Drabble #23
Nov. 23rd, 2006 08:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
matrilI'm sort of starting to feel like I'm cranking these out, but darn it, I'm going to get to the end of the month! And hopefully they won't all be too crummy. :P
Mother
----
In one way or another, Leia's dream-like recollections of her real mother had always colored how she responded to Han's advances. For some reason, she had assumed from early childhood that the blurred anguish she faintly remembered on her mother's face had to do with her lost love. It was probably just the silly fancy of a young girl, but the impression had persisted. She had been in pain because she had loved someone, and it had gone wrong.
Leia knew that love could be sweet and wonderful. Her adoptive parents proved that to her every day, with their quiet, meaningful smiles and rock-solid devotion to each other. Yet deep inside, she feared that it would be her lot to taste the pain without the sweetness.
She seldom acknowledged such superstitions. She told herself it was a matter of duty, of principle, to devote herself to her work without getting tangled in romantic nonsense. That was why she rebuffed Han. Also, he was insufferably annoying.
And she was afraid of being lost.
She overcame it; she risked the pain and the loss and told Han that she loved him. Who knew if it had been love, after all, that painted sorrow across her dead mother's face? Childish nonsense; baseless fears -
Alone on the bridge in the Ewok's village, watching Luke disappear, she felt the fear wrapping around her as never before. Her mother had loved Vader. It would explain everything. It would kill Leia, too, to realize she loved a monster.
The risk was too great. Leia shut her eyes and wished all her feelings away where they wouldn't have a chance of hurting her.
"What's going on?"
Han. She could barely speak, stumbled out a few words and gave up. He was giving up too, walking angrily away. She wanted to call out, but her throat was closed up.
And then he came back and spoke again. "I'm sorry."
Coming from him, it was hardly less than a miracle. She clung to it, clung to him, clung to the remains of her feelings. And another vague image arose in her mind like a dream. Her mother, smiling with tears in her eyes.
-----
Mother
----
In one way or another, Leia's dream-like recollections of her real mother had always colored how she responded to Han's advances. For some reason, she had assumed from early childhood that the blurred anguish she faintly remembered on her mother's face had to do with her lost love. It was probably just the silly fancy of a young girl, but the impression had persisted. She had been in pain because she had loved someone, and it had gone wrong.
Leia knew that love could be sweet and wonderful. Her adoptive parents proved that to her every day, with their quiet, meaningful smiles and rock-solid devotion to each other. Yet deep inside, she feared that it would be her lot to taste the pain without the sweetness.
She seldom acknowledged such superstitions. She told herself it was a matter of duty, of principle, to devote herself to her work without getting tangled in romantic nonsense. That was why she rebuffed Han. Also, he was insufferably annoying.
And she was afraid of being lost.
She overcame it; she risked the pain and the loss and told Han that she loved him. Who knew if it had been love, after all, that painted sorrow across her dead mother's face? Childish nonsense; baseless fears -
Alone on the bridge in the Ewok's village, watching Luke disappear, she felt the fear wrapping around her as never before. Her mother had loved Vader. It would explain everything. It would kill Leia, too, to realize she loved a monster.
The risk was too great. Leia shut her eyes and wished all her feelings away where they wouldn't have a chance of hurting her.
"What's going on?"
Han. She could barely speak, stumbled out a few words and gave up. He was giving up too, walking angrily away. She wanted to call out, but her throat was closed up.
And then he came back and spoke again. "I'm sorry."
Coming from him, it was hardly less than a miracle. She clung to it, clung to him, clung to the remains of her feelings. And another vague image arose in her mind like a dream. Her mother, smiling with tears in her eyes.
-----
