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Chapter 34- "WAY BACK WHEN"

Clark could tell from the burden in her eyes that this was a secret that had been weighing her down for some time now. Lois wrapped herself up in a blanket that Martha had knitted.

"I wasn't a pretty child..."Lois started.

"I find that hard to believe."

Lois's eyes met Clarks. She gave him a small smile, but braced herself and continued her story "By the time I hit puberty, how I looked had pretty much become my obsession. I went through the baby fat stage, the brace stage, the acne stage and the perpetually flat chested stage. I had very little self esteem...If you can imagine it."

Clark nodded slowly, his whole concentration on her.

"..It didn't help that we moved around a lot, from army base to army base, so as you can imagine I didn't have very many friends. And you know my dad, kind but old school strict; I wasn't allowed to hang about the army bases like all the other military brats..." Lois hesitated, looked down and stared at her shaking hands. Clark gently took one of her bandaged shaking hands in his and began to slowly kiss each one of her fingers one by one.

Lois's heart skipped a beat. But she continued,"...The General had strict instructions :No makeup, no pierced ears and certainly no boys. Not that I knew any, only the ones we saw at Mass on Sundays, and even then I never spoke to any of them. So, by the time I hit 14 I was chubby, lonely and painfully shy. Completely convinced that I'd end up alone, fat and with a million cats..."

Clark was attentive.

"...Anyway, one day at the bases school which was really just three makeshift stucco building,a new kid showed up, his name was Wes..."Lois stopped at the name and practically spat it out "...Wes Christian Keenan."

"He had just turned 16 and his dad had been transferred from Texas, but I was assigned to be his study buddy because of the shortage of pupils. This was way back when I used to be a straight A student..."

"Straight A's?" Clark asked ,a small smirk on his full lips.

"Yes. Once upon a time I got straight A's",Lois smiled and playfully swatted at Clark "... I mean it's not like I had anything to do besides study and listen to Michael Jackson and Prince cassette tapes."Lois gave a small chuckle. "As far as sixteen year old boys go, he was very good looking. All the girls thought so. He had that Blonde haired, blue eyed all American thing going on, and to top it off he was an athlete, plus he was catholic and incredibly well mannered. My mom and his mom, Glory...used to socialise at the Bingo hall and quilt together. My parents though he was an alright kid..." Lois stopped talking and took a deep breath.

"Is it your hands?"Clark asked "Let me get you some painkillers." He began to stand up.

"No...I'm fine."Lois gently tugged on Clark forcing him to remain seated"...So whilst my mom was downstairs watching Jeopardy or one of her soaps, we were in my bedroom doing everything but homework. I was incredibly shy and compliant back then, it really didn't take him long to figure out that I was a soft touch."

Lois looked down, suddenly feeling exposed. Clark gently tucked her hair away behind her ear and tilted her chin, forcing her to maintain eye contact.

"He didn't pounce on me, wait...I don't even think he tried hard to seduce me. We just talked for hours about anything and watched the A-Team and Saved by the bell together. I was just so relieved for the companionship and that someone could actually see past my baby fat. When things took a sexual turn it just seemed so natural, It never occurred to me to tell him to back off..."Lois stopped talking and looked at Clark to gage his reaction, his face remained neutral but he lightly squeezed her hand to let her know he wanted her to continue talking.

"Even though I had such low self esteem and was painfully shy, I sort of blossomed and came out of my shell under all his affection. I was high with happiness, completely infatuated and everybody noticed the difference but I couldn't tell anybody...it was our special secret."Lois stopped talking and blinked away tears before they had a chance to fall. Clark knew instinctively that they were only touching the tip of the iceberg.

"I was almost four and a half months pregnant before I realised what was wrong with 's a miracle that nobody else noticed ." Lois said quickly. Only this time she didn't look at Clark. She reclaimed her hand from his clutch and brought her knees up towards her chest. "In my childish naivety I was ecstatic; I thought it would mean marriage and being with Wes forever. I told him immediately after I'd rode a bus an hour and a half to the nearest town and bought a pregnancy test that confirmed what I already knew. If he was freaked out he didn't show it, he just told me to keep it hush until he figured out what to do..."

Lois coughed to clear her throat,"Then suddenly I turned up at School one day only to find out that, Wes 's father had been transferred to Germany immediately and that he was at home packing. So I got on my bike and pedalled over there as quickly as I could. I knocked on his door and he ushered me around the back. He promised me he would come back for me as soon as he told his parents, as soon as they were settled in Germany and I believed him."Lois bit her lip "...I wrote him every day for 3 months and each time my letters were sent back to me, unopened with a big fat 'return to sender' stamp on them."

Lois unfolded her limbs and stood up. She ran he fingers through her hair and leant against the bookcase. "I had no choice but to tell my parents. Baggy clothes just couldn't hide my bump anymore. They were hysterical; disappointment doesn't even begin to cover the look on my mother's face. The General called me a Whore, which surprisingly didn't hurt. I guess I was just glad he wasn't going to kill me like I had assumed he would..."Lois tried to laugh at the memory but all she could manage was the hollow sound of someone still in pain.

Clark stood up and went to her. "Don't." Lois said, side stepping his embrace "...Just let me get this all out before I completely break down. Please."

Clark nodded. He understood but it didn't stop him from wanting to hold her. Lois went to the liquor cabinet and pulled out one glass and a bottle of whisky. She poured a glass and handed it to him.

"'ll probably need was I?"Lois asked "Oh yeah...so, the General probably would have killed me had he and my mother not been dealing with issues of their own. Unbeknownst to me, my mother had been diagnosed with lung cancer a few days before.."

"...and besides, It was too late for an abortion. Not that my parents would have let me have one anyway. They did devise a plan though, to send me to Edge City to go live with Uncle Gabe, Aunt Moira and Chloe until the baby was born .This was maybe a year or two before Aunt Moira had her nervous breakdown, just before they moved to Smallville."

Clark remembered Chloe telling hi m about parts of her childhood in Edge City.

"...Aunt Moira had all these pills that they had put her on over the years, tranquilizers and antidepressants." Lois turned to Clark "I've always thought depression and anxiety ran in our family. Anyway, to cut a long story short, I took them all. Over 300 pills and chased them down with half a bottle of Rum."

"You tried to kill yourself." Clark stated sadly.

Lois started to cry, Uncontrollably "I meant it to work. I hoped it would be Painless and quick."

"Why didn't you ever tell me this?"He whispered softly, as he gently rubbed circles into her back. "God honey! Why didn't you trust me enough to tell me?"

Lois continued. "I took the pills once everyone was asleep, safe in the knowledge that I'd be dead by the time they woke up." Lois wiped her tears and let Clark envelope her in a huge crushing hug, His warmth was so soothing and for the life of her, she couldn't remember why she'd never told him. "If it wasn't for the onset of the miscarriage I probably would have died that night, but the pain was so unbearable, I had to wake Chloe up. She was only 11 years old, poor thing."

Suddenly it all made sense. Why Lois had acted the way she had, why she had become depressed, alcoholic and distant. Their own miscarriage had triggered all those awful memories, or so Clark thought.

"The stress was too much for my mom, she began to deteriorate rapidly after that."Lois hugged Clark back "Suicide and murder are both mortal sins and my mother couldn't bear the thought of me going to hell, but as far as I was concerned I was already living in hell. I actually woke up in the hospital with a priest praying over me!"

"I'm so sorry that you lost your baby, you don't need to say anymore, I totally understand..." Clarks head was whirling from all the things he hadn't known about Lois.

"You don't understand Clark.." Lois pulled away from Clark and looked him in the eyes. "..my baby survived."

Clark tried to hide his shock.

Lois continued "...I named her Lucy."

TBC.

NB: Reviews, comments and feedback are very much appreciated.