Disclaimer: All things Star Wars belong to Lucasfilm.
At the Homestead
by ami-padme
(ami_padme@yahoo.com)
Chapter 3
Cliegg was sick of lying in his bed. He
was just plain sick of it.
With that decided, Cliegg swung his legs – his leg – over the side of the bed
and pulled himself up into a sitting position.
The bed groaned underneath him.
This "new" mattress Beru had bought was old and creaky and not
terribly comfortable. But he hadn't
complained. He knew why they had gotten
rid of the old one. And, he thought
sullenly, the change was rather appropriate.
He wouldn't have wanted to sleep in his real bed without his wife
anyway.
He hoped all the noise wouldn't catch his son's or Beru's attention. They'd rush in here and fuss at him, telling
him he needed more rest and to not push himself too hard. They meant well, and he knew that, and they
had taken good care of him over the last two weeks. But he wasn't on the verge of death any more, and it was time he
stopped acting like it. He was strong
enough to get into that damn chair on his own.
It was right beside the bed, the little hoverchair Owen had found the day after
Cliegg had had his surgery. It was
actually in good condition and had gotten him around a few times so far, even
if it moved too slowly for his personal taste.
He didn't think he'd ever get accustomed to using it all the time, but
what he was worried about today was getting out of bed for a few hours. He needed to get back to his farm.
He grabbed one of the chair's arms and leaned on it heavily as he stood up on
his good leg. He was careful to balance
himself before moving again. Cliegg
realized he was getting better at that – the first time he had tried to get out
of bed, Owen had caught him before he teetered wildly to the floor – but that
thought only made him think he was getting used to what happened, and that only
made him feel angry.
He was steady enough to lean over and grab a shirt, which he pulled on roughly. Then he hopped and turned himself around,
and slid back into the chair.
He settled into it as he activated its repulsors. It hummed and whirred, and he winced at how loud it sounded, but
he didn't hear Owen or Beru coming. He
suddenly realized that they weren't in the main house at all. He pushed the small control stick and the
chair rotated slowly, away from the bed and toward the door. He then pushed forward and left the room.
The house was clean and orderly, and he looked things over as he floated
by. It was all pleasant enough, he
supposed, but a different order had been established in the last two weeks –
Beru's, instead of Shmi's. Even the
minor changes…books stacked this way instead of that, clothes folded instead of
hung, food set out on the counter instead of the cabinets…every point innocent
enough on its own, but together, they all left the room with a sense of the
terrible thing that had happened.
Cliegg suddenly had an overwhelming urge to simply crawl back into bed. Instead he swore and cursed out loud, and
went outside, finding Owen and Beru working in the plaza.
"Dad!" Owen cried. He was
instantly on his feet, kicking away some of the parts that were closest to him.
Beru was already running over to him, frowning at him – but in a way that
showed concern instead of anger.
"Cliegg, why didn't you call for us like we told you to? We would have helped you out here."
"Well, you can see that I didn't need a whole lot of help, Beru. I can get around just fine," he said
irritably.
She squeezed his shoulder, and completely ignored his tone. "I'm glad you're feeling so much better
then," she answered, her frown smoothing out into a slight smile.
He sighed, immediately wishing he hadn't snapped at her, but feeling too
agitated to offer her a proper apology.
He gave her hand a light tap instead and hoped that would suffice. He thought it was fortunate that neither
Beru nor Shmi were quick to take offense to his – or Owen's – moods, or what
Shmi had kindly referred to as their "endearing grouchiness."
His smiled at that memory, but it was pained.
He moved his chair away from Beru and over to where Owen had retaken his
seat, in the middle of a scattering of tools and parts. His son was frowning at him now.
"You don't have to worry about me, all right?" Cliegg said. "I'm not about to spend the rest of my
days in bed, staring at the ceiling.
And…Shmi would probably kill me if she saw the way I've been moping
around the last couple of weeks."
"Dad, you were seriously hurt.
You've had major surgery. You're
entitled to take some time to recover."
"And I have," Cliegg replied.
"Owen…you know that self-pity didn't help me much when your mother
died, and it's not helping me now. I'm
not trying to be difficult. I know
you're both worried about me and that you both miss her. And I appreciate it. I just want to stop being babied."
Owen nodded, and didn't say anything more.
Cliegg took his hand briefly and squeezed it. "I know this isn't easy for you, son. But we've been through this type of hell
before. Let's hope it's the last
time."
The words came out with an ease that Cliegg hadn't expected. Was that it? He had lost another wife and that was all there was to say and do
about it?
Cliegg was overwhelmed for a moment before deciding he could grieve in some
better way later, on his own. Right
now, he only wanted to think about something – anything – else.
His eyes fell on a data pad that Owen was holding. "Are you doing inventory?
We did that about a month ago."
"I know…" Cliegg watched him exchange an uncomfortable glance with
Beru. "Ummm…well, you're not the
only one who needed something to do. I
thought we could get a head start on the next one. Maybe finish it a little early."
"What? Why? What could have changed in a month?"
"Well…" Beru began.
"What?" he asked again.
"Cliegg," she said, "do you really want to discuss this
now?"
"Yes."
Beru took a seat next to Owen and the two exchanged another glance before
facing him again. There was a long
pause, then Owen began speaking.
"Dad, we have to re-think a few things.
Your medical care – it cost us a lot."
"How much?"
"A lot," Owen said. "We
had to get a surgeon to come and operate on you in the middle of the night…and
then we bought your chair. And there
were some other issues we had to take care of on the farm, and repairs that had
to be made. All these costs were
necessary, of course, but they're not something we can absorb very easily. And besides that, there's…another
issue."
"What would that be?"
"We – we have two less workers than we did before."
His son had said the words gently, and Cliegg sharply reminded himself that he
was the one that had insisted on being out here and having this conversation in
the first place. And he would have
pushed Owen for the admission anyway.
He tried to swallow back his despair.
Owen was watching him nervously, and continued with a slightly unsteady
voice. "We might need to sell some
things. To make sure we have enough
money on hand for the immediate future. I'm trying to put together a list of things we can try to sell to
the Jawas, or maybe out in town."
Cliegg leaned over to look at the list, and was taken aback by how long it
was. "I can still work,
Owen. I can get around in this
chair."
"I know, Dad. But we still need to
adjust to the way things are now."
"We can't give up all this!"
"We might not have to sell it all.
I was listing what we could sell. I want to make sure we make it to harvest all right. Once we sell the water for this season, things
will be much more secure." Owen
tried to move the list out of his father's view, but Cliegg reached out and
took the data pad from him. He studied
it, occasionally making notes as he went along.
His family hadn't ever been rich, but the money it had taken to free Shmi years
ago had set them back permanently.
Maybe not drastically, as they weren't suddenly destitute, but they had
moved down into a different level from which they still hadn't climbed out of. It had been worth every bit of what he had
paid – he had always thought himself lucky that her owner hadn't completely
fleeced him, because Cliegg might have sold the farm itself to get her. Still, he knew that the family wasn't as
prepared now to deal with a financial setback, not another major one. Selling all these things would give them
relief for the short-term, but Cliegg preferred to hold on to what they could
and live a little leaner, and not hurt the farm any more than it already had
been.
"Pay that doctor, and then don't sell anything else. We don't need to have money lying
around," he said. "You're
right, we can hang on until harvest."
"Cliegg?"
His eyes rose from the list, and met Beru's.
"There's at least one other expense besides the doctor that Owen and I
think we have to cover. And it's not an
insignificant one."
They both were agitated, and Owen even took her hand before she went on. "We need enough to send a message to
Coruscant. A full holo-image one, not a
text message. That will definitely cost
us a few more pieces of equipment."
"A message –?"
"We have to find a way to let Anakin know what's happened,"
Beru said passionately. "Shmi
would have wanted that. And he's owed
at least that much. There's no way we
could afford passage out there, so we thought a message would have to do."
"What? For goodness sake, Beru,
what could we possibly say to him?" Cliegg asked, anguished. "We can't even tell him for certain
what happened to her! He doesn't even know
us! And how do we know that he's on
Coruscant? These Jedi are all over the
place, he might not even get the message if we send it there!"
"We've thought about all of that," Owen said. "But it's not like we have a lot of
options, Dad. And we have to tell
him."
Cliegg was suddenly struck with an image of Shmi, a sad one, of the times when
she appeared to him as a little more than a childless mother, when she couldn't
fight the pain of her loss, and she let herself feel the sorrow of not having
Anakin with her.
That image though, was not the usual one – most often, she had found joy in
remembering Anakin, and she shared that with all of them. She had been embarrassed at first about
speaking of her son practically every single day, of telling certain stories
over and over again. But none of them
had minded. Anakin was such a part of
Shmi that Cliegg couldn't have imagined not being able to accept him as part of
the family, even in his absence. He had
looked forward to meeting him finally, at some point in the future.
And now, to have to tell him that his mother was gone…?
"Dad?"
"Son, I don't think we can…I don't think I can…how are we supposed to tell
him something like this?"
Owen took the inventory list from him and shut the data pad off. He began putting some of the tools
away. "I don't know, but you shouldn't
worry about it now. Like I said, these
aren't things that we need to discuss right this second. Take some time, Dad."
Cliegg almost instinctively began to disagree with him, but the impulse died
quickly. He knew he wasn't ready to
deal with this.
He pushed the control on his chair, and silently returned to the inside of the
house.