Staring out the window, Lois wondered when she’d become so blind. She’d always considered herself to be a good mother, which had been a miracle considering who she’d grown up with. Yet Lisa had been suffering for months, and Lois hadn’t had a clue.
All she’d noticed was that Lisa had become withdrawn and quiet, and that the joy had faded from her eyes. She’d been concerned, especially at the outbursts of anger and defiance, but she’d never realized the truth.
Her daughter had lived in a world of monsters, and she’d suffered quietly and alone.
It was almost anticlimactic, now that a solution had been found, but Lois couldn’t help but feel the sharp sting of guilt. She should have been the one to comfort her daughter; she should have been the one who made it all better.
Glancing over at Clark Kent, she wondered why he was being so nice to her. The face he was showing them now wasn’t anything like the man she’d first met. That man had been cynical, irritable and something of an *** .
This man was someone she couldn’t read. The moment of awkward vulnerability he’d shown when Lisa hugged him had vanished afterwards, but it hadn’t been replaced with the same polished veneer.
“I’m sorry,” Lois said, glancing at her daughter, who was sitting across from her. The huge black glasses looked ridiculous on her face, but considering what they were doing for her, it was worth it. “I’m sorry you had to go through all that.”
Lisa was reading a book of poetry Clark had found her. She glanced up at Lois and said, “It’s ok.”
Clark tapped on a button and the window between them and the chauffeur began to rise. Lois could see the man staring at them through the rear view mirror, a fresh looking scar on his eyebrow raised.
When the window was up, he said, “Let’s try to be careful around the staff. Joshua and I are the only ones who are in on the secret.”
Lois flushed a little. She hadn’t been sure just how much the staff knew. Most of them were so closed-mouthed that she hadn’t really gotten an image of them as people. They were professional, but Lois hadn’t seen any sign that Clark encouraged them to be friendly, or that he tried to get to know them as people.
“Why are you being so nice?” Lois asked abruptly. “Surely you’ve got better things to do with your time than to take my daughter to get a more attractive set of lenses.”
“I made a commitment a long time ago,” he said. “I don’t have much of a family. But Kal…we’re very close. I was there throughout his vision problems, and I know just how horrifying they can be.”
Vaguely, Lois remembered something about glasses on the night she’d met Kal El. She wondered if that meant he had been still new to the world, a newcomer struggling with abilities that he hadn’t had before.
Obviously he hadn’t had them on his home world, or Clark Kent wouldn’t have had to help him with his glasses.
She wondered idly if the glasses her daughter was wearing were the same ones she’d slipped off Kal El on the night they’d met.
“So this is out of sympathy?” Lois asked.
“Partly,” he said. “And partly because Kal and his abilities have given me more than I can ever repay.”
He sounded a little guilty at that, and Lois wondered about their history together. Had Kal El used his abilities to help Clark Kent become wealthy? It seemed a little unethical and very much unlike the alien she’d met these few times. It was totally unlike his public image as standing for truth and justice.
“Could we go out for ice cream after we get my glasses?” Lisa asked. There was a strange pleading note to her voice, and she glanced first at Lois and then Clark.
“It’s been a while since I’ve been out,” Clark admitted. “I don’t see why not.”
“Dinner first,” Lois said.
Whether she’d been blind or not, she was still a mother.
When Clark nodded, she couldn’t help but see the pleased look on Lisa’s face.
****************
“You’d be happier with a polycarbonate lens.” The technician clucked disapprovingly at the old glasses. “It’s lighter and a lot stronger, not to mention safer. With children it’s important…”
“We just need a set of frames,” Clark said. “Help the girl out.”
His voice was firm and his gaze unyielding. This was a man who was used to getting his way, and the technician saw that as well. Lois saw him slip the man a hundred dollar bill, and she sighed to herself. At least the man shut up about lenses, finally.
At least the technician seemed to know his business. With discussions of face shapes, coloring and current styles, he soon had Lisa outfitted with a pair of stylish wire rimmed glasses that complemented rather than detracted from her face.
Lois winced when she saw the price tag. Although the designer frames were the most attractive in the store, Lois wasn’t sure that spending hundreds of dollars on a set of frames was really necessary.
“We’ll take two,” Clark said.
“Um, maybe we can…”
They were out of the store before she had a chance to really protest.
It wasn’t like her. Usually Lois was the first person to stand up for what was right. But this time was different. Maybe it was her guilt for not having seen what was right in front of her face. Maybe it was just her feeling that Lisa deserved to have something nice for a change.
Maybe it was just that Lois was still overwhelmed by everything. She’d spent the last few weeks trying not to think about the implications of her daughter’s heritage.
Would she be able to have children? Would people find out what she was and ostracize her. Would she be able to have anything resembling a normal life? None of this was anything she’d ever imagined for Lisa.
All she’d wanted for Lisa was a chance at the things she’d been denied. College, a career, a partner who loved her. A marriage that wasn’t a horror show.
Being able to see through walls hadn’t been in the plan.
Now she had to face a whole new slew of questions. What other time bombs lay in her daughter’s genetic makeup? Was there new unpleasantness coming that Kal El simply hadn’t mentioned? Would Lisa even get the full complement of her father’s powers?
What if her bizarre genetic makeup never let her get the same sort of control over her abilities her father had. Would she always be forced to look at the world through glasses?
Would she be able to fly?
It would be a grave injustice for her daughter to go through all the pain and anguish these powers brought and not be able to do the one thing that made it all worthwhile.
Kal El had a lot to answer for. If it wasn’t for Clark Kent, Lois wasn’t sure what she would have done.
**********
The restaurant was a lot fancier than what Lisa was used to, but that didn’t matter. Her plan was working. Her mother and father’s attitudes towards each other were thawing considerably.
If she kept them together long enough, Lisa knew that they would realize that they were both good people. It was only a step from that to realizing that they were both lonely.
How could her father NOT be lonely, living isolated on a mountain and barely even talking to the people who worked for him? Lisa knew better than to think that he was perfect, but she could see that he needed someone.
She was sure of it.
Her mother’s loneliness was old and familiar. Lisa hadn’t realized it for a long time, having never known anything else. The nights spent at friends’ houses had shown her the difference.
Her mother wore her loneliness like an old shirt, one she’d worn so long she didn’t even realize she was wearing it anymore.
There was a look in her eyes when she saw happy couples walking down the sidewalk, an expression that Lisa knew was probably reflected on her own face. I was a craving for something more…even if neither of them was sure exactly what that was.
Lisa stared at the arrayed silverware in front of her, at the crystal glasses and linen, and she was suddenly glad that Grandma Ellen had been such a stickler about manners.
It hadn’t felt like it at the time, but this was something she could use. Her father’s surprised, but pleased expression after he realized that she knew how to sit and choose her silverware sent a warm glow through her. She was going to be able to fit in, and so would her mother.
Lisa stiffened as she noticed someone staring at them. A blonde woman wearing a big hat. She’d always thought it was polite to take hats off indoors, but it didn’t seem to bother this woman.
Her first impression of the woman was hair. She could barely see her face due to the profusion of blonde hair. Huge sunglasses covered her eyes, and her lips were covered in a lipstick that was startlingly red.
Even from here, Lisa could smell the scent of cigarettes. It didn’t seem to bother her mother, who was usually sensitive about these sorts of things, so Lisa assumed it was another one of those things she shared with her father.
Worse though was the vague smell of rot. There was something about this woman that wasn’t right, and Lisa had an uneasy feeling it was some sort of sickness.
The woman rose slowly to her feet and Lisa could see that she was painfully thin. Her dress was beautiful. It reminded Lisa of something she’d seen Audrey Hepburn wearing in an old musical.
But as the woman approached, she saw her father stiffen. His back was to her, and he couldn’t have seen her, but his senses were at least as keen as Lisa’s.
“And so I was telling him he had to…”
Lisa’s mother was trying to be bright and funny, but she broke off as she noticed the sudden tension between Lisa and her father.
The woman stepped forward and put a clawlike hand on her father’s shoulder. He stiffened and hunched in on himself slightly, almost seeming to shrink before Lisa’s eyes.
“Hello Clarkie. It’s been a long time.”
The woman’s voice was shrill and strident, but there was an unpleasant sound of phlegm to it that Lisa didn’t like.
Her father didn’t say anything, and the woman continued. “Why don’t you introduce me to your new friends?”
He closed his eyes for a moment then said, “Lois, Lisa, I’d like you to meet my ex-wife, Lana Lang Luthor.”
Lisa couldn’t help but stare. This was the woman her father had been married to?
Why would he marry someone who reminded her of nothing so much as one of those Halloween witches, the kind with the warty noses and scraggly hair? It wasn’t that her skin was green, but there was something about the tone of her voice that made Lisa’s stomach clench.
Perhaps it was just that she could hear the blood pumping furiously through the woman’s veins, and her heart pumping rapidly. Although she appeared to be calm on the surface, she sounded like a woman who was furiously angry.
The woman smiled, and although Lisa couldn’t see it because of the sunglasses, she knew the smile didn’t reach the woman’s eyes.
“I’m sure we’re all going to be the best of friends.”
Lisa didn’t have to hear the woman’s heart racing to know that was a lie.
