Cannot be understated how stubborn brown rice is, so nothing Clark is doing is very urgent. He shakes some cherry tomatoes onto a cutting board, lazily goes about halving them with all the idle focus of presiding over a longform chess game. It can be quiet, like this. That had been the nice thing about space, and also the terrible thing.

He looks over at the normal thing Bruce says, but doesn't seem confused by it. (Someone should tell Perry that even Supermen deserve mental health days, right after they convince him that mental health days can apply in an office full of hypercompetitive A-type journalists. Good luck.)

"Is it still going?" he asks, turning his focus back down on tomatoes, trying not to squish them before they slice. An exercise in dexterity even if you don't have superstrength to regulate.