Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“I’ll tell you upstairs.” 

“Why upstairs?” 

“Guess.” 

+++

Clark caught up with her on the staircase, wrapping his arms around her waist, making her giggle and squirm. With a chuckle of his own, he scooped her into his arms and carried her the rest of the way to their bedroom, dumping her gently on the bed. He flopped down onto the bed beside her so they lay side by side, facing each other. 

“You’re not telling my mom all our dirty little secrets, are you?” He asked her with a playful grin, his fingertips grazing her ribs. 

“No.” She laughed and leaned closer to him, giving him a quick kiss on the lips, then tucking her head into his neck. “I was telling her…that I want to…” she trailed off, burying her head further into his neck.

“You want to…?” He prompted, pulling back slightly so he could see her face. She was smiling shyly, her face slightly flushed. “What?” 

“Well, that…” she sat up, a nervous giggle escaping her. “That I want to have a baby.” 

Clark sat up, surprise and joy flooding his entire body. “You do?” They had been talking about it for weeks, and she, of the two of them, had shown the most hesitancy. 

She nodded, her eyes shining brightly at him. “Yes, so if you’re ready…well, I am, too.” 

“I’m ready!” Clark pulled her into his arms, and they fell back onto the mattress, laughing and kissing. A sobering thought sucked away his joy after a moment. “But…what about…? We still don’t know if we can…?” 

Lois shrugged, snuggling into him. “So, let’s just try anyway. When Doctor Klein gets back to you, we can go from there.” 

“I don’t want to disappoint you,” Clark said softly, his hand coming up to cup her cheek. “If we can’t.” 

“Like you said, we have other options.” She pushed him onto his back and slid her body on top of his, making him moan loudly as she pressed against him. “But let’s not talk about them now.” She leaned down to kiss him, and his higher brain function began to shut down. 

“So, we’re trying right now, then?” He managed to say with a chuckle, rolling her under him.  

She laughed. “Yes. If you want to?” 

“I want to.” He assured her, leaning down to kiss her. 

She pulled away abruptly. “Your mom will be so happy.” 

“Lois...” 

Chapter Text

The morning sun streaming through the curtain-free window woke Clark early. He sat up, momentarily confused about where he was, his face then splitting into a grin as he took in his surroundings. He turned his head to look at his new wife, who was curled up beside him, sound asleep.  

Their new bedroom was a disaster. Boxes stacked on top of boxes sat haphazardly against one wall. Their closet was overflowing with their joint wardrobes. Books, picture frames, and miscellaneous items were stacked in another corner.   

Their new bed frame wasn't arriving until next week. They spent their first night in the new home on Clark's mattress on the floor.   

Clark shifted into a sitting position, smiling as he tucked the sheets gently around Lois' bare body. He kissed her forehead gently, and his heart swelled as she gave him a sleepy moan.  

"So…bright…" she mumbled, cracking one eye open, quickly closing it, and snuggling into her pillow.   

"Go back to sleep, honey."  

"Okay, but turn off the lights." She moaned, rolling over to face away from the offensive sunlight.  

"It's the sun, baby. We don't have the curtains and blinds up yet." He reminded her.  

She made a soft sound of annoyance. "Need to prioritize that today." She sounded more awake now, rolling onto her back again, squinting up at him, giving his arm a gentle caress.  

"Well, I wanted to put them up yesterday, but  someone  insisted I do everything at human speed." Clark tucked her wayward hair behind an ear. "Putting those bookcases together took forever." He flopped back down onto the mattress, pulling her into his arms.  

"I told you to follow the instructions." She yawned, cuddling into his bare chest.  

"The instructions were in Swedish."  

"You read Swedish." She reminded him.  

Clark huffed out a breath. "Well, they still didn't make sense to me." He tightened his hold on her.  

"Hmm, well, maybe today I'll let you do one or two things at super speed." Lois shifted her body on top of his.   

"Yeah?" Clark raised his eyebrows, looking up at her. He tilted his head up to kiss her. "Not this, though, right?" Another kiss, deeper now.  

"No, not this." She agreed with a smile. 

+++

Chapter Text

"There is something I have to tell you." Lois slid out of her husband's arms and brought herself into a sitting position, looking down at him. She chewed at her bottom lip nervously.

Clark sat up, a look of concern on his face. "You can tell me anything, honey." He ran his fingers along her bare arm, giving her shoulder a sensual kiss. 

"Let's get dressed first," Lois said after a pause. 

"Geez, this must be serious." Clark chuckled nervously. He reached for his shorts and tugged them over his hips while Lois reached for her robe and slipped it on.  

"It's nothing, really." Lois sat back down on the bed, crossed-legged, one finger absently tracing the pattern on their comforter.  

"Okay." Clark sat opposite her. "Did something happen? While I was away?" 

Lois' eyes met his. "Just having Clark here, the other Clark," she clarified needlessly. "Was really hard for me. Don't get me wrong, he was a big help, you know, with Superman stuff? But having him here, instead of you, was hard." 

Clark nodded. "I understand. It would be weird having me here, but not  me  here." 

"Exactly!" Lois nodded emphatically, leaning in a little closer to him. "The thing is…" she cleared her throat, looking down at her finger, still tracing the pattern on the comforter. "He's a lot like you, he's…basically you…but you know, sad, because he doesn't have his Lois…and I was here without you… my Clark  and…well… he's just…he was wearing your clothes and smells like you, and he…hugs like you and…" she took a shuddery breath, her stomach twisting with guilt as she managed to look up at him.

Clark turned pale before her, his eyes wide. "Lois, what are you saying? Did something…did something happen between you and… him?" 

Lois buried her face in her hands. "I'm so ashamed! I'm so sorry…it just…sort of happened! We were just sitting talking on the sofa, and he-" 

"I don't think I can hear this!" Clark leaped off the bed. "Who does this guy think he is!" He paced in front of her. "Coming over here and taking advantage of my wife! I don't care if he is me! Well, not me, but…. I can't believe this!" 

"What? No…!" Lois protested, jumping from the bed to stand before him.  

"I'm going to need some time to process this, Lois…" He ran a hand through his hair, looking away from her, heading for the bedroom door. "I'm going downstairs." 

"No, Clark! We didn't…sleep together!"

"What?" He turned back to face her, confused. 

“We just… kissed …almost kissed, our lips touched…just barely… I'm sorry, we both felt terrible." She said tearfully. "I'm sorry." Her head came to rest against his chest.  

"Oh." Clark exhaled. He pulled her away from his chest and looked down at her. "You  kissed?" 

"Well, no, not really, but the intent was there… we pulled away at the last second." 

"So, nothing happened then?" Clark furrowed his brow. 

"But the intent…" 

"You pulled away, though?" 

"We both did." Lois nodded. "I hid up here and cried myself to sleep over you." 

"Okay." Clark nodded slowly as he took in this information. "Okay," He said again, pulling her into a hug, and Lois felt his body relax against hers. "I'm sure it was very upsetting and confusing for you. If things were reversed and I was with another you, I might have been tempted too." 

"Better not be." Lois pouted up at him. "But you're okay with it?" 

"I'm not saying the guy is welcome in our home any time soon." He chuckled. "I'm sure I'll move past it eventually, though. It's hard to be upset at, well, myself?"   

Lois squirmed out of his arms, biting her lip. "There is something else," She said in a small voice. 

"What, you almost kissed HG Wells as well?" Clark joked. 

"No… but remember when I got stuck in the other universe?" 

"Oh, geez…" 

++++

Chapter Text

“They weren’t really evil, were they?”   

“I don’t know.” Clark guided his wife up the stairs onto their back deck, giving HG Wells a polite wave as he and The Time Machine faded from their backyard. “Misguided mostly.”  

“Do you think we helped them?” Lois asked.  

 “I’m not sure,” Clark answered her honestly. “I think we gave them hope that they could be better people. And with hope, anything’s possible, right?”    

Lois nodded as he led her into their house. “Well, we got them to dismantle Intergang. That’s something.”   

“And they put Luthor behind bars.”   

“The President is no longer a clone.”   

“Tempus is now also in prison where he belongs.”   

Lois shook her head, chuckling. “I just can’t believe Wells found an earth where we are evil! Us!”  

“Not evil.” Clark reminded her with a gentle smile. “Misguided.”   

“Right.” Lois removed her coat, crossing the living room to hang it up. She looked at her husband thoughtfully. “The evil Lois and Clark.... did you find them at all, well, you know …?” She trailed off suggestively.   

“Hot?” Clark finished for her with a nod, removing his own coat and hanging it beside hers.   

“All that leather and spandex.” Lois bit her lip.   

“Her hair.” Clark sighed dreamily.   

Lois’ head snapped to look at him. “You liked the long hair?” She ran her hands through her own short, cropped hair.   

“Well, yeah, long and wild, like her.” Clark’s eyes glazed over. He cleared his throat after a moment, meeting his wife’s wide, accusing eyes. “I mean, I like your hair too, of course.”   

“Riigght…” Lois smirked at him, giving his chest a playful pat, “Well, his suit was much more revealing than yours. Reminded me of your black New Krypton suit.”   

“Really?”    

“Yeah. Really tight, in all the right places.”   

“You know, I still have the black suit.”  

“Yeah, but you’re not evil.” Lois pouted. “It won’t be the same.”  

“Perhaps I should have gotten some tips from your counterpart. She was pretty damn… misguided.” Clark teased. “Not to mention…handsy.”   

“I know! What was that? She was all over me, too! She was more into me than Evil-Clark was.”   

“Uh, yeah, that was weird.” Clark coughed, recalling removing his counterpart’s hands from his own ass on more than one occasion.  

“So, what now? We just go back to our boring old non-evil lives?” Lois sighed. “I feel like we’re so dull compared to them.”    

“We’re not dull, Lois. We’re just not evil.” Clark wrapped his arms around her and guided her toward the kitchen. “Come on, let’s have a cup of oolong and cuddle on the sofa. We should try and get an early night.”   

“Alright...” Lois sighed, leaning into his arms.    

They moved about the kitchen silently, Clark making tea while Lois went through the pantry searching for a sweet treat.  

The tea made, they sat together at their breakfast nook. Clark poured them a cup each while Lois chewed on a cookie.  

Clark took a sip of tea and cleared his throat, breaking the silence. “So, you really liked his suit? I mean, better than mine?”   

Lois swallowed the last of her cookie. “I don’t know. Should I grow out my hair?”   

+++

Chapter Text

Lois was drunk. She couldn't remember ever being this drunk. At least not this drunk alone. Sure, a few times in college, she had taken a break from her studies and gotten a little tipsy at parties.  

Not like this, though. She was wasted. Off her face. Smashed.   

She giggled to herself, taking another swig from her bottle.  

Alone and wasted, wandering around her apartment with a bottle of tequila, wallowing in self-pity.  

She sat down on her sofa as the room spun around her. She carefully set the half-drunk bottle of tequila on the coffee table and flopped back onto the sofa, her head beginning to pound.  

She was a mess. Her life was a disaster.  

"A federal disaster." She cackled to herself. "Here's to another federal disaster!" She cheered. She closed her eyes as the last couple of weeks flashed through her mind.  

The Planet being destroyed.  

Lex proposing to her.  

Clark telling her he loves her.  

Superman rejecting her.  

Walking down the aisle towards Lex.  

Lex jumping from his penthouse.  

Clark holding her in his arms.  

Clark telling her he didn't love her after all.  

Clark. Clark. Clark. Always Clark.   

"Clark..." She sobbed. He didn't love her. Nobody did.   

She moaned as she tried to sit up. It took three tries, but she got there. She reached for the tequila bottle again, her hand-eye coordination failing her, and she knocked it to the carpet, the alcohol seeping out of the bottle.  

"Oh, shit …" She giggled, picking up the now mostly empty bottle and setting it back on the coffee table. Stumbling to the kitchen, she grabbed a dish towel to clean up the mess and trudged back to the living room. Lois got down on her hands and knees to press the towel to the saturated carpet, standing up just in time to hear the familiar whoosh and accompanying breeze chilling the back of her neck.

She spun around to find Superman standing in front of her open window, curtains fluttering behind him.  

+++  

"Oh, it's you." Lois greeted him with a sneer. She stumbled towards him, and Clark could smell the alcohol radiating from her body.   

"I was just in the neighborhood," Clark said politely. "I thought I would check on you." He had been spying on her. Well, not spying on her, keeping an eye on her, he corrected himself.   

Okay, he was spying. And with good reason, he justified to himself if spying on a friend could be justified.  

It had been a rough couple of weeks for her. Probably the roughest couple of weeks of her life, and he was concerned. 

"Good for you." Lois turned away from him, taking a swig from the drizzle left in her bottle. "Wanna drink?" She offered him, with a giggle, sitting down on her sofa.  

"I don't really drink." Clark took a few cautious steps towards her. He had never seen her like this before. He had seen her tipsy at most, never drunk like this.   

"Of course not." She scoffed. She settled herself on her back on the sofa, held the bottle up to her lips, and giggled as she missed her mouth, tequila running down her chin and into her neck.  

"I think you've had enough." Clark approached her, removing the bottle from her hand. "I'm cutting you off."  

She growled, struggling to sit up and grab the bottle from him. "You don't get to tell me what to do!" She yelled at him, chasing him into the kitchen, stumbling and almost falling as he tipped the remaining alcohol down the sink.  

"That's not fair!" She shrieked at him.  

"Your friends are worried about you, Lois. Perry hasn't heard from you in weeks." He tried to keep his voice steady and even. "Clark said you've been avoiding his calls." 

"I do not want to talk about Clark!" Lois glared at him. She pushed past him, returning to the living room, almost falling again.  

Clark followed her, reaching for her arm to steady her. "I'm worried about you, too." She pulled away from him, turning quickly to look at him, losing her footing and falling into his arms.

"You break my heart, but you're worried about me? Thanks, Superman." She shuffled away from him, crossing her arms in front of her chest.   

Clark swallowed. He had broken her heart? His stomach sank, remembering the night he had told her they couldn't be together. He knew he had hurt her, but hell, she had hurt him too.    

"You and Clark and Lex, all the men in my life! What a line-up!" She took a breath, beginning to pace in front of him. "One asks me to marry him, and guess what? He turns out to be a homicidal maniac responsible for half the crime in Metropolis." She took in another shuddery breath. "Then there's  Clark ." She spat his name. "He tells me he's in love with me, and just when I'm about to tell him I love him too, he tells me that he doesn't love me, that he made it all up just so I wouldn't marry Lex!" With another breath, she stops pacing to stand facing him. "Then there's you, Superman, the man I stupidly thought I was in love with, well, you-"  

"Wait, wait, wait…." Clark interrupted her, his heart and mind racing. "You were going to tell Clark you love him?"  

++++  

Lois brushed past Superman to sit on her couch again. All that pacing had made her dizzy and nauseous.  

"It doesn't matter anyway. He took it back." She sighed, suddenly overwhelmed with sadness, feeling like she might cry again. "Nobody loves me. Not one of you." She closed her eyes as they filled with tears.  

"Lois, that is ridiculous." Superman almost sounded like he was laughing at her, and she cracked one eye open to watch him. "You are very much..." He swallowed. "Loved."  

"Then why doesn't Clark love me?" Lois hoped she didn't sound as pitiful and desperate as she felt. "Why doesn't he, Superman?"  

Superman looked nervous suddenly, and Lois watched him curiously as he avoided her gaze. She wondered if he knew something she didn't. She wondered if Superman knew she had rejected Clark.  

Just like Superman had rejected her.   

But it wasn't Superman she wanted anymore. She wanted her best friend, her partner, the only man she could stand to spend ten hours a day with and not want to murder.  

She loved Clark Kent.   

She tried to clear the lump from her throat. "Has he said anything to you?" She asked Superman.  

“He’s…well…” Superman stammered and looked away from her. Superman never stammered! He had to know something.  

"Tell me!" Lois jumped to her feet, instantly regretting it, feeling like she might fall over. She closed her eyes briefly, steadying herself. "He's all I think about! On my wedding day, walking down the aisle towards Lex, all I could think about was Clark! I...love him, Superman, even if he doesn't love me." Her eyes filled with tears again.   

Superman remained quiet, then he closed his eyes and opened them again, taking a breath. "I think maybe you should talk to him, Lois." He said quietly.  

"And make even more of a fool of myself? No, I've done enough of that lately." She shook her head. Every newspaper and tabloid in town was reporting on her aborted wedding and Lex Luthor's subsequent demise. It was downright humiliating.  

Superman cleared his throat. "I just think if you tell him how you feel, you might be surprised."    

Lois' eyes widened at the implication, her heart skipping a beat. "You mean…?"  

"Just tell him, Lois." Superman implored her, then looked towards the window. "I should go. You're going to be okay?"  

Lois nodded, her mind whirling. "Aside from the killer hangover I'm going to have tomorrow, I guess."  

"Call me if you need anything."   

Lois nodded, following him over to the window. "You won't tell Clark about any of this, will you?"    

"Of course not." Superman's jaw twitched, and he turned away from her. "Goodnight, Lois."  

"Goodnight, Superman."  

Lois watched him fly off, then crossed the room, suddenly feeling reasonably sober. She reached for her phone, quickly dialing Clark's number she had memorized by heart.  

"Hello?"  

"Clark, it's me. I know it's late, but can you come over?"  

"Sure, I'll be right there. You want me to bring you anything?"  

"…maybe a bottle of aspirin."  

++++

Chapter Text

“Well, Bye.” 

“Bye.” 

Clark heard her sharp intake of breath as she left the kitchen, the door swinging closed behind her. 

He sighed and pushed his newspaper away. He felt awful, and he knew Lois did too. 

At least she was trying to be civil, he thought. She was trying to talk to him. 

And what was he doing? Answering her with clipped tones, and not even bothering to look at her? 

This wasn’t how he wanted to treat his wife! He had promised himself he would never make her cry. 

And she sounded damn close to doing just that as she left the kitchen. 

Enough was enough. 

“Lois.” Clark became a blur, rushing through the kitchen door, catching up with her as she was pulling her arms into her coat. He came to a halt, hugging her from behind. 

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” he whispered into her neck, kissing her behind her ear. “I don’t want to fight.” 

He felt her entire body sag, relaxing against him as all the tension from the last few days left her body. 

“I’m sorry, too.” Lois whimpered, turning in his arms, hers coming up around his neck. “I’ll tell Perry I can’t be editor,” she said quietly into his shoulder. 

“No.” Clark shook his head. That’s not what he wanted. He pulled back so he could look at her. “You deserve to be editor.” 

“But we’re fighting.” she protested. 

“Not anymore,” Clark promised. 

“I killed your story.” 

“Perry tries to kill our stories all the time. I’ll just do what we always do.” he grinned and winked at her playfully. 

“What we always…?” she paused for a moment, before her eyes widened and she gave him a small smile. “You mean work on the story in our own time, and then when we’re onto something big, make him think it was all his idea?” 

Clark nodded. “Do I have your permission to do that?” he asked tentatively, not wanting to cause any more friction between them. 

She nodded after a moment’s consideration, giving him a playful smile. “Yes.” 

He hugged her. “I love you.” 

“I love you too.” she leaned forward, and their lips met in a gentle kiss. 

Clark reluctantly pulled away first, and Lois buttoned her coat and reached for her purse. 

“Are you sure you don’t want to ride in with me?” she asked him. 

Clark grimaced. “I’d love to, but I really do have to meet Ralph’s source.” 

Lois nodded and winced. “I am sorry I stuck you with Ralph.” 

“He could use some guidance from an experienced reporter.” Clark conceded diplomatically. 

“I’ll palm him off onto someone else next week,” Lois promised him. 

“I would appreciate that.” Clark breathed a sigh of relief, pulling her in for another quick hug. 

“Meet me for lunch?” she kissed him again. 

He nodded his lips still against hers. 
“Yes.”

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