The Cat and the Bullet

Chapter 2

"No!" I zoom toward her, ignoring every aching bone telling me to slow down. My ears pop.

"Help!" Lana screams, tumbling twenty stories below.

The concrete street crawls closer and closer, the cars below steadily growing bigger. I am getting a serious case of deja vu. Only this time, I'm saving a spoiled, entitled princess, instead of a farm girl. At least when Lois falls to her presumed death she has the decency to not beg. Lois knows I will always be there to catch her. And Lois will always be my anchor to Earth. The wind rips the flesh off my bones. Through the roar of Lana's screams, my ears subconsciously find Lois miles away.

'Superman needs you,' Lois says. 'I'm worried about him. He's dead on his feet and that freak show actually made a dent in his armor.'

'Somebody needs to nail that boy's feet to the ground.' Uncle Emil thunders. 'Why bother with having a doctor? He won't listen to me.'

'He's stubborn,' she says dryly. 'It's one of his more irritating qualities.'

Her words flood me with hope. I've never heard her refer to Superman with such resignation and irritation. She usually leaves that exasperated tone for Clark Kent.

"Somebody save me!" Andrina draws my attention away from Lois. Tears stream down her terrified face.

I sweep her into my arms and slow my flight. Andrina closes her eyes and hugs me tight. "Oh, Clark," she whimpers and buries her head in the crook of my neck. "That was so scary!"

"It's Kal-El or Superman," I respond in a robotic voice. "Or American Alien," I say tightly.

Andrina blinks her eyes open and looks up at me through a curtain of choppy dark bangs. "Come now, Clark, we know each other better than that," she twists to face me and wraps her arms around my neck. She wears her flowery perfume like a second skin.

We fly the rest of the way to Upstate Metropolis, also known as the Art District, in blissful silence. The cityscape glitters beneath me like gilded gold. A gentle breeze pulls back my hair. It dawns on me this is exactly how I held Lois the first time we kissed after the interview with Superman. I would only have to bend down my head a centimeter and Lois . . . no Andrina and I will be able to lock lips. Lois is the only woman I fly with. Holding Andrina this close feels like a betrayal of her trust. I straighten my back and wince, the movement sending a shard of pain down my body.

"It didn't hurt you too badly?" The concern in her voice sounds authentic.

I realize without thinking I have started to drift down. I swerved to the right, narrowly missing colliding with the roof of The Museum of Worlds and Cultures. It's as if a hundred knives built out of Kryptonite are plunged into my gut. Lana feels more like a ninety-thousand-pound eighteen-wheeler than the wisp of a girl she is. The world swirls like the inside of a washing machine. My eyes grow heavy; it becomes harder and harder to stay awake.

"No," I pry my eyes open. "I am fine," I lie through my teeth.

"Phew, that's a relief," Lana says. "I was worried about you."

She lost the privilege to worry about me when she told me she could never love an alien.

I touch down on a sidewalk that is a block away from her penthouse and step away from her. The streets in Upstate Metropolis remind me of Paris with their ornate buildings and bronze fences. Elegant marble angels proudly hold up the building's balconies, wildflowers pouring out of the gaps in the balcony. I'd have to sell my soul to Lucifer to afford an apartment Upstate.

"You're safe now, miss," I say.

"Clark," there is a pleading whine to her voice. "Wait," she commands.