Ch. 28
Chloe was bored. She had spent all morning at the Luthor mansion with Lana. It would have been much more bearable if Lex and Andrea didn't have their tongues down each others throat. It had gotten to the point where both she and Lana had gotten so fed up they simply left without saying anything.
They pulled slowly in the Kent farm, the windows rolled up as the clouds looked threatening above them.
Pulling up to the truck by the house, Chloe exited her vehicle and took a deep breath. "You know, I don't think I could have taken any more of Lex and Andrea."
Lana shut the door and nodded. "I had had enough after about a minute." She stretched her back with her hands on her hips. "Well, we might as well go and knock on the door." She trudged towards the porch steps, Chloe only a few feet behind. She reached for the door and knocked on it a few times."
They were both greeted with a smile from one Martha Kent. Opening the door, Martha ushered them inside. "Lana, Chloe, come in, please." She watched as the two smiling women came in and took off their shoes. "So, what do we have the pleasure of meeting you fine ladies today?" She asked, still smiling at them.
Chloe spoke first. "We were back for a visit, and thought that visiting the Kent farm was too hard to pass up." She smiled as Martha wrapped her in a tight hug.
"I'm glad you came." Martha said, letting go of Chloe and hugging Lana.
Lana felt a little uncomfortable in the embrace. She shouldn't have, but she found it strange that Clark's mom was still friendly to her, especially after Clark and she had broken up. "We're more than glad to be here." She said awkwardly, getting released from the hug a second later.
"Have you had lunch yet?" Martha asked, looking at them.
"Actually, no." Chloe said, looking to the floor in embarrassment.
"Well, then come in and I'll you both a sandwich. There is plenty more food in the fridge if you're hungry for something else." Martha worked her way over to the cupboard and fished out two plates, setting them on the counter by the butter.
Jonathon came down the stairs a second later, finishing tying up his belt. "Dear, now that Clark and Lois are out of the house, maybe we should take the opportunity to be-"
"Jonathon." Martha exclaimed loudly.
His head went up suddenly at the loud mention of his name. His eyes widened in shock as he saw Lana and Chloe standing at the island. "Hello Chloe, Lana." He said quickly, hiding his embarrassment. He knew full well that they knew what he was going to say. He reached the bottom of the stairs and went to the fridge. Fishing for the milk, he stood up and looked at the two rosy cheeked patrons in the now ever increasing uncomfortable kitchen. "Have you had lunch yet?" He asked.
Lana gulped for air as she shook her head. The thought of Mrs. And Mr. Kent…She let the thought disappear. She could never see them doing that. They were the perfect couple.
Chloe rescued Lana from complete embarrassment as she answered quickly. "No, Mrs. Kent just offered us some and we graciously accepted." She looked over to Martha who was still smiling; the only hint of embarrassment was the red on her neck. It was hard to notice because of her red hair, but she saw it.
"What would you girls like on your bread?" Martha asked, looking at them, waggling a knife in her hand.
"Just butter and some jam." Chloe said unevenly. "Please."
"Cheeze Whiz please." Lana said a second later.
"Honey?" Martha asked, turning to Jonathon, who was about to drink from the carton. "Now I know where Clark gets that from." She smiled slyly, looking over at the two girls that were almost giggling.
Jonathon eyed his wife and set the milk on the counter. He turned, opened the fridge and got what Martha needed. Setting both the jam jar and the cheese whiz on the island counter, he proceeded to grab a glass from the counter above the sink.
Marhta slapped what she need onto their sandwiches and threw another slice on top of each one. "Anything to drink?" She asked, closing the lids on both jars.
"No." Chloe said abruptly, taking her sandwich and taking a bite. "I think we'll go play with Shelby outside." She was incredibly uncomfortable with the situation. She could also see Lana nodding her head vehemently along with her.
"Okay, but come back in if you need anything else." Martha watched as the two of them nodded and walked out the front door, almost tripping over one another. Turning to her husband, she gave him a quick scowl. "You should look around before blurting anything out."
Jonathon just shrugged and put the milk back in the fridge. "It's not my fault they decided to show up." He grinned as he took a good gulp from the glass. "Plus, the expression on both of there faces was worth it."
"Jonathon!" Martha exclaimed suddenly, her voice high and disproving. She put the jars back in the fridge and just glared at her husband. The twinkle was still in his eyes after more than twenty years.
Chloe bit down furiously onto her sandwich as she tried to get her mind off of very disturbing things.
"That was very uncomfortable." Lana stated as she followed Chloe towards the barn. She was feeling too strange to even eat her food. Looking at the sandwich, she took a cautious bite. "I doubt that I'll be able to keep this thing down."
Chloe just ignored her question, unable to continue to let the image settle in her mind. "Let's just eat up in the loft." She quickened her pace as she saw a laboring dog head towards them. "Shelby!" She exclaimed, sticking her food in her mouth as she bent down and scratched behind the ears of the barking animal. She smiled through the sandwich as Shelby continued to wag his tail back and forth furiously. Getting up of her knee, she brushed her hands off on her pants and grabbed the food hanging from her mouth.
Lana just ignored Shelby. Truth was she was never really fond of the animal. Stepping past Chloe, she walked into the barn and towards the stairs. There was no sun out, so the barn was dark. She trudged up the stairs and turned on one of the few lights that occupied Clark's sanctuary. Looking around the loft, she let out a large sigh.
Chloe walked up the stairs and almost bumped into Lana at the top as she played with Shelby. "Lana, are you all right?" She asked, straightening herself as she looked around. The place was as neat as ever and there seemed to be a layer of dust on everything. Noticing the hay window open, she walked over and closed it just in case it rained. She turned around to look at the loft from her new angle. Surprisingly, everything looked exactly the same.
"I haven't been up here in almost four months." Lana said longingly. Her eyes lingered on the sofa where she and Clark had both lost their virginity. She fought back the tears that were welling up in her ayes as she painfully remembered their horrendous breakup. Her feet dragged across the floor as she made her way over to his desk.
Chloe made her way towards Lana and followed her to Clark's desk. "It looks like no one has been up here in a while." She said, wiping her finger on the desk and blowing the dust off her finger.
"No." Lana said suddenly. "Someone has." She reached out and picked up a picture frame. She stared at it for a minute, not wanting to take her eyes from it. There was no dust on it at all.
Chloe spied Lana staring at a picture frame, her eyes not moving anywhere else. "He doesn't still have that picture of you on his desk does he?" She hoped that his earlier words were not backpedaling at that moment. He had said he and Lana were over. Even Lois had said it.
Lana shook her head and gave the frame to Chloe with an outstretched hand. "That's not me in the picture frame." She said weakly.
Chloe frowned and took the picture frame. Turning it over, she lost her grin at who occupied the small golden frame. Her cousin, Lois in all her tank top greatness was smiling, her arm around Clark's shoulders as both of them smiled for the camera. Clark was in nothing other than a white t-shirt as the picture only showed them from their midriff up. Something about the picture caused Chloe's stomach to flop unexpectedly. Maybe it was the fact that they were actually touching each other, or the fact that they seemed genuinely happy, but it was strange none the less. "Lois said they were becoming good friends." She said, settling the picture back to its original place on the desk, the space that had once been occupied by Lana's picture.
Lana just continued to stare at the picture. A thousand things ran through her mind as she tried to piece them together. "You don't think they're, you know?" Her heart was tearing apart as soon as she finished her question.
Chloe didn't know what to say back. The parts of her that wanted to say no were staying quiet for some reason, while her mind screamed yes at her over and over. Shaking her head, she pushed those thoughts out and tried to reassure Lana. "I don't think so. I know Lois; she would never have anything to do with Clark. He's not her type of man." She glanced back to the photo. The two smiling figures seemed as if they were staring right into her soul, making her feel as if her words were nothing but lies.
"They did have sex." Lana said, each word coming out with great difficulty. She so badly wanted to believe Chloe, but the picture wasn't helping. Each smile seemed to look as if they were mocking her, their eyes peering into her heart and ripping it into a million pieces.
"I know." Chloe said with a shaky voice. "You have to remember though, everyone gets caught up in the moment. Everyone does things that they regret."
Lana did still not believe Chloe's words, and from the sound of the young blond's voice, she was struggling to believe it too. "I don't know Chlo, they seem awfully happy together." She pointed to the picture and took a sharp inhale, as if she was about to cry.
Chloe shook her head in defiance; making herself believe what she knew was true. "Friends take pictures all the time. We've been gone for a long time Lana; we couldn't expect to stay his best friends." Her own words began to eat away at her heart too. Lois had usurped her in the friendship department. Her jealousy was becoming too much and she turned away from the desk. "Clark and Lois are just friends." She said to Lana, but more or less to herself too.
"I don't know Chloe, that picture-."
Chloe cut Lana off before both of them could continue to wildly speculate. "I saw both of them this morning. They acted as if nothing happened. That only reaffirms my argument that they're not involved romantically. Neither of them would shrug it off in that way if there was real feeling there. You know Clark; he just doesn't act normal around someone if he's in love with them." Her mind had finally convinced herself she was right.
Lana took her words and thought about them for a second. She was right of course. If Clark was even remotely interested in Lois, he wouldn't be able to stand anywhere near her and act like himself. "You're right Chloe. I don't know what I was thinking."
"I do." Chloe said, turning around and looking at a relieved Lana. "We are both loosing the only man in our life that we cherish more than anyone. How can we not be upset about that?"
Lana let a somber tear fall to the floor. "I just don't know where everything went wrong. For the longest time we were apart, pining for each other, and then once we're together, he breaks up with me." She dug the heel of her hands into her eyes and rubbed them in confusion. "God how I wish things were back like they used to be."
Chloe almost laughed at Lana's words. The woman was pining for Clark still, even after she knew it would never happen. Chloe even knew she and Clark never had a chance, and she had come to accept that. "Lana, it's over between you and Clark. Just be happy that you might be able to save your friendship." Chloe didn't believe her own words. There was no likelihood that Clark would care to remain friends with the poor girl. He seemed fed up with the selfish little girl. "Don't forget, he has a date tonight. I think that's grounds for moving on, don't you think?"
Lana bobbed her head down in defeat. Clark had actually moved on, and her window had finally been slammed shut. "I will try my best Chloe." She let a sob rack her body as she dropped a few more tears. "It was supposed to be perfect." She said in one last attempt to convince herself it wasn't actually over. "We were supposed to go to University together, live together and live the rest of our days in bliss."
Chloe had had it with Lana's whining. With a loud stomp of her foot, she took off down the stairs in anger. She went straight to the house, not her car. Walking faster, she opened the porch door and slipped her shoes off. With her anger still in check, she felt like slamming a door. She made her way up the top of the stairs to Clark's room. With a defiant act, she slammed the door behind her in one smooth motion.
Jonathon looked at his wife with one raised eyebrow.
"Bathroom." Martha muttered. It was the only answer.
She spun around the room and glared at anything she could destroy. It wasn't her house, yet Lana made her feel as if she needed to strangle something. She was so fed up that she almost ended their friendship right then in there. Thankfully she had stormed out in time. Her eyes rested on an old flannel shirt that seemed to be stuffed into a corner by the closet. It looked like it hadn't been worn in a year, so she presumed I would be perfect for tearing apart. Walking over, she yanked it, but was actually tied to something. She yanked harder and the shirt finally popped out of a good sized hole in the bottom of the wall. It must have been there to keep mice from getting into the room. She was about to turn away when she saw something glitter in the hole. Frowning, she reached in and pulled something out.
Moving over to the bed, she sat down and blew the dust off the object. It was an old shoebox with the word "memories" written on it with a large black marker. She turned it over to see if there was anything written underneath of it, but there wasn't. Her anger had disappeared after her discovery, but it still lingered somewhat. Thoughts of evading Clark's privacy ran ramped through head, but her investigative nature was pulling at her too hard. She opened the box and peered in. Inside were dozens of photos, thrown about the box as if given little regard. She picked one out and looked at it. She smiled as she recognized it. In the picture stood Lois, herself, and the General at his appreciation dinner commemorating his thirty years in the service. They all looked so happy. It was one of the rare times her uncle had actually smiled.
She picked out another picture and looked at it. It was Lois and herself at a park. In the background she could see the empire state building from their trip to New York. She smiled again and set it down. These were Lois's memories, not Clarks. Again she rummaged through countless photos, surprised that her cousin even kept such things. Lois was never one to keep things from the past. After looking at numerous pictures, she found a small clump near the bottom that had an elastic band around it. Frowning, she picked up the collection of photos and took off the elastic band.
The pictures were facing her backwards so she flipped them over. She looked at the picture with moot surprise. She flipped to another, then another. They were all basically the same. They showed Clark and Lois together, smiling at different places as they posed for the camera. She recognized many of the settings, the caves, Lex's mansion, Smallville high, and interesting enough, the farm. Each picture had them smiling. Chloe was confused how so many pictures had been taken. She was the only one who did so often enough for there to be so many.
She couldn't help but smile as she looked at more pictures of Clark and Lois. Her cousin had had a very hard life and the pictures seemed to show as if she had found a family. There were also pictures of Lois with Jonathon and Martha, but her smile was never greater when she was pictured with Clark. The photos raised so many questions in her mind, but for some reason all she could do was smile for Lois. If being around Clark and his family mad her cousin happy, she had no rite to be jealous of Lois. Tears began to form in her eyes as she looked at one particular picture that had all four, Martha, Jonathon, Clark, and Lois in it. It seemed like a family portrait. They were in front of the house, just after Clark and his father had fixed it after the meteor shower.
She heard footsteps and before she could close the box, Martha stepped in.
"Chloe?" Martha asked, opening the door and looking at the blond woman sitting on Clark's bed. She smiled wide as she saw the shoebox in Chloe's hands. "They're really good photos aren't they?" She asked, sitting down beside the teary eyed woman on the bed.
"You know about them?" Chloe asked, wiping away a few tears.
"Of course I know about the pictures Chloe. I clean this house often enough to know when things are out of place in my son's room, even if Lois is staying here." She plucked a picture out of the box and stared at it. "This was just after we finished repairing the house after the meteor shower." She smiled wider in remembrance. "I don't think there has been a happier day in my life.
"Lois really is like a daughter to you?" Chloe asked, almost jealous.
Martha nodded her head and put the picture back. "She is my daughter Chloe. There is not a day in my life that I don't think otherwise. Sometimes I think she was sent here by an angel to make all our lives better. I know she would scoff at such words, but it's true. We all love her." She could feel a tear almost form in her eye as she spied the numerous pictures of Clark and Lois in her hand. "Those pictures are my favorite." Martha said, taking them from Chloe's hand and looking through them.
"When did they become so close?" She asked the older women, her curiosity getting the best of her.
"Right after he broke up with Lana." Martha sighed and gave pictures another glance. "She made it her mission to keep him from moping." Her smile grew even wider suddenly. "Of course, I had to push them both to spend more time with each other; otherwise they wouldn't even talk to each other. Lois wasn't really happy that Clark couldn't buck up like she would, but you and I both know why Clark acts the way he does."
Chloe nodded as she sifted through some more photos.
"Well, after I explained some things to Lois, nothing about Clark's secret, but enough to make her realize that she was giving him a hard time, she made it her mission to help him. She said after all the times he had helped her, she owed it to him to try and help him for a change." Martha put the elastic band back around the photos and placed them neatly in the box. She put the top on and set it beside herself and looked over at a somber Chloe. "I know that you feel horrible that you're not around Chloe, and I know you feel as if you're betraying Clark somehow, but you must realize he's not as bad off as you think."
"I know Mrs. Kent, but I just feel that I should have been there for him too. I keep kicking myself thinking that he had to get through it all by himself. I never thought Lois would be the one to get him to open up." She was feeling jealous again, but it didn't feel as bad as it did before. "I hate feeling like I do." She wiped another tear away as she stared at the door in front of her. "I thought maybe she and Clark were romantically involved." She laughed suddenly as she realized how funny it sounded once she had gotten it out of her mouth.
"Would it be so bad?" Martha asked.
Chloe thought about it for a second. With her feelings for Clark having finally been put in the past, she smiled just a little. "I guess not, but I just don't see it happening; they're at each others throat all the time."
Martha smiled back to Chloe, but her mind was thinking the opposite. Everything to her screamed that Clark and Lois were hiding something from everyone, but she wasn't sure enough to ask them. She also knew there were two women who still harbored feeling for him, on whom was sitting beside her at that exact moment, and she knew that she had to keep her own suspicions to herself for the time being. She would share them with her husband later, but she wouldn't speak of it any other time. Gathering herself, she walked over to the hiding spot in her sons wall and slid the box back in, along with the shirt that concealed it.
Chloe stood up and sighed. There were so many things that had changed since she had left. A lot of them were for the better it seemed. The only problem was that none of them turned out better for herself, only for others.
"Now, why are you really up here?" Martha asked as she came back over towards Chloe.
"I got tired of listening to Lana whine about Clark. Ever since we've been back, she does nothing but whine and complain."
"I think you are beginning to see why Clark lost interest in that young woman."
Chloe nodded her understanding. "I just wish I could get her to shut up." She laughed suddenly.
Martha draped an arm around Chloe and gave her motherly squeeze.
The door opened and Lana stood at the doorway, her eyes red from crying. "What are you two talking about?" she asked.
Chloe slipped from Martha's arm and walked past Lana and gave her the cold shoulder. "Nothing." She said hoarsely as she passed by her black haired friend.
-
Kat waited for Lois patiently, her shoe tapping on the mall floor as she sat on a bench. She got to her feet as she watched Lois come out the store, her dress bag draped over her shoulder and her shoebox under one arm. "Can I take one of those?" She asked politely
"Please." Lois replied, handing over the shoebox. She watched as Kat slipped the box into her own bag.
"See, just enough room." Kat moved the bag to her other hand. "Now, you're going to need some nice earrings to go with that dress."
Lois groaned. "I don't have much money left, but I'm sure I have something at home that will do just fine." She desperately wanted to get a new pair, but she simply just couldn't afford it.
Kat nodded her understanding. "Well, what then do you want to do? We both have everything we came for."
"I don't know." Lois said in defeat. "Smallville took the car, so we can't really go anywhere."
"My SUV is still here. We could head to Victor's house and meet them. I'm sure they'll be done with whatever they're doing by then."
Lois shrugged. "That's up to you, I'm content on waiting for them to come back, but I'm not overly nice when I have to wait."
Kat chuckled at Lois's remark. "Okay, we'll head for Victor's and I'll phone him once we're in the vehicle."
"Sounds like a plan." Lois said cheerfully. She wouldn't admit it to anyone, but she was already missing Clark. There was sudden pain in her gut as she remembered where Clark was going later on.
Kat opened the mall door and looked back to Lois who suddenly looked sick. "Are you okay?" She asked, crossing the street towards her vehicle.
"I don't think so." Lois said, her voice sounding dejected and angry at the same time. They reached the vehicle and Lois hung her dress from the hanger in the back seat area. Getting in the vehicle, she let out a big sigh and did up her seatbelt. "Clark agreed to go on date with another woman yesterday. It's tonight."
"You're letting him date other people." Kat was perplexed. "Clark doesn't seem like the kind of person to do that." She finished, starting the SUV up and backing out of the parking spot.
Lois knew it was her fault; she had brought it down upon herself with the secret nature of their relationship. She began to explain it all to Katherine as they headed towards Metropolis Hills, home of the wealthy.
