Beautiful. So beautiful. Let's start from the beginning, that bit of song lyrics that starts it all off. I usually react to lines from songs with a stubborn coldness, grumbling that the writer ought to get on with the story instead. But how marvellous these few lines of poetry really are, and how poignantly they describe Lois's feelings for Clark:
Under the weight of your wings
Could there ever be a more beautiful way of talking about Clark's ability to fly? Or the weight of responsibility that comes with it?
You are a god and whatever I want you to be
Oh, Lois! Isn't Clark, isn't
Superman like a god? And how many times have you imagined that he is
everything you could ever have dreamed of, everything you could ever want a man to be?
And I wonder if you truly are
Nearly as beautiful as I believe
Aye, there's the rub, Lois. Is he as beautiful as you believe, not only in body (because you are already fairly sure of that) but in mind as well? Haven't you trusted men before and been badly burnt? Still, surely Clark -
Clark!! - is as beautiful as you believe?
Wow, editor. How perfect and lovely.
Now on to the story. We should remember that, as you say, when the story starts off it has only been twelve hours since Clark revealed his Superman identity to her, and Lois reacted very badly, feeling rejected and deceived, and wounding an already aching Clark with her own anger and hurt. And then at 3 a.m. she just had to go back to his apartment and see him, and they quickly ended up embracing - but apparently saying very little. And now, at work the following morning, they are totally ill at ease, awkward and tongue-tied. Pretending to work and studiously avoiding the other one, all they can think about is each other, and the previous night, and all that has happened, and the fact that everything is as precarious and as unsettled as a walk on a tight-rope:
It was strange to suddenly view Clark as, well, superhuman.
And to see Superman as completely human.
I have rarely seen this simple fact about Martha and Jonathan's son from Krypton being stated quite so beautifully.
The panic she'd felt when she realized she'd forgotten to reassure him that she wouldn't tell anyone about his secret.
Driving back to his apartment at 3 a.m. to tell him so.
The elation that had rippled through her when he'd pulled her into his arms afterward.
The doubts that dogged the heels of all her thoughts.
(Let that last phrase roll across your tongues and inside your minds, FoLCs...)
Lex's death. Clark, comforting her minutes later. A painful, self-imposed estrangement. Anger. Heartfelt confessions. Hurt. Denial. Love. Doubt.
Fear?
Yes, Lois. Fear. The most devastating of all human, and Kryptonian, emotions. Nothing robs us of our humanity, of our
selves, like fear. How, then, do you trust?
Funny, how everything had seemed so small and unimportant when Clark held her outside his door this morning.
For just a few minutes, everything had faded to mere background noise, safely muted inside a Pandora's box somewhere in the back of her mind.
(Ah, but a Pandora's box is dangerous! It can be opened!)
She'd felt so safe, so cared for, so ...
Shut up, brain. Focus.
But just a few yards away, Clark is having no more success at concentrating:
His eyes flicked between the recent Planet report on gang violence in Hobbs Bay and his notes.
Anything but Lois.
Lois.
His hand shook, and a line of blue ink sliced through a neatly printed column of crime-rate increases from the past eight years.
Damn. Focus.
He didn't dare look up from his work. He couldn't meet Lois' eyes, which he knew would be full of questions and concern.
So Clark can't reach out to Lois. But this time, Lois will reach out to him:
"Clark?"
Oh, Christ.
Clark's hand stilled mid-word. His eyes were riveted on his notepad. He couldn't look up. He just couldn't.
"Clark, I - I know this is a little ... awkward," Lois began haltingly. "But you haven't even looked - "
Clark's head jerked up.
His eyes met Lois gaze, and she saw the hesitation there, mirroring her own. He looked almost ... scared.
" ... at me," she finished quietly.
"I just ... I don't know what to say," he mumbled, his eyes fixated on the back of his oak nameplate. "I wish I did, Lois."
He looked up at her then, losing himself in her dark eyes shining with compassion.
"Look," Lois interrupted. "I know this has to be - " She stopped and looked around to see if anyone was listening to their conversation. "Weird," she continued in a lower tone. "It is, kind of. I mean, a lot. I mean ... oh, God. You know what I mean."
Clark nodded mutely, willing himself not to grin at Lois' babbling and marvelling at her ability to lift his mood.
Isn't this adorable? And can't you feel Clark's spirits lift, so that he's finding his way back to Lois again?
And to think you were too damn scared to even look at her just a minute ago.
And so they agree on a date, and Clark has to run off to save the day as Superman, and Lois helps him come up with an acceptable excuse, and then she grabs Jimmy to go chasing after the superhero and get another Superman exclusive - and beat Clark to it, of course!!!
Lovely, editor. So Lois, so Clark, so angsty, so WaFFy. So - in the end - so cute. And so, so beautiful.
Ann
They had essentially agreed to see where this thing goes. Well...keep it coming! 
I can't wait to see what happens.
