Kansas was holding its annual corn festival. Clark was coming home for the weekend the “human” way: by plane. “Maybe Clark will bring that Laurie with him,” Jonathan told Martha.
“Maybe,” Martha said.
On the phone, Clark was full of news about ‘Laurie’—Laurie this, Laurie that.
Maybe Clark finally had a steady girlfriend. Except Martha had noticed that Clark’s bylines lately were shared with a ‘Lawrence Lane.’
And Clark had never been a hot-dog with the girls.
Whoever this “Laurie” is, I hope they’re better than Lana Lang.
Lana had taken far too much for granted with Clark. Martha had been relieved that Clark didn’t end up getting Lana pregnant and staying in Smallville as Lana seemed to expect. In fact, she was willing to wager Clark never slept with Lana—which made Martha wonder—not to mention there was so much she and Jonathan didn’t know about Kryptonian physiology—
Let’s just say, Martha Kent wasn’t entirely surprised when her son Clark showed up in Smallville’s town square alongside a slender young man of middling height, bright green eyes, and a sharp tongue.
“I’ve heard about these small towns,” Martha heard the young man tell Clark. “You see Mr. Regular Joe there flipping hamburgers? I bet you he's a cross-dresser.”
“Mrs. Kent,” the young man, Lorry said politely.
“Martha, please,” she said, and Lorry gave her a surprisingly shy smile.
“You kids must be hungry. Let's get you something to eat.”
“I don't know, Mom,” Clark said in the way he did when he was about to tell one of his ponderous jokes that made his eyes light up while other people shook their heads and sighed. “Lorry thinks that the cook might be a cross-dresser.”
Martha laughed “Honey, that's Clark's father. I can't get him to buy a dress for me, let alone one for himself.”
Lorry blushed scarlet and glared at Clark.
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| The marvelous Jerry Hardin plays Irig. |
Clever. Good manners. Bashful. Not a pushover.
Martha knew exactly what she believed about her son and “Laurie.”
Jonathan was more skeptical. “They must be here for a story,” he said. “That weird affair at Irig’s, I’ll bet.”
Martha let him pull Clark away for a discussion of the “rock” that their neighbor, Wayne Irig had left with Martha and Jonathan before the EPA descended on his farm. She would grill Clark about Lorry some other time.
I know my son. He’s smitten. Maybe he has—what’s the phrase?—a man crush. Bromance. Maybe it’s something else.
Lorry came into the kitchen, his hair still damp from a shower. He was frowning at his phone, and he gave Martha a sideways look.
“Uh, I’m having trouble getting a signal.”
Earlier, when the four of them arrived at the Kent home (of course, Lorry would stay with them!), Lorry made a comment about the “boondocks” and started to explain his need for Wi-Fi. He’d then been thoroughly embarrassed by the Kents’ up-to-date technology set-up. Martha found his current diffidence as adorable as his previous flustered apologies. She sent Lorry off to the living room to use the computer just as Clark and Jonathan stumbled in from the barn.
Martha was used to worry. Her son might be indestructible, faster than a speeding bullet, capable of leaping tall buildings in a single bound, etc. etc. etc. A mother still fretted when her son dove into a volcano or flew into space.
And yet, she had never felt more frightened than she did now, staring at Clark’s white face and trembling hands.
“It was Irig’s rock,” Jonathan muttered. “I showed it to him and he collapsed.”
Martha touched Clark’s forehead and snatched her hand back: “You’re burning up!”
She reminded herself that regular, non-Kryptonian people did get sick. Lorry, for one, didn’t seem that concerned about Clark’s “fever.” He assumed that Clark was suffering from a summer cold and made jokes about Clark wearing a SARS mask. Lorry’s assessment proved the most accurate. Clark was better the next day after the recommended “good night’s rest.” For a normal young man . . .
Except he wasn’t. Or wasn’t supposed to be. As Jonathan pointed out, they had no baseline, no way they could say, “Oh, sure, this is what to expect.” Or “Don’t worry, it’s a passing phase.”
Martha was reminded of the first time Clark moved beyond lifting ordinary heavy objects to performing feats that not even a circus strongman could manage. The first time he dug up seventy stumps in less than an hour. The first time he ran to Kansas City for a part for the tractor. The first time he flew.
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| The fair worker is the amazing Patrick Thomas O'Brien. |
Would it be so awful for Clark to be normal? To come home on a plane every visit? To not have to always be listening for earthquakes and twisters and multi-vehicle traffic accidents? Would that be so terrible?
“He’s not human,” Jonathan kept insisting. “This loss of power doesn’t make sense.”
“The rock is obviously from Krypton. Nothing else could affect him so much.”
“It did fall on Irig’s property about the same time we discovered Clark as a baby. What does the government want with it now? What do they want with Superman?”
Nothing good. Martha was a Midwesterner born and bred. She distrusted bureaucrats, IRS agents, D.C. news reporters, and anyone who used words like “cisgendered” and thought they were actually communicating.
What if Clark did stop being the object of interest by government agents? Would it truly be so bad if the most difficult part of her and Jonathan’s life was accepting their son’s boyfriend?
Luckily, she didn’t have a chance to get too used to the idea of a non-super-powered son. She might have wanted it a little too much. Clark got his powers back, then got the government goons (who turned out to be rogue agents) off Irig’s farm, helping Irig in the process.
Same old. Same old. And Clark clearly wasn’t ready to say anything about Lorry. Martha wasn’t entirely sure what Clark believed about his relationship with Lorry or about himself. She wished the “boys” well and kept her biggest wish to herself. I want my small-town son to have a true confidant in his big-city life.
