MARTHA'S STORY
by Samuel Hawkins
As the shadows of a mid-summer evening began to fill the room, Martha Kent began to speak.
For the last time.
"It's funny. Jonathan and I knew each other all our lives. Played together as kids. Went to church together. Started school together. Learned to read together.
But we never had eyes for each other. He was going to marry Jeannie Miller, and I was going to marry Luke Patterson. It was just the way it was going to be.
I'd barely even seen Jonathan in the two months since we'd graduated. I was three weeks away from marrying Luke. Jonathan and Jeannie were set to get married that September. We were all set to go down the road that had always been there waiting for us. And that was just the way it was going to be.
But the way things are going to be are never the way things are.
It was a Saturday afternoon. I was in Tucker's Boutique trying on my wedding dress. My mother was with me, and we were giggling like schoolgirls and having a good old time. I had on my dress, and was looking at myself in Mrs. Tucker's big mirror, when up in the corner of it, I saw the strangest sight. A face was floating there like ... a ghost or something, and it took me a second to figure out what it was.
When I did, I couldn't believe it.
It was Jonathan, standing outside, his face pressed into the store window. To this day, I can't describe the look he wore. It was like he was ... seeing me for the first time.
Maybe I can't describe it, but I knew exactly what it meant. I turned around to face him, and he didn't blush or move or flinch or anything. He just kept looking at me. And I just kept looking at him.
After a while I just nodded.
He didn't have to ask.
I just went ahead and answered.
About that time I realized that Ma was talking to me, wondering what was the matter. I just looked at her and smiled, then hugged and kissed her, and headed out the door, Ma and Mrs. Tucker both yelling at me because I still had on my wedding dress.
But I knew I was going to be needing it.
And two hours and one trip to the justice of the peace later, Jonathan was carrying me across the threshold into our home."
The glorious sunset coloring the sky contrasted sharply with Smallville's mood. Something bad was happening. The kind of bad that even the town's young hero couldn't prevent. Despite a curious increase in the past five years in the number of attempted felonies and extraterrestrial-related incidents, the presence of Superboy had made Smallville a remarkably safe place in which to live. But bending steel and seeing through walls didn't change some facts of life.
Folks in Smallville still got sick.
Folks in Smallville still died.
And there was nothing that even a Superboy could do about it.
"It was quite the scandal around here. Us up and running off and getting married like that had tongues wagging all over the county for months. Wasn't quite proper, folks said.
And in my case, some said, not quite smart.
See, Mr. Patterson owned the granary and the bank, so for me to pass up his son for a poor farmer just starting out made sense to no one. But to me, it made the only sense. From the moment I knew that Jonathan was the man for me, I couldn't even consider doing anything else. We both felt bad that Luke and Jeannie were embarrassed, but we never regretted what we did.
Sometimes life takes its time getting you ready for something. But when you're ready, there's nothing that can stand in your way."
Martha Kent's eyes fluttered opened. For the first time in hours, she looked around, though it was not the present she was seeing.
"It's like Jonathan and me becoming parents. I don't know exactly why we weren't able to have a child the natural way. It was just one of those things that don't work out. And I don't exactly know why we didn't go out and try to adopt a child. I guess it's because ... well, us not being able to have children was ... well, it wasn't anything that Jonathan and I ever really got out in the open.
Some hurts are just too big to talk about. You put them away. And leave them there. So that you can manage them.
And that's what we did. We had each other, and we had our farm, and both of those things kept us plenty busy. We were happy.
Even though we always knew that something was missing."
Martha twisted in the grip of the deadly fever, then relaxed slightly as a cool breeze caressed her brow. Her eyes closed again, but she continued to speak.
"I like to think that all those years without a child were getting us ready for Clark. We were past 45 when he came, and even though I didn't know it, all that time without a baby had built up in me the love and ... appreciation ... that would make every day of having him a pleasure.
And I think that all those years of Jonathan, out by himself in those long fields, nothing to keep him company but his thoughts ... well, I think it built up in him the wisdom that someone special like Clark would need.
You could never have planned it that way, but it all fit together.
Clark needed someone, and so did we, and when he came, we were waiting for him."
As the first stars came into view, the sounds of the Smallville night, mostly crickets and the occasional car, were even more muted than usual. Most of the townsfolk were sticking close to home this evening.
With what was happening over at the Kent place, it just seemed right to be with your family.
"Lord, it was a sight when that rocket blazed across the sky. I suppose I've seen stranger things since, but not then. It was like heaven opened and dropped a star into our cornfield. Jonathan kept saying that it must have been a meteor, but I could tell that he didn't believe it. We both knew it was something special. I must not have been in my right mind to let him take us out to that field, but I guess there was no keeping him from it.
When you're ready for something, there's no stopping you."
Across town, Reverend Jacobs was returning home from visiting the Kents. His wife looked up from her reading and smiled as he walked through the door. He just looked at her and slowly shook his head, and watched sadly as her smiled faded away.
"When we got there and saw what it was, I about died. Right away you knew it wasn't a meteor. You knew it wasn't an airplane. In fact, you knew it wasn't anything you'd ever seen before. Jonathan and I were jabbering about it maybe being Russian, but that was just nerves talking. We both knew it wasn't from this neck of the woods. Somehow, it was just too ... elegant.
I was so scared. Jonathan wanted to go up to it and look in, but I wouldn't let him. I just wanted to go home and call Chief Otis, or maybe just go home and not call anybody at all. Just pretend that the whole thing hadn't happened.
Then I heard the baby cry.
And all of a sudden, everything was different."
Down the street, Pete Ross was pretending to watch television. "Going anywhere tonight?" his mother asked him.
Pete took a moment to answer. "No. Not tonight."
His parents pretended not to notice the catch in his voice, or the wetness in his eyes. He reciprocated by pretending not to notice when his father subtly walked over and subtly patted his shoulder.
Some hurts, Pete Ross was learning, are just too big to talk about.
"I shot past Jonathan so fast he didn't have time to grab me. The rocket was still smoking, but I didn't care. I didn't care about anything but getting to that baby. Now, I didn't know what kind of baby was in that ship. He could have had nine heads for all I knew.
But I knew that it was a baby, and it needed me. And that was all that mattered.
The first moment I laid eyes on him, it was like ... the moment the world began. I poked my head into that rocket ship, and there he was.
The most beautiful thing I had ever seen."
Under the apple tree on the line that divided the Kent and Lang property, Lana Lang sat quietly. She hadn't done this much since she was a little girl, but she felt like she needed to do it tonight.
She wasn't watching stars, though. She just stared at the single light glowing dimly next door, in the house that was to her like a second home.
And every now and again, she would wipe away a tear.
"Now, part of being a parent is looking at your children through parents' eyes. I mean, Millie Edwards thought her little Patsy was a beauty, and we all know that wasn't ... exactly the case. You never can say for sure if what you're seeing in your child is the way they really are, or the way that only you can see them.
That being said, near as I can tell, that baby truly was the most perfect thing ever to set down on this planet. His eyes were a deeper blue than you could ever imagine. His hair was dark and thick and wavy, with this one adorable curl like a delicate flower tumbling onto his forehead. And his skin. It was so soft and smooth ... it was almost like he shined.
Every inch of him was perfect.
But most of all, it was the look on his face that you noticed. It was not at all a look you'd see on a normal one-year-old. You could tell just by looking at him that he was a lot smarter than a child that age had a right to be. But it was more than that. It was a look of gentleness ... but with sadness, and ... sincerity mixed in. I guess it's silly to put it like that, but that's what I saw. I couldn't help but see it.
Of course, I fell in love with him right away."
Lex Luthor leaned back on his cot as he monitored the local police bands using the miniaturized receiver hidden in his ear. On the verge of his 18th birthday and adulthood, this was to be his final escape from the State Home for Incorrigible Boys, and its success depended on Superboy being distracted for a few minutes. For the past week though, the nights in Small County had been eerily uneventful. No accidents. No crime. Nothing, in fact, that required the services of his hated foe.
Lex was so bored he was on the verge of risking a confrontation with the blasted alien just to break the monotony, when he heard the county dispatcher ask the city dispatcher how the Kents were doing. Their sudden and deadly illness was news to Lex, and as he listened to the report, he noticed within himself a feeling so disused as to seem almost alien. He quickly fought it back. Just two less hicks in the world, he reminded himself.
Still, the Kents were ... all right ... in their way. They'd always been kind to him, Lex supposed. And they hadn't even treated him any differently after the blasted alien had stolen his hair.
And their kid was okay, even if he was dipped in sugar.
Lex Luthor leaned back on his cot, and decided that tomorrow night would probably be better for an escape. For some reason, he suddenly didn't much feel like going out.
"Becoming a mother is like starting everything over. One day, life is pretty much the way it's always been. The next day, everything has changed. Your priorities are all different. I don't think it's so much that the other things are really less important to you. It's just that against the background of what your baby means, they don't stand out so much any more. What you feel for your baby is a flood that drowns everything else.
When I pulled Clark out of that rocket, he wasn't being born, but it was like I was."
In the eastern corner of Smallville, Bernice Taylor was enduring the nightly war required to put her three little ones to bed. So intense was this evening's conflict, she was completely oblivious to the rapidly heating skillet on the inadvertently left-on stove. In moments, the first potentially disastrous sparks would begin to fly.
Then a red and blue streak passed through the Taylor home.
Hearing something, Bernice stuck her head into the kitchen. Seeing nothing, she shrugged, then remembered that she hadn't checked after dinner to see that the stove was off, and was relieved to find that it was. She smiled, reminded herself to be more careful, and rejoined the battle.
"It would be nice to think that once we snatched Clark up out of that rocket, that everything was okay for him.
But it wasn't.
Those first few months were rough. Being under our sun was quickly developing his powers, and adjusting to them was harder than you'd think. Suddenly, everything about him worked so much better that it was all happening too fast for him. We had to work very hard with him to slow him down. To teach him how to live at a human pace.
But even worse, he was so sad so much of the time. Even if he didn't understand exactly what had happened, he knew what he had lost.
Those first few years, Clark didn't remember a whole lot about Krypton or his parents. But sometimes he would dream about them. He would wake up sobbing, and as little rest as he needed, it was hard for him to get back to sleep. I'd go into his room, and lay down with him in his bed.
I'd hold him for hours.
I'd rock him and sing to him.
I'd tell him that everything was okay.
Finally he would drift back to sleep, his nightmares gone for at least a while. And sometimes in the dim light, I could see his face.
And it would have the sweetest, most peaceful look on it.
Then I'd cry."
...
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