This story assumes that (at least) the final episode of Lois and Clark never happened, although it starts considerably later in time. Thanks very much to Kathy and Ray for being such wonderful beta-readers!
“A Long Time In Coming”
“Lois, your mother is on the phone,” Clark said as he entered the room. The “again” was unspoken, but present nonetheless.
Lois met his eyes in the mirror and continued to brush her hair. “Tell her no.”
“Just no?” he said. His brown eyes looked concerned.
“What do you want me to say?” she spat out, trying to hide the quiver that threatened to take her voice and, along with it, her delicate control. “Not now, not today, probably not this week. Tell her to call again next month or so.” She paused. “I don’t suppose you can convince her that *she* forgot what day we told her?”
Clark grinned. “Well, I could certainly try, but I’m pretty sure she won’t fall for that. She may be a little rash on occasion, but she’s no fool.”
Lois shrugged. “Clark… I don’t know what to tell her. Tell her I must have been stupid, I miscalculated the date. Make something up. This is your fault, you know!”
Clark sighed and left the room. She could hear his whisper into the phone as he walked down the hall, and she imagined what he was telling her mother. No, not yet, and boy, was Lois crabby.
She’d only brushed half her hair, but suddenly it didn’t really seem to matter. She left the brush where it lay and stared at herself in the mirror. Ten months. It had been ten months. And no matter what she ended up telling people, she had certainly not miscalculated the date.
Clark entered the room, smiling and shaking his head.
“Did she believe you?” Lois asked hopefully.
“Not in the slightest.” He shrugged. “How’s my little guy?”
“She *could* be a girl, you know,” Lois said.
“Or girl,” Clark amended. “A girl would be just as wonderful as a boy.”
“I’d like a girl,” Lois said wistfully. “But a boy could be fun, too. I wonder if he’d want to be a reporter.”
“Or a farmer. My dad would love that.”
“What do your parents think of all this, anyway?” Lois asked.
“Well, they’re worried. But they agree with us. The last ultrasound showed that the baby wasn’t nearly as far along as the doctor thought it should be, remember? He actually considered revising the due date, except that when he looked at the first ultrasound, the baby was right on target. He was mystified, but I’m not.”
Lois shook her head. “Of all the things to have never even considered.”
Clark laughed. “I know. We spent the year after our marriage until your pregnancy worrying that we wouldn’t be compatible, and then we spent the whole pregnancy worrying that the doctors would notice something strange on the ultrasound, or that the baby wouldn’t make it until term. It never occurred to us that Kryptonians might have longer pregnancies!”
“Since your parents said that you didn’t start showing any super-powers until you were a pre-teen, I thought we’d be safe until then.” Lois bit her lip. “I am sorry that I keep snapping at you, Clark. I know it’s not your fault.”
“I just wish you’d remember we’re in this together.” He took her hand and held it to his lips for a moment, his eyes meeting hers.
She smiled slightly. “I do, really. But… there are some things that you can’t do for me, although I know you would if you could. You can’t give birth for me, and the prospect of labor has me terrified.”
He took her hand. “I promise I’ll be there for you the entire time. I’ll do anything I can to help.”
Tears came to Lois’s eyes. “I’m just so scared, Clark. I keep remembering this stupid joke from when I was a kid.”
“What joke is that?” he asked.
“Oh, you know. A woman gets pregnant, and she really wants her child to be polite. Maybe her husband wasn’t or something, I don’t remember if there was a reason why. So anyway, throughout the pregnancy she keeps rubbing her stomach and saying, ‘Be polite, baby, be polite.’ She reaches the ninth month, and then the tenth, and the eleventh, but the baby is never born. This goes on for years. Finally, as an old woman, she dies. During the autopsy, they find inside her stomach two little old gray-haired men, each one offering the other the chance to be born first. ‘You go first.’ ‘No, no, you can go first.’”
Clark grinned. “You think you have two little old men in your stomach.”
“Well, no,” Lois admitted.
Clark took her hand in his and rubbed it gently. “Lois, there’s one thing I can tell you for certain. No child of yours would *ever* be polite.”
Lois laughed through her tears. “Clark!”
She bent forward and rested her head on his chest for a moment. Then something occurred to her. “Clark, what if it *is* twins, though? I mean, couldn’t it be?”
He shook his head. “The ultrasounds only showed one baby.”
“But maybe we somehow created a second one a later? And for some reason the first one has to wait for her twin before she comes out?”
“You can’t create a second child once you’re already pregnant. You know how twins are created, they talked about that in birthing class.”
“Birthing class,” Lois scoffed. “I’ll probably have long forgotten everything I learned in that class before I actually go into labor.”
“It can’t be that much longer, Lois.”
Lois hefted herself off of the vanity chair. “This gets harder every time,” she muttered. “But, honestly, Clark, do we really know that? We assumed that since we were able to get pregnant, humans and Kryptonians were compatible, or at least close enough. But what if Kryptonians have a two-year gestation period, Clark? Or twenty-pound babies!”
“Actually, the record human birth weight is twenty-three pounds,” Clark said. “In 1897, if you’d believe it. To a woman who was seven-and-a-half feet tall.”
“This really doesn’t make me feel better, Clark,” Lois warned.
“I know, sweetheart,” he said, capturing her hands in his own again. “I’m sorry. I just… the thought of risking you in childbirth terrifies me. I’ve been so afraid.”
“I didn’t realize you’d thought about it,” Lois said. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
He shrugged. “I guess I didn’t want to worry you more, in case you hadn’t thought about it.”
“Clark! We’re in this together! We can’t keep things from each other; we agreed, remember?”
He nodded, and leaned forward so that his forehead touched hers. “I remember. So what do you think we should do?”
“I think we should give Dr. Klein a call.”
* * * * * *
“Sure, I see it,” Lois said, straining her eyes at the screen that showed a black and white blob that was, apparently, her baby. She looked up at Clark, who was peering with the same intentness at the screen, seemingly determined to detect some sort of Kryptonian tag on the child.
“No cape yet,” she whispered to him. He started, then laughed.
“What do you see, Doctor?” Clark asked.
“I’m pretty sure that white blob is the head,” he said.
“Dr. Klein!” Lois exclaimed.
“Just teasing you a little, Lois. Although you know I’m not an obstetrician, I have looked at a few of these in my day.” He peered at the ultrasound again. “Well, I can tell you that your baby looks fully-developed, as far as I can see. But he’s a bit small.”
“He?” Lois asked.
“How small?” Clark asked.
“Well… maybe comparable to a seventh- or eighth-month fetus. How long did you say you’d been pregnant?”
“I’m long overdue,” Lois said. “They say that 37 to 42 weeks is normal. This is my 44th week.”
He nodded, tapping a pen against his nose. “Late, then, certainly. There are still women who give birth in the 45th or 46th week, although it’s a bit rare. But the fetus… well, I can tell you it looks far more like what I would expect from a woman in her seventh or eighth month, not her tenth. Are you sure about the date?”
“Quite. My original obstetrician did an ultrasound early on. He confirmed the conception date based on the developmental level. But then he did another ultrasound later, and he seemed surprised. The baby wasn’t as far along as it should have been. He talked about revising the due date, until he looked at the original ultrasound again and changed his mind. It just seems like the baby is developing slower than she should.”
Dr. Klein looked puzzled. “If you have an obstetrician, why are you coming to me? Surely he knows far more about fetal development than I do.”
Clark nodded. “But when the baby was about two weeks overdue with no sign of labor, the obstetrician wanted to induce. He said that it’s dangerous to let the pregnancy continue too long. There’s a risk of hypoglycemia, and the placenta can actually start to break down.”
“But you didn’t want to let him induce?”
“This isn’t a normal pregnancy, Doctor. What if I’m late because Kryptonian babies *need* longer in the womb? The ultrasounds seem to support that. I could be endangering my child—” She glanced at Clark. “Our child. Our miracle child. I can’t risk that. We just have to let this pregnancy go its own course, no matter how long it takes.”
“As long as the baby continues to seem healthy,” amended Clark.
“If only we knew how long a Kryptonian pregnancy should be,” Dr. Klein mused.
“But this baby is only half-Kryptonian. It might be somewhere in-between a human pregnancy and a Kryptonian one.”
“Clark, you don’t know how long it should be?” Dr. Klein asked.
“Somehow, I don’t really remember being in my mother’s womb,” Clark answered ruefully. “And she never mentioned it on the holograms she and my father left me.”
Dr. Klein’s eyes lit up. “Holograms? You were left messages from Krypton? Did your parents tell you what was wrong with their planet? You see, I can’t imagine that a planet would just explode from getting too close to its sun. Surely it would have been unlivable for years before that, if it were really that that caused it to explode. Are you certain it actually exploded?”
“Dr. Klein!” Lois glared at him.
He blushed. “Ah, sorry. But letting the pregnancy take its course could be a risk as well, as you know. For all the reasons your obstetrician mentioned.”
“We know,” Lois said. “But it seems a lesser risk than inducing, as long as the baby seems okay. If the pregnancy needed to be induced, surely she’d be larger, right?”
“Not necessarily. But most likely, assuming he was getting adequate nutrition. But we do have a special situation here, and I agree with you that the length of this pregnancy is probably due to the nature of the baby’s Kryptonian heritage.”
“We’ve talked about it, and we feel that it’s best to let the pregnancy run its natural course if at all possible. But we don’t want to be reckless, doing this without an obstetrician. We had to leave ours because of the risk that he would become suspicious. We just told him that we’d decided to have the baby closer to my parents, and were transferred to an obstetrician there. The fax number his office sent our records to belongs to my parents.”
“We were wondering if you could monitor the pregnancy for us,” Lois said. “Make sure the baby looks healthy.”
“Well, I can try. I did spend some time in obstetrics during my residency,” Dr. Klein said doubtfully. “But it’s been a long time.”
“Anything you can do, we’d appreciate.”
“But what about other people who know about the pregnancy? What are you going to tell them?”
Lois sighed. “We’re not sure yet. Especially since we don’t know *when* I’ll give birth. Weeks from now? Or even months? I can tell people that I miscalculated, although my regular obstetrician confirmed the date of conception. But they aren’t going to believe that I was two months off, and that my obstetrician didn’t notice! And how big is my baby going to be by then?”
“Well, right now he’s a bit small. I’ll chart his size, and if he starts to get bigger than I think you can safely deliver, we can do an emergency C-section. I’ll find a colleague who is experienced in obstetrics to do it.”
Lois blanched and covered her stomach. “A C-section?”
“If the baby gets too big, it’s too risky to let you go through a vaginal delivery, Lois. But don’t worry about it right now. He’s fine and healthy, and he may only get as big as a normal human baby. Kryptonians are similar in physical size to humans; there’s no reason why the baby should be abnormally large. But you still haven’t said how you’re going to hide this from your family and coworkers. Won’t they notice?”
“Well, I am already on maternity leave…”
“What if you went to Smallville?” Clark said suddenly. “What if you said that you panicked being able to give birth…”
“Me, panic?” Lois said.
He gave her a look. “And that you were worried about taking care of the baby in the first few months, and my mother offered to help you? She loves babies. Superman could offer to fly you, as his friend, to Smallville. And then you could send back word that the baby had been born but that you were going to stay in Smallville for a few extra months. You could be the overly protective mother and refuse to let anyone but family see the child right away. That might give us enough time to cover the fact that he was born later than we claimed.”
“What about if we said that *you* were panicked about me giving birth, Clark? I like that version better.”
“What about the sex of the child?” Dr. Klein asked. “People usually call all their relatives to tell them the sex of the child, the name, and the birth weight. Wouldn’t people be suspicious if you don’t know the sex of the child yet?”
“Don’t they usually figure out such things from the ultrasound?” Clark asked.
“Well, yes.”
Clark looked pointedly at the ultrasound.
“Oh, of course!” Dr. Klein said. He looked at the screen again. “Uh…”
“Yes, Dr. Klein?”
Dr. Klein shrugged helplessly. “I’m not sure. The leg is rather in the way. That *might* be something… perhaps a boy. But I can’t tell for sure. I’m not very experienced in this, you know.”
Lois had thought of something. “What about the birth certificate, though? Won’t it give away the truth?”
“Not if I write it,” Dr. Klein said. “I’ll write a real birth certificate when the baby is born, and backdate it. The Vital Records office won’t be thrilled, but I’m sure they’re already familiar with absentminded doctors. If you need to take the baby for a check-up, though, I’d suggest that you tell the doctor the truth about the baby’s birth date, otherwise the developmental milestones pediatricians watch for will be all askew.”
“What do you think, Lois?” Clark asked. “Can you stand to stay in Smallville for a few months?”
“I suppose so, if it means keeping people from discovering our secret. But, seriously, Clark, you are going to be the one who is panicked about labor. Got it?”
“But I thought you said the idea of labor terrified you.”
“Well, of course it does! Who wouldn’t be a bit scared at the thought of pain for hours on end? But just because I’m rightly nervous about it doesn’t mean I’m panicking. I’m just mentally preparing myself.”
Clark grinned and helped her off the examining table so that she could get dressed.
“I stand corrected,” he said. They waved to Doctor Klein and headed down the hallway.
“Good.” She grinned at him. “Because if rumor got around that Lois Lane was scared of a tiny little baby, she’d lose her tough reputation.” She glared at an orderly who almost pushed a gurney into her side. “Watch it! Pregnant woman coming through!” she yelled at him.
“I don’t think there’s any danger of that, my love.”
Lois blushed.
“You know, this Smallville idea does seem to solve all of our problems,” Clark said as he and Lois stepped out of the medical center and into the bright afternoon sunlight.
Lois sneezed. “Only one thing, Clark.”
“What’s that?”
“What do we tell my parents?”
* * * * * *
Lois held the receiver a little further from her ear at her mother’s shriek. “You’re going to Smallville to raise your child?” Ellen Lane asked, her voice rising shriller on every syllable. “Leaving your own mother out of the entire process?”
“Mother,” Lois said patiently, “We’re not planning to raise our children in Smallville. I’m just going there for the birth and maybe a few months afterwards until I have this whole motherhood thing under control.”
“Trust me,” Ellen said, “Motherhood is something that you never get under control. You give birth to them, raise them, sacrifice your life for them, and the next thing you know, they’re planning to travel halfway across the country to raise their own children so that you’ll forget you even have grandchildren.”
Lois sighed. “Mother, really.”
“Fine. You aren’t excluding me? Then I’d like to be there with you, in the hospital.”
“Well…” Lois thought for a moment. “Clark and I were thinking that it would be better if we ended up keeping it to just the two of us in the hospital room. Even Martha and Jonathan are just going to wait at home. The Smallville Medical Center has a wonderful maternity ward.”
“So then I’ll wait at home with Martha and Jonathan, so that I can see my grandchild when they do.”
Lois waved until she caught Clark’s attention, then mouthed “your turn” and pointed to the phone. He nodded and picked up the other extension.
“We’d be delighted to have you come to Smallville to visit us and see your grandchild,” Clark started. “We just feel that it would be better if you gave us a little time to recover after childbirth and to bond with our baby ourselves.”
“So. It’s because I’m an alcoholic, and you think I’m going to be a bad influence,” was Ellen’s reply. “Fine. I understand. Go, have your baby in Smallville, let Martha and Jonathan enjoy the newborn days. I’ll wait and see her before she gets to preschool.”
She hung up before either Lois or Clark could reply.
“What are we going to do?” Lois asked desperately. “Mother and I were only just beginning to repair our relationship, and now it’s ruined again!”
“We have to look at her side of it, though. Not only will we not allow her to attend the birth, but she thinks we’re denying her a glimpse of the baby until he or she is months old! And *since* you’ve been repairing your relationship, she looks forward to the baby as an additional bond between you and herself.”
“But we can’t tell her about you, and we can’t tell her about the real due date without telling her about you. She seems to have accepted what we told her about miscalculating, but we can’t hold her off much longer. And we know what a danger it would be for her and my father to know the truth. They’d be in danger! Not to mention that my mother can’t keep a secret.”
Clark nodded. “But the truth is, Lois, that I can’t see myself being able to keep my powers a secret from my parents… even if they hadn’t already known. Or if I was marrying Ultrawoman… I know I’d tell my parents, and trust them to keep the secret. Maybe that’s what hurts your mother.”
Lois lowered herself to the couch. “But my parents aren’t like your parents.”
“Maybe we should give them the chance.”
“If it was just my father…” Lois sighed. “But we couldn’t tell my father and leave my mother out of it. She’d figure it out soon enough. It’s not that I don’t trust her…”
“Then what?”
“Oh, I don’t know. She’s just not very discreet. And…” Lois hesitated. “Clark, she’s going through so much right now. She’s still working very hard to get her alcoholism under control, and her relationship with my father is so tenuous right now. Keeping a secret like yours is a big deal. It changes a lot of things.”
“You don’t regret knowing, do you?” Clark asked, taken aback.
“Definitely not!” she laughed. “Don’t you remember how mad I was at you for keeping it from me so long? But it still means that I always have to be on my guard, watch what I say and how I act with you in public. It’s like constantly playing a role, to some degree. I don’t want my mother to have to deal with it on top of everything else.”
“And you think that if she slips back into her alcoholic pattern, she might let slip the secret.”
“Well, yes, that’s occurred to me, too. Clark, I don’t think that it’s a risk we can afford to take.” She touched her stomach gently. “We have somebody else to protect now, who’s even less able to take care of herself than I am.”
“This from the woman who is always getting herself into some tough spot and yelling for Superman?” he teased, sitting down beside her and putting an arm around her.
She leaned into his side. “Oh, I always had it under control. I just figured you could save me quicker than I could.”
“Oh, could you?” He nuzzled her neck, and Lois giggled. He caught her mouth with a kiss.
“Does that mean you still find me attractive, even now that I probably weigh more than you do?”
“Are you kidding? You look even sexier now than the day I married you. Whatever they say about the glow of pregnancy, it’s true. In fact, I’d carry you up the stairs right now, except…”
“Except what?”
“Except that I’m not sure I’m strong enough to lift both of you at once.”
She laughed. “I guess we’ll just have to stay down here then, won’t we?”
“I guess so.” He kissed her again.
* * * * * *
The next day, Clark was ready to take Lois to his parents. Ready, at least, physically. Ready emotionally was another matter.
“Clark,” Lois asked conversationally as they were in the air, “Do you have any idea how fast we’re flying?”
He shrugged, no small feat with a hugely pregnant woman in his arms. “Thirty miles an hour or so, I guess. Why?”
“You do realize it’s something like 1300 miles to Kansas, right?”
“So?” he asked, scanning the horizon for the best route.
“So, at this rate, it’ll take us over 40 hours to get there? And there aren’t even 40 hours in a day? You told your parents that we’d be there tonight, didn’t you?”
Clark stopped in midair and stared at her. “You know,” he said slowly, “somehow I hadn’t really given that much thought.”
“What’s wrong, Clark? We usually go much faster when you carry me. We get to your parents’ house within a few minutes.”
“But I’ve never flown with you when you were this pregnant before!”
“Maybe you could just take it a *little* slower than normal… but still enough to get us there today? Although…” She blanched and held her stomach.
Clark’s eyes widened, and he lost twenty feet of altitude almost instantly.
“Clark! Don’t do that!”
“But… is it the baby? Is the baby coming? Ooh, I should have known this would make a Kryptonian baby come! And they kept talking about trying spicy foods and all that…”
Lois was exasperated. ““No, the baby’s not coming! I have to, um, go to the bathroom.”
“But we just left home twenty minutes ago!”
“Just find a gas station or something. Please!”
To be continued...
