Okay, I don't have the strength to go through all the parts and find quotes, so I'll quote from memory. Correct me if I'm wrong.

When Lois was thinking about what Clark means to her a few parts ago, she was comparing him with her job. She realized that Clark was infinitely more important to her than her job. The unspoken implication is that she is perfectly willing to give up her job to keep Clark. And indeed, she has already taken steps to make sure that the Daily Planet has a competent editor as she steps down. She has already more or less named her successor, and she has hinted to Perry that the editor-to-be needs a mentor. Perry has already assumed that role.

Lois is perfectly willing to sacrifice her job for Clark. What is Clark willing to sacrifice for Lois in return?

Nothing. He has been telling himself that he is willing to give up his marriage to Lois, for Lois's own sake, of course. But he didn't inform Lois about his plans, because he probably didn't want to risk her telling him that she didn't want a divorce. What if she had told him that she didn't want a divorce? He wouldn't have had a good reason to distance himself from her to make it easier for her to leave him. And what if she had said that she was okay with dissolving their marriage? He might have felt obliged to leave her. And if that happened he would be alone, and it might take a long time for him to find another woman to share his life with.

If Clark had told Lois about his thoughts about a divorce, he might have imperiled his marriage. He might have lost Lois.

Clark didn't want a divorce. He didn't want the messiness that comes with a divorce, and he didn't want the loneliness afterwards. So what did he want?

I think Clark just wanted Lois to be a better wife to him. I think he was unconsciously "blackmailing" Lois in order to force her to devote more of herself to him. He was unhappy with his marriage, or rather, he was unhappy with how Lois treated him, so he wanted her to change. And he is succeeding, as Lois has already started the process of giving up her job for him.

Somebody said in an earlier FDK thread that the reason for Clark distancing himself from Lois was probably that he wanted to give her a guilt-free escape. My interpretation is the exact opposite. I think Clark wanted to make Lois feel guilty, so that she would change her ways, so that Clark wouldn't leave her.

I have said in an earlier post that I find it unreasonable to assume that Clark would be less busy than Lois. I can't help thinking that this fic is being unfair to Lois by implying to us that he is. Clark is juggling two jobs whereas Lois only has one, and in his Superman job Clark has completely unpredictable working hours. For all of that, Clark is able to be a beloved basketball coach for a bunch of kids, on top of his two other jobs. If I remember correctly, Clark was playing a match with the teens every week on a predetermined day and hour. Let's say, for the sake of the argument, that Clark was playing basketball with the kids every Friday at seven p.m. Does that mean that Superman is taking a vacation every Friday at seven p.m.? And if that is not the case, what explanations will Clark give the kids for standing them up every third or fourth Friday? That he had to return a video? That he had to have an emergency haircut? That he had to pick up his Cheese of the Month shipment?

I find it impossible to believe that Lois is busier than Clark when she has only one job and he has three, if you count his commitment to the kids as a (volunteer) job.

And then we have the child business. Oh well.

I'm not questioning that Lois wants a child with Clark. I'm just saying that it is Clark who has been obsessing about a child, over and over again.

Clark has told Martha that he needed to distance himself from Lois, so that she could divorce him, so that she could have a child. In my opinion, Martha should have told Clark much more bluntly than she did that Clark ought to discuss things with Lois rather than provoke her to divorce him. And Martha should have asked Clark if he was really sure that Lois wanted a divorce in order to have a child.

Clark didn't ask Lois about that. And Martha didn't ask Lois about that. To Martha it is enough that Clark is obsessing about a child. So now Martha has taken steps that will make it very awkward for Lois not to have a child with her father-in-law. Martha doesn't know what Lois wants, but she has put her son's wife in a position where the younger woman probably feels obliged to have her husband's child through her husband's father.

Lois has been made to feel that she has to sacrifice something of her own if she wants to keep Clark. So now she has begun to give up her job for Clark's sake, and she probably feels obliged to have her father-in-law's child for Clark's sake. But Clark is giving up nothing for Lois.

Maybe you would be better off having a divorce, Lois.

Sometimes Love Isn\'t Enough by Tank Wilson - and here Clark is the über-busy one.

Ann