Note: Much love to sonsofdurin, Velk, kenobilover, MystiStar1, Lauren, conflow, brucejulie, thejediqueen, SerendipityAEY, and several guests for reviewing, and thanks to all who are reading. :)

CHAPTER TWO:
appetence

"I met someone from Coruscant today," Lisbet called to her brother from the kitchen where she was seasoning their supper. "At least - I think he was from Coruscant. He sounded like it."

Gareth poked his head through the doorframe, wild mahogany curls framing his concerned face. "You don't think-?"

"No," she hurried to reassure him. "Oona says he's been here much longer than we have. He lives out in the Jundland Wastes."

"Really?" Gareth's nose wrinkled in mingled distaste and confusion as he disappeared again. "Why would anyone live out there? Nothing but snakes and Sand People."

"Is it very dangerous, the Waste?" Lisbet moved on to slicing the bread she'd baked in the sun-oven that afternoon. This was the rhythm that their evenings had fallen into - talking as they finished their nightly chores, then sharing a meal.

"I wouldn't be caught out there after dark," Gareth said. "Did he say why he came to Tatooine?"

"He didn't say much at all." Lisbet absently set two dishes at their small dining table, thinking of Ben's eyes and ghost of a smile.

Her brother reappeared in the kitchen, wearing a clean shirt now. "Smells good, Lis," he said as he transferred the steaming dish of stew to the table.

"I'm learning," she grinned, knowing that he was also remembering some of the disastrous meals they'd both attempted to prepare the first couple of weeks on their own. Working in the Senator's household had taught them many skills, but cooking wasn't one of them.

They sat down to their simple dinner, glad to rest and be still after a day of hard work. Gareth seemed to have forgotten all about the stranger from Coruscant, and Lisbet was content to let the subject drop.

"How is the farm?" she asked instead.

A mournful look passed over her brother's features as his spoon settled glumly in his bowl. "I'm not much of a farmhand, Lis."

"I'm not much of a weaver," she retorted. "It'll come. What is Kairon's crop to be this cycle?"

"Bloddle, whatever that is," Gareth picked his spoon back up, dejection seemingly forgotten. "I only just missed the planting when we arrived, and the sproutlings are already knee high. It's incredible what they can do with agriculture here, Lis. The whole planet is made from the contents of a dustbin, and they've still found a way to grow underground. Kairon told me that…"

Lisbet hid a private smile, letting him ramble. Gareth was used to things coming easily to him, so when he said that he wasn't a farmhand it only meant that he wasn't perfect at it straight away. He loved learning, and this was clearly no different.

Once they had eaten and started to clean up, Gareth shook himself as if remembering something. "Say, do you mind cutting this shaggy mop of mine? It's gotten long."

"Sure," she replied as she scraped the leavings from her bowl into the composter. They were only just getting started, but Oona had assured them that eventually they would have enough finished compost to help sustain a few fledgling plants. "Let me find my shears."

Their little house wasn't much more than a few cramped rooms, so Gareth took a kitchen chair outside the back door since it would be easier to clean-up there, anyway. One of the suns had set, but the other lingered on the horizon. Lisbet shivered a little as she followed him out into the cooling air.

There was a soothing ritual in cutting hair, in settling the drape over someone's shoulders and trimming away what was no longer needed or wanted. Lisbet had been the hairdresser for all of Senator Tibirian's household, and this was the first time she had cut anyone's hair since fleeing the capital. Suddenly, it wasn't soothing at all.

"Alright?" Gareth asked when he felt her hands still at the crown of his head.

She looked at the length of his curling hair between her fingers, pulling herself away from the sudden onslaught of memories. "Alright," she echoed as she resumed her work. "I was just remembering."

He knew better than to nod while her scissors were so close to his ear, but she knew he understood what she hadn't spoken aloud. They passed a moment in silence except for the soft snipping of her shears.

"I was thinking, Lis," Gareth began, his tone serious. "Maybe we shouldn't talk to the man from Coruscant. He can't be quite right if he's exiled himself to the Jundland Wastes."

Lisbet frowned at his sideburn, which was she carefully trimming. She'd had no intentions of deliberately befriending Ben, so she wasn't sure why the request not to made her feel defensive. "I don't think it will come up at all," she settled on saying. "Oona told me that he hardly comes into Anchorhead. We probably won't see him for quite a while."

"More's the better," her brother said. "I suppose he's harmless if he keeps to himself."

Lisbet brushed the bulk of the fallen hair trimmings from his shoulders before taking the drape off. "There - you're as good as new."

"Thanks," he said as he stood and picked up the chair. "Coming in?"

"In a minute," she replied. Twilight was her favourite time of day, especially here on this planet of extremes. Poised between the sweltering heat of day and night-time's chill, when the fading sunlight sent streaks of purpling dusk across an otherwise unforgiving sky - she loved it, and their little house at the very edge of town had the best views.

Gareth lingered inside the doorway for a moment, probably wishing she wouldn't stay outside and brood when the memories of home had come so close to the surface a few moments ago. Lisbet curved a half-smile at him so that he wouldn't worry, and he flashed one in return as he closed the door behind him.

She turned to watch the sunset.

Lisbet precariously balanced the bolts of cloth in her arms as she shut the door to Oona's workshop behind her. She really should have put all the fabric into the little grav-cart that they kept for that purpose, but the repulsor modulator was starting to short out and she didn't feel like fighting it all the way to the marketplace. As it was, her arms were so full that she had to crane her neck at an awkward angle to see ahead.

She realized too late that she hadn't put on her headscarf. She tried to free a hand to pull it over her face, since she already had a particularly bad burn and the midday suns would only make it worse. But it was impossible to hold everything with one arm - she would have to wait until she got to the fabric stall.

Despite not being able to see her feet, she made it all the way to the fringes of the marketplace without incident. By then her arms ached and she tried to speed up her pace as she dodged the people around her. Why Oona had sent her to replenish the stall's fabric supply at the busiest time of day was beyond her.

Someone bumped into her shoulder hard enough for her to lose her balance, sending the bolts of cloth into a heap on the ground. The only thing that kept Lisbet from tumbling after them was a hand on her elbow to steady her.

"I'm so sorry," a familiarly accented voice said, and she looked up into crystalline blue eyes under brows furrowed by contrition.

"Oh," she said, finding to her dismay that her tongue wasn't quite working properly. She knelt down, both to pick up the fabric and to cover her confusion. Hadn't Oona said that Ben only came to town every month or two? And yet here he was, just ten days after she had met him.

"That was terribly clumsy of me," he said as he went to a knee next to her. "Please let me help you."

"I wasn't watching where I was going, either," Lisbet finally found her voice. Most of the fabrics had come half-unfolded from their neat bundles when they hit the ground, so she carefully refolded each one and then stacked them on her lap out of the dust.

Beside her, Ben was doing the same. "You can hardly be blamed, carrying a burden like this."

"In that case, it was entirely your fault," Lisbet grinned at him. A shadow of a smirk on his face answered her, but she was beginning to suspect that this man wasn't easily given to merriment.

"You must be Oona's apprentice," he said. "I'm afraid she neglected to mention your name when we met the other day."

"Lisbet Irimore," she replied, folding the last fallen cloth. The stack was pretty evenly divided between them.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Miss Irimore." Ben extended a hand to help her stand.

She took it. "Please call me Lisbet - I don't like the Miss. Um, thank you for your help, Ben. I think I can manage-"

"Oh no," he said, twisting away from her reaching hand as she tried to take his share of the fabric. "The least I can do is help you carry this to your destination."

"It's only just through the market," Lisbet protested. "I don't want to inconvenience you."

"It's hardly an inconvenience, since I am on my way to Tosche Station as it is," he said, and now he did smile. It was a disarming smile, one that made his eyes crinkle and revealed a pair of indentations in both cheeks.

Oh no, Lisbet thought, momentarily struck dumb as her heart somehow sank and soared in equal measure. He has dimples.

"Well," she said, swallowing. "Alright. I'm just on my way to restock the fabric stall," she felt the need to clarify as Ben fell into step next to her. "Apparently this is a busy market day."

"Hmm," he said noncommittally.

"So, do you come into town often?" she asked, deciding that it was probably best to pretend that she and Oona hadn't talked about him already.

"That depends on your point of view," he said, and there was the smile again - except this time it was a little sad. The melancholy didn't last long on his face, though, as he returned her gaze with an arched brow and a twinkle. "I take it you prefer not to come outside often?"

She touched her sunburned skin with a rueful laugh. "I'm not used to the sunlight here. We don't get nearly as much exposure back home."

"Where are you from?"

He asked it so naturally that she almost answered without hesitation, until she remembered Gareth's distrust of the stranger from Coruscant. But surely Ben had heard strains of the Inner Rim in her own accent and was curious about someone else so far away from home. And if he really wanted to find out more about them, he could simply ask Oona. Wasn't it better to control what information he knew?

"Hosnian Prime," she said after a split second. It was the truth, and there was no need for him to know that she and Gareth had worked on Coruscant before coming here to Tatooine.

By then they had already passed through much of the market and nearly arrived at the fabric stall, and their conversation was cut short by Solstice's relieved gasp when Lisbet and Ben appeared.

"Lissy! Thank the stars you're here. This baby has been grinding his heels into my bladder for the last hour at least. Mind the stall, would you? I'm just going to pop into the cantina, won't be gone for more than a minute!" She clasped Lisbet's free hand in passing before bolting away.

Lisbet plunked her pile of fabric down on the counter, which wasn't much more than a few boards nailed to rickety legs. At least the stall had a roughspun canopy overhead, and she was finally out of the blistering suns. "Thank you again for your help," she said as Ben deposited his own bundle next to hers.

"It was no trouble at all," he said, lingering in the shaded stall, his hands going into opposite sleeves of his brown cloak. "Would you consider it rude of me if I asked why you left Hosnian Prime?"

"Our parents died," Lisbet said bluntly. That was technically true, too - except they had been orphaned almost twenty years ago, and their grandparents had taken them in at the time. Still, she and Gareth had agreed that the most convincing lie had more than a grain of truth to it, and built their story from there. "And my brother lost his job. We didn't have anywhere else to go, really. We thought Warwick would be able to help us, little knowing what we were walking into."

"I'm sorry," Ben replied, his eyes grave. "That cannot have been easy."

"I hated it at first," she confessed as she began sorting the fabrics they'd brought so that she could put them into their proper places. "But the people in this town are kind and I like the work I'm doing. I won't say that I love Tatooine, but it's not so bad. Well," she amended with another experimental pat to her sensitive cheek, "everything except the suns."

She was rewarded with his dimples again, which called an answering smile to her face. Lisbet decided that she had been wrong about his eyes the first time they met, when she thought they were as blue as the cloudless sky. Now they were pale green, like the seafoam at the shores of the Great Western Sea. Maybe they changed colour according to the light.

"Why did you leave?" she gambled, remembering how Oona said he kept his reasons to himself. But it was only fair for him to return the favour after she had explained herself, even if she had given him only half-truths.

"I was a pilot for the Republic in the war," he replied with a twisting of his lips that was half wry, half sad. "So was my brother. We served together until he died, and - well. Tatooine is as far from Coruscant as possible, without going into the Unknown Regions."

Lisbet thought of Gareth, her greatest constant and friend. Just the idea of losing him made her throat constrict. "I'm so sorry," she said, wishing, however absurdly, that she could reach out to touch Ben in comfort. There was something suspiciously like tears in her eyes, but she wasn't sure if it was out of sympathy for him or at the thought of her own brother dying. But she hated crying in front of people, so she went back to restacking the fabric.

"Were the debts left by your relative very great?" Ben asked gently.

"Enough to cripple us for a time," Lisbet replied, grateful that he had steered the conversation into somewhat less emotionally charged waters. "We spent most of our savings on transport to the planet, and of course Jabba seized what was left shortly after we arrived. Once we repay the debt, I think we'll begin saving to go back home."

"Back home?" Solstice chose this moment to reappear, latching onto Lisbet's arms with a frown. "Don't let Auntie hear you talking that way. What would she do without you? Oh! Hello, Ben."

"Good afternoon," he said.

"What brings you into town today?" Solstice asked as she surreptitiously drove an elbow into Lisbet's ribs. Lisbet was pretty sure she intended it as a secret signal, but what it meant was completely beyond her.

"I am headed to Tosche Station," Ben replied. "And I should be be on my way. I hope you ladies have a pleasant day."

"You too," Solstice said, a wicked half-smile playing at the corners of her lips. "I'll tell Auntie that you sent your regards."

"Ah," Ben replied with the very slightest shadow of a pained expression on his face as he bowed. "Thank you. Good day."

"Good day," Lisbet echoed to his back as he walked away. She quirked a brow toward her friend, who was now fully grinning. "What was that?"

"Auntie would eat him alive if she could," Solstice beamed. "He's difficult to read, but even I can tell that it mortifies him. Can you even imagine?"

Solstice had already started giggling, and the mental image of Oona wooing and winning the handsome stranger brought an involuntary grin to Lisbet's face.

"Oh Ben," Solstice said in a seductive whisper, except it was a pitch-perfect imitation of Oona's gruff rasp.

"No," Lisbet said, trying to choke the mutinous laughter back down.

"Oh Ben, ravish me," Solstice continued, warming to the concept even as her impersonation was interrupted by her own fits of giggles. "Make me a woman. I want you to touch every inch of my body." She switched back to her normal voice with a pause to catch her breath. "Meanwhile, Ben is backing away, politely looking for a means of escape."

Lisbet clamped a hand over her mouth to better suppress her mirth. "Stop," she begged, the mental image growing more vivid by the second. "She's been so good to me, I shouldn't laugh!"

This only made Solstice laugh harder, and after a moment Lisbet caved and joined in, too. "Oh, Lissy!" Solstice said, wiping tears from her lashes. "I'm glad Auntie found you in Mos Eisley. You're a gem. Although you can't be happy about all this sunlight!" Her palms, miraculously cool, came up to frame Lisbet's face. "How did you ever come by such a burn?"

"I wasn't even outside for very long," Lisbet sighed. "Oona sun-bleached some of the muslins in the backyard and I went to collect them. It seems like I only have to think about the suns, and I crisp up."

"Better be careful," Solstice said, "or you'll soon have skin like a Hutt. Ohhhh, this baby just punched me in the kidneys. I shouldn't have laughed so much." She grabbed Lisbet's hand, pressing it over her round belly. "Feel! He's kicking."

Lisbet couldn't suppress a smile again, this time in wonder at the little life under her palm. "Do you think it will be a boy?"

"Yes. I like to believe it's a mother's intuition," Solstice replied, thoughtfully sketching the shape of a heart with her fingertips around where the baby had kicked last. Then her face broke into a grin. "Wouldn't I look silly if it's a girl after all? As long as it's healthy and sweet and loves me, I don't care."

"I'm sure he will," Lisbet said, squeezing her friend's arm. "But I should probably go. Oona will be wondering what's taken me so long."

Solstice wiggled her eyebrows with a sly smirk. "I won't tell her that you were talking to her boyfriend."

"You're an angel," Lisbet said wryly, and then was obliged to submit to Solstice tugging her headscarf into place.

"Stay out of the suns," she charged her sternly. "You're as red as a Zeltron already."

"Yes, ma'am," Lisbet replied. Solstice was several years younger, but she had two little sisters, which gave her a certain combination of authoritative and nurturing. Plus, Lisbet privately wondered if pregnancy had made her a little extra maternal.

"Although," Solstice mused. "Aren't Zeltrons quite a sultry folk? Perhaps we can work with this. I'll just call Ben back..."

"I'm going back to work," Lisbet said, summoning an extremely prim attitude as she tucked the last fold of her scarf into place. "If you'll excuse me."

"You never know," Solstice called after her as she turned away and stepped into the harsh glare of the sunlight. "He might like that kind of thing!"

"Good day," Lisbet tossed over her shoulder.

Her friend replied only with laughter. Shaking her head with a fond smile, Lisbet hurried back to Oona's workshop, and tried not to think of her hand in Ben's when he had helped her up.

appetence, (n., English), an instinctive inclination or attraction.

I would love to hear what y'all think! :)

05.18.16