Title: Something Blue
Author: upsidedownbutterfly
Summary: In the midst of celebrating Jaina's wedding, Luke and Leia take a moment to remember the people they wish could have been celebrating with them. Spoilers through Apocalypse.
Rating: G
Disclaimer: They're not mine, people.
The distant sounds of celebration dimmed still further as Luke passed through a low door into yet another of the many narrow back corridors that crisscrossed the bowels of the Dragon Queen. This hallway was almost plain by Hapan standards. While its walls were the rich, vibrant shade of emerald so favored by the Queen Mother, they were also unadorned, and the carpeting likewise was plush and golden, but similarly modest in style. The only concession to décor were six low white benches set back into shallow alcoves that had been spaced evenly along the length of the corridor.
Leia sat on the nearest of those benches, head bowed and hands clasped tightly before her. She didn't slouch. Even here, alone with her thoughts, she was still every inch the Alderaanian princess she'd been raised to be. Yet there was a subtle slump in her shoulders and a tension around her mouth, tiny nearly imperceptible hints that anyone else would have missed. Only this was his sister; Luke knew her inside and out, and to him, she looked tired. Luke supposed they both did.
"I was wondering when you'd show up," she remarked conversationally as Luke slid onto the bench beside her, reaching out to her in the Force as he did. Even her Force aura was drawn in tight around her. Not hiding per se – even if they had been capable of hiding from each other – but guarded, closed. Luke reached out further, following the bright thread of their bond through her wards.
"I can go if you want," he said, but even as he spoke he felt her Force presence reaching out to meet his, warm and welcoming. She shook her head unnecessarily and reached out to take his hand, twining their fingers together in a physical connection to echo their mental bond.
Luke wasn't certain how long they sat there in silence. He knew what was troubling her of course. He couldn't not; he'd sensed it at the first brush of her in the Force. However he saw no need to rush her into putting those thoughts into voice. Leia would talk when she was ready. In the meantime, Luke was content to remain quietly by her side, clasping her hand tight within his own, offering his presence and his love.
"I wish they were here," she said at last in a voice barely above a whisper. Luke didn't need the Force to know who she was talking about. "Anakin," she continued. "And Jacen. Mara too. And… and Chewie." Her voice broke then as the tears came, trickling down her cheeks and splashing against the fabric of her dress, leaving tiny pinpoints of darkness where they fell. Luke untangled their fingers, freeing his arm to pull her gently against him.
For a moment, he simply held her as she cried. She needed this, he knew, this release. She had been holding herself together by determination alone for too long now. It had been her way for as long as he'd known her. She would set aside her own grief and pain and keep herself moving forward, never allowing herself to spare even a moment to mourn her own losses, not when there was still work to be done and a galaxy full of people to protect. However no one – not even Leia Organa Solo, one half of the famed Skywalker twins – could keep that up forever. Enough pressure and even durasteel will shatter if you don't take the time to mend the cracks. So Luke held her and kissed her hair and let her fall apart.
"Chewie would have been so proud," Luke found himself saying before he'd even registered making the decision to speak. He felt a fond smile steal over his face at the thought. It was true after all; Chewie would have been absolutely delirious with delight at the thought of little Jaina all grown up and getting married. "Couldn't you just hear the howls of joy the moment he saw Jaina in her dress?"
"He was always so wonderful with the children," Leia sniffled against his shoulder. Then she added with a sigh: "He would have loved Allana."
"She'd have had him out there waltzing her around the dance floor for the last six songs." Luke was grinning now in spite of himself. He could picture it: Chewie rwrring playfully with feigned exasperation as Allana bounded after him, brimming with nine-year-old energy, demanding just one more dance. Evidently, so could Leia, because she let out a damp little laugh, and Luke could feel her Force aura brighten with splashes of genuine mirth.
"Mara would have had far, far too much fun with the bachelorette party," he continued, talking through the pang of longing he always felt at her name. "She would have personally invented the galaxy's dirtiest party game in the express hope that it somehow got back to Han just so she could watch him turn eight different shades of purple at the thought."
"Only eight?" said Leia. Luke chuckled.
"She would have probably insisted Jaina wear combat boots and a holdout blaster under her gown too. Just in case." Actually, Luke reflected there was no probably about that. Mara would have absolutely seen to it that her niece married well-armed. He went on: "Then Jacen would have fought Han for the right to give Jaina away, and they would have bickered about it non-stop until Jaina finally threw up her hands, hit them both with a stun bolt, and walked herself down the aisle."
Again he could picture it: Jaina, dress hiked up to her knees to reveal military issue footwear, stomping furiously towards the altar, with Jacen and Han trailing dazedly after her, still squabbling intermittently. He held the image in the forefront of his mind where he knew Leia would be able to see it and was rewarded with another little laugh as her Force aura brightened still further.
"And Anakin…" he trailed off, half-expecting to feel the shadows steal back into her presence at the mention of her youngest son. Anakin was still the rawest of the wounds, even after all these years.
However the tendrils of her mind that were curled around his own never lost their gentle glow as Leia finished the thought for him, her voice steadier now and laced with fondness rather than sorrow: "Anakin would have danced with Tahiri."
They lapsed back into silence then, drawing comfort from each other's presence as they listened to the distant sounds of celebration trickle out of the Dragon Queen's main reception hall. Raucous laughter mingled with the tinkling of glasses and the low, resonant notes of a Hapan waltz.
Eventually he felt her shift against him and pull herself upright. She stood, hands smoothing down the front of her dress with a practiced motion that Luke recognized from long years of familiarity, and when she turned to face him, her expression was poised and her eyes free of tears. Outwardly she was once again the consummate stateswoman and Jedi Knight who had learned to put the galaxy before her own happiness before she was old enough to walk. However it was with an easy grace she slipped back into the role, a stark contrast – at least to Luke – to how he had found her, clinging to her thin veneer of composure by force of will alone.
Luke could feel the difference within her too. Beneath the mask that would have fooled anyone but him, she was still Leia, his sister who had buried two sons and more friends and loved ones than either of them cared to count. Nevertheless her presence was lighter now than it had been a few moments ago, no longer mired in guilt and grief but buoyed by fond recollection of those they had lost.
She offered him her hand. "I believe there are festivities to rejoin," she said, smiling down at him. "Something about my daughter getting married."
He grinned back at her as he reached up and took her hand, letting her pull him to his feet. He held the grasp as they made their way down the corridor and back towards the reception hall – back to Jaina smiling with her new husband, to Han coping with his little girl's marriage by drinking himself into a champagne-fueled stupor, to Ben letting Allana drag him about the dance floor.
They had lost so much throughout the years, but gained perhaps even more. Their family was smaller than it should have been, battered by the demands of duty and destiny, but still vibrant and strong. And through it all they'd had each other – to lean on, to pull the other through when it all seemed too much to bear. It might not have been much, but for them it was enough.