February, 2014 (Lex is 34, Clark is 26, Nicole is 7)

Chapter 17 - Fairness

Fridays were Nicole's favorite day of the week.

First off, Fridays were pancake days. Her parents didn't want her to have pancakes every day for breakfast. But they had been willing to negotiate. They let her have pancakes on Fridays if she was willing to have them with fruit and milk instead of syrup and powdered sugar. That was very fair. She could still have them with syrup on special occasions.

Fridays were also a shorter day at school. She liked school, but it was too long sometimes, and she didn't get to make any of her own choices about what to do when. Sometimes recess came right when she reached the interesting part of her book, and sometimes class dragged on for what felt like hours an hours while her feet felt so restless she could barely contain herself. She knew better than to try to argue with her teachers, though. Her dad thought it was kind of funny, messing up her hair and saying, "definitely my daughter," but her mom made her write apology letters to her teachers for talking back. Nicole hadn't figured out exactly what talking back even meant. She was expected to answer questions, wasn't she? And ask them? But there were some questions the teacher never liked. Nicole didn't usually have time to fall into those traps on Fridays; it was too short a day. She got to come in late, during lunch, and just stay for three hours instead of six.

But the best part, the very very best part about Fridays, was that Friday was the day her dad picked her up from school. He usually arrived fresh from a business meeting, so he was the only parent that showed up in a full suit. That made him the handsomest dad.

Today, he wasn't wearing a suit, but he was carrying Benjamin, which was even better. He was so cute, with his little fire truck shirt and big smile with the tiny dimples. Nicole jumped off the swings and ran over to him. Benjamin reached toward her, and their dad put him down on the ground, where he toddled over to Nicole, grinning.

Nicole knelt down and hugged him, even though he didn't really know how to hug back right. Then she stood up and launched herself into her dad's arms. He caught her—he always did — but he groaned before he squeezed her tight. "You're getting too big for this, Nikki."

"No. You'll get stronger."

He laughed out loud and let her go, then he went to scoop up Benjamin, who had started heading toward the playground. "We need to go to the grocery store."

Nicole pouted. "I don't like the grocery store."

"Sorry, Nikki."

"Can we negotiate?"

Her dad shifted Benjamin to one arm then reach down to take Nikki's hand. "On the way to the car."

Nicole breathed a sigh of relief. Her dad had taught her that phrase for when she wanted to do something different, but if she asked to negotiate and he said no, she wasn't allowed to argue at all. He usually said yes, though. Mom usually said no. "What if we go tomorrow instead?"

"We're out of milk. We need to go tonight."

"Can I have animal crackers while you shop?"

"You'll spoil your dinner."

"Well, can we buy ingredients to make cookies tonight?"

He looked down at her, I thinking look on his face. "Tell you what. I'll sweeten the pot. Help me with Benjamin during the trip, and if you don't complain once—I mean once, Martha Nicole—I'll get macaroni and cheese for tonight, and macaroni and cheese ingredients."

She couldn't help but bounce for the next few steps. "Deal!"

He squeezed her hand, then he helped her with her seatbelt.

"I still can't sit in the front?"

"Nice try."

Nikki sighed. He went over to the other side of the car and helped Benjamin into his carseat, then he drove off to the grocery store.

"Dad," Nicole asked, "what's inside our eyeballs?"

"Vitreous fluid."

"What's that?"

"It's what's inside our eyes."

"Why?"

"Why not?"

"Da-ad." Nicole hated when her dad answered like that. She tried a different question. "Why's Uncle Clark so strong and Nana and Papa aren't?"

"Uncle Clark was adopted."

"So were you."

"He came from a different family than me."

Her dad didn't like talking about his own family before Nana and Papa. "What family did he come from?"

"We never met his birth parents."

"But—"

"These aren't my stories to tell, Nikki. Ask Uncle Clark sometime."

"Okay, I will." She kicked her legs a little, looking out the window. "Why am I not allowed to touch kryptonite?"

"Your Uncle Clark is allergic to it. You might be, too."

"But if he's adopted, and you're adopted, and you didn't come from the same family as each other—"

"You're not allowed to touch it because I said no." His voice sounded a little angry.

"But Maggie from my class said her uncle touched it when he was a kid and he got this superpower where he could split into two people. And Kevin said his mom's grandma's friend touched it and she could see the future!"

"This one's not up for negotiation, Nikki."

"What will you do if I touch it?"

"You'll be in a lot of trouble."

"What kind of trouble?"

"Nicole."

"Okay, okay!"

It was quiet in the car for a moment, then her dad said, "The vitreous fluid actually helps focus the light in your eye."

"Whoa, really? How?"

Nikki slid up to the edge of her seat, and her dad told her all about eyes for the rest of the drive to the grocery store.

She did her best to keep her promise while he shopped, even though it was so boring. She was really, really hungry, and she wanted to ask again for animal crackers, but he would probably count that as complaining, and she wasn't going to risk it—he'd picked up her favorite macaroni and cheese, the hot dogs she liked to go into it, and those big thick chocolate chunks for cookies. That just made her even hungrier. Benjamin started whining at one point, and she made his little teddy bear kiss his face until he giggled again. She wished she had Bunny with her, but Benjamin would probably drool on Bunny.

The checkout line was really long. "Dad, can I please go outside?"

"Stay by the front entrance. Louis is working security today, stay where he can see you."

"Yay! Thanks, Dad." She ran out towards the front before he could change his mind.

Nicole smiled at Louis on the way out, then she went to go sit in the grass by the sidewalk. She dug around in the dirt, looking for earth worms. She didn't find any, but she did find some thing much more interesting than earth worms.

Kryptonite.

Nicole almost got up and went back in to find her dad and let him know. She had trained her to come find him whenever she saw it. He usually contacted people who would remove it to somewhere safe.

But then Nikki started thinking about the stories she had heard from her friends. She wasn't supposed to touch kryptonite, but what if it wasn't for her? Benjamin was having such a hard time learning how to do things like walking and feeding himself. If she could give him powers, maybe things would be easier for him.

Her dad wouldn't like it at first. But he would be happy if he gave Benjamin an easier time. That made it worth it. She scooped up a couple of the rocks and slipped them into her pocket. She would just have to slip them into Benjamin's crib well nobody was watching.

"Nikki!"

She gasped and looked up. Did he see her?

"Let's get back to the car. We need to start on dinner."

Suddenly, she remembered again how hungry she was. She skipped over to her dad, who took her hand and walked her back to the car.

Lex did his best to answer Nikki's questions on the way to the grocery store, but his mind was mostly focused on the stressful day he had at work. He had had to leave in the middle of a meeting that had run long in order to pick up Nikki, and the executives he'd left weren't exactly happy about it. He wasn't looking forward to having that conversation with Annie, either.

Mercifully, though, Nikki was very quiet on the way back to the house. When they arrived, she asked once while Lex was putting away the groceries how long it would be until dinner, and he guessed it would take about an hour, and she just nodded and went to her room.

Lex tried to put Ben in his playpen, but Ben kept falling over, his eyes at half mast. He had skipped his nap earlier in the day, because he had just kept giggling, and now that it was almost 5, and he was supposed to be going to sleep in a couple of hours, now he wanted to take a nap. Lex knew he was going to regret this, but he didn't have a lot of options. He took Ben to his nursery and lay him down in his crib.

He went back to the kitchen and started working on dinner. Nikki often came out to help, but not today. It was nice to have the space them self, as much as he loved having her there. It let him decompress from the day's work. For once, the house was quiet.

… Come to think of it, it was too quiet.

He gave the pot a last stir and set a timer before going to check on Nikki. Her room was empty. "Nikki?" he called.

She didn't answer.

That was weird, coming from her. Maybe she didn't hear him. He left her room and walked down the hallway to the nursery.

There she was, standing over Ben's crib, reaching toward him with one hand while the other gripped her stuffed rabbit.

"Nikki?"

She jumped back from the crib, guilt written all over her face.

For a moment, his mind flashed back to the last time he'd stood over a crib with this weight of guilt in the air. It gripped at his chest and took his breath away. When he could see again, he stepped over to Ben's crib.

Ben was breathing, sleeping peacefully. "Nikki," he whispered, "what did you do?"

"I was just looking," she whispered back.

He turned to face her. "Nikki, I'll give you one more chance to tell the truth." He and Annie had taught Nikki that lying earned a double punishment. She almost never lied.

Nikki lowered her head. "Look under his pillow."

Lex frowned and pulled up the edge of the little cushion.

Little green rocks glowed there.

Lex gasped and swept up the rocks into his palm. He ran them into his room, breathing hard. He had a little lead box in his closet; he stowed the rocks inside, snapping it shut. His hands shook.

Kryptonite. In Ben's crib. He could have been hurt, he could have been infected and mutated, he could have died...

Lex had thought he'd recovered from that flashback from twenty-two years ago, but he hadn't. The terror still gripped at him. It wasn't quite the same, but he knew his baby had almost been hurt, and he couldn't have done anything to stop it...

"...Dad?"

He turned slowly to find his daughter standing behind him, clinging to her stuffed bunny.

"Dad, I'm sorry—"

"What were you thinking?"

Nikki flinched. "I'm sorry!"

Some part of him was aware of how sharp his voice sounded. He still didn't think it was sharp enough. "You'd better start explaining yourself, Martha Nicole."

"I just wanted him to be better! He can't even talk or feed himself right—"

"He's a baby."

"But I could give him powers! I could make him fly!"

"You were told never to even touch kryptonite!"

"I'm sorry!"

"And you put it in Ben's crib? You knew it was dangerous!"

"But—"

"Do you even care about your brother?"

"I... I..."

Rage blurred the corners of his vision. It was taking a tremendous amount of self control to hold himself back from grabbing her and teaching her a lesson in the same way Lionel would have. "Where did you even find it?"

"O-outside the grocery store."

"And you didn't tell me?"

"I'm sorry-y-y!"

"You found kryptonite, you didn't tell me, you picked it up, but you didn't just stop there. You went to hide it in your brother's crib."

"But—some people get powers!"

"Yeah, and you know what happens to them? Almost every single one of them? They either die horribly or start killing other people." He'd never told her that part. He had thought she was too young. Now, he wished he'd told her younger.

She was frozen in place. She didn't even react.

"Do you hear me? You could have killed your brother! Is that what you wanted? You want to live with that for the rest of your life?"

Her mouth hung open, face pale. She didn't even move, except to pull her stuffed rabbit in closer to her chest.

He reached down and wrenched it from her arms. "Go to bed. Come out in the morning," he said.

"D-daddy!"

"NOW!"

She jumped and raced away.

He let out his breath. If she'd stayed another second, he would have lost control. He would have hit her.

Numb, he walked out into the kitchen and set the rabbit down on the counter.

He knew he hadn't killed Julian. He'd uncovered those shrouded memories with a therapist back in his teens. But his therapist said there would always be a part of him that felt the guilt for Julian's death. He could manage it, but every now and then, it would haunt him in the moments he felt the most helpless.

But he'd gotten through the worst of it, and he hadn't hurt his daughter; he'd just sent her to bed early, which was a light sentence for what she'd done. Ben was safe, and so was Nikki. All things considered, things could have been much, much worse. He wasn't a terrible father.

The pasta timer startled him out of his reflections.

He took a deep breath and went back to cooking dinner, allowing his mind to think back again on his work day, though his mind strayed back to Nikki every now and then. How had she thought it was OK to put Kryptonite in Ben's crib? Had he been unclear with her? He would have to talk to her about it again. He was still glad he hadn't hit her, but she should probably have had a stiffer sentence than an early bedtime. He might have to add to it in the morning.

Annie arrived at home as Lex was wrapping up dinner. She put away her purse before coming over to kiss him.

He wrapped her in his arms, breathing in her warm scent. "How was work?"

"Same old. You?"

He groaned. "Fresh hell. I'll tell you more later."

Annie smirked. "I'm starving. Where's Nicole?"

Lex sighed. He wasn't looking forward to this. "I sent her to her room."

Annie raised her eyebrows. "Is she sick?"

"It's worse. She tried to put kryptonite in Ben's crib."

"Why?"

"She thought it would give him superpowers."

Annie burst out laughing.

New anger boiled in Lex's veins. "She could have killed him."

Annie sighed, but kept a slight smile. "We would have found it before it came to that."

"I've told her not to even touch it, Annie."

"I'm sure she didn't mean to defy you, Lex."

"She disobeyed me."

Annie nodded, her face a little more serious. "Well, wrap up the time out. It's dinnertime."

"I told her she could come out in the morning."

Annie stared at him a moment, and he knew that look. She was livid.

"Don't give me that. She could have killed Ben. I can't let her think that's okay."

"Lex, we agreed. You said no hitting, and I said no taking away food. And we agreed."

"She doesn't eat much. One missed meal's not going to kill her, Annie."

Her face was turning red. "Neither would a couple of swats, but what would you say if I did that to her?"

"If she'd just almost killed her brother? I think I'd find it in me to forgive you."

"Almost killed him? Lex, we live in Smallville. There's always going to be kryptonite around."

"That's why this is important. What would you do if she tried to stick Ben's finger in an outlet? Or shoved him out into heavy traffic?"

Annie breathed in to speak, but then she glanced behind him. "She went to bed without Bunny?"

"I, uh..." He swallowed. "I took it from her."

Annie's jaw dropped. "Lex, she's seven! She can't sleep without it."

For what felt like the millionth time since they'd begun raising children, Lex was struck by how little he understood stages of development. His life had looked very different when he was seven. "She'll be fine for a night."

"Did she try to negotiate with you?"

"No. I think she felt guilty, she knew she deserved—"

"No, Lex, that's not normal for her!"

"She's fine, Annie. Could you just trust me on this?"

She crossed her arms, setting her jaw. "Fine. If you're so sure, let's check on her."

"She's probably asleep."

"Then you've got nothing to worry about."

He threw up his hands and left for the hallway. He could hear Annie following close behind him, but he ignored her, heading directly for Nikki's room and throwing open the door.

And he stopped in his tracks.

Nikki was sitting on her bed, backed up against the wall, clutching her knees to her chest. Her whole face was bright red and coated in tears and snot, and she was crying so hard the sobs were coming in silent, almost breathless.

No. No, no no no...

He had done this. To his baby.

He had to make this right. "Oh, Nikki," he whispered, and he went over to sit beside her, reaching out to brush her hair behind her ears.

She flinched back.

His breath caught, and he couldn't pull it in again. Annie shook her head at him and went over to scoop up their baby girl.

Lex hadn't seen Nikki cry so hard since she broke her arm a year before—maybe not even then. This fear had haunted him since the day Annie told him she was pregnant. That he could never be a good father, because it wasn't in his blood, wasn't in his nature. Some days he fooled himself, but some days he proved his own blood...

Nikki clung to her mother. "I . . . I . . . lo—" She couldn't get her words out through the violent sobs.

"Sh, sh, it's okay, baby," Annie said.

Nikki pushed away and looked toward Lex. "D-dad, I . . . I lo . . . l-lo . . ."

"Deep breaths, Nikki," he said. "Take your time."

She took a few slower breaths. "I—I . . . l-l-love . . . B-ben . . . Benja-jamin-n-n."

"I know, I know," Annie whispered.

"D-daddy thinks—thinks...I w-want...him to die-e-e."

Annie looked up at Lex, daggers in her eyes, and Lex knew then that he was in more trouble than he had ever been in.

"M-my tummy h-hurts so ba-a-ad."

Lex prepared himself for the worst. He and Annie had always tried to present a united front, but she would break that now. She would drive a wedge between Lex and his daughter, and he'd never recover the lost ground.

"I'm sorry, Nikki," Annie said. "But you're going to have to take that up with Daddy."

Nikki turned to face Lex. He'd never seen her eyes so swollen. She sniffed. "Daddy, c-can we p-please negotiate?"

Lex wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry. He could feel his eyes starting to prickle. "Come—" His voice cracked, and he tried again, sitting down on the bed. "Come here, baby."

Nikki crawled out of her mom's arms and into her dad's.

He held her close for a moment, running his hand though her hand. She didn't hold onto him tightly, but she rested her face on his chest, tears soaking through to his skin. "You didn't mean to hurt him," he said softly.

"I know you said it was dangerous, but—but I just wanted...to help him..."

"I know." He kissed the top of her head. "And I know that was a really long time-out."

"Uh huh." She pulled back for long enough to wipe her eyes, then rested back on his chest.

"I think it's time for it to be over. What do you think?"

She looked up at him. "Can I still have macaroni and cheese?"

"Yes. It's almost ready."

"And cookies?"

He wanted to tell her not to push it, but he could feel Annie's eyes on him. "Of course. But, Nikki." He looked her right in the eyes. "You have to follow the kryptonite rules in the future."

"I'm sorry." Her fingers clung to the front of his shirt. "Do I still have to have another punishment?"

"Yeah," he said. "You have to play with your little brother for an extra hour tomorrow."

"OK!" She smiled. "I love Benjamin."

"I know you do." He stroked her cheek gently with his thumb. "Let's get some dinner, OK?"

She smiled. "OK, Dad."

After Nikki was asleep, the dishes washed, and leftovers put away, Lex waited for Annie to go take a shower, then he moved his pillow from his bed to the couch.

Annie came out in a bathrobe, her hair wrapped in a towel, just as he was laying down. "Lex, what are you doing?"

"Figured you might want some space tonight."

"Have I ever made you sleep on the couch?"

"I've never been that bad of a father."

She sighed and came over to sit beside him on the couch, taking his hand. "You're not a bad father, Lex. Nikki's already forgiven you."

He hung his head, and she rested her head on his shoulder.

"You think Ben'll be OK?" he asked.

Annie frowned. "He was exposed to Kryptonite for, what, two minutes? Nikki had it for longer."

"I know, but he's so young..."

"Lex, he's fine."

He sighed. "I know. It's just..." "

You're protective. It's what I love about you. But Lex..."

He shook his head. "I can rein it in. I swear."

"I know you can." She took his hand once again, and led him into their bedroom.

Nikki woke up in the middle of the night feeling thirsty. It was probably from all her crying. She got out of bed to get herself a drink of water. She could do that by herself; she was seven.

On her way back from the kitchen, a little noise from Ben's nursery startled her. Was he awake? He had gone to bed really early. She peeked into his nursery. He was awake, but he wasn't crying. He was actually giggling, his eyes on his teddy bear.

Which was hovering over his crib.

Nikki grinned. Her plan had worked!

She almost went to tell Dad, but decided not to. If Ben wanted Dad to know about his powers, he could show him himself.

"Cool powers, Ben," she whispered.

He looked up at her and gurgled, gripping at his feet. The teddy bear waved.

She waved back. "Good night!" she whispered, and she went to bed.