“Fives, I’m just not up to it this year.” Echo brings his hand to his forehead, trying in vain to rub away his ever present-headache. “It’s just not going to be fun for me or anyone else there, and I don’t want to deal with the traveling.”
“Then we’ll bring people here,” Fives insists.
They’ve been going around in circles for coming up on half an hour, sitting in front of the sparkling Life Day tree and arguing over whether or not Echo should participate in this year’s festivities. Because, of course, this can’t be just Echo’s decision to make.
Last month, Echo had the last of the surgeries to remove the metal from his chest and reconstruct his lungs. Until the synth-lung takes and the doctors can be sure the new tech is going to work properly, he’s wheelchair-bound. In some ways it’s a relief. He doesn’t have to wear the prosthetics and his lower body pain has been cut more than in half. Then again, there’s the whole part where he’s stuck in a wheelchair and his chest hurts and he can’t breathe and he’s on so many meds and he’s tired and in pain all the time and traveling is a pain and, well, it’s really for the best that Fives go to Life Day alone this year. It’s their first Life Day as civilians. He deserves to celebrate with the rest of the 501st.
“Fives, can you please just humor me with this? We can do something low-key here, just the two of us, but I really don’t want to have a party.”
Fives huffs out a dramatic sigh, flopping over the arm of the couch. “Echo, I don’t understand why you won’t even try—”
“You’re right,” Echo snaps. “You don’t understand, so leave me the fuck alone.”
Fives sits back upright so quickly Echo wouldn’t be surprised if he got the spins. “I—Fine. Fine, I will.” He stands, brushing his hands awkwardly on his pants. “I’ll… be outside, then. Shoveling.”
The front door slams behind him.
“Fives, should I wrap Tup’s shit in the purple or the green paper?” Echo calls, shuffling across the floor to grab the tape. “It’s just a sweater and some hair stuff, but I’m putting it in boxes.”
There’s a clatter from the kitchen and the sound of soft cursing. Then, “The purple, probably.” Another clatter. “Wait, did you get Kenobi something?”
Echo freezes with his hand on the scissors. “I thought you got Kenobi something.”
The trials and travails of becoming an extended family. The buying of presents for siblings in law.
“Whatever,” Fives decides. “I’ll get him something tonight.”
Echo tapes Tup’s sweater box wrapping closed. The purple paper is just light enough for the black marker to show up when he scrawls, “To Tup, From Echo,” on the top. “Fives, if I—”
“I already talked to Rex,” Fives interrupts. “If you wake up tomorrow and you feel like shit, I’ll go over in the morning and then come back and we’ll do Life Day in. Rex can come over, too, if you want.” The rustling pauses. “And before you say it, you’re not ruining anything and it’s not a problem. We love you and we’re more than willing to accommodate you.”
“Oh.” Echo’s breath catches all funny like his regulators aren’t working right. “I love you guys, too.”
Echo disappears halfway through opening presents. Fives isn’t sure exactly when he slips away, too preoccupied with his own gift-giving and unwrapping to keep an eye on him, but somewhere between Tup dumping tinsel on Jesse and Rex crying over a holo, Echo goes missing.
Fives finds him in the laundry room. He’s sitting on top of Rex’s dryer (Rex has a dryer now because Rex has his own clothes and house, hells, Fives is still trying to wrap his brain around that one) reading one of his new books and looking more stressed than anyone should look on Christmas.
“Hey,” Fives greets, hopping up to sit on the washing machine.
Echo hums in acknowledgement. Not talking, then, but he doesn’t tell Fives to leave, so he can’t be too far gone.
“Overwhelmed?”
An affirmative hum.
“Can you talk?”
A pause. “No. No, no.”
“Alright. That’s okay.” Echo shifts uncomfortably, crinkling the pages between his index finger and thumb. “I’ll shut up now,” Fives promises, and Echo snorts.
For a long while, they just sit like that, listening to the muted sounds of Life Day and the birds outside. Echo reads. Fives scrolls aimlessly on his ‘pad.
Wherever Life Day started (Fives suspects it’s a sanitized amalgamation of a galaxy of traditions, but that’s neither here nor there), it must have been cold late in the year. Wintery symbolism is part and parcel of Life Day. Everything’s decked in fur trimmings and fake ice and fluffy synth-snow, even here on Tatooine, where the day’s never colder than 25C. Hell of a place to celebrate Life Day, but such is the nature of war. Campaigns wait for no man and no holiday.
Fives wishes they were in space. It’s cold in space. Maybe, if it were colder, he could bundle up in a blanket or share a bunk and try and thaw the ice in his chest.
Maybe if he were in space he could fly away from this shit. The whole celebrating thing is pointless, anyway. Waste of resources and energy. Rex never should have authorized it. Skywalker should have put a stop to it.
Across the makeshift barracks, Jesse jams a long red hat onto Kix’s head. Appo falls off his bunk laughing.
He takes a hold of the pendant hanging on his necklace. It, at least, has the good grace to be cold. It’s smooth and skin-worn and it warms slowly in his hands, seeping chill into his fingers. He wonders whether its twin was destroyed in the explosion. Must have been hot then. Firy.
“Happy Life Day, Echo,” he whispers into his white-knuckled fist.
No one answers.
He wants to go to sleep.