The woman standing on the Daily Planet roof was huge, dwarfed only by the man in front of her, and merely barely by him. The woman crouched on the roof behind the couple was nowhere near as tall or…curvaceous. A fact that normally wouldn't irritate her, but the man on the roof was kind of important…
"Kal is your name," the standing woman insisted.
"Not the one I prefer," the important man reminded her for the umpteenth time.
"We've had this discussion." She placed attractive hands on dangerously well-rounded hips while the other woman stayed unseen and unheard in the shadows. "What I choose to call you is what I shall call you."
"You're never gonna call me Clark." He sounded exasperated, but anyone who knew him would know he didn't mean it that way, his tone was playful. The woman crouched behind knew it was playful.
"Clark?" Lois couldn't believe her mouth had done something so momentous without consulting her first.
His head turned. She caught it, before he stopped the motion.
"Clark." And there it went again and this time with her feet in cahoots, but her anger was no longer directed toward renegade body parts.
He flinched, hard, recognizing her voice and tone and cursing himself with the energy that hadn't died when he heard her, for having thought nothing of her close heartbeat, so natural was the pounding in his ears. Defeated and afraid, he turned to face her with his head down but with his eyes on hers beseechingly.
She let him squirm, willing to prolong this as much as she could stand, and reaffirmed his attire in her heart. Accidentally flashy yet deliberately tasteful red cape, check. Big red boots on ginormous feet, check. Blue spandex lining slender but strong legs, check. Red underwear on the outside, check. Yellow, purposeless belt, check. More blue spandex holding much too tightly to an unbelievably well-shaped and just as unbelievably muscular chest, check. Continued blue on comforting arms, check. Yellow background to unmistakable red "S" in upper center of body, check.
She drew up a hand and fingered the symbol—the sign she looked for every night on the man she saw everyday—letting go of the last tendrils of her ignorant bliss. The man she touched listened to the silence as his lies broke and his honest deceit crashed upon him, revealed for the stupid, ill-thought things they really were.
"You let me call you Superman?" Softly, deadly, frighteningly incredulous.
"I wanted you to call me Clark," he countered without rancor, frightened honesty in pure Clark-voice, Superman had picked flight, head slightly lifted as though trying to make his point but lacking the will to do so effectively.
She backed away, forgetting to drop her arm, and his body bowed toward her as his feet cemented to the roof.
"Please," he begged, wishing his knees would unlock so he could fall onto them.
"I wish I could hit you," she said, "but that would only hurt me, wouldn't it?"
"I'm sorry." He scarcely was able to make the pleading noise words.
She laughed and the sound burned his inhuman ears.
"I don't want to see Clark tomorrow, or the day after that." Her eyes were no longer her eyes.
"I want to see Superman doing amazing, newsworthy things." Her hands were on the door and wall behind her.
"I want him to keep the scoop to himself." She turned and left him.
His knees unlocked and he caved the shape of them into the roof when he fell.
Diana thought it best to afford Superman a night off, and Clark a moment of peace, so she flew.
He moved to do as asked when tomorrow came.