That was a lovely ending to your fic, Carol!
What she saw stopped her in her tracks.
Clark lay on the couch, his left arm bandaged where the bullet had gone straight through. It hung limply by his side, his hand brushing the floor.
On his bare chest lay her son. Tiny Jon was curled up against the strong chest of his father.
His father.
She had said it many times before that biology didn't matter, that Clark was his father no matter what the genetics might say, but it wasn't until that moment that she truly believed it. In that moment, she knew in her heart what she had known in her head since she told Clark she was pregnant.
That green rock – whatever it was – had stripped Clark of his unique abilities and he had still flung himself into harm's way, going so far as to take a bullet to protect her and the child he had no way of knowing was his.
Matching breath for breath, the two men in her life were finally at peace. After the terror of the day, together they had finally found a way to move beyond the uncertainties, the now inconsequential realities of DNA, and they had found peace.
Clark, the strongest man in the world, made seemingly of steel, at his most vulnerable point had risked his life for hers and for the life of the innocent child now resting on top of him.
In that instant, Lois knew.
She knew what she had known for years, but had never been able to admit. Not completely. Not to herself, not to anyone.
Aunt Louise had known this day would come, but had not lived to see it.
She loved Clark Kent.
With every ounce of her being, she loved him.
Sorry about the long quote, but it is perfect! Lovely!!
This has been such an interesting fic, where Lois was "forced" by circumstances to marry Clark, when she was only seventeen. I applauded her for making it clear to Clark that she married him because he offered her a way to help Lucy, not because she wanted an intimate relationship with him. I thought she was too young to have to accept the full obligations of marriage at the age of seventeen. Unfortunately she got stuck in her fear of intimacy, but then again, that sort of thing can happen to a person. It is a very human thing to get stuck sometimes. It was interesting and moving to see Clark spending years trying to wear down Lois's resistance, much like he did in the show, except here he did it while they were already married to each other!
Like many others, I was unhappy about the fact that you had Luthor rape Lois. There are several reasons for my objections. First, in the perfect world of fiction, I'd like to imagine that Lois doesn't have sex with any other man than Clark, at least not after she has met Clark. (She can be excused for having sex with other men before she has laid eyes on Clark.)
Also, speaking about LnC fics in general, the idea that Lois should have sex with Luthor always makes my skin crawl! And I hate it when she gets raped.
And in this particular fic, it was rather painful that Clark wasn't the first to have sex with Lois, after he had waited so long and been such a caring and loving husband.
And if we think in terms of realism, it was rather improbable that Lois should run into
two highly-regarded men who turned out to be determined, ruthless and sophisticated rapists with their sights set on her.
However, the rape situation did create a couple of very positive effects. The first was the fact that Lois was made to inhale, drink or otherwise take in Miranda's pheromone. I love the effect that has on her. It doesn't make her a loose woman who wants to have sex right and left, but it does take away her inhibitions and makes her want to make love to the man she truly loves, Clark Kent. I really thought that the pheromone incident was a great confirmation of Lois's true feelings for Clark in the show. In this fic, I didn't mind that she was "drugged" when she made love to Clark for the first time. It was just that her her fears and denials were taken away from her for once.
Second, the fact that there was some doubt about the paternity of Lois's child made it possible for Clark to demonstrate his complete love for Lois and her child. I think it might have been hard to come up with a scene as perfect as the one I quoted at the beginning of my post if the whole rape and pheromone incident hadn't happened.
I still think that Luthor's rape of Lois throws some gears into the clockwork of this story and makes it run less smoothly. On the other hand, isn't real life like that? Rarely do our lives form the shape of perfect arcs like rainbows. In real life we have to live with imperfections, and so do Lois and Clark in this fic.
But their love is perfect.
Ann
