Beautiful. I like the compare and contrast between the two parts. What a difference the filling the void in her heart made to the sound of silence. I know that since becoming a mother I appreciate the sound of silence. I've always liked it but now it's soothes me like the taste of chocolate. Silence is chocolate to a mother's ears.
It's so sad of how Lois felt complete in her life, in her heart, except for this one thing, this one failure that she couldn't overcome.
When I saw it was two parts, I didn't know if you'd show Clark upstairs, not sleeping in the silence either (as Lois had thought), but in his own depression hole for not being able to become a father, blaming himself as Lois blamed herself.
I'm glad you ended it on a happy note. Christmas stories are much better with a happy ending. (I was afraid you might go full circle and return to silence being bad, children grown & gone and Superman killed or something.) It's so sweet to see how much happier Lois is knowing that, but for Clark, she is no longer alone. Clark always had the Kents to fall back upon, but Lois really had no one (other than her friends).
