Sunshine is to Flowers

Chrysanthemum

Sola did not cry at Teo Tristane's funeral. She leaned into her brother as she sat at the service, her head nestled into his ribs. He put his arm around her, drawing her close to his body. The weight of it felt good, and she realized she hadn't been hugged in weeks. Zhi-zhi and Jax took turns standing on the other side of her, holding her hand and wiping the tears from their eyes that ran down their faces. Jax tried to remain stoic, Sola could see, but failed at it. Of course he did, he has just lost his father.

As she leaned into Uri, his uniform was starched and he smelled of the shoe polish he'd used to shine his boots and his cologne, a classic scent from Astarrax. It was good of him to come, she thought. He had dropped everything (Uri had said something about pirates, but Sola could not recall now the specifics) and came to her side as soon as she had called him that Teo had had an accident at work.

"Teo's gone," she said numbly over the comm. She was surprised he'd answered her call, she knew he was on duty and did not answer personal calls until after hours.

"Of course, he's gone, darling," Uri said very slowly, as if he were talking to a child. "He's at work."

"No," she explained, no feeling in her body or her voice. "He's had a spontaneous arterial brain hemorrhage."

She heard his intake of breath over the comm, then, "Oh. Oh, Sola. I am so sorry. He didn't suffer, did he?"

"They said he died within minutes. He was dead when they called me." She felt nothing as she said the words, and it worried her slightly, in the back of her brain. She should feel something. Sadness. Regret. Fear. Something. But she didn't feel anything at all.

"I'll be there as soon as I can," Uri had said. And he had meant it, being there so fast that he must have left only a few hours after getting her call.

She had not cried at all since getting that message. She walked around in a kind of fog, going about her business as usual. Nothing seemed to have changed, except that Teo wasn't in the house. But her daily routine stayed the same. There were no stolen moments of missing him and it made her realize that their lives had been so separate, his criticism of her so complete, that there was nothing for her to miss.

Her heart had broken over her last moments with Thrawn in his private shuttle. Had she really told him she loved him? He had reciprocated her advances with the same fervor she'd given them. She felt an emptiness where his strong arms had been around her, pressing their bodies together, his groin showing undeniable proof of his desire for her.

She hadn't felt desired for a long time. But Thrawn made her feel wanted. He wanted to know her opinions, wanted to be close to her, wanted her. And she wanted him. She wanted him like she had never wanted another person in her entire life. Leaving him felt like an invisible cord was being cut from her solar plexus each and every time. Coming home to the emptiness of her marriage had made the contrast that much starker. But she was married. And she had thrown herself at another man who was not her husband, hardly befitting an Imperial Lady.

In her shame, she hadn't reached out to Thrawn since their visit to Edam. She had no idea what to say after her behavior. Did she act like nothing had happened? Or did she very much act like something had happened and open a conversation about it? In her indecision, she did nothing and felt abandoned when Thrawn did not reach out to her either.

She wrote a bevy of tear-stained poetry in her diary in an attempt to get her feelings out, sending the better pieces to Uri to read. She thought they were veiled enough that he wouldn't know what they were about. The more specific poems she kept to herself, locked away, handwritten on her datapad under lock and key.

Traversing the upper-level Coruscanti public gardens, where she'd walked with Thrawn more than once, she named off each of the flowers she passed by, making arrangements in her head to send to him. Tulips for connection. Alstroemeria for loyalty. Daisies for friendship. Everywhere she looked, she saw meaning, meant to be put in a basket or bouquet. Memories of walking next to Thrawn, the click of his boots, the smell of him in contrast to the flowers, the low heat of his body next to hers, his hands clasped behind his back as they walked, kept invading her thoughts.

When she finally decided to send a bouquet to Thrawn, she spent a small fortune at a mid-level florist where she could make her own posies. She carefully picked out flowers; orchids, peonies, violets for love, hyacinth, clementis, asters for loyalty, carnation, camellia, lilies for admiration, blue bells, iris, lily of the valley for longing. Arranging them in beautiful bouquets with sunroses and forget-me-nots scattered throughout, only to tear them apart in frustration as the basket did not have the correct message she wanted to convey. By the end of her session, she was surrounded by disabused flower petals, their mixed fragrance filling the flower shop, scattered at her feet like a bride on her way down the aisle to see her groom. Only her feet were rooted upon Coruscant, she didn't have the bravery to take them back to the Chimaera. The smell of the flowers filled her with anger at her own ineptitude, so she ended up sending nothing to Thrawn.

Now, after Teo's funeral, Sola was surrounded by flowers. White, to signify death, black roses to tell her to be courageous and strong, personal flowers thrown in to identify the sender of the bouquet or basket. She through them methodically, her eyes dry.

"Is there something wrong with me?" she asked her brother. "Why aren't I crying?"

"We all grieve in our own way," Uri told her. "Don't be too hard on yourself."

What she didn't tell Uri was that she did not miss Teo now that he was gone. That there was nothing to miss.

She missed Thrawn.

As she went through another round of flower baskets, she came upon one of white chrysthamums, stark in its simplicity. It held a sunrose on one side and a small cluster of forget-me-nots on the other, with a single red rose at the top poking out. The card, written on paper, a rare expense, said, "My condolences on your loss. You are in my thoughts. Your friend, Thrawn."

It was only then that she burst into tears.