Sand | Obidala

3.

Padme needs time to get used to the strange boy she keeps seeing in mirrors and window glasses, and so do I.
The volitive, impeccable, impressively up-doed woman I knew is nothing like this cotton covered lost creature.

I guess she thinks the same of me, minus the up-do detail. I catch her gaping in my direction, from time to time, looking puzzled.

We tacitly started a new game. In my mind, I call it 'stay numb'. The goal is arriving at sunset tired enough to win a comatose night.
The twins help a lot, of course; we do our part pursuing endless tasks, endless fixings, endless cleaning.

The farm starts looking like something one can live in.
We built Japor wood cots for Luke and Leia when they couldn't fit in their baskets anymore. I repaired more vaporators, now we have enough water to start a Hydroponic garden. We soon eat our own pallies and tatoes (it seems that I fulfilled my fate and ended up in the Agricorps, after all.)
Padme completed her metamorphosis with an unusual tan. I just got red.

We don't talk much but tend to gravitate one around the other.
When we fail our game, we meet at the kitchen table and wait for dawn in silence, drinking H'Kak tea. Close, but not able to reach.

"I can't stop rereading my life in light of what happened," she told me one of those mornings. "Each memory gets rancid, everything becomes a lie."

"Dismantle the past, then come back and try to recover something," I replied. "We have no other choice."

From time to time, we travel all together to Mos Espa, or Anchorhead, though Padme is not exactly eager to play the happy family, and I often go on my own.

There aren't many holoviewers on the planet, and we both try to avoid the news, so we know very little about what's happening to the Galaxy.
Tatooine seems a haven for those who do not wish to be found. The truth is that, being so scarcely populated, everyone knows too much about everyone else. Neighbours live at least half an hour of speeder from us; despite this, they soon get curious, and we must find new names.
Ben and Chordè; a nickname Satine gave me when we were embarrassingly young and the name of a loyal handmaiden. Friends who died because of us.
I'm afraid what we picked reveals we are more sentimental than we wish to admit.

We are so dazed we do not prepare surnames as well and end up keeping mine. Luckily, this does not represent a problem. Kenobi is so common here that people often start their conversations asking if I'm a relative of one of their acquaintances from some remote place or another.
They refer to Padme simply as 'Mrs. Kenobi.' She snickers every time.

My inability to feel, despite all the efforts to save it, has faded. These days, my anger doesn't spare anyone.
Neither my Master, whose obsession for a pathetic child practically caused the fall of the Order.
Nor Yoda, that made me do what I told him I couldn't and stranded me here without reason.
Nor Padme, so narrow-minded and selfish to let a Jedi get her pregnant.

Of course, above all, I'm angry at myself. Anakin did not turn in a day, I knew what was going on, and I did nothing. All the times I pushed him away, and all the times I kept him too near, only to make it worse. I hate myself for what I did to him on Mustafar, and even more for what I did not.

Finally, I'm angry at Anakin. My anger toward him is so fierce I am somewhat surprised it doesn't have any visible emanation. I expect earthquakes when I walk or fire when I talk.

I'm shut to the Force and I never think about the Code. Nevertheless, I'm still a Jedi - if ever this means something anymore - and I fight these feelings with all my being, though with scarce results.

I guess Padme is going through something similar, I see it in the way her eyes flame when she lays them on me.
Sadly, experiencing analogous reactions does not help us in any way. Sufferings can't be shared, every living creature hurts alone.

One day, after the umpteenth 'Mrs. Kenobi,' she snaps.

"Funny. I'm a Kenobi but I've never been a Skywalker, though I married one," she hisses, checking on my face if she managed to hurt me with the revelation.

I do not disappoint her.

That night, instead of disappearing into her room the moment the kids fall asleep, Padme comes to sit at my side on the doorsteps.

"I don't know why I said that," she tells me.

I shake my head. "It shouldn't matter anymore, and I guess you have all the rights to hate me."

"I don't." She frowns, looking hurt. "Do not believe this, please. I know you paid a high price."

We stare at the dunes.
The nights here seem immobile but are actually full of life. Most animals wake up at dusk to crawl and creak in the shadows, the wind changes every ten minutes.

"Has..." She bites her lips. "Has it ever been... physical, between you?"

She stops my objections before I can raise them. "What difference does it make, now? You said it yourself."

"For a few weeks, a while ago," I answer, struck by the absurdity of this talk. "I'm sorry."

She dismisses the matter with a faint smile. "This changes very little. I shared Anakin with you from the beginning, and I could never compete. You were a formidable rival, I have been jealous of you for so long."

"You? Of me?" I let out a snigger. "I wish we had talked of this sooner. Anakin loved you. He only wanted me to be his property."

"I'm ready to argue about this whenever you want," she jokes.

Padme remains silent, then bursts out laughing. Every time she tries to explain, she just worsens it, and I start getting infected.

Finally, she covers her face with a hand, I barely understand what she's saying. "You know, he had this threesome kink..."

I try to sound grave and fail. "I preferred not to know."

"We three... A huge bed..." Padme peeks at my reaction from behind her fingers, about to choke. "A big, happy family."

"He may have said this - and I'm glad I wasn't around when he did - but he would've killed me if I ever touched you."

I remember the way Anakin glared at me when I got off Padme's ship.

"Of course." She smirks. "We should've been there exclusively for him. No interaction whatsoever between us two."

Our laughs scare away some Sand Skitters and make us feel both guilty and relieved.

When you break, the stars fall, the world ends, though they don't really. Pain doesn't kill you and, as strange as it may seem, it doesn't stop anything from happening. Newborns keep growing, the Suns keep rising, your blood keeps flowing. Your sufferings count nothing.

Tonight, Padme and I laugh together in the middle of nowhere as unlikely friends, asking ourselves what the kark is happening. No matter how much we felt dead, we are not.