Vibrant Eyes | Din Djarin

40: for

Din's first question came swiftly: "What?"

He couldn't think of anything fitting enough to follow.

Ira blinked. "You heard me, right?"

"I... I did but..."

Din couldn't think straight. She was... what? Blind?

How did that make any sense?

"That makes no sense," he said.

"I know."

He withdrew his hand from hers and leaned back, staring at her. Her eyes were as focused as ever. She claimed she'd been blind all this time. If she was...

"How?"

She smiled mildly and shrugged. "The Force makes many impossible things plausible."

"Your... sorcery?"

"Sure."

"What about..."

"Everything?"

Din could only nod.

"I've never met another Force wielder like me, so I don't know if it's the same for everyone, but I see the Force differently than most."

"How so?"

"The world around me is a construction of Force concentration. The wisps of it in the very air we breathe, the collection of it in a person's heart, the way it creeps through every planet and ties everything together. While others feel this, I see it. It's the only thing I do."

Din was still skeptical.

Ira quirked a small, uneasy grin. "And I must mention that it also allows me to feel others' energies. Moods. The very basis of thought."

"So you know I don't believe you."

"You do not, and I have no way to truly prove it to you."

Din studied her, then huffed. "How do you look at me like that?" he finally asked.

"Hmm?"

"You've never had any difficulty meeting my..." He hesitated. "My eyes."

Ira shifted in her seat. "I've never met another like you," she said.

"What does that mean?"

Then she lifted her head, met his eyes in that impossible way, and explained that day in Sorgan, a week before he arrived, when she saw him for the very first time.

"I've always been able to see you," she whispered. Her voice cracked on the word that defied the one thing she could never truly do. And Din suddenly began to remember every time it was used in reference to her and what he did not know. What she hid so well. "I don't know why, I... I swear on the stars I don't. But I am ever so grateful. You don't know what it's like, to never have something solid to cling to. So, I'm very sorry if I ever clung to you, if I am now, in a way you didn't like."

"You haven't."

"Oh, but I have," she whispered with a self-deprecating chuckle. "I have clung to you from the moment we met. I left Sorgan because I wanted a life where I could see a future beyond the one I lay out for myself. I wanted to find a way out of the fog and the nothingness."

She paused and Din felt his heart give in when she ran a hand over her face with a harsh sigh.

"I think, even then... I didn't want to be alone anymore."

"Ira," he said.

She looked up, saw him, and now he knew to what extent. He thought he might have loved her for it. For everything and every moment. For who she was, for the past couple months, for sitting with him, for saying his name, caring for the child, fearing for him, and surviving up until this moment.

For allowing it to happen, for him to know her, and for everything to feel right.

"I've clung to you, too. More than even you will ever know."

Ira forced a smile but even that looked frustrated and saddened. "You didn't used to."

He knew he didn't. Din never thought he ever would. But he had clung to her then for far longer, and far more, than the hold they had on each other's hands since the day before. This hold could not be labeled as a physical thing for it existed without and beyond that.

Din never wanted to need someone before. Before the kid and her. But he knew more now.

He knew he needed her more than he'd needed anything else in his life. He needed the family they'd created together. The one with Grogu, balanced meals, and card games. The way it made him feel whole in the days that he never thought he would.

"When did it start?" she asked softly, hesitantly.

At least she seemed too preoccupied to notice the whirl of thoughts swallowing him whole. The warmth in his chest and that which engulfed his ears as he came upon realization after realization. 

He really didn't need her noticing at all, at least not then.

"Navarro," he answered. Then he remembered all he didn't know about those days that felt like years. "Which I still know nothing about."

Ira grimaced. "Well, yes. I've never disclosed anything on that, have I?"

He kept his silence and stared at her, incredulous.

She chuckled, picking up on it easily. "Yes, I get the irony."

"You never disclose anything."

"I didn't," she corrected, pointing at him with a smile. Din studied her eyes and realized that it really did all make sense. Others looked at multiple things on a person while speaking. Her gaze never moved an inch. "I do now."

"You do?"

She lowered her hand. "Only for you," she hummed.

Din's cheeks went ablaze, and he was glad she couldn't see it because of his helmet. Then he realized that she couldn't in the first place. Then he realized that she probably could because of her... Force. Those abilities, whatever they were called.

Huh, this was tricky.

"We'll figure it out," she said.

Thank Maker she hadn't sensed the origin of the confusion.

"Yeah," he agreed, nodding. Then he paused, the anticipation of getting a long-awaited answer itching at him. "So. Navarro?"

Ira smiled sympathetically. "I'm afraid we need to start at the beginning."

"The beginning beginning?"

"Yes."

Din sighed.