Chapter 2- Say Something Ironical

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Above nearly all else, Jimmy hated office gossip. Whenever it arose (and it really wasn't very often), he disregarded it entirely and went on with his work, fully and utterly above such trivial things.

That may or may not have been true, but he felt much better telling that to himself. So, when Lois and Richard broke off their engagement in the friendly, quiet, grown-up way that he would have expected from them, he tried his very best not to notice. Suffice it to say that he wasn't entirely successful.

All of those false pretenses aside, the whole thing really did seem rather anticlimactic after over five years of the Donna Reed Show. They had been, well, a really cute couple, as his little sister would have said. The two of them still came in to work together, so he allowed himself to assume that they were still living together, a situation that screamed of awkwardness. Jason kept at work with them as always, hanging out at either one desk or the other, but now there was no quick kiss on the cheek shared by the two parents whenever the torch was passed. In all honesty, the sudden lack of public displays of affection was the only thing that had really changed. Good for them.

Clark's reaction to the news (if news it could be called) went something along the lines of what Jimmy had anticipated, as he became more bashful, clumsy, and generally Clark-like than was typical. Nobody noticed the subtle change.

Having only narrowly avoided a great deal of drama, everyone in the office was throwing themselves more and more into their work. Even Superman seemed to be clocking in extra hours on the job, with four potential front-page feats accomplished in a single afternoon.

More scoops, more digging, and generally more effort put in by everybody else meant that Jimmy, whether he wanted it or not, was much busier than usual. Three different assignments the previous day had left him with far too many shots to go through in a single sitting. Unfortunately, he didn't have much of a choice, as he had been sitting still so long his legs had gone numb and if he stood up now he'd get that horrible tingly feeling that he had dreaded since he was seven. So, here he sat, nose two inches from the screen of his computer, flipping frantically through images, his deadline approaching faster than a speeding bullet. He was almost finished, so close, so tired…

"Jimmy?" If he hadn't been sitting down, the effect would have been disastrous. As it was, the shock sent him a good six inches out of his chair, his head colliding painfully with the monitor, his knee with the underside of his desk. It was enough for him to have super speed, super sight, super hearing, did he have to be so stealthy, on top of everything else?

"Yup?" It was rather painful watching Clark try to get his words out. He had seemed almost teetering this last week, past the level of utter exhaustion that everyone else was currently experiencing. Jimmy certainly couldn't blame him. He had a read something about a spot of trouble in Chechnya, a tricky hostage situation that had taken Superman quite a while to sort out. No one seemed to be quite clear on the details, but every source seemed to be in agreement that it had been one of the Big Blue Boy Scout's more stressful situations, and Jimmy had caught Clark almost dozing off at his desk several times that day.

"Did you want to head down to the bar for a drink after you've finished up?" At this roundabout request, Jimmy was rather taken aback. As often as they ended up at the Ace O' Clubs after a long day at work, it had never been at Clark's suggestion. They hadn't gone in a while, simply because Jimmy had begun to take greater notice of Clark's strange attachment to the video screens and radio consoles in the bullpen that must have made his other job so much easier. Not for the first time, Jimmy pitied his friend for his inability to get sufficiently drunk. He really could have used it right about now.

"Sure Clark, just give me five minutes."

After hand picking a few more shots, Jimmy rose gingerly from his chair to make a stop at the printer. On the way he caught sight of his tall, bespeckled friend, slouching in his chair, eyes fixed on a blank computer screen. It was probably the saddest thing Jimmy had ever witnessed.

A quick drop-off in Perry's office, a second at his desk to pack his camera, and it was his turn to stand behind an oblivious Clark. For a second he was tempted to give the superhero something of a scare himself, but before he got the chance to make up his mind, Clark rose from his seat, as if he could have heard Jimmy coming a mile off. Which of course, he could.

Jimmy made sure to talk on the way to the bar, keeping up a steady stream of one-sided conversation, pausing only when he noticed a pair of shoes lying haphazardly in the far corner of the elevator, shoes which looked conspicuously similar to the ones that Clark was now wearing. Clark stiffened noticeably when he caught sight of them, but Jimmy just passed it off as "one of those things", before elaborating further on the photo story that someone from Regional wanted set up.

They had been sitting for five minutes, Clark having hardly said a word (opting instead for occasional grunts of acknowledgement whenever something Jimmy or Bibbo the bartender said required feedback), when the bell above the door rang half-heartedly and Lois entered, characteristically composed but totally exhausted.

"Mind if I join you?"

Jimmy only nodded; Clark felt the need to respond with a, "Not at all," spoken at an unusually high register. Lois, impatiently waving off her own request, took a heavy seat on Jimmy's right.

"So, how've you been?" she asked, chancing a glance in Clark's direction before staring at the beer that had been placed in front of her. If Jimmy hadn't known smoking to be her only vice, he would have thought that she was already drunk.

"I-I'm fine. Lois, are you sure you're alright?" Clark replied, frowning, apparently worried by her current state of disarray.

'There you have it,' thought Jimmy. The instant he even thought about helping people his voice dipped to something manly and endearing. Jimmy wished he could do that without sounding like an idiot.

"Oh sure."

"How's Jason?" Jimmy had never been good at maneuvering through these sorts of conversations.

"He's fine." What had happened to the chatty Lois Lane that occupied the Planet office, whose very presence was dreaded in press conferences, whose big mouth mob bosses were willing to pay thousands to keep quiet?

And so they sat, in a stillness and silence only broken whenever one of them took a drink from their beer bottles, staring at the grossly uninteresting counter, wondering who would take the initiative to spark a conversation.

"I have to go."

Lois looked up, annoyed. "What could you possibly-" But Clark had already left, a few dollars sitting next to his half-empty bottle.

"I've forgotten how he used to do that." A few more seconds silence, and then-

"You know, there's a lot Clark never got to tell you about his trip." This, at least, seemed mildly interesting to her.

"Really?"

"Oh yeah. He was in the Congo, for a while."

"The Congo?"

"Sure."

This was why Jimmy had never had much of a knack for high school drama club; he really wasn't any good at improvising. So while Lois straightened up on her stool, clearly expecting to hear more about Clark's undoubtedly fascinating experiences in the rainforest of Central Africa, he was left rather tongue-tied. Whatever he made up, whatever lies he spouted to keep Lois's mind occupied, neither of them would ever be able to fully picture Clark gallivanting through the jungle in an Indiana Jones hat with a machete in his hand. They'd never even seen him out of one of his unbelievably old-fashioned three-piece suits. Or at least, Jimmy hadn't. What a "whoa, don't wanna go there" topic that was.

"Do you think he really did all of those things?" Lois's words weren't screamed through a bullhorn at him, but for the second time in an hour, Jimmy almost flew out of his chair. Had he said any of that out loud?

"What do you mean?"

"Do you think that Clark really paddled up rivers and threw himself off of cliffs and ate rattlesnake and all of that?"

"If he says he did."

"But he hasn't said anything. He hasn't told anyone anything at all. I bet he hasn't even told you." Fabulous. She was in one of her town cynic moods now. Jimmy fought back the urge to duck.

"He's probably just waiting for the right time."

"The right time?"

"Well, yeah." When her glare did not subside, he added- "What I mean is, when the opportunity presents itself, he'll tell you everything. I'm sure he will."

Jimmy could have slammed his head into the bar for all the irony in his last sentence. God, he couldn't stand irony. Lois just shrugged, and finished her beer.

Author's Note- The next chapter won't be such a filler, and if I feel up to the challenge, Jason may make his first real appearance.