"Lois, you said that there's a lot you've never told me about what life was like growing up and I’m not asking you to tell me now, but I've known for a long time that you weren't telling me everything."
Because many times, but not always, love hears what isn't spoken just as deeply as what is spoken.
It's moving that he doesn't just reveal her hidden fears, but he also exposes himself. He uses the example of the nightmares to show how he has been secretly expressing his love for her even though he knows she isn't ready to receive that when she is awake.
I can see from here where I listened to my adopted parents' heartbeats fade out. And now... to see the planet that had my birth parents on it explode..."
It's funny that I've never considered that footage as Clark witnessing his parent's death. It isn't as if a thousand voices cried out on Alderaan and then were silenced. Instead, to me it has always felt as if it were an impersonal special effect.
There is something profound about the second time death is experienced that effects a person much deeper than the first time. For many people, no matter how old they are the loss of the second parent, or in this case the second pair of parents, hurts so much deeper than the first time. You mourn the first loss all over again as if it just happened. I imagine that somehow Clark *feels* like an orphan. Certainly he's been an orphan for half his life, but now he feels like one.
She was still so fragile. Her heart was still surrounded by walls, but she'd married a man who was strong enough to break them down if she'd let him or fly over them if she wouldn't. More than she'd realized, he'd been there for her, comforting her when she needed it most, knowing that there was no way she would accept his actions if she knew, reassuring her subconscious that he would never leave and beginning to prove it to her in terms she could understand.
Isn't it strange that Lois gathers the strength she needs to comfort Clark from Clark's own strength? Yet, I find that very plausible.
I know there are some who will feel that by having one heart-to-heart fix everything you're making the ending too easy, but I don't see it that way because they have come up with a workable plan to overcome their relationship's shortcomings. A similar comparison would be that one conversation might not end a family's money woes, but if it leads to a budget it just might.
Elisabeth
PS As for tortuous deaths, have you read Fox's Book of Martyrs?
