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“I’m not the one you want to dance with, Clark. She is.”
The way his face lit up would almost be cute, Lois mused, if it wasn’t so ridiculous. Like a dog hearing it’s owner get home, or her old Metropolis University classmates when it was after midnight and the club started playing that new Gwen Stefani song. She swore his ears perked up.
And Lana did look pretty, not that that was unusual. Maybe not the look Lois would’ve gone with, but Lois wasn’t currently wearing the look she would’ve gone with, so who was she to judge? Clark glanced back at her. He seemed nervous, as if he and Lana weren’t listed as the dictionary entry for high school sweethearts. She nodded towards Lana in encouragement. Clark gave her a shy smile and took off.
And Lois Lane was alone at prom.
She didn’t regret not going to her own senior prom. Honestly, getting possessed by a dead cheerleader and teasing Clark was the most fun she’d ever had at a school dance, even if the dress was uncomfortable and her date was somewhere twirling across the floor with his dream girl. She’d gone as a plus-one as an underclassman, and had a fine time drinking spiked punch and sticking her tongue down the throat of her date whose name she thinks started with an S. Fine, but nothing to write home about.
When it came to her own senior prom, she remembers all the talk about “celebrating your high school experience” and “creating memories to last forever.” But sentimentality had never really appealed to Lois. It was too expensive for an army brat to afford. This time last spring, Lois was staring down a prom poster in the halls of Metropolis High and thinking: Why would I want to party with any of these people? Most of them didn’t know her name, and if they did, odds were they didn’t like her very much. She could sweet-talk her way into a date with a guy who’d stare at her boobs all night, or she could flash her fake ID and and go do karaoke at the drag bar three blocks west of downtown. Sue her, but the latter had seemed like a more fun way to spend a Saturday night.
She’d been surprised when Clark had mentioned not going to his prom, though. A football-playing farmboy with a heart of gold seemed like the exact kind of guy who’d want to celebrate high school. The Lana of it all had helped it click into place -- what was a textbook Prom King without his Prom Queen? Clark didn’t talk about Lana with her much, but it didn’t take a mind-reader to see he was still in love. And if Lois was putting money on it, she’d bet that Lana was carrying a torch, too. They made a cute pair. Even Chloe was kind of rooting for them, now that she’d started to move on from the crush she’d talked Lois’s ear off about for the last few years.
But, a stupid little voice in Lois’s stupid little mind supplied, you’re the one he took to his senior prom.
The thought was so unwelcome that the whole gym could probably see her grimace.
It had been haunting her ever since the Kents had filled her in on the whole possession thing. Sure, she hadn’t been herself when she put on this ridiculous dress and demanded to accompany Clark to the dance, but Clark had been himself when he said yes. He’d put on the tux and everything. He’d even asked her to dance, and it seemed like he’d meant it.
Well, he had, until Lois deflected, and pointed out Lana. Until she brought them back to reality where Clark danced with his little wet-eyed soulmate and Lois stood around and watched.
She frowned and rolled out the tension in her shoulders. She didn’t have anything against Lana, honest. Lana had been nothing but kind since Lois crash-landed into all their lives. Besides, she was Chloe’s best friend, and Clark loved her, and all that had to mean something. If Lana held Lois at a little bit of a distance, she wouldn’t be the first. She was probably reacting to the same abrasive, loud, Lois-ness that had set Lois at odds with some of her own classmates. Lana wasn’t abrasive or loud or Lois-y at all. Chloe had told Lois months ago, after she and Lana had met, that Lana had suspected she and Clark were an item. It was a laughable idea, considering how head-over-heels Clark was for Lana. She pitied any of his future girlfriends.
Lois would admit, under pressure, that she liked having Clark around. Over the last year, he’d gone from an annoying necessity to someone she considered a friend. She liked helping him and Chloe uncover all the crazy shit that went down in Smallville, even if he’d had to save her ass more than once now. Plus, he was cute, in kind of a scruffy, apple-pie sort of way. If she flirted with him sometimes, it was inconsequential -- Lois would flirt with a brick wall if she was bored enough. It was fun to push his buttons and watch him go sort of pink. It was even more fun on the rare occasions when he flirted back. She hated to admit it, but he could give as good as he got, under the right circumstances.
Come on Lois, she remembers him saying, didn’t those guys on the base teach you anything? He was so smug, and it was so easy. Easy to dunk him, easy to watch him emerge from the water with a wet t-shirt and a blinding smile, easy to ruffle his hair and hold his gaze when she returned to the crowd of students. But she wasn’t stupid. She was a pretty teenage girl, so Clark being occasionally attracted to her didn’t mean much. She’d seen him around Lana, and the logic was simple: Clark didn’t flirt with girls he actually liked, and Clark flirted with Lois. Lois was far too proud to waste her time on a guy who was pining for someone else. Even if she wasn't, she could already see the way that would end, and it wasn’t sunshine and rainbows. Sure, they’d probably have great sex for two weeks. But then Clark would get tired of her bullshit, or Lois would lose patience with his wholesomeness, and they’d fight and break up and have weird, sexually-charged, bitter tension between them for the rest of their lives. The novelty would wear off before he even learned her middle name. It usually did.
She gave him a once-over from her spot on the outskirts of the gym. He cleaned up nice. He and Lana looked like an advertisement for small-town America and hair products and that rent-a-tux place off Main Street. They kept stealing little glances at each other, uncertain and timid but, like… definitely in love. Maybe Lois didn’t have to pity Clark’s future girlfriends. Maybe she would go to his and Lana’s wedding in five years. She’d be the life of that damn party. She would even be tasteful with how much she flirted with the groom, before running off to hook up with one of Lana’s future sorority sisters or a distant relative of the Kents. She’d have to look into whether or not Clark had any hot cousins.
That wedding would probably feel a lot like this, she realized. Lois Lane, party of one. Never the bridesmaid nor the bride, but always on the guest list. She could only hope that next time she’d look hotter and be a lot tipsier.
She could feel herself getting mopey, and it annoyed her. She was not going to spend her night sulking around a high school gym in nowhere, Kansas, after she turned down a dance with a guy she didn’t even really like. It was a tiny crush at most, induced by proximity and a lack of eligible bachelors in Smallville and the dry spell she’d been in since getting kicked out of college. She’d found a surprisingly good friend in Clark. She refused to let herself sabotage that.
She turned away from Clark and Lana to see Chloe, clearly throwing an even worse pity party for herself than Lois had been. If she needed another reason not to indulge in any one-sided feelings for Clark Kent, Chloe was a walking public service announcement.
“Hey,” Lois called out as she approached Chloe’s table. “You know, a year from now, this is all going to feel like a lifetime ago.”
Chloe smiled. “That’s funny, because it feels like just yesterday when he deserted that nervous freshman on the dance floor.”
I guess that makes two of us. “You’re headed for Metropolis,” Lois insisted. “You are destined to be a big-shot reporter at the Daily Planet. Do you really picture Clark Kent being able to keep up with you?”
A strange, conflicted look crossed her cousin’s face. After a moment, she replied, “you know, Lois, I think Clark might have a lot more to offer than you realize.”
“I wouldn’t bet on it,” Lois said breezily, unfazed by Chloe’s eye roll. Next year, Chloe would be in Metropolis, Lois would go back alongside her, and Clark would be studying farming or chivalry or having-green-eyes at Central Kansas A&M.
And when she got his wedding invite in the mail, she’d RSVP yes.