A week of unclouded happiness.
That was a lot.
Some people never got that much in their entire lives.
I got it all at once.
For an entire week.
Obviously, Lana and I weren’t together every minute of every day.
We each had our own lives, our own responsibilities, and our own things to take care of.
But even simply knowing that your dream was right there with you, not somewhere inside a dream or fantasy, but right here, right now…
That was worth a lot.
The next morning, Lana and I walked together to the school bus stop, and we entered the school holding hands.
Which, naturally, amounted to a public announcement to every gossip in the school that we were now together.
Among the “popular” crowd, couples formed all the time.
And changed just as often.
It wasn’t exactly something that could surprise anyone, but people still watched those changes very closely.
And what could possibly be more interesting than us?
The Prom Queen with the guy who had broken the nose of the previous Prom King.
All eyes were firmly fixed on us.
Mostly jealous ones.
For some reason, people rarely seemed genuinely happy about someone else’s happiness.
They were, however, very often jealous of it.
Humans were strangely constructed.
Life was strangely constructed too.
During classes, whenever it wasn’t prohibited, Lana moved over to my desk and squeezed Ross out of his usual seat.
Pete didn’t object.
He simply moved over to Chloe.
That was actually pretty strange.
Pete was probably one of the very few people at school whose jealousy toward me didn’t increase that day.
It decreased.
And that was a good thing, right?
Lana and I also went home together.
After that, of course, we split up to take care of our own business.
Everyone had plenty of things to do.
Lex stopped by and congratulated me on my “victory in the war.”
I merely shrugged at that and continued grinning stupidly.
In fact, that smile barely left my face all morning.
It stayed there afterward too.
Dad even suggested that I chew on a lemon.
I told Father about Greg, by the way.
At first, he frowned.
Then he simply shrugged.
That’s life.
Sometimes shit happens.
Sometimes it happens more often than you’d like.
He was much more concerned about my relationship with Lana.
I didn’t tell him how much she actually knew.
Let them quietly keep their secrets from each other while I watched and laughed.
Lex also brought me another job as a programmer.
A little driver needed to be written in Assembly for some piece of equipment, along with the specifications and calculations describing the physical process taking place inside the machine.
The money was all properly covered by a contract.
Everything was legitimate.
So why not take it?
The important thing was not to forget to stretch the work out over at least a week so I wouldn’t attract too much attention.
I promised I’d give it a try.
Lex left.
I finished my chores and went to meet Lana, intending to walk her to the stable, help out there, and then go riding with her.
Why not?
I knew how to ride a horse too.
Just like Lana.
After all, I had grown up on a farm, not in a city.
There were horses in the stable that I was allowed to ride, so there was no reason not to.
Riding was a romantic activity.
Pleasant, overall.
Assuming you had either enough experience or an iron ass.
I wasn’t lacking in either department.
About a mile and a half from the stable, Lana finally asked me a question.
“Clark, how long has this been going on with you?”
“What?”
I didn’t understand immediately.
She clarified.
“Being so strong and fast.
How long?”
“Always, as far as I can remember.”
I shrugged.
“I was probably born this way.”
“Or not?”
I thought about it.
Because honestly, what had I been like when I was born?
Was I already as strong as I was now?
Probably not.
Surely nature wasn’t cruel enough to give a newborn baby my full strength.
That would have been excessive.
Then again, what did I actually know about my biological species?
“I was found after the Meteor Shower.”
“My parents…
the Kents took me in.”
“My biological parents were never found.”
“A lot of people died that day.”
“I know.”
Lana’s expression became sad.
“They tried to find out something about my parents, but they couldn’t.
Apparently, they were travelers, people from somewhere else.
Otherwise, some relatives would have shown up sooner or later.”
“But nobody did.”
“The Kents didn’t have children of their own.”
“Mom…
Martha Kent couldn’t get pregnant.”
“She still can’t.”
“So they adopted me.”
“That’s sad.”
Lana sighed.
“I never really thought about the fact that the tragedy that day wasn’t only mine.”
“Looks like you and I were in almost the exact same situation.”
“We both lost our parents that day.”
“Only Nell took me in, while the Kents took you.”
“I prefer to think that I didn’t lose my parents that day.”
“I found them.”
“I don’t remember my biological parents at all.”
“Not even a little.”
“And honestly, I doubt they would have been better than the Kents.”
“What do we actually know about them?”
“I…”
Lana seriously considered the question.
“I suppose I only know what Nell told me.”
“I don’t know, Lana.”
I sighed.
“Maybe it’s a betrayal of my biological parents, but I don’t really want to find them.”
“Or their relatives.”
“Something tells me the meeting wouldn’t be a happy one.”
“Martha and Jonathan are my real mother and father.”
“That’s rather cruel toward people you don’t even know.”
Lana frowned slightly.
“Maybe.”
I sighed.
“But I’m biased on this subject because I consider the Kents unbeatable.”
“They should have a monument erected to them while they’re still alive.”
“I can’t imagine anyone who could have done a better job.”
“Even so?”
Lana smiled.
“Just imagine a three-year-old kid with all the curiosity, restlessness, and energy of a normal child.”
“Except this kid can easily pick up his father’s tractor and throw it thirty meters away like it weighs nothing.”
“He can tear a steel winch cable apart.”
“And he runs so fast that a video camera can’t even record him, let alone allow a human eye to follow him.”
“And his father’s belt isn’t frightening at all because it’s not just the belt that bends when it hits him.”
“Even a crowbar bends.”
Lana couldn’t help herself.
“Sorry.”
She immediately tried to recover.
“I just remembered that crowbar…”
“It’s all right.”
I smiled too.
“Except it stops being funny after the first time you put your head through a wall.”
“And then part of the roof collapses.”
“And then all the humor disappears completely when you start chewing on a gas cylinder.”
“You chewed on it?”
Lana stared at me.
“What is there to be surprised about?”
I shrugged.
“I told you yesterday that I’m bulletproof everywhere.”
“That includes my teeth.”
“And what happened to the cylinder?”
“Household gas explosion.”
“Wall blown out.”
“Fire in the kitchen.”
“My father got his first gray hairs.”
“I had a fiery burp.”
“And naturally, that caused another fire.”
“Fiery burp?”
Lana raised one skeptical eyebrow.
“Seriously?”
“Does it look like I’m joking?”
I sighed.
“Can you show me?”
“Do you have a spare gas cylinder?”
“I’ll find one for the sake of such a spectacle.”
She said it with complete confidence.
“Because at our place, we’ve had only electric stoves and ovens since then.”
“Just to be safe.”
“And there’s a fire extinguisher in every room.”
“And the ceilings are reinforced with welded frames.”
“And the tractor is the simplest old cheap one we could find, repaired so many times we’ve practically rebuilt it.”
I sighed again.
“But you’ve grown up already, haven’t you?”
Lana smiled.
“We can relax now.”
“Mom won’t let us.”
“She’s waiting for grandchildren.”
“She’s preparing.”
That finally broke Lana completely.
She laughed loudly.
Then, about five minutes later, she suddenly stopped and looked at me suspiciously.
“You think these abilities are hereditary?”
She asked the question carefully.
“I’m sure of it.”
I sighed.
For the next ten minutes, silence settled between us.
Lana seriously considered this new information, and I didn’t interfere.
Jokes were jokes, but if this woman really intended to stay with me rather than simply “dating” me for six months or a year, then she needed to know about these things.
And the key word here was know, not merely understand intellectually.
I couldn’t even imagine how my parents had managed to raise me.
How had they found enough patience?
No.
The city was definitely out.
You couldn’t raise little “Kents” there.
They’d tear the entire city apart.
Stone by stone.
Especially if there was more than one of them.
No.
Only the countryside.
Only open space.
Only Smallville.
“Well, I suppose I’ll have to take a couple of master classes from your mother on raising little Clarks.”
Lana finally seemed to reach some kind of decision.
She smiled.
I smiled brightly in return.