she found herself snapping as she stood up, paced away from that couch. "Damn it, Kevin! It wouldn't be love, wouldn't even be life, if it didn't hurt!"

"Lois?"

She spied her purse on his desk and snatched it up. "I'm leaving."

"Where are you..."

"I'm going to bed. I'm going to sleep. This is what you do after a hard day." After a hangover, even. God! Was she still a little drunk, doing something like this? "You don't wipe your mind clean. You just... You sleep. You don't do this." She picked up her blazer as well, shrugging it on. "I don't know how I convinced myself I could. Kevin, I..." Shge stared at him, just looking sadly at her. Damn him, he meant well. "Seriously, this is nothing against you, but... I'm not Lex. The things he saw... they might have made a villain out of him, but they made a better person out of me than I might have been. I could still be that girl, pasting up a wall of weird and never understanding that there's more to it than freaks and normal people and... Thank you."

"Thank you?"

"You made it clear. The truth is... That's life. That's what happens. Maybe it isn't always pretty. But we have to accept it and keep moving on and... Just thank you." She moved to the door quickly, afraid he'd talk her back into it. She heard him call her name as she shut it loudly and skipped the elevator, moving to the stairs.

She'd go home. She'd drink some water, take some aspirin. This was all just part of a bad hangover. She'd wake up tomorrow and this could just join last night in that file in her head marked "very bad decisions." She'd got drunk, used Clark, felt miserable. So what? It wasn't like he'd be bringing it up any time soon. She didn't even have to see him if she didn't want to. Hell, he was the one that showed up unwanted in the first place! Maybe she'd kind of pulled him in, but... 

"Stupid man," she muttered as stripped off her suit and pulled on her oldest, ugliest, softest pajama pants, then glared at the "I Heart Metropolis" T-shirt balled up half-under her bed. He’d bought it. She should burn it. Or maybe she'd keep it, wear it only when she did nasty things like clean out the air conditioner filter or scrub the toilet. That would serve him right. She picked it up and shook it off, wondering if would make a good dust rags. If Clark ever came by again, she could very obviously take them out and...

She jumped as she heard a knock on her door and held it to her chest, then laughed. It wasn't like anyone could see through her walls... unless it was Clark.

"Better not be Clark," she groaned as she quickly pulled it on. "This doesn't mean anything," she whispered to the shirt as she pulled it down on the way to the door. She didn't have the energy to deal with him after... Her eyes widened as she pulled it open. It was actually, literally, the last person she expected to see. 

"Lana!" She quickly looked down either end of the hall before yanking her in. "What the hell are you doing here?”

“I….”

"Lex is out of Belle Reve." She shook her head as she closed the door, then locked it for good measure. "I don't even know if you know he was in Belle Reve, but..." She stared at her again. "Don't panic. Everything's fine. Calm down," she said in a rush.

“I am calm,” Lana said, clutching a giant bag.

“Well, I’m not.” She let out a slow breath and checked the locks again. “Listen, this is not the time to catch up. I mean, a lot of things have happened and you probably need to know, but if someone sees you…”

“No one saw me, Lois,” Lana cut in softly.

“Lois,” she repeated dully. “How did you know about that?”

Lana laughed. “I must have seen it on The Planet’s website.”

“No, you couldn’t have. I opted not to include a picture… at this time,” she finished, staring at Lana. “Considering…”

“That Chloe Sullivan died?” Lana said, a note of bitterness in her voice. “I guess that wasn’t such a horrible thing I did if you can turn around and…”

“It wasn’t the same situation,” Lois cut in, narrowing her eyes. “There was a misidentified body and…”

“How is that different?”

“Because she was my cousin,” Lois answered hotly, “and Lex killed her.”

Lana’s eyes widened and she seemed to back away. “I’m sorry. I know that you and Lois were close…”

“Wrong cousin,” Lois cut in, moving past her to the living room. “Her name was Lucy.”

“Yes. Lucy. I knew that. I must have forgot…”

“How the hell did you…”

“I’m sorry. Okay?”

“Make no mistake, Lex meant to kill me. He’s changed, even more than…” She stopped, running a hand roughly through her hair. “You know, maybe I was a little hard on you back then. But that was before he killed…” She sighed and dropped to the couch. “Listen, it’s been a long week and a lot has happened. Maybe I should just tell you…”

“I know about Lex,” Lana cut in. “I know he won’t hurt me.” She let out a strange laugh. “He won’t even know me.”

Lois stood, her eyes widening. “Have you seen him? Clark said he saw him. Lana, that’s risky even…”

“So you’re still working for Clark?”

“Working for…”

“I mean, that’s what this is, right? All these years, you’d just… do anything for him, even when it’s all wrong.” Lana shook her head. “That can’t be good for you, Chloe.”

Lois narrowed her eyes. “It’s Lois now and… Lana, my work or… otherwise with Clark is none of your business.”

“Otherwise,” Lana breathed. “I’m just concerned about you. I always have been. I always knew you investigated with him. I just never knew how much… otherwise there was to it.”

Lois took a step toward her. “If you have something to say, why don’t you just come out and say it?”

“He doesn’t want to be with you,” Lana said, lifting her chin.

“Yeah, well, at the moment, I don’t care what Clark does or doesn’t want,” Lois sneered.

“He may sleep with you, but…”

“He may not… anymore,” Lois finished lamely, trying to figure out what to make of this little visit. “Have you even talked to Clark? I may be a little ticked off at him right now, but I can’t see him signing off on…”

“No. He hasn’t contacted me yet,” Lana said stiffly. “He’s waiting until it’s safe for me.”

Lois threw up her hands. “You just said it’s safe for you now!”

“He’s… He has work to do and…”

“You know what, if you want him, have at it! I have a life of my own and I never asked him to come back,” she finished, her voice breaking. No. No crying. Not now. Damn it! She turned away and moved into her kitchen, pulling open the cabinet and going for the damned aspirin. Why did she let Lana do this, pull her into this? This wasn’t high school and Clark… She didn’t want him. Wouldn’t let him…

“I know you have a life,” she heard softly.

She whirled to find Lana right behind her.

“I want to help you with that.”

She rolled her eyes. She shouldn’t have – shouldn’t have taken her eyes off Lana for a second. The next time she blinked, she was on the floor, Lana leaning over her… a mask being forced over her mouth and nose… and a sickly sweet smell…

*********************
***************
***********
*******
***
*

No wonder she’d fainted dead away at the sight of Lana. It made her angry, made her want to seek out Lana and ask her if she was still so damned concerned about that poor, poor girl fooling herself about Clark.

But that wouldn’t do any good. It would just make her angrier. It would also involve thinking about him, talking about him, and she wasn’t ready for that. 

Maybe she’d just drive. It was after eight by now. The roads would be clear and open in all directions. She could go anywhere. She had five whole days.

She put her car in drive and pulled away from Belle Reve, staring at the dark roads and realizing one day was over. Four days. Suddenly that seemed like so little. How was she supposed to face her life in four days? How could she go back to that same life when so much inside her had changed?

Maybe I shouldn’t have to. She pulled over before the interstate onramps. North or south? Either choice suddenly felt like something permanent. Because she had a savings. It would only take a phone call to transfer every bit and find somewhere to… 

No. That was ridiculous. She wouldn’t do that. 

She made her choice and pulled out, releasing the breath she hadn’t even realized she’d been holding.

She could do this. People did this all the time. People got through times like this. Maybe with some help. Linda had her therapist and Diana had her yoga and Bart had his food and Clark… Well, she wasn’t thinking about Clark. But he always had his mother, didn’t he?

****************

Martha Kent was waiting on the porch, bundled in a coat and a mass of blankets on the swing.

“Mom, what are you doing out here? It’s gotta be under…”

“Oh, I’m fine.” She dug in her blankets and pulled out a thermos. “I came armed for the cold.”

He sighed and took a seat next to her. “That cocoa?”

“With additions.” She poured some into the plastic cup and held it out. “They’d probably just ruin the taste for you. But it’s nice for me.”

He sniffed at it, then grimaced and pushed it back to her. “You’ve turned into a lush,” he chuckled.

“Eh, political life. It’ll change you.” She smiled as she took a sip.

“Well, it’s late. You should be…”

“I didn’t want to go to bed yet,” she cut in. “I knew you’d be here sooner or later. I talked to Oliver. Do you think she really…”

“She knows,” he said, frowning. 

“Trust you to be all upset about something good. Clark, we’ve been hoping for so long for…”

“She knows and she went away.”

“That doesn’t mean anything. It just means she wants to be alone.”

“Away from me.”

“Alone,” his mother corrected. “That’s not the same thing. Some people talk it out, others like to hole up and process things on their own. We’ve pushed in on her before. I think we should let her have her space right now.”

“But…”

“She’s not a helpless, confused girl. She’s a grown woman and she knows what she needs. I’m actually more worried about the others.”

“I checked on Jimmy.”

“And Lex?”

“I think seeing me right now would only make things worse.”

She sighed. “You’re probably right. Still, Grady had many patients. I shudder to think what they’re going through right now. I just hope they’re okay.”

Clark stood, moving to the edge of the porch. “You’re right.”

“Right?”

“Grady helped a lot of people.” He pulled out his cell phone. “They might need more than our good wishes. Yeah. Victor. I need a list of Kevin Grady’s patients. I want information on as many as possible.”

“I can look into it,” Victor said absently, “but just so you know, I need statements from you and your mother on the Lang confessions. I don’t know if Oliver told you, but I’m putting together…”

“There’s time for that later,” Clark said impatiently. “Right now, I need to try to put things right. I need that list and I also need people off the books. Look for anyone else that might have been brought in with strange convulsions yesterday morning.”

“So you’re thinking all of his patients had…”

“Lex had an episode yesterday, too. I want you to check Belle Reve for any notes on his condition.”

“Jesus, Clark! Are you gonna see him? If he knows…”

“No. He’s somewhere where he can get help if he needs it. We can’t say the same for all of them. Text me names as you get them,” he said before hanging up. He turned to his mother. “Thanks, Mom.”

“For what?”

“Just reminding me what I should be doing.” He wasn’t a kid anymore. He had limited time to sit around being miserable. He stripped off his suit as he moved off the porch.

“Well, where are you going? You don’t know how to find these people…”

“I know at least one,” he said before taking a running jump.

It took four tries to find him. Four places Dan Taggart had been seen at in the last few days. The first was his work, a clean if overly garish place called Queen Mary’s. 

They told him to “take a damned break. He’s a good worker, but I don’t put up with drinkin’ on the job,” the rather intimidating woman who owned it huffed. “He can come back if he sobers up. And I’m talking meetings, chips, a sponsor.” She’d looked him up and down then. “So you looking for dancing work or what? I got three supermans, but you’ve got the best get-up I’ve seen. You do that Flash guy, too?” 

He’d asked a few patrons before leaving and they sent him on a little journey. The bars got shadier and shabbier after that.

At the third, half of the patrons fled as soon as he walked in. Good If they were running, then they probably had a reason to. He’d stop and ask them what if he were actually with the police. Maybe it was good he was so closely associated with law enforcement in their minds, but he wouldn’t be abusing that relationship. Besides, he didn’t have time.

That was hammered in at the last place -- not even a bar, just a boarded up house in what Turpin liked to call the “bad neighborhood’s bad neighborhood.” Clark was getting far too well acquainted with these places as was Superman.

They didn’t even scatter when they saw him. Just stared, wide-eyed as he moved through the people lounging on ratty chairs and couches and even the floor, as if he was just some part of a bad trip. That was the worst part of being Superman. It wasn’t as if he had the power under law to do anything for these people. He could call the cops, he supposed, but they’d just raid the place, put too many in jail when what they needed was rehab and counseling. Maybe he could…

“Not today,” he whispered under his breath. He could only do so much and, right now, he had just one person to concentrate on.

“In the back,” a woman had said on a wheezing laugh. “Anyone ever tell you you’re like a dead ringer for that guy? Who’s that guy? He’s got an outfit like that guy. Who’s that guy?”

He left her and a few others to debate that guy and what they called that guy and moved to a closed door.

A hand tried to block him opening it. “Hey! You want in this room you pay like…” The skinny man trailed off when he saw who was on the other side.

“I’m looking for Dan Taggart,” he said stiffly. 

The man just fled. In fact, the whole room emptied as he moved in, but for one.

Dan just laughed, clenching one end of a rubber strip in his hand. “Oh, there he is. You know, I was telling everyone I knew you for so long, told em all about that time and nobody believed me. I could have told these guys, too.”

“I can tell them myself,” Clark said carefully, approaching him. “I could tell them with you.”

“No, thanks. Rather have the bump. I’m coming down. I paid for it.” He looked around, catching the strap in his teeth and pulling. “Where’d it go? Did you chase it out with them?”

Clark barely knew what a bump was. “You don’t need it. You sound like you’ve had a few things already.”

“There it is.” Dan picked up a needle on the matted carpet.

Clark just stared at him, not sure what to do. He could knock it from his hands, but would that stop him from finding more later.Jesus! He was in way over his head. “I don’t think you want to do that, Dan.”

“I think I do. This sh*t’s good. Tino’s get a good rep, good stuff,” Dan said, “And clean needles. Gets em all from the exchange. I always said no before, but…”

“Then say no now.”

“Please! Lighten up. It’s just a little bump. I can handle it.”

“People have died,” Clark said softly, kneeling down, “thinking they can handle it.”

Dan laughed, gripping the strap in his teeth. “You know what?” he said around it. “They say that’s the ultimate high.”

“You can’t really think that.”

“Better than this.”

“Than what? I talked to your boss. She said you could come back if…”

“Yeah.” He dropped the strap, sneering. “She left me a message. Go through the f*cking bullsh*t programs like some mindless robot. I can’t do that sh*t anymore, not when I see everything clearly for the first time in…”

“I know what you see and I know it hurts,” Clark tried, eyeing the needle, shaking in his hand, so close to his arm. “But this won’t take it away.”

“He took it away. That dead bastard!”

“I know,” Clark said softly, lied actually. He hadn’t realized Dan knew. 

“Then he gave it back,” Dan sobbed, shaking his head frantically. “I didn’t want it back.”

“But how is it different?” Clark tried. “This last year, you were…”

“Blind,” Dan sneered.

“Living, working, taking care of yourself,” Clark corrected. “What’s actually changed? Your past? That you know it?” Clark shook his head. “That’s not who you are now.” He stared at the needle, so close to dropping from Dan’s hand. Clark wasn’t stupid enough to think he could fix everything in this moment, in this situation. That would be up to people far more well-trained than he. But for Dan to just drop it. Just choose to drop it. “Haven’t you had a better life? Do you really want to let that go?”

“I don’t have a choice.” Dan gasped in a breath. “How can I go on now, pretending…”

“You don’t have to pretend. You can choose to live your life and deal with the past however you need to. I don’t know what happened to you, Dan. But whoever did it, they don’t deserve to dictate the rest of your life,” he nodded to the needle, “let alone how it ends.”

**************************

It was never-ending… or maybe it just seemed that way. It had only been two days, but they’d been so full. There were the scant patients Victor could get from sealed records. There were the seizure victims, each checked on and questioned by Clark Kent or Superman, depending on which would be more effective, and given a card. Just a card with a number. 

That number led to a hotline that would lead them to rehab, therapy, whatever their needs dictated… funded by Luthorcorp, of all entities. 

It was supposed to have been spearheaded by Queen Industries, but when Clark Kent and Jimmy Olsen had convinced Perry to put the word out in The Daily Planet that anyone who “accepted treatment from Doctor Kevin Grady in Metropolis, officially or otherwise” was the “victim of an unlicensed psychologist and may be in need of follow-up treatment,” Luthorcorp was suddenly publicly volunteering to cover all costs.

Clark let it happen, wondered if Lana thought that would make up for everything. It wouldn’t. It was actually the very least she could do, considering she helped create this situation.

By Friday night, he was just plain tired… and not just physically. He wasn’t a therapist, counselor, psychiatrist... He was only too glad to foist some of this work onto those who could handle it… and more than a little annoyed to find someone in his apartment when he finally made his way back to it.

“How’d you get in here?” he said with a withering glance as he tossed his briefcase to the floor.

“Your mother,” Linda said, spritzing something that smelled like perfume awfully close to his face.

“Hey!”

“It smells like cat pee in here, you know. You should get these carpets replaced.”

“Well, you can’t beat the rent,” Clark sighed. “What are you doing here?”

“Waiting for you to stop screwing around,” she said absently, staring at his red couch. “You still have this nasty old thing?”

“It’s comfortable,” he said, irritated. “And what you call screwing around, I call the hardest work I’ve ever done,” he said hotly. “I’ve had to deal with people that…”

“No. I’m sorry. I get it.”

“You don’t,” he hissed. “Today, I met a ten-year-old girl, in and out of foster homes all her life. She got adopted out and sent to Grady. I saw the tiny burn scars up and down her arms.” He shuddered. “I don’t even want to know what she had to forget. So don’t you tell me…”

“Fair enough,” she cut in, putting a hand up. “I’m sorry. Screwing around was a bad way to put it. I meant… procrastinating, I guess.”

“Wha…”

“How’s that going, by the way? Oliver said he’s having his staff pitch in with Luthorcorp’s on the hotline, weeding out the phonies.” 

He groaned and shrugged off his coat, letting it fall to the couch. “We’ve got a few, claiming emotional trauma and demanding money, but they aren’t hard to spot. Also, the Planet finally got a legitimate patient list sent to them from a source that wished to remain anonymous.”

“Lana?” Linda sneered.

“Maybe.” He sighed and shrugged out of his suit jacket, then pulled off his tie. “Things are finally settling down.”

“Good.” Linda nodded. “Good for you.”

Clark just gave her an annoyed glance as he threw himself on the couch. 

“What? I know you think I only exist to bust your chops, but I think it’s great that you’ve put so much into helping Grady’s patients.”

“But?” he prodded.

“But you forgot one,” she said soberly.

Clark sat up, shook his head. “I didn’t forget. She said not to...”

“To worry. That doesn’t mean we won’t and she has to know it.”

“She wants her space.”

“Like that stopped you before. You found her that summer.”

He stared at her. “You know about…”

“I know a lot more than you think. I know more than I’m told, even.” She sat on the couch next to him, then tucked the spray in her purse, then placed her purse on her lap. “I know where she is.”

"Well, I don’t and I don’t want to…"

"You know, too,” she cut in. “At least you have an idea. It's probably the same one I have."

He did. He’d flown over New England. There was more than Happy Harbor there. There was… He shook his head. "She said she'd be back and...”

“Yeah, well, I want to be sure of that,” Linda said, her voice breaking. “Clark, you’ve done enough now. So can’t you just do this for me? Find her for me? Because I’m gonna need her…”

“She’ll be back,” Clark cut in, turning to Linda.

“I need to know for…”

“She said to let her have this time.”

“And what if she decides that it’s not enough? We both know her. We both know she could go either way. Come back to us or hide her head in the sand and…”

“We just have to wait till Monday and…”

“I don’t want to wait! You found her before, didn't you?"

“That was different. I…”

“Yeah. I know. You had that little red rock that made you a selfish ass*hole,” Linda said with a sniffle. “But maybe it’s not like that. What is it’s just.. just you getting out of your own way?”

“Trust me,” Clark sighed. “It’s not…”

“You know, I scour Ebay for vinyl records for Oliver. He insists they have this legit sound. I think he’s bordering on hipster with that bullsh*t, but it makes him happy. So I find them. I find other things there, too.” She grasped his hand and he was so surprised she was actually doing it, with all the crap she gave him, that he barely registered what she was actually doing… until she’d done it. 

“Smallville class rings,” he heard her say as his eyes clouded over. “Maybe they think it’s funny, keeping recalled rings and selling them off at three times their value for the meteor obsessed crowd. I guess it works. Had to beat out a few for this piece of crap.”

He stared at his hand, flexing his fingers, taking in that deep red glint on the third. There was something relaxing in that warm glow…

************

The winter season was over. This tiny B&B might have closed its doors days ago, but for one customer who insisted she would still pay full price and didn’t mind the hammering and the dust and the boxes…

She stared at a few piled up at the base of the stairs. They said “knick-knacks” and “books,” but she felt strangely tempted to look in and make sure. She wasn’t sure she would ever see a box as just a box again. Her dreams seemed to elevate them to some status above folded cardboard.

“Are you sure?” that girl asked, the one with the flowered barrettes, the ruffled shirts.

“Open them,” she said firmly.

“What if it hurts?”

“Of course it’ll hurt,” Lois found herself saying. “It wouldn’t be life if it didn’t hurt sometimes.” She suddenly saw a box cutter in her own hand. Like magic…

She stepped forward, but the girl stepped in front of her. “And what happens then? We don’t even know…”

“Shhh!” Lois moved to her, pulled her in. “We can take it.” She pulled back and stroked the girl’s silly, flippy hair. “We already know we can do anything we ever wanted to.”

“We can?” She sounded so unsure, so afraid.

Lois pulled her in again. “Look at us. Didn’t we do everything we said we would?”

“What about me?” The girl gripped her back hard. “Don’t let me go!”

“Never!” Lois pulled back, touched. “I never will. Never wanted to. I’m so sorry…”

“Oh, sorry about those.”

Lois shook herself as Lester scooted around the front desk. “It’s fine. I can get by if I…”

“Well, I warned you,” he said on a laugh, as he hefted one box on top of another, “there’s always a little clutter at the change of seasons. You really should come back in the summer.” He smoothed back his red hair as he stepped away. “We get a real big crowd. Clam bakes on the beach and…” He stopped, staring at Lois. “Hey, don’t I know you?”

Lois tugged on the bucket hat she’d picked up at the only souvenir store still open and shrugged. “Don’t think so.”

“Well, you just looked familiar.” He laughed. “Then again, I get a lot of types here from all over.” He shrugged. “Just wondering what a pretty girl like you is doing all alone?”

"I was just wondering why a pretty girl like you doesn't go out more. The summer kids are having a clam bake down the beach."

Just wondering... If you took Lester literally, he apparently did nothing but wonder what she did with herself. 

She smiled as she moved past him. “Just a little tour.”

A tour of places she knew, a tour of places that were supposed to tell her… something. She wasn’t sure what yet.

She’d come here, remembering a time when it seemed so safe to be here, away from anyone she knew, working for Oliver, writing for The Underground. It seemed a nice place to revisit -- a learning sort of place. This is where he left her. This was as good a place as any to remind her of that. 

But she hadn’t actually counted on a familiar face. Yet there was something about Lester that had comforted her, both then and now. Maybe he was something a little like her father. Maybe that was what made her feel safe here, both then and now. Just an older, ginger-haired man with a kindly face and cornflower-blue eyes.

She let herself into room twenty-three, tossing her key… somewhere. She’d find it later when the sun woke her up as it rose over the Atlantic. Sometimes she wondered, rather absently as she kicked off her shoes, why anyone took a vacation anywhere else. These bay windows had a hell of a sunrise. She pulled up her top as she stared at the window… the open window. 

Had she done that? She tugged her top back down and moved to close it. It was too cold for…

"Don't stop now. It was just getting interesting."

She screamed and whirled around. There was a dark shape in her bathroom doorway. She knew it too well by now. She pulled the shirt down quickly. “Clark?”

He chuckled, stepped forward, his eyes flashing red. “In a way.”

She caught sight of his hand in the scant light from the streetlights outside. A ring. A red rock.

She laughed. She had to. After all this time, it was almost ridiculous. “Kal?” 

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

The last cliffy of this story!



You might recognize that last scene as a sort of revisiting of a similar scene from Almost Clark. This time, things will be different. 

There's a talk coming that has been years in the making and I hope to get it just right.

I hope you forgive me for stepping away one last time to update my Chlollie fic as they’ve been waiting a month and I always try not to let people wait more than that.

But I’ll be back after for the finish!