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The traffic buzzed and hummed outside, streaks of movement among the glittering city lights of Coruscant at night. Flow watched it all - even the lights not everyone could see, the sparks of life in every car, below him all the way down the apartment building, everywhere, an ever-present spiritual radiance that reassured him most of the time.
Not tonight. Tonight, he lay curled around a pillow on the couch, emotional and vulnerable. He thought he couldn't look much like a Jedi right now, and in all honesty, he didn't quite feel like he deserved the title either. His mind tried to straighten itself out with every exercise he had been taught but always came back to the series of missteps he had been mulling over for hours now. They weren't even major missteps. Nobody's life had been in danger, at worst feelings had been hurt. The logical part of his mind had been telling him it meant nothing, an apology was all that he needed to start to set things right. And yet, he couldn't stop dwelling on how he'd continued to make it all worse.
Where had he gone wrong? Should he have tried harder to sense her intent, instead of being distracted by recent events? Maybe if he'd sensed it through the Force, he would have been able to recognize she had been flirting with him before he'd opened his stupid mouth. Maybe he would have been able to measure his rejection then, instead of shooting her down so bluntly before he'd even known that's what he'd done. Or maybe...
His face burned and he gripped the pillow he'd curled around tighter. He didn't know what to make of the tangle of feelings that bound him. Ashamed, embarrassed, horribly guilty, and worse still. He liked her as a friend, but revisiting it in his mind pulled on a carefully buried thread of guilty curiosity. How was he supposed to feel? He'd seen other people in love, caught glimpses of their emotions in passing, and he was sure it wasn't like that. Wasn't any desire being purely physical worse? Or was that better? Which had she wanted? Would it have been leading her on, when his attraction to women was so weak he hadn't even thought to consider it until later, too late?
Why was he thinking about any of this? It was over. That route was lost, perhaps for the best. He would probably be even more confused and guilty if he'd given in. But he hadn't meant to come off as moralizing. He hadn't meant to insinuate he didn't want her company anymore.
Did he have to ruin the friendship along the way?
Not tonight. Tonight, he lay curled around a pillow on the couch, emotional and vulnerable. He thought he couldn't look much like a Jedi right now, and in all honesty, he didn't quite feel like he deserved the title either. His mind tried to straighten itself out with every exercise he had been taught but always came back to the series of missteps he had been mulling over for hours now. They weren't even major missteps. Nobody's life had been in danger, at worst feelings had been hurt. The logical part of his mind had been telling him it meant nothing, an apology was all that he needed to start to set things right. And yet, he couldn't stop dwelling on how he'd continued to make it all worse.
Where had he gone wrong? Should he have tried harder to sense her intent, instead of being distracted by recent events? Maybe if he'd sensed it through the Force, he would have been able to recognize she had been flirting with him before he'd opened his stupid mouth. Maybe he would have been able to measure his rejection then, instead of shooting her down so bluntly before he'd even known that's what he'd done. Or maybe...
His face burned and he gripped the pillow he'd curled around tighter. He didn't know what to make of the tangle of feelings that bound him. Ashamed, embarrassed, horribly guilty, and worse still. He liked her as a friend, but revisiting it in his mind pulled on a carefully buried thread of guilty curiosity. How was he supposed to feel? He'd seen other people in love, caught glimpses of their emotions in passing, and he was sure it wasn't like that. Wasn't any desire being purely physical worse? Or was that better? Which had she wanted? Would it have been leading her on, when his attraction to women was so weak he hadn't even thought to consider it until later, too late?
Why was he thinking about any of this? It was over. That route was lost, perhaps for the best. He would probably be even more confused and guilty if he'd given in. But he hadn't meant to come off as moralizing. He hadn't meant to insinuate he didn't want her company anymore.
Did he have to ruin the friendship along the way?