It had been months since I had seen my Master. I mean, really seen. As in looked at him long enough to notice all the changes. At first, it wasn't anything I could put my finger on. Just a general sense of uneasiness between us.

Sometimes I thought, what? Suddenly he can't stand to be in the same room with me? What happened to lingering over our morning tea while we planned what we were going to do that day?

That was another thing. He was definitely losing weight. In fact, now that I thought about it, he rarely ate at the same table with me anymore. I frowned and buttered a slice of toast. I smeared greasy fingers across my tunic and handed the toast to my Master.

Now he was frowning.

"Master?"

"You do realize you'll have to change your clothes now." He sighed heavily. "It's not like we have a great deal of time today, Anakin. You could be more thoughtful when you do these things."

"What things? You mean eating?"

"I can't believe you expect me to put that in my mouth," he said sternly.

That made my mouth go dry. "Umm…you don't like toast?"

"Not when your fingers have been…all over it. Why are you staring at me that way?"

I forced myself to smile in a totally unnatural way. "I wasn't."

"You were."

"I was thinking."

"About what?"

You. You touching me. All over. With your fingers. Smeared with butter. Like the toast.

I sputtered, but nothing remotely intelligible came out. I cast my eyes down to the table in front of me and sought my center, but it eluded me. Somehow that didn't surprise me. I had a feeling it might be a very long time before I could meditate safely anywhere near my Master.

He made an exasperated noise and I looked up in time to catch him sliding the tip of his tongue between his straight white teeth. Force, I was instantly hard. Any second he was going to expect me to get up and fly after him at hyperspeed. But that would be embarrassing. For both of us.

"Anakin, I know what you're thinking."

"You do?" I exclaimed, wincing at the sound of my voice breaking.

"Yes." He leaned over me, and I swallowed nervously. I could feel his warm breath on my face. Almost close enough to k—.

"Anakin! You are most inattentive this morning."

"Yes, Master." I had to agree with that. My mind was not functioning. But my eyes were. My Master's hands were visibly shaking as he clasped them around his cup of tea.

"Master? Are you all right?"

He met my gaze with equanimity. But that was when I noticed something else. Fine lines around his eyes. Lines that hadn't been there, say, six months ago. He wasn't eating. That I knew. But it seemed that he wasn't sleeping either.

I should have seen this before. I had made studying my Master into an artform, one that I desired to perfect, if he would only allow it. He was tense, irritable, living on his nerves. Why hadn't I caught this earlier? I flushed dark red, inexplicably angry, at myself for not knowing, at him for not wanting me to know. How could we go on like this, hiding from each other in plain sight?

"Master, I'm worried about-"

"Fear leads to-"

The ever-present Jedi litany. Well, fuck that. Fear led to one thing. More fear. And not talking about things that needed to be out in the open. "Listen to me!"

"Anakin! Mind your tone!" he growled at me, and I suddenly realized that he might seem  weary, but that wouldn't stop him from striking out.

"Master, please!" I reached for his hand, and he pulled back sharply. I blinked. He didn't want me to touch him.

That was what was at the heart of this. No touching. My Master stopped touching me nearly six months ago. I missed those touches, surreptitious though they might be. The way he restlessly stroked my hair, the way his fingers softly caressed my face. I closed my eyes briefly, unable to look at the man who trained me to observe the most subtle changes in body language. Changes like…not touching someone.

Like he was afraid of me.

His gaze shifted away uneasily before meeting mine again, almost defiantly.

"You have classes, Anakin," he said, his gray eyes flashing an indistinct warning.

I clenched my jaw mutinously and leaned forward, deliberately intruding on his personal space. He held his breath when I trailed my own fingers along the side of his face. I waited for him to tell me how inappropriate this was. But he never said a word.

"I never took you for a coward, Master." Now I knew I had stepped over the line. Still he didn't challenge me. He merely continued to study me with those eyes that saw everything…and nothing.

I took a step back, somewhat stunned that I had gone as far as I did. But I think I was even more stunned that my Master didn't stop me. He just stared at me like I was his last hope.

Suddenly going to class seemed like a better idea than staying there.

My classes seemed interminably long. My Master wasn't around for noonmeal, and I was beginning to despair of seeing him for latemeal as well. But I finally caught up with him afterwards. In the gardens.

"Meditate with me, Padawan."

I knelt in front of him and assumed a more humble posture, automatically settling so that our knees almost touched. His eyes were closed, his face serene. He looked so much younger like this. As if whatever was troubling him couldn't reach him. I studied him from beneath my eyelashes, cautiously examining him, feature by beloved feature.

His eyes opened suddenly, vividly blue for once, and I stifled a startled gasp. "Are you having trouble meditating?"

"N-no. Y-yes. M-master."

"Well…which is it?" He waited so patiently. If I trained for a hundred lifetimes, I could never achieve that level of calm.

Grasping for something, anything, I latched onto what turned out to be more than just an interesting rumor I had picked up in the refectory. "I heard we're going on a mission."

Without breaking eye contact, my Master drawled, "Really, Padawan?" in that tone of voice that said, I've forgotten more than you can ever know.

"Yes, Master," I murmured, finally succumbing to the implied pressure to lower my eyes obediently.

"Is this mission more important than your meditations?" he asked not unkindly.

"No, Master," I whispered. Great. Now I was reduced to monosyllables while he continued to stare at me intently. I didn't have to see him to know that he was still looking at me. I could feel his eyes, initially tender in their regard, grow hot on my face.

"Padawan, where is your center?" he questioned softly.

You. It's you. I wanted to scream the words in a very un-Jedi-like fashion, but that wouldn't be an auspicious beginning to the relationship I yearned for. Instead I hid my hands inside the long, concealing sleeves of my robe and interlaced my fingers to prevent myself from acting on the intense impulses that throbbed throughout my body. Earlier I wouldn't have hesitated.

Earlier I wouldn't have been scared half to death of screwing things up.

"Meditation is highly overrated," I muttered under my breath.

"What was that, Anakin?"

"I said, we're going to be late." It briefly occurred to me that being good at lying wasn't something that a Jedi should aspire to, but I quickly dismissed that thought out of self-preservation.

"You're not looking forward to this mission, are you?"

"Oh, no, Master. I'm sure it's going to be very…interesting." I couldn't help but stumble over that last word. My Master was staring at me so hard, his eyes were like bright blue laser beams, cutting right through me. He could see everything. I could feel the blood draining from my face. He knew.

"Interesting. Not the word I would have chosen. But I can see why you might say that."

"You can. I mean, you can?"

"Certainly. Can't you?"

"Can't I what?"

"Anakin, I don't think all that time spent in meditation this afternoon helped you at all. You seem…" Obi-Wan was searching for the right word, and all I could do was stand there with my mouth hanging open like some pathetic crecheling.

"Lost," he said huskily. Force, that voice. "Are you lost, Ani? Would you like to be found?" he continued, that same benevolent blue flame lighting up his eyes.

"M-master? Do you feel all right?" He couldn't be looking at me like that. I must have fallen asleep while I was meditating. Any minute now, my Master was going to pinch me and I was going to wake with a hundred new regrets.

"Anakin…" Suddenly he was so close. His mouth was a breath away from mine. If I didn't know better, I'd swear he was going to kiss me. His hands felt warm on my face. Stroking my cheek, my jaw…oh, damn, I couldn't breathe. His eyes fluttered shut, right before his lips touched mine. They were warm and dry and so very soft…

It was everything and nothing like I thought it would be. I could feel desire spiraling deep inside me, and all at once I wanted to touch him the way he'd touched me. When I ran my fingers lightly over his beard, he opened his eyes, laugh lines crinkling at the corners. There was a smile there, and it was for me. I could feel it.

I wanted all of his smiles, as rare as they were, but I was trapped by my own feelings again. I, who always accused Obi-Wan of analyzing things to death, was paralyzed, afraid to move forward. Change was inevitable. Necessary.

I took a half-step backward, breaking out of his embrace with so little difficulty that I had trouble realizing that any of it had been real. "I can't," I whispered.

The smile disappeared from his eyes, the light gone out just that fast. He ducked his head slightly, in an effort to hide his expression, but what little I could see broke my heart. "As you wish," he replied hoarsely.

I wanted to scream at him not to go. But I choked on the words, and he left hurriedly. As if I'd wounded him.

"Master…" I murmured wistfully.

To Be Continued

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