I take my fun seriously. Sometimes a bit too seriously, according to my dad, but hey, you gotta take your breaks when you get 'em. It isn't like we're getting an awful lot.
I remember when I was younger, my mom once told me it was about time we started making time for little things we otherwise considered to be a waste of time. Like family. A hug. Or just being a kid. Our family had lost out on a lot because we hadn't remembered this. A lot of the little things Mom used to say comes back to me at odd moments. I guess it's just me trying to desperately cling to what little I have left of her memory. That I might forget is a secret terror I harbour deep within me. Already her face has started to go fuzzy in my memories of her.

I remember after Mom died and Caedus fell, I tried to be strong for Dad. I tried so hard to grow up in an instant, to match up to the responsibilities I felt now lay on my shoulders. And I knew the cost. I felt like I was going mad inside my head. My heart would feel like cold stone. I preferred it that way. It didn't hurt so much. I swallowed my grief, my emotions, kept them under lock and key until finally they began to manifest themselves in different ways. My concentration suffered. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't focus on anything for long. My mind would inevitably start to wander. I couldn't sleep. The recurring nightmare of the Hapes cluster, and then Kavan would come unbidden and I would wake up with a scream, feeling the emptiness in the Force as if for the first time. Jacen's betrayal, the Embrace of Pain, our confrontation on the Anakin Solo would repeat themselves during my sleeping hours, and I would get no rest. I would wake to find my sheets soaked with sweat. It didn't help that Dad noticed next to nothing at the time. He remained in his private coccoon of grief and pain, refusing to let anyone, even me or Aunt Leia in to comfort him. Meditation didn't help. The Force didn't help at all. So I took the opposite direction.

Brooding in the hangars, I'd want to be anywhere but at home, which had slowly come to feel as eery, quiet and morbid as a tomb. Everyone took turns to come and try to talk to me about "It", to try and help, to get me back to Dad. But my new-found cynicism and bluntness would eventually drive them off. Not that that made anything better. On my own I would constantly feel restless, but have nothing to do. My depression got worse. Eventually I found myself in lower-level Coruscant tapcafs, degenerating into your average sleaze-ball. Dad still hadn't noticed. Not that I wanted or expected him to. Finally, Masters Kyp Durron and Corran Horn discovered me late one night, passed out in a pool of liquour mixed with various bodily fluids, including blood, on the floor of some riotous nightclub. They took me over to my aunt and uncle's and Uncle Han did what my Dad could never have. He got me round and then punched me in the face. In hindsight, I have to admit, Mom would probably have done the same. But then again, if she had been there, it probably wouldn't have happened in the first place.

Aunt Leia and Uncle Han fought over me. I overheard their argument.

"That was completely uncalled for! You broke his nose, Han!"
"Somebody was going to eventually, rate he was going."
"He's devastated, poor child. Luke isn't even looking after him, he's sunk so deep."
"The lad doesn't need 'looking after', Leia. He was GAG, don't you remember?"
"He just lost his mother, Han! How can you be so insensitive?!"
"He's not the only one who lost her, you know."
"That kind of thing is enough to send anyone over the edge."
"Not Ben. I know him. And I expected him to rise to the occasion, to know where he's needed, not drink himself into a coma in some sleazy tapcaf."
"You're disappointed in him, is that what you want to say?"
"Yes."
"Well, you still didn't need to bloody him for that."

I ran away, back to the hangar bays. Uncle Han's words had wounded me deeply. I thought about going off-planet and dashed up the ramp of my mother's Horizon-class star yacht, Jade Shadow. I was already settled in the cockpit, running the pre-flight, when I felt the rough jerk on my collar as my uncle almost yanked me out of the seat. My anger had been so strong it had clouded my feeling of the Force! I hadn't even been able to sense his approach! His eyes were livid as he spun me around to face him.
"I've dealt with my own lot of Force-sensitive kids, so don't think I don't have the goods on you. You don't have a trick I ain't seen yet."
I glared at him.
"Come on. We're going back."
"No! You can't make me!"
"Oh? I wasn't asking your permission, kid."
"Let me go!"
He didn't bother to respond. Neither did he ease the stranglehold on my shirt.
I struggled furiously.
"You're not my father," I hissed vengefully. "I don't have to listen to you!"
He let go of me so suddenly I almost stumbled.
He brought his face to within an inch of mine and grabbed my arm in a solid iron grip. I could see the suppressed blaze in his eyes. When he spoke, his voice was dangerously soft.
"But you're more than a son to me. I should know. I've lost both of mine."
I looked away, feeling guilty and ashamed.
"I'm taking you back home. Where you do happen to have a father. He may not show it, but he needs you. And you're going to go and be the son you're supposed to be. You go ahead and hurt me all you want, but if you cause him one ounce more of pain, I promise you I'm going to find another part of your body to break."
I tried my best to look at him murderously and stalk off. Don't know if I managed to pull it off because suddenly all I wanted to do was to hug him.

I entered our dark apartment as quietly as possible. The air smelt stale.

"Dad?" I called cautiously.
No reply.
I stretched out with the Force. He must have felt my touch.
"Ben?"
I had to strain to hear my father's voice.
"I'm in here."
His voice sounded dry and husky through disuse.
I walked through the house, turning on the lights as I went, trying to banish the gloom from within.
He was in the bedroom, sitting on the edge of their bed. He winced and tried to shade his eyes as I abruptly switched on the primary light. I got my first good look at him in days and my heart flooded with concern. My dad looked… aged! I mean, he'd never exactly been a spry youth in my lifetime, but… there had always been a sense of vitality, of calm reassurance around him. He was the Grand Master of the Jedi, for kriff's sake! He'd never lost control! But there he was, haggard and unkempt, cowering in front of me, afraid of seeing the light. Uncle Han's words hit me with fresh force and I was engulfed with a tremenduous sense of guilt and shame. This was my father! My father! How could I have done this to him? I hated to think of what Mom might have done to me had she known I'd let him go to pieces like this. This time, though, I knew what I had to do. Swallowing all the crippling regret tearing my heart apart, I went up to him.
"Dad," I said, "When was the last time you ate? You know, food?"

That night, once I'd pulled him out of his self-enforced stasis, literally wrestled him into the refresher for a much needed bath and change of clothes and managed to deliver up a pretty edible subsistence meal, I commanded him to go to bed and sleep some. I could sense some of the torture he must have been putting himself through. He was so helpless without Mom, it hurt to look at him. For once, our roles had been reversed. Uncle Han had been right all along. He really did need me to be strong for him. There was no way he would be able to get through all this alone. And it was high time I acted like a supportive son.
For the first time since I'd been maybe four or five, I crawled into my parents' bed. That way, when he turned over in the middle of the night, Mom's side of the bed wouldn't feel so empty.