Storms (A Star Wars Fanfic)

PART 6

You woke a while later; you knew not how long you had slept. A dull headache bothered you, but it was nothing you couldn't handle. You rubbed your eyes sleepily, yawned, and sat up.

You could still hear the storm raging outside, unfortunately. The room was still dark; no light could make its way this far into the mountain, you assumed. You felt around for a lantern of some kind. It would be by Luke, wouldn't it?

Anger arose in your chest as you were reminded of your altercation last night. He overreacted, that asshole. He just wanted to argue, that was it, you thought as you felt along the ground for the lantern. That asshole always wanted to make a fool of you, it seemed. Fuc-

A blinding light suddenly shot throughout the cave. You jumped back and covered your eyes at the intensity of the lantern. You had accidentally touched it, activating it. You slowly uncovered your eyes. "Oh, fuck you," you said to the lantern. The sudden light had intensified your dull headache, which was something you definitely could have gone without.

"Nice," a voice said behind you. It was Luke, of course. That snide tone you could recognize anywhere.

"Where were you?" you asked, ignoring his comment. He had not been by the lantern.

"I couldn't sleep last night, so I went back to the ship. I got some extra supplies that I forgot when I first took you here," he said, coming into view. He set a large crate of items on the floor in front of you. "The care package thing was for emergencies. This one is for expeditions. I completely forgot about it."

You looked up at him struggling to open the crate. He did, indeed, look exhausted. Not that he didn't usually look exhausted; ever since you stopped talking, he'd had deep circles under his eyes. He obviously hadn't slept last night.

You got up and came over to him, deciding to help him with the crate.
He looked glanced at you with apprehension, but said nothing. There was an awkwardness in the air, as per usual, but you could sense something had changed. You weren't sure what, however.

The top of the crate came open with a little effort. Inside, you found food rations to last you both a week, extra Rebel uniforms (you knew yours would begin to smell in a few days, so you were happy) medical supplies including anti-infection creams and pain-reducing pills (you thanked the Force for that), a few boring-looking books, some thin yet durable blankets, small head-sized pillows, and two strong-looking unfoldable cots (which you were also extremely grateful for; the ground last night had been somewhat unforgiving on your already sore muscles).

"Right," you said, and gathered your respective things. You set them down where you had been sleeping and had begun to set up your cot when Luke tapped you gently on the shoulder.

"You forgot these," he said. You turned around. He held out in his hands the books that had been in the crate.

He was never much of a reader, before you met. But when he had learned that you loved to read, he had gotten his hands on every book he could find. He'd spend hours just sitting in the control room with Leia (there wasn't much noise there) pouring over these books. You'd walked in on him more than once, and he had always acted as if you'd caught him stealing.

All that stopped a while ago.

You recalled the awkward smile he'd always have on his face when you saw him reading as you gingerly took the books from him.

"T-Thank you," you mumbled. He nodded, and turned away to gather his things as you had.

You knew you had to do something, if only just to erase this silence that had layered over your already tense relationship.

"I'm sorry," you blurted out unexpectedly.

He looked at you in surprise, while carrying his things to his end of the cave.

"What?" he asked, setting them down, never taking his eyes off of you.

You gulped.

"I'm sorry that I said...that I said what I did last night. I didn't really think you would...you know."

He looked away, unfolding his cot.

"It's okay."

You were suddenly enraged at his answer. Even before you opened your mouth, you knew that what you were about to say would throw your mild effort into the garbage chute.

"That's it?" you demanded.

He didn't look at you as he spoke.

"Yes," he replied bluntly.

How dare he?

"You don't think you did anything wrong? At all?!"

"No," he said, with the same infuriating bluntness.

You looked at him, appalled. "You son of a bitch," you breathed.

He turned around, halting his progress with his bed.

"What did you say?"

"You heard me," you hissed, scowling.

He stood up and stormed over to you, a new flame in his eyes.

"What the fuck did I do wrong, huh?! What did I do? Tell me, what did I do?!"

You stood up to meet his gaze. You almost smiled at the excitement of finally breaking the silence. You knew you had provoked him.

"You overreacted. You made a big fucking fuss over the word 'drag'. Really? DRAG? You're not familiar with figures of speech?!"

He inched closer to your face as he raised his voice.

"You can't blame me for mistaking your 'figure of speech' for a personal attack; everything that comes out of your mouth is bullshit these days."

"You're one to talk, asshole," you retorted.

He raised his hands in exaggerated inquiry. "What, then? What did I say to upset your royal highness? What is it?"

You wanted to say something. You wanted to bring up 'That's an order' and 'soldier' and 'are you done' and 'I didn't think so' but you couldn't. It was a dam you weren't ready to break. You couldn't.

You stood, glaring at him until finally, tears began to rise in your eyes. You turned away before he could see them. You had reached to wipe them away, when a hand roughly grabbed your wrist and whirled you around again. You stood quite still, frightened as you had never been before in your life, as he held your wrist painfully in his fist.

"LISTEN - listen..." he started to say, but he trailed off. The passion in his eyes began to ebb away as he laid eyes on his own hand, clutching your wrist. He stared at it for a moment, unmoving. You stared at him, wide-eyed. It was the first time he had touched you in a long while, and it was fueled by dangerous anger.

He quickly released your wrist, his expression shocked. He looked into your teary eyes. You saw in his own anguish...regret...misery...

"I...I'm..." he said quietly. Whatever he was trying to say, he couldn't. He suddenly whirled around, mumbling something about going back to the ship for more supplies. But you knew there was going to be nothing more at the ship.

He left your sight. Your hand was still in midair where he had left it. You began to shake as you looked at it, seeing the faint red marks his fingers had left on your wrist. It still burned with the pressure of his hand.

You didn't feel yourself crumpling to the floor, shaking uncontrollably as your body was wrecked with sobs you had never experienced before. You didn't hear Luke outside the cave, staring at the fist with which he had held your wrist, and breaking out into curses and crying out into the storm. You only wanted to feel happiness again, only wanted to be able to think about him without regret stabbing you in the heart,
only wanted to hear his voice speaking in soft, joyful tones as it once did.

How did it come to this?

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Guys, I hope you enjoy this part. I really loved working on it, lol. I'm always anxious to read your comments! 💖 Anyway, let me know if there are any plot or grammatical inconsistencies. And if you are not from Instagram already, follow me there @skywalkerstudios!