FDK and Authors\' Notes Here -----
Clark sat on the couch, stirring his tea in the artificial twilight caused by lights bleeding through the curtains into the otherwise darkened living room. He tried to ignore the sounds out front. Lois was upstairs, snoring softly. Their son was in his room…
…Clark set down the mug as he picked up on the rapid heartbeat and erratic breathing. In seconds, he was standing over Johnny’s bed, shaking the boy’s shoulder. “Johnny. Johnny, wake up. You’re having a nightmare.”
Johnny woke with a gasp, and almost immediately his heavy eyelids began to droop again. “…Dad…?” He asked groggily, his voice still holding a slight tremor.
“You were having a nightmare,” Clark repeated.
Johnny closed his eyes for a moment, still breathing fairly hard. He groaned. “My chest hurts.”
“What?” Clark felt his own heart stop. “Oh my god.” He raced for the cordless phone, and in a nanosecond was back and sitting on Johnny’s bed, the numbers ‘9’ and ‘1’ already pressed. “Wh-what kind of pain?”
“…Jus’ sore…” Johnny slurred, managing to sit up with some effort.
“…Sore…” Clark echoed. In the dim light, he was able to make out the bruises covering his son’s torso. “Just…just sore? That’s it? Are you sure?”
Johnny nodded. “Yeah. M’okay, Dad.”
With a sigh of relief, he hit the ‘Clear’ button on the phone. “It’s probably just from when the bullets hit you.”
Johnny stared quietly at him for a while. “They really shot me?”
Clark met his son’s eyes, the brief silence between them cutting like a knife. “Yeah,” he said at last. “They really did. But it wasn’t your fault.” His gaze dropped to the now idle phone as he toyed with it in his hands. “They’re terrorists, Johnny. They didn’t even know you were there.”
“I kn---.” Johnny paused, then sighed and nodded. “---Okay.” He stiffly lay back down.
His heart rate was still too fast. Clark frowned. “Are you all right?”
Johnny shook his head. “They tried to kill me,” he said, his voice trembling. He took in a shaky breath. “The voices kept saying that they would; that it was all my fault.”
Clark stared at him for a moment, then set the phone down on a dresser. He stretched out, lying next to his frightened son. “Tell me what you’ve been going through,” he said softly.
“Huh?” Johnny looked at him in confusion.
“What do those voices tell you, exactly?” Clark asked. “What is it that you’re so afraid of?”
The boy frowned. “No one’s ever asked me that before,” he murmured.
“Not even Dr. Friskin?” Clark asked, his eyebrows raised.
Johnny shook his head. “She just asks about *when* I hear them, and other stuff.”
“Other stuff?” Clark echoed.
He shrugged. “How I feel about you and Mom…” He shrugged again. “Stuff.”
“Well,” said Clark, looking up at the ceiling, “I want to know. What exactly do you think about that bothers you so much?”
Johnny sighed, also staring upwards as if he and his father were watching the same, unmoving, square cloud. “I---I keep thinking that everyone wants to kill me. And that maybe I deserve it.” He curled his arms around himself, his expression becoming pained. “They tell me that I’m in your way. In Mom’s way. In the world’s way. I’m in everyone’s way and they want to get rid of me.” He shut his eyes tight, pressing his hands against them. “And then I think I should save them---you---the trouble, but I’m scared to. And that makes me worse.”
Clark gaped at his son in shock. “You’re never in my way,” he murmured.
“Sometimes I can believe that,” said Johnny. “But other times…I just…can’t.” He let out a breath.
Another silence lapsed between them.
“When I first found out I was…different…” Clark said, returning his gaze to the ceiling, “I was convinced that the world would never accept me, because of what I am. My dad always told me that if people knew the truth, I would get hauled away to a lab and dissected like a frog. I sometimes pictured all our friends and neighbors forming an angry mob and storming our house.”
He sighed and glanced at his son. “Even after I became Superman,” he continued, “I was still afraid. Even though most people seemed to like Superman, part of me was convinced that would all change if---when---they saw through me. People who like Clark Kent and like Superman would still hate the man who was both. I still can’t get past that thought sometimes, even after being accepted by people like your mother and Dr. Klein.”
Johnny smiled a little. “You’re paranoid too,” he stated.
Clark nodded. “Yeah. I guess I always have been,” he said. “Lots of people are, at least a little.”
Johnny seemed to relax at the realization. “So,” he said, after a moment, “what are you going to do now?”
“Now,” Clark answered, glancing toward the window, “I’ll just have to do the same thing you’ve got to do: take one day at a time.” He sat up, giving his son an affectionate squeeze before heading to the door. “Get some sleep,” he said. “Dr. Friskin is going to be coming by early to check your blood-count again.”
Johnny nodded, already yawning, and fell back into the deep sleep of the drugged.
Clark sighed, listening to the crowd of people that was still camped in front of his house, and went to lie awake with his nightmares.
