"Guilt"
Rating: G
Obi-Wan is left in a garden.
"I won't compete with your ghosts, Obi-Wan. Good night."
The words were flat, clipped at their base with dull anger. If he stretched, Obi-Wan could feel them, falling into the Force, dead weight. The garden shivered and Obi-Wan felt the cold sink into him, through him. His heartbeat echoed in his own ears. He thought perhaps his hands were shaking.
So much for vaunted Jedi control.
A pale leaf caught in Bail's hair as he was walking away, leaving. The contrast was eye-catching, from this distance Obi-Wan could imagine it was a sign of age, a sign of something coming. For a moment, the gardens shifted, grew cold and dark, trees falling back to be replaced by withering vines, dead leaves pulling at Bail's clothes.
Obi-Wan shoved the tickle of future-sense away with a groan.
It hurt, watching him disappear into the trees.
Obi-Wan told himself that this wasn't like losing a lover, because they weren't lovers, not yet. Not while Qui-Gon still played disembodied wraith in the drama he pretended was a personal life.
It wasn't like losing a lover, but it was all too like losing a friend.
They laughed together, told long involved stories that rejoiced at having a new ear. Obi-Wan had grown used to having a friend, someone different and not full of expectation. Bail understood, didn't resent his duties, his schedule, his life. The Viceroy didn't have unlimited free time of his own.
The tiny steps, little flirtations, careful attentions that were subtly flavored with want and interest. Not an all-encompassing need, not a terrifying ride, not like it was before. Now he was an adult, well past the first blooms of passion, the uncomfortable yearnings for the unknown.
Bail wanted him. It was there, that desire, curled up and sleeping between them with tiny whispers of maybes and pleases. Bail didn't push, didn't do a thing but offer friendship. The problem wasn't that Bail wanted him.
No, that wasn't the problem at all.
Obi-Wan sighed, watching as the faint imprint of Bail's boot print in the gravel next to his, so very close to his, seemed to shift, change under his attention. He shuddered when he realized the stones were moving to create a different print.
A dead print.
Bail had kissed him. He had kissed Bail. The world didn't stop. The ground didn't shake. It had felt good, though, warm and wet and right.
Obi-Wan had been happy. That was the worst of it. Bail's care, his smile, his laugh -- they came so free and easy and willingly given. The kiss was just more of the same.
Bail made him happy and on the heels of that happiness walked guilt.
Guilt because Qui-Gon was gone. Guilt because Obi-Wan didn't think of Qui-Gon every day, that his padawan, his friend, his lover couldn't remember what he smelled like or exactly how his eyes looked first thing in the morning.
Guilt that every night didn't bring red-tinged, panic-driven nightmares. Guilt that when Anakin called him master it felt natural and right and he didn't look over his shoulder. Guilt because sometimes his dreams involved a pair of dark eyes and a knack for bad jokes and a blazing irreverence.
Guilt because maybe Obi-Wan was living and maybe it wasn't Bail who was doing the leaving.
Obi-Wan smiled and stood. If he hurried, Bail would be pacing in the upper gardens, trying to talk himself out of coming back down and continuing the argument. Maybe that leaf would still be caught in his hair and maybe he would let Obi-Wan brush it away.
Maybe...
The old pain tickled his throat and for a moment he simply breathed.
He walked away, cloak brushing the gravel, smoothing the patterns. The dust swirled up, then settled as night began to fall.
~ fin ~