Beyond the Saga Post Afterglow--Songfic Roulette Challenge--Leia/Han Vignette (uppin' the post)

Title: Post Afterglow
Author: leiamoody
Timeframe: Post ROTJ
Characters: Han Solo, Leia Organa Solo
Genre: Vignette
Summary: After the afterglow, Leia has some reflective moments.
Notes: This is the response I came up with for the song assigned to me in the Songfic Roulette Challenge back in 2007. For the record, that song happens to be "I Do (Cherish You)" by 98 Degrees.
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"Are you serious?" Leia flipped over onto her stomach. The lower half of her hair was tucked underneath her navel, so she had to roll over and tug the never-ending curtain attached to her scalp and toss the brown-auburn mess over her shoulder. And it was a mess; at three twenty-five in the morning, a combination of active coitus plus one hour's worth of sleep made for knots and tangles in her hair. One part of her brain wanted to make a dash to the fresher and attack the twists and turns with a comb. But doing that would ruin the mood. She didn't want to pierce their perfect bubble in this bed with rumpled sheets and a coverlet that the housekeeping droid hadn't changed yesterday...but it didn't matter. Not in the grand design of the little stitches and stars that made up the universe. In the fuzzy glow of the sunrise shimmerlamps tucked in the ceiling, all was cozy and perfect. The afterglow of the afterglow, somehow and sometimes pure and perfect than what preceded the calm.

"Are you serious?" She had to ask the question again, just to come back into the present. Floating away in the middle of her conversation with Han, not a good idea. Even if his suggestion was peculiar, one of those middle-of-the-early, early morning notions that wouldn't make sense later on...still, this was wonderful.

Han stared at her. That dazed look he got whenever something about her caught his attention. It still made no sense that a man could lose track of his thoughts over something trivial like hair. The unbraided mess on top of her head was sticking out at odd angles...after the tumbles they had engaged in when they first spilled onto the bed, surely a few strands were poking up like untamed sheaves of wheat. It looked terrible. Yet Han never cared. If anything, he was more attracted to her in this disheveled state. The times when he tried to pull apart one of her coiffures that took forever to arrange were frustrating, but funny. Funny, and sweet.

He didn't love the princess. The perfect holoimage splashed about on all the news channels...the figurehead who led a rebellion and was the locus of hope and renewal for a displaced people...such a distant ideal. A mythic image no man could ever touch, or desire, or love. But the woman...he'd proven enough times how strong his feelings were for the reality that lay beneath the shallow veneer of the royal ideal she projected to the galaxy.

Leia smiled. It was glorious, and odd. She reached out to his collarbone, brushing her fingers against his skin. Still wonderful, strange, miraculous, divine, all of this time with Han, this adventure of the heart.

Her fingertips, as they traced along his skin, brought Han out of his reverie. He reached up and took her hand away from his neck. "Sorry, got caught up in the view." He kissed her hand, then he smiled. "You're too distracting sometimes."

"Sometimes? Is that all?" Leia held the laugh back, until the circle of their mutual joke was complete.

"Sometimes." He traced his thumb along her chin. "'Cause a guy's head has to be somewhere else besides sex all the time, right?"

He changed the script again. Just a little, but still, he broke the routine. That happened every so often when they played this verbal game. The beginning was always the same, but the ending was forever open to innovation. On certain nights, he would have to finish the circuit, because she was too caught up in the rapture of the moment. Other strange hours in the middle of late night and earliest morn, Han was the one unable to speak. Both of them could become overwhelmed by the strength of their bond. Two disparate souls brought together by the funny little quarks and quirks of the universe...Han brought her out of that empty world that was her existence once, in those days, months, and years between the moment Alderaan was blown asunder, until...when, precisely? On Ord Mantell? That moment when he risked everything to head across the icy plains in the deepest hell of a frigid night to save Luke? Perhaps. But it all became solid when Han returned in the midst of chaos and confusion, when the beams were falling, and the fleet was rising up to the sky, and she was praying to every ancient deity she'd ever read about that they would be granted safe passage to the Alliance safe world. Her fate didn't matter. Death was the inevitable conclusion to her journey, just as it had been destined for her father. In the command center, her service and life were meant to end.

The Force, and all its celestial attendants, had other plans. Han came back, which was impossible to imagine in the maelstrom of battle and invasion. He was there to save her. Extraordinary.

He believed she mattered. That was his reason for coming back, pulling her away from duty and the unbreakable bond to the dead of her childhood. The remote virgin devoted to the highest cause of freedom was meant to lose her altar, so Those Higher obviously decided. It wasn't until later, after she brought him back from the fringes of death, that Leia understood the truth. They were meant to be together.

It was so strange. But she would never give this present, and future, back for whatever used to be her existence before he entered her life.

"I love you," Han whispered.

She reached out her hand and brushed his cheek. "I love you too." Then she smiled. "Now, about that crazy idea...are you serious?"

 

That was lovely

[face_LOVE]

Its great to see Han and Leia have time to enjoy themselves without danger lurking on the horizon for a change.

Great response to the challenge

 

He didn't love the princess. The perfect holoimage splashed about on all the news channels...the figurehead who led a rebellion and was the locus of hope and renewal for a displaced people...such a distant ideal. A mythic image no man could ever touch, or desire, or love. But the woman...he'd proven enough times how strong his feelings were for the reality that lay beneath the shallow veneer of the royal ideal she projected to the galaxy.

Awwwwww... Perfect!

 

Loved it! You captured their loving and unique relationship perfectly!

Her fingertips, as they traced along his skin, brought Han out of his reverie. He reached up and took her hand away from his neck. "Sorry, got caught up in the view." He kissed her hand, then he smiled. "You're too distracting sometimes."

"Sometimes? Is that all?" Leia held the laugh back, until the circle of their mutual joke was complete.

"Sometimes." He traced his thumb along her chin. "'Cause a guy's head has to be somewhere else besides sex all the time, right?"

He changed the script again. Just a little, but still, he broke the routine. That happened every so often when they played this verbal game. The beginning was always the same, but the ending was forever open to innovation. On certain nights, he would have to finish the circuit, because she was too caught up in the rapture of the moment. Other strange hours in the middle of late night and earliest morn, Han was the one unable to speak. Both of them could become overwhelmed by the strength of their bond. Two disparate souls brought together by the funny little quarks and quirks of the universe...Han brought her out of that empty world that was her existence once, in those days, months, and years between the moment Alderaan was blown asunder, until...when, precisely? On Ord Mantell? That moment when he risked everything to head across the icy plains in the deepest hell of a frigid night to save Luke? Perhaps. But it all became solid when Han returned in the midst of chaos and confusion, when the beams were falling, and the fleet was rising up to the sky, and she was praying to every ancient deity she'd ever read about that they would be granted safe passage to the Alliance safe world. Her fate didn't matter. Death was the inevitable conclusion to her journey, just as it had been destined for her father. In the command center, her service and life were meant to end.

 

If you leave it open-ended like that, all SORTS of things come to mind! - And that's just a few of them!

EDIT - Oh... I'm not sure about that song, but if it's a remake of the oldie "Cherish" by The Association, then I DO know it! (PT is an oldie too, you know...)

 

I liked this a lot, leiamoody. Leia's ruminations were fun to follow. Its hard to imagine Leia in that disheveled, post coital way. But, I did.


He didn't love the princess. The perfect holoimage splashed about on all the news channels...the figurehead who led a rebellion and was the locus of hope and renewal for a displaced people...such a distant ideal. A mythic image no man could ever touch, or desire, or love. But the woman...he'd proven enough times how strong his feelings were for the reality that lay beneath the shallow veneer of the royal ideal she projected to the galaxy.

and

He believed she mattered. That was his reason for coming back, pulling her away from duty and the unbreakable bond to the dead of her childhood. The remote virgin devoted to the highest cause of freedom was meant to lose her altar, so Those Higher obviously decided. It wasn't until later, after she brought him back from the fringes of death, that Leia understood the truth. They were meant to be together.

I was especially enamored of these two very well written and descriptive passages. Leia is very self aware. She is aware of how she perceived by the public, but also aware of who the 'woman' is that Han loves so much. Excellent fic.

 

KELIA Yeah, I like to make things rather easier for these two than the profic does. There is such a thing as too much chaos for The Immortal Beloveds.

Golden_Jedi Yep, it's the standard ooegy googy love schmooze between the two. Cute enough to not be nauseating.

VaderLVR64 "loving and unique"...yep, that's a good way to describe their bond. Definitely unique. Seriously.

PonyTricks Well, I tried for something in the back of my mind, but nothing terribly original came up. And then I realized there was no need for the reader to know the question. The whole point of the fic is the love mush.
Oh, and the implied kinky stuff, too.

And the song isn't a remake of The Association song. Funny thing is, I'm more familiar with that song than the 98 Degrees one...but I was in my mid-twenties when the boy bands were popular. Too old for 'em, I was.

brodiew Is it hard to imagine Leia in that post coital state because it's hard to imagine a princess that way?

As for Leia being self-aware...I would imagine she possesses that quality to some extent.

 

Unlocked thread, solved the massive case of truncationitis, and upped the post for current consideration.

 

*Melts!* You really are toppers! at the entire H/L thingy. The sense of love and wonder & rejoicing in one another - I enjoyed Leia's musings/introspection. I agree that Han has always loved the woman that she lets none else see.

That is a wonderful song, BTW.

 

I had to google what "afterglow" meant in this context (#aceproblems), but yup, I think I figured it out.

Nineteen out of twenty times, don't dig the "first time" fics as it's often on the border of being a proof that a character is "normal" only when they slept with somebody or whatever or it's an excuse for the author to objectify like there is no tomorrow and utilise Ikea erotica; but this was written with so much respect and with only subtle hints of anything erotic, focusing on the emotion, a look back at Han and Leia's entire relationship and much, much more than that.

I like the idea that both of them had problems realising their true feelings and chanelling their emotions prior to this.

And there's a hint of absurdity in this that I enjoy more than I should - how the hair needs to be combed and how we never get to know what Leia is asking about three times. Could it be that Han told her he loved her?

This is beautiful:

He didn't love the princess. The perfect holoimage splashed about on all the news channels...the figurehead who led a rebellion and was the locus of hope and renewal for a displaced people...such a distant ideal. A mythic image no man could ever touch, or desire, or love. But the woman...he'd proven enough times how strong his feelings were for the reality that lay beneath the shallow veneer of the royal ideal she projected to the galaxy.

Also, this:

Not in the grand design of the little stitches and stars that made up the universe.

 

Thank you. I've always liked Han and Leia, so I think that I understand them pretty well and have been able to do some pretty decent stories about them. Definitely not in the top writers' category...there were some incredible H/L writers that were *amazing* when I was writing and reading among a certain group some years ago.

Well, I don't write Ikearotica because I'm not interested in writing sex scenes. I find them awkward and, dare I say (dare, dare!), boring. I prefer writing about the dynamics of the emotional life that exists between two people in a relationship. That's always appealed me more than the physical aspects.

This particular fic doesn't count as a "first time" one for Han and Leia...I was thinking this particular evening/morning took place about a year or so after ROTJ...which leads into the question which made Leia ask Han if he was serious...honestly, he was proposing to her. More specifically, an impromptu wedding...not the one that occurred in Leave, but something informal and unexpected (at least to her).

 

I just read the story. I loved it.

 

I also love the way we never get to find out what she was asking about! Lots of things passed through my mind...getting married, having a baby, something a little kinkier perhaps? Or maybe even something more mundane not having to do with love or sex at all. Taking a wild adventure (not that they haven't had some already) or playing a practical joke on someone, or even painting their room a terrible shade of mauvish pink. Whatever it is -- erotic or not -- it doesn't matter because it's still an intimate moment. I love that. Leaving it up to the imagination is so much better than letting us know. Glad this got bumped.

 

That justifies it. I find most of them boring as well, unless they can convey the emotion rather than "he put his thingy in my you-know-what". And this is so much better!

One can see how knowledgable I am about functional relationship. D'oh, sorry for getting it wrong.

And an impromptu wedding sounds ;ole something everybody would ask that question about!

 

Thank you.

Thank you. I've retconned the situation into Han asking Leia to marry him in some impromptu wedding ceremony, but when I wrote this I had no idea what the situation was supposed to be. I was going for the feeling of the moment. I created the meaning of it later. Creativity is strange sometimes, right?

That's not any improper reading on your part. I was trying to be vague about what Leia was referring to, because I wanted the focus to be upon the moment...because I wasn't entirely sure about what the situation that was being referred to was supposed to be. Eventually I looked back on this piece and realized I could incorporate it into a larger fic that is supposed to include H/L getting married while on some diplomatic mission. But I have to write another fic that helps establish background for that one, so I haven't gotten around to weaving this bit in yet.