Ambivalence
Rated T
Thanks to KenJ & Morgana for beta-ing! Thanks to all you lovely people who read
Ambivalence. It was very helpful!
Last chance to let me know if there were any loose threads, etc. I need to fix (or make it clearer why they’re left hanging) prior to archiving the story. I don’t know when/if I’ll be writing more L&C, but if you want to follow my writing in general, you can like my author page on facebook or check out my blog (elizabethfrerichsdotcom).
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Despite the late hour, the lights were on when she got to Clark’s apartment, but he didn’t answer the door. She couldn’t wait another day to talk to him, so she broke in. Clark was gone. He must have just stepped out—maybe an emergency? She headed towards the couch, then detoured to look at the souvenirs Clark had on display. She found herself looking at the apartment with new eyes. She’d known that he’d traveled the world, but she’d never cared. From the moment she’d met him, she had categorized him as a hick, and much of that had never changed. Yes, she’d realized that hick did not equal stupid after meeting his parents, but it had still equaled an uninteresting background. And now, knowing that he was Superman, she was voraciously curious.
Superman hadn’t shown up until a year ago, but she clearly remembered seeing pictures of Clark as a young boy. In a way, it was a comforting thought; Clark had lied to her about Superman, but perhaps not everything was a lie. There were things she knew about him. She had seen his first grade picture. She had met his parents. Wait, Clark’s parents—were they from Krypton too? Why had they come to earth? And Clark clearly saw himself as Clark, not as Superman, but if he’d been raised as a Kryptonian . . . . She had so many questions.
She turned in a slow circle, studying the apartment, trying to reconcile the down-home country boy with the aloof, larger-than-life superhero.
It didn’t help. This was Clark’s apartment; there was nothing of Superman’s visible—not that she’d recognize anything other than the Suit and the globe. She thought about rifling through his apartment to see if she could turn anything up, but discarded the idea. For the first time she wanted to wait for someone to tell her their secrets. For the first time she
could wait because Clark would tell her when he was ready.
Just then she heard the whoosh that signaled Superman’s arrival coming from Clark’s bedroom. His balcony. Of course. How convenient.
“Clark?” she called, wanting to let him know she was here—though she doubted that she could surprise him with those super senses of his.
In the bedroom Clark stilled for a moment before rapidly changing out of the Suit. After a brief hesitation, he left his glasses off. He’d been so preoccupied that he hadn’t even realized Lois was here. He hadn’t expected to hear from her for a couple of days at least, and he’d been mentally bracing himself for an outcome that involved leaving Metropolis. Taking a deep breath, he walked out of his bedroom.
Lois almost started to see him—without his glasses, wearing a T-shirt and jeans with his Clark hairstyle, he was a man she’d never seen. She studied him, realizing that this was the real him. She couldn’t believe that a pair of glasses had fooled her for more than a year. And yet it was more than just the glasses—there was something different in the way he carried himself. The Suit seemed designed to stand out and Superman commanded attention and respect, whereas Clark fit in so well he became almost invisible.
They stood in silence for long moments, each studying the other.
“You lied to me,” Lois said, then mentally cursed herself for letting those words be the first to leave her mouth. That hadn’t been how she’d wanted to start things off at all.
Clark hesitated. “Yes.” He took a step towards her. “I lie to everyone; no one can know about Superman. Can you imagine what my enemies would do to you, or Perry and Jimmy, or my parents, if they found out?”
“Your parents? They aren’t from Krypton?” she asked, distracted by his concern for them.
“No. They’re really Kansas farmers.”
“Why—Why didn’t you become Superman earlier? When did you get here? Why did you come? Who are you really?”
Clark gestured to the couch. “Maybe we should sit—unless you really want to have this whole conversation standing in the middle of my living room,” he said, trying to inject a note of levity.
Lois sat down, and he joined her on the couch, turning to face her. “I came to earth when I was a baby. My parents think I was about four months old. They were headed home from town, and they saw what looked like a meteor streaking across the night sky and landing in a nearby field. When they investigated it, they found me. They hadn’t been able to have children and thought it was some crazy government agency that had put a baby in space, so they buried my ship and implied that I was a relative’s unwanted child. They were thrilled to adopt me and have loved me as their own ever since. It wasn’t until I was twelve that my powers started manifesting.”
“Wait! You didn’t know you were from Krypton?”
Clark shook his head. “No, not until last year when I found my ship and the globe in Bureau 39’s warehouse.”
“What ship?” Lois frowned, remembering the photo of the man with Superman’s “S,” and then quickly added, “That projection from the globe?”
“A hologram of my birth father. The globe contained messages from my birth parents explaining who I was. That’s part of why I was so frantic when it was stolen—it’s my only real link to them”—he grimaced—“plus there’s enough information for someone to piece together more than I want known, like that I was sent to Kansas as a baby.”
“Why did they send you?”
Clark studied the couch cushions. “Something happened, and Krypton exploded. My parents modified a space probe so that they could save me—that’s the ship that Bureau 39 had. I’d show it to you, but it was too big to take when we were there, and it went missing when they cleared out the warehouse.”
Clark looked so sad in that moment that, despite the confused mass of emotions roiling through her, Lois couldn’t help but comfort him. She put a hand on his. “I’m so sorry. They must have really loved you though to send you away.”
He turned his hand up and clasped hers, meeting her gaze. “Thanks, Lois. I don’t know exactly how I feel about it. I’m glad that I know who I am—there was always something missing when I didn’t know who my parents were or why they’d given me away—but my birth parents are just people in a hologram. The Kents are my real parents.”
“Maybe we can find your ship someday,” she said, already mentally flipping through her contacts to decide who would be most likely to know about it.
“I’d like that. I’m sure if anyone can get a lead, you can.”
She gave a distracted nod. Clark had arrived as a baby, but Superman hadn’t show up until a year ago. She refocused her attention on him. “You said that your powers started manifesting when you were twelve, but Superman didn’t become active until a year ago. What changed? What made you decide to become Superman?”
Clark smiled. “You.”
Lois’s eyes widened. “What?”
“Lois, even though I’ve never told anyone about my powers, I’ve always wanted to help people with them—and I have helped as best as I could. Once I graduated college, I’d move somewhere, freelance a bit, and help people until I did something to make someone suspicious. Then I’d move on. When I came to Metropolis and met you, I knew I wanted to stay here. Plus, getting a job at the Planet was a dream come true. I started trying to figure out how I could help without being caught, and that day that I saved that man in the sewer explosion—you remember that, don’t you?”
Lois nodded, mentally flagellating herself for having missed so many clues. Little things had begun making sense in the wake of Clark’s manuscript, and she had the feeling she’d be continuing to put things together for quite some time. It was still galling though to realize that she’d missed things even from the very beginning. “So that was you.”
“I tried to pass it off as the man being delirious, but, yeah, it was me. Remember what you said to me?”
Lois tried to remember, but she’d been focused on Platt and the Messenger. Sadly, Clark and most of the things he’d done had been incidental at the time, so she’d forgotten them. “I have no idea.”
“You told me to ‘bring a change of clothes to work.’”
Lois let out a small chuckle. “How did you get ‘become Superman’ out of that?”
Clark chuckled too. “Because a costume just made so much sense. That had always been my problem—trying to hide in plain sight. A costume is just another way to do that. And because I take my glasses off, people never think Superman is hiding. Nothing about the Suit is secretive.”
“Far from it,” she agreed with a laugh.
“Yeah,” he said, trying not to blush. “You should have seen some of the other ones. Trust me, that was the best.”
“There were others?”
“Yeah, my mom made several different types. The Superman Suit is the one we liked best.”
“‘My mother made it for me,’” she said wonderingly. “You told Platt’s daughter that your mother made it.”
“She did.”
“I thought that meant your Kryptonian mother made it, that maybe you’d been sent here to help or something.”
“That’s what you were meant to think,” he said.
Lois sobered, remembering how many things she’d misunderstood, how huge the lie was, and how awful she’d been to Clark. She pulled her hand from Clark’s and focused on the designs in his living room rug.
Clark let her go, but using his index finger, raised her chin so that she was looking at him. “Lois, I know I lied to you. But I’ve never told anyone. Neither have my parents. Lying to you wasn’t personal. When I was younger, when I first discovered that I was different, my dad used to tell me that if anyone found out about my powers, they’d lock me up in a lab and dissect me like a frog. I’ve had that hanging over my head most of my life, and, after our experiences with Bureau 39, I’m pretty sure my dad was right. It makes it a little hard to have relationships.”
Lois felt her heart break at the picture Clark had painted—a boy, alone and living in terror that someone would find out and take him away from the parents who loved him. Not being able to tell anyone who he really was, to never be himself around anyone—it must have made him so isolated. She understood why Jonathan had been so paranoid, so desperate to protect the son he clearly loved, but she wished they’d been able to keep the secret without passing on all that fear to Clark. She blushed as she realized that she’d been one of the most avid searchers for Superman’s secrets in the beginning. Once more the memory of how she’d treated Clark rose to the surface—how could she have said that Superman’s eyes were radiant brown, not dull, insipid, mud-brown like Clark’s? Weeks ago she’d realized that she was a bad friend to Clark, but knowing the truth of who he was, this was beyond being rude—she’d been dismissive and downright cruel. She couldn’t believe he could still want her. She studied her hands where they rested in her lap. “I was so horrible to you. I don’t know why you would decide that I’m worth the risk.”
“I was horrible to you too. I didn’t tell you about Luthor—”
“You tried to.”
“Yes, I tried to, as Clark. I didn’t tell you as Superman. I was confused, and I wasn’t sure that you’d listen to me since every time I tried to talk about Luthor we ended up fighting, but the reality is that I should have told you as Superman. I was hurt, hurt that you thought Superman was so much better than Clark. This is new to me. I haven’t gotten this whole dual identity thing figured out yet.” He shook his head. “Regardless, I didn’t handle Luthor well. I didn’t handle our relationship well. I didn’t pursue you as Clark, and then rushed you. I gave off signals as Superman. I knew I couldn’t have a relationship with you as Superman; it was just hard to suppress my feelings for you when I felt like you actually saw me whenever I had the cape on. I raised your expectations, and then rejected you—”
“I rejected you first though,” she said in a small voice.
“Lois, you didn’t know—”
“Yes, but I should never have asked you to contact, um, you, after I’d rejected you. That was cruel and insensitive. I’m sorry.”
Clark took a deep breath. “I can’t pretend that didn’t hurt, but as I said, I didn’t handle it well either. We both made mistakes. It’s not a matter of who made the most mistakes—the question is where we go from here.”
Lois blushed at the intensity in his voice. Where they would go. For the first time since she’d learned the truth of who Clark was, it occurred to her that it made sense that she’d been in love with both Clark and Superman. The past few months she’d realized that she would choose Clark, but now she didn’t have to choose. Although, knowing how messed up she was, the idea of being in a relationship with Superman was daunting. She still couldn’t believe that a pair of glasses had fooled her for so long. “Why do you wear glasses?” she asked suddenly.
“I got them in junior high,” he said. He suppressed a sigh, remembering all the anguish of the revelation of his abnormality. “I can’t tell you what it was like having my powers appear. My parents had told me I was adopted, but not how they’d found me. I was at school when I saw through a blackboard. I was bored and not really paying attention, and suddenly I could see into the classroom next to us. That was actually when I first started writing—as a way to try to deal with going from being a normal kid to some kind of freak in the space of a day. Anyway, we discovered that I couldn’t see through lead, so my parents got me a pair of glasses with leaded glass lenses while I was learning to control my powers. The ones I wear now are plain glass, but they remind me to be careful using my powers.”
She looked up at him, tracing the lines of both Clark and Superman in his face. “I can’t believe I didn’t see it.”
“You weren’t supposed to see it. I work very hard to camouflage and minimize any similarities between Clark and Superman. So far no one’s figured it out. It doesn’t make you any less of a reporter that you didn’t see it. You’re used to Clark being the one to run away from trouble to go call the police, and you’re used to Superman coming to the rescue. Why would you think that they’d be the same person?”
“You say ‘Clark’ and ‘Superman’ like neither of them is you, but when I was reading your story I got the impression that you see yourself as Clark. Which is it? How do I know what’s true?”
Clark slid his hand between them, holding it out so that she could take it once more. Lois hesitantly put her hand in his.
“Lois, I’ve never lied to you about anything except being both Clark and Superman. Both of them are me. And everything both of them have told you is true. You know me—better than anyone. Honestly, it’s only been after Luthor that I’ve started to come to terms with who I am—the man who’s both Clark and Superman, or neither if you want to look at it that way. I used to think of Superman as a two-dimensional character and of myself as the real person, but during my journaling I realized that Superman isn’t two-dimensional. Superman is the side of me that can use my powers openly, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t use them the rest of the time.”
“You don’t?” She shook her head. “You do?”
He chuckled. “If you could clean your apartment in ten seconds flat, wouldn’t you?” Without waiting for an answer, he continued, “Of course I use my powers when I’m not wearing the Suit. I can’t even shave without using my heat vision.”
“I suppose x-ray vision would come in handy in our line of work,” she said, trying to imagine how she’d use those powers in everyday life if she had them. Then she gave him a playful slap on the arm. “No wonder you’re so good at finding things! You use your powers all the time, don’t you?”
“Gives us a little extra edge,” he said with a smirk.
She stared at him wonderingly. “You don’t even need me to be your partner, do you? You could probably investigate circles around me. Why—”
“Why are we partners?”
She nodded.
“Lois, I love being your partner. I have no desire to strike out on my own—”
“That’s where you went!” she exclaimed as she remembered the argument that had prompted the temporary split in their partnership.
Clark frowned. “When?”
“When you said we should split up and I could chase down Stoke while you hunted for Camden. You were chasing down the sound man, weren’t you? You must have heard something. Why didn’t you take me with you? Wait—are you okay? That article said that Superman had to run away from the sound man.” She gasped. “Dr. Carlin! You were shot! Clark!”
Something in Clark’s chest loosened at the sound of her panic and concern. She cared about him, not just Superman, but him. He gently squeezed her hand. “And you saved me. You were so brave.”
“I don’t know about that. Terrified is more like it.”
“But you still dug that bullet out. You still saved me even though you were scared. You did great, Lois.”
She blushed.
“And yes, chasing down the sound man is where I went. I heard something and went to go catch him. I didn’t take you with me because I couldn’t explain how I’d heard it or go change into Superman without you knowing about me. As far as things with the sound man went, I’m all right now. If the cops hadn’t shown up, I wouldn’t have been, but they did. I spent that afternoon in bed because I could barely move. I wasn’t trying to cut you out of the story.”
She gave a half smile. “I know. As I said, I realized that you aren’t the kind of person who steals stories. I really am sorry about freaking out over the Kerth. Perry said that I’m a better writer with you than without you, and he’s right. I know I give you a hard time about the touchy-feely stuff, but I don’t really mean it. I just—” Lois paused, searching for the right words.
“Have an image to maintain?” Clark suggested, unsure he’d heard her correctly. She’d apologized for not trusting his instincts and had deferred to him while investigating Dr. Kelly, but she’d never said anything positive about his writing style before. He’d always thought she considered him a lightweight.
“That’s part of it. I am a woman trying to make it in a man’s world,” she said. “But it’s also not a style I’m very good at, and I’ve found that Perry doesn’t give me as many of those assignments now that I have a reputation for hating them. Anyway, I know I don’t tell you often enough, but you’ve always been able to move me with your words. It wasn’t the style of article that bothered me about the Kerths—once I’d thought about it, I realized it was a perfect article for you to have nominated because you care about the disenfranchised, and your writing is so perfect for highlighting their plight and getting people to really care about it. Like I said, I just freaked out because I thought the Kerth committee agreed with the gossip, and I used the fact that my article had a larger global impact to argue against it. I really do like that our styles complement each other.”
Clark’s mouth swung open. “Wow, um, thanks, Lois. Me too.”
They sat in silence for a moment, both deep in thought. Clark decided to ask the question that had plagued him for months. “I’m sure you noticed where I ended my story,” he began.
Lois nodded.
“Well, part of the reason that I didn’t get any further was because I gave you the edited version that was a combination of two versions—one strictly from my perspective and one from yours. I was trying to figure out how I felt and where you were coming from. But I got stuck writing your perspective after that night. Well, even that night. I know you meant it when you said that you would love me even if I were an ordinary man living an ordinary life—”
“Clark,” she swallowed hard as her stomach roiled. “I’m so sorry. I knew something was wrong with Superman, and after reading your perspective on the past few months, I couldn’t believe how I’d treated you.”
“Lois, I’m not trying to assign blame. I’m just trying to understand. Can you tell me what it was about Superman that made that side of me so attractive to you?”
“I know,” she said, thinking that she didn’t deserve someone like Clark who had forgiven her for something far larger than she’d had any idea of and was actually trying to understand where she’d been coming from. She cleared her throat. “Well, it wasn’t you. I realized that I had a, um, block as far as letting myself have feelings for you. Not because of who you are, but because of who I am. You know I don’t trust people. I’m actually trying to change that—to let people see me and to care about others, not because of who other people are, but because of the kind of person I want to be. Anyway, I realized that I could let myself love Superman because I never expected you to hurt me. Superman seemed larger-than-life and good in a way that meant I wouldn’t be risking my heart at all. And, well, there’s a lot that goes into it, but basically, I thought I needed to have someone successful love me in order to prove that I was lovable—can’t get much more successful than Superman,” she said with a wry smile. “I mean every woman in the world wants to be with you.”
Clark shook his head. “No, all those women want to be with the fantasy of Superman, not the reality of me. Lois, I am far from perfect. I have an even harder time trusting people than you do. I work obscene hours. I have to run off at a moment’s notice. Some days I’m a wreck when a rescue goes badly. And, even though I don’t want to, I think I’ve proven that I will hurt you. I’m human.”
She gave him a small smile. “Don’t you mean Kryptonian?”
“Yeah. And that means a lot of things I probably don’t even think about. Having a relationship with me means dealing with all of that. I’m not normal,” he said.
“Who is?”
Clark gave a half-shrug. “Pretty much everyone else on earth.”
Lois gave him a look. “No one feels normal. Everyone feels like they don’t fit in at some point or another.”
“Yes, but they actually are normal.”
She shrugged. “My point is that it isn’t just you who doesn’t feel like they fit in. No one fits in even though we’re all pretty similar.”
Clark hesitated. Was it really that simple? He’d been focused on the fact that he was so different from everyone else, especially in the early days when he’d been learning to control his powers, but maybe he should have been recognizing the similarities—after all, no one knew that Clark was from another planet. “Hmm. I guess I’ve spent so much of my life wishing that I were normal that I never thought about that.”
Lois frowned. “Clark, do you think that’s why you didn’t see yourself as Superman?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, like you said, Superman is the side of you that’s not-normal. Maybe you were predisposed to think of ‘Clark’ as yourself because you wanted to be normal so badly.”
Clark stilled. He’d never thought of it that way, but it made a lot of sense. “See, this is why I need you. You see me better than anyone else, even before when you thought I was two people. You understand that side of me better than I do some days.”
Lois blushed. “I think it’s just common sense.”
“Not at all,” he maintained. Then, remembering why Lois had said she’d been attracted to Superman, he asked, “You do know that you don’t need someone to prove that you’re lovable, right?”
“I’m starting to,” Lois said slowly.
“Good. Because I think you’re very lovable, no matter what anyone else says or thinks or who loves you.”
“Thanks, Clark.”
He cleared his throat. “I know why I reacted the way I did after Luthor proposed, and hopefully I conveyed all that in my story, but can you, um—”
“Explain my side?”
“Yeah.”
She stood and began pacing in front of him. “I don’t know. It didn’t make sense. You know how I jump into the pool without checking the water level. I just”—she waved her arms in the air—“I just couldn’t deal with losing the Planet. I’m a different person now, and I would handle it differently if it happened today, but at the time, I thought I was losing myself, losing everything that made me worthwhile. It goes back to lots of boring family stuff.” She huffed. “No, that’s a lie. I’ve been doing this thing lately: trying to catch the lies I tell myself. It’s not really ‘boring family stuff.’ It’s just—uncomfortable to talk about.” She turned to study Clark’s bookshelves. “See my dad wanted a son, not a daughter. So I was never good enough for him. And even though I rebelled and went into journalism instead of medicine, I was still trying to prove to myself that he was wrong.” She sniffed, trying to keep the tears from overflowing. “I ended up with Lex because I was trying to prove that I could be a success, that someone successful wanted me.” She turned to face him. “But, Clark, I said ‘no.’ I realized that I didn’t want to marry Lex, so you know that part with the ‘do you so-and-so take so-and-so to be your lawfully wedded husband’? I said ‘no.’” For the first time since she’d done it, the memory brought a smile to her face. “You should have seen the look on his face.” She giggled. “It was like he’d never heard the word before in his life.”
“He probably hadn’t,” Clark said dryly.
Lois gasped as she realized where Clark had been those two days he’d been missing around her wedding.
“What?” Clark asked.
“What did Lex do to you?” she demanded.
“What?”
“You told me that he had Kryptonite and held you prisoner.” She held his gaze. “Clark, what did he do to you? And don’t give me any of that ‘it’s too much for me to hear’ crap.”
Clark winced. “What exactly do you want to know? I already told you the basics.”
“How did he get you there? Why did you go? How’d you escape?”
“He left a message for Superman on Clark’s machine saying that he wanted to talk to me about you. I went because I was worried, and I hadn’t thought about him having Kryptonite. I was arrogant and stupid. I escaped because he came down to gloat just before your wedding and left the keys where I could see them and a cumberbund around my neck. I was able to use it to get the key, and then I changed into my Clark clothes and escaped.”
Lois wasn’t quite sure what to say to that. She felt like he still hadn’t answered her question, but maybe now wasn’t the time to press. But if not now, when? “What was the Kryptonite like?”
“Uncomfortable,” he said shortly.
Lois frowned at him.
He held up a hand. “I know you want more details, but I’m just not comfortable talking about it. I don’t like thinking about it, let alone talking about it. Here; I’ll tell you exactly what I told my parents: Luthor had a cage coated with Kryptonite.” He suppressed a shudder. “By the time I got out of it, I was completely drained of my powers—obviously, since it took them weeks to come back.”
“Oh, Clark, that sounds awful. I mean, when you said that he had Kryptonite and held you prisoner, I wasn’t envisioning a cage.” She exhaled noisily and sank back onto the couch, exhausted by the reality of all Lex represented. “Treating Superman like an animal sounds like his style. He probably hated that you were more powerful than him,” she said, staring at the television in front of them.
Clark winced. He had been treated like an animal, but hearing it aloud sounded so much worse than in his own mind. “We weren’t on good terms.”
“I can’t believe that you had this whole”—she waved a hand on the air—“relationship with him and I didn’t know anything about it, not from you—either of you—or Lex.”
Clark made a face. “We were enemies. I wouldn’t call it a relationship.”
“You know what I mean. It was obvious that you didn’t like him, and he wasn’t a fan of you either, but I thought that was just a personality clash. I know I’ve said it before, but I am sorry that I didn’t listen to your instincts. You’re so good at listening to mine. I just didn’t want to admit that mine might be wrong, didn’t even go off around the most evil man I’ve ever come into contact with.”
“Lois, he kept you so off-balance they didn’t even have a chance to go off.”
She looked over at him. “I actually came to that conclusion too. It helps to hear it from someone outside the situation though.”
“I wouldn’t say I’m outside it. Anyway, thanks for telling me. When I was trying to understand where you’d been coming from, I realized that I had made things a lot worse. When I told you that I loved you, I took away my support as Clark—not that I’d been able to be supportive about Luthor, but I could have at least listened to you. And, as I said, I should have told you about Luthor as Superman.”
Lois put a hand on his arm. “You do know that I would have believed Superman, but only because I knew he might have seen things with his powers that I wouldn’t have. I can’t say that my feelings for Superman wouldn’t have played into it, but I wasn’t ignoring your warnings because I thought you were lying—you’d just never given me anything more than insinuations. And I knew you were jealous.”
“Yeah. And you were right: I was. I wanted what he had. I still do,” he said quietly.
Lois shifted to hold his gaze, searching to see if he really meant what he’d said. “Are you sure?”
“Yeah, I am. Even the past few months when I’ve been hurt and angry, I still haven’t been able to leave you. I—I never thought I’d tell anyone about my Kryptonian heritage, except whoever I married—and I’m not talking about marriage yet—but I realized that I’d made it impossible for you to love me because I’d never let you see me. I rushed you before, and I’m trying to avoid that now, but, Lois, I know I want us, whatever that looks like. I don’t know how to do a relationship like this where the other person knows about my powers, where I’m trying to be Clark Kent, Kerth-award winning investigative reporter”—he shot her a teasing look—“and Superman—I’ve never tried it. But after realizing what life without you would be like, I realized that I want to try, even if it’s hard and messy. Life is hard and messy. I don’t know why I expected a relationship to be any different.”
“Clark, are you sure? I mean, look at what a mess I made of things before.”
“I want you. I love who you are, mess and hang-ups and all. You wouldn’t be you without them and you are beautiful to me. The question is: what do you want?”
What did she want? Having a relationship—a real relationship—with Clark was so much bigger than whether she wanted Clark or not. She knew she wanted him; she loved him. But a real relationship would require her to be as fierce in her personal life as she was in her professional life. It meant things like telling Clark the kinds of things she never told anyone—everything from her past to her closet Ivory Tower obsession. It meant sharing herself. It meant being honest about her own secrets and continuing to work through the ones she’d already discovered. She mentally grimaced, realizing that she could only get so far by herself which probably meant that it was time to call Dr. Friskin. Having a real relationship would be a huge step.
And there was the whole dating Superman thing: she’d always wanted to support him, to provide companionship, and to be there for him after rescues, but now that she was faced with the reality—could she actually do it?
For a moment she considered telling Clark “no,” that she wasn’t ready and wasn’t sure she ever would be, but then the thought of life without him hit her once more. If she refused, he’d move on, eventually date and marry someone else. She didn’t know how things would go if they tried a relationship, but she was certain she never wanted to be without Clark.
She took a deep breath, straightening her spine as she resolved to meet the challenge head-on, to refuse to let her past determine her future. She reached up to cup his cheek. “Yes, I do want us. I don’t know how this will go. You know I’m a mess. I realized on my wedding day that I don’t want to be without you though.” She hesitated, then plowed on, remembering how heartbroken she’d been on her wedding day realizing she’d never told him how she really felt. “I love you, Clark.”
He put a hand over hers, drawing her closer. “I love you too, Lois. We’ll just figure it out together.”
“Yeah,” she said, leaning towards him.
He took the hint and kissed her. It was everything he’d remembered and more. Kissing her without the secret between them, here in his Clark clothes without his glasses, knowing that she loved him, made every single one of his daydreams pale. He pulled back, sliding his hand up to caress her cheek.
“So what now?” she asked, looking up at him, a smile that felt permanent on her face.
He shrugged. “We take it a day at a time?”
“Yeah.”
“And”—he glanced at the clock—“it’s the middle of the night. Want me to take you home and maybe we can do something tomorrow on our day off?”
“That sounds nice. What’d you have in mind?”
“We haven’t done pizza and a movie in a while, or we could go out on a real date. Maybe I could even take you to that Chinese place you like so much.”
Her eyes narrowed as she realized how Clark was always able to find such good food. “It’s in China, isn’t it? That’s why you wouldn’t tell me where it was.”
He grinned. “Yup.”
She couldn’t help but smile back; he was so boyishly pleased. “How about I call you in the morning whenever I wake up? How much sleep do you need anyway?”
“Less than you,” he said teasingly.
“No wonder you can eat whatever you want and still look like that!” she exclaimed.
Clark chuckled fondly. He’d known that Lois would be curious about every single facet of his powers and that she’d intuitively grasp things left and right, but it was still fun to watch. “I get most of my energy from the sun. I do need some sleep, but only about four hours per night. It was more when I was a kid. And I eat because I like to eat, not because I need to. My metabolism doesn’t seem to have a problem with whether or what I eat.”
“I guess I’m going to be finding out little things like that for a while, huh?”
“Isn’t that what dating is all about?” he said with a smile.
“I guess.”
“So, want me to take you home?”
“You mean walk me home?”
“No, I mean fly you home,” he said with a grin. “I’ve always wanted to fly you somewhere as myself.”
Lois opened and closed her mouth. Sure a part of her had dreamt of that when she’d imagined dating Superman, but it had been in a this-will-never-happen kind of way. “I’d love that!”
“We can even take the scenic route if you want.”
“Um, okay,” Lois said.
Clark stepped away from her and spun into the Suit.
Lois gave a little gasp as she realized how quickly he was able to change. “No wonder you can pull off being two people. I never even realized that I’d never seen both of you together until I was reading your story.”
Clark held out a hand and Lois took it, walking to stand right in front of him. Holding onto her hips, Clark lifted them off and flew them out the window. “That’s definitely part of it,” he agreed.
As Clark lifted off with Lois in his arms, Lois put her arms around his neck, her heart racing as she realized that it was the fulfillment of all her dreams, but at the same time better than anything she’d ever imagined. Somehow even with Clark in the Suit, he was still himself. Superman was the fantasy, but Clark—the Clark who was both Clark and Superman—was the real thing. She could never have made a life with Superman, but a life with Clark was a definite possibility. He was right. She did know him—maybe not as well as she wanted to, but that was what dating was for, as he’d said.
“So what’s the scenic route entail?” she asked coyly.
“What do you want it to entail? This isn’t the last time I’ll take you flying, so we don’t have to do much if you’re tired.”
“I am tired, but I’m enjoying this too much to want to go home any time soon.”
Clark thought for a moment, then flew them high enough that they could see the sunrise over the curve of the earth. “How’s this for scenic?”
“It’s beautiful,” Lois said, looking around in awe.
“Yes, it is,” Clark said, staring down at her. “And it’s even more beautiful having someone to share it with.”
Lois caressed the nape of his neck, once more realizing how lonely Clark must have been. Not only had he spent his life hiding, he had so many experiences that he couldn’t share with anyone. She pulled him closer, pressing a soft kiss on his lips. “Thank you.”
“For?”
She waved a hand towards the sunrise. “This. For being you. For letting me see the real you. For pursuing me all those months ago when we first met. I never appreciated how much effort you went to until I was trying to pursue a friendship with you. We never would have gotten here without you.”
“It was worth it. Trust me, the pleasure is all mine,” he said, tightening his hold on her.
Before long, Lois began to hold back yawns and Clark decided it was time to get her home. He flew down, skimming over Metropolis on the way to her apartment. Looking down he could see the Daily Planet rising up, whole and unblemished. Maybe that had been his problem the past few months, he mused—he’d been trying to figure out how to rebuild what they’d had before Luthor when he should have been trying to build something new.
They’d spent months clearing away rubble, and now they were beginning to re-build. Yes, they would use much of the foundation they’d had before, but many of the old blocks had been unusable, riddled with secrets and bitterness, poisoned by his lie and Lois’s scorn. They’d both changed, and it was time to do something new. Something stronger than ever.
