Evilredknight: You're almost right. Don't worry, I've got everything planned. Glad you're still enjoying yourself though.
Phnxfyr1: Well, here it is. Enjoy!
Bubbly minx: I'll see what I can do.
Anonymous: Thanks!
Nequam-Tenshi: agreed
IceQueen825: Definitely bad of Lois
Wtchcool: I know right? Who'd want to act like Clark for a day?
JUJUChick16: She should, but I just couldn't see her doing it.
Jeremy Shane: Thanks!
Madlenita: Glad you think so
iheartBL: Thank you! No need to be sad anymore. I'm back now.
Clois16: Thanks ppms= please post more soon?
Crazy4fanfic2008: Hey Mary, Lol. Despite suffering from laziness, I hope you do well in school, and I'm glad you were able to picture Jo'an in the chair. That part was funny to me too.
LooneyTLuna: I'm so happy you're still laughing and enjoying this. Hope you like this chapter as well.\
Twylyte: Thanks. I'll try.
Lostieamyethyst: Aww, sorry about the Lana stuff. She's always in my stories; glad you finally decided to take a look.
Emeralphoenixx5191: Wow thanks! There might be repercussions;)
~~{(O)(O)(O)(O)(O)(O)}~~
"Junior."
Nothing. Lois has been randomly calling out the child's name for the better part of an hour; maybe even an hour and a half.
The kid won't answer. In fact, she won't even look Lois's way…hasn't looked her way since Tess left the two of them alone together; hasn't said a word since then either. She didn't even finish her cookie. She threw it away. Her kid threw away an almost whole double dipped chocolate chip cookie…that's just unnatural behavior.
Then the child sat down in her father's chair quietly and behaved the way Lois would've liked her for her to behave when they first arrived.
Not, now though. Now she wants the kid to talk to her. She'd do anything. She's tried everything; offering the kid a trip to the ice cream parlor, a full day at crater lake tomorrow, permission to play hookie instead of going back to school on Friday; she even threw in Disney World…nothing. No response, not even a shrug of the shoulders.
Just twenty more seconds of the most unbearable and cruelest silent treatment Lois has ever had to endure, she decides it's time to go home. Yes it's early; but she really can't focus on the story she's been writing.
"Come on, let's go home," She sighs and begins to gather her things.
To Lois's surprise, Jo'an gets up immediately. She expected her to ignore her completely; but then Jo'an walks ahead of her, quickly; gets in the elevator, and before Lois can get to her the door closes, meaning she has to wait for the next one. She clenches her teeth together. Not so much out of anger, but out of pure frustration. She's ninety-nine percent sure the child pressed the "close door" button.
When Lois gets to her car, Jo'an is already waiting at the back door; and even though the child has her back toward her, Lois can see the exact moment the kid realizes she's behind her. She stands upright, rigid and stiff before placing a hand on the handle, waiting for Lois to unlock the door.
Once the door is unlocked, Jo'an gets into the car, buckles herself in, and has her door shut by the time Lois even sits down; and she did it at human speed too.
"Junior, I'm sorry. Okay?" Lois apologizes once she's buckled in.
Jo'an rolls her eyes at the window because she absolutely refuses to look at the woman in the driver's seat. She doesn't care if she says she's sorry. She's too upset for "sorrys".
Lois starts the car after a few seconds. It's more than obvious that the kid's really not going to talk to her, let alone forgive her anytime soon.
She drives for about twenty minutes before she tries again.
No answer.
She looks at the child via the rear view mirror, hoping she didn't answer because she's asleep.
She's not. She's wide awake, and still staring out the window.
"Junior, I'm"-
"Leave me alone Lois," Jo'an sneers nastily. She's not looking at the woman, but she can still see the way Lois's whole body stiffened when she used her real name instead of calling her mommy. She's probably in trouble for that, but Jo'an doesn't care. It's what she wanted right? She asked her over and over to call her Lois. She got her wish.
But Lois doesn't yell at her like Jo'an expected her to. She doesn't say anything, just sniffs a little and starts talking to herself about allergies and Shelby's dog hair.
Jo'an realizes that Lois is lying about the allergies, and that she's hurt; but she still doesn't care. She's disappointed in her mommy, like she'd been let down really bad. And she's mad. Really mad.
Before going into the Daily Planet, Jo'an would've sworn not only on her life, but on Bobo's and her whole family's lives that she was never going to call her mother Lois; and right now they'd all be dead because of her…if that's the way swearing on someone's life worked.
She also thought she'd have fun at the Daily Planet. She usually does. Her mommy always let's her help out with the stories, and she usually gets to sit in her lap until her mother's legs get numb, then they would go out to lunch. Sometimes, but not a lot, Jo'an's mother would let her carry her to somewhere far for lunch. Jo'an misses doing that. It's fun; carrying her mother around.
But she wasn't with her mother. She was with Lois. And Lois was no fun; making her sit still for minutes at a time. Jo'an Lane Kent is not suited for staying still. So she went to the bathroom. She didn't have to go, and she only felt a little bad for lying to her mother about it.
For about a minute she wondered around the building, noticing that some stuff is a lot different; and making it a game to find all the different things she could.
That's when she bumped into Tess Mercer. Literally. Lucky, she was just walking normal, or she could've really hurt the woman.
At first Tess looked like she was mad at her, but then she looked at her really hard; and then she smiled. Jo'an smiled back. She hadn't seen Mercy in ages; and she was about a second away from saying it when Tess asked her if she was by any chance related to Clark Kent.
Jo'an's mood soured a little as she answered with a nod of her head. She'd been so excited to see Mercy at first, but she'd been reminded that the woman doesn't know her yet.
"Hmm," Tess commented with a small smirk; then she slowly began to walk back to her office. She didn't say anything about Jo'an following, but Tess made it more than obvious that she wanted her to; and since it seemed to be expected of her, Jo'an grabbed Mercy's hand and went with her. It's not like she had anything better to do than to sit down in her daddy's chair anyway; and it's not like her mommy was even gonna notice she was gone. She hadn't been paying attention to her the whole time they'd been there. Only when she did something to annoy her; so she really didn't feel bad about going.
And even though her mommy doesn't like Tess too much, she happens to be Jo'an's secret best friend. They share everything together. Everything. Mercy doesn't believe in secrets and lies, only when they're necessary; and between the two of them, they aren't necessary; so when her mommy won't tell her something because she's too young to know, she usually sneaks off to see Mercy. If Mercy knows the answer, she tells Jo'an. Like the time her mommy and Aunt Chloe told her about Davis. She had a whole lot of questions; but her mommy said that she knew enough already and she wouldn't tell her anything else. So, she went to Mercy. She'd been more than glad to help. She told her sooo much more than her mother and Aunt did; and she showed her what Davis Bloom looked like when he did not look like the monster in her nightmares. She said her mother could've at least done that much. That if Jo'an knew that the monster didn't always look like a monster it would help her out a lot; and it did. Davis didn't look as scary as the monster did.
It was so good to talk to her secret friend again. She had fun; way more fun than she had with this mommy. The only bad part about going with Mercy was when she pulled the green rock out to show her; the same rock that hurt her when she was in her daddy's loft. Mercy asked her if she thought it was neat; but Jo'an couldn't answer because her stomach was hurting too bad. She wasn't as close to the rock as she was during her first encounter with it, so she didn't fall down.
"Are you okay," Tess asked once she realized the child was bent over in pain. Jo'an told her
"no" and that the rock hurts her really bad. Tess put it away immediately and apologized. Jo'an forgave her instantly. It's not like she knew the rock was going to hurt her. Jo'an didn't even know the rock could hurt her until just a few days ago. And there's just no way Mercy would ever hurt her on purpose so…
Tess apologized a few more times before offering Jo'an a cookie and promising to remember about the rock forever. It was really more than the child could ask for in an apology; a 'promise not to do it again' and sweets. Chocolate sweets.
She devoured the cookie in all of twenty three seconds; and had to wipe at her face because there must've been crumbs or something on it. Mercy was staring at her like there was anyway; but there wasn't, and so she asked Tess why she was staring at her.
When Mercy told Jo'an that she was just wondering when her birthday was, the child smiled because it was almost her birthday, and she was wondering if Mercy was going to get her a present. Mercy gives the best presents, as they're usually things she's not allowed to have. Like last year, she got six puppies…'cause she turned six. They we're so much fun. "Were" being the operative word because Jo'an wasn't allowed to keep them. They are not allowed to have them at home; and her mommy's allergic, which is why they live in an apartment that doesn't allow pets.
If she wasn't so sad about the puppies leaving, she would've been entertained by how mad her mommy was. She was really mad at Mercy, and she kept using grown up words; all kinds of them, some Jo'an hadn't even heard of before but knew she shouldn't ever repeat them…around other people anyway.
The puppies are at Mercy's house. She hardly ever gets to see them, because she hardly ever gets to go over to Mercy's. She used to sneak over to see them, but when she came back, her mother always knew where she'd been and she'd get into trouble. She only gets to go to Mercy's when there's an emergency; and it's got to be a really big one.
"You don't have to tell me if you don't want to," Tess smiled down at the child, but Jo'an could tell that Mercy was a little sad.
"No, I do. It's March 19th" Jo'an answered brightly.
"Really," Tess gasped, "That's really soon," she exclaimed, making Jo'an frown and cock her head to the side.
"You're using a baby voice," she said simply. It was weird, Mercy never uses a baby voice with anyone, not even her.
Tess chuckled at the child. "Alright," she answered a lot more grown up-y. "How about now?"
"Much better," Jo'an grinned back.
"So March huh? Of what year?" Tess asked before offering the child another cookie.
Jo'an took the cookie slowly, but she was even slower at answering. Nearly ten seconds went by before Tess told her she that if she didn't know then…
And that was when Jo'an interrupted with an indignant "I know what year I was born!"
At that Tess raised her eyebrows; not because she'd just been yelled at by a child; but because the child knew what year she was born but was hesitant to say so intrigued her.
"You just can't tell anybody," Jo'an decided to tell her a few seconds later. Mercy's her secret best friend. They share everything; and even though Mercy doesn't know that they're friends, she still trusts her. And why not? Everyone else is almost the same; Bobo, Uncle Ollie, Aunt Chloe, even her mother…to a certain degree.
"Cross my heart," Tess promised.
"2011."
"But it's 2009," Tess rebuttals, just to be sure.
"I'm from the future," Jo'an confirms before telling Tess that her daddy left her with his "friend" to be babysat, and that she was probably looking for her now. So Mercy gave her one more cookie and brought her out to her mommy.
Only this lady; this Lois is not her real mommy. Her real Mommy would never deny her, or tell someone that Lana is her mother. Her mommy loves her too much. This mommy, even though she's nicer than before, doesn't love her like her other mommy. She really misses her mommy, and she misses Pepper, and Mr. and Mrs. Gold, and her old room, and her old house. She misses her old life.
"We're home," Lois announces.
Jo'an blinks. She hadn't realized that they were pulling onto the Kent property. Coincidently, she was just thinking about home. Her real home; and how bad she wants to go.
She gets out of the car, quickly, while her mother's still gathering her things and leans into her side through the window. She's still little, so she has to stand on her tippy toes.
When Lois turns to open the door, she's face to face with the child. She's totally caught off guard and her mouth goes dry. The kid is staring straight into her eyes unflinchingly; it's such a fierce gaze, Lois can't help but to be a little nervous and afraid.
"I hate you," Jo'an whispers. "And I want to go home."
~~{(O)(O)(O)(O)(O)(O)}~~
A/N: So I'm officially back from Miami, I had two days off during the whole trip; and I only went to the beach once; which is really sad as it wasn't even five minutes away. Hope you enjoy this. There should be about five or six chapters left… I hope.
Next post should be Thursday, October 7th. That's if I don't have another computer malfunction.