12 Days of Christmas

Part 6 - Clean Up Your Act

After weeks of painstaking planning, Lena's holiday party is tonight. The food has been approved, and the caterers will arrive an hour before start time. After sitting through hours of basic and trite interviews with musicians, she's decided to go with an array of CDs instead. She's certain her mother will make a snide remark about the lack of live music, but Lillian will find something to pick apart and use to try and wear the edges off of Lena's ego, polishing it like a stone in a rock tumbler. If she chooses the target, if Lena picks something about which she has little to no care and directs her mother's thread pulling attention there, then the damage will be mitigated. Mitigation is the best she can do. To hope to come out unscathed from a visit from Lillian Luthor is unrealistic. Now that would be a Christmas Miracle.

If it wasn't for bad luck, Lena is certain she'd have no luck at all. Her cleaning crew is apparently a family, all snowed in at an airport after a visit home. That's what family and sentimentality will get you. Still, it's more than annoying. It's an unmitigated disaster. Though Lena keeps things tidy, if her floors aren't literally clean enough to be eaten off of, she'll get an earful from Lillian. It makes her shudder with a quick flashback to learning to make hospital corners on her bed at only four-yrs-old.

She paces while her phone rings, leaving it on speaker so she can wring her hands with frustration. When it reaches a third ring, she nearly falls into a full blown panic attack. Then it's answered, and Jess' attentive yet gentle tone is a balm to her nerves.

"Miss Luthor, this is a surprise. Merry Christmas."

"Yes, Merry Christmas, Jessica. I have an emergency."

In the silence that hangs between them, Lena can almost imagine Jess looking longingly at her family. The picture sitting on Jess' desk, an elegant older woman that is bouncing a chubby-cheeked infant on a knee comes immediately to Lena's mind, and no matter her own frazzled condition, she nearly apologizes and hangs up. But then Jess' quick, "Of course, Miss Luthor. How can I help you?" breaks through, and Lena breathes a sigh of relief. "Do you want me to meet you in the office. I can check for flights and—"

"Oh, God, no," Lena hurriedly interrupts. "Even I'm not that needy and gauche. My cleaning crew cancelled. Can you call around and find me someone available today?"

"On Christmas? Miss Luthor, I don't know if—"

"Please, Jessica. You've met my mother. Please."

And Jessica has. The great Lillian Luthor has graced the halls of L-Corp with her presence on more than one occasion. Each time, Lena seems to shrink in on herself a tad more, her light shining a bit less bright. It's a running joke around the office that if Mrs. Luthor didn't put so much weight on her daughter's shoulders, Lena would stand even taller than her mother's impressive six feet in flats. It's just not a very funny joke.

"I have," Jess replies, and Lena is flooded with hope even before the words, "I'll make some calls and get back to you," come out.

"Thank you, Jessica. Offer the cleaners whatever it takes to get them out here. I don't care if it's stock options. Just make it happen." She's kidding... mostly. "I don't know what I'd do without you. You are a literal lifesaver." That she literally means. Whether it be her own life or her mother's, Lena is certain Jess' calming, competent presence has kept one or both of them alive. "Please, give your family my apologies. If there's anything I can do to make it up to them, just ask."

"I think the catered dinner you're providing is plenty. My mother hasn't looked so relaxed around the holidays in, well, ever. I'll find you someone, Miss Luthor. You can count on me."

She always can. As they hang up, Lena begins to count the minutes also, the long, painstaking moments of uncertainty while she waits for her assistant to once again come to her rescue. Knowing it's five o'clock somewhere and that the guilt of day drinking is probably the one thing she can't afford, Lena pours herself a scotch. She downs the first one like a shot, hissing through her teeth at the initial burn before it settles like embers in her belly. The next one she nurses, enjoying the warmth that spreads from her throat, across her chest, and throughout her belly as she uses her patience. Eventually, it's rewarded.