One of the things that fascinates me the most about the human condititon is how we are locked inside our own minds when we try to take in and understand outside reality. Sometimes, in my more philosophical moods, I try to imagine what reality really is - you know, there are molecules, made up of atoms, made up of protons, neutrons and electrons, the protons and neutrons in turn made up of quarks, and then mediating forces between them. And I can stare at, say, a table, and ask myself, how the heck can simple protons and neutrons and electrons create this table? Give it its solidity, the unique texture and feel of it, its size and proportions, its specific color, its various little imperfections? And I imagine that I could force myself to see this table as it
is, as a collection of protons, neutrons and electrons with mediating forces between them.
But I will never see the table that way. And I'll never break out of the confines of my own mind. And sometimes I'm just flabbergasted at how my brain creates a world for me and serves it up on a platter for me, with sounds, lights, all kinds of sensations and a feeling of normalcy, predictablility, logic and coherence. And I'm thinking of how my brain has categorized the world for me, created set patterns. And I know it is diligently trying to bend and interpret my new observations of "reality" so that they corroborate what I believe I already know about the outside world. And sometimes I'm wondering how out of touch I really am, how far away "objective" reality really is from me. Inner and outer reality, you know. How are we supposed to tell the difference between them, when we are forever forced to look at "outer reality" from within the confines of our own minds?
So, Sara. I launched this lengthy introduction just so that I could comment on how viscerally, dizzyingly effective your story is at making us see the world through Lois's eyes, making us try to interpret the world according to what Lois believes she knows about it, and making us feel, again and again, how the floor is just pulled away from under our feet, because Lois doesn't have the information she needs to understand her situation. Sometimes we're a little ahead of Lois, we know where she will go wrong, but sometimes we are - or at least I am! - as confused and shocked and out of my depth as she is.
Just consider how brilliantly you build this scene where Lois is in the cemetery, watching Clark (Clark!) trying to stop a man from committing suicide:
Clark was shifting away form her, she realized belatedly - probably seeking the source of the sound. She crawled after him, looking along the line of his vision, and located it - a small, plump, bandy-legged man was standing in front of a tombstone with a bunch of flowers... and... and...
Well, here Lois is taking in that Clark is somehow worried about the the disturbance that emanates from this man. So he is abandoning her to go investigate. But he can't leave her! She crawls after him to be with him, and to see what he is trying to see. Hmmm. This small, plump, bandy-legged man doesn't look so dangerous... but what is he doing in the cemetery at this hour, in this weather? And something is definitely off with him, with something he has brought along... isn't it?
Yep, something is really wrong here. Wrong, and irritatingly uninteresting at the same time. Because the guy himself looks so... inconsequential? But she and Clark are going to be caught up in something they won't necessarily like because of this guy, aren't they?
The night was too dark, and she couldn't make out what Tubby Guy held in his other hand.
"Well, Mama, I guess you were right about me all along. Everything I touch turn to cow patties..."
Clark was moving, she realized, as gracefully and silently as a panther. Puzzled, she followed for a moment, and then stopped. She looked from him to Tubby Guy and back again, and snorted.
<Please tell me you're kidding, Clark, you idiot, you're not Superman. Leave it alone...>
Lois is realizing that "Tubby Guy" is planning to do something stupid, quite possibly commit suicide. And suddenly Clark has completely forgotten about her, and all he is thinking about is stopping whatever bad thing is about to happen. Well, honestly! Clark, don't be a fool, don't endanger yourself, you are not Superman!
"So being as how I'm just about as worthless as a one-legged bird dog..."
Clark clapped the stranger on the shoulder, and she winced on reflex.
"You're not going to do what I think you're going to do, are you?" Good-naturedly, light-heartedly. One man to another. Sympathetic, but empathic. How did he *do* that?
Doesn't Clark realize he might be endangering himself, confronting this man, touching him? But then... just listen to the way he is talking to this guy. Connecting with him. How can he just communicate with people that way?
A flash of lightning illuminated the entire area, and Lois's eyes fell to the man's left.
To me as a reader, this flash of lightning feels like a bolt of destiny, since you, Sara, makes it so clear to me that something extremely crucial is about to happen. And yet it wasn't until the second time I read it that I realized just
how significant this flash of lightning really was, if only because it was prophesying the flash that would come next. But to Lois, all it means is that it provides a source of illumination. So that she can see...
Every single drop of blood in her body turned to ice.
This sentence is so effective, it almost froze me solid with sympathetic shock.
A gun. That was what was clapped so tightly in the little man's left hand.
A gun.
The outside world, the cemetery, doesn't exist for Lois right at this moment, Like MaraElaineKent already pointed out, Lois's awareness and sense of reality has shrunk to a single point. The point containing the gun.
The cemetery has disappeared completely. Lois is back in the gambling den, where Clark was shot.
Red and white and black. His black hair tumbled against the white of his face, serene and pale in death. Her screams bouncing red off the four walls, her screams the color of pain, blood red with the taste of her agony.
Now Clark has been shot. In the gambling den. Now he is dead. And his death overwhelms Lois so completely that her world is reduced to three stark colors, red and white and black. Black as Clark's hair, white as his dead face, red as her own screams, her pain, her agony.
And Clark was still talking. Talking easily and calmly, his arm all the time reaching downwards, slowly, slowly.
Clark is dead. But still he's talking. Because he isn't dead yet? Because this is the sequence of events inexorably leading up to his death? Because she is about to see him being shot to death all over again?
Clark. And a gun. Clark and a gun. Near each other.
Yes... She is about to see him being shot all over again....
In that second, she was aware of exactly two things; Clark's fingers - the man she loved, the fingers of the man she loved - closing around the weapon, and Tubby Guy's eyes narrowing dangerously.
Yes... Tubby Guy will shoot him
now.... (And her world consists, right now, of her beloved Clark's fingers on the gun and Tubby Guy's menacing eyes.)
Without a single word, a single thought or a single breath, she launched herself straight at the two of them.
How could any other course of action make sense to Lois in her present state of mind?
Her frozen fingers closed around the cold steel of the firearm, a giant crack sounded somewhere in the region of her right eardrum, and then she knew no more.
Of course she had to get the gun away from Clark, at whatever cost. Of course her own life would seem totally insignificant compared with the necessity of preserving Clark's life.
And for us as readers, the giant crack definitely suggests that the gun has been fired, and the fact that Lois apparently becomes unconscious definitely suggests that she has been shot. Of course, what really happened was that Lois was hit, or nearly hit, by lightning, and that this bolt of lightning transferred at least a part of Clark's superpowers to her.
This brilliant contrasting between objective and subjective realities turns this story into an absolutely breathtaking, totally dizzying read and ride. Hmmm, Sara. Reality. Wouldn't it be interesting if I could see my computer for what it really is, down to atomic and sub-atomic levels? And wouldn't it be interesting if I could look into your mind, and see your neurons and synapses process what you know and think about reality, which helps you create a totally breathtaking story like this?
Ann
I like having a good cry over a well-written story (I'm remembering my weeping over "For the sake of the story") and your first posts are very moving; now there is a difficult moment, and I love it, I'm looking forward to knowing your solution!
