Chapter 3
"We're not going to be able to talk about this until I put her down."
If she could take a picture of his face in this moment, she'd paste it in the dictionary under the word 'dumbstruck.' There was no other word for it. She shifted her weight uncomfortably, waiting for a reply.
"I know. I just... Can I... can I see her? I mean... can I at least come in?"
Hana groaned against her chest unhappily, and Lois nodded, desperate to hang onto him this time. Because telling him she was sick was one thing. Telling him he had a daughter? She refused to let her little girl go fatherless just because she was stubborn and he was scared. "Of course." She opened the door wide in invitation, and he stared at her daughter blankly for a few moments, white as a sheet, before finally realizing he was still standing there and walking past her carefully. She wished she could get some sort of read off him. Her heart pounded in her chest. So far all he'd done was stare in silence. Lois turned to close and lock the door behind her, taking a moment to worry her bottom lip between her teeth and resituate her daughter in her arms.
"Mama," the girl fussed, pouting and squirming against her.
"What is it, Hana Banana?"
She pointed over at Clark shyly, giving her a look. Lois huffed a small laugh and stroked an unruly lock of hair out of her eyes. "This is... Mama's friend, Mr. Clark."
She tried to gauge his reaction to her words, but still nothing. He stood there in shock, gaping like a codfish.
"Clark?" the girl echoed, suddenly alert and gleeful.
That got a reaction out of him. Joy spread across his face, and he reached a hand out hesitantly before pulling back again. He rocked back on the balls of his feet, but wasn't able to shake his grin. Lois felt her heart skip a beat. As long as he was smiling, she could try and make this work.
"I'm Clark!" the toddler shouted gleefully, her enthusiastic motions almost knocking herself out of her arms. Lois scrambled to keep her daughter at her hip.
Clark chuckled, Lois was happy to see, and he got up the nerve to take a step closer. He smiled at her but kept his eyes on their daughter. He gave a gentile bow and really hammed it up. "Pleased to meet you, little lady."
Havana giggled and turned to bury her face against her collarbone. Lois smiled wryly and bit her cheek, tossing an eyeroll his way, and Clark laughed outright. Her stomach flip-flopped again, and Lois forgot for a moment. She forgot it all. The way her bones ached, her head ached, the slight nausea that constantly ebbed and flowed. That she was sick, dying, and that he's never been there for them. That this was their first meeting.
This was their first meeting.
She felt a tear prick the corner of her eye. She wished he hadn't just shown up like this, out of the blue. She could have planned something nice, something memorable, something picture worthy. As cute as it was to see the two laughing together-- and her train of thought derailed, because boy, did she look like him. She'd always known, intellectually, that Havana took after Clark more than her, just based on memory of his looks alone. But seeing them, inches apart, the way both their eyes crinkled when they laughed and the dimples in their cheeks... it nearly bowled her over.
Clark cleared his throat to get her attention, and she realized she'd been scrutinizing them. She quirked her lips at him quickly. "Uh, it's her middle name. Havana Clarke Lane. Clark with an 'e' at the end." He looked gutted at that, and she blushed a little. "I wanted... I wanted her to have a piece of you... and I never did get your last name."
It was his turn to blush as he grasped for words with his mouth hanging open. "I don't know what to say.... thank you. It's, uh, it's Kent, by the way."
Lois huffed a quiet laugh, smoothing a hand over her daughter's hair. "Drat. That would have made for a way better middle name."
He laughed through his nose a little, and silence threatened to make things awkward again. Lois hefted Hana against her hip again with a slight grunt of discomfort. "All right, missy. Time to say goodnight to Mr. Clark."
"Noooo!" she wailed into her ears, pulling away. Lois grimaced. Of course. "No bed!"
"Havana--"
"No bed!" She kicked at her, and pain flowered at her hip. Lois hissed and set her on the ground gently. The girl immediately took off, shuffling away in her unicorn-patterned footed pajamas like an adorable, pink, fuzzy bat straight out of tiny toddler hell. Lois huffed irritably and took a moment to gather herself before preparing to give chase.
Clark's hand landed gently on her back, and she looked up to find kind, concerned eyes looking back at her through his glasses frames. "Are you okay?"
She flushed and straightened. That girl was definitely her daughter. She couldn't behave herself for long enough to impress him. That would be too easy. "I'm fine. Um. Would you mind..."
He nodded and turned towards the sound of Havana's voice, chanting 'no bed' over and over again as she ran throughout the apartment. Clark walked quietly over to the corner of the hallway and stood there waiting, an amused grin on his face. Lois scowled. He wasn't doing anything! Lot of good he was. She was about to tell him to nevermind, when Havana came careening back into the room and he scooped her up midstep.
She squealed delightedly as he swooped her and brought her up to his chest, which at least ended the irreverent chanting. Relief filled Lois, and longing. Because he was holding his daughter in his arms, and she was giggling, and they looked so happy. She silently wished for something that wasn't possible, and walked over to his side with her arms outstretched. "Here, I can take her."
He hesitated, and she realized he was reluctant to let her go. Even more surprisingly, Havana wasn't fighting to get away from him. She was an independent child, and didn't like family coddling her, let alone complete strangers. But here, in his arms, she seemed at ease. Maybe she sensed something about him... Lois bit her lip and instead smoothed her daughter's soft curls again while the girl caught her breath between giggles. "Hana, you were already supposed to be asleep. You've had all this extra time already."
There was no reasoning with a two year old though, and she folded her arms around Clark's neck stubbornly. "No. I'm stay Clark."
Exasperation filled her, and she looked at Clark to find his expression amused and delighted. She shot him a glare, and he finally picked up on it. He made a show of yawning, and stretched an arm out wide. "Mr. Clark is getting tired, Havana. Mr. Clark wants to sleep too."
Havana contemplated his words with a furrowed brow as though she were weighing giving someone the death sentence. Lois tried her best not to smile, because that would only encourage her antics. She needed the girl to go to sleep... she needed to talk to Clark.
"Okay."
Surprise flooded her, followed quickly by relief. "Okay?"
"'Tory?"
Clark looked to her in confusion, and Lois smiled. "Okay. One more story."
She turned to Clark and repeated her question. "'Tory?"
He grinned and nodded at her. "Yeah, I can tell you a bedtime story."
"You don't have to," Lois protested. She didn't need his help. She'd been just fine by herself all this time, and she didn't want her daughter getting too attached.
Just in case.
He looked at her with pained brown eyes, those same eyes that she saw reflected back in her daughter's face, and she pursed her lips.
"Please? I want to."
She conceded with a nod, and he smiled. She led the way down the hall to Havana's room, and they followed with muffled, small steps. He spoke in soft, soothing tones, and Lois chanced a look back to see her little girl's head resting on his shoulder, and Clark looking completely awed.
"All right. Once upon a time, there was a beautiful princess named Havana."
"Me?"
"Yes, just like you. And she had a whole kingdom, and she ruled over it, and everyone was happy. All the people loved her, because she was kind, and gracious, and smart, and brave, and beautiful. Just like you." Lois smiled at his description, knowing their daughter wouldn't understand half the words, but appreciative that he wasn't talking down to her. She turned into her daughter's room and took in the mess-- stuffed animals littered across the floor, shirts and outfits spilling out of her bottom dresser drawers-- and she wished once again that she'd had some warning of his arrival, and she'd cleaned it up a little more. Havana was a like a tornado; she could undo a clean room in less than a minute. She sighed but gestured for Clark to enter ahead of her.
He smiled at her softly and stepped past her, miraculously evading all of the booby traps on her floor. "But Princess Havana had a secret," he continued, taking on a warning tone as he dipped her down to lie her in her crib. He settled her on the mattress gently and stroked her hair. Lois felt her heartstrings pull at the scene. "She had a secret superpower. She... could... she could hear what other people were saying all through the land. And it was loud, and it was scary." Lois tilted her head at the turn in his story, curious where he was going with this. He paused a moment too, and Havana started squirming again. He smiled at her, glanced around the room, and reached for the nearest animal. "So she turned to her trusted friend, Mr. Bunny."
She clapped and reached for him with a sleepy grin, and Clark passed the stuffed rabbit who had seen better days to her. Lois bit back her smile.
"So Princess Havana asked Mr. Bunny--"
"Hop!" she interjected, and Lois rolled her eyes. She was an insistent child, but god help her, she loved her to death.
"Hop," Clark corrected with a grin. "She asked Hop what to do. And Hop said that there was an old story about a superhero that used to protect the kingdom, and had the same powers as her. And if she was brave, she could go find this superhero and learn how to control her powers."
Havana hugged the bunny tight to her chest, and Clark started brushing out her dark curls softly, in a repetitive, soothing motion. "So Princess Havana went on a quest and found this hero. And--" he gasped playfully, a smile on his face-- "you'll never guess who it was."
Her eyes went wide, and Lois could see the bags under them. She wished her daughter would just sleep.
"It was her mommy!"
Havana looked over to her with an open mouth and pointed, and her heart warmed. "Mama?"
"Yes! Mama was a superhero! And she fought bad guys all day long, and she helped good people, and she saved the world." He turned his eyes up to hers, and spoke directly to her. "She was very brave, and also very beautiful. But especially brave."
Lois blushed and tried to swallow the lump in her throat vainly. He hardly knew her. He couldn't claim she was brave. He wasn't there for all the times she wasn't. She wasn't sure she was brave now.
Havana cuddled Hop and shifted to lie on her side, and her eyes-- finally!-- started to droop.
Clark's voice lowered. "And her mama said that if she closed her eyes, and was really brave, she could control her powers and listen well, and save the world, just like Mommy. And the princess tried it, and she could. She hugged her mommy tight, and her mommy told her that if she ever needed help, all she had to do was be very brave, and very wise, and she'd save the world. Whether or not Mommy was there to help."
Tears sprung to her eyes unexpectedly, and she covered her mouth so as to not make a noise and wake her baby girl. Clark smiled at the little girl and stood up, taking a moment to just look at her. "And so Havana slept soundly, knowing she wasn't just any old princess, but she was a hero," he whispered softly.
He finally turned to face her with a weak smile and a little awe still lining his eyes. Lois wiped at her tears and turned to pad softly out of her daughter's room.
Their daughter's room.
Clark followed silently, and she sealed the door behind him with a soft snick. They stood there in silence, somewhat awkwardly. Lois gestured over her shoulder, and he followed her out to her living room.
"She's perfect."
His words were soft and reverential, and pride filled her chest. She sank down onto her couch cushions with a sigh. Finally, she could sit. "Thanks." He stood there tentatively, unsure, and she realized he was waiting for an invitation. "Sit, please."
He pursed his lips and nodded, sitting in the armchair directly across from her. Gone were his smiles, his jokes, his laugh lines-- replaced by anxiety and nerves. He twiddled his thumbs, looking to his shoes. Lois decided she'd have to be the one to break the ice. "That was a sweet story, Clark. Very... unique, but still sweet."
His lips turned up in something close to a smile, and he darted a glance up at her furtively before turning back to his shoes. "Thanks."
She tapped her fingers against her thigh, now nervous herself. "Look, I know... I'm sorry. I should have told you. And I would have, truly. I tried my best to find you for the past three years, but I didn't even have a last name. There's no way... Plus I thought you lived in Cuba or something. I couldn't go back there, no matter how much I wanted to. And I found out I was pregnant, and then that I was sick..."
He looked up at her questioningly, worry wrinkling the lines in his forehead. "Is... Havana's healthy?"
She nodded rapidly, quick to allay his fears. "Of course. She's healthy as a horse. Never been sick. Although--"
"Although what?" he interrupted, and she could see how scared that word made him.
"It's nothing big," she soothed, reaching out to land a hand on his knee. "The doctors worried that she might have CIPA." His eyes went wide with terror at the acronym, just like hers had at that appointment before the doctor explained. "It just means she doesn't feel pain the way most people do. Congenital insensitivity to pain with anhidrosis. CIPA. She doesn't notice when she falls or runs into stuff, even if she gets cuts or bruises. It doesn't help that she's... rambunctious."
He exhaled in relief and slumped back into his chair. "That's good." Lois arched an eyebrow at him, because she'd been a little more worried when she'd first heard the news. He noticed her look and shifted uncomfortably. "It's, uh, probably genetic. My fault. I remember I fell out of a tree when I was little and I don't think I even cried."
She nodded on the outside, but inside she was floored. There was so much she didn't know, even about her daughter, because she didn't know him. "I'm sorry," she repeated. "Just trying to wrap my head around all this. I... I don't know anything about you," she confessed.
Clark licked his lips, the sight of his tongue drawing her attention sharply, and he gave her a gentle smile. "Okay. Let's do something about that. We each get a question at a time, okay?"
Yes. This would be helpful. She straightened in her seat, tucking a leg underneath her to get more comfortable. "Okay. You first."
"All right. What's Havana's birthday?"
She smirked at him a little. "March 27th, 1991. She's going to be two and a half at the end of this month. And also, that's not about me."
He grinned sheepishly. "Fine. I'll take a mulligan. What... is your favorite dessert?"
She smiled broadly, grateful for the neutral territory. "Chocolate. Chocolate anything." He smiled and nodded, like he was locking it away for a special occassion. "My turn. What's your favorite color?"
"Blue. How did you get interested in journalism?"
That was a very perceptive question. She thought about it a moment. "I guess I've always had this strong sense of justice. I always have to know the truth. I worked at the school paper in high school, and loved it, decided to major in journalism. I got an internship at the Planet my junior year of college and that was that. Perry told me if I got a couple of good samples of my writing, he'd let me stay on." She eyed him carefully. "What about you?"
He shrugged. "Pretty much the same. Worked at the school paper, got an after school job at the Smallville Press--"
She snorted. "Smallville? Where are you from?"
He shot her a playful glare. "That's two questions."
"It's ancillary to the original question," she batted back at him.
He smirked. "There's that infamous Lois Lane spirit." He sobered a little, and conceded. He scratched the back of his head. "I, uh, I grew up in Kansas. In Smallville. Well, the farm was just outside town, so I guess--"
"Kansas?" Lois tried her best to say the word without laughing, but she couldn't keep the teasing mirth out of her tone. "You're from Kansas?"
He scowled. "Yes. I'm from Kansas."
"From an actual farm?"
She didn't think it was possible for his scowl to darken, but it did. "Yeah, like half of middle America. You know, you don't have to look down your nose just because I didn't grow up in some big city like Metropolis."
"Hey! I'm not a snob. I'm just surprised." He looked sideways at her, as if trying to gauge her honesty. "I mean, I met you in Cuba. Can you blame me?"
He dropped the scowl. "I suppose not." A familiar silence fell between them, this time a little more comfortable than before. "Okay, my turn again."
She shrugged. "Ask away."
"When did you get sick?"
She sobered, the friendly mood gone. "Clark."
"Please."
She shook her head, eyes shut. "I'm not sure. I was pregnant with Havana when they caught it. At first they thought it was connected to my pregnancy, that it was just taxing my system... but that wasn't it."
"What is it?"
She shuddered and picked at an invisible piece of lint from her leggings. "They still don't know. I'm an anomoly. It's not cancer, although there's some markers that mimic it. My T-cells are off the charts. They say it's like my body is fighting itself, but they can't find the cause. There's no suspicious lumps or masses. It's too different from any of the other... usual suspects. It's nothing... sexually transmitted, if you're worried. And like I said, Havana's perfectly fine."
He stared at her, his expression a blank mask. She shifted uncomfortably, trying to ignore the ache in her bones. "Say something, please."
He blinked finally, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "I think it's my fault."
She shook her head and sighed. "No. It's nobody's fault, Clark. Nobody could have seen this coming, not even me. It's just another one of those things... they just happen for no reason."
He shook his head. "No. You're perfectly healthy one day, you meet me, and you're suddenly not?"
Lois cocked her head to the side, watching his face as he started unraveling. "Why do you think it's your fault?"
"Because--" he cut himself off, glanced to the hallway and lowered his voice noticeably. "Because I'm different. I'm not from here."
"Right, you're from Kansas," she said pointedly.
"I said I grew up in Kansas, I'm not from there."
She froze; there was something ominous about his phrasing. "Where are you from, then?"
He didn't reply for a while, head bowed, hands clasped in front of him. The tension ratcheted up her shoulders with every passing second, and her heart raced uncontrollably. "Havana's great," he started carefully. "In fact, she's perfect. But I can tell you, she doesn't have this... CIPA thing."
"What?"
He glanced up at her and looked away shamefully. "I was adopted. My parents, they found me, took me in. I didn't know... When I was five, I broke my arm and hardly felt a thing. I was healed in a matter of days. When I was seven, I fell out of a tree and didn't get injured. When I was eight, I started hearing things," he broke off, and locked eyes with her. Her pulse skipped a beat at the memory of his bedtime story, and another bout of nausea swept over her. "Things other people were saying, sounds from far away. It... it took a long time to control that."
"Clark."
"When I was nine, I started seeing through the walls, and then my eyes, I accidentally lit the broadside of the barn on fire--"
"Stop it, Clark," she hissed, eyes tearing up. "You stop it right now. This is not funny."
"It's not a joke."
"Then you're crazy!" She jumped to her feet, backing away from him. He stood too, but kept his distance thankfully. She needed space. Lois kept her voice low, but couldn't help the panic that was straining her tone. "You're... you're deranged! You must have stalked me, you're obsessed-- and I-- I had your daughter!"
"Lois."
"What?!" she snapped, shooting daggers at him through her tears.
"It's not a joke."
He gestured down with his eyes, and she followed his gaze...
She gasped when she saw he was floating a few good inches above her floor. A dizzying bout of nausea washed over her again. "Wh-what are you?"
He grasped for the right word, but she collected herself before he found any. "Get out."
"Lois--"
"Get out of my house!"
She pushed him a few steps back until he was out the door and she slammed it in his face.
