Archive of Our Own ^beta

I met Jonathan Kent at a concert.

I was in the front in my black boots with my hair dyed blue. Looked pretty good, judging by the photos he still has.

He was in the third row. Looked like he was gonna throw up. Found out later his friends dragged him there. Jim, Corey, and this girl named Lisa who was trying to get her claws into him.

I saw him on my way out back to get a drag of something I won’t mention in case Clark ever gets his hands on this.

He was cute. Nothing crazy. I thought it was funny how scared he looked of the lights and the noise and the yelling. We made eye contact. I nodded. He pushed past everybody to get to me. It didn’t matter any more how crazy it was. He knew I wanted to meet him.

See, I found out I couldn’t tell Jon Kent I wanted something. I couldn’t tell him unless I wanted him to move heaven and earth to get it.

There was one thing he couldn’t get.

He held me on the way home from the doctor that last time, driving the truck one-handed with his other arm around me while I sobbed into his shoulder. I could feel his tears dripping into my hair. It was a good thing he could have navigated those roads blindfolded.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” I said it, and he said it. We had a bank account that said empty and bodies that said empty and hearts that said empty.

You need money to adopt. You need money to find an agency that isn’t creepy and money to prove you’re legit and money to travel and money I probably never even thought of. All we had was receipts for money spent on doctors who couldn’t tell us why everything was perfect between us except one thing.

Every night, I turned the music up loud. I turned it up and pretended he couldn’t hear it while he did his chores outside just like I pretended he couldn’t tell how much it hurt.

“Something’s weird, Mar.”

I turned it off as soon as I saw Jon’s face.

The boy came to us one night while I was blowing out my speakers and washing pots as loudly as I could on purpose, making them smash into each other the way my hopes felt like they were smashing into my despair.

“Should we tell somebody, Jon?”

For once, I wasn't sure. I could feel desperation more altering than any substance I had ever taken before.

I held him. I held the most beautiful baby in the world, and his eyes were blue, and he clutched Jon’s pinky finger and smiled.

“Nope,” said Jon. He was so sure. “He’s ours.”

Jon was always the softie. Jon was the one who never lost his temper and rarely raised his voice. He was the one for long talks and giving driving lessons.

But you weren’t there. You weren’t there the day Clark sat on my lap and picked his first favorite song. You didn’t see how he came to me first when he figured out something new he could do, how excited he was to drag me outside by the hand and show me. You don’t know how I was the one he told first when he realized it was time to go to the city, how he put his arms around me and reminded me that we’d always known he was destined to do more. You didn’t see me trying not to cry.

“She’s like you, you know.”

Jon was finally smiling, after hours and days of worrying about our son. He sat on the edge of our bed, pulling off his shoes.

“Who?”

“Lois.”

I laughed. “She’s got a degree, Jon, and her name’s in the papers.”

“Ain’t what I mean, and you know it.”

“I know it.” I sat down next to him and put my head on his shoulder. He put his arm around me like always.

“She’s real sure, except when she isn’t,” I continued.

“Good thing she’s got Clark,” he said softly, turning like he does when he’s ready for a kiss.

“Good thing.” And it was.

That’s how I knew it was going to stick. I might not be sure about everything, but I was sure of that.

Right before they left, I gave Lois a gift. It was an old cassette that wouldn’t play any more, the old tape with his first favorite song on it. “Ask Clark what it's about,” I said.

I was sure she would.