It was easier to look ahead than to look for his reaction, but that was the trouble with being a Jedi. She sensed it all the same. Shock rippled through the Force, causing Freya to slow her steps and frown to herself. Though the feeling dissipated quickly, it was strange enough that she nearly forgot the tightness in her throat threatening to grip her as it always did whenever she let herself think of her birthday for more than a passing moment. And not just strange – his shock had been strong, out of proportion for her minor admission.
But it wasn’t minor, was it? Birthdays were important – less so in adulthood, and even less when there was no one left in your life who remembered it, for whatever reason – and that was the problem. If birthdays in the Shepherd household had been less special, if they hadn’t been the one day of the year when one son or daughter got all the attention instead of splitting it five ways, then it would’ve been easier for Freya to accept the idea that August 23rd was just another day when the people who made it special were no longer with her. But the best memories were the hardest to forget, and the ache of her family’s absence was more piercing on this day than any other. She didn't miss the attention so much as she missed their love and all the ways they showed it on this day. Her day.
She supposed from the outside, and somewhat from Kyle’s unique view inside, her feelings might seem anomalous for someone who had more or less accepted her own solitude with a resignation that was easily mistaken for peace for so long. But that still didn’t explain...
“Is that really so surprising?” She responded to the feeling behind his words rather than the words themselves; his observation was correct and there was no use denying it. For the moment, she avoided turning, though she did pause in the middle of the aisle, clinging to her bag and speaking a little more defensively than she intended. “I can hate things without hating them. I'm still just a person, I'm not – ”
Closing her eyes, Freya caught herself before her temper got away with her. It was misdirected anyway, old wounds sparking an anger to conceal the real culprit – which was pain, of course. Plain old pain. Normally she was better at keeping it buried, but then again, she never talked about it. And conversations with Kyle were far from normal, from all that was said to all that wasn’t.
All that wasn’t.
Freya turned, looking curiously over her shoulder. Maybe that was it. The reason he’d reacted so strangely was because there was something he wasn’t saying. There was no sign of it now as he looked contemplatively at a book on the shelf, not actively avoiding eye contact as she’d just done, but not exactly seeking it out, either. Her eyes lingered on his extended finger tracing the spine of a book for perhaps a moment too long before they snapped to his face, narrowing suspiciously. Even that small admission of not caring for his own birthday, that was covering for something else, she could feel it.
“I didn’t always.” Stepping next to him, she kept her voice even and picked a book at random at the shelf below his, which was more on her eye level. She glanced upwards once, quietly hoping to herself that if she kept talking then maybe he would too, then resumed flipping through the book. “Hate it, I mean. I used to love it, because it was the one thing to look forward to in August. Sometimes school started on my birthday, and I even loved it then. But now it’s just… empty.”