Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/5564245.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      F/M
  Fandom:
      Star_Wars_Episode_VII:_The_Force_Awakens_(2015)
  Relationship:
      Kylo_Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben_Solo
  Character:
      Ben_Solo_|_Kylo_Ren, Rey_(Star_Wars), Finn_(Star_Wars), Poe_Dameron,
      Jessika_Pava
  Additional Tags:
      Alternate_Universe_-_Modern_Setting, Unhealthy_Relationships, Freeform,
      Angst, Alternate_Universe_-_High_School, Alternate_Universe_-_College/
      University, Drug_Use
  Stats:
      Published: 2015-12-28 Completed: 2016-04-03 Chapters: 6/6 Words: 8302
****** when there's nothing left to burn, you have to set yourself on fire.
******
by ohyellowbird
Summary
     He hates his family and he hates his friends and sometimes he even
     hates her, but oh, when he doesn’t.
Notes
     Hello, my name is oyb and I am Reylo trash. I love this ship with my
     entire being and really just wanted to get a feel for them with this
     drabble. I might flesh this au out in the future or add a few more
     chapters of freeform drabbles if anyone is interested. xx
***** Chapter 1 *****
The boy next door isn’t your average American Eagle campaign. He isn’t tanned
arms in muscle tanks and blond hair swept under a logoed snapback. His backyard
isn’t full of pretty drunks and red solo cups. The noise coming from his
bedroom isn’t Drake and laughter.
No, the boy next door is what the woods look like at night on a new moon--black
and dangerous. He is dark hair hiding darker eyes and a temper that shakes the
window panes.
He hates his family and he hates his friends and sometimes he even hates her,
but oh, when he doesn’t. When he doesn’t, he leaves footsteps on her roof and
flowers on the desk inside her room, an apology for yesterday’s tears. When he
doesn’t, he plants roses with his mouth on the corners of her shoulders and
plays her ribcage featherlight like a glass piano.
Some nights, when it’s too hot for covers he’ll lay with her on sun-warmed
concrete and let her trace out his shape with pastel-colored chalk, let her
draw stars for his eyes and a rainbow for his smile. And some nights, when
there’s frost on the shrubs and her heater’s gone out the window will slide
open and he’ll slink into her bed, waking her with frozen hands and hot breath
on the nape of her neck.
When he misses her, he’ll double text, he’ll call six times. But when he
doesn’t, when he’s hanging out with a bad crowd and making even worse plans, he
disappears. He’ll skip town for a week at a time, ditch school and his parents.
No note, not to them, not to her. He will let her worry herself sick and turn
up again like nothing’s happened, refusing to explain.
It gets so bad that eventually they both end up with scars, hers inside, a wall
forged around her heart to keep him out and his a miscalculated outburst, a
glass ashtray he kept on her sill thrown when he shows up after another long
absence. It cuts him across the cheek and the bridge of his nose and she spends
the next twenty minutes standing between his legs in the upstairs bathroom with
antibacterial and butterfly bandages.
“I’m sorry,” she says, looking through tears, angry and sad, and his remorseful
I love you hurts.
When he’s patched up and they’ve cleaned the glass from the roof, he kicks
dirty black Converse under her desk and crawls into bed. She stands for awhile
at the foot of it with crossed arms, a collage of anger and guilt, and still,
despite all reason, of love. Until he sheds his Morrissey shirt and beckons
with hands and heart and a look that pulls. “Please.”
With her foster parents downstairs and his across the street out of their minds
with worry, she shelves it all, again, and allows him to draw her under the
blankets. In his arms, she listens to empty promises about graduation and
leaving this town together and then they’re kissing, her face still wet and his
bloodied.
And his kiss, oh. It still lights her up inside in a way only he is capable of.
It still burns through all the rest.
***** Chapter 2 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
“REY! REY! REY!!”
At the end of the runway, she grins, wide and white. And with a paper number
pinned to her top and a pole in her hand, she takes off in a sprint.
Extracurriculars are paramount for getting into a good college and Rey does it
all: debate club, newspaper, volleyball, french. But her very favorite of all
after-school activities is track and field, and of that, the pole vault. It’s
the closest she’s ever been to flying, all of her baggage left on the ground,
tiny dots and shapes of landscape when her body soars and swerves overhead.
That same voice chanting her name is back at it again when she lands face-up on
the pit, only now it’s a chorus of voices, “Rey! Rey! Rey!” When she rolls up
onto her feet and rejoins the rest of her team, Jessika is the first to embrace
her, sweat be damned. They hug and twirl and congratulate one another--Jessika
does hurdles. And at the end of the meet, just before sunset, Rey is released
with gatorade and a banana to find that voice in the stands.
It isn’t her labelless lover supporting the match, no, he’s in the middle of
another disappearance; it’s been four days now. But her performance tonight and
the arms that inhale her mitigate that ache.
“Finn!”
“Holy shit, girl! You were fire out there!”
“You must be my lucky charm,” and he laughs, lifts her up away from the cement,
buries his face in the salt of her neck.
Finn is like a brother to Rey, was once, for a few months. They met young, both
growing up in the foster system and though their placement together didn’t work
out for reasons beyond their control, they’ve been one of few constants in one
another’s lives. As they've gotten older, hang outs have become less frequent.
FInn goes to school across town, but their football teams are playing tonight
and Finn’s boyfriend is the quarterback.
“Let me hit the locker room. Rinse off real quick and I’ll be back, okay?”
He nods, pointing down the stands towards a small shack by the field, “And I’ll
get us something to snack on.”
 
Twenty minutes later they’re huddled together around a basket of chili cheese
fries and two forks.
Forty-five minutes later Poe scores a touchdown and Finn spills a liter of Dr.
Pepper in the rush to his feet.
Two hours later the game is over and Rey is wearing Poe’s letterman while he
and Finn walk her to the parking lot. Their breath is visible, late Fall crisp
and all around. When she gets in the car it’s only after cheek kisses and bone-
crushing hugs and threats that if they don’t get together soon there will be
hell to pay. And then she leaves them to lovebirding and follows dark roads
towards home.
 
Her evening has been beautiful: orangey-pink adrenaline and then midnight blue
victory before the strings of green, yellow, red amidst black. But when she
pulls into the quiet cul de sac where she lives, everything is a heart-
palpitating red and blue.
It’s everywhere, beating against the houses and the cars, invading her front
windows and transforming her smile into a slackened fearful frown.
The engine stops in her driveway but she runs the other way. There are figures
on the lawn in front of her and two by the door, but the only truly rendered
sight before her is that of Ben on his knees in the grass.
“REY!”
Chapter End Notes
     this is kind of an in-between chapter, but i wanted to flesh out the
     universe a bit more. the next one will be very reylo-centric.
***** Chapter 3 *****
Chapter Summary
     Rey is sprinting for him, the need to close the distance between them
     the only thing on her mind but before her shoes hit the sidewalk
     there are arms around her shoulders peeling her back and a man’s
     voice in her ear, “Miss, you can’t be here. Miss.”
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Ben’s eyes look like glass from this far away in the dark, wide and shining and
so full of torment. Rey is sprinting for him, the need to close the distance
between them the only thing on her mind but before her shoes hit the sidewalk
there are arms around her shoulders peeling her back and a man’s voice in her
ear, “Miss, you can’t be here. Miss.”
She ignores it and, blind with tears, fights against the uniformed officer.
“What-what happened? Ben, what did you do?!” but he remains a quiet, unblinking
mass on the lawn. A figure on the porch, however, stirs. Mrs. Solo traces the
edge of the grass and reaching them, gently prizes the policeman’s hands from
Rey, explains that it’s alright, that she can stay.
Rey fixes her eyes on Leia, numb to her own body, to the neighbors trickling
out from their houses to see what’s going on, to the officer on his walkie-
talkie saying that there won’t be an arrest, that nobody’s pressing charges.
She clamps her arms around Leia and begins crying in earnest, their hearts
trapped and frantic inside the hug.
“Are you okay? Is everything okay? Ben-”
“Everything’s fine,” Leia presses gently, “we’re all okay,” but Rey can’t
believe it. This isn’t what okay looks like, not even close.
“Can you tell me what happened?”
“It’s late. Let us walk you back.” Ben’s father has appeared at Leia’s side and
now Rey is beginning to understand. His left eye socket is swollen and there is
a trail of crusted blood underneath one badly discolored nostril. Anger finds
it’s place next to fear within her.
“Oh my god! Ben! Did he-”
Han sighs, nodding. He glances back at his son slowly getting to his feet,
“Things haven’t been easy. We have a lot to talk about. Can Ben call you
tomorrow?”
And Rey wants to scream no. Her track meet feels like a distant memory, any
contentment or joy she’d found in the night washed away by the sight in front
of her, and she wants answers for it. Ben can be a real shithead, but hitting
his father? The police being called? That’s a level of fucked up she’d thought
was behind her.
But this isn’t about her. This is a family in crisis, and so she nods, pulls
Leia in for another hug and gets Han for one too before sparing the quickest of
glances at Ben where he stands. And then Rey walks away from his pleading stare
and back to the harmony of her own house.
 
Her foster parents have questions for her inside, about her meet and about the
scene outside and she indulges them for a few minutes, still teary-eyed, before
heading upstairs to shower. The water works at her muscles while she works
unsuccessfully at calming her mind. She stands under the stream thoroughly
rattled, face swallowed by her hair. What had he done? And why? She’s been
watching him slowly unravel for over a year but what she’d seen outside was
just a pile of loose yarn.
The water goes cold and she towels off, touches on the idea of calling Finn to
put her at ease or at least to distract but then exhaustion seems to blanket
her all at once, and so with her hair in a damp bun, Rey burrows into bed and
falls into a fitful sleep.
An hour later she is woken by the window.
“No.”
Ben’s silhouette pauses before dropping into her room, “Rey, please. Let me
explain.”
Eyes puffy from crying, she drags herself up to sit against the headboard and
puts one arm out to keep him back. “You hit your dad.”
“I know.”
“Who the fuck does that?”
He looks physically stricken by her anger, winces at the venom in her voice,
cowers from it, “I’m sorry.”
“That doesn’t mean anything.”
Rey’s pulse is thundering but an unnatural calm also settles now that she’s
heard him talk, seen that he is just a boy again. It’s a calm that speaks on
fatigue. Of the ups and downs he puts her through. Of the blooming idea that
love might not be enough.
He must know how close he is to losing her because with the most pained whisper
he begs to come closer, his hands opening and closing in anxious fervor at his
sides, “Please.”
She doesn’t say yes, but she doesn’t say no and so he hurries, dips down onto
her bed to kneel in front of her, wraps his arms around her folded legs and
rests his cheek against her knees.
“I have school tomorrow.”
“I know, I’m sorry. We can go to bed.”
“Why did you do it? And why do you leave?”
His face lifts up and he straightens, adjusts to sit cross-legged and reel her
into his lap, putting them face to face, his nose brushing hers, “I’ll tell you
everything. You’re so important to me.” The words hold hardly any sound and his
eyes are hooded, watching her mouth. He sounds like he might shake apart or
cry.
Rey wants to be strong, but she’s so bone-deep tired and burning down one of
the only homes she’s ever had is too much for tonight. “You missed my meet
today,” she says, a white flag, and then they’re kissing.
Ben makes a hungry sound and leans into her like he’s starved, his hands
starfished against her back, bending her in. The scar on his face is still hard
when it scrapes over her jaw, his head tilted to plant lips against her neck.
He treats her like a gift, “I love you, I love you…” but she wants his body,
not his words. Only the former can bring her some scrap of temporary peace. And
of course, he’ll oblige.
Her sleep shirt comes off and his sweater, and then go the chain wallet and his
jeans before he flattens over her on the bed. His skin is a cold kiss until
they get under the covers. “So precious perfect,” he coos, squirming down the
mattress to put his mouth between her legs, hot breath against the cotton of
her underwear. He makes a wet spot there with the flat of his tongue until she
can’t stand the constant pressure and then he strips her bare. Fingers kneading
the lean muscle of her thighs and the repeat-rasp of stubble where she’s soft,
it’s so good. But after a few minutes she dredges him up with needy hands and a
quiet admission of want.
In a moment they’ve rearranged so that he’s seated and she’s sitting, the
comforter draped around them both when she lifts her hips and he guides her
down. She sighs heated relief and he groans, drops his forehead to her shoulder
and bites, rests his thumbs against the creases of her thighs and lets Rey set
the pace. It’s slow and quiet, just their love-lust sounds and push-pull
breaths and the occasional string of I love yous that Ben stitches into her
skin with his mouth. Images of cop cars and bruised bones fade until it’s just
this and Rey comes with her fingers knotted in his hair.
“Tomorrow, I’ll pick you up from school and you can ask me anything you want,”
he says after, sealed up against her back while her breathing starts to even
out. “Tomorrow, I’ll fix it.” And before it all comes back, she tells him okay,
that she knows. And they sleep.
 
In the morning he’s gone and her parents are downstairs waiting with news. They
know what happened last night, they’ve heard.
When Rey finds out it was drugs, cocaine in Ben’s system and more than an eight
ball in his pocket, she lets Jessika take her home from school. They go rock
climbing and then to the hardware store so that she can buy a lock for her
window.
Chapter End Notes
     drug addiction is the dark side! this is such an angsty au, i'm
     sorry. i will write more soon (because i have problems).
***** Chapter 4 *****
Chapter Summary
     For months and months she sleeps with the blinds closed and the
     stereo on.
Chapter Notes
     this is another short in-between chapter for the most part.
See the end of the chapter for more notes
For months and months she sleeps with the blinds closed and the stereo on.
Those first few nights, when he hadn’t known she knew, when he didn’t
understand, the panes would vibrate with such desperate wrath. Rey would strip
her covers from the bed they used to share and sleep on the couch, unable to
imagine him crouched outside.
For months and months she aches like a freshly split lip, spending time with
friends and on the phone, busies herself to exhaustion to keep the devastation
from finding her idle. Poe starts letting her stay over when his parents are
out of town, his house a long walk from her own. They stay up late talking
about Finn and sometimes they cuddle, his warmth against her back platonic and
pure but a salve for the quiet moments when she can’t escape the hurt.
She throws herself into classes and extracurriculars, sets her mind on college
applications.
Jessika takes her to shows on the weekends, to see local bands in cafés and DJs
in scraped out warehouses. It’s fun, the heavy bass in control of her heart for
a little while, but when she turns and sees a pair of eyes with pupils blown
wide, it brings everything back. Was ending things like she did really for the
best or was she abandoning Ben in his time of need? The trajectory that they
were on was only leading down, and she made the decision to get off the ride,
but could he? Or was she letting him drown?
Panic pulls Rey out of her daily routines, the attacks frequent enough that
those around her know what it looks like, how to help. Her parents are scared,
asking questions that don’t have easy answers.
 
It isn’t until late January that she sees him again. Not glimpses from across
the street, a sliver of black slipping in and out of a car at all hours, but
really sees him. She is stretching with her team for a meet, spread out in a
circle doing crazy-eights, talking in puffs of white on a Saturday morning.
Jessika is talking about the ska band she’d seen last night when suddenly her
eyes stick somewhere over Rey’s shoulder and a dark look marrs her face.
“What is it?” Rey asks in a half-smile that melts.
It’s Ben. At the end of the bleachers sitting alone, his arms bare in a black
tank top with low arm holes, a lyrical tattoo she’s traced countless times
visible against his ribs. It’s barely pushing 50 out, not nearly warm enough to
forgo sleeves, and yet.
Rey’s head snaps back, eyes glazing over, pricking red, and Jessika wants to
say something, but she waves off the concern. “Don’t. I’ll be okay.” A few of
the other girls notice but only momentarily, and then they’re all being called
over by the coach.
She performs worse than she can ever remember, but her team only worries. They
sit huddled when it’s over wondering whether her knee has fully healed since
she tweaked it, regaling horror stories of friends who’ve blown theirs out or
needed surgery. She is grateful for it, for their warmth, hugs them with juice
in her hand and then leaves.
Ben is waiting by her car.
The abrupt sight of him runs her through. It takes everything to remain
upright, but she does, armed with memories of his mistreatment. Closer, she
sees that he’s got a silver hoop through one nostril now, that there’s a new
tattoo crawling up from beneath the shallow U of his muscle shirt. His scar has
healed, now just a long line of milky pale dividing his face.
A teammate’s boyfriend passes her by then, raises a hand to Ben as he goes,
“Kylo! Up top!” They high-five and then the guy is speaking low; Rey doesn’t
catch his words but she can imagine what it might be about. Her shoulders
square, her chin tips high.
“Rey, come on.”
She stops short, out of reach, “Is that what you’re going by now? Kylo? To
clientele anyway.”
His eyes are hard and so, so black. His stare has teeth. “You don’t know what
you’re talking about.”
“Get off my car,” but he remains, arms folded though his body’s bent towards
her like a plant towards light. There are shadows shaped like rowboats
underneath his eyes and his cheeks have hollowed. She takes it in by bits, his
reality she’s blinded herself to. “You need help.”
“Says someone who doesn’t give a shit, who left me.” And he laughs, but it
isn’t happy.
Rey wants to cry but stubbornness won’t allow it. She drops her duffle and
comes closer, pushes at his chest, puts her hurt somewhere else, sets her rage
aflame, “You fucking lied to me! You were always lying to me! And I didn’t
deserve it. And neither did your parents. I fucking--I let you have
everything!”
Ben takes it for awhile, lets her beat on him, but then his arms are around her
and that she can’t take. “Please, please, talk to me,” he begs against the
shell of her ear, binding her against his chest. But he can’t put her out, not
now that she’s a wildfire. In a violent twist of motion she whips out of his
grasp and shoves, locks herself into her car before he finds his footing again
and peels out of the lot.
 
Twelve hours later she’s sitting in the ICU waiting room with Han and Leia
while Ben is inside being treated for an overdose.
Chapter End Notes
     SO SORRY FOR THAT! really! i promisepromise that i will update again
     very soon, hopefully before the weekend is out. xx
***** Chapter 5 *****
Chapter Summary
     There’s nothing to do but wait, and so she does. Waits and remembers.
Chapter Notes
     oh my god you guys. i'm so sorry it's taken me so long. this month is
     my birthday month and i've been dealing with job interview stuff, and
     i'm just so sorry! anyway, love you!
     UPDATE 3/31: i am so close to being done with the next/last chapter.
     just a few scenes left!
See the end of the chapter for more notes
There’s nothing to do but wait, and so she does. Waits and remembers.
 
 
She remembers the first time she let him kiss her, remembers his confession
beforehand of how badly he wanted to, remembers the way his voice shook. He was
barely contained in a way she’d learn was common; a bent branch at the brink of
snapping, frayed and splintered but still useful, still good. They’d been out
by the river, somewhere he’d wanted Rey to see, and on less than a date. He was
the boy next door and she was wary, but proximity brought him into her orbit
often and with enough coaxing she’d gone.
The sun was setting and Ben’s hands were parentheses in the air around her
waist; he was always in wait. “Let me,” he breathed, and the warmth of his
words against her face was a spell cast.
Stood up on a log of driftwood to put them at eye level, she grinned. He was
handsome and tall and the intensity of his attention felt like belonging if she
were to guess at the way such a thing might feel. Watching the way his dark
eyes fed on her, she said, very carefully, “Okay.” And then there wasn’t any
air between them or in either of their lungs.
 
She remembers how they met, a misstep and a fall and him only in the right
place at the right time because he was a creep.
Before she joined the gym by school, when she was first moved in, Rey would
spend afternoons at the old rock quarry, free climbing before sunset. Working
out had always been something of a constant in her life. It was cheaper than
therapy and gave her a leg up in track.
The day they met, properly, Rey was fifteen-or-so feet high up one side of the
quarry. She’d been searching for her next handhold when a hawk, swooping
suddenly into her vision towards its nest, had startled her. From there,
everything happened in slow motion. Rey watched herself lose grip and fall away
from the rock, had enough time to berate herself for being so stupid as to
climb here alone, and worry for whoever might find her.
In seconds she’d be sunny-side brains.
Except that she wasn’t. She was caught, a bundle in strong, bare arms. She was
caught and then on her feet, wheeling around with her heart ready for take off
and her every thought rattled.
It was the boy next door, the one with the long, pale face who would sometimes
lay out on his roof at night with the stereo blaring from inside his room.
She was momentary gratitude that soured to indignation. “Where’d you come
from?”
“Well, when a mommy and a daddy love each other very much…”
“Don’t be cute.”
“I followed you down here. I wanted to know where you go.”
“What? Ew.” She wished she had something to swing. Her hands curled into fists.
He remained entirely unaffected by her hostility, smirking even. “What’s your
name?”
Her chest puffed, chin high, “That’s none of your business,” and then she
turned heel to leave, hearing him walking behind her all the way home, quiet
and smug because of what he’d done, because of how, despite herself, she’d
blushed.
 
She remembers him showing up with donuts to one of her early morning practices,
feeding her a few glazed bites before leading her to his car so that she could
return a hero with stacked pink boxes for the team.
 
She remembers less innocent things too, better. She remembers being in the pit
with him jammed up against her back, them both covered in the sweat of
strangers and his mouth against her ear, his words drowning out the heavy
bassline. “I can’t fucking take this, other people touching you, getting to
feel how soft you are. Fuck, you smell so good. When we get home, can I bury
myself in you? Rey - I need it, Rey.”
And while he was talking, and the band was playing, his cock was hard against
the small of her back and his hands were wandering. The legs of her shorts were
frayed to nothing and his fingers rimmed the torn edges almost absentmindedly,
giving her an electrical shock whenever they’d skim her inner thighs. The
players on stage grew fuzzy and then her eyes were rolling because he’d snuck
up one of the legholes to rub against her, the very tip of one finger slip-
sliding past her underwear and inside.
“Jesus, baby, you’re killing me. So wet, so ready. I want to fuck you now. Take
you to the bathroom and set you down on the sink, make you babble with my
tongue and then fucking have you. Please.”
But they didn’t leave early. Ben continued to tease her into madness, his tone
turned pleading as time went on. He left marks along the sides of her throat
and pumped her just one or two knuckles full. Nobody noticed, people sardined
together, unable to see below shoulders and heads. When the last band had
finished their set, however, he had all but carried Rey to the car, grasping at
the tops of her thighs, at her ass, pulling her into the backseat. He wanted to
kiss her breathless, to put his hands where anyone else’s might have grazed.
They fucked there, frantic and starved in the cramped space and then again at
his house on the couch just inside. His parents were out of town and she was
able, for once, to scream. He made her want to, down on his knees with her legs
over his shoulders, before either one of them had showered. It was a little bit
gross but Rey was weak for how insatiable Ben was for her; she’d never felt so
wanted in her life, by anyone.
 
She remembers one of their worst fights, when he put a hole in her room after
she told him she’d been with Finn that day and that, no, they really weren’t
fucking. She remembers how wild his eyes were even after they’d filled with
angry tears, remembers them being warm when she’d pushed them away with her
thumbs.
The next day he’d come back, to the front door for once, with a framed picture
of Alex Honnold to cover the hole.
 
She remembers his fingers twisting, fucking her deep and his huge hand pressed
against her belly to feel it, knelt in the covers between her legs like she was
some holy thing to be prayed upon. She remembers sucking him off after, only
getting her mouth on him for a minute or two before he wanted her riding his
cock. They were back in the quarry again - his idea. She’d found a note on her
desk with instructions that afternoon, and then blankets and dinner at the
site. One year together, spent the very best way.
 
She remembers, despite it all, always feeling like a necessity around him,
tethered so completely to another person, no longer floating alone.
 
 
“There he is!”
Time stops. Her world spins off its axis.
Rey unbuckles and leans forward into the space between the two front seats,
feeling the same as she had when she’d fallen in the quarry, her heart quickly
carving its way out of her chest.
Walking slowly down the front steps in a grey t-shirt with a rolling bag and a
duffel, is Ben making his way towards the car. His hair is shorter, partially
shaved.
It’s bright out, the first warmth of spring, and she can’t stand it. Like the
flowers and the trees, she has waited. Three months of it and she’s done. Rey
eases open the door and steps out into the sun, into his path. It takes a
moment to register, but when he sees her his whole face changes, his hands let
go and the luggage drops.
They have miles to go before they’re better, Rey knows that, but sprinting
towards Ben that day, cutting through the carefully curated lawn of Valley
Recovery Center, she can’t remember the last time his smile had been so easy
and so full.
Chapter End Notes
     now that ben's out of rehab, maybe things will work out?
***** Chapter 6 *****
Chapter Summary
     After the initial bliss of seeing him passes, she is reminded of the
     vast damage he’s done, to himself and to her, to his family.
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
It all feels so surreal.
After the initial bliss of seeing him passes, she is reminded of the vast
damage he’s done, to himself and to her, to his family. Her body begs to be
near him but her mind struggles. Forgive and forget is simple, in theory.
After a shared hug with his parents, Ben folds his long frame into the backseat
with Rey, keeping her hands, marvelling at them when his eyes aren’t feasting
upon her face.
She is in knots about his laser-focused affection.
During the drive there is little talking, the Skywalkers treading lightly as
though they might upset three months of recovery with the wrong phrase, but Ben
has words for her, questions. “How are you? How have you been? I’m so sorry,
Rey. You have to know… Did you take the SATs yet? Is your track season over?”
He shows interest in things that hardly phased him in the last year, takes to
worrying her knuckles between his fingertips when she answers slowly or not at
all. Rey swallows and releases one of her hands to pin a piece of hair behind
his ear.
“Enough, okay? How are you?”
Ben curves his hand around the side of her face, turns her to see him head on.
His eyes are anxious, bouncing between each of her own and she forgets for a
moment that his parents are feet away.
“I feel good,” he says seriously, like he wants to press the words into her
skin to show her the truth of them, “better.”
But Rey doesn’t know what to do with the emotions that rise up to drown her at
such fixed attention, breaks their contact every way she can and breathes,
looks back up only after the moment has passed. “Good. That’s good, Ben.”
 
Nothing starts back up between them once he’s home again. She becomes
determined to give the Solo family space, and to focus on her studies. Everyone
needs some time to adjust, to heal.
Without her obstinate rage to keep her distant, it can be hard, not to call or
to let herself hope that he’s waiting just behind the window coverings at
night. But something has settled since she’d seen him leaving that rehab
facility. Ben didn’t feel like a time bomb anymore and Rey wasn’t kept awake
wondering how she might diffuse him or what the carnage might be if she
couldn’t.
The track season finishes and is quickly replaced by volleyball. Ben comes to
every match, unobtrusive at the top of the stands and gone by the last whistle.
She often wonders what else he’s doing with his time but keeps herself too busy
to find out. The gym, her studies, French tutoring on Wednesdays, college
research with her fosters…
Soon there aren’t any holes in her schedule and she’s run out of the energy
required to dwell on thoughts of him.
 
It’s May before she has a chance to take a breath, before they really talk
again.
The sun is staying out later, days in the final stretch towards summer, and
it’s only just dusk when Rey gets home from debate team. She’s shirking out of
her blazer in the driveway when her name is called.
“Rey!”
Butterflies like bats stutter out of repose and take flight in her belly.
Ben is sitting out on the sidewalk with a Coke, his hands slick with grease
from his dad’s old Chevy. She loosens the knot of her tie and without thinking,
walks into the street, ‘Hey.”
His hair is pulled up out of his eyes and she can see now that the underside is
still buzzed short, but is distracted easily by the way muscle has filled him
out. Arms, shoulders, calves. He looks healthy, looks great.
“How are you?”
She shrugs, “Good, you?”
“Same. So, letting anybody take you to prom next weekend? Just curious, wanna
know if I should be jealous.” He says it with a smirk but there’s no familiar
undercurrent of possessiveness to his voice, just a little bit of sadness.
Rey folds her arms, squinting, steps back when he stands to offer her a sip of
his drink. “Nope, too busy. I’ve got SATs that afternoon.”
“Cool. I think I’m going to transfer to USSD in the Fall. They have a good
science program.”
She can barely contain her grin hearing him talk so freely of the future,
taking the initiative to plan for it.
“Will your units from last semester transfer?” She swallows down a mouthful of
soda and he grimaces, tells her he doesn’t know, that it doesn’t matter. One
wasted semester of community college isn’t that big of a deal in the grand
scheme of things.
When she hands back the drink their fingers brush.
“Well, I better, uh, go home. Need to study.”
“Okay. I’ll see you.”
“Yeah.”
Ben’s blackened prints are still discernible when she’s back inside her room
getting ready for bed, when she’s lifting the curtain to see him working under
the corner street light. His face turns towards her window and she lets the
fabric drop, feeling pleasantly stung but nowhere near ready.
 
When Jessika finds out that Rey‘s ditched junior prom, she shows up late that
night, unannounced, firing off a text and then two, and when they both go
unanswered resorts to blaring her horn.
“COME ON, BUN HEAD. I KNOW YOU’RE UP!”
Rey only catches the second round of honking when she emerges from the shower,
tripping over her towel in the race to her bedroom window. She snaps open the
blinds and looks down, hardly decent. Below, Poe and Finn are draped over one
another in the backseat of Jessika’s drop top, and the three of them are still
dressed to the nines. They all raise their faces and wave, beckoning her out.
“Come out and play,” Finn hollers, standing up in his seat, “We can’t let you
miss out on all the fun.”
There’s nothing for it but to laugh, and Rey does, gesturing to herself, “Look
at me. I’m a little underdressed.” But before she can go on with her excuses,
Poe is out of the car and climbing the lattice on the side of the house,
scrambling up tiles and into her hastily opened window.
It takes a few minutes of convincing and the plundering of her dresser, but Poe
coerces her into a black, ladder-backed halter and beige shorts. “Where are we
going?” Rey asks over the whirlwind, grateful for her fosters’ absence this
weekend, but Poe’s lips are zippered and keyless and then she’s being rushed
down the stairs and into the dark.
“I just want to go on record as saying that I hate you all,” she declares,
yanking open the passenger door, and is met with an enthusiastic deluge of
hugs.
 
A rave. They take her to a rave. In a warehouse. On prom night.
In line for the door, Jessika tears away the bottom third of her dress, tossing
a careless shoulder at everyone’s gaping mouths, “Chill, it was a thrift find.”
By the time they make it inside, Rey’s hair has almost completely dried. She
coils it up into matching buns as they cross the threshold, assaulted by sound.
The DJ on a raised platform at the way front of the building is settled between
a cityscape of pulsing speakers. In front of them lies a sea of squirming
movement. Blacklight paint and satin, glowing crowns and chokers, plastic cups.
It’s madness, but any swell of trepidation is drowned out by the beat and her
friends, three smiling fools that lead her to the bar where they slam shooters
from LED lit glasses. Jessika gets into the paint and drags neon color in a
thick band across Rey’s eyes. Finn and Poe join in, drawing shapes on bare
shoulders and cheeks.
“Your teeth are so white,” Rey goggles at Finn, feeling her drink, allowing
herself to enjoy it. She is pretty sure the SATs went well, and relieved that
it’s all over. They four cheers to that with mixed drinks and then Rey is
feeding herself into the mess of a dance floor.
In time, she twirls and pogos her way to the front, skin gleaming and heart
racing in the best way. The people around her are technicolored ghosts, happy
blurs moving in and out of her space; none of them linger too long.
A few songs later, she finds her way against the platform and rests there for a
moment, laying her arms out across the stage. Her very bones vibrate from the
closeness of the speaker and she grins at the sensation, eyes open and then
stuck on a vaguely familiar face. The DJ is looking down at her and then off-
stage somewhere. She has short-cropped hair just shades from white and a
smoothly shaped helmet laying next to her feet.
“I didn’t know you were a Phasma fan,” comes a voice from her left and Rey
startles. Ben has emerged from absolutely nowhere and is leaned down for her
ear while keeping a cushion of air between them. She turns in the sliver of
space and smiles, the zap of fear deflating, “I’m with friends. Isn’t she one
of yours?” He nods and presses a cold water bottle into her hand, watches her
chug half of it down.
She comes up for air eventually and stuffs it back into the pocket of his
sleeveless hoodie, “Thanks.”
“I like the makeup.” His thumb traces the edge of the paint, dusting over her
cheekbone and the bridge of her nose, and she can’t help but lean into him. His
hand seems loathe to leave her skin, trailing down the side of her throat and
along her shoulder, sweeping down her arm to hold on at the elbow.
His stare weighs a ton, it always has.
“I’m scared,” she says over the music, unable to meet his eyes as she fidgets
with the zipper of his hoodie.
“I know.”
But he doesn’t leave her then, just tips Rey into his chest, rubs circles with
his thumb into the base of her hairline, and they move together slowly to the
next couple songs.
Their inevitable goodbye is sealed with a kiss, Rey on her tippy-toes to push
lips against his adam’s apple. By then her buzz is wearing off and sleepiness
has begun to set in. She needs sets sight for her friends.
Jessika is flirting with the bearded bartender near the front door and the
lovebirds are back in her car, no doubt defiling it.
“This was fun,” Rey tells them during the drive home, so full of love for love
and her friends.
Her bed is a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow by the time she’s safe inside
and undressed. Foregoing any skin care regimen, she flops down to the sound of
fading chatter from outside and sleeps soundly alone.
 
Summer weather arrives before the end of the school year and with it, Rey’s
longing for lazy days and the blissful absence of morning alarms.
She starts spending more time outside when her schedule allows, taking French
lessons on the grass, studying on a blanket by lantern. Her days take on an air
of ease despite how they fly by.
One sunny Saturday morning she wakes up to people’s voices and opens the blinds
to find Ben and his parents sitting in the open garage across the street. It’s
difficult to make out what they’re saying but the tone is unmistakably light
and Rey swoons in secret for a moment before carrying on with her routine.
 
The day she presses play is an ordinary Thursday night..
Volleyball runs late. By the time it wraps the stadium lights have kicked on
and her stomach is speaking in tongues.
“I think I’m starving to death,” she wails to the coach, shoving her kneepads
into a mesh bag and draining what’s left of her water bottle over her face.
Luke laughs, “Not before finals this weekend,” and calls practice at last.
Phone out to dial home for a ride, Rey misses Ben waiting for her at the mouth
of the roundabout until she’s nearly on top of him. He catches her by the
shoulders, grinning at the look on her face, “Took you long enough.”
She scowls, clutching her chest, “You know what? You’re gonna give me a
freaking heart attack one of these days. Also, hi.”
And now he’s laughing, taking her bag and bottle and tossing them both into the
open window of his car.
“Can I take you somewhere?” he asks cautiously, scanning her face for micro
expressions. “You can say no.”
Rey sighs, unsticking her sports bra from the center of her back. She’s used to
him cropping up out of thin air by now and after a moment of searching herself
for any apprehension she replies with a grumpy, “I stink,” that isn’t a no.
He stops for In-N-Out on the drive and lets her get halfway into his lap
explaining her order to a crackling speaker: Protein style. Ketchup and mustard
instead of special sauce. Onions but not tomatoes. They eat in mostly silence
with the stereo turned up until Ben signals for an apartment complex on the
right.
‘Where are we going?” Rey asks around a burger bite, and the look he gives her
is hard to decipher.
He makes the turn and begins down a long aisle of covered parking, pulling into
a numbered spot near the back of the lot. Rey is still in the car when he opens
her door to take over fast food duties with a double decker handful of fries.
“I want you to see my new place,” he says, nodding towards a tan row of
buildings.
She pauses with one hand on the buckle, blinking up at him from the low bucket
seat, “You’re moving?”
“Yeah, I just got the keys today. Come on.”
 
It’s perfect, she thinks, from the time they climb the steps and throughout the
rest of the tour. A one bedroom apartment with a tiny kitchen and patio, cheap
hardwood floors and clean white walls. It’s small and generic and it’s just
perfect for him. Something built atop his hard fought foundation for a new
start.
“I love it,” she says, dusting a finger over the fireplace mantle, “but why?”
Ben is parked against one wall, watching her flit from corner to corner, “I
needed a change. And it’s about midway between home and USSD’s campus.”
Rey nods slowly, trying to imagine the things from his room spread out in the
empty space. There isn’t a stick of furniture yet and she has the childish urge
to make snow angels on the empty floors. “When do you move?”
“Next weekend,” he says, “want to help?”
She has indulged and is starfished out on the floor, and giggling, “Nope. But I
will, I guess. If you need it.”
Ben pushes away from the wall and comes closer to stare down at her, openly
admiring the way her shirt has ridden up for a moment before his attention
snaps to something more serious. He nudges her side with the toe of his sneaker
and outstretches both hands, “I want to show you something.”
She doesn’t move right away, eyes stuck on his hands while their past forever
flashes by but then the moment passes and she lets him heave her up, numbly
follows his lead into the bedroom where light is pouring in from the window.
“Yeah, it’s nice,” she admires, having seen it already, but then Ben is pulling
her by the hand towards the closet and a recessed chest of drawers. With the
seconds stretching on and longer to look, she sees that the bottom two drawers
have been labelled with tape, drops to her knees in order to get a better look.
It’s unmistakable then.
Rey
Everything stops.
Hands reach beneath her armpits to lift her and by the time her feet touch down
she’s started crying.
Ben spins her to face him and begins frantically wiping at the sudden rush of
tears. “I just thought you could leave some of your stuff here when I get moved
in…” he says quietly, “You will always have a place with me, Rey. You have
always had a place with me.”
But the tears don’t stop and he becomes visibly shaken, pulling her into his
arms when her silent tears turn to sobs. Her face fits perfectly into the bend
of his shoulder and he keeps her there, gripping her tight, pacing the room
slowly with her feet stood up on the tops of his own.
The waterworks take a long while to slow and then stop and it isn’t until Rey
can breathe freely that she realizes what’s brought them on. Ben leading her
into his room to show her that the space she’d carved into his heart for
herself is still vacant was crippling. She’d been afraid that when the time
came she wouldn’t want him anymore, or that she would and it would all be the
same. But when she saw her name printed out on label tape, there wasn’t even an
inkling of fear present in the multitude of emotions that exhausted her.
The love never left. It waited, patient like her foster parents taught her that
it could be. She and Ben were a bone that had to be broken if it was going to
ever heal right and now she knows it is time, that the cast can come off.
She is not afraid. The future is here and it’s him.
Pulling away enough to look up, Rey smiles so big her cheeks hurt and squeezes
Ben tight around the middle, so entirely sure.
“You already know, Ben, but I love you.”
His answering, “I love you so much,” is all but lost in the quick collapse of
himself and Rey as separate beings. They fold into a kiss without an end that
brings them to the floor, Rey pinning Ben with elbows and knees, only lifting
away from his chest when he reaches to peel off her tops. He kneads at her all
over, covering her again with his touch, kissing her slow and filthy while she
grinds down and snags polyester over his studded belt and jeans.
He pulls at her thighs and ass, forcing her more firmly against his covered
cock, leaving her mouth to lick a stripe up the salty expanse of her sternum.
His fingers loose her hair from its tie and delve into the mess of it, a groan
ripping itself from his throat when she gets a hand between them and pulls open
the fastenings of his belt.
“Please,” she says, breathless and flying, wanting to be rolled but wary of the
rugburn. One of his hands joins her own and with a little maneuvering she is
free from her shorts and nudging her cunt against him. She wants to be split
open without any coaxing or help, steering her hips away from his hand when it
dips between her legs.
Ben gets the angle just right and sinks slowly inside and her whole body wilts
over him, arms stretching out over his head, her mouth open on his cheek.
Pleasure and safety and belonging and love blanket Rey all at once and she
hardly survives it, vision going black for a moment when he starts pushing from
below. She has to set shaky hands against him and sit up, anchoring herself in
the here and now before starting up a lazy rhythm.
It hardly occurs to her that she’s naked except for her trainers and that he’s
fully dressed. The whirlwind of making love makes so much extraneous.
Ben becomes a litany of strained I Love Yous, his grip around her waist
cinching tighter by the minute, and Rey feels herself rising up towards the
ceiling, his hips jumping up to meet her bounce. She comes with her face
pressed into the same spot where she’d been crying earlier and Ben follows
moments after, stuttering until he slumps with arms around her back and
precious words spilling freely into her ear.
They lay in a mess and eventually he gets the bright idea to test the shower.
There are no towels for after but they’ve faced worse. Rey sprints in first,
spinning the handle and kicking out of her shoes. She’s under the spray before
he cracks open the door and slips in behind her.
Without soap they simply stand together under the spray until Rey turns to
scrub her palms over his chest and is confronted with the entirety of the
tattoo she’d seen a glimpse of months ago when things were bad. It’s another
label, like the one on the drawer in his bedroom, and it says the same thing.
Rey
Her name in script below Ben's collarbone feels dangerous but in the same way
his stare does, that his hands do. The sight of it stings her in the same way
his bite does, a flashing jolt of pain that eases and blooms into warmth.
"Ben," she sighs, staring at the declaration, the promise he put to flesh. His
expression is soft, his head is bent for her. Rey traces it before meeting his
eyes, before slotting her smile against his own.
Chapter End Notes
     Thank you so much for sticking with me! I know this chapter took a
     bazillion years to post and I'm throwing it online at 2AM so if it's
     horrible, I'M SO SORRY!
     I'm usually a pretty big fan of unhappy/ambiguous endings but not
     today! These two numbskulls figured their shit out and can give it a
     real go again. :) I love this ship and I love you for loving it too.
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