As everyone else has said, this was yet another fantastic story from you, Yvonne. When you first showed me the beginning of the story, I wondered how on earth anyone - even you - could possibly coax a happy ending from such a traumatic beginning. I know that several people - me included, early on - did try to persuade you to go for a fairy-tale happy ending, but you were right to resist.
What you gave us - ghost-Lois excepted - is a real-life ending. In real life, nobody gets a perfectly happy ending; we get imperfect outcomes, the kind of thing we learn to live with, as opposed to perfection. So Lois and Clark keep their son - because Jon is their son, even if he's not theirs biologically - and CK accepts that Jon is better off with them even if it devastates him to give him up. I think that's the right outcome, as I was never completely convinced that CK wanted Jon for himself and not as the last living reminder of his Lois.
As for ghost-Lois, I love that extra touch! It means that CK isn't completely alone; that he does have someone he loves to help him through the dark hours of the night. Whether she's really there in ghost-form, or whether she's a product of his imagination, there's no doubt that he's learning to live again.
Not a fairy-tale ending, but an honest-to-goodness
real ending to a terrific story.
Wendy
