Office hours [all day]

[sith_happened]

Anakin arrived a little late to work today: traffic coming through town had been a mess, and he'd almost had to start fights with three different little old ladies aggravating shoppers.

He put down his bag of decorations--lights and tinsel (stupid tinsel), bows and greenery--and began decorating his office.

And then taking pictures to send to Rory's phone. He had a promise to keep, after all.

The door was open. Holiday music was definitely not playing.

Comments

[solo_sword]

After class, Jaina made her way to Anakin's office as promised.

And upon looking inside, she greeted him with, "Seriously?"

[sith_happened]

"I promised Rory," he replied, blushing.

[solo_sword]

"That you'd..." She sort of wanted him just to say it. She could see what he was doing.

[sith_happened]

"Make my office shiny and full of holiday crap," Anakin muttered.

[solo_sword]

Jaina grinned. "Did she say it like that?"

[sith_happened]

"Not exactly like that, no," Anakin admitted.

[solo_sword]

"I like it better your way. Why does she care what your office looks like?" she wondered.

[sith_happened]

"She cares," he said with a little shrug, "and it makes her happy. It doesn't have to be up long."

Anakin was such a soft touch.

[solo_sword]

"Meaning good thing I came today 'cause tomorrow it's gone?" she guessed.

[sith_happened]

He smirked. "That would be wrong."

Didn't mean it hadn't crossed his mind.

[solo_sword]

"Saturday?"

[sith_happened]

"Probably," he said. "She didn't set a time limit on it..."

[solo_sword]

"Then I'd say you're in the clear." She was her father's daughter.

[sith_happened]

"I'll be sure to blame you if I get caught," Anakin teased.

[solo_sword]

"Sure, blame the granddaughter. That'll go over well."

[sith_happened]

"It depends on how big the box of chocolate I'm hiding behind is," he said, grinning. "How was your week?"

[solo_sword]

"Very quiet," she said. "Working, mostly. Filled with cocoa and tinsel. Yours?"

[sith_happened]

"Tinsel, yes, cocoa no," Anakin said. "I got to spar Ben yesterday before he exploded from something that he won't talk to me about."

[solo_sword]

"I think he generally just has stuff going on," she said slowly.

[sith_happened]

"He's angry and looking for a target," Anakin said. "That's not good for anyone."

[solo_sword]

"Let him work through it," Jaina said. "Just don't mark him off as a threat automatically and let him deal."

[sith_happened]

Anakin gripped his desk hard. "You know why I don't like to do that."

[solo_sword]

"And that helped me so much," she said dryly. "Don't push, let him handle it. He's a smart kid, he'll do the right thing, whatever it is."

[sith_happened]

Anakin bit back a reply about Jacen. Jaina didn't need to hear it.

"It's very, very hard to sit back and wonder if your family is going to continue to make the same stupid mistakes you did," he said to the top of his desk.

[solo_sword]

"Your family's got one thing going for it, which is that we're not you," Jaina said bluntly. "You're a great big warning sign we grew up hearing about. If anyone went that way anyway, you getting overprotective isn't likely to change that."