That was absolutely wonderful, Rac. It must have been one of the most beuatiful tributes to Clark and Lois's love that I have ever seen.
First off, though, I loved seeing Lois getting an honorary Doctorate *as herself* - as Lois Lane, I mean. Imagine, Ultrawoman wins the Nobel Peace Price and Lois Lane becomes a Doctor of Humane Letters.
This was priceless:
"Mommy, you have a funny hat," Jon announced.
"I do," she agreed. Lifting the puffy velvet cap, she put it on Jon's head. "Now you have a funny hat." Jon grinned.
There could be no better way to demonstrate to us that Lois knows what is important in life. That, however, is a lesson that Ellen Lane has yet to learn:
"We're so proud of you," her mother added. "My daughter, the doctor."
"Just an honorary doctorate, Mother," Lois repeated.
"And the dean called you one of the University's favorite daughters," Ellen Lane gushed. "Is this going to make the society page?"
Like I said...
"I'm hungry," Jon said.
"Yes, I think it's time for lunch," Sam agreed. "And we've got reservations at Chez Josephine." Jimmy smiled across the group at Lois. She seemed oblivious to her parents' cross talk. She was calm and serene and happy, playing with her son.
And again, Lois knows what is important in life.
But Lois is missing an incredibly important aspect of her life:
Leafing through the album, she turned the pages slowly. She lifted her mug of tea to her lips and took a small sip. Her eyes blurred with unshed tears as she looked down at the images of her husband. She touched the image of his face, trying to remember how it felt to touch him. Trying to remember the slightly rough feeling of the stubble on his cheek and the smell of his skin. And the way she could wrap his dark locks around her fingers.
I love how she is touching that photograph, imagining that it is the living, breathing Clark, and that he is right here beside her.
Clark is still not there, but she has Jon:
The sound of his voice soothed her soul. Lois held him close, listening to the soft 'thump' of his heartbeat. Jon was her strength. He was everything that mattered to her. The only reason she'd been able to hold together some semblance of a life was because he needed her to. And no matter how long she had to keep going until Clark came back, she'd do it. For Jon, she'd do anything.
But Clark is indeed coming back. This is masterfully written:
She looked up from the sink full of dishes. At first, she wasn't sure anything was there. The sound was just an echo, and one she always carried with her. But this sound wasn't just in her head, was it? It was all around her, pervading her consciousness, filling her mind. There was nothing else. The steady thump-thump beat out a rhythm she'd know anywhere. Her breath caught in her throat. The plate fell from her hands, shattering on the cold tile of the kitchen floor. She didn't notice it. For a moment, her feet felt glued to the ground – every muscle in her body frozen in disbelief. It felt like forever passed in the span of a heartbeat, in the length of time it took her to get past the shock and race for the door. Not knowing exactly how she got there, she found herself standing out on the porch, staring out at the gently waving young wheat stalks, rippling in the soft summer breeze as twilight descended slowly upon the farm.
I particularly love how you don't mention Clark's name in this paragraph. Lois is picking up Clark's presence with a relatively "primitive", or maybe "elemental", part of her brain. Her body knows, the huge part of her that is her love for Clark knows. That part of her which is her life force and her reason for being knows. This part of her is just taking over, shutting conscious thought down, as it is propelling Lois's body to reunite itself with Clark.
His name formed itself in her throat, but she couldn't produce the sound. Instead a tiny sob escaped her lips as tears blurred her vision, making it almost impossible to make out the solitary figure slowly making his way through the wheat field toward the house. She drew in a shaky breath at last and ran to meet him. She never took her eyes off him, afraid that if she looked away, he'd disappear, swallowed up in the stalks or whisked away on the ethereal wind, another ghost sent to haunt her. His heartbeat was louder now, thundering in her ears, drowning out all other sounds – the wind rustling through the leaves of the oak trees, the cicadas chirping in a pastoral orchestra, signaling the onset of another summer night.
Clark is like a dream, a hallucination, growing out of the Kansas landscape like a stalk of wheat. Except he keeps approaching her, and his heartbeat thunders in her ears. But she still can't say his name.
His eyes met hers.
She was in his arms, holding on to him so tightly she thought she'd never be able to let go. She held him so tightly that no force in heaven or earth could have separated them. She held him as tightly as she should have four years ago.
This brought tears to my eyes. "She held him as tightly as she should have four years ago." Lois probably thinks she did the right thing when she let Clark go four years ago, but still, the overwhelmingly large and strong part of her that needs to hold Clark tight is clamouring that she was wrong that time.
“Clark,” she murmured against his neck as they fell to their knees. He buried his head against her shoulder, whispering her name over and over again like a benediction.
And she can finally say his name, as he is saying her name, over and over like a prayer.
She tried to anchor herself— to the earth, to him—as she was buffeted by emotions so intense, so powerful they defied understanding, let alone explanation. Relief, amazement, disbelief all swirled around her in a chaotic storm. In a sudden flood, they welled up inside her. She felt them so strongly that it ached inside; her heart pounded furiously, so enraged at being confined in such a small space, that it might have burst in her chest. The whole world was still too small to contain these feelings.
This is so incredibly beautiful - how Lois's ribcage and indeed the entire world is too small to contain the feelings that threaten to burst her heart.
Right now, all she needed to do was to keep touching him, keep proving to herself that he was no phantom, no specter sent to build up and dash her dreams, to haunt her nights and leave her cold, confused, miserable, and alone. No, he was warm and solid and comforting and if there was anything she could do about it, never leaving again. She threaded her fingers through his too long hair. The tears coursed down her face. Lois thanked whatever power it was that sent her husband back to her. He was thin—painfully thin—and he was hurt, but he was home.
So, so beautiful.
She held his face in her hands, hardly noticing the unfamiliar beard that obscured his perfect, beautiful features. “You came back to me,” she whispered before kissing him. His arms around her tightened and he kissed her deeply. The sound of his heart hammering out an erratic rhythm filled her mind. Her whole body trembled. As did his. She kissed him as though she needed to remind herself of him, his taste, his touch, the way he invaded all of her senses. But she didn't. She knew these things. She remembered. How could she ever forget his touch? She would know him anywhere. No distance, no measure of time could ever make her forget. Without conscious thought, her own heart sped up, coming into sync with his.
She speaks so little, but what she says is hugely important. And her body language speaks volumes and volumes - how beautiful is it that her heart is speeding up and coming into sync with his?
He finally pulled away to look at her, tears in his eyes. He exhaled a shaky breath and raised a hand to her cheek. She dropped a kiss in his palm and closed her eyes. She placed her hand on his, holding it against her skin, letting its warmth banish the tiny, insistent voices of fear that had taken up residence in her soul, that had whispered, over and over again, that she would never again know what it was like to touch him. To feel the warmth of his skin against her own.
Again and again, this is just exquisitely beautiful. I love the language that their hands speak.
“I made a promise,” he said, his voice hoarse. He coughed and she could feel his slender frame shake. She had been too overjoyed by his return to see just how weak he was. He leaned his weight against her, obviously exhausted from the effort of coughing. Lois placed an arm around his waist and lifted him gingerly from the ground. She could have carried him the way he always carried her, but she wasn't sure he'd forgive her the ignominy of being cradled like a child by someone half his size.
But now for the first time, you introduce an element of worry, or maybe something that deserves another name. This Lois and this Clark are not the same people who fell in love with each other several years ago. They fell in love as Superman and "Normalwoman", but the image of Lois carrying Clark brings home so starkly the message that Superman and Normalwoman are no more. Maybe Superman will return, maybe not. And maybe Ultrawoman will once again give way to Normalwoman. But a role reversal of overwhelming proportions has taken place between Lois and Clark, and it will be hard for both of them to deal with.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw their son, regarding them curiously. “Mommy?” He looked up at her with his big brown eyes full of questions. Supporting his weight while keeping his feet within millimeters of the ground, she hoped she could maintain the pretense that she wasn't floating a grown man across the room.
And Jon sees his father for the first time, but Lois can't introduce them, not yet.
“I don't understand, why shouldn't he have sunlight, he needs it, doesn't he?” Lois asked, a note of agitation creeping into her voice.
Bernie frowned for a moment. “A famine victim,” he began, unhelpfully. In response to what she was sure was her puzzled expression, he continued. “You can't take a famine victim to an all you can eat buffet, it'll be worse than the starvation. His body is too weak right now for the sunlight. He can't deal with the overload. He needs to get up a little bit of strength the old fashioned way first.”
I like this rather unusual take on Clark's dependence on sunlight.
Lois smiled, unsure how to express her gratitude to her friend. She picked Bernie up and flew him home, counting the seconds before she could return to Clark's side. She was forced to fly more slowly than she wanted on the way to Metropolis to keep from injuring Bernie, but as soon as he'd been safely delivered to his home, she turned back toward Kansas and broke every speed record in history getting back to Clark.
I love this little detail of how relatively slowly Lois flies Bernard Klein to Metropolis, and how incredibly fast she herself flies back to Kansas.
She held his large hand in both of hers. For hours, she just sat and watched him sleep, listening to the sound of his breathing and his heartbeat – now slow and steady. The room grew dark as the sun set and night descended. A soft breeze drifted through the open window, carrying with it the smell of jasmine and honeysuckle.
So incredibly beautiful. You make me feel that Lois would be content to sit and just watch Clark for hours, holding his hand and listening to his heart, just letting his presence fill all her senses, marvelling and marvelling and marvelling at the fact that he is there at all.
“Come here, sweetie,” she said, a pang of guilt slicing through her as she realized that Jonathan and Martha had been watching him so that she could maintain her vigil by Clark's side. She picked Jon up effortlessly as he tried to climb into her lap. She sat him down and wrapped her arms around him, dropping a kiss on top of the little boy's head.
“This is your daddy.” She whispered the words she'd been waiting years to say.
“Is he tired?” Jon asked as he whispered into his mother's ear.
Lois felt fresh tears prick at her eyes. “Yes, he's very tired,” she said. “He came such a long way to be with us. But he's home now.” Jon sat quietly in her lap for a long while and finally fell asleep in his mother's arms. She wondered if her son could really understand what was happening. The only thing that mattered, though, was that Clark was home - her son would know his father and Clark would be able to watch his little boy grow up.
Wonderful.
She took Clark's hand in hers and continued watching him sleep. Her silent vigil continued through the long hours of the night. She sat perfectly still, studying every detail of his face in peaceful repose, mesmerized by the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest as he breathed.
So utterly beautiful.
“Lois.”
He spoke so softly that no one without super hearing could have heard him. He said her name again, this time a little louder.
“I'm here, Clark, I'm here,” she coaxed him gently, squeezing his hand. He squeezed back. She swallowed hard, a quiver in her throat threatened to become a sob as a flood of emotions she wasn't even sure she understood threatened to sweep her away.
“I have to get home. I have to get to Lois,” he mumbled.
“You're home, honey. I'm here. I'm right here.” She brushed away an errant tear.
“Lois, I need…”
“What is it? What do you need?” she asked.
“"sa dream. Not real.” He shook his head, but didn't open his eyes.
“It's not a dream, come on, Clark, open your eyes.”
“Then you'll go away…not real.” He kept shaking his head.
She reached out to smooth a lock of hair away from his face and bent down to kiss his forehead. “I'm real, I promise. And you're home. Just open your eyes, Clark.”
He did, hesitantly at first, but his eyes focused on her immediately. He squinted despite the dimness of the room. “Lois?” His voice was full of disbelief, as though he'd fully expected to wake up somewhere else without her.
She smiled at him, tears forming in her eyes again. She had no idea what to say. “I love you,” she managed at last. She kissed his hand, holding it tightly in both of hers. She held it against her heart and shut her eyes, trying to fight the tears.
“I love you, too,” he replied. “Oh, god, Lois, I…” his words dissolved in a shuddering sigh.
Oh, this is just heartbreaking.
She reached out to touch his face and closed the distance between them. Her lips met his and an entire world of hurt and pain and loneliness seemed to melt away. The coldness that she'd felt deep down in her chest for so long, the coldness that had eventually made her feel numb inside, was gone. Now that she had him here with her, she wanted to spend every moment of the rest of her life basking in his warmth. She felt tears course down her face. He reached up to caress her cheek, brushing the tears away with his thumb. Clark started to prop himself up on his elbows. He closed his eyes and lines of pain began to form across his brow from the effort.
“What is it? What do you need?” she asked anxiously.
“To hold you,” he replied.
She drew in a ragged breath and smiled. She lay down beside him on the bed and allowed him to gather her into his arms. There was so much they could have said, and so they said nothing. There would be plenty of time for words. Later. She spent an eternity staring into his eyes, allowing herself to drown in their depths, searching for, she wasn't sure exactly what, but she knew that if she looked long enough, she'd find it. “I missed you. I missed this,” she murmured.
Exquisite. Exquisite.
(But she is searching for something in his eyes, something she can't name or explain. It's better, I think, that she just accepts him. That she just basks in his presence.)
Clark took her hand in his much larger one and raised it to his lips. “God, I love you so much,” he whispered. He reached under the collar of his black Kryptonian uniform and pulled out a long chain. Undoing the clasp, he let the chain slip into his hand. He pulled the gold band off the chain and held it between his fingers. She looked down at her wedding ring, its smooth surface now marred with the tiniest scratches. She tried to imagine all the places he carried that ring, all of the places when it was with him, close to his heart when she couldn't be.
He slipped the ring on her finger. “I have loved you from the beginning.” She looked down at the ring, finally back where it belonged, returned by her husband, her lover, her partner, her friend – the man who had promised to keep it safe.
She removed the chain from around her own neck and let the ring fall into her palm. She took his hand in hers and placed the ring on his finger. It slipped on too easily and she worried it would fall off. “I will love you "til the end,” she whispered as she lowered her head to kiss his hand, sealing her promise.
It is as if they are getting married all over again, renewing their wedding vows.
Lois drew in a shaky breath. “I want you to meet your son, Jonathan Clark Kent.” She looked down at Jon, who was still hiding and gently guided him in front of her.
With obvious difficulty, Clark stood up. Lois tried to help him, but he held out a hand, silently asking her to let him do this on his own. He took several steps forward, closing the distance between him and his son. She could see the tears in Clark's eyes. This time, the tears fell, first one, tracing a lonely path down his face, disappearing in his gruff beard. And then another. And another. He bent down and pulled his little boy into his arms, closing his eyes tightly.
“My son,” he whispered.
I love how he needs to walk to his son on his own, with no help. But then he allows himself to cry.
I have said it so many times, but this was absolutely incredibly beautiful, Rac. Now, of course, so many trials and tribulations await our just-reunited couple. I hope and think that their absolutely cosmic love will triumph over all the coming difficulties.
Ann
