p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"strongThe Fears of the Mother/strong/p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"It was a bitter pill to swallow. It was the most diplomatic solution, she knew it, but just as there were no rules to follow, no guidebook for motherhood, nothing could prepare General Leia Organa to see her son like this. Staring ahead with those blank black eyes, his face awash in the glow of the energy barrier. Nothing could soften the blow she took to her guts as she watched the sweet child she gave life - chin lifted in quiet dignity, his hands restrained behind his back - walk escorted into the harsh confines of a Resistance prison cell. It was better than the alternative. No one believed he deserved death, but the word "carbonite" had been uttered on multiple occasions during the heated discussion regarding just exactly what they were supposed to do now with their most auspicious, high priority prisoner. He may have made the decision to abandon his throne on his own, his assistance may have proven invaluable... but that didn't erase the crimes of his past. It didn't wash away the blood on his hands./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Upstairs and across the galaxy there was nothing short of an ear-splitting cacophony of celebration. The revolt was a success, the First Order dissolved with a puff and a whimper from beneath its own malignant leadership, and the war was over. There was still a steep road ahead of them to climb, putting the galaxy back together in a manner toward which everyone could agree. But this was not what kept her lying awake at night in a pool of her own cold sweat. Now was the time for negotiations and treaties and legislation. These were her strengths. Now was span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"her/span time./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"What had been keeping her in a swollen, sluggish state of sleeplessness, however, was fear. The same fears that had haunted her for over thirty years. The fears of the mother./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"When she was still young, scarcely more than a child herself and Ben was just a flutter tickling in her belly, she knew fear then. He didn't even have a name at that time (in fact, Leia'd hoped he might have been a girl that she would have called Bella, loosely after her foster father), but she still had fear. She had the normal fears ubiquitous to all creatures that have, at one point, given birth - she feared he wouldn't have two arms, two legs, ten fingers, and ten toes. She feared he wouldn't be healthy - she feared he would be frail, with malformed lungs or bones, or a weak heart. Normal fears./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"And then there was the Force./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"But after he was born, when he was swaddled and nestled against her, pink and warm, gnawing on his own fist with his wet, slobbery gums, those normal fears were assuaged and replaced with new normal fears. She feared she would drop him. She feared she didn't know how to be a mother. She feared he would swallow something and choke while she wasn't looking. She feared she couldn't produce enough milk, and that he would somehow grow up weirdly detached from society from a lack of proper breast feeding. She feared she'd suckle him too much, and he'd become a weak man too dependent on his mother to stand on his own two feet. She feared she wouldn't be there for him when he really needed her. She feared she'd smother him too much./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"And still... there was the Force./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"When he was walking and running and speaking small sentences and starting toilet training, her fears grew darker still. But everything grew darker at that time, looking back on it. Like how the sun gets blotted out by clouds building before a storm. It was the kind of shadow one failed to notice until the thunder started to rumble. It was a warning that was too subtle to heed. She feared she was working too much. She feared she was walking a fine line between what it meant to be a mother, and what it meant to be a role model. She feared her husband was unable to close the gap. She feared her son was too in love with a father that didn't trust himself to be a father. She was wretchedly terrified she would one day watch her son's heart break, although she knew she would. Every mother did. She knew she would see it over and over in his life - if not from his family, from the attempt to start one of his own. Such was the way life worked. It didn't make her any less fearful of it. These fears were instinctual./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"But there were other fears that also seemed... more than just instinctual. They were trying to tell her something in a language she didn't understand. There began a time of nightmares. It was tough to call it that... but in hindsight that's exactly what it had been. Countless nights she awoke screaming, her arms flung out before her reaching out for the invisible dark. Sometimes she had been next to her husband. Other times she had been in a strange bed in temporary chambers provided while she was traveling on business. Each time, however, the dream had been the same - someone had come in in the night and had taken her son away from her, snatched him straight out of his crib. Sometimes she would stand in the 'fresher, cold water on her face and shaking in a cup gripped in her trembling hands, while she shook off the nauseating echoes of Ben's tiny cries fading as he was carried off into the night./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"It was around this time that Ben began having trouble sleeping. The boy would weep and wail and sob at all hours of the night, only collapsing into sleep once he'd breached the barrier of exhaustion, like a sort of trial. It was when he started talking about an imaginary friend who "scared the bad," that she started speaking to a medical professional. Leia could imagine nothing more horrifying as a mother than knowing she was failing her son so miserably that he required medical attention. And though the kind doctor went far beyond his means to assure her that her son's insomnia was purely a result of teething and growing pains, and that imaginary friends were perfectly normal for someone who was still too young to find socialization in public school... Leia couldn't let go of this, this... this nagging voice in the back of her mind./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Because, again, there was the Force./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"After that, his childhood was a whirlwind. A maelstrom. He was still restless, and she was afraid. He grew withdrawn and secretive - beyond what a normal pre-teen boy would experience as he began to discover his own sexuality. And she was afraid. Events began happening in their home - objects moved on their own, there were broken pieces poorly hidden, there were things he tried to repair. Ben was subject to a Force that was beyond his understanding. Which drew scorn from the father he idolized./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"And she was afraid. Because span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Ben/span was afraid. And someone, something, was still doing its level best to claw its way into their home at night and steal him away - rip the rug away from beneath their family and drag her son headlong into a void. Steal him away to a place where she couldn't follow./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Long, red-rimmed, wakeful nights followed. Arguments erupted between herself and her husband, their tempers beating against the lid that allowed a malevolent tension to percolate underneath. She did her best to hold them together, to be the glue her family needed. It was like holding onto a fistful of balloons on a windy day, and one by one she was watching them slip away. At that point, all she had was her fear.../p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"And the Force./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"She succumbed to her fears the day she gave her son to her brother. The greatest fear she had was that her inability to choose the correct course of action would only make the problem worse. She was afraid she'd been choosing poorly his whole life. She was afraid she chose inaction when she hadn't meant to, or had been convinced otherwise. She was afraid she simply just... wasn't there./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"She was afraid she was a bad mother./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"A mother would do anything to keep her baby safe, even if it meant she had to give him up. Ben clearly needed help, and it was help she could not provide him. So she faced him as she broke his heart... and broke her own. She faced him as she stroked his face, told him she loved him, then kissed him her last kiss and said good bye. There wasn't a night since when she didn't lie awake wishing she could take him back... take it all back. Give up everything else and just... keep him. Squash her silly, stupid fears and just keep her own damned son./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"And now she had him. At last, she had him. Not as she wanted him... she would never again have that funny, curious, bubbly little rascal that loved splashing in the bath tub and chasing mouse droids in nothing but a diaper. But she still had him. She settled for sitting at a bad angle, where she could see him sitting in that cell but she was out of his line of sight. She had him now, and she sighed through unshed tears as she watched him stare ahead... just breathing. Just letting go, just letting the ordeal finally be over, just giving up his control and allowing himself to put this all behind him and finally relax. She gulped down her fears for his future as she watched him slowly blink and enjoy a rare moment of peace./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"But then his head turned, as if he'd heard a strange noise. Shyly he stood. He took two timid steps before he leaned forward to peer out of the cell, searching for something Leia couldn't hear or see./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"And like the rainbow after a storm, the door at the end of the hall swished open. It was the girl, Rey. The girl with stars in her eyes - the girl with a smile that was so disarming it could end a war. And it was tough to say it didn't. The girl who was so bright and guileless, so eternally hopeful, she embodied everything that was good in the galaxy, and Light in the Force. She gave the guard on duty a nod and a grin before she patted him on the shoulder and sent him on his way. She held in her hands a covered tray, and clutched beneath her arm a dusty old book. She didn't even pause before she approached his cell - she was totally fearless. The bond of trust between this girl and her son was as strong as it was unspoken./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""Hungry?" she chimed at him as she uncovered her tray. Atop it was a collection of small sandwiches and two slices of something that looked like an attempt at jogan fruit pie. "So it turns out," she beamed at him, "that you can go on the holonet and find span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"actual step by step instructions/span on how to make your own food! Make it yourself! From ingredients!" She set her book down and tossed a hand in the air excitedly. All Ben could do was blink and smile at her, bemused by her sweetness. It was the first time Leia had seen her son smile in fifteen years. "It's so easy! I made this - all by myself! I know what I did wrong this time, but I still think it's pretty good."/p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Of course it was good. It was pie. Ben loved pie, although Leia knew he preferred more savory items like candied kukuia nut or chooca mousse./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"She watched the girl break about fifty-seven different intergalactic wartime laws and regulations when she silenced the alarm on the barrier and briefly brought it down for a moment to hand him a plate of food. In that time, he made no move to flee - he made no act of violence, he made no attempt to reach the light saber locked safely away in their armory, he made no bolt for freedom. At this time... freedom meant something completely different to him. Instead, the barrier back in place where it belonged, he settled for sitting cross-legged on the floor just opposite her, filling his belly with something warm and delicious./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"She had completely cast her spell on him. She'd opened the book and had begun reading aloud, asking questions and asserting her opinions, drawing him out of his alabaster shell with a fascinating discourse on the nature of the Force itself - a topic he couldn't resist. Their heads were as bunched together as the wall of buzzing energy would allow, their voices hushed yet animated. And when he'd muttered something to her about some sort of crappy analogy, he'd laughed./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Oh, sweet Maker, there had never been music so fine./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"It was the same laugh he'd made when Leia had been dressing him as a baby, and she'd tickled his belly. It was the same laugh he'd given Uncle Lando when he'd called the boy some new sort of creative nickname - something gross, something little boys loved. It was the same laugh Chewie had elicited every time he'd sailed the boy through the air by his armpits, making the closest approximation to jet engine noises that a Wookiee could make. Leia pressed her fingers to her lips to quiet one single heave of a sob./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"It was the wave of relief she felt as one of her fears finally left her./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"She dried her cheeks and gazed lovingly at her son. His eyes never left the girl. He was utterly charmed. He was so spellbound he was helpless to hide the bare adoration he held for her as he hung breathless on her every word. Leia could feel it through the Force, his longing to touch. His longing to hold. His longing to be hers, to be held, and his willingness to sacrifice whatever was necessary to make that happen. His willingness to let go of the darkness he clung to for so long. His eagerness to find safety and belonging in something span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"right/span. Something that was better for him, something that meant him no harm./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Leia breathed a deep, beautiful sigh and turned her eyes to the heavens. The fears of the mother were an animal part of her, a part that would never leave her. They were the cross she was proud to bear. But she was no longer afraid for her son's future./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"For he had found love./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"It was a bitter pill to swallow. It was the most diplomatic solution, she knew it, but just as there were no rules to follow, no guidebook for motherhood, nothing could prepare General Leia Organa to see her son like this. Staring ahead with those blank black eyes, his face awash in the glow of the energy barrier. Nothing could soften the blow she took to her guts as she watched the sweet child she gave life - chin lifted in quiet dignity, his hands restrained behind his back - walk escorted into the harsh confines of a Resistance prison cell. It was better than the alternative. No one believed he deserved death, but the word "carbonite" had been uttered on multiple occasions during the heated discussion regarding just exactly what they were supposed to do now with their most auspicious, high priority prisoner. He may have made the decision to abandon his throne on his own, his assistance may have proven invaluable... but that didn't erase the crimes of his past. It didn't wash away the blood on his hands./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Upstairs and across the galaxy there was nothing short of an ear-splitting cacophony of celebration. The revolt was a success, the First Order dissolved with a puff and a whimper from beneath its own malignant leadership, and the war was over. There was still a steep road ahead of them to climb, putting the galaxy back together in a manner toward which everyone could agree. But this was not what kept her lying awake at night in a pool of her own cold sweat. Now was the time for negotiations and treaties and legislation. These were her strengths. Now was span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"her/span time./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"What had been keeping her in a swollen, sluggish state of sleeplessness, however, was fear. The same fears that had haunted her for over thirty years. The fears of the mother./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"When she was still young, scarcely more than a child herself and Ben was just a flutter tickling in her belly, she knew fear then. He didn't even have a name at that time (in fact, Leia'd hoped he might have been a girl that she would have called Bella, loosely after her foster father), but she still had fear. She had the normal fears ubiquitous to all creatures that have, at one point, given birth - she feared he wouldn't have two arms, two legs, ten fingers, and ten toes. She feared he wouldn't be healthy - she feared he would be frail, with malformed lungs or bones, or a weak heart. Normal fears./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"And then there was the Force./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"But after he was born, when he was swaddled and nestled against her, pink and warm, gnawing on his own fist with his wet, slobbery gums, those normal fears were assuaged and replaced with new normal fears. She feared she would drop him. She feared she didn't know how to be a mother. She feared he would swallow something and choke while she wasn't looking. She feared she couldn't produce enough milk, and that he would somehow grow up weirdly detached from society from a lack of proper breast feeding. She feared she'd suckle him too much, and he'd become a weak man too dependent on his mother to stand on his own two feet. She feared she wouldn't be there for him when he really needed her. She feared she'd smother him too much./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"And still... there was the Force./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"When he was walking and running and speaking small sentences and starting toilet training, her fears grew darker still. But everything grew darker at that time, looking back on it. Like how the sun gets blotted out by clouds building before a storm. It was the kind of shadow one failed to notice until the thunder started to rumble. It was a warning that was too subtle to heed. She feared she was working too much. She feared she was walking a fine line between what it meant to be a mother, and what it meant to be a role model. She feared her husband was unable to close the gap. She feared her son was too in love with a father that didn't trust himself to be a father. She was wretchedly terrified she would one day watch her son's heart break, although she knew she would. Every mother did. She knew she would see it over and over in his life - if not from his family, from the attempt to start one of his own. Such was the way life worked. It didn't make her any less fearful of it. These fears were instinctual./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"But there were other fears that also seemed... more than just instinctual. They were trying to tell her something in a language she didn't understand. There began a time of nightmares. It was tough to call it that... but in hindsight that's exactly what it had been. Countless nights she awoke screaming, her arms flung out before her reaching out for the invisible dark. Sometimes she had been next to her husband. Other times she had been in a strange bed in temporary chambers provided while she was traveling on business. Each time, however, the dream had been the same - someone had come in in the night and had taken her son away from her, snatched him straight out of his crib. Sometimes she would stand in the 'fresher, cold water on her face and shaking in a cup gripped in her trembling hands, while she shook off the nauseating echoes of Ben's tiny cries fading as he was carried off into the night./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"It was around this time that Ben began having trouble sleeping. The boy would weep and wail and sob at all hours of the night, only collapsing into sleep once he'd breached the barrier of exhaustion, like a sort of trial. It was when he started talking about an imaginary friend who "scared the bad," that she started speaking to a medical professional. Leia could imagine nothing more horrifying as a mother than knowing she was failing her son so miserably that he required medical attention. And though the kind doctor went far beyond his means to assure her that her son's insomnia was purely a result of teething and growing pains, and that imaginary friends were perfectly normal for someone who was still too young to find socialization in public school... Leia couldn't let go of this, this... this nagging voice in the back of her mind./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Because, again, there was the Force./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"After that, his childhood was a whirlwind. A maelstrom. He was still restless, and she was afraid. He grew withdrawn and secretive - beyond what a normal pre-teen boy would experience as he began to discover his own sexuality. And she was afraid. Events began happening in their home - objects moved on their own, there were broken pieces poorly hidden, there were things he tried to repair. Ben was subject to a Force that was beyond his understanding. Which drew scorn from the father he idolized./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"And she was afraid. Because span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Ben/span was afraid. And someone, something, was still doing its level best to claw its way into their home at night and steal him away - rip the rug away from beneath their family and drag her son headlong into a void. Steal him away to a place where she couldn't follow./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Long, red-rimmed, wakeful nights followed. Arguments erupted between herself and her husband, their tempers beating against the lid that allowed a malevolent tension to percolate underneath. She did her best to hold them together, to be the glue her family needed. It was like holding onto a fistful of balloons on a windy day, and one by one she was watching them slip away. At that point, all she had was her fear.../p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"And the Force./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"She succumbed to her fears the day she gave her son to her brother. The greatest fear she had was that her inability to choose the correct course of action would only make the problem worse. She was afraid she'd been choosing poorly his whole life. She was afraid she chose inaction when she hadn't meant to, or had been convinced otherwise. She was afraid she simply just... wasn't there./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"She was afraid she was a bad mother./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"A mother would do anything to keep her baby safe, even if it meant she had to give him up. Ben clearly needed help, and it was help she could not provide him. So she faced him as she broke his heart... and broke her own. She faced him as she stroked his face, told him she loved him, then kissed him her last kiss and said good bye. There wasn't a night since when she didn't lie awake wishing she could take him back... take it all back. Give up everything else and just... keep him. Squash her silly, stupid fears and just keep her own damned son./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"And now she had him. At last, she had him. Not as she wanted him... she would never again have that funny, curious, bubbly little rascal that loved splashing in the bath tub and chasing mouse droids in nothing but a diaper. But she still had him. She settled for sitting at a bad angle, where she could see him sitting in that cell but she was out of his line of sight. She had him now, and she sighed through unshed tears as she watched him stare ahead... just breathing. Just letting go, just letting the ordeal finally be over, just giving up his control and allowing himself to put this all behind him and finally relax. She gulped down her fears for his future as she watched him slowly blink and enjoy a rare moment of peace./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"But then his head turned, as if he'd heard a strange noise. Shyly he stood. He took two timid steps before he leaned forward to peer out of the cell, searching for something Leia couldn't hear or see./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"And like the rainbow after a storm, the door at the end of the hall swished open. It was the girl, Rey. The girl with stars in her eyes - the girl with a smile that was so disarming it could end a war. And it was tough to say it didn't. The girl who was so bright and guileless, so eternally hopeful, she embodied everything that was good in the galaxy, and Light in the Force. She gave the guard on duty a nod and a grin before she patted him on the shoulder and sent him on his way. She held in her hands a covered tray, and clutched beneath her arm a dusty old book. She didn't even pause before she approached his cell - she was totally fearless. The bond of trust between this girl and her son was as strong as it was unspoken./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""Hungry?" she chimed at him as she uncovered her tray. Atop it was a collection of small sandwiches and two slices of something that looked like an attempt at jogan fruit pie. "So it turns out," she beamed at him, "that you can go on the holonet and find span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"actual step by step instructions/span on how to make your own food! Make it yourself! From ingredients!" She set her book down and tossed a hand in the air excitedly. All Ben could do was blink and smile at her, bemused by her sweetness. It was the first time Leia had seen her son smile in fifteen years. "It's so easy! I made this - all by myself! I know what I did wrong this time, but I still think it's pretty good."/p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Of course it was good. It was pie. Ben loved pie, although Leia knew he preferred more savory items like candied kukuia nut or chooca mousse./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"She watched the girl break about fifty-seven different intergalactic wartime laws and regulations when she silenced the alarm on the barrier and briefly brought it down for a moment to hand him a plate of food. In that time, he made no move to flee - he made no act of violence, he made no attempt to reach the light saber locked safely away in their armory, he made no bolt for freedom. At this time... freedom meant something completely different to him. Instead, the barrier back in place where it belonged, he settled for sitting cross-legged on the floor just opposite her, filling his belly with something warm and delicious./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"She had completely cast her spell on him. She'd opened the book and had begun reading aloud, asking questions and asserting her opinions, drawing him out of his alabaster shell with a fascinating discourse on the nature of the Force itself - a topic he couldn't resist. Their heads were as bunched together as the wall of buzzing energy would allow, their voices hushed yet animated. And when he'd muttered something to her about some sort of crappy analogy, he'd laughed./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Oh, sweet Maker, there had never been music so fine./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"It was the same laugh he'd made when Leia had been dressing him as a baby, and she'd tickled his belly. It was the same laugh he'd given Uncle Lando when he'd called the boy some new sort of creative nickname - something gross, something little boys loved. It was the same laugh Chewie had elicited every time he'd sailed the boy through the air by his armpits, making the closest approximation to jet engine noises that a Wookiee could make. Leia pressed her fingers to her lips to quiet one single heave of a sob./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"It was the wave of relief she felt as one of her fears finally left her./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"She dried her cheeks and gazed lovingly at her son. His eyes never left the girl. He was utterly charmed. He was so spellbound he was helpless to hide the bare adoration he held for her as he hung breathless on her every word. Leia could feel it through the Force, his longing to touch. His longing to hold. His longing to be hers, to be held, and his willingness to sacrifice whatever was necessary to make that happen. His willingness to let go of the darkness he clung to for so long. His eagerness to find safety and belonging in something span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"right/span. Something that was better for him, something that meant him no harm./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Leia breathed a deep, beautiful sigh and turned her eyes to the heavens. The fears of the mother were an animal part of her, a part that would never leave her. They were the cross she was proud to bear. But she was no longer afraid for her son's future./p
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"For he had found love./p