a.n. My response to the December challenge at the Pad-Ani Fanfic Archive

Challenge: Illustrate the moment Padme realized she loved Anakin enough to risk the life she had worked so hard to create for him.

I Have to Tell Him

I hold it true, whate'er befall;
I feel it, when I sorrow most;
'Tis better to have loved and lost
Than never to have loved at all. – In Memoriam A.H.H Section XXVII, Alfred Lord Tennyson

Here we are, our moment of reckoning, awaiting the end. In a few moments, we will meet our fate and that will be it. We will be no more. There will be no more regrets, no more tears, no more joys, no more things left unsaid. There simply will be nothing.

But before we go, there is one more thing I have to say. One more thing I have to unburden myself with. It's funny how when the end is near, you realize there is so much more you want to do, so much more you want to say. How you look back on your life, wishing you had done something different, or wishing you had said something you hadn't.

I have few regrets in my life, for my life was one of service to my people. From a young age, I had heard of and seen many horrors and wrongs in society, wrongs that I hoped to eradicate. Politics had seem the right path to travel, the path that would allow me to help the people I served, to help the planet I loved.

All my life, I looked at the bigger picture, the one that showed me what would make my people happy, the one that allowed them to live peaceful, happy lives. I never gave a thought for my own happiness or what I wanted for myself. I know my family often wondered when I would start thinking about myself rather than my duty. I know they have always wanted me to leave the political field to settle down and start a family. But I couldn't abandon my people, not as long as I felt they still needed me.

Yet now, as I stand here on what could be my very last day, I have finally realized that there is more to life than work. There is some innate sense of happiness and joy that comes from having someone to love and sharing a long life with that special someone. While I may have felt my life was complete with my work in politics, I can now see that there is an empty void, one that has been there for some time.

Is it too late to fill that void? Do I die now, never knowing the true happiness I could have known if I had only lived for love rather than duty? Is it too late to tell him how I feel, that I feel the same way he does? Can I tell him now that I would give our love a chance and put it first over the life I have had, not worrying about how wrong it may be in the eyes of the law, only how right it is in our hearts?

No, it is not too late. As we stand here awaiting whatever is in store, I still have time to tell him one important thing, the one thing I know I have to tell him.

I have to tell him that I love him.

And I will tell him now, because I would rather die knowing he loves me than to go on living without him and his love. I want to tell him that I have always devoted myself to everything I have done in my life and now, I want to devote myself to him and only him.

I notice him staring at me, his calm blue eyes so filled with the love that I have yet to return to him. He too knows that our time is almost up and I know that he is staying strong for my sake. His gaze catches mine and he struggles to remain calm, despite the emotions I know must be eating him up inside.

I see him wanting to say something, to assure me that everything will be all right and I know that now is my chance for me to tell him everything that I had been denying. It is time for the truth to come out. It is time for me to face my destiny.