"Look, Lois, I…"
"Clark, I really shouldn't have…"
"…I didn't mean to blind-side you with the thought, it's just that I…"
"…yelled at you like that yesterday and I'm sorry for how I've behaved…"
"…I'm sorry I got angry with you, it's just that…"
"…It's your life and you should live it how you want to."
"…It's my life and I want to…wait, what?"
Lois and Clark looked at each other in amazement at the fact that they were in complete agreement for a change.
She spoke first. "I'm sorry, Clark, I didn't mean to get so angry; you have every right not to go back to working as Superman if you don't want to. I shouldn't have yelled at you."
"I'm sorry too," he replied softly as he turned to look at her properly. "I haven't made up my mind one way or the other yet, but I shouldn't have blindsided you like that." He tentatively relinquished his grip on the wheel and placed a hand over hers. Neither spoke again until they passed the toll booth and saw signs directing them to the airport. "I'm glad we got this off our chests before you got on that plane; I was afraid you'd go back to Metropolis still mad with me."
"Me too. I hate it when we're angry at each other, it just feels like more time that's being wasted."
"I know," he said with a sigh and a shake of the head. Too much time has been wasted and lost already…
They pulled into the parking garage and found an open spot on the third floor. Lois disengaged herself from his arm as he got out of the truck cab to collect her suitcases and she re-attached herself as they entered the elevator and headed down to the check-in terminal.
"Do you have your boarding pass?" he asked as they disembarked and strode toward the check-in counter.
"Yes."
"And your ID?"
"Yes."
Clark waited patiently behind her as the stewardess checked Lois in and took the luggage to be added with the rest of the aircraft's cargo.
"What about a sweater in case you get cold on the plane?"
"I've got it right here," she said, indicating the one currently tied around her waist.
"Do you need any money for a snack or anything?"
"Clark, I just ate one of your Mother's world-famous breakfasts; I could go a month without eating and still not be hungry."
He shrugged his shoulders and grinned sheepishly. "Guess she's just used to feeding a growing farm boy like me." He waited a moment before asking another question. "And Richard knows what time your flight's getting in and is picking you up at the airport, right?"
"Yes, he and Jason will be there for me when I land." She gave him a trying smile as he opened his mouth again.
"Are you sure you didn't leave anything at the house…"
Lois turned to face him before getting into line at the security checkpoint, taking both his hands in hers. "Clark, look at me. I'm going to be fine. This isn't the first time I've flown, remember?" she said with a sly wink. "Besides, I'll be back with Jason to see you in just ten days."
"I know, it's just…I worry about you, you know? I can't help it, I've always worried about you, and if something happens to you back in Metropolis I won't be able to get to you…"
She looked him square in the eyes. "I've gotten along without your supercharged-self's help for awhile now, and I think I can manage the next week and a half on my own. I promise you that Mad Dog Lane won't go looking for trouble, so stop fretting about me and start focusing on getting better, ok?"
He stared down at her and got lost in her gaze as she spoke so earnestly to him. Clark stopped over-thinking and over-worrying and let his body act of it's own accord, wrapping his arms around her and kissing her so passionately in the middle of the terminal that she dropped everything in her arms so as to properly return the favor. Lois let her hands run wildly through his hair as he picked her up off her feet and pressed her closer to him; he ran one hand up toward the nape of her neck while keeping one firmly planted on her lower back in order to brace her for the impact of his fervent caresses. She stopped mussing his hair and clasped her hands around his neck, holding onto him as if to the mast of a sinking ship, not wanting to break the spell of the moment and board the plane back to the city. They continued like that for several minutes until Clark finally opened his eyes, acutely aware of the silence around them that was punctuated by the occasional chuckle or gasp from the surprised on-lookers.
"Uh, Lois?" he said, trying to draw her attention away from nibbling on his lower lip. She stopped and looked around as he slowly put her down. Both had satisfied smiles on their flushed and embarrassed faces as the other passengers skirted around them and went about their business. Clark bent down to pick up the belongings Lois had dropped in the midst of their ardor and as he stood back up he leaned in to whisper in her ear. The scent of her flowery perfume tingled in his nose as he said, "I love you", the three words sending chills up and down her spine. Lois kissed him once more on the lips before turning away and joining the queue, leaving him enamored and speechless.
As she neared the front of the line she turned to gaze at him once more with a seductive look in her eye. She whispered, "I know," in a husky voice meant only for his ears, and Clark felt his face grow red at her innuendo. It took a moment longer before he realized that he had heard her as clearly as if she had been standing before him, when in reality she was a good twenty to thirty feet away. Lois had turned her back on him to face the security personnel and didn't see him wince as every sound within a fifty mile radius bombarded his senses. He struggled to maintain his balance while not letting the cacophony bowl him over, and kept a brave smile on for as long as she was in his sight. She got through the monitors and turned to wave at him one last time before rounding the corner, disappearing from view.
He had planned to stay and watch her plane take-off until it was beyond even his enhanced eyesight, but the noise proved to be far too distracting. Clark crept to a nearby bench and sat down just as an aircraft from another terminal took-off. He bit his tongue to keep from crying out and frantically grabbed at his ears in the hopes of muffling the sound, but that only succeeded in making everything sound as if it were underwater. He strained his ear drums to focus only on the beating of his own heart, forcing his breathing to slow down and even out so that the rhythm of that masterful organ would also be steady and even. Ten minutes later he got up and made it to the parking garage as quickly as he dared without arousing suspicion, before turning the key in the ignition and driving back to Smallville, trying to find some relative peace and quiet.
The ride home seemed interminable. It took a great deal of effort on his part to keep the old truck upright on the road. Every squeak and clank of the engine's gears resounded in his ears, as did that of every other car around him. He heard radios blasting a smorgasbord of tunes, caught snatches of intimate cell phone conversations, and even picked up the mad thumping of a hidden animal's heartbeat as it lay in the safety of the brush, having narrowly escaped becoming road kill. Even the rocks and dirt crunching under the truck's tire wheels as he turned down the driveway threatened to bring about a super-migraine. He parked alongside the farm house and entered through the back door, the sound of the television informing him of his Mother's presence in the living room.
"IN OTHER NEWS TODAY, THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES…" the television blared.
Martha quickly piped up and spoke over the newscaster. "OH THERE YOU ARE, CLARK! DID YOU AND LOIS GET A CHANCE TO MAKE-UP BEFORE SHE LEFT?" He didn't answer her, and instead held a finger to his lips as he strode over and turned the TV off. He went off in search of a pad of paper and a pen as he heard Shelby's footsteps on the stairs and Martha's heartbeat pick up. The clacking of her knitting needles as she put down the new sweater she was working on told him she would be right behind him.
"WHAT'S THE MATTER? ARE YOU ALRIGHT, SON? CLARK? CLARK, WHAT'S WRONG?" she asked anxiously, following him into the kitchen as he rummaged through the junk drawer. He held the finger again to his lips as he thought, Why can I never find a blasted pen when I need one?! If only I could take a couple of aspirin to get rid of this headache too I'd be all set…aha, gotcha! Clark grabbed the pen and sat down at the kitchen table to write. Martha opened up the glasses that hung on the chain around her neck and put them to her face.
She read her son's note: "Mom—Yes Lois and I made up, just before my super-hearing came back at the airport."
"OH DEAR," she said involuntarily before clasping her hands to her mouth. Martha vividly recalled when his super-hearing had come in the first time, and how hard he and Jonathan worked to separate and tune out the sounds one-by-one until he could go about his daily routine without the flap of a passing bird's wings making him jump. She wondered how he was going to handle it this time around when Clark provided the answer.
"I'm going to go out to the West field and see if I can't sort the sounds out like Dad taught me," he wrote, passing the pad back to her. She nodded. "I'll try and be back for dinner," he hastily added before getting up to walk out the back door. Martha grabbed the pad of paper and wrote something else down before following him. He heard the scratching of the pen and the scraping of the chair as she eased it away from the kitchen table and he turned back to face her.
"Don't forget your warm sweater and winter coat," she wrote, looking over his long sleeve shirt and jeans semi-disapprovingly. Not wanting to argue he smiled at her before speeding up the stairs to throw on the sweater, then stopped in the front hallway for his jacket. He paused only long enough to kiss his Mother good-bye before bolting out the back doorway, her hair flying back from the breeze created by his wake. The windy exit relieved her anxious mood somewhat, reminding her of her speed-demon boy of yore. She returned to the living room and tried to find a quieter activity to occupy her hours, one that would be less grating on Clark's hearing, and picked up an old copy of Louisa May Alcott's novel Jo's Boys.
As a Mother, Josephine March had nothing on me, she mused as she flipped to the first chapter of her old favorite.
Clark sat in the middle of the unplowed field, the sounds of the world bombarding his newly re-heightened auditory senses. He inhaled deeply, the scent of the wet earth filling his nostrils, then exhaled slowly and concentrated on sorting and distinguishing what it was he was hearing, an exercise his Father had taught him long ago.
The most predominant thing he heard at that moment was the voice of Mr. Hutchins down the road, cursing and kicking his tractor as he struggled to get it into working order. The contraption would roar to life only to splutter and shut down in a few seconds time, and Clark quickly discerned that one of the pistons wasn't fully closing. He zoomed in and out on the noise, drawing it close so that he thought both man and machine were standing right beside him (instead of six acres away), then forcing it out to the very periphery of his range before bringing it back to it's rightful place in the barn down the road. This measure was repeated for some time until Clark felt comfortable pushing it permanently into his non-essential circle of hearing, and he picked out the next sound.
Out in the field with his eyes closed he knew no sense of time. Noises came and went as he strove to differentiate and detain them. He did this with a crow flying overhead, a car traveling down the interstate ten miles away, a radio playing in another neighbor's kitchen, a gopher burrowing out a new home underground, a group of teenagers gossiping as they left Smallville High, and lastly with his Mother's steadily beating heart. When at last he was able to control the din of the world around him he opened his eyes and discovered that the stars twinkled in the sky above him. Clark stood up slowly and stretched in the midst of the vacant field before speeding straight up to the back door.
Martha felt the gush of wind and heard the back door slam shut as her son returned home. She tiptoed out of the living room holding the pad of paper in front of her like a flag of surrender. "How are you feeling?" it read.
"I'm fine, Mom, really. I think I've got this ability back and under my control, and it only took…" he glanced at the clock to find that it was closing in on 10 PM, "…twelve hours to get it sorted away. Not bad for a day's work if you ask me." He smiled down at her.
"Not bad at all." She reached up and pulled him down to give him a hug and a kiss, both of which he readily accepted. "Are you hungry?" she asked as he let her go, moving toward the plate she made up for him in the refrigerator.
Clark gave her a sly wink before replying, "Can Kryptonians fly?" He tipped his head back and roared with laughter at his own wit as she chuckled along with him.
It wasn't the sarcasm that Martha was reveling in, but more the change that was slowly and steadily creeping over her son, making him more like his old self with each passing day.
