Morning Edition Revelations
Planet offices, around 6:30 pm. Clark shoves a few things into his bag along with his palmtop and gets up from his desk. "Right, I'm finishing up here. Bye, Lois."
"Bye, Kent." Lois says distractedly, not looking up from her computer. A thought hits her and she pauses, looking up. "Did you get the information on - hold it, what's with the GQ look? Since when do you look that smart?"
"Since I have a date." Clark replies, straightening the line of his jacket.
"Clark Kent. Dating." Lois replies.
"Lois, I do have a sex life. I just choose not to blare it like some people in this office." 'Some people' being a not-so-subtle referral to Raoul and Kendra, whose individual love lives every single Planet newsroom worker could write a very, very detailed book on.
"Riiight. Where're you going so dressed up?"
"Dinner and then Cabaret."
Lois stares. "On the opening night? How did you get tickets? Human sacrifice?"
"My date knew someone." Clark grins.
"Details of this mystery person, please."
"He's sexy and I like him."
"Nothing more?" She asks.
"Nope." He grins again and turns to go, leaving one parting shot. "Get your own sex life, Lois, and stop living vicariously through mine."
Next morning, Clark walks into the newsroom. To be immediately accosted by Lois, brandishing the morning edition. Not to mention a few wolf whistles from the rest of the newsroom. "Clark Kent, your ass is mine."
"What?" He asks defensively.
She pulls it open to the society and arts pages, known in the Planet as 'Cat's Domain of Dirt', and reads "Stars come out for opening night of Cabaret." She taps one of the photos and shoves it under his nose. "Tell me who that is."
"Lex Luthor." Clark supplies.
Lois smiles sweetly. For a crocodile. "And the person next to him?"
"Alan Cumming? He played the MC when it was on Broadway a few years back. I thought you knew he was due to be there."
She grits her teeth. "The one with his hand on Lex's shoulder, Kent."
"Um... he's familiar."
Lois bangs the paper down on the nearest flat surface. "Exactly when did you start seeing Lex Luthor, Kent? And when did he become so comfortable with you that he doesn't even notice you in his personal space?"
Clark blinks. "What? Personal space?"
"Kent, you know as well as I do that Lex Luthor's personal space bubble is sacrosanct. Especially in public, especially with dates. It looks like there's a barrier between them even when the latest one's plastering themselves to his side. What did you do that makes you the exception?"
Clark shrugs. "He's never complained."
"Never...complained." Lois gives him the beady eye, attempting not to start letting steam out of her ears. "Clark Kent, do you mean to say you're - no, I am not processing this." Lois covers her eyes and whimpers. "How long?"
"Years." Like it was nothing.
"Why?"
"Have you seen him?" Clark asks, raising an eyebrow.
"But... it's Lex Luthor!" She wails. Her tone gets the ears of everyone in the newsroom who wasn't already listening in.
"Luthors need sex too."
"Ruthless businessman! Manipulative! More money than god!"
"Well, yes. But he still won't give me the Lamborghini." Clark grins.
She stares at him suspiciously. "And he doesn't mind you continually burrowing into his business practices."
Clark shrugs. "He says it keeps him more honest that he would be, and on his toes. And I can list several more bad points than you have. Obsessive, possessive, hogs the bedsheets, and a habit of comparing anything you can find to ancient Greek and Macedonian battle schemes. That's just the start. He gets that one from Lionel, though. Anything else?"
"Just one question." She says, deflating slightly. "Why you?"
"No idea. I've asked." Clark confirms. "He says it's because I'm respectful of his comics habit."
"Lex Luthor has a comics habit?"
"Yep. And I'm not telling you which titles in case you try to psychoanalyze him any more than you already have."
Lois folds her arms, recovering a bit. "Right. So if it's been years, why did he let this one slip and let the two of you be clearly photographed, no gagging of press?"
Clark shrugs. "Bored of keeping it in the background. We didn't make a big decision or anything."
"We." Lois raises an eyebrow. "You get a vote in this relationship. Really."
Throughout the next few days, there's a lot of "No comment" whenever Clark answers the phone. Interest dies down after a week, when a new story turns up. Even most of the Planet staff have let it die and turned their attention back to the latest exploits on Raoul or Kendra, depending on which is having the more interesting relationship this week. That is until a couple of days after the interest has almost completely died down, when Lex Luthor strides into the Planet newsroom.
Perry White glares at Lex. "What are you doing here, Luthor?"
"I'm here to take Clark to lunch." Lex replies mildly. "Now if you don't mind?"
Clark comes into the newsroom under a pile of papers from the clippings room. He groans. "God, I forgot about lunch! Let me just put these down and grab my jacket and I'll be ready to go, Lex."
"Where have I heard that before?" Lex asks, amused.
"Don't start, you're just as bad as when you're working." Clark replies, dumping the papers on his desk and grabbing his jacket. "Where're we going again?"
"Somewhere that serves good pasta." Lex replies. "That place near Chinatown?"
The rest of the newsroom doesn't stop gawping until they've left. Jimmy swallows. "Since when were Clark and Lex Luthor dating?"
Lois folds her arms, glaring in the direction they left. "Years, apparently."
Cat Grant squeals indignantly. "Years?! How could I have missed it? One of the most eligible bachelors in America and Clark? God, the scoop it could have been..."
Raoul elbows her to cut the squealing. "Cat, you did scoop it. Remember? Cabaret opening night?"
"Oh. Yeah." Cat says, coming down from her insulted smut-rakers platform.
"They kept it quiet and put up smokescreens is how." Lois grumbles. "But you could still break the fact that it's apparently serious, Cat."
"Mm-hmm. 'Secret Mystery Man Exposed'." Cat muses, already thinking of her headlines.
"Clark'll kill you." Jimmy replies. "Try and keep the flashy stuff out of it."
"Jimmy, sweetie, my whole life is flash." Cat replies. "Story of the year, I'm telling you. This is going to knock that bitch Becky Kovalcek's expos on Haley Joel Osment into the gutter."
"And she's still not bitter about that one, oh no." Someone says from the back of the crowd.
Cat blows the anonymous speaker a kiss. "Darling, call me when you get the amount of exposs I do, then we'll talk."