---- Chapter 2: Lost In The Shuffle

Opening her eyes, Chloe was greeted with the view of her wall. What the hell was ringing? Rolling onto her back, she took a second before sitting up. Was that her phone? Rubbing at an eye, she unwrapped herself from something and rolled towards the edge of her bed, standing up and walking the few feet to her purse, dropped on the floor amongst some clothes after a late night out. She gabbed her purse and pulled her phone out, flipping it open.

"Hello?"

"Miss Sullivan? This is Blake Stanton, from Stanton Tech."

Chloe held the phone away from her ear for a second and slapped herself across the face to wake up a bit, blinking as she put the phone back to her ear. "Mr. Stanton, how are you?"

"I'm fine, thank you. Look, I've been thinking about your interview on Friday and while I still can't offer you the spot you interviewed for, I want to offer you a job. It's not a good job, or a job that pays well, but it's work and you'll have the opportunity to move up in the company over time."

Chloe really felt like telling him yes, but she figured she should hear what the job was first. "I'm flattered you've been thinking about me. What's the job?"

"My assistant."

Chloe had heard worse news. It might be a fresh new start, if nothing else, and it would certainly keep her from ending up waiting tables or working retail. She preferred not to do that unless she really had to. After thinking about it for a second, she spoke. "I'll take it."

"Good, I'm glad. You can start this week or next, whenever you feel like you're ready to go and..."

"I'll start tomorrow. The sooner the better."

"Great, alright. We'll get everything squared away when you come in tomorrow morning, then. Welcome to the team, Miss Sullivan."

"Please, call me Chloe."

She heard him chuckle on the other end of the line. "Alright, Chloe, but only if you call me Blake. People calling me Mr. Stanton makes me feel stuffy and old. I'm trying to avoid that until I'm stuffy and old."

"Blake it is. Thank you, very much, and I'll see you tomorrow."

Chloe closed her phone and smiled, closing her eyes and bouncing around in a little dance of joy. Finally, something was going right. It might not be the best job, but it was a job and gave her opportunity for advancement, so it was something.

Yawning, she turned around and looked at her bed, freezing. Why was there a guy in her bed? When had he even gotten there? Rubbing at her eyes a second, he was still there. She didn't even feel anything residual from the night before. Getting back into bed, she laid down and sighed. She must have had more to drink than she thought. As Chloe fell asleep again she wondered if it had at least been decent sex.

Chloe grabbed a writing pad and pen before answering the buzzing phone on her ear. "Mr. Stanton's office."

"This is Andrew Morgan. Is Mr. Stanton in?"

"I'm sorry sir, but he's out of town right now. Is there a message I can get to him for you?"

"Just let him know I called, please. He has my number."

Chloe heard a click on the other end and pushed the hang up button on her earpiece before writing down the man's name and getting back to the paperwork she was sorting through. Two weeks into her job and so far it was pretty much the same work she'd done in her early days at the Planet. Phone answering, sorting, take this and that here and there. At least here she didn't have to answer questions about pet obituaries.

As she finished one stack of papers, she grabbed another out of a box she had next to her desk chair on the floor. Getting financial statements sorted was tedious but time consuming. The phone calls weren't as frequent as she thought they might be, but she guessed people still weren't fully aware that this place existed.

Taking a second before she started on the stack, Chloe sat back in her chair. Blake was a good boss, really, and treated her as an equal instead of a subordinate. He even used her opinions on public relations. Apparently since she'd been in the journalism community, she knew what sounded good and to whom. Most of what she said was common sense, but he and the PR department seemed to like it, so she was happy to help.

The phone started buzzing again and Chloe grabbed her notepad and pen before pushing the answer button. "Mr. Stanton's office."

"Chloe, it's Blake."

"Hey, Blake. How's your trip going?"

"Very good. I found an investor and that's always a plus. Have there been any calls since lunch?"

"Yes, just a moment ago, actually. A man named Andrew Morgan called, and said that you would know his number."

"Yeah, I do. I should call him, so I'll talk to you later, Chloe."

Chloe hung up and went back to her paperwork, sorting and filing until the box was empty. She checked her watch, finding it to be four in the afternoon. Smiling, she looked around at the office. It was a nice place, if not sparsely decorated. They kept it simple, and that was fine by her.

Today was going to be a good day, though. The first paycheck. She smiled to herself as she thought about actually getting to put money into the bank instead of her constant withdrawals. It would take time to replenish her savings and be able to live how she wanted again, but this was the first step on that road, and more importantly, the first step to getting the hell out of her crappy apartment. She felt like that place was just the cherry on top of the crap sundae that was her life.

But now there was hope. She had income, and she felt like the only way things could go was up. Lex had done his best to take her hope away, causing her to lose her job and starting that spiral that had nearly ruined her life. But she'd won. His negative influence on her life was being brushed away like the ash of an old fire so that a new flame could be made.

Checking her watch again, she bit her lip and waited impatiently. Blake had told her that the paychecks were hand delivered to desks every other week, so she'd been looking forward to this day for the whole week, not to mention the previous.

Finally, a few minutes later she saw a guy walking around and handing out envelopes. She'd had so little to be excited about recently that she was almost bouncing in her chair as the guy walked towards her desk. Then he walked by without stopping. Chloe frowned for a second, scratching at the back of her left hand before standing up and following the guy. After he handed an envelope to somebody she tapped him on the shoulder and he turned to face her.

"Hi, yeah, I'm Chloe Sullivan. You didn't happen to pass me up, did you?"

"Let me check," he said as he looked at a list of names. "No, there's no Chloe Sullivan on here. Are you a new employee?"

"I started ten days ago, so yeah."

"Did you get all your paperwork done? Maybe sign up for direct deposit?"

"Yes to the first question, no to the second. Call me old fashioned, but I actually like to see my check instead of just randomly having money put into my account."

He shrugged at her. "Don't know what to tell you. I guess you can take it up with the accounting department, or maybe human resources. I just hand the checks out, got nothing to do with them being signed or whatever."

Chloe gave him a quick smile before turning away and frowning. It figured. Her happiness just had to be ruined by some stupid mix up. Making her way back to her desk, she grabbed the earpiece to the phone, her notepad and a pen before heading towards to other end of the office. She knocked on the accounting offices door and quickly was told to come in.

A middle aged woman sat behind a desk covered in papers. Chloe gave her a quick smile before speaking. "Hi, my name is Chloe Sullivan. I started here ten days ago, but I didn't get my check today. The guy said to try here first, so this is me trying."

"Alright, what day did you start working here?"

"July 23rd. A week ago this past Tuesday."

The lady started punching things up on her computer and Chloe waited patiently. The phone wasn't ringing, fortunately, so this could work itself out as quickly as possible instead of her having to step out and take a call.

"I do not see your name on the payroll, Miss Sullivan. What's your job?"

"I'm Mr. Stanton's assistant."

"And you got all your paperwork filled out and filed?"

"That was most of my first day."

"Well, there's not much I can do. You need to go to HR and see what happened to your paperwork, because I haven't received anything to put you on the payroll."

Chloe fought the urge to roll her eyes and left the office, heading back towards her desk. She turned and walked into the little side part of the office devoted to HR. She walked up to their main little desk thing and spoke to the guy sitting behind it. "Who do I see about not getting a paycheck?"

"You want accounting, down further that way," he said as he pointed towards where she'd been.

"I just came from there, actually, and the lady said that I need to come here since my paperwork or whatever didn't get sent to her so that I was put on the payroll."

"Oh, alright. You want Trip back in the corner. He's seeing somebody at the moment, so you can have a seat if you want, or I can have him buzz your desk."

"I'll wait," Chloe said as she took a seat in a chair against the wall. Sitting back, she crossed her legs and let her hands rest in her lap. A few minutes later she saw somebody come walking out and got waved in by the guy at the desk. She walked back to the office and knocked on the opened door. "Trip?"

"Yeah, that's me. What can I help you with?"

Chloe took a few steps inside the office. "I didn't get my check today, and the lady in accounting said she never got any paperwork to put me on payroll, so I was sent here and pointed your way."

"Alright. When were you hired.?"

"July 23d."

"And you filled out all the forms?"

"As far as I know."

"Your job?"

"I'm Mr. Stanton's assistant."

The man started typing something, and a few minutes later started going through some papers in a filing cabinet next to his desk before sitting back down and shaking his head at her. "I cannot find any information on you anywhere. You seem to have slipped through the cracks of the system, unfortunately."

Chloe sighed. Perfect. Now she couldn't even catch a break when she caught a break and got a job. "Is there anything we can do about it?"

"This afternoon? No, sorry. Basically what needs to happen is that you have to redo all your paperwork, because it's gotten lost somewhere. It's not in the system and it's not in my files. We could do that now, but Blake isn't here to sign off on it."

Chloe rubbed at her forehead for a second, eyes closed as she fought the urge to yell a few obscenities. "So, when Blake gets back on Tuesday we can do all this and I can get paid?"

"Well, maybe. We can do all the papers, but in all likelihood you won't be able to get paid until the end of the week. Probably. It might be a week from next Friday, but you can talk to accounting about that."

"Two weeks? I may not get paid for another two weeks?"

"Like I said, you can talk to accounting about that. There's not really anything I can do right now."

"At least tell me that this has happened before and I'm not just lucky like that."

He smiled sheepishly. "Sorry."

Chloe exhaled loudly. "Can I at least get the paperwork to fill out over the weekend so I'm not wasting a day letting work pile up while I'm doing it?"

A little while later Chloe walked out of the office, still feeling like steam should be pouring out of her ears. At least she had the paperwork, but the possibility of not getting paid for two weeks... why? Why did this shit happen to her? Why did it ONLY happen to her? Getting back to her desk, she tossed her headset down on it and set the automated message to play until Monday. Grabbing her purse, she walked out of the office and caught a cab, heading home until Lois and Clark came by to pick her up for dinner.

Once in her apartment, Chloe changed into some much more comfortable clothes and flopped down on her bed. Rubbing a hand over her face, she got up again and walked over to her mini fridge, pulling out a bottle of water before heading back to sit on the edge of her bed.

She'd been trying to cut down on her alcohol intake since she'd gotten the new job. It had seemed like hope, and while she'd never thought of drinking as hopeful, it had seemed to make her forget hopelessness for a while. Waking up with a hangover three mornings a week was not pleasant, though.

Checking her watch again, she figured that Lois and Clark would be there any minute. Grabbing her purse once more, she slipped on some sandals and headed downstairs, walking out of her building and standing on the sidewalk. It was an oddly cool day for August, but felt pretty good. The sun was still high enough that she caught a little bit of it on the back of her neck. Running a hand back through her hair, she ruffled it a little bit so that it shielded her neck until the sun disappeared behind the buildings.

After waiting another ten minutes outside, Chloe had moved back to sit on the steps leading into her building. Scowling, she pulled her phone out to see if she'd gotten any calls, finding that she hadn't. She sighed, deciding to wait for a while longer. It wasn't like Lois was the most punctual person in the world. Running late was almost force of habit for her, at least in the morning. Waking up was not her cousin's strong suit, or so she claimed.

Chloe had always thought that Lois could have been a morning person if she hadn't chosen to go into a profession that kept her investigating things late at night. Once Clark had gotten back from his training and been teamed up with Lois, she'd taken to doing more during the day. Having a lookout for her activities, even if it was Clark, had emboldened her a little. Once Clark had told her about his powers and non-spectacled alias, she'd been very emboldened, especially soon after when they were together.

Not that Lois had really needed emboldening. It was just piling on to where the was already excess, really.

Chloe checked her watch again and rested her arms on her knees as she watched cars drive by. When Lois had seen her new building, she'd about flipped. If not for Clark holding her back, she was sure that Lois would have single handedly moved her into their basement. She'd claimed that Chloe would have been just as close to everything without having all the less than stellar looking people around, plus it was free.

As flattering as it had been to have somebody care enough to try and forcibly move her into her home, Chloe had wanted to maintain some semblance of autonomy in her life. If she'd have been in their basement, she never would have stopped hearing from Lois about how she should try dating again, or how she should keep going after journalism jobs, no matter what the outcome would obviously be. What if she was pleasantly surprised?

Truth was, she'd thought about doing that. But what was out there for her? She goes to a smaller paper, sure, but she'd still have the black mark on her record. What would they let her do? Reporting on the happenings of city hall in some random city really didn't sound like the greatest thing. She'd worked for the Daily Planet, one of the preeminent papers in the world! Taking a step down like that would have been too much.

At least she still had her pride. Not that it got her anywhere, really. All it did was keep her from leaving Metropolis to work at what she did best for a small paper that would never dare take on Lex Luthor, at least not in print. Hire her? Sure, but she wouldn't have any effect on the world, and that was where the pride kicked in. She'd changed things in Metropolis that had repercussions through the country and even internationally; anything less wouldn't work.

Chloe rested her face in her hands, pulling it up a little bit until her chin was resting on her palm. Her thoughts were going in circles. She had to stop thinking about what she didn't have anymore and focus on the future. She had a job again, one that didn't seem to want to pay her, but a job nonetheless. Opportunity for advancement in a young tech compant that was getting financiers behind it, well, that had potential written all over it.

Pulling her phone out of her purse, Chloe scrolled to Lois's cell and hit the dialing button. She put the phone to her ear and listened to it ring for a minute before her voicemail picked up.

"You've reached the voicemail of Lois Lane Kent. Leave me a message and I'll call you back ASAP, or at least when I have a chance."

When it beeped, Chloe spoke. "Hey Lo, it's Chloe. Just wondering where you are. I'm sure you've just got your hands full with Jacob and Clark is out, or something like that. I'm looking forward to dinner tonight, and to seeing you guys. Bye."

Two hours later, Chloe was sitting in her apartment, scrolling to Lois's number again. She growled as the stupid message played and waited for the beep. "So, Lois, how's it going? If you feel like you forgot something tonight, don't worry about it. Fits in perfect with my day, where my new job seems to think I don't exist. Have a nice night, or day if you get this when it's sunny tomorrow."

Chloe closed her phone and grabbed her purse again, heading out of her apartment and downstairs. It was one thing to slip between the cracks in a company, but to be forgotten by her cousin, who was basically her sister, without so much as a call? Walking along the sidewalk, Chloe kept an eye on every dark crevice between buildings. She finally got to the diner and pulled on the door, only to find it locked. Looking inside, all the lights were off. She just about screamed.

Waving down a cab, Chloe got in and had the driver take her to the nearest restaurant. Somehow that ended up being a Chili's fifteen minutes away, but she wasn't complaining because she was starved. Walking inside, Chloe went straight to the bar and sat down. Motioning to the bartender, he walked over to her.

"What can I get you?"

"Tall Shiner Blonde. Can I also get a thing of chips and salsa and a cheeseburger with lettuce, tomato and ketchup?"

"Sure thing. I'll go put the order in and get your beer right after."

He walked off and Chloe let her head rest on the bar, closing her eyes as her stomach grumbled at her audibly. She lifted her head back up a moment later when the bartender put her beer and the chips in front of her. Chloe smiled at him a second before taking a big drink and grabbing a couple chips, crunching them loudly. She dipped the next few in salsa, enjoy the spice, but she went through the chips quickly. She turned down another basket of them so that she would have room for her burger and fries.

When those got there, Chloe ordered another beer and dug in, eating the burger like it was going out of style. She let the fries linger a bit before finishing them off and ordering a slice of some chocolate cake and kahlua combo that really topped things off well. She finished off her third beer after she finished her cake and paid, walking out of the restaurant. Pulling her phone out of her purse, she found that she had no messages and called the cab company.

An hour later she was home, slipping off her sandals and clothes before pulling on a nightshirt and falling into bed.

Chloe woke up with a start as somebody was pounding on her door. Blinking a few times, she got out of bed and pulled on the pants she'd discarded last night before pulling the door open, finding Lois standing there.

"What the hell are you doing here at... what time is it?"

"8:30. I am SO sorry that we forgot about dinner last night, it's just everything piled up and we didn't even eat until about 9:00, and by that point I had just been so busy... God, that's no excuse. I shouldn't forget about you, no matter what. When I got your message after waking up this morning I felt like the world's biggest ass."

Chloe waved her off, going back and sitting down on the edge of her bed as she rubbed at her eye. She stifled a yawn as she spoke. "Don't worry about it, Lois. I ate at Chili's, came home and passed out. It was a well rounded night of eating and drinking."

"Well at least let me treat you to breakfast. Clark and Jacob stayed home so it'll just be you and me. We can talk about what happened at your job yesterday! I'm very ready to lend a sympathetic ear. Come on, up and at 'em! Get dressed!"

Chloe eyed her cousin a second before getting up and pulling a clean shirt and bra out of her laundry bag, walking over to the bathroom and pulling her dirty clothes off before pulling the clean ones on. She grabbed her toothbrush and some toothpaste, giving her teeth a quick scrub before walking out to the her living room again. She picked a hairbrush up off a pile of junk and ran it through her hair as she talked.

"So, where do you want to go?"

"How about we..." Lois was interrupted by the sound of her phone ringing, and when she pulled it out of her pocket and looked at it her face fell. Chloe raised an eyebrow as Lois looked up at her. "I'm going to take this, but I'll be right back."

When Lois stepped out into the hallway, Chloe sat back down onto bed, groaning as she tossed the hairbrush away. She felt like she could sleep for another two or three hours, and after sleeping for nine, figured that to be a bad idea, no matter how good it sounded. She laid there for a minute, then sat up when she heard Lois walk back in. The brunette looked annoyed and sad all at once.

"I'm so sorry, Chloe. That was a source I've been trying to meet with for near to a month, and if I don't take this opportunity the story may never pan out."

Second to a story. That had never happened before, at least not on a weekend. "It's alright, Lo. I've been there. Maybe we can do lunch later or something."

"Actually, the source is kind of out of town, so I'm going to have to get Clark to fly me there."

"Where are you supposed to meet?"

"Oregon."

Chloe stared at Lois, a little slack-jawed for a second before shaking herself out of it. "Ok, well, that's that then. Good visit."

"Let's meet up tomorrow. We'll come get you early or meet somewhere and make a family day of it. Maybe Lucy and Jimmy could join us, eh? They'd make it a total family day."

For crying out loud, now she was going to be the fifth wheel! Counting Jacob and the embryo she could be the seventh wheel again. Much as she wanted to tell Lois she wanted it to be just them, she plastered on a smile and nodded. "Sounds great, Lo. Good luck with your meeting."

Lois smiled and walked over, leaning over and hugging her. "I love you, Chlo. I'll call you tonight and we'll hammer out details, alright?"

"Perfect."

When Lois left, Chloe sat and stared at the door, sighing. Tomorrow was going to suck. It was going to be couples stuff the whole day, or at least as soon as Lucy and Jimmy got there. With her luck they'd probably already be deep in conversation by the time she got to wherever they decided to go and would spend the whole day getting babbled at by Jacob.

It was family, though. The only thing left she cared about, really. She just wished that she felt like a part of it anymore.

Chloe paid the driver and got out of the cab, thanking him before walking over to where Lois and Clark were standing next to Jacob's stroller under the shade of a tree. She smiled at them when they saw her and got wrapped in a hug when she got close to Lois.

"Again, so sorry about yesterday, Chloe."

"Again, I understand, Lo. I remember what the chase was like, and when your source is making himself scarce, you have to take advantage of the opportunities you can."

She was hugged a little tighter for a second before she was let go. Clark smiled at her. "So, looking forward to the zoo?"

"Yeah, though I'm still not sure how we ended up making this the place we were starting our day at. I've never been big on the zoo, and isn't Jacob a little young to remember any of this?"

"I'm not putting anything out of the realm of possibility with a half kryptonian baby," Lois said quietly as she lifted Jacob up out of his stroller. She took the few steps back over to her and deposited the eight month old into her arms. Chloe smiled down at him as he wriggled a bit and looked back at his mom.

"I know, little guy. I always feel kinda sad when your mommy lets me go, too." Chloe got him settled against her body, bouncing a little and he calmed down a bit but was still looking back towards his mom. Lois handed her a pacifier and she offered it to Jacob, who took it like it was exactly what he was waiting for. "You always seem to know what he needs, Lo."

"When there's enough crying and fussing over time, one tries to learn as quickly as possible. Fortunately, Jacob is as easy a read as his father is."

"I don't know if I should take offense or be happy you know me so well, Lo."

"I'm saying the latter, Smallville... what's up?"

Chloe looked over at Clark, and she recognized the look he had. He looked at them, sighing. "I need to go. I'll catch up with you guys later."

Chloe watched him run off, shaking her head at her friend's departure. It was too bad he had to go, because it really felt like this could be a good day. They spent the next couple minutes in a comfortable quiet, Chloe playing with Jacob and noticing Lois messing with her phone. On a break from bouncing, Chloe spoke to her. "Whose call are you waiting for?"

Lois looked up. "What? Oh, it's nothing."

"It's not nothing. You're staring at that thing like it's about to turn into a big pile of money. If it is, I'm trading you your baby for that phone so I can move out of my hole and into someplace nice, or at least less of a hole."

"Deal, but only because I love my son so much. Normally any random piles of money that come from my phone would stay mine."

"Duly noted."

After a moment of quiet, Lois spoke. "So, what happened at work on Friday?"

Chloe looked at Lois for a second before looking back to Jacob. She rubbed circles on his back as he laid his head against her. She walked over next to Lois, standing there and watching people pass them by. "Really, it just seemed like one of those things that could only happen to me these days. It probably felt like a bigger deal than it was, but when I asked if it had happened to anybody else and was told no, it was just a steam coming out of the ears moment."

"Then I ask again: what happened?"

"Well, the paycheck guy was passing out the checks. I like to actually get my check instead of having it go directly into my bank account, so when he passed me by like I wasn't even there, I went after him. He told me I wasn't on his list. So I went to accounting, and they had no record of me. Finally, I went to HR and was told that all the paperwork I filled out on my first day had disappeared, like it never existed. I couldn't get my check, and filling out the papers wouldn't do me much good because apparently Blake needed to be there to sign them."

"When will you get paid?"

"No idea. The HR guy, Trip, said that it may be the end of next week, or I may just have to wait until everybody else gets paid two weeks from then, so in twelve days."

Jacob started fussing as Chloe finished speaking and Lois reached over and took him from her, getting him settled in her arms and speaking to him quietly. Chloe crossed her arms over her chest, looking up at the blue sky for a second before looking at the trees. There was no wind to speak of so everything was really still. She looked down at the people for a moment, watching some pass them and go into the zoo until her eyes trained on Lucy and Jimmy walking up. She waved at them and the walked over.

"Hey guys. How's your day been so far?"

"Uneventful. Wake up, breakfast, come here and see you guys."

Chloe glanced at Lois, who raised an eyebrow at her sister. "Still no morning sickness?"

"Still no morning sickness."

"You are just..." Lois stopped speaking for a second and Chloe hid a smile by turning away and looking at Lucy and Jimmy. "You're lucky Jacob is around, and we'll leave it at that."

"Say, where's C.K. at?"

"He had some errands to run, but he's going to join us as soon as possible. So, we ready to head in and look at animals?"

Once inside, Chloe grabbed a map and started guiding them around. They made their way through some of the smaller exhibits before heading towards the birds. As they were walking, Lois's phone rang and Chloe took the stroller from her, letting Lois walk off a little ways. They made their way over to a bench to sit while they waited. Chloe smiled when Jimmy wrapped an arm around Lucy and she leaned into him.

"I'm glad you guys are happy."

Lucy smiled at her. "Thanks, Chloe." Lucy stopped there, and Chloe was thankful for once she had dodged a bullet. She always had to say that she was happy for people for some reason, generally before she thought about what she was saying, and it never led to good things. Usually it led to people saying thanks and wishing her the same luck. Stupid luck. Not that she was bitter or anything. She turned and looked into Jacob's stroller for a second, then Lucy spoke.

"I know Lois asks you this, but have you thought about dating again? I don't want to push you into anything. I just want to see you, I don't know, living."

Chloe sighed and turned her head to look at Lucy with one eye and keep the other on Jacob. Keeping him in view would keep her from yelling. "I think I missed the memo that said dating is living."

Lucy frowned. "Yeah, that came out wrong. Dating is not living; not to sound jaded or cynical, but dating is systematically lying less and less until the other person is invested enough to not care if you're half crazy."

"My wife, the romantic."

Lucy elbowed Jimmy in the stomach before continuing to speak. "What I'm trying to say here is that it makes me sad to see you sitting on the sideline, watching everybody else live while you just drift along. I know you've got the new job, and that's great; getting back into professional life is important, too. Will you be happy with just working, though?"

Chloe looked up at Jimmy. "Can you gives us a minute?"

He nodded. "Yeah, not a problem. I'll go get us some funnel cakes."

Chloe watched him walk off a moment before turning back to Lucy. "Sorry to send your husband off, but this would be awkward with him here." Lucy nodded and Chloe spoke again. "I'll give you the condensed version of what I told Lois. I'm always the wrong girl. Every time I invest in a guy, I'm not what he wants. I know that's true for most couples because not every couple that dates gets married, but this isn't about that. I'm the stand in until they can get what they really want, and I'm sick of it.

"In this world of outstanding people we live in I'm not outstanding, I'm just all right. I accept that and I always have. When I found Mark, I felt outstanding. When he asked me to marry him, I was giddy and started thinking that I was outstanding to him, which is what mattered. But he never loved me. I was never outstanding, just something he thought he wanted. He loved some woman named Laura for the last eight months of our relationship and didn't have the balls to end us because he thought I was good for him.

"I don't mind breaking up with a guy. It's part of life, and a part I've been on both sides of. But to put myself totally out there and told that I'm not enough? If I have to go through that again, it will be the end of me."

Chloe frowned and looked away. That had turned into the barely condensed version of what she'd told Lois, but it probably got the point across, and that's what was important. When Lucy spoke again, Chloe wondered if her point hadn't been clear.

"Chlo, everything in life is a crapshoot. You can't give up on it because these things have a way of working themselves out, cliché as it is. There's a guy that flies because he's from another planet, for Christ's sake! Anything is possible so long as you're open to letting it happen."

"Letting it happen is what keeps hurting me, Lucy, so I'm getting pretty tired of that kind of thing. Some people get lifetimes of happiness, others two and a half years of fake happiness. I happen to be in the latter group."

Chloe was going to say more but saw Lois walking back to them and stopped. She could now tell why Lois had always described her as extremely stubborn about things when before she'd always been pleasantly amenable. God, she'd gone the whole morning without feeling sorry for herself and Lucy just had to ruin that by trying to help. Lois got to them and smiled sadly.

"So, I need to go. Another meeting with a source."

Chloe stood up and shoved her hands in her pocket. "That's too bad, Lo. Maybe we can do something next weekend."

"Well actually, I was going to ask if you wanted to watch Jacob. I was going to give you my house key so you could go there and spend time with him."

"I'll do it!" Chloe looked back over her shoulder at Lucy, who seemed to just realize what she'd shouted. "I mean, ya know, if you don't want to, Chloe."

"No, that's alright. The practice is a lot more relevant for you than it ever will be for me, so go ahead."

"Chloe, why don't you go with her and Jimmy?"

Chloe gave a tight smile and pulled Lois into a hug. "I just endured that torture, and I don't need more of it."

Lois pushed her away, but held onto her arms. "What do you mean?"

"Remember that talk we had at the end of the night when Lana and Pete were in town?"

"Yeah, kind of... why?"

"I basically just had it all over again, and Lucy didn't want to let things go nor did I have a cab to escape in. You leaving is my cab. I love you, and I'll talk to you later." Chloe turned around and waved at Lucy. "Love you, Luce."

Lucy waved at her and Chloe walked off, heading towards the exit. Another day, another talk on why she wasn't happy alone. Why could nobody get that this had nothing to do with being alone? It was about hurting, dammit, and she was tired of hurting. If being alone kept her from hurting, then that was the way things had to be.

Not wanting to go home yet, Chloe walked into an adjacent park and took up a spot on a bench, watching people walk by. Why were so many of them holding hands? Worse, why were there so many people with kids? God, now this crap was in her head! Alone was the only way to keep what was left of her heart, and that's what counted. Unfortunately, it hurt what was left of her heart every time a couple walked by. To never have that again...

Shaking her head, Chloe tried to temper her thoughts but was unsuccessful. Either she was the only damn single person in the entire park or she was in the midst of the most ill-timed visit in history.

Sighing, Chloe covered her face with her hands a second before running them back through her hair. Lois asking her why she wouldn't date, Lucy asking her why she wouldn't date... she needed some kind of alarm that would tell her when somebody was going to start in on that crap. Why couldn't anybody else figure out that she didn't get the happily ever after love and just quit bothering her about it?