Chapter One: Secret
"I know I don't know you
But I want you so bad
Everyone has a secret
But can they keep it
Oh no they can't"
2012 Metropolis, Daily Planet Building
"You heading home for the night?" she asked without drawing her gaze from the computer screen that glowed a dull blue against her face.
"The farm actually," he replied as he pulled the navy blue blazer on over his dress shirt. Lois' head jerked up in surprise and delight. She asked the question with her eyes before she could open her mouth to vocalize it. "Mom's home. She's going to be running senatorial headquarters out of Metropolis for a while, so I'm taking the weekend to help her get settled in," Clark answered.
Lois smiled, one of those rare genuine, unreserved smiles that Clark had learned to treasure since he'd started working with Lois at the Planet.
"That's great, Smallville. I bet it'll be nice for you to spend some time with your mom. I know how much you miss her." She smiled again, but Clark recognized the difference between this and the previous smile. If he hadn't been distracted by that, he would have stopped to think about how much Lois seemed to have noticed about him when he thought he was finally getting better at covering up those things.
"Yeah," he said, leaning over to switch off his computer, "I have." She was typing fervently at her computer again. Clark sighed and turned to make his way to the elevator. He could tell there'd been something wrong as of late; he wasn't blind. Ever since that story they'd covered in the Middle East, Lois had been unusually quiet and reserved, and when it came to Lois Lane silence was something Clark had learned to fear. As much as he'd wanted to get to the bottom of it though, he'd spent the entire week making mindless small talk like this. Neither of them were very good at being direct.
Clark paused as he reached the far end of the bullpen and listened to the penetrating sound of her fingers hesitantly hitting the keys in an uneven rhythm. She'd never been a very fast typist.
"Lois?"
"Hmm?"
"You sure you can stay out of trouble without me for two whole days?" He got a derisive snort in reply.
"I get in trouble when you're with me, Smallville; it's what I do," he could hear the smile in her voice, and he wished it would stay there so he could stop worrying about her. He'd felt this odd sort of exhaustion for a few days, and between long nights at the Planet with Lois and his extracurricular activities he hadn't really had a chance to remedy it with a good night's sleep. He was looking forward to some semblance of relaxation. "But seeing as how I'm taking the weekend off too, we can reduce the amount of potential trouble I can pilfer by eliminating the occupational hazards I seem to run up against constantly." Clark turned to face her direction in slight surprise.
"Lois Lane taking off a whole Saturday? Unheard of."
"Don't be silly, Smallville. I take time off all the time."
"To chase a story when Perry tells you to drop it. That's not exactly rest and relaxation."
Lois' brow furrowed in an unthreatening glare, and Clark smiled in reply. He stood silently for one of those moments where a weeks worth of sleepless nights washed over him like a cruel riptide.
"Clark?" Her voice penetrated everything. Clark looked up as he rubbed the bridge of his nose.
"Hmm?"
"You going to stand there all night?"
"What? . . .Oh, no." Clark shook his head and turned toward the direction of the elevator, pausing again before he reached the hall.
"Lois?" No reply came. "If you're going to rest this weekend there's no quieter place than Smallville. You sure you don't want to spend the weekend at the farm?" A chuckle came from across the bullpen as Lois stood up and turned off the monitor for her computer.
"Am I sure, Smallville?" She grabbed her bag and coat. "I thought you'd never ask," and in a few strides she was passing him on her way to the elevator. Still slightly stunned, Clark stood in place as she called back to him. "You coming, or am I going to have to eat all of your mom's apple pie by myself."
Clark laughed and instantly felt lighter. This was the Lois he knew how to handle: bold, brash, sarcastic. He turned and ran to catch the elevator door as she waited silently inside for him with her hand on her hip and a smile on her face.
"Safest way to travel, right?" and Clark answered the memory with a nostalgic smile as he leaned up against the elevator wall and watched the doors close.
"Right, Lois."
Smallville, Kent Farm
A knock sounded at the kitchen door of the Kent family farmhouse. Martha Kent looked up from her pile of voting records and state spending budgets, pulling the pair of glasses that hung around her neck onto the bridge of her nose. A smile spread across the woman's face and she hurried to the door to open it.
"Clark," she exclaimed as a man, head and shoulders taller than her, pulled her into a tight embrace, "It's so wonderful to see you; I thought you'd never get away from the Planet since they promoted you to the city desk with Lois." She pulled out of Clark's hug and gave him a good once over.
"It's been almost a year now, mom."
"You know what they say about newspaper men," she paused, "I heard about that hostage situation in New Troy on the news today." Clark met her with a knowing gaze.
"Yeah, but the Blur took care of it. Nobody was hurt. Lois and I filed the copy pretty early in the day." Martha gave him a small but reserved smile.
"The Blur? I've heard people are calling him something else now, even here in Smallville. The Super-Man?" Clark's brow wrinkled in disapproval.
"That'd be Lois' doing, and I'm afraid it's caught on pretty effectively." Martha Kent laughed and gave her son an affectionate squeeze of the arm.
"I don't think it's so bad, and besides with names like the Green Arrow and The Flash to compete with it was bound to happen soon. I think people were finding the Red-Blue Blur to be a bit of a mouthful," Martha chuckled again at her son's unwavering expression of discomfort before his expression changed as if he'd remembered something.
"Speaking of Lois . . ." The distant sound of a car door shutting drew both the Kents' attention out of the open door to the porch.
"Smallville! I found my BlackBerry. It must've fallen under the seat when you hit that pothole," called a voice too loud for the quiet peace of the country. Lois hopped onto the lit porch with a duffel bag and a large purse over her shoulder and a BlackBerry in hand. "Mrs. K!" she exclaimed, quickly pushing Clark out of the way to engulf the older woman in a hug.
"Please, Lois; it's Martha." Lois released her and gave her another one of those smiles Clark had been missing recently. He wondered for the first time that maybe it was him and not the Middle East that had made them so infrequent.
"Whatever you say, Mrs. Kent."
The ease with which Lois had always taken to his mother continued to amaze Clark as he watched them. They were so different, and yet he could see the similarities. He knew that his mother saw in Lois a woman she had once been, a path that she had almost taken in her own life.
"Clark, did you hear me?" his mother called, and he looked up from his reverie.
"Hmm?"
"Could you get the door?" Clark stared at her a minute and then turned to the open doorway.
"Oh . . .Oh, yeah," he wrapped his hand around the side of the door, standing for a moment, and then looked back at the two women. Lois gave him a strange look that he didn't quite understand. It disoriented him. "Actually, I think I'll spend a little time in the barn. I'm sure there are some chores that could be caught up on."
"Smallville," Lois' tone was disappointed, and Clark was attuned enough to her nonverbals to know that she was masking some aggravation as well. He definitely needed some barn time; now he was sure he'd done something. He just didn't know what it was. "You just spent all day at work. Even the Chief thinks you work too hard. The cows can wait 'till morning."
"It's okay, Lois; I won't stay out too late."
Lois turned to Mrs. Kent for backup, but Martha just put her arm around Lois' shoulder and nodded to Clark.
"You go on, honey. Lois and I'll save you some pie." Lois turned to Mrs. Kent with a scowl.
"Speak for yourself." The kitchen door shut softly behind them.
Mrs. Kent led Lois into the living room, and Lois was pulled out of her pout by the sight of the couch neatly made up with a blanket and pillow, just as it had always been when she'd previously lived here.
"I've made up your old room for you if you'd like to put away your things."
"What?" Lois asked slightly dazed. "Oh, no. Clark should sleep in his own room; I can take the couch." She was still staring at it.
"Oh, dear. There must be something wrong. You go ahead and put your things down, and I'll get us some coffee." Lois sighed and smiled a little as Martha ran back to the kitchen to put on a pot of coffee and pull a pie from the oven. Lois let the strap of her overnight bag and her purse slide off of her shoulder and settle at the base of the stairs, before she fell into the cradling corner of the couch. She kicked off her heels and pulled her legs up underneath her, wiggling her toes into the crevice between the two cushions. She closed her eyes and let out a deep breath that'd been trapped inside of her all week. She was home; she was safe here at the farm with Clark. Uggh. Clark. She didn't understand when he'd become such an important part of her life. She felt like 'with Clark' had become a permanent addendum to her name. Where was Lois? At the Planet with Clark. Who does Lois Lane share a byline with? With Clark. What does Lois do on her days off? She plays Guitar Hero with Clark. Can't find Lois, Chief? She's probably chasing leads. With Clark.
And yet, Lois knew Clark had a life outside of her. He was always disappearing, running off, chasing his own leads, coming to her with mysterious stories and asking her to help him investigate. Lois had never questioned it before; she'd always known Clark had secrets. Chloe had made that apparent, but before their story in Afghanistan, it had never mattered. Now, she never quit wondering. She sighed again. Lois seemed to be doing a lot of that, lately.
"Here you go, sweetheart," a gentle voice interrupted her. She looked up and appreciatively accepted a steaming cup of coffee, while Mrs. Kent set two saucers of pie down on the coffee table and fell into the seat next to her.
"You want to talk about it, Lois?"
"Nah, Mrs. Kent, I'm okay, really. It's just been a really long week at work, especially for Clark."
"I've noticed. I've been keeping up with your articles; you think Intergang is behind all of the random spikes in crime?" Lois took another sip from her coffee and let it warm her.
"Well, Clark does."
"And you two don't agree?" the surprise in Martha's tone made the unwarranted aggravation flare up in Lois' chest again. Did everyone assume the Lane-Kent team were one person?
"No, I do agree. I mean, I can't really agree, because I don't know anything, but I trust Clark. He's my partner, and he seems to know something I don't about it."
"Ah, you think Clark is keeping secrets from you." Lois shook her head--A fuller draft of coffee.
"No, I know he's keeping secrets from me. I've always known," Lois looked up at the slightly taken aback expression on Martha Kent's face, "but I just don't know if I should be alright with it anymore. I've always known that Clark shares the important things with the people he cares about, even if he can't tell them the big secrets, and I thought that was enough,"
"But now you're not so sure." Lois looked in Martha's eyes and nodded.
"I'm not oblivious. I see things that would make any reporter worth her salt jump, but I've learned when it's important to let things go, at least until you have the whole story. It's just that I'm to the point where I'm putting the pieces together, and I can't just ignore the picture even though I'm missing a few pieces."
"Lois . . ." "No, it's okay, Mrs. Kent. We don't need to talk about this anymore." Lois set her coffee down and pulled the piece of pie to her chest in comfort.
"Lois, you know that I have just as much obligation to you as I do to Clark. You can tell me." Lois shook her head.
"I gave some advice to Chloe several years ago, and I realize now that it was probably about Clark, but I'm having a hard time convincing myself to follow my own advice."
"What advice is that, Lois?"
"That if keeping a secret didn't hurt anybody, she should wait for her friend to come to her and try to be supportive in the meantime."
"And that was probably very good advice for Chloe, but I'm not sure it applies here." Lois looked long and hard at her pie.
"Maybe, you're right."
"I've gotten used to it over the years." Lois laughed lightly.
"I know that it's all connected. The arsons, and the bank robberies, and those hostages at that hotel today. I just can't prove it, and I know that Clark's investigating it behind my back which means he thinks it's too dangerous for me." Lois gave a frustrated growl, "I'm sorry Mrs. Kent. I don't mean to worry you with work; I'm sure you have plenty you're working on."
"We all do, but I think sometimes you and Clark work yourselves to death. I'm glad the two of you took the weekend off." Lois sighed at her empty saucer.
"Clark didn't want to. Shit. Don't tell him I told you that. Perry practically had to threaten him with his job to get him to take the weekend off. I wouldn't have either, but I was afraid if I stayed, Clark would too." There was a scowl on Martha's face.
"As stubborn as his father."
"Yeah." Lois choked a little on the word. "I think Lex has something to do with it, but Clark is convinced he's dead and buried, and Clark is too busy beating himself up about it to really listen." Lois said flippantly, annoyed not for the first time that Clark felt as though everything was his fault. "There was a little girl last week who got hurt in one of the suspicious fires, and he thought that was his fault too."
"You don't think Lex is dead?" Lois tried to ignore the skeptical look Mrs. Kent was giving her that was so much like Clark's, questioning her paranoia and stretch to find an answer.
"It's not so unbelievable; the Luthors have pulled off similar resurrections in the past, Lana included, and if Clark knows something beyond what I know about he's not saying anything. Trust me, I've tried." Martha nodded hesitantly.
"It's not easy for him," Martha said quietly, "to see people get hurt, especially children. Lex has always been a bit of a sore spot. Clark feels responsible for him, that maybe if he'd given their friendship another chance Lex would've changed his ways."
"That's ridiculous!" Lois growled. "I don't even understand what someone like Clark saw in him to begin with."
"Jonathan and I didn't understand it either, but it was something Clark saw. Clark thinks his own secrets are what destroyed Lex, drove him to obsession." Lois shook her head in disgust.
"Mrs. Kent? Did Clark tell you I was coming with him this weekend?" Martha shook her head in reply. "How did you know about this then," she said gesturing to the made up couch they were sitting on. The older woman smiled.
"I had an idea, a hope really. Clark always liked a full house, something of an only child syndrome. It's been lonely around here since Jonathan died. You, Kara, Lana: He's never been able to stand this house being empty."
A small pang of guilt struck Lois' chest as she remembered the large part of the last few years Clark had spent living alone in this very house, and the insistence he always had that she never skip a Guitar Hero weekend.
"Sometimes I wonder why he did come to Metropolis. The way he is with kids, I'd always imagined him settling down with a sweet girl and having litters of his own kids, living in domestic bliss on this farm for the rest of his life." It was a nice dream for her friend, but somehow Lois couldn't picture herself in the sweet girl position, frequented in her psyche by Lana Lang's face, a fact that made her feel something she refused to call jealousy. There was a sad look in Martha Kent's eyes.
"In an ideal world, I'm sure that's what Clark would've wanted too, but sometimes life shows us different paths that can be greater than what we originally imagined for ourselves."
"Yeah, a loud boss with coronary problems, a bowtie wearing photographer, and a partner who can't spell." Lois laughed, "everyone's ideal family." Lois received another sad smile from Martha and was frustrated that she couldn't pinpoint what it was that she was missing.
"I'm sure that it sounds comical to you, Lois, but I know Clark considers you apart of his family. I shouldn't be telling you this, but Clark probably won't be able to have his own children, so he likes to take care of those who don't have their own family. He sees himself in them."
"What?" Lois looked up in surprise, her face twisting in sadness, "Why didn't he ever say something?" Mrs. Kent patted Lois' leg affectionately and reached for the dirty dishes.
"I'm sure it's not something that comes up in everyday conversation." Lois stood up and followed her into the kitchen, silently watching her feet.
"Why is life so unfair?" she looked up, "to people like Clark, no less. He deserves better than this."
"Not unfair, Lois, just a different path, a path that I'm happy led him to you." Lois blushed and hugged Mrs. Kent before she could continue this line of conversation.
"Goodnight, Mrs. Kent," she whispered before running through the living room and kicking on her heels, heading out of the front door with more quiet finesse than she usually accomplished.
"Goodnight, Lois." The woman with graying red hair smiled knowingly at the light in the barn she could see through the kitchen window, as she cleaned up the remaining dishes.
Smallville, Kent Barn
Lois stood hesitantly at the bottom of the stairs to the loft, before she quickly pummeled up them. She was a pulling of the band-aid quickly kind of person, and she wasn't one to stand quietly until he noticed her, not tonight. He was standing at the open window, looking out like he usually did, in the place where his childhood telescope had once stood.
"I'd have knocked, but I think we've had this discussion before," she called, but he didn't move from where he was, even though she was sure she could see a small smile on the corner of his lips. He'd changed out of his work clothes and into a red t-shirt and a pair of jeans, such a bright color she hadn't seen him wear in more than a few months.
Lois walked up to him and leaned against the opposite side of the loft window. The cool Autumn air was refreshing against her enflamed cheeks.
"This doesn't look like chores to me," she said punching him affectionately in the shoulder. "If I didn't know any better I'd say you were avoiding me."
"Nah, Lois," he chuckled in a voice thick with disuse, "nobody can avoid you." He laughed lightly again, but she could tell he was hiding a cough in it. She furrowed her brow in concern, realizing for the first time how pale he looked.
"Smallville, are you okay?" she grabbed his shoulder lightly.
"Yeah," he shook off her touch, "I've just been overworking myself, that's all." Lois gave him a piercing look, but he just smiled and turned back to looking at his stars.