the shadow child CHAPTER THREE

I don't understand why Julian thought it so strange for me to smile when my mother's life was so literally hanging in the balance, because when I first met him he was watching his brother with rapt anticipation, his own face joyfully alight while his brother's consciousness drifted away. I saw no joy in that.

Julian didn't explain much to me then. He said it was because I'd only just arrived, and after never really living I wasn't ready to be told. Not yet. He never really did give it to me in words, but it took little observation of Julian to realize he'd been almost delighted when his brother nearly died.

Julian was lonely.

Had it not been for Clark's monumental self-oppression, I might never have understood what it was that made Julian hunch over day after day, retreating into himself as he insisted that he didn't need anyone. Having lived for even a short while between his mother's womb and eternity left him incomplete, because he'd given some of himself to somebody who understood him - but Lex could not accompany him here.

Julian says that only Lex could still feel his existence - their father had numbed himself to it long ago, though occasionally it took an extra drink to keep the memory at bay. It was only Lex toward whom Julian felt no bitterness. It was only his older brother who had never wronged him, though for so long Lex believed otherwise. Julian craved to push through and show his brother that he bore no fault in his death, but it was so long before he found the strength. Until then, Lex carried the guilt with him like a pocket watch, out of sight but always linked to him. Julian gives himself the blame for his brother's darkness. He says that if he'd been strong enough, if he'd held on, then no offense would have been laid on Lex's shoulders. Their father's eyes would never have held the kernel of indicting contempt that always burned in them when fixed on his eldest son. Perhaps even their mother might have persevered, though Julian could never think of her without condemnation. She was the only one who could come to him now, but she remained lost to him. Each of the Luthor men had lost Lillian, but each in a different way, and Julian blamed himself for them all.

That, I can understand.