TO WAKE FROM DREAMS
PART 13
“When I left the doctor’s,” she started, taking a circuitous route to her revelation, since that was easier, “I went home and thought about that dream night. I thought, somehow it must have happened. It must have *really* happened. But for that to have happened, you would have to be alive. And when I thought hard enough, I figured out why you were alive. Your big secret. It all came together. And then I knew that the doctor hadn’t been a complete kook, like I’d thought. I knew she’d been right.”
“Right about what?” he asked.
She took a deep breath.
“About me being pregnant.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Clark stared at her, gaping, as the meaning behind her words sunk in. She was *pregnant*!
He was speechless. He didn’t know what to say. His thoughts were moving in a million different directions, so formulating a sentence was not in his near future.
She had learned he was Superman because their night together had resulted in pregnancy? Now he felt more than ever that he had done something horrible to her. Taken advantage of her. Violated her!
But at the same time that thought formed itself, other thoughts took its place.
He was *capable* of getting her pregnant? He was completely elated at that. He had always wanted a family. And from the moment he had met her, he had wanted that family with her and only her.
He was completely terrified at the same time. He was going to be a father.
He was Superman. He had so many enemies. Would the child ever be in danger?
Would he be able to be a good father? Being Superman, it might be hard…
But he would work at it.
But… would Lois want him around? Or would she want to do it on her own? Would he be only allowed to visit… in a manner of joint custody?
He wasn’t sure how she felt about marriage.
Or about babies.
That brought his thoughts in a whole new direction.
How did Lois feel about this?
He had gotten her pregnant!
She was a career woman. If she was open to the idea of starting a family, she probably didn’t intend to do it yet. She was completely dedicated to her job. This would change everything! She wasn’t planning on having a child yet. They hadn’t even dated yet. And she hadn’t been aware of what was happening when it had happened. She would have done something to prevent it! He would have done something!
She was in a situation she most likely did not want to be in… for a few years yet… because of *him*!
He felt like such an idiot.
He put his head in his hands and groaned.
“Clark?”
He looked up and saw her, concern in her eyes, bending over him, talking to him.
“I’m so sorry, Lois,” he said. “I…” He tried to steady his breathing. “I got you pregnant?”
“I had something to do with it,” she joked.
“But that is the thing, Lois. You didn’t! You didn’t know what you were doing! I *should* have. I… I feel awful. How you must feel…”
“You have no idea how I feel.”
“What a monster you must have thought me when you figured out that you could only be pregnant because I am Superman and I slept with you while you were… sleeping,” he finished, his face conveying his feelings of revulsion with himself, as he spit out that last word.
“I have never thought you were a monster, Clark. In case you didn’t hear me before, I recall that night. And what I recall was beautiful. It was… how I could only imagine being with *you* could be,” she said, taking his hands. “Stop saying that you are some monster. Stop thinking it. We already agreed that it happened because of how much we missed each other. There was instinct involved. And love,” she said, her voice gentle and soothing. “You said that,” she finished.
“Of course there was love, Lois. I love you. But I feel like you are stuck in a really bad situation because I was careless.”
Her face fell at his words and she looked down. “A really bad situation?” she asked quietly.
The expression on her face and the sound of her voice made his heart feel like it had fallen to his stomach. “Lois. Lois, no,” he said. “Not like that. I’ve always wanted to have a family with you. It’s been a dream of mine for a really long time. I would marry you in a heartbeat, not because of this, but because I love you more than anything. Because I can’t live without you. Because are you, Lois Lane, and you are *everything* to me,” he said, his emotions threatening to break him. “But Lois… when this happened, we weren’t even dating. We haven’t ever dated, for that matter. And now…” he trailed off, noticing her expression had not changed. She still looked completely wounded. “Please, Lois, look at me.”
After a few moments, she did. She looked like she wanted to break down, but was holding herself together. Just barely.
“I know how you feel about starting a family. I mean, I don’t know exactly. But I assume it is not something you want in the immediate future, if you ever wanted it at all. I know you are focused on your career right now. And I know this doesn’t exactly fit into what you had planned for yourself.”
“No, it doesn’t. But things happen. And they can’t un-happen. And plans can change. You can lose someone so dear to you in one horrible moment… and that world, which you had created for yourself, which had once held all of your joy, can fall off its axis. And you realize that it didn’t hold all of your joy anyway. That it hadn’t for awhile. You realize that that had to do with that precious thing you had lost. Clark… don’t you understand? When you died… when you were lying on that floor, not moving, not breathing… and I knew that you were *gone*… I realized, so quickly, how much I loved you. How I’d been lying to myself for so long. You were far more important to me than anything else in this world. That’s why I couldn’t do anything. That’s why I came here. That’s why I couldn’t get over it. That’s why I quit my job! That job was once the most important thing to me. You know that! And don’t get me wrong. I missed it the whole time. I have every intention of going back there and working again. With you. I have every intention of continuing to work there, even with a family. I always knew that if I had a child someday, I would want to continue working. I always wanted to make it work, if a child was in my cards. And I actually think I can. I think *we* can make it work,” she said. She ran her fingers over the smooth skin of his hand.
“But that job that I missed, that I want to return to… is no longer the most important thing to me. I knew it when the noise from that gun *finally* stopped and I realized that I had lost *you*. So quickly things changed. So quickly, I realized everything, too late. You have always been more important than a byline or a front page story or a fancy award. Always.” She took a deep breath. “I know that if you’re with me, Clark, everything in life is good… and it can all work out,” she said, wiping a tear.
“Having a family wasn’t something I had thought about before. I won’t lie. I hadn’t really given that part of my future much thought. While I was here, looking at your things, every day… I would see pictures of you and your parents. Happy, smiling. I knew you probably had wanted a family. I wished so badly that we could have had the chance… that *we* could have had a family. I finally thought about that part of my future, and it was too sad to think about because I knew I only wanted a family and that future with you! And aside from that, I felt you had died before you had ever even lived. So yes, Clark, this changes things. And no, Clark, this was not in my plan. Either was losing you like that,” she said softly, her voice dropping to almost a whisper. “So what’s so great about plans?”
He smiled and shook his head. She was so wonderful and he felt, under the circumstances, that he did not deserve this. That he never would.
“This is unexpected, yes,” she continued. “It’s even unbelievable. But I never for a second thought of it as some threat to what I want in life. I mean, I wasn’t sure how I felt about it at first, when the pieces had finally come together. But then… so quickly… I knew exactly how I felt about it. And that feeling was not grievance for the life I could never have now. I don’t know exactly how any of this is going to work or turn out. But... I’m not afraid to find out.”
“I’m not either,” he said.
“This clearly wasn’t meant for later in life. This was meant to happen like this. Now. In the wake of a realization of love that actually didn’t come too late. And somehow, I already love this baby. I don’t want it to ever feel that for a second, its very existence was… I don’t know, regretted,” she finished.
“I don’t want that either,” Clark said. He looked at her for a long moment. “Lois, you never cease to amaze me. I mean… you are looking at the positive side of this. I assumed that you would be enraged and definitely thrown, this happening the way it did.”
“Clark, you taught me that. You taught me to find the rainbow, so to say. And in this situation, I didn’t even have to look for it. It’s strange, Clark. All of my instincts are telling me this is right. I know, as well as you do, that normally I would be in full-blown panic mode right about now, having my plan pulled from under me like this. But, I guess, when it comes to you… I am different. Especially since the existence of this baby proved the most amazing thing for me.”
He looked up at her and met her intense gaze.
“It meant that I hadn’t lost you.”
And finally, he smiled. “Is it bad that I’m happy about this?” he said, after a heartfelt moment.
“God, Clark, no!” she laughed. “I was so afraid when I saw your reaction before that you were mad about it. Not at me, obviously, because of the situation. But just… mad *at* the situation, I guess.”
“I still feel horrible about what happened that night. And about not telling you about me the night I was killed. And about how you eventually learned the truth. I feel so guilty about all of that.”
“But, Clark – “
“ – I know, Lois. And I heard you. I did. I even understand what you mean. Part of me even agrees with it. But… I don’t think I’ll feel better about it any time soon.”
He took a deep breath and reached a hand up to touch her cheek with the backs of his fingers. He looked into her eyes – memorized them – with all the love in the world. “Having a baby with you, though… is the best thing I could ever imagine.”
She smiled and turned her face into his hand, which he had turned to cup her cheek.
Placing his other hand on her other cheek gently, he pulled her toward him slowly. Wanting to make sure she was okay with this, he looked into her eyes, just before his lips touched hers. She closed her eyes and slowly finished what he had started, closing the distance between them.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
It was the kiss she had been waiting her whole life for. When she had believed her chance of ever having this kiss was forever lost – gone – she had ached for a chance to have it.
She had thought she’d gotten it in a dream. That that would have to last her. Get her through. That that would have to be enough.
But that didn’t really count.
Neither of them had known exactly what was going on. That night their two broken hearts had sought each other in the dark and clung desperately to what they had lost.
It had been heart-wrenching and beautiful.
But it hadn’t been this…
She was fully aware that she was *really* kissing him. Kissing Clark. He was here. He was okay. He wasn’t dead. She’d woken up from that nightmare from what seemed like ages ago. Finally!
And he loved her. And she loved him…
And they were kissing.
The kiss was sweet and soft… warm and gentle… but emotionally charged and a little bit desperate.
And in it she could feel his love. She could feel it like it was something actually tangible. Something she could touch. Something she could hold with her hands, or touch with her lips… her tongue…
Something she could hear… like a beating heart… or an intake of breath as a kiss deepened. Or the sound of her name, breathed between a kiss. A whisper. A feeling in her heart and soul.
The kiss heightened all of her senses. Her loneliness from having been without him for so long danced alongside her passion and love for him and their clear attraction for each other.
It took all of her energy to pull away from it. But there was something she had to do.
“Clark,” she said, dazedly. Her lips were raw and chapped from the kiss… swollen in the most delightful way.
He stared at her lips for a moment, his breathing heavy, before he looked into her eyes.
“We have to get you back,” she said.
He didn’t appear to know what she meant.
She placed her hand over his hand, which was cupping her cheek. “We have to bring you back, I mean. From the dead.”
“Oh,” he said.
He looked down for a moment. “I was hoping together we could think of something. Or, well, that you would know. I’ve tried to think of a way, Lois. Believe me. I’m out of options. But you… you always have the answers, Lois. Even when things seem hopeless.”
“I tried to think of things earlier today, when I realized you were alive but that no one could obviously the truth about why that was. I couldn’t think of anything.”
He sighed. “It’s hopeless, isn’t it? It's worse now than it was before. I love you and I find out that you... that you love me, too. And you're having a baby and I can't even be around for it! Not really. Not the way I want to be. It's just... it's completely hopeless!”
“That doesn’t sound like something that the Clark Kent I know would ever say,” she said.
She took his hand in hers.
“I did think of one thing just before you came. But it barely registered, until a moment ago. When you were kissing me. You know, every night after you died, I had prayed that Superman did have the power to bring people back from the dead. I had promised whoever was listening to me that I would trade all my days of flying with him for that power. He had always saved the day before. I just wished for a way to make it possible for him to somehow still save the worst day of my life. But I knew. Superman has many amazing powers. But he does not bring people back from the dead. It’s ridiculous!”
Clark looked at her, his mouth falling open a bit, as he realized where she was going with this.
“I just never really thought about it before,” she said. “I don’t know how I didn’t think of it when I was desperate to get you back. But we do know *someone* who brings people back from the dead. Hell, it’s what started this whole mess,” she said, sounding like she used to when she would crack a case wide open.
He smiled at her.
“I can’t believe I didn’t think of that,” he said, shaking his head. “It was right there – the most obvious solution, right under our noses.” He looked at her again. “But Lois… it’s been over a month.”
“Capone, Dillinger, Bonnie, Clyde… they were all dead for a lot longer than a month, Clark.”
“But won’t it seem… I don’t know…”
“Clark,” she cut in. “Have you even *looked* at Hamilton’s notes about all of this?”
Not looking exactly at her, he shook his head. Taking it all in.
“Nothing ventured, nothing gained,” she said. “Didn’t your parents tell you that?” she said, knowingly.
He smiled. “But do you think anyone will believe it?”
“They’ll believe Superman.”
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
