- - - Chapter Twenty
Lois had started planning the wedding. She was browsing magazines for a dress, and already had a start on the flowers. Of course, she still had no idea where she wanted it, how many people they'd be inviting, or anything concerning money. Clark gave his input only when directly questioned, telling Lois that he wanted what she wanted so long as it wasn't too bizarre.
"Number one, or number two?" Lois asked, showing him two options for wedding dresses.
"Lois, it's your dress, pick the one you want," he said gently. She'd been doing this for almost an hour now. At first he'd given her his opinion gladly, but it was getting ridiculous. "Maybe we should go to a store and look at some," he suggested when he saw her eyes narrow. "You could try some on; you're going to be wearing it all evening, you might as well be sure it's comfortable."
"It's a wedding dress, Clark; it's not supposed to be comfortable. It's supposed to be pretty."
"Well, you're pretty enough to make up for any prettiness the comfort takes out of the dress," he said. She was still glaring at him, but the malice had left her eyes. Crisis averted, Clark thought to himself, mentally wiping his brow.
"We haven't got time to go shopping now, though," Lois said wistfully. "Jason needs to be picked up in twenty minutes, and we promised we'd take him to a movie."
"We did?"
"Well, I did," Lois smiled at him. "It's the first day of winter break and he asked nicely."
"Sounds good," Clark said, praying that nobody would be in mortal danger and he'd be allowed to sit through one movie with his family.
- - -
Three hours later the three of them were back in their living room. They'd seen 'Bridge to Terebithia' and enjoyed it. Jason was already lost in his own little world, making up imaginary characters for himself and trying to discover secret worlds hiding under the couch or behind the TV.
"Careful, Jason," Lois reminded him when he almost knocked over the TV. He'd been showing signs of super-strength lately, lifting up things that would normally have been a little heavy quite easily. He didn't seemed alarmed at all, just surprised when he'd lifted up the coffee table that morning before school. Suddenly Jason froze, staring at the back wall. Lois glanced back and saw nothing out of the ordinary; "What's wrong honey?"
"Where did the fridge go?" He asked, walking towards the kitchen.
"What?" Lois asked, glancing at Clark. His eyebrows were knit together, looking from Jason to the wall and back, obviously not seeing whatever Jason was either. His face dawned with comprehension just as Jason walked straight into the fridge door.
"Ow," Jason said, rubbing his nose even though it hadn't hurt. They all looked at the fridge; Jason's eyes suddenly focused on it, confused. There was a faint face-print in the metal.
"What happened, Jason?" Lois asked, walking over to him and rubbing his back while they watched Clark fix the fridge door.
"It disappeared," Jason said, looking to his dad for answers. Clark was smiling.
"I think you're getting x-ray vision," he said gently. Jason looked terrified.
"I don't want x-ray vision!" He was looking back at the fridge again, worried it would disappear. Unfortunately, when he focused on it, it did disappear, revealing their balcony beyond and the cityscape. "Bring it back!" He looked at his dad, pressing back against Lois when he saw a skeleton and muscles instead of the face he was used to. Jason squeezed his eyes shut until he felt his dad's soothing hands on his shoulders.
"Open your eyes, Jason," Clark said calmly.
"No!" Jason said, but he did what he was told slowly. He sighed with relief when Clark's face was in place. He reached out a cautious hand and touched his dad's cheek.
"What did you see?" Clark asked gently.
"The fridge was gone, and I could see out like we can see on the balcony," he turned and looked again; the fridge melted away and he could see the city again. He squeezed his eyes closed before looking at his dad again. "And I saw your bones." he repressed a shudder. Lois, still rubbing his back, moved a little closer.
"Bones aren't something to be afraid of," Clark said. "Everybody has them."
"But I don't like seeing them," Jason responded.
"It's a little weird at first, I know," Clark shrugged. "Is it happening now?"
"No," Jason answered, glancing back at the fridge and smiling when it didn't disappear even when he squinted.
"Next time it happens let me know and I'll try and teach you how to control it so you don't have to look at bones when you don't want to. Okay?"
"Okay," Jason smiled. The three of them sat there for another moment before Jason squeezed out of his mother's grip and went into his room to find some toys.
"I thought you said we'd be waiting till he hit puberty," Lois accused, standing up to look him in the eye.
"It's going to be different with him," Clark shrugged. "He's part human, too."
"I never even thought about him developing powers," Lois said. "Even after he threw that piano on the yacht," she shuddered, remembering the experience. She'd told Clark the whole story about what had happened on the Gertrude the night he'd told her the whole story of what had happened at the Fortress. Clark hugged her to him.
"This could be fun," he said. She looked up at him skeptically but he just smiled.
- - -
Jason was walking into walls.
The poor boy was walking around the apartment with his hands in front of him. He knew where the walls were and where the furniture was, but then he'd find a door. There was no way to be sure if the door was opened or closed when you could see right through it. Clark had been working with him since the beginning of his winter break three days ago, but the x-ray vision could definitely be quantified as 'worse.'
At first, Jason would get random flashes where he would see through this or that. He'd asked his mom where the kitchen table had gone three times before they both realized he was seeing through it. As soon as he realized it, the table appeared again, but the chairs disappeared. It was extremely frustrating. He'd gone to Clark as soon as the chairs had swum back into view, trying not to look at anything too closely so that it would just stay solid while he walked past it. He'd made it into the same room as his dad when he'd looked down at his feet and seen through the fall, promptly falling over in fright when he thought he was going to fall.
"What's the matter, Jason?" Clark had asked, speeding over and catching his son before he hit the floor.
"The floors gone," Jason said, staring down. The landlord's room was below them; she was a grumpy single woman reaching her fifties who's flirted with Clark constantly until she'd realized the little boy who had moved in with him was his son, not just the son of the co-worker he'd told her was staying with him till she got on her feet. The woman kept cats; it was one of the few apartment complexes that allowed pets. She had a half dozen hugely fat cats and all of them were lounging around, watching the landlady make herself a sandwich.
"Blink a few times and try to see the floor instead of Miss Humpfridlink," Clark instructed, watching his son do as he said. Jason's face burst into a smile after he'd been blinking for about five seconds.
"The floor's back!" He looked at his dad and frowned as soon as his eyes focused on him. "I can see the bones in your face," he sounded horrified.
"Try not to focus on that, it gets kind of icky to look at people's insides," Clark shuddered remembering a time when he'd watched his father's brain for a full half an hour partly because he wanted to get over the fact that he could see his dad's brain, and partly because he hadn't figured out how to turn it off yet. Jason was blinking again, and then his face cleared. "Here," Clark said, leading Jason by the hand into his bedroom.
Jason stood still in the doorway while Clark filled his backpack with stuff. "What're you doing?" He asked when his dad turned around, holding the bulging bag in front of him.
"Tell me what's inside," Clark said, watching his son's face. Jason looked surprised for a minute, then helpless, looking at the bag and willing it to disappear.
"I can't… It all goes away when I try to look inside," he sounded very disappointed in himself.
"Just think about what parts of it you want to disappear and what you want to see instead," Clark suggested gently. Jason nodded, focusing on the bag again.
"I see my blue swimsuit!" He shouted out a moment later, looking up at his dad in surprise. He was even more surprised when his dad's face didn't melt away into bone.
"And what's wrapped up in your swimsuit?" Jason squinted at them again and Clark was glad that he wasn't developing heat vision at the same time or they'd be having some problems.
"There're a few Lego guys in the pocket."
"Which pocket?"
"The closest one," Jason said immediately. "The other one is turned inside out."
"Very good," Clark said, surprised.
"And the swimsuit is wrapped around my Buzz Lightyear flashlight that doesn't work anymore," Jason said, his voice getting more and more excited. He went on to tell his dad half the things in the bag without mistake. He had some issues when he tried to see past one thing without seeing through the thing behind it, or making the bag disappear altogether.
"That was very, very good, Jason," Clark complimented, hugging his son. Lois had gone to get groceries so they could have lunch, leaving the pair of them to figure it out. "I'm so proud of you," Jason was almost glowing. It was one thing to hear his dad say those words, another to know that his dad was Superman and he was saying those words, and an entirely different thing to know that he was being complimented on doing something only the son of Superman could do and doing it well for the first time.
It took Jason the rest of the week to truly figure out his new talent, but he picked up on it fast, much like he'd learned how to control his super-hearing very quickly. It surprised Clark, first that the powers were developing so early, and second that Jason was mastering them so quickly. It was clear they'd have a lot to look forward to a lot sooner than they had predicted.
Clark was sure to lecture his son about the importance of privacy. He made sure Jason understood that he should not use his x-ray vision to spy on people, to watch Miss Humpfridlink and her cats below them when he was bored, or try and see through peoples' clothes just because he could was a big don't. It would be a few years, luckily, before they really had to worry about Jason wanting to see through anybody's clothes, and Clark was able to get his point across about respecting peoples' privacy.
"We have amazing talents, Jason," he explained. "We need to know how to use our talents so we can help people when they need us to, but we need to know when not to use our talents, too."
"Can I use my x-ray vision to find toys when I lose them in my room?"
"Yes," Clark said, smiling, "but you shouldn't look through walls when we're at home because you don't need to. We don't need to see the cats downstairs eat their dinner, or sofa in the living room when we're bored, just like we don't need to listen to the twins upstairs fighting some afternoons, or the lady practicing singing across the street."
"But we can, and the lady across the street sings really good."
"Yes, but she only sings because she thinks nobody can hear her."
"But she sings really good!"
"But she doesn't want us to listen."
"Then why does she sing?"
"Maybe she enjoys it," Clark shrugged. "But we shouldn't listen because she only sings when she's alone in her apartment."
"Why do you know that if you say you don't listen to her?" Jason asked accusingly.
"Because I have to keep my ears open so I can hear when people need my help."
"Shouldn't I listen for people who need help too?"
"No, definitely not!" Lois's voice carried quietly to them from the kitchen. She'd mumbled it under her breath, having decided to let Clark deal with this, but they both heard her anyways. Jason frowned at the door, looking through it to watch his mother stirring whatever she was making for lunch.
"Right now helping people is my job, Jason," Clark said carefully. "When you're older, after you finish all your school, you'll be ready to help. I know you're really strong, and you don't get hurt, and you can hear things and see things and want to help, but you're still a little boy," Jason frowned at that. "Yes, you are," Clark chuckled. "You're a very special little boy, but you've got a lot of stuff to do that you can only do when you're a little boy… Just let me worry about listening and watching for people that need help, and you enjoy your winter break."
"Okay, Daddy," Jason said after contemplating the proposal for a minute. Clark could hear Lois sigh with relief out in the kitchen. There was more than one reason they were asking Jason to keep his eyes and ears to himself and it mainly had to do with things that happen when the lights go out in adults' bedrooms, not only in their own but in the young couples' apartment a few doors down, and in all the others within Jason's earshot, and now, his view.