strongerthanblood | [for ben]

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ben solo

[for ben]

She can't sleep.

For hours, she's tried but something is keeping her awake, some gnawing thing that she can't seem to identify. She gets up to make tea, padding silently through her too big apartment in a pajama set that felt had like a particularly decadent purchase, a soft pink silk tank with thin straps and matching shorts.

Boy shorts, the sales woman had called them. They don't look like anything she's ever seen a boy wear, but she didn't argue. She had thought the set was pretty, and she keeps telling herself that it's okay to get something just because it was pretty. And if a part of the reason she gets it is because maybe she'd like someone else to see it someday, well, she doesn't think on it too hard.

After drinking a cup of tea and doing a little reading, she tries again to go to sleep, but it's futile. She feels too warm, stretched out on one side of the bed with a sheet draped across her legs, and she closes her eyes again to avoid staring up at the ceiling.

She feels so restless, and she allows herself to wonder what Ben is doing, if he's tossing and turning like she is. She thinks of him so often, in a multitude of ways, but right now she thinks of him fondly, wondering what he might look like when he sleeps.

Rey is so busy wondering, in fact, that she doesn't even notice when the mattress subtly dips with added weight.

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"Ben!" Rey squirms in his grip without any real intent to get away, laughing happily and stumbling forward once he lets her go. She turns around to see him there, barely covering himself with the towel, and lets out another happy laugh. He's so beautiful, especially when he smiles.

"We can share," she assures him, scrubbing the towel over her hair before coming over to drag across Ben's torso. She leaves him with the damp towel and then steps away, pulling on a clean pair of white cotton panties as her eyes fall on the crumpled pile of Ben's black sweater.

"Case in point." The sweater is soft in her hands when she scoops it up, and she tugs it over her head with a pleased sigh. It drapes down to her thighs, hanging over her hands, but she gives him another happy smile. "Sharing."

Edited 2020-03-18 21:34 (UTC)

Huffing out another laugh, he used the damp towel towel over his hair and down his legs, drying himself off quickly and efficiently. Tossing it into the same pile as the sheets, he walked over to retrieve his pants and pulled them on, the loose drawstring leaving them seated loose around his hips.

"I'm going to need that back," he said, without any real heat. He knew that she would be able to tell just how it felt, seeing her in his sweater, which hung nearly to her knees.

"It isn't going anywhere," she assures him, feeling her cheeks heat up as she takes a step closer to him. His mind hasn't felt shuttered to her in a long time, but now it's more open than ever. He looks at her and she can feel her own fond possessiveness mirrored there in him. It isn't a desire to own, or stake any claim, but instead the knowledge that they are a part of one another. They belong together.

She comes over and presses a kiss to a spot just below his collarbone, lingering for a moment before she bends to scoop up the bedding and the towel. It smells like them and she blushes as she carries them through the kitchen to the tiny washer and dryer set tucked away in a closet.

"It probably won't all fit," she says as she leans into the washer to retrieve a forgotten sock, kicking one leg back for balance. Just the sheets first, then. Blanket later. She shoves them into the machine and huffs in frustration when the detergent proves to be pushed too far back onto the top of the machine for her to reach, and then uses her mind to nudge it into her hand. "Ah ha!"

Moving forward to help her, Ben paused mid-step, smiling fondly as he watched the box of detergent slide across the top of the washer and into hand.

"Acquired a taste for coffee yet?" He asked, looking at the machine sitting on her counter— the same standard issue that had come with the apartment. He thought of that first evening in Darrow, sitting across from her at the dinner, watching the charming way her lip curled with every sip from the cup clutched between her hands.

"I have not. I like tea," Rey tells him as she starts the washer and follows him into the kitchen. There is a tea kettle on the stove that she fills with water and seats to heat on a burner, and she reaches into the cupboard next to him to pull out a sampler pack of tea bags she got.

"I like the earl grey one." She pulls out a bag and holds it out to him, and her smile softens. "But I'll make sure to get some coffee."

There is a drop of water in the hollow of Ben's throat, and she leans forward to kiss it away. "And another towel."

Edited 2020-03-19 00:16 (UTC)

"I don't mind tea," he said, though something in him unexpectedly softened at her offer.

Plucking the tea bag gently from her grasp, he settled a hand at her waist, which somehow seemed even more narrow under the oversized weight of his sweater. "Do you have a second mug, or do we have to share that, as well?"

“I do have two mugs! They were already in there when I got here,” she admits, forgetting all about the tea for a moment when he draws her in close. It feels a little like there is fire in her veins and being touched by him is the only thing that soothes it.

It can’t last forever, she assumes, but she is happy to enjoy it while it does.

Rey presses up onto her toes to give him another kiss, and this one is softer than the others. Their mouths stay pressed together, warm and lingering, and she doesn’t pull away until the kettle starts to whistle. Her cheeks are pink when she does, and she turns to pull two plain white mugs from the cupboard.

“Here you go,” she says, filling them both with water and selecting another tea bag for herself. Once it’s steeping, she carries her mug down to set it on the coffee table, gesturing for him to follow. “Come sit.”

Edited 2020-03-19 03:57 (UTC)

The kiss was lingering, breathless, and he felt a bit dazed as she pulled away from him, staring blankly at the countertop for a long moment as he mindlessly dropped his tea bag into his mug, muttering a curse as he dropped the paper tag on the end of the string into the water. Hissing as he fished it from the cup, he followed her into the living room, hiding a sheepish smile as he sat down on the sofa at her side.

"So."

“So,” she repeats, smiling at him for a long moment before suddenly jumping to her feet and rushing into her bedroom. She comes back out a moment later with her phone and looks at the empty spot on the sofa for a moment before sitting sideways on Ben’s lap instead, with her backside on one thigh and the arches of her feet on the other, bare legs bent up against her chest.

“It’s probably a little early for cheeseburgers,” she murmurs, opening up the delivery app as she rests her head against Ben’s shoulder. “Mm, maybe breakfast burritos.”

Edited 2020-03-19 20:03 (UTC)

Blinking as she suddenly sprang into action, Ben watched her with bemused fondness, still in awe of the passion she seemed to have, even for the small moments. She climbed into his lap and he quirked a smile, his hand resting against the curve of her spine.

"I haven't tried one of those," he admitted, his chin resting against the top of her head.

“Ben, they’re wonderful,” she assures him, knowing that he hasn’t gotten quite as adventurous with food as she has. “After a lifetime of the same freeze dried portions, I want to try everything. All the time.”

Rey orders two bacon, egg, and cheese burritos and an order of churros, and after a moment’s consideration, she also adds a large coffee for Ben, even though he said he doesn’t mind tea. She wants him to have what he likes, not just what he doesn’t mind.

Once the order is submitted, she tosses her phone aside and turns to press her face into Ben’s neck. He smells like her soap, her shampoo, and an earthy sort of scent that is him alone. She presses a kiss there, resting a hand on his chest before nosing his damp hair out of the way so she can kiss the shell of his ear, nipping playfully at the lobe.

He wanted to tell her that he was glad that she was being given the chance to try new things, now. She had freedoms, even in this world with such strange, rigid boundaries. She deserved every new experience she desired, every luxury, every pleasure, but also the difficulties she'd missed out on. The mundane, boring, painful aspects of life she might never have experienced alone on Jakku.

Unable to find the words, he left it there in his mind for her to find, if she wanted to.

"I can't help but wonder what Luke would say about all of this."

Just as Rey is about to press her tongue the soft spot under Ben’s ear, she senses the shifting of his thoughts. It feels like there is a but hovering at the edge of it all, and she pulls back to look at him at the mention of Luke.

She has no idea, really, what he would say. Since Ben showed up in her bed last night, she hasn’t thought of anything but him, and the intensity of their bond. Thinking of the rest of it makes her brow furrow the slightest bit, and she slides her palm soothingly along his bare chest.

“I think he would be proud of you,” she admits. Ben and Luke’s relationship is more complicated than she could ever fully comprehend, but she does believe that. “He knew that he failed you. He should have—“

Rey shakes her head, because she’s spent too much time on should haves and what ifs. Instead she looks at Ben, solid and real beneath her, and reaches out to touch his cheek. “As for us, I honestly don’t think he would be all that surprised.”

"I decimated an entire generation of his pupils, I don't know that he had it in him to be proud of anything I did in the wake that," Ben admitted, his jaw twitching with tension as she mentioned Skywalker's failings.

"He tried very hard to keep us apart," he pointed out, one corner of his mouth twitching into a faint, humorless smile as he thought of that moment between them, their fingertips touching before she was ripped away.

Rey swallows hard at that, jaw working as she tries to think of something reassuring to say, but she can’t. He did what he did and there is no changing that, but Ben knows that. He has never once tried to make excuses for what he did, and there is nothing to do but move past it.

“Perhaps he knew,” she says softly, touching the pad of her finger to the divot under his bottom lip. “At least in some part, what we were to each other. It’s not like he would have told us.”

"I was the darkness he was trying to shield you from," he said, with an edge of wry humor. While he now understood Luke's intentions a bit better than he had once, he still couldn't let go of all the bitterness he felt towards his uncle. Perhaps, what hurt the most was Luke's weakness. To a young Ben Solo, his Uncle Luke had seemed invincible.

It was the greatest disappointment, realizing that he was just a man. A man capable of awful mistakes.

"The Jedi forbid personal attachments," he said, his hand curling gently around Rey's slim wrist, his lips pressing to the tips of her fingers.

“Fat lot of good that did,” Rey replies with a shake of her head. “I knew you would come back, Ben. I just knew it.”

She watches Ben’s face and the emotions that play across it so subtly, looking into his deep brown eyes. He is the one responsible for his actions in the end, but so many people failed him along the way. It all could have gone so much differently, she thinks, but they’ll never know.

“I would think a dyad would be exempt from that, don’t you?” Admittedly, Rey had sort of forgotten that part of the Jedi code. Or— not forgotten, but at the time it seemed so irrelevant that she didn’t give it much thought. “Why would we be given this sort of connection if we weren’t meant to nurture it?”

"I didn't," he admitted, with a faint smirk, and while he didn't say it, he knew she could feel how grateful he was to her, for not giving up on him.

"I doubt they gave the possibility much thought," he said, shifting his grip on her wrist, his thumb brushing along the lines of her palm. "Dyads are exceptionally rare."

He kissed the heel of her palm, pressing his face there for a long moment.

"The Sith foretold of it, not the Jedi. They were obsessed with it. With the power a dyad could possess."

“I knew enough for both of us,” she assures him, smiling at that rush of gratitude. Of course, she did have her moments of doubt, fueled by desperation. She was a fool to think she could end it all when she ran him through on those ruins. The second the lightsaber made contact, she ached with regret the likes of which she had never known.

And she’s sure Ben would have felt the same. Neither of them could ever die at the other’s hand, not without also destroying themselves.

Her eyes narrow at the mention of the Sith, but the tender way he touches her reassures her, and she uses her other hand to sweep his hair back from his face. “I am not interested in power.”

Edited 2020-03-20 03:40 (UTC)

"Oh, I know," Ben said, smiling briefly into the palm of her hand. "I couldn't understand it. That was all I ever had to offer you, and you wouldn't take it."

This time, the smile he gave her was tinged with sadness.

"They assumed that power could only ever exist in the dark side. They were wrong. I was wrong."

“I just wanted you,” she admits, turning in his lap until she’s straddling his thighs, settling back so that she can face him. “You’re plenty, Ben.”

Her palms rest gently against the sides of his neck, sliding back into the soft hair at his nape. For a long moment she doesn’t know what to say, so she leans in to give him a gentle kiss.

“You know better now,” she assures him, reaching down to take one of his hands in her own, threading their fingers together. “As for the Jedi code. We’re the last ones, aren’t we? So who’s to say we can’t make a little adjustment to the rules? An addendum, just for us.”

"You're the last of the Jedi, Rey. The last Skywalker. I have no right to claim that for myself, not after what I've done," he said, a firm statement of fact. Fleeing the temple, he'd known that he had forfeited his place among the Jedi Order, and whatever redemption he might've earned in death couldn't change that.

"I wanted you. When we fought in the snow. You bested me, and I... I lost my way. All I could think of was you. It was twisted and selfish. I wanted to possess you for my own—" He cut himself off, drawing in a shuddering breath, his jaw working anxiously.

"To feed my own power. I might've killed you." He reached out to tuck a strand of her hair behind her ear. "I wish I could be as forgiving as you are," he admitted, then, with a faint flicker of a smile, he added, "Or are you as selfish as I am?"

It was easy, perhaps, to forgive someone you were bound to through fate.

Edited 2020-03-20 04:14 (UTC)

Rey simply nods at that, knowing better than to argue. It’s a lonely feeling, being the last of something. The last Jedi, the last Skywalker. The last Palpatine.

She listens to Ben as he speaks, keeping her hand on his jaw and stroking her thumb soothingly across his cheek as his anxiety rises. It’s easy to remember how terrified she was of him. Sometimes it’s hard to fathom that the man who fought her in Starkiller Base and the man looking at her now are one in the same, but they are. And she loves him still.

“I would have talked you out of it,” she assures him, choosing to believe it because there is no way to find out if she’s wrong. “You felt it too, remember?”

He smiles at her and she returns it, shrugging her shoulders a little before tracing the pad of her finger along his dark eyebrow. “Maybe it’s a little of both. I— I need you, Ben. I just do. I don’t know if that makes me forgiving, or selfish. I don’t really care to decide. I don’t care about the code. I just need you.”

She surges forward to kiss him, sweeping her tongue into his mouth before pulling away to rest her forehead against his. “I am the last Jedi, and I’m changing the rules.”

"All right," he agreed, his hands framing the sides of her face, "It's futile, arguing with you, once you've set your mind to something."

Of course, that didn't mean there weren't arguments in their future. A lot of them, judging by who they both were, but if the past was any indication, she would be winning more than her share. Luckily, losing to her never felt like the defeat that it should have.

Just then, her phone buzzed loudly against the coffee table, alerting them that the delivery driver had arrived.

"I'm glad you've come to your senses," she says warmly, relaxing against him as he touches her face. She'll never get used to being touched like this, she's sure. It feels like she has an entire lifetime of being starved for affection to make up for, and Ben seems more than up to the challenge.

More than anything, she's glad that they're on the same side. It isn't even so much light versus dark anymore, now that they're stuck in this place. It's just Rey and Ben, and she can't help but to feel like they were meant to have this second chance.

She kisses him again, wanting to be close to him, to take him inside of her again, but before she can put this desire into action her phone vibrates and she huffs in frustration against his mouth. Gripping the sides of his face, she gives him another kiss and then gracefully twists off of his lap, smoothing down his sweater before going to answer the door.

The delivery guy looks her over and Rey murmurs her thanks as she shuts the door in his face, juggling the bag and the coffee as she makes her way back over to Ben.

"Here's your coffee, now that our tea is cold," she says with a laugh, handing him the cup as she sits at his side. The burritos are big and warm and Rey lets out an involuntary squeak of happiness as she hands his over. "Here, eat up."

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