#rel: The Dreaming (Boba & Sintas)

[nieithryn]

An Anon asked: Meta + Sintas [For Boba? You seem to use his Legends canon]

Nonny, I want to give you a lil smooch, because this is such a thoughtful lil thing to send me, and you're right, I do mainly use Boba's Legends canon! Partly because I haven't actually seen Book of Boba Fett as yet (...I'm working on it) and partly because I actually think it's an important and meaningful storyline that gets misinterpreted (willfully or otherwise) by folks a lot.

Boba loved Sintas. Wholly, unconditionally. After he got out of prison, she was another youngster in the outlaw scene, and she didn't want to be there any more than he did. She said she wanted to get out of the life, and Boba had never really wanted to be in it. She said she wanted to be normal, to have a family like they never had. And Boba agreed.

There were red flags he probably should have noted, but he was only 14 when they started sort-of seeing one another. It didn't seem weird to him that she made their encounters more about her than him. He didn't notice how she corrected him frequently, shaping their shared future into her dream rather than a collaboration. But he didn't realize that those weren't healthy. She stayed, she said she loved him, and she asked him to take her away from their life, to build a new one with her, and he did.

Boba got a real, stand-up job as a Journeyman Protector. He married her. He was so excited to be a father, to raise Ailyn. To be a normal person, to have the life his father couldn't have or give him. To give his daughter that life. He loved his wife, and he wanted her to have that life too. Normal, quiet, peaceful.

Sintas didn't love their life that much. She loved the idea of being a family woman, but she resented being at home on the farm while Boba worked. She left him to care for their daughter when he got home, and they fought frequently about that and many other things. They fought over everything, really, but he thought they could work things out. He always thought they could work things out.

Boba would have done anything for his family, and he did. He killed a man for his wife, and rather than seeing it as the love he bore her, the urge to avenge her honor and protect her and their daughter, Sintas accused him of ruining their lives. She refused to join him off of Concord Dawn after his exile, instead staying where he could never go back, effectively cutting him off from his child. She told him she never wanted to see him again.

He grew to resent her. He resented being denied his daughter, being told that he could never see her, that he was the reason Ailyn would have no father. He resented Sintas acting as if he abandoned them, and he resented her becoming a bounty hunter again after she sent him away, when she could have done any job to raise their daughter. He resented her making everything his fault.

He also believed everything she said. He never remarried. He never tried for another family. He believed he did ruin their life, but he was barely more than a child himself. He felt responsible.

And he still loved her.

Boba held onto the flame of that love for decades. Loved her from afar, with pain, even after learning she turned their daughter so far against him that she wanted him dead. Still loved her even after learning she left their daughter alone in the galaxy.

Boba Fett died still loving the woman he fell in love with at the age of 14. Despite the insecurities she caused in him, the pain. Despite the wounds she inflicted that never ever stopped bleeding. He never stopped loving her. He never thought himself worthy of anyone's love ever again, but he still loved her, even into his sixties, seventies. Even after she was freed from carbonite, a fraction of his age, he gave her a culturally significant gemstone necklace to let her 'catch up' with his memories (Sintas is a kiffar with psychommetry) from the time after they broke up. He still loved her, despite it all. Wanted her to catch up with him, opened his soul to her.

Theirs was a horrid, toxic love, traumatized teenager and pre-teen romance that should never have gotten past a crush, but for his part, Boba loved Sintas truly and deeply.

(Anyway, if you want a good overview of the Vibes of Boba and Sintas' relationship, these songs, in order: Take Me To Church Abracadabra The Dreamin' That's All My Life Hope you enjoy the suffering!)