a/n: so, this is kind of ... meta? and so is it's companion piece, which is from Leia's point of view. and it's inspired by the american founding fathers, weirdly. anyway, you're inside Han's head leading up to the moment Leia finally confesses her love.

Wait For It

Han

He often wondered what part of his reckless, devil-may-care nature kept him there. It went against everything in him to work for ideological success rather than cold, hard cash; it directly contradicted his penchant for self-preservation to involve himself in missions that inherently seemed to preclude success. For what reason was he sticking his neck out, risking his life, for a ragtag band of freedom fighters hell-bent on beating impossible odds?

He was past the age when the desire for glory and recognition drove his every action; he wasn't a revolutionary at heart. He'd abandoned aspirations of legitimacy when he couldn't fit himself into the mold the Academy wanted, and he'd long since forgotten that he hadn't always been at home in the ranks of criminals and scum.

There was no logic in his remaining with the Rebel Alliance – and his frustrated confusion over his inability to leave was quick to turn into grudging acceptance of his emotional attachment not to the cause, but to the people; to Luke, to – to her.

He'd always been prone to volatile emotion; acting on instinct, acting without thinking, without calculating – that was what got him kicked out of the Academy; it's what got him in hot water time and time again, and that sort of knee-jerk nature was rooted in a soul that felt too strongly and yet had never been taught to control it. When he realized he was still on Yavin because he was concerned about that Princess recovering; when he realized he was still smuggling supplies for them in the years after because she seemed to always seek him out, seemed to need him; when he realized his fear on Ord Mantell wasn't for himself, but for her – and when he realized he was going to shirk his responsibility to Jabba again, for her, to keep her safe, to make sure she was okay, that's when he gave up trying to rationalize his behavior.

It wasn't rational; it was instinctual. He wanted her, physically at first, and then all of her – he wanted her mind, her soul, her voice, her touch; he wanted her lips on his, her hair on his pillow – it was an agonizing realization because she was impossible to decipher. She protected herself well, and no matter how often he found himself in her company, her closest friend, her guardian, her evenly-matched opponent in increasingly emotionally charged wars of words, he couldn't figure out if she reciprocated this thing that had snuck up on him, tackled him, and pinned him down – he was helpless, unable to escape.

He hung around to wear her down, and he hung around to wait for her, to see if he'd ever crack her armor, draw down the shield from her heart, and elicit some raw emotion out of her. There came a point when he suddenly knew exactly why he was still slumming with the Empire's Most Wanted; the closer he got to her, the more he was in awe of her, and the more his hands seemed to shake when she looked at him and his blood rushed when she spoke – silently, she seemed to beg him to sweep her off her feet, but he didn't dare.

He was hampered by his own uncertainty, out of his element with her, and he tried to provoke her into breaking first, in making his time here worthwhile; he was too proud to realize she was struggling with feelings she'd never experienced before. He fought for her, and he bled for her; he teased her, he charmed her, he did everything to get her attention, he did everything under the stars, picking on her in hallways, making that blush rise to her cheeks, he talked himself up, he flared with obvious jealousy when other men courted her. He did everything but tell her that he was in love with her, because he'd never been quite this unhinged by the feeling before.

It was brutal how he waited for her to come to him, because amidst his own absurd mix of pride and insecurity, he hesitated to scare her; he knew what she'd been through – and even after that first kiss, when he tasted in every second, in every breath, how completely she returned his attraction and affection, he didn't want to scare her, to frighten her; he'd waited around for an epiphany on why he'd thrown in his lot for the rebels, and so he could wait for her to be ready.

It came so unexpectedly, so shockingly – Princess Leia, the composed one, the cool thinker, notorious for keeping her plans close to her chest, for keeping herself collected – he'd never have thought, standing there in that Carbon freezing chamber, betrayed by Lando, facing possible death, that she'd break then; hostile, hard hands dragged him away from her, and he could damn near see salvation when she said it –

"I love you," she cried – certain, collected; final.

The confession was electric; it was worth the wait – it was worth the frustration of trying to make her see what she was doing to him for so long, it was worth the fighting and all the flirting – he didn't know if he'd make it through the next five minutes, but he knew he had her, and the only thing he could do was soothe her, make sure she understood that he took the responsibility of having her so, so seriously –

"I know."

He somehow managed to sound calm, collected. If these next moments killed him, he'd die knowing that she could have had anyone, and yet she had him; he hadn't wasted his time with this Rebellion, he'd only enriched his life, and if he got through this, if he survived this steam and this smoke and all the carnage ahead, he'd stand by her the rest of his life and relish every second he'd spent waiting on her to fall as hard as he had.

"...and if there's a reason I'm by her side when so many have tried
I'm willing to wait for it..."
-Lin-Manuel Miranda / Hamilton: Wait For It

eh?
-alexandra
story #288