A/N: I'll be out of town for the next week or so, but I should have a new part ready when I return. Thanks so much to all who have taken the time to review! Posting a story in a new fandom is always a little nervewracking, and you've made me feel very welcome. I hope you continue to enjoy the story.

“I’m sorry, honey,” she said softly, pulling him close. “I’m so sorry you’re hurting.”

She felt him shudder slightly against her as he allowed his head to drop to her shoulder. Superman’s invulnerability was the biggest myth of all, Martha thought tenderly, as she smoothed her hand over her boy’s dark hair. She’d played devil’s advocate a little and told Clark some things she believed he’d needed to hear, but there was a corner of her mother’s heart that fiercely resented Lois Lane for the pain she’d caused.

The guy’s an alien! He could have lived in a...a pod somewhere and survived on dead rats for all she knew.”

Martha blinked at him. “That’s...one of the strangest things I’ve ever heard you say, son."

Honestly, Clark, it’s a darn good thing you are invulnerable, as much time as you’ve spent shooting yourself in the foot.

How he wished he had been meant for this life. How he wished it could be enough for him to pour his soul into the fertile Kansas soil, to arrange his existence around the simple rhythms of planting and harvesting. To return each night in sweat-stained clothes to a small frame house with a squeaky screen door. To sit quietly in the evenings on a darkened porch, watching the fireflies dance. To awaken each morning to the smell of strong coffee, knowing the new day would follow the same soothing pattern as the one before.

He was wise to her now, and he flatly refused to be held in her thrall any longer. He was the strongest man in the world, and he was certainly capable of conquering his own heart.

“Fine,” she said. “So don’t talk. But I still have some things to say, and you’re going to sit down and hear them.”

His jaw clenched, but out of long habit of obedience, he dropped back into his chair and gave his mother an expectant, if truculent, look.

“Good enough.” Martha rolled her eyes. “Now, here are the facts as I see them: Clark Kent went to Metropolis, met Lois Lane, and decided he was through wandering the world. Only you know how related those last two things might be, but your father and I have always thought they were pretty much cause and effect.” She paused for a response from her son, but he was sitting stony-faced, refusing to give anything away. She sighed, clearly exasperated, and went on. “Then Clark Kent had his mother sew him an outlandish costume and began moonlighting as a superhero, going to a great deal of trouble to make sure that no one would suspect he and Superman are one and the same. The first thing he did as Superman was to save the Messenger shuttle, appearing in glorious red and blue to swallow a bomb and then single-handedly lift the shuttle into space. The second thing he did was to choose one reporter out of all the ones covering the launch and sweep her up into his arms and fly her back to The Daily Planet. Remind me, honey – which reporter was that again?”

Clark gave her a baleful look, to which she responded with a gentle smile.

“Don’t you see, sweetie?” she said, covering his hands with her own. “You singled Lois out – as Superman – from practically the very first minute. You brought this crush of hers on yourself. You’ve never for one second treated her like the other reporters. And I know why, and you know why, but how on earth was Lois supposed to know it?”

Clark sighed. “I appreciate that, Mom. You know I do. But I’d never forgive myself if something happened to you and Dad because of my carelessness. And right now Lois is a loose cannon. I don’t know what to expect, but I think you and Dad should be prepared for the worst. Lois wouldn’t want to do anything to hurt you, but she doesn’t always think things through all that well, and she refuses to believe that Luthor is dangerous. If she trusts him with this...with my secret...then you really might have to go into hiding. I’m not sure there’d be any other way to keep you safe from him.”

Well, no more. He was wise to her now, and he flatly refused to be held in her thrall any longer. He was the strongest man in the world, and he was certainly capable of conquering his own heart. As he caught sight of his father, a rotund figure atop a tractor, obscured by a cloud of dust, he renewed his vow to keep his distance from Lois Lane.

Originally posted by KSaraSara:


Hope whatever was out of town went well.

Sara

The farm soothed him, but it was people - people in all their flawed humanity – who fascinated him, who inspired him, who endlessly beckoned him into their midst. They touched him and amused him and sometimes horrified him, and then they seemed to whisper in his ear when he sat at his keyboard and tried his best to tell their stories. It was the people of the earth who made him feel there might be a reason a baby had hurtled through millions of miles of cold, dark space and landed unharmed in a twilit Kansas field.