Part 8 – Reconciliation
Liv was sitting on the sandy beach, the waves gently lapping her toes, thinking about all the interactions she’d had with Superman.
The first time had been at Superman Day in elementary school where he had come to speak to the whole class, something he did across the city for all the kids. She’d been sitting with her friends giggling about the suit, asking whether he had kids, and she felt herself blush at the memory.
The second time was the interview for the school paper. She’d set that up intentionally after coming to the conclusion that he was her father, still under the belief her Mom had willingly participated in an affair with him. She’d done her research, looked back into the Daily Planet archived material on their website, and found all the Lois Lane reports from Superman’s early days. Branching out into other media, she’d quickly found speculation on her Mom’s relationship with Superman, often accompanied by photos. The long defunct Metropolis Star had printed the worst of the rumours, but Olivia had been able to match most of the photos with an investigation, usually with Superman saving the day, and her Mom, yet again. She’d wanted to meet the man who was her father and question him on it, but when faced with him, knowing the chaperone was outside listening, she hadn’t been able to tell him her secret. Instead, she’d asked if he was lonely, something she had struggled with after eschewing all extracurricular activities and struggling with friendships.
The third and final time was after she’d crashed Poppa’s truck. It had been icy, the ground covered in snow, and she’d been driving too fast. Having no experience driving in winter conditions, she’d tried to control the truck, but had hit the tree, thankfully glancing off the side. The old truck was solid, and it took less damage than a newer truck would, but she knew had anyone else been inside that cab they would have been hurt. Without a scratch on her, she’d climbed into the truck bed, sat on a bale of hay that was there, and tried not to cry. When Superman had shown up, she’d known her Mom had contacted him, and had been furious, refusing to speak with him, kicking herself for not going back to the farmhouse sooner. She’d only permitted him to fly her back because she was not about to share her deepest secret with this man who was not as good and wholesome as he portrayed himself to be, and that had been the only way to get rid of him.
As a teen, she remembered her Mom watching the news updates whenever Superman was on the scene, almost obsessively. At the time, her behaviour had fueled the belief that her Mother had had an affair with Superman, and was still clearly infatuated with him. Knowing the truth, it made more sense in retrospect, that she had been watching her husband. The idea that her Mom hadn’t had any choice in the affair hadn’t occurred to her until a few years ago as she had to acknowledge how much her parents loved each other.
Olivia pulled herself out of her musings when she saw the unmistakable red and blue suit flying towards them, this time carrying her Mom. Olivia stood, brushed the sand from her shorts, and wondered how this first interaction with all of them sharing secrets would go.
The moment her Mom’s feet hit the sand, she moved to embrace Olivia. “Liv, I’m so glad you’re ok. We were so worried…”
Olivia stepped away as she felt her anger returning. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
****
Lois gulped as she stared at her rightfully indignant daughter. How could she explain the years of uncertainty, strife, and fear she’d felt, knowing they would have to include Olivia in the secret, yet also acknowledging the secret could blow apart, and get all of them hurt, or worse. As she opened her mouth to speak, Olivia turned her back.
“Go ahead, Dad,” she said, to Lois’ confusion.
When Clark stopped spinning, dressed in shorts and a t-shirt, but minus his glasses, he announced he was done and Olivia turned back to face them.
“Um,” he nervously coughed. “She can see…” He made a spinning motion with his finger and Olivia looked anywhere but at them.
“Oh,” Lois said, at a loss for words, a little relieved that the awkward moment had taken some of the anger out of Olivia.
“Nothing I can say is going to ease the reality that we hadn’t told you yet,” Lois began. “I can say we meant to tell you many times over the years, but something always seemed to come up, and we decided it wasn’t the right time.”
“But how do you think I felt, Mom?”
“Probably about as good as I felt when your Dad asked me to marry him, and he still hadn’t told me.”
“Dad!” Olivia exclaimed incredulously. “You didn’t tell her?”
“Well, I was going to but…”
“I figured it out,” Lois finished, cutting a potentially long story, short. “He asked me to marry him, and I questioned who was doing the asking; Clark or Superman.”
Olivia glared at Clark. “Why didn’t you tell Mom? Wasn’t that an important part of marriage?”
“I was…”
“I got angry, wanted to know if he had planned on telling me before or after the kids started flying around the house,” Lois interrupted, laughing at the memory.
“Well, too bad I didn’t. Perhaps then I would have been included,” Olivia said, her attitude changing from one of interest, to anger.
“Honey,” Lois began contritely until she noticed the familiar tilt to Clark’s head and his frown. “What is it?”
“Nothing,” he said, but Lois knew better.
“Out here?”
“What?” asked Olivia, looking between them both.
“A boat is in trouble,” he answered simply.
“Go,” both Olivia and Lois said at the same time and as Olivia turned around, Lois watched her husband spin back into the suit.
“I won’t be long,” Clark said with a kiss to Lois, and smiled at his daughter before disappearing.
“Did you hear anything?” Lois asked Olivia curiously. Clark hadn’t said much on the flight here, other than that their daughter had inherited his powers; but that much they’d already surmised. He’d seemed almost giddy, but Lois wasn’t sure if that was from finding Olivia and her agreement to work things out, or that there was someone else on Earth that would understand exactly what he could and couldn’t do.
Olivia shook her head. “So now what?”
Lois watched her headstrong daughter take a few steps away from her, and face out towards the vast expanse of ocean. They were somewhere in the Pacific, perhaps south of Hawaii, and the island had looked very small as she and Clark had flown in. There was nowhere for them to go…for her to go, Lois amended. Olivia could leave anytime and vanish from their lives, a thought that made her choose her words carefully.
“After we got engaged, your Dad and I broke up. His greatest fear was me getting hurt by someone trying to get to Superman, which wasn’t unfounded given how many times I’d been kidnapped or threatened in the hopes of drawing Superman out. We eventually worked things out, and as we started our lives as a married couple, we became quite conscious of our interactions with Superman.”
“How did Dad interact with Superman?” Olivia asked rudely, rolling her eyes before staring back at the ocean. “It’s not like he could have a conversation in public with himself.”
“No, but he, and I, regularly had Superman exclusives, interviews, bits of news that no one else could know. We had to change that, dissociate ourselves from the resident superhero.” Lois sighed as Olivia continued to stare off into the distance, but continued.
“We’d been told for years we would never have children, so throughout my pregnancy, I had a hard time believing it was true. When you were born, and the nurse placed you in my arms, it was the greatest moment of my life. And the most terrifying moments of my life. Suddenly it wasn’t just your Dad and I anymore, there was a tiny new life we were bringing home, and it scared both of us to death. What if someone decided to take you in the hopes of bribing Superman? We decided it was best for you if we changed a few things.”
“Like Dad’s job?” Olivia asked without turning around.
Lois paused before answering, not wanting to give Olivia the impression she’d been the sole cause of Clark’s change of employment. “There were many reasons there, including the new Editor not being as forgiving to your Dad’s continual absences as the previous one. Instead we stopped doing as many Superman exclusives, letting other reporters get some of the big rescues, and we stuck to investigations. We did what we could to try to keep you safe.”
“So why didn’t you tell me? I get that when I was younger you couldn’t, but why not when I got older?”
“Remember when you broke your wrist when you were nine?” Lois asked, taking a seat on the sand, waiting for Olivia’s nod before continuing. “Every time I took you to the doctor I was afraid they’d find out you were different. I worried the needles would break, or they’d find something that would single you out, that someone would guess you were Superman’s child.”
Olivia turned to face her mother. “Is that why you took me to Dr. Klein?”
“Yes. He knew our secret so we’d take you to him first, and then to the regular doctor. If anything out of the ordinary showed up, we could have some warning.”
“But what does this have to do with my broken wrist?”
“Your Dad and I wanted to wait to see if you’d develop powers, like his, before saying anything when you were younger…”
“…and when I broke my wrist it meant I was normal?” Olivia interrupted. “Then why keep on with the two doctors?”
“By that age, your father was already different. He was stronger, faster, and smarter than all the other kids. You hadn’t shown any signs of that yet, but we didn’t know if that was because you were only half Kryptonian, or if you wouldn’t develop powers. We only had your Dad’s developmental timeline to go on, and everything else was guesswork.” Lois hesitated, unsure if Olivia would answer her or not. “Liv, when did you start developing powers?”
Olivia sank to the ground, and picked up a handful of sand, letting it run through her fingers before answering. “Remember when I quit basketball and track? By then I knew I was different, that I was stronger and faster than all the other kids. I’d been hiding it for a while, always trying to be slower than the fastest kid in track, but sometimes I couldn’t help it.” Olivia shrugged and picked up another handful of sand. “I didn’t understand why at the time.”
Lois longed to gather her daughter into her arms and apologize, but despite Olivia’s slumped shoulders and reclined seated position on the sand, Lois knew her daughter well enough to know she was still upset. “We didn’t tell you because you were too young to be burdened with such a secret, and it would have put you in harm’s way. We weren’t ready for that risk…”
Lois glanced around in the direction Clark had flown away hoping he was on his way back. She and Olivia were two very hot headed people and his calming influence in this conversation was needed. As Olivia glared at her, Lois took a breath and tried to find the right words to explain.
“The timing was never right,” she began, cringing inwardly at the pathetic excuse. “Every time we wanted to tell you, something would happen, and we’d have to re-evaluate.”
“So you’re saying that this is my fault?” Olivia demanded and Lois instantly regretted her choice of words.
“No, sweetie. It wasn’t your fault. Please don’t ever think that. It was poor timing…”
“Instead of taking a chance on me, you let me grow up confused, scared and angry? Didn’t you ever stop and think about me? Or was it always just about you?” Olivia stood as she shouted at her mother.
“Olivia, it wasn’t that cut and dry. It’s not as though your Dad and I discussed an age when we’d sit down and tell you. We waited to see if you’d develop any powers, and when you hadn’t, or so we thought, we started trying to plan how to tell you the truth. Life just kept getting in the way.”
“Oh?” inquired Olivia, crossing her arms over her chest and glaring at her mother. “Like what? Give me an example of something that stopped you telling me who my father actually was.”
Hearing the warning tone in Olivia’s voice, knowing that she was on the edge of her control, Lois struggled to find the words to calm her down. “There were so many times over the years we would decide it was time to tell you. We made plans, more than once, to go away as a family so we could have time to process together what this meant for all of us…” Lois trailed off. How did she explain to her angry daughter that it was her behaviour at the time that had changed their mind? Thinking of another sad, sudden, moment in their lives, she used that instead. “Remember we had the vacation to Costa Rica planned, and Nana passed suddenly?”
Olivia nodded. “Yeah.”
“It was very unexpected, and after just losing your Poppa, we were overwhelmed. We thought it would be best to recover from losing both of them so close together before adding something new to the mix.”
“I still don’t understand why you couldn’t find a good time to tell me something this important. Ok, fine, so maybe not when I was twelve, but what about sixteen? Seventeen? Did you not trust me?”
There was no way Lois could answer that question and not upset Olivia more. While she floundered for the right words to say, Olivia turned her back and vanished, a slight dusting of sand hanging in the air for half a moment before it cascaded back to the beach in her wake. Lois stared at the indentations in the sand indicating Olivia’s travel path, stunned at witnessing her daughter’s use of powers. While she hadn’t disbelieved anything Clark or Olivia had said, she hadn’t fully considered how Olivia arrived at the island, and seeing her daughter vanish in front of her eyes was a bit of a shock.
The firework! At the neighbourhood barbeque she had heard what she had assumed had been one of those Superman fireworks, but it hadn’t been. Instead it had been Olivia leaving. Lois rested her head in her hands, wondering how she had missed what had to have been obvious signs of Olivia learning to use her powers. Where was Clark? Where had Olivia gone?
Having no idea how much time had passed, other than noticing the sun’s rapid movement higher into the sky and the increase in temperature, Lois stood, and brushed the sand off her clothes. The island wasn’t large, she could easily walk around it, and she started following Olivia’s trail, while keeping to the minimal shade provided by several large palm trees. It was a quick walk, and had the brush behind the palm trees not been so dense, Lois could have walked right through to the other side of the island in minutes. She stopped as she spotted Olivia sitting with her head buried in her knees. She sighed, wondering how best to proceed, relieved that her daughter hadn’t flown away. Hopefully that indicated Olivia’s desire to work this through.
“I can hear you,” Olivia called, raising her head and turning towards Lois.
Instead of answering, Lois stepped away from the shade and joined her daughter by the waves on the beach. They sat in silence until Olivia began to speak.
“I was in the bathroom at school and a group of girls came in. They didn’t know I was in there, and started talking about me, and how I was winning all the track events. Rumours started to spread that I was being given drugs to make me faster than everyone else, so I just slowed down, stopped winning. I still enjoyed basketball, and then you guys asked if I wanted to do soccer, but I couldn’t always control how fast I ran, or how hard I threw or kicked a ball. It scared me, so I stopped participating.” Olivia shrugged as though it didn’t bother her anymore, but wouldn’t look at Lois.
“Then the next year you guys were asked to meet with the principal. I was sitting in the hallway and I heard everything. Not only was I faster and stronger than the other kids in my class, I could hear way better than anyone I knew, I could learn really quickly, and remember it all too. There was something not quite right with me, and I couldn’t figure out why.”
As Olivia spoke, Lois remembered those years; Olivia’s anger that she’d chalked up to puberty, the sudden drop of interest in sports, followed by all the school activities. That had been followed by the smoking incident.
“The smoking…” she said aloud. “Was that…?”
“Me lighting things on fire with my eyes? Yup,” Olivia filled in, her tone bitter. “You were so quick to believe I was smoking, there wasn’t any opportunity for me to open up to you.”
“Oh, Liv,” Lois said, her heart sinking. “I’m so sorry. I, we, your Dad and I, we had no idea.”
“That’s when I knew there was something else going on. I’d suspected it before, wondering if I could be a distant relative of Superman’s, but once I started accidentally starting things on fire, I was convinced I was his child.”
Lois was trying to wrap her head around how much she’d missed, the obvious signs that she’d ignored. Olivia, oblivious to her mother’s internal torment, continued.
“Most of the time, I tried to ignore it, but then something would happen, and we’d end up fighting. Remember the hair incident?”
Struggling to remember, Lois shook her head.
“I wouldn’t let you take me to get my hair cut because I discovered it wouldn’t cut anymore. I was at a friend’s house and she was giving everyone bangs but when it was my turn, the scissors broke. We all laughed and forgot about it, but I knew it was my fault. It took a few tries, but I figured out I could use my somewhat tamed ability to light things on fire with my eyes, to trim it. By that point I was pretty much invulnerable, it wasn’t just my hair, which is why I didn’t want to go to Dr. Klein’s anymore.”
There was a bite of anger still in Olivia’s voice, but sadness was more prominent, and as much as Lois wanted to ask why she’d never come to either of them with any of this, she feared they’d start arguing again. If Olivia wanted to just talk, then she wouldn’t interrupt her.
“By this point I knew there could be only one real reason I was the way I am; I had to be Superman’s child. At the time I assumed you’d had an affair with Superman, as you and Dad were married for several years by the time I came along.” Olivia turned and glared at Lois. “It’s not like there wasn’t enough evidence pointing that way. Whenever he was on the news, you were glued to the television. I did some research and looked at news reports and articles from before I was born. Did you know a bunch of old TV reports are online for anyone to watch?”
Lois nodded. She knew they were there, as were thousands of other news reports from those early years, and there were entire streaming platforms dedicated to Superman, his public appearances and rescues, with the older material being more popular as Superman had been more active, as well as more willing to talk to the media.
“On more than one occasion you were there, front and center,” Olivia accused. “There are even commentaries speculating about your relationship with Superman given how many exclusives you wrote, how many times you were rescued, and all the video evidence of you fawning all over him. It wasn’t hard to jump to the conclusion that I was Superman’s child.”
Olivia paused; Lois wondered if she was trying to contain her anger, but kept silent, giving her the time she needed to think through what she wanted to say.
“I would get so angry. I wanted to ask Dad what he thought about those years, about your obvious crush on Superman, but I chickened out every time, and I was scared you guys would start fighting. It wasn’t until later that I wondered if you’d had any choice in the affair, and by that point I’d convinced myself you wouldn’t want to be reminded of it, so I kept my secrets, just like you kept yours.”
There was another long pause as Olivia composed herself, and Lois considered her words carefully.
“We didn’t want to scare you as a child, or give you this huge burden of a secret. Our plan was to let you live as carefree a childhood as possible, and enjoy your youth, before saying anything about your father’s other identity.”
Lois paused. It would be so easy to leave the conversation there, as they’d never shared her challenging youth, or the struggles Clark had endured as he’d grappled with who, and what, he was. Deciding it was best to tell the whole story, Lois forged ahead, wishing Clark was there with her to share his story.
“Your Dad had a good childhood. Grandma and Poppa Kent loved him and didn’t care where he had come from, but they were scared that someone would come and take him away from them. When he started being different, every new skill was something terrifying and unknown. Poppa was always worried someone would take your Dad and study him, even if it meant killing him. My childhood was less than ideal as my parents fought a lot, and they weren’t happy. I remember wishing I had a normal family life, and as you grew up, I wanted to be sure you never wished for that.”
“I know about your childhood. Nana told me.”
Lois stared at her in shock.
“It was one of the times I ran away from home. I’d often go to Nana’s, though I’m sure she called you.”
Lois nodded in affirmation. She had been surprised that Olivia had chosen her mother’s home as a place of refuge when things at home had become too much. It was the last place Lois herself would have gone, but knowing her daughter was safe, she hadn’t pried.
“There was that one cupboard, under all the china, where she kept the liquor. I never saw her drink any, but I knew she kept it for when Grandpa visited, and after he died, no one touched it. I wanted to try some, see if it would do anything. One night, after I heard Nana go to bed, I snuck downstairs, and tried a few of them.”
Lois tried hard to keep her cool. Olivia had been trying to drink at sixteen! How had she missed this as well!
Olivia pulled a face. “It was gross. I don’t know anything about alcohol, but some of it burned going down, and some of it made me gag, but it didn’t affect me at all. Nana caught me as I was putting the bottles away, and despite the alcohol having no effect, she could still smell it on my breath. She sat me down and told me about her alcoholism when you and Auntie Lucy were young, how she tried to drown her sorrows in a bottle, forget reality.”
Olivia turned her deep brown eyes to meet her mothers. “I was mad at you so much for not telling me about who I thought my father was, but you were still there for me. I love Nana, and after she told me how awful she was to you, I was angry with her, but I didn’t want you or her to know. She told me she was sorry, and was grateful for the second chance you gave her to be part of a family. We sat on the floor and she cried. I was so numb I just held her. When she died last year, that’s what I remembered.”
Lois couldn’t hold back the tears that cascaded down her cheeks. Her broken family, challenging childhood, and frustrating maturing years, had been a defining part of who she had become. After her marriage to Clark, and while she was pregnant with Olivia, Ellen had been there for her in ways Lois had never dreamed of. She had been so thankful to have those years of closeness before her mother had passed, something pleasant to remember. Hearing that her mother had intervened in Olivia’s life, shared her own painful experience, and verbalized her sorrow over the lost years, was bittersweet. She’d learned to let go of her anger at her mother’s alcoholism years ago, but hearing that Ellen regretted it and talked to her granddaughter about it, washed any remaining bitterness away. Lois scooted closer to Olivia and wrapped an arm around her in a hug, holding onto her even though Olivia did not return the gesture.
“Oh, honey. Thank you for sharing that with me. Your Nana and I didn’t get along for most of my life, but we grew closer after you were born.” Lois swiped at the last of the tears on her face, before wiping an errant tear off her daughter’s cheek. “I know there’s a lot to work through, and we’re not going to get it all today. Plus, your Dad should be here too. Why don’t we head up to the shade for a bit, and hopefully he’ll be back soon.”
Lois was relieved when Olivia stood in agreement. She was getting very warm and thirsty, but was unsure if Olivia was like her father in that respect. She licked her lips subconsciously at the thought of water, as they walked back to the relative shade of the palm trees, keeping an eye to the sky and hoping Clark would be back soon.
“I can’t see him,” Olivia remarked.
“Can you hear him?” inquired Lois, unsure of how strong her daughter’s powers were, and unwilling to ask during the lull in their argument.
“No… but there’s something I can try.”
Lois watched as her daughter closed her eyes and frowned hard in concentration. She looked around, but wasn’t sure what to expect. As Olivia opened her eyes and shrugged, Lois stared at her, bewildered.
“It’s something I thought I’d try. I don’t think it worked though,” Olivia said by way of an explanation.
“Oh,” replied Lois, having no clue what her daughter was talking about. They sat in the shade for what Lois estimated to be around thirty minutes, when Olivia jumped to her feet.
“Dad’s coming back,” she announced.
Lois began scanning the sky and it was almost a minute before she saw Superman flying towards them. He landed and handed them each a bottle of ice cold water, before spinning into his Clark clothes.
“Thanks,” Lois gasped between gulps.
“What happened, Dad?”
“There was a fishing boat on fire,” Clark said. “They were fishing illegally so they didn’t want any help at first. I tried to save the boat but there was too much damage. I had to take them back to shore individually and then report to the authorities, before taking the boat back to land. It took much longer than I anticipated.”
Lois finished her water, surprised at how thirsty she had been. Olivia took a few long sips from her bottle before handing the remainder to her.
“I’m not thirsty, you can have it,” she said.
Lois nodded her thanks, before taking several small sips.
“We need to figure this out,” Clark said to Olivia, to Lois’ confusion.
“I didn’t know it would work. I just thought I’d try,” she shrugged.
“What are you talking about?” asked Lois, feeling as though there was something else that hadn’t been discussed between herself and Olivia.
“Well, it did. We just need to figure out how, and why.”
“But you did it with this island,” Olivia protested.
Clark crossed his arms defensively, while Lois continued to watch both of them. “I wasn’t aware of it at the time.”
“What’s going on?” Lois demanded, having had enough. “Is there another conversation going on that I’m not aware of?”
“Kinda,” admitted Olivia. “When we came here, I got an image of this place, and how to get here, in my mind. It wasn’t me, but Dad was thinking about it at the time. And just now, I tried to think really hard about ice cold water to see if Dad would understand to bring some back.”
Lois stared at her husband. “Did you?”
He nodded. “It wasn’t an image, like the island with Olivia, more like a feeling that I should bring some water back with me.”
“Wow,” said Lois, softly.
“We need to figure this out, test it a bit more and find out what it is, and…”
“No, Dad,” began Olivia, agitation once again creeping into her tone.
“Sweetheart, just come home for a few days,” pleaded Lois. “Let’s talk this through as a family.”
“He doesn’t want to talk; he wants to test me.”
Lois looked at Clark and was annoyed to see acknowledgement in his face. “Clark…” she began in a warning tone.
“Look, it’s not testing, per se. I would like to see Liv’s control.” Clark turned back to their stony faced daughter. “There’s no one else here that can understand what you’re going through better than I. If your control isn’t as good as you think it is, you can do some serious damage to everything, and everyone, around you. If there’s any way I can help, I want to. I’d like to figure out this telepathic connection we seem to have as well. It might be useful.”
“Remember when I had to interview Superman… you… at school for the paper?”
Clark nodded the affirmative at Olivia’s question.
“I was going to ask you about me, how I came to be. I’d worked myself up to accuse you of breaking up a marriage, of not even caring about me, but I couldn’t do it. There was the chaperone I couldn’t get rid of, and I was terrified of how you’d react.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, do you like being the only one? You’re a hero, you’re famous all over the world. Would you be worried I would take that away from you?”
“Liv, I wouldn’t have…” Clark protested.
“That’s when I decided I had to leave. I couldn’t do the interview, tried to quit the paper, and started planning. As soon as I graduated and turned eighteen, I’d leave. Get as far away from you guys as I could, and hope that you wouldn’t send Superman after me.”
“Oh, sweetheart,” said Lois as she hugged her daughter. This time Olivia didn’t resist and within moments, Clark was embracing them both.
“Why don’t we all head back home,” suggested Clark. “We can meet at the house, have some lunch, and figure out a few things.”
“I don’t know…” Olivia said.
“Come home, even if it’s just for one day,” begged Lois. “We’ll go through everything, you can ask us anything. If you still want to travel and take a break afterwards, at least we’ll have had a chance to be open about all of this, and maybe your Dad can help you a little with your powers. I know he’s dying to find out what you can do.”
Lois laughed as Clark put on his most innocent expression while Olivia raised one eyebrow in his direction.
“Ok, I’m a little curious,” Clark acknowledged. “Can you blame me? My daughter inherited my heritage, I’m entitled to a few questions. There’s things you should know too, about me. Where I came from, and what happened to my birth parents. I have a globe that will tell you all about them.”
“Ok,” Olivia agreed in a quiet voice. “But first I have to make a few stops.”
Clark disappeared into the trees before returning in the familiar Suit, scooping Lois up into his arms. “We’ll see you in a bit,” he said, taking off before Lois could protest.
Lois watched the island as long as she could for any signs that Olivia was following them. As the island turned into a distant spot in the ocean, Lois turned her attention to Clark.
“Why did we leave her alone?” she asked.
“There’s really not much we can do to force her to do anything. Besides being an adult now, she has the ability to go anywhere, anytime. If she wants to come home, it needs to be on her terms.”
“But what if she doesn’t show up?”
“She will,” Clark responded with confidence. “Her curiosity will win out in the end. She is your daughter after all,” he said with a chuckle.
The remainder of their flight home was quiet, as Lois processed the conversation with Olivia, as well as looking back on all the moments where she should have figured it out.
****
Lois sat alone in the living room, every noise from the neighbourhood making her look at the front door in hope. Clark had gone to pick up his mother, hoping that Olivia would come home right away and they could talk as family, the only ones on Earth that knew about Clark’s, and now Olivia’s, secret abilities. In the meantime, Lois overanalyzed the conversation she and Olivia had had on the island. Should she have explained to her that all the times they’d balked from sharing the family secret had been around moments that Olivia had acted worryingly enough they were concerned about her ability to keep the secret? How different might their lives have been if they had told her earlier? Clark would have been able to help his daughter master her skills, instead of letting her fumble along on her own.
Unable to sit any longer, Lois began to pace just as the front door opened, and Clark and Martha arrived.
“Is she here?” asked Martha.
“Not yet,” Lois answered, defeated.
“Why don’t you two take a seat. Lois can fill Mom in on her conversation with Liv, and I’ll make some coffee.”
Lois smiled at her husband as he disappeared into the kitchen and began to tell Martha about Olivia’s anger, along with her worry that they’d done the wrong thing by not telling Olivia. Martha wrapped an arm around Lois, not saying a word, something Lois found comforting and awkward at the same time. Martha had tried to convince them to tell Olivia sooner, and they’d ignored her. Lois knew, from the decades they’d been a family, it wasn’t in her mother-in-law to say ‘I told you so,’ for which she was grateful, but the guilt started to gnaw at her.
“Martha, you were right. We should have…”
“No, Lois,” Martha interrupted as Clark emerged from the kitchen with two cups of coffee. “I had my opinion and aired it. You were her parents, and I know there was more in the family dynamic than could be explained. You see, Jonathan and I had it easy with Clark. We knew right away he could be different, finding him the way we did. When all his abilities started to emerge, we dealt with them as best we could, and even so, we’d probably change some things in retrospect.”
“Like?” inquired Clark, returning with his own cup of coffee.
“Your father was terrified someone would find out what you could do. He wasn’t afraid for his own safety, but for what could happen to you. We both thought you’d be taken from us and our fear for your safety drove us to instill in you a very strong compulsion to keep your secret. Even when you became Superman, we were terrified someone would figure out who you were. I was just better at hiding it than your father,” Martha added with a wink, making Lois laugh. “I can understand your fear for Liv’s safety as she grew up, and how that makes a mother very protective of her child.”
Lois reached for Martha’s hand, fighting tears again.
“Though I wonder what Jonathan would say,” Martha added as she dabbed at her own eyes.
“What do you mean, Mom?”
“Now, Clark, you know how your father was about his granddaughter. She had him completely wrapped around her pinky, but he figured a few things out that he never told anyone.”
“You mean he knew?” asked Lois, shocked.
Martha paused, thinking. “He mentioned a few odd behaviours to me, but as they didn’t start a pattern, I brushed them aside. Jonathan kept watching. I think his suspicions were confirmed after she crashed the truck. He knew she was driving faster than she said, and should have been hurt, but she wasn’t.”
“Why didn’t he say anything?” Clark wondered aloud.
“He didn’t want to interfere,” Martha said simply. “He didn’t say anything about his suspicions to me until shortly before he passed. Even when he told me, I laughed and said we would have seen more signs. He jokingly told me that I was blinded by love and ignoring the little things. Even after he died, I still wasn’t sure if he was right.”
This time, Clark reached over for Martha’s hand. “Mom, even we missed the signs, and they were quite obvious in retrospect.”
Lois was glad to hear Clark say that. Everything, from the smoking fiasco, to the sudden refusals to participate in any kind of sporting activities, had been sitting heavily on her mind, wondering how she’d missed these obvious signs of Olivia’s emerging powers.
“How long will it take her to get here?” Lois fretted, worried about the flight over the ocean, and whether Olivia would come home or vanish again.
“She had her phone in Alaska,” Clark explained. “I think she had to go retrieve it, and her backpack. I’m not sure how comfortable she is flying over the ocean, or how fast, so she might be taking it slow and steady over the coast.”
Sitting still and waiting were not activites Lois was good at, and she tried to be content with wringing her hands together, fidgeting with her rings, until Martha gently placed her hand on top of Lois’.
“Don’t worry, she’ll be here,” the older woman said kindly.
Lois tried to relax as all three of them sat in relative silence, sipping on their coffees. When Lois saw Clark’s head snap up, before giving her a brief smile, she knew Olivia had come home. Sighing in relief, she waited until the front door opened.
“Mom? Dad? I’m home.”
****
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