-Chapter Four-
They kissed greedily, frantically, jerking and bucking, pawing at clothing. She was pinned against the side of the pickup with her legs hooked around his waist and it meant her hands were free to touch and explore. She cupped his face, ran her fingers down his neck, delighted in pushing her palms over his shoulders, arms, chest, anywhere she wanted, feeling the shapes and tensions of muscles underneath his shirt she had barely been able to imagine.
Clark went to unbutton her shirt, his fingers and knuckles brushing against her breasts and Lois moaned her encouragement into his mouth. Her hands found the waistband of his jeans, then belt buckle, and she was working on getting it open when a voice cut through the haze.
"Lois! Are you out here?"
At first they didn't bother to stop.
"Lo-is!" Lucy yodeled, louder. "Is that you?"
Lois broke away, letting her head rest against the cool metal of the truck. She had to wait a moment so she could answer on an exhalation and be steady. "Yes!"
"Is everything okay?"
Clark dropped his lips back to her skin and she felt him smile against her neck. In between breaths, she called, "Everything's fine."
"Is that Martha's truck, out there?"
She swallowed, trying to concentrate. Clark had started to trail a line of kisses down her throat. "Yes."
"What are you doing?"
Lois looked skyward. She yelled out a strangled, "I'm with Clark!"
From the barn, there was silence. "Oh."
Lois called back, "He's showing me the old orchard."
"Oh. Okay." Another stretched silence. "I. I just came to say that we're having the cake." A few more awkward moments dragged by. "I'm going now."
"We'll be right there."
Her sister called a polite bye and they were alone again. Clark released her and a little shakily Lois put both feet to the ground. They began to refasten open clothing.
"She's always had that sense of impeccable timing. It's a gift, really."
"I'm just going to need a minute before I go back in there."
Catching his sheepish grin, her eyes fell and, understanding, she whispered a heartfelt, "Sorry."
He shook his head, no. "I should have told you before. I mean, I wanted to tell you." They locked eyes. "What you do to me." She saw his throat bob. "You're incredibly beautiful."
Lois blushed and smiled and, overcome again, they touched heads and laughed softly together when Clark told her he was going to need another minute.
...
By the time they had returned to the barn they had missed Moira blowing out her candles and the party had restarted, the DJ introducing his last set of the night. Taking her by the hand, Clark led Lois into the middle of everybody to dance with her again. This time, when the songs got slower, Lois looped her arms lazily around Clark's neck and he held her close on her waist. They didn't talk much, and when they did, it was with lingering whispers, into the ear. No one cut in.
At midnight, one by one, the lights in the room went back up and guests began the process of wishing Moira a last 'happy birthday' before drifting home. Around them, Lois and her family began to clean up.
Martha and Clark stayed to help stack chairs and sweep the floor. Lois and Clark were given the job of going out to the porch and taking down the lights.
The Sullivans lived about fifteen minutes away from the orchard, with the Kent farm another twenty minute drive farther out. When Martha offered everyone a ride home in the old Chevy, Lucy's kids jumped at the chance.
Gabe and Moira took their place in front with Martha. Everyone else climbed into the back to ride in the open air. Lucy and David snuggled up together in one corner while the other adults sat apart, each with a small child nestling in their lap. The truck ambled slowly through town, its pitch and yaw lulling the children into sleepiness. It was a balmy summer night, moonlit and blue. Clark and Lois sat on opposite sides and Clark was unable to take his eyes off her, and the way the breeze nudged at her hair.
...
When Martha pulled up outside the Sullivan's place, everyone got out to hug and exchange warm, quiet, goodbyes.
As they had done almost exactly a day before, Lois and Clark came together to say goodnight.
"So."
"So."
They traded goofy smiles. Lois's teeth caught at her bottom lip.
"I'll pick you up at ten?"
Lois nodded. "Should I bring anything?"
Clark shook his head. "Just yourself."
Neither moved. Lois brought herself to say, "I'll see you tomorrow."
"See you tomorrow."
There was a self-conscious, stop-start lean in towards each other that ended in a sweet and tender capture of lips.
It provoked a catcall of low whistles and exaggerated smooching sounds from the front porch. They sighed together as Lois patted her hands down the front of Clark's shirt. "You'll have to excuse me." Grim-faced, she said, "I have to go and kill my family now."
He nodded, "Okay." Equally serious, he advised, "Just stay away from the sharp objects. I know how you are."
She kissed him quickly, stuck her tongue out at his impertinence, and walked up to the house.
...
The next morning was bright and busy with the Sullivan household up early. They returned to the Apple Orchard to pick up leftover bags of garbage and retrieve cars. When they got home, Moira made pancakes for breakfast.
Despite her best efforts not to clock watch, at ten a.m. precisely Lois was excusing herself from the table and skipping to the front door even almost before Clark had finished his knock. When she opened the door to let him in, for a few moments they were fifteen years old again, unreasonably flustered and excited simply by the sight and physical presence of each other. Clark was wearing a plain white t shirt and a pair of long khaki shorts with sandals. He recognized Lois's short-sleeved summer dress from the night they had met.
Stepping inside, he asked her, "Ready?"
She pointed to the sunglasses he was wearing on top of his head. "I'll go grab my things."
She disappeared up the stairs. Clark put his hands behind his back to wait. When he looked back down the hall he saw David had popped his head in from a doorway. Clark rocked on his feet and called hey.
"Hey." David came forward, looking uncomfortable. They could hear Lois moving upstairs. "Can we have a quick word?"
...
Lois had her window rolled down, her sunglasses on, and the wind ruffling through her hair. Beyond her, flanking them on either side, rolling green fields of heavy-headed corn stalks stretched out to the horizon and were met there by a wide, blue sky.
She tried to be reasonable. "But I don't know anywhere. Everywhere would be a surprise to me."
"Exactly," Clark agreed, without taking his eyes off the road.
"So you can tell me."
"What would be the point?"
"So I'd know."
"But you don't know anywhere."
Her fingers swished in a U shape through the air, "So you can tell me."
Clark glanced across, "It'd just be a name. It wouldn't mean anything."
"But I'd know."
"In the abstract."
Lois frowned. He was obviously not getting this; "But I'd know."
Clark's expression and tone turned interested. "It clearly makes you antsy. The not-knowing."
Lois scowled. To compound her displeasure with the accurate and insightful nature of his character assessment, Clark added, "I like it when you're antsy."
It didn't help much when he threw in a cursory, "Just a little further, I promise."
...
Just a little further turned out to be another hour's drive along the back roads of rural Kansas. Clark pointed out places of interest and told her when they were coming up to the spot where they had met, but he would not be drawn on a destination. Lois didn't complain. Clark was intractable but the weather and the countryside were glorious. Open expanses of golden wheat; wide, sweeping, fields tilled neatly into corn rows; boundless grassy prairies dotted with wildflowers, passed, resplendent, outside her window.
Without an obvious sign for a turn, or an indication that there was a navigable entry of any kind, they were about a mile down a wooded access road when Clark slowed and turned again. He guided the pickup over an old cattle grid and uphill along a dirt track hedged in by a tunnel of overgrown tree branches and leaves. Lois rolled up her window, the branches scratched at the Chevy's paintwork and progress became slow. Several times the way ahead was almost totally obscured. Lois shot Clark a look, but he seemed undisturbed and to know exactly where he was going.
Eventually, they cleared the track and broke into daylight. Clark parked under the shade of a grove of trees that edged one side of a sloped, sparse area of weeds and coarse scrub.
Rather than answer Lois's look of inquiry, Clark encouraged her to step out of the cab and help him with the supplies he had brought. She remained skeptical but followed and proffered her arms anyway, into which he handed two thick rolled-up blankets. He lifted out an impressive-looking picnic basket and, hand-in-hand, they continued uphill to where the gentle slope became more pronounced and turned into a ridge.
When they reached the top of the ridge, they stopped. They both removed their sunglasses. For a second, Lois was lost for words.
"Wow." Beneath them, on the other side, the ridge rolled back down and became a small, sun-drenched meadow. A river that was wide but slow-moving ran through the meadow. Daises and pale yellow primroses, and other wildflowers Lois couldn't name decorated the banks in the full rainbow of colors. "So where are we?"
"Schickle's Creek."
"Wow." Clark was watching her. She turned to him, "So where are we?"
He chuckled, a broad, pleased grin on his face because of the look on her face. They set off down towards the water, to where the branches of an old sycamore tree created an area of dappled shade on the riverbank and the grass was shorter.
"Schickle's Creek. It's a tributary of a tributary that eventually joins the Missouri, I guess. Smallville would be about," Clark slowed to tip his head in a sideways direction, "eighty, ninety miles that way. The next town over is about," he frowned before flicking his thumb to the other side, "fifty miles that way. And that," he said, emphasizing the word, "puts us just about in the middle of the county." They stopped walking because they had reached the tree. He raised an eyebrow at her, "So now you know."
They chose a patch of grass that was even and set down the blankets and the basket. Lois dropped her purse and they laid their sunglasses on top. Putting her hands to her back she surveyed what was before her, giving the place the once-over. "This is some picnic spot, Clark."
He was also taking in the view. He nodded. "It's sort of idyllic, right?"
"It's beautiful," Lois said, simply. She eyed him, "Secluded." She lifted her eyebrow, "Come here often?"
Clark missed her look. "We used to," he said, absently, still casting his eyes over the area. "It's been a long time. It hasn't changed at all."
The nostalgia in his tone had her frowning. She thumbed at the trunk of the tree behind her and teased, "I'm not going to find, like, a carved heart with Lana's initials in it, am I?"
Clark turned to her, confused, and then he couldn't help smiling and told her he doubted it. He shrugged, glancing at the floor, "Maybe an old fishing hook, a piece of cork, something like that." He explained, "My father used to bring me here. We used to camp, fish, build a fire." Clark looked up to the sky, "He'd teach me about the stars." Lois watched him sigh. Almost as if only just realizing, he said, "I haven't been back here since he died." He met her gaze, "Nobody else knows about it."
They were quiet. "It's beautiful."
She saw his expression change, starting in his eyes. The wistfulness disappeared, and was replaced by something altogether more immediate and vital.
With a smile playing at appearing, he echoed her, "Secluded."
Lois looked round in one direction, then the other. Then she squinted at him. "Not another house fifty miles either way, you were saying?"
Clark nodded. "At least."
There was a quirk of her bottom lip. "We're alone."
Clark glanced around too. He lifted an arm from his side. "The ants. Small animals, critters." He looked up, "The birds and the bees."
Lois tucked her shoulders, walked a couple of steps in so she was stood right next to him. "But I mean, the nearest potential person, human being..." She trailed off.
"I guess there might be a hiker somewhere in the vicinity. A day-tripper, maybe. A farmer, possibly," Clark allowed, keeping his eyes on her. "Although, it's mostly open range."
"The chances of anyone finding us here..." Again, she didn't bother to finish the thought, just let it dangle, provocatively.
"Statistically?" Clark said, "Extremely unlikely."
"Say," with a concerned expression, Lois pushed then pulled her fingers apart, rolled her lips, "my sister?"
Light danced in his eyes. "Extremely unlucky."
Standing opposite him, she repeated, "We're alone."
He confirmed, "Pretty much."
"So." She reached out and touched him lightly on the middle of the chest, then ran her fingers down the indentation there to the muscles of his stomach, her eyes following the movement. "If I was to take off my dress right now, and make love to you?" Her eyes lifted to meet his. They were liquid.
"I was kind of counting on it."
...
They made love together, the first time, with the same frenzied urgency that had taken hold in the orchard the night before. They rolled around in the grass until Lois ended up on top of him, rocking to a climax, throwing her head back and letting out a base cry of pleasure that disturbed the family of house sparrows that had been settling in on the branches above.
After that, they were slower. They spread out the blankets and luxuriated in the slowness. Teasing him, with her hands and her mouth she worked her way over every part of his body. When it was his turn, Clark laid Lois back and dragged his kisses across her skin until it was too much for them both and she pulled him to her and he sank into her again.
Clark put his shorts back on and Lois slipped into his t shirt to have some lunch. Clark had made sandwiches, and sliced up some cucumber and carrot to eat with a pot of Martha's homemade hummus. They sipped at root beer and managed some bites of sandwich each before they distracted themselves with the food and ended up smearing the hummus, and then the filling of an apple pie, and then whatever else they could find that was suitable, onto available skin, and licking it off.
To clean off Clark suggested a swim in the creek. He waded in to his chest while Lois sat back and admired the view. She was suspicious but Clark persuaded her that the water was lovely by lying to her. When she told him thanks but she would see for herself and came down to the water to demurely dip a toe, Clark thrust forward and bodily scooped her around the waist, pulling her in with him.
They made love in the water. They made love out of the water. On a couple of occasions, they were splayed, up against the bank, halfway between both. Every time, as she was pushed over the edge and the release came, the same feelings flooded Lois. A sense of bone-deep satisfaction, and a completeness in her heart so thorough and profound, she marveled that she had never noticed the missing piece in the first place.
...
The branches of the sycamore tree moved on the breeze. Laying beside each other on one blanket, half-covered by the other, in the shadows and the sun of the late afternoon, they watched, but didn't really pay attention to, the shapes the movement created.
Lois had her head resting against his chest, the waves of her hair spilling around her shoulders and over his skin. Her left hand followed the lines and defined muscles of his abdomen. Clark was rubbing his fingertips in a slow, deliberate line up and down her spine. The sensation was mesmerizing.
"I could do this all day. I could do this forever."
His breathing was so deep and regular she thought he might be falling asleep, but he responded, "'Time slows for me, but nature and her mistresses remain indifferent.'"
She frowned, "That's beautiful."
He agreed. "I know."
"Where's that from?"
"Verse twelve. 'The Tractor and the Plough'."
She burst out laughing and they giggled until they were propped up on elbows, nose to nose. She tried to look put out but ended up shaking her head at him.
"So this means I'm three for three, right?"
Her forehead creased at the boyish grin he was giving her.
"Smart, funny and sexy."
Her lips skewed thoughtfully. "I'm going to level with you, Clark." Both eyebrows raised, "I'm feeling kind of bad right now."
His eyebrows formed a straight line.
"For every woman that ever had a chance with you before me." She reached to him, her eyes mapping his face. He was so handsome, it was impossible. Underlining her point, she combed his hair back with her hand, "And allowed you to slip through their fingers."
"Don't get too upset." He fixed her with a deadpan look; "The screaming hordes were few. And I was always at least fifty per cent involved in the decision."
She huffed at his flippancy. "You know what I mean. That Lana girl. I'd be kicking myself."
More serious now, he scrutinized her. "That's not how it works, though, is it? A spark, a connection," his eyes darted around, searching, "chemistry." He blinked, his focus back on her. "It's either there or it's not. I don't think you can force these things."
"I'm just saying, if that was me, I don't think I would've let you go." A line of concentration marked the gap between her eyebrows. "I don't think I could've."
Clark grinned, "If that was you, we'd be-" He stopped, caught himself in time, and amended, "Most probably right here."
Intrigued, two dark eyes sparkled at him, "All possible paths lead to this point?"
Clark told her, "All possible paths lead to you."
One eyebrow went up. "If it hadn't been for that lightning strike-"
"We would've met at the party, last night."
She smiled, "If it hadn't been for the party last night?"
Confidently, steadily, Clark set her straight. "We would've met in Gotham City, in the executive suite of the Sheldon Hotel, at the National Press Association's awards dinner. Where I," he elongated the word before giving her his best effort at debonair, "would've asked you to dance."
She rested back, crossing her arms, tucking them behind her head and staring into space. "I was thinking about that. I was wondering what I would've thought of you."
He watched her. "Did you come to any conclusions?"
She breathed in and out through her nose, sighing in definitive fashion on the exhale. "I think it would have played out a lot like this."
"A demand to see some personal identification, ending with torrid picnic sex?"
Her eyes rolled, no! She cycled one hand over in a methodical gesture, relaying her opinion in the same careful way Holmes might've recounted the finer points of a case that had passed Watson by; "I would've arrived at the dinner inwardly seething whilst outwardly," she paused, "...not so seething. Some minor flunky would've pointed you out to me and I would've convinced myself that it was not that I found you devastatingly attractive, so much as it was," one finger pushed in the air as her eyes narrowed, "I was caught off guard by the fact that you turned out to be devastatingly attractive." She gestured with her hand again, "Then, I would've actually, you know, met you, and I would've melted."
"I think I would've enjoyed that."
She tilted her head to him. "I think I would've enjoyed seeing you in a tux."
"I think I would've enjoyed you getting me out of a tux."
"I think I would've enjoyed me getting you out of a tux."
He picked up her hand to hold it to his lips and kiss it. "And here we are."
"So, that's it, then." The backs of her fingers rubbed against his cheek. "Fate."
"Mmm hmm."
She took her hand back so she could lean her head on it and turn fully to him. "Everything that happens, happens as it should."
He saw where her eyes looked, followed them, observed the careful, pointed, expression that had entered them, and he reflected it back at her. "In this case."
"What about in this case?" With her free hand she reached out, touched her fingertips to the discolored mark on his skin, just above the clavicle, on his left shoulder. It was pink and puckered, the size and shape of a thumbprint.
"'All things are in fate, yet not all things are decreed by fate.'"
She circled the mark with her middle finger. "Aristotle, again?"
"Close."
"'The Tractor and the Plough'?"
One corner of his mouth twitched. "Plato."
She smiled, 'close', then hunched nearer. "Does it hurt?"
Solemn, Clark shook his head. "It turns blue when a storm front's moving in from the west, though."
She threw him a look, but the expression in his eyes was not quite apologetic.
She said, "What does it feel like?"
"Now? It's scar tissue. I guess I've lost a little sensitivity there."
She continued to caress the spot, now using the pads of her fingertips to test and understand the way the wound had healed. "Can you feel this?"
Clark nodded.
"What about this?" She stretched and bent her head to hold her mouth over his skin and replace the movements of her fingers by brushing him there only with her lips.
He nodded again, murmured a low noise of approval.
"What about when it happened." She stayed there, at the wound, touched her nose to it. "What did it feel like?"
"What did it feel like getting shot?"
She nodded.
He sighed slowly. His fingers tangled themselves idly at the end of a lock of her hair. "I didn't feel anything at first. I mean I felt the impact and I knew I'd been hit. But I could still move, run for cover. Once the adrenaline wore off, then it was excruciatingly painful."
She rolled back down so she could find his eyes and look at him, and check that it was okay. "How did it happen?"
She needn't have worried. His eyes were alive with the same self-possessed half-amusement with which he seemed to regard life in general and which she was quietly realizing she adored. "It was just a routine patrol. A night time drive-by between JTF bases in Kabul. I was riding in the back of an armored SUV with six guys from the unit. It's not considered particularly dangerous. I've done it many times."
She couldn't help frowning at him. He carried on, "It was quiet and so cold you could see the breath in front of our faces. Then all hell broke loose. A bomb went off to our left and our driver swerved to keep us upright. Probably saved all our lives. He was a local kid, fresh out of the training center at Bagram. There was a shout to take cover, so we did, but by that time we were already caught up in a fire-fight."
"Were you safe?"
"I was on my own but I was fine. Hunkered down behind a wall. I heard something between the gunshots and looked, and there he was, the driver, in the middle of the road, calling for help, trying to crawl away."
"You saved him."
"I panicked," Clark told her. "I thought somebody must've seen him. But there were bullets everywhere, in the air, hitting the dirt, and there was no one else around. I didn't even think about it."
Her eyes gazed into his. Serenely, Lois said, "'The recipient then distinguished himself by his actions, disregarding the danger to his own life by breaking cover and sprinting to ANA Private Haji Mohammed Shah. While attending to Private Shah, Mr Kent was shot in his upper torso. Ignoring the wound, Mr Kent carried Private Shah to safety. For this act of extraordinary bravery, the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan is honored to award Mr Kent its highest civilian decoration.'"
Clark was taken aback. "You read my medal citation?"
"About a month ago. After six months of trying." One eyebrow arched. "A tricky thing to get a hold of."
"I wouldn't sign the release forms. When they found out about the whole thing the State Department got grumpy and their PR guys leaned on the Gazette. That's how the paper found out."
Confused by what she was hearing, Lois blinked a couple of times in succession. "You didn't tell the Gazette that you got shot?"
"The bullet went straight through. I was out of the hospital in ten days. I didn't miss a deadline."
Processing, she blinked again. She frowned, "How long-"
"Before anyone knew? Three months. That was the turnaround between Haji filing an initial report and the Afghan government sending me official notification."
A wry smile crooked her lips. "And how did your bosses feel about that?"
Clark nodded, "They were pretty grumpy. Then I got grumpy. But I compromised; told my editor I'd allow the paper to run a story, on the condition I write it myself."
"Seems sensible." She narrowed her eyes, "So why didn't you?"
Clark's brow furrowed. "What do you mean?"
"Your article. Your famous article," she said. "You talked, in detail, about the dangers facing front-line troops, the changing nature of the conflict, the wider geopolitical ramifications. You even allude to a brief spell of hospitalization. But I checked the small print." Correctly, she told him, "You never actually mention that you got shot."
After a short pause, Clark agreed, "No."
"I bet your editor loved that."
Clark inhaled through the nose. "We had some conversations. In the end, I think he understood."
"Now I want to understand."
"Understand what?"
"What you just told me; about the incident itself. The ambush and the bullets- why didn't you write about it?"
She could see he was unsure what she was getting at. "I did."
She flicked her hand, "I'm not talking about the follow-up pieces. Back then. That first article."
He said nothing.
"Why didn't you go to the Sheldon last night?"
Clark shrugged, "I was here."
"I mean in the first place."
Steadily, he replied, "My mother's cooking."
Lois huffed out a sigh, frustrated by his attitude. Clark told her, "I'm not trying to be facetious." His shoulders hunched, "I don't care about industry-led, backslapping, love-ins. I especially don't care about being the star attraction in them."
She rolled her eyes at such a pat answer. "Why does it make you so uncomfortable?"
He stared back at her, an intense expression on his face. It was the most serious she had ever seen him. "If it's in the interests of the integrity of an article, I'm fully prepared to use a harrowing personal experience- but in general terms; as a context, as an angle. Anything more than that, and it's not journalism anymore." His jaw set. "It's exploitation."
She matched the look in his eyes. "I guess it depends on where you draw the line."
"Yes."
Thoughtfully, she suggested, "I guess it depends on the writing."
"I guess it does."
"It's still a great story."
"It's not a great story. It's a sexy story."
"That's what I meant."
His expression had softened, but Clark's tone remained undeterred and earnest. "In Afghanistan, in the towns, in the hills, GIs out on duty, villagers in their homes. People get shot every single day," his eyebrows flickered, "and worse." His lips were drawn into a straight line. "Better people than me."
An uncomplicated "Yes," was her answer to him. "But not everybody can write about it, shine a light, hold a focus, give something- an idea, a better way, a fairer way- a voice." She spoke to him, soft and intent. "We have a platform- that's our privilege. That's what we can do." She smiled. "That's what you did."
His eyes searched hers. "I reacted. It was a reflex. Instinct."
"Yes."
"If it happened all over again, maybe I run the other way, away from the driver, back to the unit. No one wants to give me a reward or a medal then."
"No."
He smiled at the absurdity. "I'm the same guy, Lois."
She answered, emphatically, yes. "And if it happened all over again- that's why you'd run out in front of the guns and take a bullet in the shoulder."
He shook his head, a brief, small gesture of dissatisfaction.
"I'm not trying to make you feel better," she scolded, gently. "Don't over-think it. You were called upon to do something difficult and brave, and you did." Her shoulder lifted, "Maybe next time you don't, this time you did. Accept the accolades, the ticker tape from a grateful society. And if it doesn't reflect on you, it reflects on them. Besides," she paused, glanced away, "I don't think it's so bad. You got shot- however you feel about it, it means you're a real life hero, someone for people to look up to," her eyes fell back onto his, they were dancing, "and also that you'll always be associated as that guy who only won at the NPAs out of the sympathy vote..."
She squeaked as he grabbed her to him, wrestled her over, and held himself above her.
Their eyes shined at each other. She lifted her hand to neaten up his side-parting.
"What did you think of my article when you read it. Tell me honestly."
She was frowning, but she smiled. "Why?"
"It matters to me what you think."
She sighed deeply. "It was a stunning piece of writing, Clark. I like to think that if I had experienced the same thing, I could've written something like it."
...
The day had slipped into early evening and the heat had worn off before, reluctantly, they decided they had better get back. They both had flights to make.
Having already spent some time retrieving scattered items of clothing from where they had been thrown, including a short, informal, ceremony to administer the last rites to the pair of panties they guessed must have floated downstream, Lois stopped in the middle of packing the picnic basket. She held up the empty hummus jar. "This has all been extremely kinky."
Fully dressed, Clark straightened, a rolled blanket in his hands. "This is not a usual Sunday afternoon for you?"
Mulling it over, with a frown Lois admitted, "I don't think I ever had sex outside before."
They looked at each other. "Me either."
She swayed a little on the spot. "I'm not the kind of girl that usually-" She stopped, and instead just showed him the jar. "I'm not that kind of girl."
They began to make their way back up to the ridge, and the pickup. They didn't hold hands this time, and they were quiet as they walked. Although not entirely comfortable, it was not an awkward silence either. So much had happened, it seemed natural that the atmosphere between them was heavier and thoughtful, and threaded through with anticipation.
As they approached the truck, Clark gave Lois a sideways glance. "Back at the house this morning."
She looked over.
"David wanted to speak to me. In private."
"About what?"
"You."
At that she looked puzzled.
"With your father not around, I guess, as the head of the family I think he felt responsible," Clark explained. They eyed each other. "He wanted to know if my intentions towards you were honorable."
"Oh dear," Lois said, both in sympathy and alarm. "I hope you lied."
"I thought it might be bad form to admit I'd been fantasizing about getting you in bed since the second I met you, so."
Her head bobbed once in relief. "Good." Another sticky thought arose, "Where did you tell him we were going, today?"
They had arrived at the back of the truck. "A ride out for a picnic at a local beauty spot."
She nodded again, "Good."
Clark loaded the truck. "I didn't lie about everything, though."
She regarded him with a fresh look of concern.
He was making sure everything in the truckbed was secure. "When he asked about my intentions. I told him that I'd never met anyone like you. I told him that I didn't think I ever would again, and I assured him that if someone, ever, in whatever shape, form, or size, even tried to take advantage of you, they would have to get through me first." Clark flipped up the tailgate and found her eyes. This was the most serious she had ever seen him. The blue eyes burned. "Because I didn't really see a future without you."
Lois absorbed all this with apparent composure, but inside she was reeling. "Oh."
"I mean, I told him I didn't know how you felt about it. Us. Which would obviously..." She could see he was trying to read her, to be respectful to her, to establish where the safe ground was in the new landscape he had laid out before them, "change things."
"Obviously."
The muscles in his jaw worked. "It wouldn't change how I feel."
Without being aware of it, she had been nodding, and she stopped. "How do you feel?"
He was gazing at her. Almost imperceptibly, a dark eyebrow twitched. "I'm in love with you."
A big, cheesy, grin lit up Lois's face as a deeply drawn, self-satisfied sigh escaped her and she folded her arms around his neck.
For Clark, the relief was overwhelming. His arms brought her closer as he helpfully offered, "That's where you say it back."
Delighted, she closed her eyes, quirked her head; "Smallvilled." She raised her eyebrows, "You're pretty sure of my feelings on the matter afterall, then?"
His hands traveled up over the curves of her waist and down again. He leaned in, telling her lips, "I'm taking into account circumstantial evidence."
They kissed, slowly and deeply. His mouth moved from hers to her neck.
With her head back and her eyes closed, Lois had to concur, "The evidence is compelling."
Clark drew back. There was a marveled expression on his face. "You're not going to say it, are you?"
Lois tilted her head to one side and squinted. "It clearly makes you antsy. The not-saying."
He rolled his eyes.
Her nose scrunched, "- I like it when you're antsy."
They let go of each other to climb into the truck. Lois practically swaggered up to her door.
"Anyway. It's just so you know." Clark settled himself behind the wheel. "I'm not that kind of boy, either."
Next to him, she was still beaming. "You wanted me since the second you met me, huh?" She was relishing it. "I knew it."
"You were wet through and half naked." Clark turned the key in the ignition, tipped his head to throw her a look; "I'm a red-blooded man, Lois."
"You want to know the truth?" The smugness in her tone had leveled away.
The engine was running but Clark kept his hand on the handbrake, instead watched her watching him.
"Opening your car door, saying goodnight outside my aunt's house-" she moved her head, "the first time."
Lost, Clark said, "Opening my car door, what?"
"Opening your car door," Lois repeated. "That's when I knew I was in trouble. Saying goodnight outside my aunt's house-" She blinked. She was full of grace. "That's when I knew I was in love with you."
It was as if a series of alignments and variables and interlocking vertices had suddenly fallen, placidly and unquestionably, into the correct correspondence. For a moment or two they wallowed in the delicious and definitive sense of it.
"This is a long-haul thing for me. You know that?"
Her eyes were soft and wry. "Long distance, too."
"For the first few months."
"Metropolis to Gotham. Either way, it's a hell of a commute."
"I guess that's why it wouldn't make sense to work in Gotham."
Off her look, Clark added, "That's if the offer's still open?"
She was working hard to keep a smile of unadulterated glee from her face. "I better talk to my editor. Make sure there's a spot."
"You think I have a chance?"
"Got your eye on any gig in particular?"
"A desk in the bullpen would be great," Clark admitted. "There's a reporter there I think I'd like to work with. Specifically."
"Really?"
He nodded. "With a formidable reputation. Fearless. Honest. Award-winning, mostly."
Her eyes creased at the sides in understanding, "Anyone would want to work alongside someone like that."
"I hear nothing but good things."
"They're all true."
"I really think it could be something special."
"I'm going to have to agree with that."
Clark paused. "I believe his name's Jimmy."
She sniggered out loud, and she was still giggling into his kisses as he pulled her to him and she climbed on top of his lap.
...
Without being a big airport, or busy, during the summer season Smallville municipal ran reliable and regular commercial services out to a roster of major cities. On an otherwise deserted row of plastic seats, they sat together, waiting, watching other people hug and make their goodbyes. Lois had her head tucked comfortably underneath Clark's cheek. Her flight had already been called once.
"I guess you better go," Clark spoke into her hair without making any kind of move to actually let her go.
"Yeah," she agreed, showing no obvious willingness to move either. "Clark?"
"Mm?"
She was playing with the edges of his suit jacket. "This happened, right? I'm not going to wake up tomorrow and the weekend was all a crazy dream?"
"Like clicking your heels and finding out you're not in Kansas, anymore?"
She laughed. "Mm."
He smiled against her forehead. "Would you like me to pinch you?"
Decisively, on a nod, she said, "No."
"I can still change my ticket. Catch the next flight if I have to." He was stroking her hair down her back, "We can wake up tomorrow together if you like?"
Her eyelids flickered. "Don't tempt me."
"I mean it. I can layover in Metropolis. Make my connection from there instead. I'd just be a day late."
Lois sighed, stoically. "I'd never get out of bed. And you'd never get back to Afghanistan. And before we met we were both respected, and admired, dedicated professionals."
Beneath her, she heard him sigh. "What?"
"Nothing," he began. His tone was longing, and a little forlorn, "Just. Mentioning beds. I was thinking how nice it would be to have sex with you on a mattress."
She chuckled, rubbed her nose into his dress shirt.
"Sheets and pillows."
She agreed with him it would be nice. Clark let his head roll back and looked up to the ceiling. "This is going to be a long five months."
Her hand rubbed along the top of his thigh. "I'll striptease for you on webcam and things." She patted him on his knee, "It'll be fine."
He closed his eyes and groaned.
The last call for her flight was announced over the PA system.
"I gotta go." Lois stood and shouldered her purse. Clark got up with her.
"This is, like, the fourth time I've had to say goodbye to you in the last forty-eight hours. I don't like it very much."
She smiled up at him, slipped her hands into his and interlinked their fingers.
The slope of his shoulders moved up and down. "Please be careful."
She bounced their hands; "We have a deal."
His eyes snagged on the fresh band-aid just visible behind her fringe. "The part that worries me is that I think my side of it is going to be easier to keep up."
She grimaced, considering it. "That's probably true."
"There are land mines and check points where I live."
"I will be extra, super, careful," she promised with great solemnity. She squeezed his hands before letting them go. "And I'll be waiting for you. And I'd like you back in one piece."
The moment presented itself to say something more but they both held back in a kind of observed acknowledgment that some things could wait and it was helpful to the other to not make the parting any more bittersweet than it already was. So instead they kissed.
Clark leaned his forehead against hers. "This is going to be so hard."
Despite the heaviness of her heart, Lois grinned in triumph- "I told you you were a moper!"
Without pretense or hesitation, Clark said, "I'd mope over you."
"Don't mope," she told him. "Just take care of yourself. I'll see you before you know it."
They kissed for a last time before Lois rallied herself and bent to find the handle of her travel case. Clark stuck his hands in his pockets. "Call me as soon as you're home."
"You'll still be in the air?"
"Leave me the message. I'll call you from Gotham International."
He watched her walk away from him.
"Hey. Look after that sweater."
She half-turned back to call, "I'm going to keep it warm for you."
Clark blew out a short breath. To himself, he muttered, "It's going to be a long five months."