---- Chapter 3: Piling On

"Mr. Franklin? Come on, Mr. Franklin, I need to speak to you."

Chloe knocked on the landlord's door again, hoping that he would answer. So far all she'd heard from him were obscenities that were loud enough to be heard through the door. She knocked again and finally heard steps coming towards her. She backed up a bit as the door opened.

"What?"

"Hi. Look, there's a possibility I'm going to be a couple days late on rent and I just wanted to tell you before you started threatening me with an eviction for not paying on time."

He leaned up again the door jamb. "And why shouldn't I just tell you to get out right now?"

Chloe shrugged and smiled as best she could. "Because I had the courtesy to tell you?"

"Thirty dollars every day you don't pay. More than five days late, you're out."

He retreated back into his room and slammed the door shut. Chloe sighed and walked back to her hole. This whole not having been paid thing was not her idea of good times. When she'd landed the job she'd started splurging on things like more cab rides and better food, assuming she'd get to replenish her savings. As such, now she was running short, even for the minuscule amount her apartment cost. At the moment, though, she needed to come up with that minuscule amount or she was going to be out on her ass.

Her options were limited, though. If she couldn't get paid in the next few days she was going to have to resort to asking Lois and Clark to loan her some money, and that was something she wanted to avoid if at all possible. She'd do it if there was no way around it, but that would just lead to questions that she would feel obligated to answer, no matter how uncomfortable they were. She'd always preferred to be the one asking the questions.

Once in her apartment Chloe walked over to the fridge and pulled out a beer. At least Blake would be back tomorrow. Hopefully when she talked to him about what had happened she'd be able to get him to have the accounting lady to get everything in order and cut her a check. It seemed unlikely.

Chloe yawned as she walked through the office, covering her mouth as she got to her desk and dropped her purse down into a drawer. She grabbed her earpiece and put it on before turning off the automated message and checking to see what had been recorder, if anything, over the weekend. There was one message and Chloe wrote down the name and number before logging into the computer system.

She worked for a little while, taking a couple more messages before she saw Blake walking down the hall towards her. He smiled and stopped in front of her desk. "Hey, Chloe. How was your weekend?"

"It was all right." She handed him the piece of paper with the messages on it. "The first one was left on the system over the weekend, the other two in the last twenty minutes or so. When you get a free minute, can we talk?"

"Yeah, sure. I'll buzz you as soon as I've returned these calls."

He walked into his office and closed the door behind him. Chloe sat back down at her desk, getting back to the paperwork she had to do. Immersing herself in the work, she barely noticed time passing, and found that it had been an hour before she knew it. It was the one thing about this job that she could appreciate, the loss of time factor. Not having deadlines was also a plus, though she found herself longing to have a deadline to write something at the most random times.

Just as she was getting back into something her phone buzzed on her ear and the light on the desk indicated it was from the office. She pushed the answering button. "You need something, Blake?"

"Chloe, come on in."

Setting the message in case of any calls, Chloe dropped her earpiece onto the desk and grabbed the papers she'd gotten from Trip on Friday. Walking into the office, she gave Blake a quick smile before sitting down. "What can I help you with?"

"Well, while you were out of town on Friday paychecks went out. I didn't get one. After some investigation, it turns out something happened to my paperwork somewhere along the line and so I basically don't exist inside the company."

"Are you serious? I handed that paperwork to Trip myself!"

"I don't know what happened. Trip gave me the paperwork and I filled it out again, hoping I could get you to sign off on it so I can be paid today."

Blake sat forward, resting his arms on his desk and motioned for the papers. Chloe handed them to him and after he gave them a quick scan, signed a couple places and handed them back to her. "I'll talk to Lisa right now and get everything sorted out so that you'll have a check by lunch. Why don't you go give your papers to Trip and tell him that I want to see him about this before the day is done. If something like this happens when we're this small, how the hell is he going to handle things as we grow?"

Chloe figured that last bit was more to himself than her and let herself out of the office. The only thing she could think was that she was incredibly happy that she wasn't going to have to go to Lois and Clark for money. God, if she'd needed that they probably would have tried to get her to move into their basement, again, and she didn't know if she'd have resisted. It would be easy to move in somewhere where she could live for free, no matter how much more sad it would make her sad life.

Walking into the HR section of the office, Chloe came to the guy at the desk again. "I need to see Trip for Mr. Stanton."

"He's free, so head on back."

Chloe nodded and headed past his desk until she got to Trip's office. She knocked on the door once before walking in. He looked up at her and sat back in her chair. "Sullivan, right?"

"Right." Chloe handed him the papers. "Filled out by me, signed by Blake. He'd like to see you about this situation by the end of the day, too."

He looked up at her. "Why?"

"Something about losing papers and handling growth. Really, you'll have to talk to him about it. By the end of the day, Trip."

Chloe walked out of his office feeling very satisfied. This had all gone much better than she'd thought it would. Blake making sure that she would have a check by lunch was great, and Trip getting a talking to after he'd apparently been the one to screw things up was just icing on the cake.

A couple hours later Chloe was sitting at her desk when the phone buzzed. "Mr. Stanton's office."

"Miss Sullivan, this is Lisa from accounting. Mr. Stanton had Trip and I fast track all your paperwork and I have your paycheck here. You can pick it up anytime."

Chloe smiled and sat back in her chair. "Thank you, Lisa. I'll be by to pick it up in a few minutes."

Chloe pumped her fist, holding in the victorious cry she wanted to let out. All of it was an overreaction, sure, but what few victories she could achieve deserved to be celebrated to the fullest. Giving herself a moment, she closed her eyes and hoped that this was the beginning of good things, at least professionally. She didn't expect her whole life to turn around just because she could actually get paid.

"Slacking off?"

Chloe spun around in her chair and looked at Blake. "Taking a moment to hope that a simple paycheck means more than money in my life."

"Would lunch help?"

"Couldn't hurt."

Chloe took a piece of paper he held out to her. Looking at it, all that was written on it was a phone number. "What's this for?"

"Little Chinese place a few blocks from here. Order whatever you want, we'll eat together in my office."

Chloe looked at the number a moment before looking up at him. "Ok. What do you want?"

"Imperial beef and a couple eggs rolls." He tossed something at her and she caught it. Looking down at it, she found she was holding a credit card. "It's a company card. Charge it on there and come on in when it gets here."

When Chloe looked up Blake had already retreated back into his office. Shrugging, she dialed the place and ordered his food, along with some hot braised pork and egg rolls for herself. Half an hour later the food was there and she paid with the company card, giving the guy a decent tip before turning on the message and dropping the earpiece on the desk. She grabbed the food and walked into Blake's office, setting the food down on his desk. She handed him the company credit card as he started pulling food out of the bags. They were soon seated and eating their respective meals.

"So, Chloe, tell me if I'm overstepping my bounds, but how's life treating you these days?"

Chloe looked over her food at him. "Why do you ask?"

"I remember that you seemed pretty dissatisfied with it when you interviewed, not to mention you said not an hour ago that you were hoping a paycheck meant more than money. That doesn't exactly sound like the statement of somebody with happiness surrounding her."

"There's happiness," Chloe said around a bite of egg roll, "but it just has a hard time penetrating my tough exterior."

"You have a tough exterior?"

"It's possible." Chloe frowned as he laughed. "It's possible!"

His laughter calmed down into a wide smile. "I'm sure it is. I think you're still recovering from the whole Lex Luthor incident and aren't really happy here, knowing where you should be."

"You're not all wrong. I am still recovering from some things in my life, but I'm thankful for this job. If I hadn't gotten this I probably would have ended up in the food service industry, maybe retail. Nothing wrong with either, but they're not my first choice, as you may guess."

"Still recovering from things? Were there circumstances not involving Luthor?" He winced. "Sorry, I tend to put my nose into other people's business. You don't have to answer that."

Chloe swallowed her food and was silent a moment before speaking. "No, it's alright, I'm not afraid to share." Chloe bit her lip a second before starting. Maybe she was a little afraid of sharing. "Four days after Lex cost me my job, my fiancé left me for another woman after telling me he never really loved me. Haven't heard from the bastard since, thankfully. Since I had no job at the time and felt like shit, I went to stay with my dad and while I was there, he suffered a heart attack and passed away."

Chloe looked up at him and found him wide eyed, his mouth hanging open a little. She leaned across the desk and pushed his mouth closed with her chopsticks. He smiled sheepishly. "Sorry. Wasn't really expecting to hear all that."

"I wasn't really expecting to live all that in the span of twelve days. It still kind of dominates my thoughts, along with avoiding my cousins and their desires to see me wrapped around a man."

"What?"

Chloe laughed, realizing how that must have sounded. "They think that if I get back into the dating scene I won't feel so bad about my life. They're better than they sound, I promise, but they're both married, one is pregnant and the other has an eight month old."

"I've been there, kind of. It's probably worse for women, but I have a mother that is determined to see me give her grandchildren before she dies. Seeing as how she runs marathons and gets a clean bill of health every time she goes to the doctor, there's plenty of time left for that, I figure."

"Never take that for granted," Chloe said as she pointed her chopsticks at him.

"You're right, I shouldn't. The constant pressure, though... She wonders why I don't go visit her more often, and I tell her it's because I'm busy here but really, I can only take some much pressure to marry and have kids. Since it gets worse every year I don't have any my visits have become a little shorter over the years. I want my company to be successful before I even think about getting married, let alone kids."

"She is not unlike one of my cousins, Lois. Before everything happened in April she had taken to planning my life out for me. Even had my first baby, which apparently was going to be a girl, named for me. After I lost my job, when we were out having a picnic, she told me that since my mom was unavailable she was playing the role."

He laughed for a moment, taking a drink of water. Chloe laughed a bit, too. It was fairly absurd that Lois had taken to naming her children for her.

"I think your cousin may actually have my mom beat."

"I don't doubt it. Lois has a way about her which tends to have her doing things in a big way. It's why she's the top reporter at the Daily Planet."

She smiled when Blake frowned, trying to put together what she said. "Wait, your cousin is Lois Lane? She's the Lois of Lane and Kent?"

"One and the same. I'm the reason those two met, actually."

"I can only imagine this story."

Chloe shrugged. "The short version is I ran afoul of Lionel Luthor, he tried to kill me, Lex actually helped me survive and fake my death, Lois went to Smallville to try and find me and met Clark, working with him to find me."

"You'll have to tell me the long version sometime." He looked at his watch and sighed. "Unfortunately, it can't be now. I have a conference call in ten minutes I need to prep for." Chloe nodded and got up out of her chair. "I enjoyed talking to you, Chloe."

She smiled at him. "I enjoyed it too, Blake. We may just have to try it again sometime."

"I agree. If you want to save your food, you can stick it in my mini fridge, if you want."

"I think I'll take you up on that."

After putting her food away, Chloe walked back out to her desk and sat down. That had been nice. They had similar family situations, if nothing else. Pretty much everybody could bond over one family thing or another, though. It had been fun just talking to somebody with no expectations. If only that were the norm.

Smiling, Chloe walked home from the diner. After work she hadn't been able to get to the bank before it closed so she'd held onto it, deciding that depositing it in person would be a nice symbolic gesture of getting back on her feet. She could write a check for rent when it was in there and at most she'd have to pay thirty bucks extra. Not too bad, considering that she might have needed to pay four days extra after borrowing money, of all things.

After the unsuccessful trip to the bank dinner had been in order, and she'd gone to Marv's for a chicken sandwich and some fries. It wasn't very good, but at least she had good food to look forward to for lunch the next day. Reheated good food. Way better than skipping lunch to save money.

Rubbing at her neck as she walked, Chloe turned a corner and yawned. She let her hand dropped to her side and walked along slowly. Somehow she'd ended up staying at Marv's until he'd closed the place down. She blamed the television; when she didn't get something useful very often, she found that taking advantage of it when it was available to be a good idea. Unfortunately it left a two block walk home in the dark.

She'd never been a nervous person, really, but Lois had gotten the idea of a mugging stuck in her head when she'd moved into the building. Lois had assured her that half the mugging's Superman stopped were within a three block radius of her apartment, which Clark had debunked seconds later. Yet, here she was, keeping an eye on every nook and cranny because of that speech.

When a hand went over Chloe's mouth she almost rolled her eyes at the timing. Of course she was going to get mugged when she was thinking about Lois telling her she was going to get mugged.

She was thrown back into an alley and stumbled, falling over. She rolled over and sat up, looking at her attacker. He was holding a knife that glinted in the moonlight. Jesus, was she in a cheesy television show or something?

"Gimme your purse, lady!"

Chloe sighed and held up a finger at him. She looked up at the sky. "Superman!" She looked down and smiled at the mugger who was looking up apprehensively. She waited a moment, glancing at the sky after a few seconds and finding no help from Clark. "Superman?"

"Looks like you're the one woman in this city Superman isn't going to save, so hand over your fucking purse!"

Chloe scrambled up to her feet and backed away a bit as the man advanced on her. Alright, this was looking worse and worse by the second. Holding her purse close to her body, she continued to back away slowly. "Superman! Come on!"

Chloe jumped aside as the mugger dove at her, knife first. She started running the other way, but being in heels kept her from achieving any pace. She was tackled from behind and couldn't do much except try to crawl away. The man grabbed her purse and jumped off, running down the alley she'd been thrown into.

Getting up, Chloe dusted herself off, feeling lucky that the man hadn't resolved to use the knife. She'd protected the purse out of instinct more than anything else. Nothing worth anything was ever in there anyway.

Except, of course, her paycheck.

Chloe suddenly felt like she could cry. She'd had it, and now it was gone. Stupid symbolic gestures! Why couldn't she have just dropped the damn thing in a night deposit box? No, she had to do something to try and make herself feel better about her life and it cost her the money she wanted to make the gesture with!

Suddenly a gust of wind blew into her face and she closed her eyes for a second until it passed. When they were opened, Clark was standing in front of her. "What happened Chloe? Why were you calling me?"

"I just got mugged. He's long gone, by now. According to my mugger, I appear to be the only woman in Metropolis you aren't going to save from trouble."

Clark sagged a little and walked closer to her, laying a hand lightly on her shoulder. "I'm so sorry, Chloe. I was helping with a fire and rescue just east of the city when you called and I couldn't do things any faster than I did."

"It's not your fault, Clark. This is just the kind of thing that seems to happen to me."

"What did he take? Just your purse?"

"Yeah, but it actually had something useful in it for once: my paycheck."

Clark groaned, and Chloe felt like joining him. "Lois told me everything that happened with that. I'm sorry, Chloe. You don't think there's any chance I could find him?"

"I couldn't see any distinguishing features or clothes, so no."

"Damn," he said. He disappeared for a second and reappeared in his regular clothes, putting his glasses on. He walked up to her and smiled sadly. "I feel like I can't say it enough, Chlo, but I'm sorry. I want you to come stay with us tonight and sleep in a comfortable room instead of your apartment. Do you have your keys?"

"In my purse."

"More difficult, but not a big hindrance." He disappeared again, and a moment later reappeared with her bag of clean clothes and laptop. He handed the latter to her and walked her out to the street, waving down a cab. They both got in and he told the guy where to drive.

"Clark, you don't have to do this."

"Do you know what Lois would do to me when she heard about this if I didn't bring you back with me? My son would have to learn about me from you because I'll be in a little pieces and Lois will be in jail for involuntary manslaughter."

Chloe smiled and looked over at him. "Why involuntary manslaughter? Seems like Lois would realize what she was doing while dicing you."

"She wouldn't know what she had done until the white hot rage cleared from her vision."

Chloe nodded, knowing that to be a distinct possibility. The rest of the cab ride was quiet as she watched the scenery fly by. When they got to the house Clark paid before Chloe could try, not that she had any money on her now. Clark hoisted her clothes bag up over his shoulder and walked her into the house. When they walked into the living room Lois looked back over her shoulder and frowned.

"What happened?"

Clark answered before Chloe could say anything. "Chloe got mugged and I couldn't get there in time to even catch the guy as he ran."

"What?" Lois jumped off the couch and walked over to her. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah. Fortunately my mugger wasn't too keen on stabbing, just threatening and thieving. He had ample chance to kill me but didn't."

"What did he take?"

"My purse, which normally wouldn't be a huge deal except it had my paycheck in it."

"Oh God," Lois said as she wrapped Chloe in a hug. "I'm glad Clark brought you here. What did I tell you about that place being a haven for muggers? Nevermind." Lois backed out of the hug and held Chloe at arm's length. "I'm just glad you're ok. Does this at least change your mind about living there? Will you please come stay here where it's safe?"

"Lois, please..."

"Come on, Chloe. I know I'm kinda being harpy here, but if you came here the basement would be all yours. You could save money until you had enough to buy a nice apartment, or even a small house."

Chloe backed away a bit and crossed her arms over her chest. "Lois, listen to the following statement: Thirty one year old living in her cousin's basement because she got mugged while living somewhere crappy and has no money. What comes to mind?"

Lois grinned and shrugged. "A once and future journalist that's down on her luck and needs her family?"

"Close. A once and former journalist no longer able to do what she loves and has had a run of bad luck that makes the worst gamblers look like they're on a hot streak. I'm almost afraid that if I come live here something bad is going to happen to Jacob!"

"Don't be ridiculous, Chlo."

"One, count 'em ONE good thing has happened to me in the last three months, Lois. That was getting a job as an assistant, which in my case is fancy talk for secretary. That's it. That's all I've got, and I can't even find a way to get paid for doing the job! Coming and living here will only mean the bad things that keep happening to me will follow me here, not to mention I'll officially be pathetic. If anything happened to you guys..."

"But it won't," Lois said. "All of that's in your head. I know you're having a rough time; I've been in the front seat for a lot of it. But that doesn't mean that it's going to keep going. You're going to be fine and recover from all this. Let us help you achieve that by giving you a place to stay. Your old furniture is down there, anyway, all set up with the TV hooked up."

Chloe rubbed at her forehead for a minute, eyes squeezed shut. Finally, she sighed and looked at Lois. "Fine, I'll come live here. One bad thing happens to any of you around me and I'm outta here faster than Clark can fly."

"Good thing nothing is going to happen. Tomorrow, after we're all off work, we'll pay your landlord for the next couple months and move all your stuff back here. Well, your bed, since that's basically all you had there besides clothes and other small things."

Lois went on making plans for a little while before they all decided to retire for the night. Chloe walked down the stairs and into the fully carpeted basement. The people before them had apparently liked the notion of basically having a third floor to their house. Chloe looked around as she got down to the bottom of the stairs. She walked over to the couch and sat down, grabbing the remote to her television and turning it on.

She watched for a little while before heading to bed. She found her clothes bag in the room already, figuring Clark must have dropped it there, and changed into a night shirt before getting into the bed. Living in her cousin's basement because her life sucked so much.

"Welcome to the rest of your sad life," she mumbled as she turned over on her side and closed her eyes.