Disclaimer: I do not own the rights to the series Smallville and, therefore, do not own any of the character. I am merely allowing my imagination to run wild.

A/N: So, I tend to get these crazed and frantic obsessions with certain television shows and pairings, obsessions that occupy my mind until I decide to do something with them. Hence, this one parter that focuses on the pairing of Clark and Lois. I have rediscovered Smallville and have been rewatching all of its seasons for these last weeks. Season 9 is the exception, since I am waiting for it to be released on DVD, although I am up to date as to the Clois developments in it. I have absolutely fallen in love with this pairing and their push and pull chemistry, which I will be playing off in this story. This is my first attempt at a Smallville story, so feel free to be brutally honest, but don't bite my head off. :)

Unlike Another Night

"Like the tear in my brand-new dress, it's a beautiful mess (you make)."

Lois entered the Kent Farm at an indecent hour, midnight had long gone past, and if she had had a curfew she would have severely broken it. Fortunately, for her sake, she had never had one, which she was grateful for, because could you really put a time limit on fun? She fumbled with the lock like she was anxious about breaking this said curfew and was in a hurry to get in to the house, stumbling in as if she had had her share of drinks that evening.

She had been dressed to kill when she had left the farm a few hours earlier, ready for a night out. Granted she didn't have a group of girlfriends to join her, but she could have fun on her own. Sometimes a little more fun than other times, more specifically when she managed to bump into a guy who wasn't completely wasted from the get-go and actually managed to successfully get out a couple of decently charming lines. One had even been lucky enough to have been allowed the privilege of taking her home with him. It all happened on her terms, of course.

She couldn't exactly take them back to the farm and risk Clark catching her; his favorable perception of her would collapse instantly like a house of cards, and she didn't want that. That didn't mean, though, that she had ever experienced the walk of shame. In fact, the guy usually made her breakfast in bed the next morning and when she did leave, she always left them wanting more. And, her most important rule: she never gave them everything, saving the best she had for somebody who would prove to play a bigger role in her life than merely have a short part in her sexual escapades, someone who would venture out from between the sheets.

However, her good judge of character had forsaken her terribly tonight. They hadn't even made it to the guy's residence. He won her over with sweet talk and had drawn her to his car with promises that could only be fulfilled horizontally, or so she had assumed. He hadn't meant it, any of it. He, like her, had only been looking for one thing: a warm body, although he hadn't cared whether it would be willing or not. She had managed to get away, her "virtue" intact by throwing a few punches, although she had still come out of the battle damaged.

She pulled the fabric of the dress she was wearing together at her chest so as not to expose too much of it. The dress she had chosen to wear didn't leave a lot to the imagination: the gold tinted fabric clung to every curve, was cut low at the chest, and come up very short at the upper thigh. Her legs looked even longer and leaner than they usually did in the golden pumps she had strapped on to her feet and she had put up her hair messily to show off her toned arms. But what had taken hours to accomplish had been undone in a few minutes. Her skirt only barely still covered her backside, though to the guy's unpleasant surprise (when the he had hitched it up against her will) she had been wearing a pair of flesh toned shorts underneath. There was no reason why she couldn't still be comfortable while being fashionable at the same time. Besides that, the fabric at her chest had been pulled and, resultantly, ripped, her up-do had fallen apart, she had smeared her lipstick, and, on top of all that, the faintest of bruises was beginning to show at her jaw line.

And somehow she was able to hide all of that from Clark. She heard his footsteps come down the stairs, quick, rushed almost, a foretelling of concern that was to come. Lois turned her back to the staircase just as he flicked on the lights. She ran her hands through her hair, her last attempt at making herself as presentable as possible. Internally she kicked herself for obeying her inner slut and not bringing a jacket with her.

"Lois," he rubbed at his eyes; it was even too early in the morning for him, "is that you?"

"Who else should it be? Unless there is another girl living with you that I'm unaware of," she threw at him in her characteristic feisty manner. Her hands were on her hips and her manicured fingers tapped away nervously as she tried to come up with an excuse, a way for her to get up into the bathroom or a bedroom without him getting so much as a decent look at her.

"Where have you been?" He was now standing at the bottom of the steps, making an effort not to pay too much attention to her scantily clad appearance. Although his eyes kept being drawn to all of these places: her bare back, the curve of her… He cleared his throat and looked away, planning on recomposing himself, but the next focal point were her legs. He covered every inch, from her ankles, to her thighs, to what was possibly her best asset yet: her ass. He had a faint memory of grabbing it when he had been under the influence of red kryptonite, but he would have never had the courage to do such a thing now, unless he had a death wish of course. He smiled to himself; the Man of Steel didn't have the balls to grab Lois Lane's ass.

"I had this sudden urge for fresh milk… and drink it outside, where I could savor the smell of hay and horse manure." She wiggled her nose and made a face that Clark couldn't see, but he had no doubt that it clearly expressed the utter distaste she felt at the mere thought.

"Dressed like that?" He shook his head and crossed his arms. "Very funny, now where have you been, really?"

"I… uhm… damn it, Smallville. I'm an adult, I don't need to explain myself."

Clark chuckled at her frustration and wondered how many drinks she had had. "And normally you wouldn't have to, but since this is my house—"

Lois rolled her eyes and scoffed. "It's your parents' house."

"You want a couch to crash on or not?"

"Don't you mean bed?"

"It's my bed," he reminded.

"Please," she said, "most nights you're not even at home. And I never lecture you on your whereabouts—"

"You've been sleeping in my bed?" Clark interjected.

"Yep, I'm your regular Goldilocks, figuratively speaking anyway." She pulled at one of her locks, contemplating to herself whether she looked better with this darker shade in her hair, or if she had looked her best in honey tones. She wondered which one Clark preferred on her? Her mind wandered off as she began to twirl the piece of hair around her finger, giving Clark ample opportunity to look her over until his heart was content.

Lois slipped back into their teasing banter like it was a pair of her most comfortable jeans. "Don't act like you don't like my assertiveness; it's one of my most becoming features."

'Among others,' is what he thought, but what he said was, "Unlike you humility."

She shrugged. "Humility is for less talented people who have nothing to boast about in the first place." She caught a glimpse of Clark in the mirror that hung on the far wall across from her. "Uhm, would you mind not staring at my ass?" she exclaimed, although a large part of her felt flattered and she licked her lips to withhold a satisfied smile.

His eyes shoot up to find hers in the mirror, but they only remained on them for a second as he, for the first time, got a good look at the state she was in. She quickly reached for the loose pieces of fabric at her chest, but Clark's loss of composure didn't last for long. As approached her, Lois spun around to face him, her free hand on her hip as she kept her confident stance.

She didn't bow her head in embarrassment as he took her in, noticing everything, from the ripped fabric, to the smeared make-up, and the bruise. "What happened?"

Alarm disrupted his calm exterior and his gaze weighed heavily on her, but she wasn't going to buckle underneath it. She hardly ever did, even though tonight had been a hard blow to take. Still, she forced her eyes to stay leveled with his and faked carelessness as she intended to shrug it all off. "So it was a bit of a rough night. You know how girls can go wild." She winked at him, her approach seductive as she pressed her lips together in an intimate smile. Hoping that would reassure him, she went for the stairs, their shoulders brushing against each other as she past him. Of course she didn't make it all the way there, because he turned around and caught her by the arm. Lois held her breath at his proximity.

"Did you get into a fight?"

"What?" She was taken aback and raised her head, but not enough. Clark took her gently by the chin and tilted it up into the light, running his thumb over the bruise. It didn't hurt, not the way he touched her. Not that she was used to getting hurt, not physically at least. However, going for the wrong guys and getting burned in the process was a whole other thing, unfortunately. The wrong kind of guy was her heroin, just another one of her bad habits, and while she knew she shouldn't try it in the first place, she got a thrill out of it while she was with them. The downfall was, well, it always was a long way down.

"Catty girls, it's not a pretty sight," she joked while he was being deadly serious.

"Nor are you, Lois," he told her resolutely. It was almost mean.

"Thanks Clark," she started sarcastically. The jerk of her head was a rigid one and Clark dropped his hand, getting the hint. "Hours of work went into this," Lois finished, having taken a step back and gesturing at the dress. Thoughtlessly she let go of the fabric she had been holding together, revealing more cleavage to him than he was used to, and he had seen some low cut tops on her.

Clearing his throat to indicate her slip-up, he courteously looked the other way, slightly blushing.

"Seriously, Smallville?" She moved her hands to her hips once again, forgetting about her dress for the moment. "You're acting like you've never seen a girl's breasts before. It's nothing to be scared of; in fact, it's usually an opportunity guys grab with both hands."

"Lois! Can you please just take this seriously?" he asked of her. "It's three in the morning and you're in my house looking like you've… like you've…"

"Like what, Clark?" She was almost daring him to say it.

He swallowed back the words. "Like you've had more than just a rough night, okay? And would you please…" He waves his hands at her chest area, fingertips accidentally brushing against her. He was ready to offer her an apology, but she was on her way to the front door before he could so much as open his mouth.

"Lois!" he called after her, giving her a few seconds, although he was right behind her before she could reach the door. "Lois, come on," he said, placing his hand over hers on the doorknob.

"I'd appreciate it if you got out of my personal space," she shot at him and he removed his hand, but she had to admit that it had been nice to have it there, and to have him here. He wasn't as aggressive as most of the men she went after, but they had to be if they were going to be able to keep up with her. Clark didn't. His gentle demeanor was one of his most attractive qualities. What if opposites really did attract one another?

Lois sighed and turned to face him. "I needed to feel safe," were the only words she presented him with.

"Safe from what?" He put some more distance between them, realizing that she needed it to breathe and if he didn't want her to bolt. He leaned against a dresser with his arms crossed and eyes so blue and lucid, like he saw more than he let on, even though her state of distress wasn't hard to detect.

She mimicked his position, leaning back against the door with her arms tightly crossed in front of her chest. "Look, I know what I must look like…" She bowed her head; she couldn't look at him while she did this. "But it's really not that bad."

"What's not that bad?"

"I… I just made a bad decision okay, and the last thing I need is for you to judge me."

"I've never judged you."

"Yeah, okay," she retorted with a roll of her eyes. "People always judge me, usually before they even so much as speak to me."

"That's their—"

"I'm going to stop you there, Smallville. Not that it isn't sweet of you to have my back and all, but it's my own fault; I decide how I put myself out there, like tonight." She had uncrossed her arms and was unselfconsciously pulling at her dress. "So I like to go out and have a good time, pick up a guy when I get the chance." She shrugged her shoulders and crossing her arms again. "I don't see what the big deal is; guys do it all the time, but when a female does it—" She stopped herself. "I misjudged the guy. He seemed decent enough, so I thought why not. But we didn't actually get to his place… Actually we didn't get any farther than his car, and then he just jumped my bones, no foreplay—"

Lois glanced over at Clark because normally he would have pulled a face or contested in some way or other, but instead he had his eyes on the ground. He was simply listening to her. She continued, "No foreplay or anything. He was really going for it too, but I… I didn't feel comfortable anymore and it wasn't on my terms or whatever. Anyway, there's no need to freak out or anything because I got out of there before, well, you know how the whole sex thing works. I mean, I know I look… I look like this, but, believe me, I swung a couple of punches at him myself. I can take care of myself."

"I never said you couldn't, Lois."

"Well, good! It was just a stupid misjudgment on my part and I can't really bitch about it, seeing as how I was there looking for the same thing and—"

Clark shook his head. "It's not your fault."

"Are you kidding me, look how I'm dressed, obviously I was asking for it." She had to look away as she struggled to hold back tears.

"Lois…"

She shook her head and put her hand up at him, signaling that he shouldn't come any closer, despite there being a part of her that wanted him to come to her. "No, I'm not going to play the role of the victim here, because I'm not. I knew full well what could go wrong."

"Okay." He nodded, not agreeing, but understanding that it was a lot to cope with, and recognizing that Lois was a strong as well as a stubborn woman. "What do you need?"

She let out a laugh, surprised at the sound of it, since it wasn't the time for it, but then again, when did she ever do the appropriate thing? "Isn't that obvious?" She spread her arms out to underline her point, in the process allowing Clark another good look at another handful of some of her assets.

Lois touched him affectionately on the chest before hurrying up the stairs. Clark couldn't help, but keep his eyes on her even then, shyly following her movements from beneath his dark strands. He waited a few more seconds before following her up, praising himself lucky that he was wearing a pair of loose-fitting sweatpants. He shook his head at himself and at the physical reaction he was having to Lois's half dressed (or half undressed, depending on how you chose to look at it) form. Still, he considered her a good friend of his, and she had always had this sexy way about her, but on all those instances when he had so much as looked at her or thought about her in an inappropriate way, he had simply physically removed himself from whatever space they had been sharing. But he couldn't super-speed out of this situation, he couldn't do that to her, nor did he want to.

He found her in front of his closet, standing on her tip toes to reach for the piece of clothing she had dubbed suitable enough for sleepwear, but with her heels kicked off she couldn't quite reach it. Stubborn as she was, she didn't ask for his help, not even when he was standing right there. So he looked on amusedly for a minute or so before walking over to her. Clark stood behind her and reached over the top of her head to pull out one of his plaid work shirts, leaning into her a little more than he had to and leaving barely an inch between them. He dropped the shirt into her hands and watched her disappear into the bathroom.

He pressed his lips together, closing his eyes briefly as he attempted to maintain control over his own body. Keeping control was something he was practiced at, but his body proved to be the most difficult thing to keep in check. "Damn it, Lois," he said to himself, sitting down on the bed, his hands gripping his knees tightly.

Lois reappeared from the bathroom, dressed in his shirt and with a clean face. She smiled at him and climbed onto the bed, sitting on her knees beside him.

"You okay?"

She nodded, her fingers brushing against the hem of his t-shirt. He pretended not to be affected and her fingers lightly tugged at it. "Thanks for not kicking me out of the house, Smallville."

Clark smiled. "Did I really have a choice in the matter?"

Lois pulled back her hand, but rolled her eyes good-naturedly. "Always the one to ruin a tender filled moment."

"Oh, yeah, I'm the one who ruins those… I didn't even know you knew the meaning of tender." Clark chuckled lightly to himself and got up from the bed, grabbing one of the pillows to take with him.

"Where are you going?"

"To get some sleep, if you don't mind of course," Clark added, glancing back at her from the doorframe. "It'll do you some good."

"What are you, my mom?"

"Goodnight, Lois."

"Smallville, Clark… wait!" she raised her voice slightly, but he didn't turn back around until the next string of words that came out of her mouth, "Stay… I mean, you don't have to sleep on the couch."

Clark narrowed his eyes at her. "Since when?"

"Since… fine, since I got punched in the face for rejecting a guy's sexual advances, very heavy sexual advances, and have these newly acquired trust issues as a result. All because of a stupid dress I wore, and can you believe I paid full price on it as well? It's completely ruined," Lois rambled on, trying to cover her sudden burst of vulnerable honesty with out of place humor. "I suppose it served its purpose…"

"Fine," Clark agreed, throwing the pillow back on to the bed, admitting to himself that it was an unusual situation, but they were two adults and two adults of the opposite sex could share a bed. And it wasn't like they weren't wearing clothes; he was fully dressed in sweats and a t-shirt and she, well, she was wearing his shirt, even though it wasn't properly buttoned. And then there were those shorts… He caught another glance of them as she crawled further onto the bed and slipped beneath the sheets. He quickly followed her example, throwing the sheets over his midsection while she arranged herself between the pillows.

"… Although I did look killer in that dress," she went on, picking up her previous sentence where she had left it. "And don't even try denying that I didn't look good in that dress; I saw you ogling me."

Clark rolled his eyes as he turned off the light.

"So I'd appreciate if you kept your hands off me during—"

"Lois!" Clark laid back in the bed with a sigh, one hand behind his head and the other resting on his chest. "You're unbelievable sometimes, you know that."

"I'll take that as a compliment." He heard the smile in her voice and the satisfaction she got out of pushing his buttons just right.

There was a short silence between them as she turned onto her side, her back to him. "Seriously though, I know I probably don't say this enough, but thank you… for tonight and anything else you want to take credit for. I don't know if you've noticed, but you've become my own personal hero." She smiled to herself and so did Clark. He didn't say anything, didn't feel the need to. Instead, he turned onto his side as well and watched her silhouette as she drifted into sleep.

A couple of hours later, Clark found himself lying wide awake, a tingling sensation below his abdomen keeping him from his slumber. It was a feeling he had woken up to many nights before, but, unlike tonight, he tended to be alone in his bed. Thus, whatever he decided to do to increase the sensation was really something only he knew about. His face was flushed because, tonight, Lois was right beside him in the bed and he couldn't do all the things he did to and with her in his nightly fantasies. A shudder of excitement ran through him as he thought of the possibilities.

Irrationally, he shifted and edged towards Lois' sleeping form, positioning himself so that her backside was at the same height as his hips. His breathing sped up, although he held it as Lois moved in her sleep, without realizing it, increasing the pressure against him by pushing more of her weight back against him. It was the kind of stimulation that drove him crazy because he knew that he would remain on edge for the remainder of the night, unable to do anything about it. Unless he took a shower…

He made his mind up and endeavored to get out of the bed, but as soon as he shifted, so did she. He held his breath, but it was too late. "Clark," she said his name sleepily and slowly opened her eyes.

"Couldn't keep your hands off me, huh?" she asked, planning on meeting his bashful gaze head on as she turned around in the bed. But that was until the covers slid down and she no longer knew where to look. She was uncomfortable, yet, this was one of the most thrilling situations she had been in, one of those situations where the anticipation in itself was a turn-on. Their heartbeats were in sync and she could've sworn that their legs hadn't been touching a second ago.

She was incredibly hesitant, cautious because it would mean so much more; he wasn't just another guy. Lois sought out his eyes, biting her bottom lip and that was when Clark decided that he didn't care anymore. He would take the risk. He grabbed her by the chin and pressed his lips against her before she could say anything. She responded almost instantly, as did the rest of her body as she was the one pressing into him now. She had her eyes closed while he kept his open, wanting to see how yearning looked on her. He bit her lip by accident and she moaned. Her hands were beneath his shirt, but when he reached for her shirt, Clark could feel her retreat back into her protective shell. She pulled her hands back, their mouths unlocked, and she was out of bed before he could do or say anything.

"This wasn't a good idea," Lois told him, pulling her heels back on hastily. "I mean, we work together, and I was feeling vulnerable or something…"

She grabbed the keys to his truck off the bedside table. "I'll bring your car… and shirt," she bit her lip, fighting against her urge to crawl back into bed with him, "to The Planet."

Clark nodded.

"See you tomorrow, Smallville."

She left the room and he laid back down, listening to the front door open and close. Typical Lois and Clark; they both had a knack for running away from reality, rather facing something that belonged on the pages of a comic book. It was like a frustrating game of tug of war, just when he pushed, she pulled and vice versa.

But there would be more nights to come.

Please review? Like I said, I am a Smallville virgin, so critique is more than welcome when it comes to any aspect of the story, writing included as I tend to be sloppy with grammar etc. Please point out my mistakes, but also share with me if you liked this story and what you liked about it. I would really appreciate it. Although, for myself, I really loved writing this. :)