The last scene...after so many people have wondered what scene I'd pick, I hope it doesn't disappoint.
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You kick me in the stomach.
It's painful.
It's admirable.
If ever I wondered how you would take a strange man coming after you, I don't need to wonder any more. This body I'm currently in is weak and sick, and now my side feels as if fire is erupting in sporadic gouts of flame, but I have to admire your courage and resourcefulness. You always take control of a situation--I should know since you took over my life from the instant you entered it.
"Lois, it's me--Clark! I can prove it!" I call out before you can kick me a third time. My head is still spinning from when you flipped me over your shoulder; I miss my invulnerability. I reach up with a trembling hand and flip the switch that prompts the secret compartment to swing into view, brandishing distinctive blue Suits and red capes.
You stare between the compartment and me. I don't blame you for your doubt. I've tried to avoid looking into the mirror despite the sickened fascination that assails me whenever I catch a glimpse of this new body I've somehow ended up in. The blue eyes that stare back at me from beneath silvery-white hair are strange and so...not me. It's bad enough having two identities; to add a third is almost too much for even me.
"Honey, it's me," I say more softly, willing you to believe me. "Lois, the first time you looked into Clark Kent's eyes, you said you should have recognized him for the man he was. Look into mine now. If anyone can see past the shell and into my soul, it's you." A suicidal streak within me prompts my next teasing words. "Come on, honey--no glasses. It should be a snap for you."
Silence surrounds us. That in itself is enough to illustrate to me your indecision. Silence isn't something you accept all too often. That you say nothing now only means you're thinking furiously. If I were lying, I'd be scared. As it is, I'm still a bit nervous as I watch you kneel beside me, tucking your hair behind an ear.
For two years, I appeared as two men before you. One was tall and impervious and powerful and always there when you needed him. The other was ordinary and vulnerable and fallible and always leaving when you needed him. One wore a cape; the other wore glasses. And for two years, that and the different manner I adopted for each of those personas was enough to convince you--and myself--that I was two separate people.
Now, I'm not wearing a disguise. I'm hidden inside a completely different body, one older, taller, and more human than my true form. How can I expect you to look into my eyes and see that I really, truly am your husband? How can I ask this of you? And yet...I've recognized you in every one of your disguises. I can sense when you enter a room, feel when you draw near me, and know when you need me. Is that only because Superman has super-senses...or is it the bond between us?
"Don't move," you command.
I obey, not sure I *could* move even if I wanted to. You really did a number on me, Lois, but I don't mind. As far as you know, I'm a stranger. Again.
Your hand on my cheek startles me. An instant later, I read your intent from your face. A small lump of nervousness gathers in the pit of my stomach. Superman kissed you--Clark kissed you--yet you didn't distinguish the similarities. How can I convince you that I'm really me through a kiss when these aren't even the same lips?
But when you bring your mouth over mine, all my doubts and uncertainties vanish. I only know that my wife is kissing me, and strange body or not, I can't help but respond.
When you draw back, your eyes are wide with shock and realization. "Oh my...Clark, it is you. What happened?"
Joy sets every cell in my body afire with delight and triumph.
You know me.
Without even a single visual hint of my true body, you recognize me and instantly know me as Clark. Your husband. Your lover. Your soul-mate.
I kept the most enormous secret of my life from you because I wanted you to love me no matter what I wore...and you do.
Clark Kent.
Superman.
A stranger.
I shake my head a fraction to bring my attention back to your question. "He stole my body and left me in this."
"So then...that wasn't..." You look away, as if seeing the man who's wearing my body. "I knew there was something weird about the way he kissed me. N-nothing happened!"
Though I'm warmed by the assurance--and your care for me--I shrug it off. I would try to stand, but I feel weak and disoriented, so I stay where I am to hide it. And to hide how uncomfortable I am. This is our house, Lois--our home, yet I feel like a stranger. I don't see things the way I should be able to. I can't hear the house settling and the wind brushing past the roof and the flow of the water in your fish tank. It's as if I've become a stranger in my own life.
"It's okay," I say. "I've been trying to get to you all day."
"And I wouldn't listen to you." The sadness on your face is heart-wrenching. I want to take you into my arms and kiss away your self-recriminations, but I don't. This isn't the man you married, not on the outside. Since the moment I met you, I've done everything in my power--even denied my love for you--to keep from making you uncomfortable. I can't change that now. So I stay where I am.
"It's not your fault," I tell you. "You couldn't have known."
*I* hadn't even known I wasn't myself, not until I had seen my reflection. Even then, I had fought against the idea, accepting it only when I realized that I couldn't use any of my powers and when I heard that the police had identified me as a man named Woody Samms. And when I felt myself so briefly back in my own body and saw you with the imposter. After that, even I couldn't deny the truth any longer.
"Oh, what you must have been going through." Warmth and love flood my soul when you stroke your hand through my hair, showing no hint of aversion to my new shell. You've always seen to the heart of matters; it's what makes you so good at cutting through deception and propaganda to get the truth of a story. To have that insightfulness turned on me makes me love you all the more.
Suddenly, your hand pauses, and your eyes widen in horror. "Clark, you're burning up!"
Your easy use of my name pleases me even in the midst of my disorientation and fear for the future.
"Yeah." I swallow before continuing. "Lois, I'm sick. I think this body's sick. I think it's dying."
"Dying?" Horror reshapes your beautiful features. I would do anything to chase away the fear, anything at all, so I pull myself to a standing position.
"I don't know how much time I have. I've got to get my own body back."
You help me rise, your hand warm and comforting on my arm. "He knows your secret. He's looking for you."
When the room spins, I fold my arms tightly across my chest and hurriedly sit in the chair behind me. "That's not good. I keep finding myself back in my own body, but never for very long. He keeps pushing me out again. Every time it happens, I seem to get weaker."
"As long as he's you, he's unstoppable."
I notice the strangeness of your remark, but I let it pass without comment. For a long while I resented Superman; often, I wished to be simply human. Now I just want my own body back. I don't want to be this stranger. I don't want to feel different when you touch me or feel like it's not my place to reach out and hold you. I want things to be the way they were. I love our life, Lois, and I want it back.
"We have to take him when he's not expecting it," I say decisively, scrambling to come up with a workable plan. "We have to get him to relax, but you can't let on that you know anything."
"Okay," you agree bravely, your gaze intent on me.
I pull out the note Becky hastily scribbled for me. "Here's the phone number for where I'm staying. It's a motel," I assure you as hastily as you assured me nothing had happened between you and the body-snatcher. "Call me when he's most vulnerable."
I despise myself for what I'm implying. I want my life back, and I'm willing to let you do all the hard work to get it. I've sent you in places before when I couldn't go--like the time my powers were out of control due to the red Kryptonite--but none of those times has hurt as much as now. So soon after growing jealous over Leslie Luckabee's insinuations, I'm sending you into the arms of a man who looks and sounds exactly like me.
I despise myself because I ask the impossible of you. Yet you give it to me so many times that I suppose it's only natural I've come to expect it. You are the bravest and most brilliant woman I've ever met; I don't doubt that if anyone can stand against someone with all of Superman's powers and none of Clark Kent's restraint, it's you.
I despise myself because I'm not the man you married anymore. Somehow I've changed into a stranger. Yet you don't seem to realize it. You look at me the same way you look at Clark and Superman. You speak my name just as you always do. I can still remember the tender way you pulled my glasses off this morning and looked at me with such devotion and love that I almost couldn't breathe.
I need you, Lois. You make me complete. You make me whole. And no matter the situation, you always save me.
And I desperately need to be saved.
Superman has become more to me than a costume and a set of ideals. He's part of me, a large part, the part of me that sees suffering and instantly moves to correct it. For so long, I feared that I--the alien part of myself--would never be accepted, yet Superman has given me that acceptance. I love wearing the cape and boots, and working with the police officers and firefighters, and helping in situations where hope has faded and disappeared. I love being able to use my abilities and employ my powers and see terror turn to joy.
And Clark is who I am. He's the man you trusted almost from the beginning, the man who became your friend, the man who won your heart. I don't want to lose him or give him up. Through every disaster, hardship, or trial, I cling to Clark Kent. I *need* to be him. I *need* to be him for you...because despite his flaws and insecurities and vulnerabilities, you picked him to give your heart to.
I don't know, anymore, where the distinction between the two men lies. I don't know how to keep them separate. My two identities have blurred into one. But this strange body--this third identity--it's not me. It's not your husband. It's not someone who can help, or who can be accepted by the world or those people who know Clark Kent, or who can live a lifetime as your husband.
So I turn to leave, though it's one of the hardest things I've ever done.
You look up from memorizing the number, a trace of surprise flickering across your face. "You're leaving?"
I flinch away from my guilt, clinging to my conviction that this plan will work. That you'll be able to restore me to who I want to be. "Honey, I can't stay here. He'll be looking for me."
It sounds like an excuse, no matter how true it is.
Without pause or hesitation, you put your arms around me and kiss me. More than anything in the world, I want to pull you into a deep embrace and return the affection. But this isn't your husband. He's an old man who's sick with some unidentified disease. So all I can do is look at you and hope you can see all my love shining there. When I was Superman, I couldn't hide it; every villain in the world knows I would do anything to protect you. When I was Clark, I couldn't hide it; everyone in the city of Metropolis knows I love you. Now, in the body of a stranger, I pray that it's just as apparent as always. My love for you is the unifying force that makes my Superman-self and my Clark-self combine into a cohesive whole. Please, Lois, I beg you, please see it.
"I don't care what body you're in," you say, as if hearing and answering my thoughts. "I'm with you no matter what."
Do you know that this moment is one I'll treasure forever? Do you realize just how much that promise means to me? I'm the one who promised I would never leave you, yet now you give me the same promise. You know my deepest insecurities and most secret fears...and you allay them before they can even begin to fester. Do you understand that I will never forget the way you look now, or the tone of your voice as you make this vow to me, or the feel of your waist beneath my unfamiliar, weak hands?
Of course you do. You know me.
Words fail me, so I simply nod and turn to leave. Then, acting on impulse, I turn and offer a minuscule smile. "That was some forward flip." The sight of your smile pierces my heart. "I love you."
I leave you then. I knew it was the wrong thing to do even as I did it, and it causes only disaster. Kidnapped along with Becky, tortured for information I don't possess, unable to beat my way through the flames to rescue the young woman who tried to help me. The pain of the beating and the flames and the sickness eating away at me, though unfamiliar, helps to keep me focused on my task.
I have to get back to you, Lois. I can't leave you alone with the imposter wearing my face and bearing my powers. What is he doing to you? Are you all right? Has he harmed you? How could I have left you alone with him?
Even having my body restored to me and seeing the end of the Zarate crime syndicate can't make me stop worrying about you. I barely pause to give a watered-down version of events to Becky and a somewhat more detailed account to the police before I blur into the skies and head back to our house.
Home.
Where you are.
Landing in our living room, I stumble with the relief I feel upon hearing your heart beating upstairs in the bedroom. I take a slight instant to revel in the sound of the house settling, the wind brushing against the roof, the flow of the water in your fish tank. I look around and see all the things I couldn't before. When I spin into my regular clothes, I can't help but realize how much I almost lost. How much I still have.
Because even when I wasn't myself, I still had your love. Everything else pales next to that.
I ascend the stairs quietly, fearful of what I'll find. I can't detect any hints of pain from the sound of your breathing or your heart-rate, but from what little I saw of Woody Samms and from what Becky said about him, I know that he threatened you. I know that he wouldn't hesitate to use my powers to menace you.
Now I'm the one with the powers again. If I take you into my arms, will you remember whatever he did to you? When I look at you, will you see him threatening you?
Will I still be Clark Kent, AKA Superman, in your eyes? Or will I again be a stranger?
The sound of the television filters out through the bedroom. "Amazingly, only one fatality was suffered in the flames. The victim was identified as Woody Samms, 45, of Metropolis."
At the slight increase of your heartbeat, I know you're worried about me, and I quicken my pace. But how do I let you know it's me and not the imposter? How do I reassure you that I'm not the one who died at that warehouse?
Gently, I place my hands over your eyes, just as I did this morning when all we had to worry about was your recovery from the effects of cryo-stasis so soon after Mr. Smith's attack on your mind and where to go for the romantic dinner we had planned. "Guess who," I say softly, and place a light kiss in your hair, breathing in the scent of your shampoo and your essence as I hadn't been able to do in the other body.
"I don't have to guess!" Your hands cover mine instantly--smaller than mine, yet filled with strength to rival Superman's--and you turn with a joyful, beautiful smile...devoid of any fear or trauma. "I'd know you anywhere."
Emotions so powerful and effervescent that I can't even name them sweep through my body, wringing a sigh from me. My eyes slide closed, imprinting on my mind the image of you and the way you look at this moment, engraving it on my heart for all the coming years.
I love you so much, Lois. I'll never be able to adequately tell you or show you just how much you mean to me. Though I can tell you that you're my everything, it sounds cliché. And yet...it's the absolute truth, free of any exaggeration.
This time, there's no reason for me to hold myself back. When I take you into my arms and meld my lips with yours, I finally feel, once more, like myself. I'm me again. Clark Kent and Superman, the strange amalgamation of them both that you helped create and keep bound together. More than that, you helped me accept each of them--both of them--in a way that I wouldn't have thought possible. By loving them both, you made me realize neither one is something to hate or despise.
Later, I look down at you, half-asleep in my arms, and I wonder how even my super-powered body can contain everything I feel for you. Maybe it's a good thing I have two personalities; maybe that's the only way I can safely hold all the love I bear for you.
You smile lazily, and I wonder--not for the first time--if you can hear my thoughts. "I told him he wasn't Superman," you whisper drowsily. "Only you could be Superman."
"I didn't feel very super," I admit softly.
You plant a light kiss on my neck and thread your fingers through my hair. "And that, Clark, is one of your more endearing traits. Superman is the wonderful hero he is because he has Clark Kent's character and integrity. And Clark Kent will never fail anyone because he has Superman's strength of will and determination. That's why you make the perfect man."
"I'm not perfect," I tell you somberly. "I'm not even whole unless you're with me."
"Good." Your smile lights up the room with your inner brilliance. "Because I'm not whole without you. It makes us even."
"Lois, you..." I have to pause and clear my throat of the hoarseness that's invaded my voice. "*You* are Superman's strength and Clark's integrity. Superman is what and who he is because I only did what you said he should do. And Clark...Clark wouldn't even exist anymore if you hadn't loved him."
"He'd better exist," you insist mock-sternly. "The world needs a Clark Kent. The world needs a Superman."
"And I need you."
The intensity of your expression--the tenderness of your heart so apparent in every feature of your body--is enough to ground me to this earth. "That's exactly what I was gong to say."
"Uncanny how that works," I tease. "I'm almost certain you read my mind half the time."
Your laugh drives the shadows away and pours sunlight into my soul, revitalizing and healing me. "Who needs to read your mind, Clark? Everything you think and feel is written all over your face and spoken with every action you make. All I have to do is look at you."
"Thank you for looking." I startle myself with the words. I've thought them so often, yet I've never spoken them aloud. As if it is such an immutable fact of life that it doesn't even need to be addressed, like breathing. "Thank you for looking and seeing me and recognizing me. And loving me."
"You made me look. You made me see you."
"I must not be as good at that as you are," I reply. "Because you made me see you the instant you walked into Perry's office."
"Well..." You shrug with false modesty, a grin twitching at the corners of your mouth. It's so cute that I have to kiss you, though that doesn't deter you from finishing your statement. "Not everyone can be as talented as I am."
"*No one* is as talented as you," I assure you with another kiss. "Or as brilliant." Another kiss. "Or as brave." And another. "Or as beautiful."
"You're running out of B words," you say a bit breathlessly. You don't sound too worried.
"That's why there's a whole alphabet," I claim. "So I'll never run out of words to describe you."
"I can describe you in one," you assert with all your usual flair for competitiveness.
"And what's that?" I ask curiously, not averse to losing if it's to you. Though, come to think of it, I believe you still owe me fifty bucks for the night we finally did get to go on our first date. "How could you possibly describe me in *one* word?" Particularly, I add silently, when there are two of me.
"Clark, you are so...good."
I stare at you, caught by the simplicity of your answer. "Both of me?" I ask, then wince at the yearning in my tone.
You frown at me. "Both? What are you talking about? There's only you. The man I love. My husband."
As much as I love seeing your impish grin, I can't stop myself from leaning forward and kissing you, given breath and life and love from your touch.
Me.
Clark Kent.
Superman.
One man.
The man you love. The man who loves you.
It's enough.
The End
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Disclaimer: Portions of dialogue are taken from "I've Got You Under My Skin," written by Tim Minear. No copyright infringement is intended.
