Drastic Measures

By Jessi Mounts <jessi@bmounts.com>

Rated G

Submitted September 2000

Summary: Wondering about Teri Hatcher's Radio Shack commercials? The secret is revealed!

Note to those who don't watch a lot of U.S. TV: Teri's been playing her ditsy act to the fullest in a recent series of Radio Shack commercials. I'm not a big fan of those, to put it mildly, and finally decided that if I had to sit through one more of those things, I was going to have to start resorting to drastic measures. Well, one more came and went, so voila...

***

"Don't even start," Lois warned. Or more accurately, growled.

She had to admit, after watching that anthology of mercifully un-aired commercials, her husband had plenty to start about. At the time, she'd thought the story had been more than worth it, but at the seventeenth cringe into the video, she'd seriously began to wonder whether anything was worth that humiliating performance. Her ditsy brunette act wasn't always that bad, was it?

"Well..." Clark said cautiously, clearly trying to weigh what would be crossing over into the dangerous territory of "starting".

"I'm warning you, Clark..." Lois began.

"It's just you-" he tried again.

"I don't want to hear it."

"It's just you look good in bright colors," he finally blurted out.

"I look good in bright colors," Lois repeated dully.

"Yeah, you do," he said with the relieved of air of someone discovering the bomb they'd approached so carefully hadn't been armed after all. "Of course, this looks great on you too," he added, reaching across the couch to brush her business suit of the day. Sometime during the display from their TV, she'd unconsciously inched away from him to literally hide in a corner. "But bright, oh, purple would be okay for a change."

Bright purple. Sure. As if he actually expected her to walk into work wearing bright purple.

But then, for all she knew, the Suit's colors had been his idea, so maybe he really didn't see any problem with Day-glo clothing. She'd have to ask him about that sometime.

Anyway, at the moment, he was obviously trying to distract her from the problem at hand. Yes, she'd told him she didn't want to hear it, but now she was curious.

"You're hiding something, Clark," she accused. "Okay, come on, let's hear it."

"I'm not hiding anything," he protested feebly.

"Oh, you are. You really need to learn how to lie."

As he opened his mouth for another denial, she added, "And don't say it's not that important. I want to hear it anyway."

He snapped his jaws shut and seemed to find himself trapped by that. Finally, he admitted, "It wasn't that bad, really, but, uh, I don't think that that last 'Bzzz,' was exactly necessary."

Seeing Lois's reaction to that, Clark suddenly looked horrified and cut off any further remarks, but the damage had already been done. Burying her face in Clark's shoulder, she moaned, "Oh, I knew it. You're embarrassed for me. Of course you are. Why wouldn't you be? I put on my cute little perky voice and let him chase me with toy cars, and I flirted and..and...I was a cup holder! Clark, I let him treat me as a human cup holder! Of course I embarrass you!"

Clark gently raised Lois's chin until her eyes met his. "Lois," he said gravely, "you could never, and will never embarrass me. It's impossible. Got that?"

Incapable of arguing with that breathtaking declaration, but still not ready to give up her melancholy mood, she only nodded forlornly and demanded, "Then you tell me. Why in the world am I so good at playing the dumb airhead?"

"Oh, you're not." Clark said airily. "What made you think you were?"

Lois laughed and pummeled Clark with the nearest pillow. "Funny, mister. You happen to be speaking to the woman who got what's-his-name's confession on tape. He sure wasn't going to brag about his ingenious scamming feats to anybody with a brain. Much as I hate to admit it, I'd say I've got the airhead thing down to a fine art."

"Then all I've got to say is you're a great actress," Clark said.

"Wonderful," Lois said with a laugh. "Where do I go pick up my Oscar?"

"No, I mean it," Clark insisted. "You really are the most brilliant person I've met. What's-his-name never stood a chance."

Lois leaned in to kiss him lightly as a wordless thank you but then abruptly pulled away. "Now don't you kiss me back, because I'll get distracted, and I've got an important task to finish up."

"Oh, do you?"

"I do," she said, rising to walk across the room. Taking the tape from the VCR, she announced, "The only evidence ever to exist of my performance is right here, and it's going to stay that way. And don't you help it along. I want to do the honors on this one."

With that, she tossed the tape into the fire with more force than was absolutely necessary and then went back to snuggle into Clark's arms. "And that's it for the Brainless Wonder," she sighed comfortably.

"Oh, that's too bad," Clark murmured. "You really did look good in bright purple. And the blue. I really liked the blue."

Lois put the nearest pillow to good use again. "Yeah, that's it," she deadpanned. "I'll get Martha to give me some of the blue from your suit. We'll be a matching set."

At some point in the evening, that poor tape was melted well past recognition, Lois and Clark never noticed. They'd found more interesting things to occupy themselves.

THE END

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