you’re twelve years old and you break your father’s hand when he hi-fives you. the first thing you learn is that the smallest slip up can hurt the people you love. your (foster) father smiles and says it’s okay (it’s not).
your parents are not your parents. the idyllic farming community that raised you is not your home. you’re a You-Don’t-Know-What from You-Don’t-Know-Where. all you know for sure is that you’re not human.
so you can fly. so you can run fast. so you can lift cars. so what? why do you even have this power? what should you even do with it?
your father said do what’s right, so that’s what you do.
you stop a robbery. the man’s knife shatters against your skin and you see the same fear in his eyes that you saw in your father’s when you were twelve. you catch a falling child before it can hit the water. his mother looks at you like you’re a god.
they love you, even though they don’t know you. the most powerful man in the world hates you because they love you.
you wanted to write when you were younger. you wanted to tell stories that needed to be told. you never wanted to star in them. you never wanted super-geniuses and demi-goddesses looking to you for advice; like you have any idea how to handle threats to reality itself. you’re just a kid from smallville who’s trying to do the best he can with what he’s given.
you try and get back to the farm as much as you can. it feels normal being back among the open wheat; where everyone smiles because you’re that nice Kent boy.
when you were younger, you pretended to fly, hands out to your sides and running through the tall grass by the river. it doesn’t look as beautiful from on high; the details get lost and the colors of your hometown blur together from a mile above ground.
the problem with flying is that it puts you so far above people you care about
“oh but Superman is such a boring c-“ shut up shut up shut up forever.
