Chapter 2 – Nighttime Thoughts
That night, Clark hovered outside Jason's window. He was wearing his Superman suit; if Lois or Richard caught him out here dressed in his regular clothes, they would be, to say the least, alarmed. As Clark, he had no right to be here, but as Superman, he could come up with some plausible reason for his presence.
He knew all the reasons that he had to keep his real identity a secret from the world at large, but it bothered him that Lois thought that Superman was Jason's father. Superman was just a fantasy in a blue and red suit. He was Clark Kent. Yes, he was Kal-El too, and it was true that as Superman he could share his Kryptonian heritage with his son. But he wanted Jason to know him as a person, not a superhero. He wanted him to meet his grandmother Martha and to know that his father had thoughts and feelings just like every other person.
Clark knew that Lois didn't remember that he was Superman. He had erased her memory quite effectively after their one night together, and she wasn't a good enough actress to treat him so indifferently if the memory had returned. He wondered what had made her realize that Jason was his son. It must have been a extraordinary display of power, something she couldn't ignore. She was undoubtedly wondering how this happened, since she couldn't possibly remember that they had ever made love.
Last week, as soon as Clark learned that Lois had a son and fiancée, he had made the decision that he wasn't going to tell her who he was. He loved her, but he knew that he could not give her the kind of life she deserved, the kind of life she could have with Richard. However, now that Clark knew that he was Jason's father, he was going to have to tell her. This had gone beyond his love for Lois, as great as that was. His priority now was his son.
Lois stared at the ceiling. The moonlight through the window cast interesting shadows on the ceiling as Richard snored softly beside her. Jason thought Clark Kent was Superman! Her first impulse in the elevator had been to laugh. In fact, she had laughed, but it quickly turned to a choking, gagging sensation as it occurred to her to wonder if he was right. She had had so many surprises this week, and, after all, Superman had to have some real-life identity; she assumed that he didn't get groceries and pay the light bill and all the other mundane jobs of life while wearing that cape. Granted, he didn't have to be someone she knew; hell, he could be the mailman or Tom Cruise or the President. Not that this wasn't a train of thought she had been following since the day they first met, but suddenly it was a lot more important.
Her heart had done a triple flip when Jason had pushed – no, thrown – that piano across the room. Superman had disappeared six weeks before she discovered she was pregnant, and she had been seeing Richard for over a month by that time. It never occurred to her to question the baby's parentage, especially since, as far as she recalled, she and Superman had never made love. And, really, if it had happened, she wasn't likely to forget it – not when she had been in love with him from day one! But the piano incident had forced her to realize that, lack of memory or not, Jason had to be Superman's son. At some point, she was going to have to ask him how that had happened. She just had to get up the nerve. And then she had to tell Richard.
She rolled over on her stomach and softly beat the pillow with her fists. It was going to be a long night.
