By Mozartmaid [mozartmaid@gmail.com]
Rated G
Submitted December 2010
Summary: Clark looks out for the little guy. Even if it's just a defenseless office plant.
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***
That plant. That poor, defenseless, once green plant, dying with every splash of too-cold-for-Lois coffee. Clark shook his head. As cute as Lois was with her uncaring dumping of the office sludge into the pot, Clark hated to see anything suffer. Even an ordinary office plant.
He saw her do it once, and thought it was just a one-time consequence of focusing too hard on a story to get up and get a fresh cup. Then he saw her do it again, immediately calling Jimmy over to get her more coffee. The third time he caught her, she did it with such a practiced gesture that he realized it was an ingrained habit.
That's when he decided. He would become the plant's personal protector, defender from Lois Lane's careless destruction. Clark would make sure that from now on, he took away her cup of too cold coffee before it could wreak its havoc and would always be ready with a fresh cup to replace it, just how she liked it. If he timed it right and kept her from dumping her poison on that plant, it might, in time, come back to life.
Like himself, it needed the sun to regenerate, which he thought it would do if given the chance. So, Clark felt a kinship to the little plant.
And besides, he understood the trauma the poor plant went through. He had his own amount of Lois' careless dumping out on his shoulders, after all. Whenever she needed him, he was there. Whether rescuing her as Superman, or working with her as Clark, he took all of her sludge just as willingly and unwittingly as the poor office plant. He took her abuses, her jokes, her laughs... her camaraderie. Only, the poor little plant didn't get to see the nice side of Lois like he sometimes did. It only got the careless side of Lois. The side of Lois that was only focused on finishing the next story, too busy to see where she discarded her hasty decisions. And Clark knew all too well how much that could hurt.
So, he would do what he could for the little guy. He would make sure that Lois would always have her fresh, hot coffee, so no more cold office sludge could be poured out on a vulnerable little plant.
It was the least he could do.
THE END