sometimes Superman and Supergirl give motivational speeches in school gymnasiums…
“My question is for Superman–”
Clark spots the kid, dark hair and an expression that tried for neutrality, but there was an eager tilt to his shoulders and the messy knot of his tie. His eyes were that intense cloudy blue, a cloned set of his father’s.
“Go ahead,” Clark prompts, clearing his throat.
“You’re not human, but you look just like us. When did you know you were different?”
“Uh, well.” Superman didn’t say uh. “That’s a very good question–”
Clark tilts his chin up in question, because there was no reason Superman should be able to pick Lex Luthor’s fifteen-year-old son out of a crowd from a mile away. That would be weird.
“Conner,’ Conner clarifies, shifting his hands into his pockets.
“Conner. Well, I was a pretty strong kid. My Dad said he’d never seen another three-year-old tip a tractor over.” The gymnasium rumbles in pleasant laughter, and Superman smiles with confidence. “But I always felt different. Just something I knew I guess.”
Conner stays standing, eyebrows folded down in dissatisfaction, like he hadn’t gotten the answer he was really looking for. “But did you–”
Mr. Parker interrupts, cutting him off. “Let’s keep it to one question per student, Mr. Luthor–”
“No, no, it’s okay,” Clark tries not to sound desperate. He can feel Kara staring at him side-long, hands braced on her spandex hips. “You can finish. What’s your question, Conner?”
“I was just going to ask… if that was difficult for you. Walking around, pretending to be normal, knowing you were different.” And he adds, with a tilt of his head and a smile so slight it was almost imaginary, “Without the cape, of course.”
The students laugh again, and all heads swivel to Clark with sweet, expectant smiles.
He swallows, thinking of the slanting late-afternoon light hitting his math textbook, Lex cutting across the office like a barracuda to the white-board where he kept a living document in dry-erase, calculus and chemistry and it might as well have all been Greek to Clark. But that afternoon he sacrificed a corner to illustrate Pascal’s triangle, written in dusty red, and it was like magic, how things flat and dull sprang to life in the light of Lex’s voice, classroom banalities transformed with a little enthusiasm and explanation, into near-celestial beauty.
Lex had ruined public school for Clark, that was for sure.
“Yes, it was” is all Clark can manage. Mr. Parker smiles and calls on another student, who asks where Supergirl gets her boots.
Conner pulls his hands lazily from his pockets and sits down, loosening his tie. A friend reaches over and slaps him on the knee companionably. He stares unnervingly until Clark has to look away.
It had been like that with Lex, back in Smallville. Clark had always been the one to look away first.