AN:

Angie - Thanks so much! Yeah I loved Anakin quitting smoking – trying to be responsible as you said! Yeah don't worry too much!

Ivy - Thank you so much! Awesome that you read it twice!

Disgal - Thank you!

Cheire - me too!

Guest - Aww I love that. Yeah I think he also makes her feel like a kid again

Guest 2 - haha yup. Anakin is pretty much the same asshole in chapter 1 in how he handled that haha


Oil and Water


"That came for you in the mail."

Anakin pointed over to a package on the coffee table while he ate his breakfast out of one of the quaint dishes Padme had picked out. Following his finger, Padme found the small, light package and took it to the couch. She began tearing it open, getting glimpses of a familiar raggedy red cloth. She looked puzzled as to why it was in the mail.

Anakin tossed his spoon in his now empty cereal bowl and glided over to her. "Flip it over."

She slouched further back into the couch when she read the names Luke and Leia stitched at the bottom left. She glanced up at Anakin who now stood in front of her. "You did this?"

"Your sister did the stitching. I just gave her the names we want."

"Sola did this?" Padme grew subdued with the once saintly gift in her hand now contaminated with reminders of betrayal. "You sent her the blanket?"

"On her birthday. From you."

"Why?"

Anakin sensed her strict tone unfolding. The cotton candy clouds he expected they'd be draped in from the gesture were quickly erased. He dragged a breath. "Because she's your sister. And she sent it to you when you moved here – and you weren't getting along then either."

Padme stood, handing him the blanket. "That's not the same thing. I never meddled into her life."

She walked off but Anakin caught up with her and curled his fingers around hers until they made a fist and locked the blanket inside.

"What's done is done." His calm, breathy voice was a combination of love and efficiency. "Now you're gonna give her a call, and say thank you."


"Hi."

The repressed voice of Sola was heard at the other end of the phone call.

"Thanks for the blanket." Padme met her with an equally unpremeditated, strained voice.

"You're welcome." They both sat still in their respective homes. A quiet you'd allow when you think you've forgotten some minute detail. It bugs you that you can't remember, like walking into a room and forgetting why you entered it in the first place. The mental examination makes one rigid and uncomfortable. They can't focus on the present moment. And perhaps it was for the better because in a minute from now, Padme would wish Sola hadn't spoken at all.

"I was hoping you'd call. Thought it was time we put the past behind us."

Now Padme remembered the stinging feeling of betrayal again. Even though Anakin had put a band-aid on it for a few seconds in his request for this conversation. She had hoped what she overlooked was simply a minute detail. But unfortunately for her, it was a wound that wept all over again, scratched off a scab on the verge of healing. It shed skin, shed tears, all over again, reminding her of how deep the scar was as it returned to a blood red in anger. The shared blood of sisters.

After a carousel of words took their turn to linger on the tip of her tongue, Padme held them all back with a scoff. "You know, I can't do this."

"Padme–"

"–No." Padme interjected. "You had no right to do what you did. And instead of exhibiting some sense of regret, you want to sweep it under the rug. Again!"

"I said I was sorry. I told you. I did what I thought was right. I made a mistake."

"Your mistake changed us forever. You're my sister. I never thought you'd go behind my back like this."

"I don't know what to say anymore. I apologized." Sola's voice reeked of burgeoning frustration. "Frankly, it seems like you just want to keep grinding that axe."

"Oh really?"

"Yeah, and you know what, I'm not the only one who thinks so. Even Sabe thinks it's time you let it go."

"Sabe knows?" Padme was left speechless. It seemed humanity was asleep these days – yet only Padme was getting nightmares. The world was snoring, and its puffs shook everything around her. Even the feathers inside the pillows where she once peacefully rested her head were falling out, dropping under a bridge. River water had yet to pass and never return. The bridge that everyone stood atop, wearing costumes. Costumes that made them look impenetrable, celebratory. Padme felt she was the only one drowning in the still waters. She kept reaching out for the white feathers, for morality, but they were getting swept away, along with forgotten values. Nobody looked the same, not the faces of the people she knew, not the pillows which lost their shape without their fluffy insides. Everything was void of common decency.

Padme hung up and her boney, polished fingers quickly dialed Sabe's number.


"Hello?"

As soon as Sabe answered, Padme found it hard to button up her rage. "You knew that my own sister tried to bribe my husband to leave me?"

Sabe took a deep breath, not quite armed for the fray. "Oh. that."

"Yeah. That."

"Sola told me what happened when I went to see her." Sabe assumed being upfront was the best way to deescalate the situation. But perhaps it was too late for that.

"And you kept it from me? What, so you two sit around now that you're neighbours and talk about me and my life? I suppose you agree with her? Is that why you didn't tell me?"

"It's not that I agree with what she did." Sabe said hesitantly. "But Padme, you left without saying a word. And then you tell us that you married this broke, racer guy after a month... Can you blame her? Nobody could make sense of it."

"Then she should've talked to me." Padme snapped. "And I can't believe you never said anything!"

Padme stared at the window that cut into her pearl grey walls. She felt rooted to the ground in a paralytic state, waiting to branch out of this seedy surface. Arguing seemed hopeless, gravel to the ears. She found herself no longer holding the phone to her ear as vehemently. The words they exchanged took turns to dive off mouths and stroll away. Out the window, they go.


Anakin sat backwards on the dining chair, waiting for the yelling to stop, waiting for Padme to enter the living room. Dragging her feet over, Padme's hands slapped her thighs in defeat.

Anakin got a good look at her. A mosaic of history, old poems, and shades were written on her face. It pained him to see her look at him with a note of loss and utter a tone that was on the brink of being smashed into pieces.

His face said it all to her. She knew he loved her like nobody else.

"Turns out lying comes easy to all of them. I guess nothing is what it seems... " Padme's eyes burned a hole in the ground before she found an ounce of strength to look back up. "...Am I that naive?"

Sympathizing with her disappointment, Anakin walked to her, placidly. "No." He sighed, reaching out to cup her face with wholesome hands. "You just. . .see the good in everybody."

He stroked her hair away from her face affectionately as she pondered it all.

"...I think lying is one of the worst thing you could do to someone. It causes so much damage."

Those words hit him like a brick, reflecting his lack of honesty like a puritanical mirror. His own guilt grew a lump in his throat.

Anakin took a step back, vowing not to stay the same, repeat the same mistakes, follow the same roadmap and get trapped in the rocky, twisted tracks, expecting some narcissistic bliss to appear out of nowhere.

Get out of your own way, he thought. Before the desperate and dangerous tsunamis wash away his transient epiphany.

"My race tonight... It's against Maul."

Padme searched for his face that had turned away from her. "The guy you lost to? The guy that works for crime lords?"

She watched Anakin walk himself in a circle.

"They offered Sebulba a deal he can't pass up." He told her, reluctantly. "It's good money."

When he looked over, Padme's shoulders were rolling back, her jaw clenching. "Where did they get that money?"

He huffed, derisively. He didn't want her to go there. He knew where that discussion would lead. "Paper route?"

"That's not funny."

It's not like he wanted to stir the pot, but somehow they always cooked up disagreements, incongruent flavours. Oil and water. Always threading the needle; never letting one slip by. Another trend... These fights. They never stay in fashion.

Anakin guessed he was expecting some instant reward for telling the truth. He was annoyed. Mostly at himself, but it was definitely projecting out onto her. "What do you expect me to say to a redundant question like that?"

"So you're doing this... Is that what you're saying?"

Anakin fought to outgrow his own immaturity, value and honour what's in front of him. He couldn't risk losing her support over a fluctuating mood. Just keep swimming. Let the annoyance pass and keep calm, clear-headed.

"I gotta do it for us."

He was starting to use that excuse one too many times. It was taking its toll on her. "This isn't for me. This is about you."

Now their stares were the same. Tense. A challenge.

A poem with too few words. It was hard to know what was acceptable these days. There's a fear of being ordinary and not ordinary enough. There was no magic phrase to bring her in his arms.

"You don't get it." He said, feeling beat. "You just don't get it. You don't get needing to save face. To stand before everyone you failed in front of and prove you won't fail again."

Padme's stare had sharp edges as she watched him without saying a word. Finally, the most mundane sound rolled off her tongue. "Hope it's worth it."

Before she could turn around, he blurted out words that walked through her, walked into her dreams, hoping to wake her up.

"I'd like you to come... Be there... For me."

In some ways, he can't change. He tried to separate himself from the greedy nature of people like Sebulba and Maul, but he too would go for the gamble. A vague calling could drive him stark mad. Even if it ends up poisoning something deep inside.

The world showed him that timing is everything... even healing. And healing is messy, succoring, telepathic.

"I'd like it if you don't go." She crossed her arms over her chest.

His jaw stiffened in such a dim line, but he pleaded softly, "Don't ask me to do that."

He prided himself on being able to love her tenderly, even after having survived the chaos of his childhood. He hoped she would recognize that.

Padme, though, felt like she was always compensating for his worst traits, and she wished he'd recognize that. She refused to enable him this time.

"Then don't ask me to come."

Anakin felt there was nothing left to do but walk away. The door closed behind him, leaving them both alone, triggered, trapped in gentle complications.


Anakin sat in his truck, listening to the sound of the engine rumbling. As was his mind. Praying that when he steps into his Porsche on the race track, he'd look up to the skies, and see her face in the sunset.

Always willing to bet – on each other.

Just don't gamble your life away.


Dancing on the legs of a new born pony

Left right left right, keep it up son

Go ahead and have her, go ahead and leave her

You only ever had her when you were a fever


The Killers - U.R.A Fever