It is as simple as a musical phrase. [Rimbaud: "War", from "Illuminations"]
Tall, lean and muscled like some fine hunting beast, it twisted and turned beneath the hot spray of the water shower as if for my sight alone. You had unbraided the long tail that you wore by your right ear to denote your status as a Padawan learner, and it lay in a slick golden-red line over your gleaming wet shoulder. I knew that you would ask me to rebraid it for you later: a small ritual of ours that we performed daily, reaffirming your devotion to me and my care for you.
You reached out to adjust the temperature of the water, gasping softly as the heat increased, stinging your skin and lending to it a deep rosy flush like that of desire. I realised that I was holding my breath as I watched you, and I wondered just how long I could go on doing so before the air escaped me in a groan of pure need. Surely not long, when you were moving like this...
And what has moulded this body? My guidance. My discipline. My hands. I am possibly more familiar with it than you are yourself. I know every mark, every scar; I can read the history of your training, drawn like a map upon your skin. You are physically as close to perfect as it is possible to be: quick, lightly-muscled, fleet of foot and powerful. Perhaps you have not as much grace of movement as I would desire: your katas are as unhurried as they need to be, and yet always I sense the energy that you give to even the slowest of movements. You possess a barely-controlled power that takes my breath from me; a restrained urgency that warns of a sudden, unexpected pounce. 'Any second now...' it seems to say.
And yet, at other times you are practically horizontal in your attitude. A lazy quirk of an eyebrow, a cool flick of the hand and all that constrained Force energy is nowhere to be seen. You are duality personified.
And persuasion... oh, you have that in abundance! A slip of the tongue, a graceless error when performing a kata: all glossed over with a cheeky smile, a glint in the eye and a winning demeanour that has nothing to do with the Force and everything to do with you.
So beautiful...
I indulged that day in several long, delicious glances as you moved beneath the hot spray; white suds sliding down your wet skin as you rinsed them from your hair. I could not prevent ghostly Force fingers reaching out from me to touch you. They tickled the sensitive nape of your neck and I watched you shudder, your lips parting. You reached out to me through our bond, willing me to do it again.
I could not resist and the energy from me stroked down your spine, causing a breathless whimper to escape your lips. You turned drowsy eyes onto me; a slow, sensual smile curving your beautiful mouth.
Why only Force fingers, my Master? Why not your own?
Why, indeed? Because I couldn't trust my own. I realised that I was still resisting, after all this time; after I'd promised myself I would live in the here and now.
I smiled and sent the Force out anew, watching as your body caved into its touch.
Master! This isn't fair!
Who told you love was fair, Padawan?
Oh dear... that sort of slipped out...
You stared at me with huge eyes that I could happily have fallen into, never to surface again. Force! I was becoming a fool - to think such a sentimental thing as that!
"Love?" you said, aloud.
I willed my customary implacable mask back down, trying to cover my sudden vulnerability. Before it could snap completely over me, your mind gripped it, lifted it and insinuated beneath it.
Love? you repeated.
In desperation, I again sent out tendrils of Force energy to caress your body; a last attempt to distract you.
No You pushed them away. You had me, then, and nothing was going to make you let me go.
"You love me?" you whispered, a spark of hope flaring in your eyes that was as unexpected to me as it was beautiful to behold. For a brief moment I allowed sentiment to muddle my thinking once more. Could I have been so blind? All this time, when I had presumed your attentiveness had been borne of the duty and adoration that a Padawan usually holds towards his Master... all this time, it had been because you loved me in return?
A tentative thought reached me, even as I struggled with these emotions: a gentle hand stroked my heart, which I had unwittingly left open and unguarded. A flicker of joy followed it as you sensed what I had withheld from you.
Oh..!
With incredible difficulty, I finally brought down the mask of calm, feeling you pulling back, uncertainly from me even as serenity washed me like a tidal wave. When I spoke, however, the tenderness I had felt was still evident in my voice.
"Finish your shower, Padawan, and I will braid your hair for you."
I turned away from you and walked back into the common room, my heart heavy, the gift I had bought for you weighing more than a ball of lead. I knew where this night would lead, knew the trouble it would cause, but though I fought it as only a Jedi can, I knew my struggles were futile. The new bond was shimmering at the edge of my existence, almost touching me, and there was nothing more I could do to hold it back.
It was time, at last, to reach out and grasp it.