Finding an apartment was significantly easier than Clark anticipated. They found a great apartment that suited Diana's needs on the first day of their search. Whoever lived there must have moved out very recently. It was on the top floor with a balcony facing a park. It was also walking distance from Clark's home. The downside to her new place was the neighborhood, it was a rough area. During their tour of the place, Clark briefly stepped away so Superman could help an older man deal with a couple of rowdy teenagers. Since the 70's the neighborhood was booming, full of people with lots of money. More recently however, the area had declined, resulting in really nice apartments at rock bottom prices. The landlord was leery about renting to Diana, he didn't think it was quite safe for such a beautiful young woman to live there by herself. He obviously didn't have the slightest clue that he was renting to Wonder Woman.

"I should probably get some furniture." Diana said as they stood in the empty living room of her 3 bedroom, 1 and ½ bathroom apartment.

"I think you'll be fine without it. It'll make everything seem bigger." He said sarcastically.

"Very funny." Diana looked annoyed. He had been making silly jokes all day. "So tell me, is there anything wrong with this place?"

Clark looked around, scanning the walls, searching for any undesirable problems. "Nah. Pipes look pretty good, I'm not seeing any mold or anything like that. I don't know building codes but everything looks fire rated sound proof. The guy below us has his music turned up. Can you hear it?"

"No." Diana said, looking at the floor curiously.

"This place is actually really nice, you've got lots of space, the neighborhood kinda sucks, but you'll be fine." If she did get mugged, he was most worried about her blowing her ID, and possibly his, by putting her attacker's head through a brick wall.

"The landlord doesn't think so. When you stepped away, he suggested I get a license to carry a gun. Is this area really that bad?"

"No, not really. But a lot of people do carry guns."

Diana didn't really care, gunshots hurt a little, but they didn't do much damage to her. "So where did you go during the walk through?"

"A couple of high school kids were pushing a guy around. I don't think they were really trying to hurt him, they ran off as soon as I showed up."

"Oh. Just so you know, while I'm here if someone needs help I will step in. I won't allow anyone to suffer just to keep a secret between us."

"I don't expect you to, just know that most of the time people can deal with their own problems. It's when catastrophic things happen, that's when I step in. These days, just being seen flying around solves most problems... So uh, does anybody else know about you moving out here, or... about us?"

"Bruce didn't say anything, but I wouldn't be surprised if he knows about us being together. I told Julia I was going to live in Metropolis, she assumed it had something to do with you, but she didn't press me about it." Julia Kapatelis was Diana's friend, she ran the day to day operations of the Wonder Women Foundation. She knew Clark Kent from the times he'd interviewed Diana, but didn't know he was Superman. "It won't matter to anyone else at the foundation, they don't know where I am half the time anyway. Eventually I'll tell my mother, but not yet. She wasn't pleased when I told her you were my friend and colleague. I imagine she'll be even more upset to know that we're dating. I'm not worried about what she thinks right now."

Clark keyed in on her last statement. Her not caring about what her mother thought about their relationship was another point toward her actually liking him. Still, he knew about the Amazons and the misandry that was rampant on their island, and wasn't excited about the possibility of visiting Themyscira. Even Kara said Hippolyta was mean. "So I guess that means the island won't be opened up to the public any time soon?"

"No, mother is stubborn, there's so much good we could give this world, if only mother would open her eyes and see." Diana had been trying for quite some time to get Themyscira opened to the world, she hoped to become a U.N. Ambassador and represent the Amazons on a much broader scale. But until that time The Wonder Women Foundation would have to do. Looking around, Diana changed the subject. "I think I want a red sofa and some matching chairs." Not wanting to discuss her frustrations with her mother anymore. "Where do you buy things like that?" She asked.

"Uh, there's lots of places to get that stuff. You can order it from a custom place or you can do what I did and go to Gerät-Sessel and put it together yourself."

"Gerät-Sessel? I've never heard of that."

"Oh, good. This should be fun." He said sarcastically.

Gerät-Sessel was a German company that specialized in high end looking furniture for mid range prices, weekends at the Metropolis retail store meant lots and lots of shoppers. And with the shortened Sunday hours, people were scrambling to get in. Clark knew from the moment he pulled into the parking lot he was in for a miserable day. He'd have to do his best to hold in his frustrations. Diana wanted to look at everything in the showroom, Clark secretly wished an airplane would malfunction so he could get out of here. While Diana looked at counter tops that she didn't need, Clark went to the floor model of a wet bar and stood behind it, examining the bottles & glasses that were displayed on top of it.

"You look like you're serving drinks." A woman said to Clark with a smile from the other side of the bar. "I'd like a long island iced tea."

"Rum and coke is all I can make." Clark said with a laugh and a smile. The woman laughed a little too loud at his joke. All the while, Diana was standing behind the her. She briefly thought the woman was out of her mind to ask something like that. Clark's response was quick, and witty, and the woman understood it perfectly. Diana felt self-conscious again, here was this Titan, more powerful than the gods, traversing the world like it was nothing, she was just a lowly demigoddess sent from paradise and dropped into a big ball of confusion. How could they be together? "Are you done here Diana?" He said, looking past the woman.

"Yes, we can go." Diana said, meeting him as he stepped away from the bar. She briefly turned to look at the woman who spoke to Clark, and then stepped closer to him. "We should look at bedroom sets now." She said, hoping the woman could hear her. Despite her currently lowered self-esteem, she still felt defensive about Clark.

"They're both the same. Do you want lighter or darker?" Diana didn't answer as she stood between two chests of drawers. "Your wood grain is dark on everything else you picked out. I say go with the dark one and keep the theme with everything else."

"I could do that, but maybe I want something different. I don't want to feel like I'm walking into the same room everywhere I go."

"So get the lighter color."

"Why are you in such a hurry for me to choose?" He'd been doing this the whole day, it was starting to get on her nerves.

"What? I'm trying to be helpful." Clark feigned innocence.

"You've been rushing me all day. 'Are you done Diana?' 'Pick this one.' 'Diana, you don't even need those.' What is going on with you?" That was Diana. She was one of the few people who called him out on his BS. Bruce did it from time to time, but he was more subtle, giving Clark a look that made him call foul on himself. Diana on the other hand, got in his face about it. "Well, Clark?"

"I want to leave, this place is miserable. We've been here for like 3 hours. When I got my furniture... I was in and out of here in 45 minutes."

"Well why didn't you just say that?"

"Would it have changed anything? No. And I know for a fact you don't want me to walk around like a miserable cuss. There are a lot of guys here doing it, and none of their women are happy about it."

Diana looked around, aside from the woman at the bar display, she'd been largely oblivious to the other shoppers. Perhaps because most of them had been women, but when she looked closer, many of the men looked as bored and frustrated as Clark. Did men really dislike shopping this much? She thought the women who said that had been joking. Apparently not.

The rest of the trip went rather smoothly. Since she had seen most of the store already, Diana decided to indulge Clark and move a little faster. She decided to go with the lighter color for her bedroom, picking a chest of drawers, bookshelf & bed frame. She hadn't realized how much she had purchased until they went into the warehouse and actually took everything down from the shelves. They both had full carts. She was glad that he insisted they rent a van to carry everything back to her apartment. She didn't like however having to play the part of weak female while loading the van, she could lift anything he could, but it would look odd for her to pick up a sofa by herself. However Diana was not one to be outdone, when they were inside her apartment, she made sure to do her share of the heavy lifting. Not that Clark minded, he was glad to be with a woman who didn't constantly need his help. It was refreshing. They spent the rest of the evening eating Chinese take out and assembling her furniture. The frustration of the day was gone, and the laughter had returned. He no longer felt strong armed into shopping with her, he felt like her friend again. It was a good feeling, one he could really get used to.

Clark strolled into the Daily Planet on Monday morning feeling good. That is until he saw Cat & Lois sitting on his desk, quietly, as if they were waiting for him. Cat Grant and Lois Lane did not exactly get along, outwardly they were polar opposites, Lois, a consummate professional, and Cat borderline slutty. Inwardly however, they were somewhat similar, and that always ate at each of them. They only got along when Clark was involved, this was a major buzz kill for Clark, not a good way to start off the work week. Did they somehow know about Diana? No, that couldn't be it. Could it?

"Good morning, Clark." Lois spoke first.

"Morning Lois."

"Good morning, Clark." Cat said, batting her lashes at him the way she always did.

"Catherine." He said, walking past them to sit at his desk. Cat hated it when he called her 'Catherine'. That's what her father called her, and Clark was not someone she wanted in the category of her father.

"How was your weekend Clark?" Cat said. From the way she spoke, it was clear she didn't care about his weekend, she wanted something.

"It was fine." He said, phrasing his response more like a question.

"Really? Did you do anything special?"

"Uh, not really."

Lois had enough of Cat's dancing around, she wanted to know what was going on. "Cat says she saw you at Gerät-Sessel with some woman yesterday. We were just curious who she was."

"She had sort of a sexy librarian vibe to her. So, were you playing good Samaritan or do you have a new girlfriend?"

Clark wasn't particularly happy about this development, it wasn't as if he wasn't ever going to tell them about Diana, he just wanted to do it on his own terms. But now, they'll probably give him grief about it. "I was helping my girlfriend, with some new furniture."

"Girlfriend huh? Good for you, I see you finally stopped chasing the chubbies." Cat said.

"Really? You're going there again?" His last girlfriend, Lorren Landry was a size 14, they dated briefly over a year ago, but these two just couldn't let it go.

"Lorren was fat, admit it Clark, I'm just glad you're not selling yourself short anymore." Lois said.

"She was cute, and I actually liked her, so I wasn't selling myself short. And whatever happened to solidarity and sisterhood?" Diana would be proud of him if she heard that. "You've given a woman you met once, a years worth of grief, all because she weighed a little more than you? Isn't that a little high school of you?" Both Cat and Lois looked a little dumbfounded at his observation. Maybe they hadn't thought of it that way. He figured he probably should shut up now, but he didn't. "Maybe you're jealous. You were jealous of Lorren, and without even knowing her you're jealous of my current girlfriend Diana, jealous that she can bag a big country boy like me, but you're still single." Cat and Lois were completely shocked, Clark had just burned them. He never did that! Before either one could respond Jimmy walked by.

"Chief's calling a meeting in the conference room."

Clark quickly left for the meeting, feeling pretty good about himself for not letting them bring him out of his morning.