I’m having a lot of feelings about Beru Whitesun Lars so I’m going to make you all suffer with me.
Beru Whitesun had always wanted children. Since she was a little girl, she dreamed of having a son or daughter to call her own, to love with everything she had. When she married Owen Lars, he had shared the same views as her, wanting to have a child when they were ready.
Beru Lars never thought of her step-nephew Luke as a burden, but rather a blessing. With the delivery of Luke Skywalker that fateful night, after hearing Obi-wan’s explanation on how Owen’s step-brother, Anakin, had been killed, the married couple put their nephew to bed to discuss their future. Raising and caring for Luke meant they could have no children of their own; the life of a poor moisture farmer made it difficult to raise more than one child. Though saddened by her nephew’s past, Beru did not care. With every passing year, Beru cared for her nephew as if he were her own son, teaching him to read and singing him the lullabys her mother had sung to her as a child. Luke was a conscientious child, picking up on social queues his aunt did not think he would.
On one particular day, when Luke was about ten years old, Beru decided to take her nephew into town with her as she did her shopping. As she walked around the market, Luke’s hand held firmly in her own, she heard the whispers of those who heard about Luke’s mysterious past.
“Bless her,” said one woman, “taking in a bastard child. Poor woman had to give up having her own child in order to raise another’s.”
“I heard the boy was a war orphan,” said another, “related to her and Owen some way.”