Chapter Text
Chapter 7:
Chapter Title: I Love You
Normal POV:
Watch Tower
December 18th
“Thank you Green Lantern Hal. I’ll be sure to inform Miss Bloss.”
Nothing personal to the man in green before her but Lyra was struggling to keep up on the small talk he was insisting on making. The last forty-eight hours still had her head in a tail spin. Coming back to earth, learning that Clark was Superman, having him basically die in her arms, saving him as if they were in a fairy tail movie, fighting and barely managing to defeat Doomsday, meeting members of the Justice League, and now ever so patiently waiting to hear about Clark-Superman’s recovery. Out of everything she thinks that’s what she had been struggling to come to terms to- his secret identity. She would have never guessed.
“And when you do make sure you let her know it’s Hal Jordan from Earth. There’s another GL Hal from sector 23762 or something like that…..” “Hal continued speaking completely unaware of the lack of attention and racing thoughts of the woman before him. “Between the two of us she had a real thing for me when when we last had a team up.”
“I’m sure.” She was about to move the conversation to anything related to Clark or even the recovery of Metropolis, but the interest of the man in front of her shifted first, and she also turned to see what or who it was.
“Bats! How’s the big guy doing?”
“He’s awake and should make a full recovery.” Batman stops in his silent steps a few feet away from where the two were.
Lyra’s entire body lets out a sigh of relief.
Lyra felt that she had been holding her breath since Clark had been rushed to the Watch Tower and into surgery nearly twenty hours ago. After hearing Batman’s matter a fact news her breathing now felt lighter and her thoughts calmer.
“He wants to see you.” Batman spins away from them, and quickly Lyra and Hal follows behind. Without stopping in his stride or looking back he speaks again. “He just wants to see her.”
Lyra looks to her right, and sees the way that Hal slowly comes to a stop and almost looks disappointed. “Yeah…..I’ll just wait around here I guess. Not like I didn’t almost die out there right along with him.”
Batman act like he hardly hears the Green Lantern’s words, and Lyra doesn’t know what to say, but in the moment doesn’t care, Clark was priority. A few minutes into their walk, Batman abruptly comes to a stop mid-stride, forcing Lyra to do the same.
Lyra takes a measured step back when he turns towards her. She can’t necessarily make out his expression from under the cowel, but his aura is as intimidating to her as the actual monster that she helped fight a few hours ago.
The silence becomes uncomfortable enough for her to break it. “I-is something wrong?”
“Don’t hurt him again.”
“W-what?” Out of all the things that Lyra could have expected to come out of the Batman’s mouth, this wasn’t it.
“Clark. If you plan on hurting him again, then it’s best you do not even see him. Leave now.”
“When did I ever hurt Clark?” Lyra’s defenses came up at the implication. Yes, she had been the one to break up with him, but he had been the one hiding things from her throughout the entirety of their relationship.
“He didn’t take your disappearance from earth well. And we do not need a repeat of those first few weeks if you are to decided to disappear again.” Batman turns and continues walking through the hallways.
“What do you mean?”
“He’s a weapon of mass destruction with very raw human emotions. We were able to negate most of the damage, but if he losses control of himself like that again I won’t be forgiving.” Batman only speaks again when he stops in front of a closed metal door. “What happens next depends on you.”
With mouth open dumbfounded and eyes wide, Lyra isn’t sure what she was supposed to do as Batman strides away and soon completely disappearing from sight. What had Clark done in her absence? Why was she being blamed for it? Why was Batman making veiled threats to kill Superman? Weren’t they supposed to be friends? Could he even kill him?
Looking up at the door in front of her, Lyra’s mind becomes to race in a new direction that causes her to doubt if she should have even stayed after the fight or come to the Watch Tower. Should she knock? Does she want to see him? What should she say? What will he say? Why hadn’t she thought about any of this prior?
‘You’re already here……you can’t leave without saying goodbye……at least get some closure for yourself, you deserve that…..’
Lyra’s internal pep talk was enough push her to finally knock on the metal doors, which much to her surprise smoothly slid open under her touch.
“Clark!”
Lyra’s doesn’t have time to take in anything that was behind the metal doors, because her eyes had instantly fell onto its only occupant. A still heavily bruised and bandaged Clark, was struggling to fully get out of bed and walk across the room. He’s only a few feet from his bed, but looks as if he’s about to fall flat on his face.
Without thought Lyra runs in, placing one hand on his exposed chest, and the other on his biceps. She helps steady him, and slowly encourages him to take a few steps back until she can help him sit on his hospital bed. It hurts to do so, but she takes him in for the first time since the fight, and her heart aches at his physical condition. He’s shirtless and she can’t find a single inch on his chest, arms, or back, that was spared of bruises or healing cuts. At least his face hadn’t born the brunt of it and was almost completely bruise free for the exception of a nasty cut in his hairline.
“You shouldn’t be leaving bed in your condition!?”
Clark smiles up at her widely. Her tone let him know that she was upset, but he didn’t care. She was here. He had hoped and prayed for this everyday since her disappearance.
“I saw you standing outside the door…..” The ache in Clark’s voice caused him to speak lowly. “I was so excited I didn’t think I could wait for you to come in on your own.”
Lyra attempted to fight the warmth his words brought to her cheeks. He was always good at that- saying casually romantic and enduring things as if they were nothing. Her hands lets go of his body and she took two steps back. “How are you feeling?”
“You saved my life. I feel amazing!”
Clark knows he didn’t look it, but he felt alive. He felt better than alive- for the first time in a long time he felt like he was really the Man of Steel.
“I wish I could have done something about the bruises.” The fact that she had been able to bring this man back from deaths door was still something she hasn’t been fully able to wrap her head around. During her training on Zamaron, the Violet Lanterns had told her about one of their most sacred abilities- resurrecting those closest to their heart. Doing so had basically drained her lantern ring and left her extremely exhausted but it was a small price to pay.
“They’ll go away. They don’t matter.”
“Yeah…..” Lyra reached out, her fingers grazing the the gash in his hairline. The bruises and cuts shouldn’t matter. He was alive, he was breathing, he looked happy…..those were all the things that should matter. But seeing him now……closing her eyes……all she saw was his lifeless body in her arms. All she could think about was that she almost lost him.
Lyra sniffed, her sniffing turned into a gasped breath, and her gasped breath eventually collapsed into deep inconsolable sobs.
“Lyra…..”
Her knees felt too weak to hold her body up, but it didn’t matter because Clark was pulling her down to sit on his lap, not caring how sore and sensitive his body was at the moment. He held her closer then he’s ever held her before while whispering whatever reassuring words he could think of.
“I-I’m……uuuuhhhh……shaaa……agggahhhaaa…..”
“You don’t need to say anything. It’s fine. Everything’s fine.”
“I-I th-thought you- died. I-It huurrrurt s-sso much seeing you li-like that.”
“I’m fine now. You saved my life, and I promise I usually don’t get hurt that bad.”
Maybe five minutes passed maybe twenty-five, Lyra wasn’t sure when she stropped crying and began to take large gasping breaths in order to force herself to calm down. She wiped her dried tears and took the tissue which Clark offered to blow her nose, feeling slightly disgusted with herself that she was doing something like that so close to him.
When she finally pulled herself together enough to look up at him, she realized just how little personal space was between the two of them. Shyly she pulled herself out of his grasp, and scooted off his lap and onto an empty space of the hospital bed. “I-I don’t want to see you get hurt a-at a-all. God, you don’t know how terrified I was.”
“I do know. When you in the hospital after Valentine’s Day……I didn’t just hate myself for standing you up, but for not being able to make sure you didn’t get hurt.”
Last Valentine’s Day….The end to or the start to everything, depending how you looked at it. With all that’s happened she almost forgot about that evening. But thinking back to that day and several other days while they were in a relationship, she was finally starting to understand.
“Th-that’s what….what you were hiding from me when you were dating? That you were Superman.”
Clark nodded solemnly. He was going to tell her before her disappearance. He had planned it all out in his head, but now he didn’t know what he should say. She had seen it all for herself, up close and personally. Not only that but she had been the one to save him.
“I’m sorry Lyra. I sh-“
“Don’t apologize. You were saving the world and I was getting mad at you for missing baseball games when I don’t even like baseball. Agghhhhh! You must of thought I was such a horrible person!”
“I thought you were amazingly understanding. More so than I deserved.”
Silence fell. Both open their mouth and began speaking at the same time, awkward laughs soon followed.
“You go.”
Lyra shook her head. She now knew how much he had been holding back from her during the entirety of the relationship. She was going to let him talk. Let him get out as much as he possibly can. “It’s fine. You first.”
“It’s somehow never crossed my mind that you left the planet much less our galaxy, but I’m happy that you’re back.”
“I never thought I would either……” Lyra let out a little laugh that she didn’t know was absolute music to Clark’s ears. “If I had a way of contacting you guys to let you know that I was okay, I would have. I’m sorry if I worried you…..”
“It’s not your fault. I never lost someone the way I lost you and I didn’t know what to do with myself.” The double meaning of Clark’s words were lost on Lyra. “But you’re back now and that’s all that matters.”
“Only for a few more days. I wanted to make sure that you were really okay and I need to spend a sometime with Hara before leaving, and explain everything and apologize several more times.”
“What do you mean before leaving!?”
“I’ve come to really appreciate my time on Zamaron with the other Violet Lanterns. And……”
“And?” Clark pushed maybe too forcefully. She just got back and wanted to leave already. He couldn’t comprehend why. Why wouldn’t she want to stay on her home world? Why wouldn’t she want to stay by him?
Lyra took a few shaky breaths and looked away from Clark’s blue eyes. She knew that her confession was going to make her out as a terrible person. “…….I know this is selfish and if I was a good person I would say that I was happy that you were happy and that’s all that matters, but I can’t. I can’t stay here and watch you be happy. I’m sorry.”
“What you’re talking about?”
“You and Lois. I saw the two of you kissing at the dinner in June, and the way she was crying over you and saying she loved you. Clearly the two of you love one another. I mean she knew about your secret. You trusted her with all of you, and I’m not mad. I understand that your feelings for her are stronger. It just hurts.”
Clark didn’t curse but he was thinking of a handful of colorful words that would appropriately fit the moment, but a simple proclamation was enough. “I don’t love Lois!”
“You don’t have to lie to me to spare my feelings Clark.”
“She kissed me and me telling her was the second biggest mistake of my life.” Clark grabbed Lyra’s face and forced her to look at him. Forced her to see the sincerity in his eyes as he poured out his heart. “Lyra I……I did love Lois once, but she didn’t love me. She didn’t truly care about me, or want me for me. All that mattered to her was what I could do for her. And after she left for London I didn’t think I would ever trust another woman much less love them. But I wrong. More wrong than I had ever been about anything before. I met you and you were so easy to love, I didn’t even realize that that’s what it was until it was too late, and I didn’t care by that point. You were it. You were the person made for me and I wanted to be the same for you.”
“Then why didn’t you tell me about being Superman.”
“That was my first biggest mistake. I wanted you to love Clark. I was afraid that if you knew about the other guy then the nerd you let hold your hands wouldn’t be good enough.”
Lyra placed her hands onto top of Clark’s which was still holding her face. Her heart didn’t know if it should be doing summersaults at his confession of love or breaking because of how much damage his relationship with Lois had caused him.
“Clark, you’re increadible. In my eyes you’ll always be more than good enough, whether you’re a nerdy reporter or the worlds greatest hero, I’ll love you. I’ll want you. Because you have the most beautiful and kindest heart and that’s what I fell in love with. That’s what I’ve always loved about you and as hard as this year has been for us that hasn’t changed.”
“I should have trusted you more.”
“You should have.”
Clark didn’t mind Lyra’s light scolding tone because she was right. She was usually right. But then something else also came to mind, and he could feel desperation hitting at him again. “Don’t go. All these months that you’ve been missing, I’ve been miserable.”
“I won’t lie, living on a woman only planet has been sort of a dream, but it was hard to truly enjoy anything since I missed you everyday that I was there……”
“Does that mean you’ll stay?”
“Only if you promise no more secrets and no more letting other girls kiss you.”
“There is nothing I will ever hold back from you…..” Clark pulls Lyra’s face closer to him until they’re in a deep but sweet kiss. Reinforcing everything that they had been saying to eachother. “And I swear your lips will be the last lips mines will ever know.”
Lyra burst out into laughter. “You are too cheesy!”
“I thought I was being romantic, poetic even.”
“You should stick to saving the world and writing about sports.”
“I love you.”
Lyra leaned into Clark’s embrace, allowing his to shower her with kisses. Her mind felt light and her heart felt grounded. And she thinks that there might have been some truth about soulmates and the power of love.
“I love you too.”