Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

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ONE MONTH LATER

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“Hey, stranger!”

“Hey, Finn.” Rey managed a weak smile at the sound of her friend’s voice on the other end of the line as she popped open the Chinese takeout carton in front of her. “Sorry I’ve been so scarce. We thought hockey practice could be grueling — you should see what Maz and Luke are putting me through. It’s easier to just stay in Leia’s place by the rink since I’m practically living on the ice at this point.”

“It’s okay. We’re just glad you’re still texting. And you know all those repairs the super’s been dragging his ass on doing? I don’t know if your Senator lady made a call or what but everything’s in perfect working order. Even the garbage disposal!”

“I’m definitely sending Leia a card for Mothers’ Day.”

“Card, hell, I’m asking her to adopt me.”

Rey laughed, stabbing into her noodles with her chopsticks.

“I’d probably be nicer than her actual son,” Finn continued.

Rey froze with her chopsticks halfway to her mouth.

“How’s that going, anyway?” Finn asked.

“…fine." Rey set her chopsticks down and pushed her noodles away with a frown. “He’s… gotten better. We’ve gotten better.”

“’We’? There’s a ‘we’ with you two?”

“We’re in pairs skating, Finn. By definition, there’s a ‘we’.”

“Yeah, but there’s skating we and…” She could only imagine the gestures he was making on the other end of the line. “…we.”

“Well we don’t have any kind of…” Rey gestured wildly. “…we. We’re not really even friends. I mean, friends don't tend to gravely injure each other.”

“Yeah, I remember seeing that you cut his face open with your skate. Poe and I watched it on YouTube. It was pretty awesome.”

“Oh come on, it was an accident.”

“I know, but it was very satisfying after watching all those temper tantrums from the Zamboni."

Rey couldn't help but grin, propping her feet up on the sofa.

“I’m not gonna lie,” she said. “It was a little satisfying for me, too.” 

---  

“I feel like this is supposed to look better by now,” Kylo groused as he and Rey entered the rink, sipping coffee side-by-side, equipment bags on their shoulders.

“It doesn’t look as bad as you think it does.” Rey paused, thinking. “Considering you took a skate to the face and all.”

“Still looks like hell.” He grimaced and ran his fingers over the scarred tissue diagonally intersecting his brow and cheek.

“Well stop touching it and maybe it’ll heal right,” Rey sighed. “And if it bothers you so much, you can always pay to get plastic surgery. I’m sure you have enough money for whatever it would take.”

Kylo laughed, short and humorless. “I don’t have as much money as you think I do. Losing those sponsors hit my accounts hard." 

“Mm, so hard that you were seen outside a swanky nightclub with a shapely blonde a few months back, neither of which I doubt you could afford if you didn’t have some funds in reserve.” Rey took one last sip of her coffee and quirked a smile at Kylo before tossing the cup in the nearby bin.

Kylo gave her an odd stare. “She was a friend, you know. Maria.”

“Since when do you have friends?” There was a flash of annoyance or pain — Rey could never tell with him — across his face, and she quickly amended, “I mean, female friends. That I know of. Everyone has friends. Even you, I'm guessing.”

“Yeah, well,” Kylo started, shifting his bag on his shoulder, “this one was a friend.” He emphasized the word, raising an eyebrow and smirking. “Warm, friendly, inviting."

"I see." Rey said, nonchalant. 

"Very much in the past, though. If you were wondering."

“I was not. You’ve had quite a reputation for friends…” She curved her fingers into quotation marks. “…in the past, or so I’ve seen. It's none of my business who you spend your time with as long as you can still skate.”

“Yeah, well, you probably won't have to worry about it, anyway.” Kylo shrugged, gesturing to his face. “It's not like I'm going to have anyone throwing themselves at me with this.”

Rey rolled her eyes. “One: again, it’s not as bad as you think it is. And two: girls like scars. Or so I’m told.”

She hoisted her bag and started to move towards the women’s locker room.

Then, from behind her, soft and hesitant:

“Do you?”

Rey turned, eyebrows raised, to stare at Kylo, who was studiously inspecting the laces of his skates and avoiding her eyes.

“I don’t know,” she said after a moment. “I… I’ve never had a reason to think about it.”

She ducked into the locker room before he could clarify what he meant.

Her heart was pounding.

She didn’t want to clarify that, either.

---

“All right, kids,” Maz said gruffly, grasping her cane between her hands as she sat down on her familiar bench. “Qualifying is less than a month from now, so let’s see you take a whack at the new choreo.”

“Is this one a lot less… aggressive, or is it just me?” Rey asked, skating to starting position at center ice with Kylo.

“It is. It's a lot more... traditional. But it’s a lot harder, too — we’re not just doing an exhibition. This one counts.” He curved his hand around her hip, and she didn’t shy away.

“I’m not sure I’m ready for this one,” Rey murmured, glancing back at Maz as the old woman cursed and struggled to queue up their music.

“You’ll do fine. Trust me.” Rey’s brow furrowed at the warmth in Kylo's voice, the way his hand seemed to clutch her hip just a little tighter. She ducked her head away from his gaze.

The piece Maz had chosen for their short program skate in competition was a lovely instrumental piece, all soft woodwinds and soaring strings. It was somehow yearning — it made Rey think of a soft country scene, the shy touches and grins of new love.

Despite the music’s deceptive gentleness, Maz had layered on the difficulties: side-by-side Biellmanns, upright spins, a triple throw loop, twist lifts, synchronous double axels, even a death spiral.

“Don’t worry,” she’d said as Rey balked at the moveset. “We still have a month.”

It was becoming increasingly natural to skate at Kylo’s side, at least. Rey followed him into Maz’s tricky serpentine step sequence, all smooth curves and turns, never missing a beat. 

The music swelled as his hands found her waist and raised her into the twist lift, catching her easily after the second rotation. Kylo's eyes were dark as he cradled her close, held her as she moved into layback position, and Rey's heart beat faster at the feel of his hands, steady, anchoring, warm even through her skating tights. 

It was so… effortless, somehow. They seemed to be breathing in the same rhythm, the music almost a distraction to the way they moved together, sinuous, easy, all graceful, fluid moves, clinging, touching, flowing. 

Whereas two months ago Rey had struggled with her toe picks, fought to keep up with Kylo’s practiced spins and jumps, now they moved as two halves of a whole, transitioning from spin to turn, lift to hold as easily as the music flowed one note to the next. 

It was as if they had somehow learned to read each other to the point that they could pluck moves, intentions from the other’s mind and chain them into complicated sequences, knowing the other would follow.

They exited the double axel at the exact same moment, landed perfectly side-by-side. 

Rey was breathing hard as the program entered its second half, all close-quarters skating and intimate holds. There were side-by-side spins that led into carefully-crafted spiral sequences, Kylo's hand splayed warmly against her abdomen, his lips just brushing against her ear at release. There were the skating equivalent of trust falls: carry lifts where Kylo flipped Rey upside down and lifted her onto his shoulders, the death spiral where she clutched his hand and leaned back, parallel to the ice as he spun her. 

At every element, they seamlessly came back together, magnetic, breaths synchronized, rapturous. 

She wondered, briefly, if this was what it had always been like when he had been Ben. 

If that man was still inside him, somehow.

As the music drew to a close, the last notes fading, they stood at center ice in final position, arms wrapped around each other, clinging, foreheads touching, breathing hard and staring into each other’s eyes, uncomprehending, disbelieving.

They didn’t speak. Couldn’t.

“…well now,” Maz’s amused voice echoed from down ice, “I don’t know what I need more after that: a cigarette or a new shelf for the trophy you two are going to bring me from Nationals.”

Rey and Kylo broke apart as if burned, cheeks flushed, unable to meet the other’s eyes.

“I…” Kylo started first, staring at Rey before shaking his head. “I need to… get ready for solo practice tonight.” He turned quickly and skated off the ice, head down, fists clenched.

“Kylo!” He moved faster towards the locker room.

“Kylo, wait up, damn you!”

He sighed, hand braced against the locker room door. “What?” he bit out.

Rey took a step back, brow furrowed in confusion. “I… just wanted to know if you wanted to do another pass. I think... I'm pretty sure I over-rotated on that last Y spin.”

He gazed at her for a long moment, something dark and inscrutable in his eyes before he closed them, shaking his head again. “I have to get ready for training with Snoke,” he said between clenched teeth. “I can’t.” He slipped into the locker room, slamming the door behind him.

Rey stared after him, mind tumbling, heart still pounding from their performance, and entirely unwilling to think about why it hurt to see him go.

---

Rey yawned widely, coffee in hand and skates looped over her shoulder as she slotted her key into the front door of the rink. It was a cold night, well past midnight, the moon full and silvered.

She’d tried so hard to sleep, but she was just… jumpy, somehow. She’d tossed and turned for three hours in bed, willing her mind to think of anything but that day’s practice, the feel of closeness, of effortlessness, the look in Kylo’s eyes as they clung together at center ice.

(Finn would have told her it was sexual frustration. Which is why she hadn’t texted him before heading out to sublimate her whatever through a hard late-night skate.)

Rey frowned as she entered the rink — the lights were still on, and she could hear the familiar scrape of blades on ice.

Her eyes widened as she saw Kylo skating hard, head down as he hydrobladed, nearly horizontal along the ice. She’d skated with him long enough to read the utter exhaustion through his shoulders, his calves, as he righted himself and moved into a fan spiral. His teeth were gritted tight, face pale, scar livid against his skin.

There was an old man on the ice with him, hovering predatorily over him as he skated.

The man was keeping pace with him, skating beside him, and she could see his mouth moving.

Snoke.

Rey set her skates to the side, dropping to her knees and crawling along the boards, out of sight.

When she drew close enough, she could hear snippets of speech, a soft, calming voice, grandfatherly.

It was at stark odds to the words that it spoke.

“You know you deserve this punishment.” Soft, gentle, almost apologetic. “You’ve done this to yourself, allowed this weakness. You think you’ve learned strength from this girl? All she’s done is reflect your own frailty and failings back at you. Magnified them.”

Rey heard a hard thump to the ice, knew Kylo had fallen to his knees. “I know,” he mumbled, and her heart froze at the dead, defeated sound of his voice.

“She’s just using you for her own ambitions. Just like they all did. Follow her and she will lead you into ruin.”

“Yes.” That same empty, defeated tone.

“Remember: everything you are, everything you have become is from my doing. Mine. Let this be a reminder to you, boy, and be grateful that I am a... forgiving man.”

Kylo didn’t respond, and Rey pressed up harder against the boards as she heard a slow, steady scrape of skates. She bit her lip so hard it bled as Snoke stepped off the ice, unhurriedly removed his skates and retrieved a pair of moccasins, exiting the rink through the front doors.

When she was sure he’d gone, she stumbled to her feet and stormed onto the ice, eyes blazing. “Kylo, what—”

Rey's fury faded into horror as Kylo quickly tugged his shirt down.

There was blood across his ribs.

“What are you doing here?” he asked, eyes narrowed in anger, stalking over to her.

Rey swallowed hard, willed her heartbeat to settle. “Well," she started, "I couldn’t sleep, so I was going to burn off some energy with a midnight skate, but I thought it’d be more interesting to watch my skate partner get violently abused by his coach.” She reached out a hand to him, pulling it back as he flinched away.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Kylo said after a long moment, turning his back to her. “What you heard… if you heard anything… it’s not what you think. It’s motivation.”

Rey bit back a curse before grabbing his collar and pulling him down to face her. “Then I saw motivation in every single foster home the state put me in,” she hissed. “That’s not what this is. You know it’s not.”

“You don’t understand,” Kylo spat, wrenching from her grasp, pushing her away. “You can’t possibly understand what Snoke has given me. The power, the skill, the discipline...”

“The open wounds?”

Kylo opened his mouth as if trying to speak before looking away from her, his features hard and closed off.

He started as Rey grasped his hand in hers and dragged him behind her, off the ice.

He let her corral him into the women’s locker room and toss him down onto a bench as she swore and retreated into a darkened back room. When Rey returned, she was clutching a first aid kit in one hand and glaring at him. “Shirt off. Now.”

Kylo hesitated.

“For God's sake, Kylo, I played co-ed for years. I’ve seen a hundred men with their shirts off. I just want to bandage your stupid self so I can go home,” she ground out.

Her eyes widened on a horrified gasp as he slowly drew his shirt over his head.

There was an ugly curving gash over his ribs, still bleeding. But there were also scars scattered across his pectorals, his abdomen, his shoulders: dozens of them, deep scores gone white with age, wide, jagged lines, some raised, some still reddened and angry.

“…oh my God, Kylo,” Rey began, hands clasped to her mouth. “What… did he do this to you?”

“No,” Kylo said flatly, staring ahead.

“Does he make you?”

He didn’t answer.

He jumped as Rey sat beside him, half-turning him so he was facing her. “This is probably going to sting,” she murmured, retrieving a small bottle of isopropyl alcohol from the first aid kit. “Do you need to hold my hand?”

Kylo stared at her, eyes dark and inscrutable.

“No,” he said.

(Rey squeezed his hand back when he did it anyway.)

He hissed and closed his eyes as she dabbed at his newest wound one-handed, setting the soiled cotton balls to the side. “Okay, I’m going to need both hands for the next part.”

Kylo released her hand reluctantly as she moved forward to sit between his thighs, very close as she looped gauze around his torso. He was so broad-set that she could barely reach all the way around him, and she struggled to pass the roll of gauze from one hand to the next.

They were quiet as she worked, the only sound in the locker room the low hum of the fluorescent lights.

Then:

“It’s weakness,” she heard and felt Kylo say from above her, felt the rumble through his chest as she rested her forehead against it and continued wrapping. “Pairs, my family... you.”

Rey passed the gauze from her right hand to her left, taking a deep breath. “Love isn’t weakness.”

He seemed to go stock-still beneath her hands, and she quickly clarified: “Your family loves you. That’s not weakness. I don’t know what that man has told you, but…”

Rey’s words died in her throat as Kylo dropped his head forward, resting it against hers.

“I feel like I’m being torn apart,” she heard him whisper. “You don’t… I know what I have to do. What I want to do. And I know I can’t do both. I can't have both.”

He clutched Rey’s hand, holding it in his, the last stretch of gauze fluttering to the floor. Rey pulled back far enough for him to rest his forehead against hers. He was breathing hard, shoulders heaving.

She couldn’t speak.

“Why did you have to ruin everything, Rey?” he asked, voice a harsh whisper.

Before she could respond, his hands were cupping her face and he was kissing her.

Rey’s eyes were wide, her hands trapped against his broad chest as he kissed her like a drowning man, all clinging bites and slow drags of tongue.

Ben, she thought, and she couldn't tell if something inside her was singing or crying.

Heart pounding, Rey closed her eyes and kissed him back.

---

It was like skating side-by-side.

Effortless.

Her shirt discarded, Kylo's, Ben's mouth sucking hotly at her throat, thumbs playing over the tight beads of her nipples, hands moving round to her back and lifting her to him.

Pants and tights peeled down, tossed aside, her back to the bench, hands gripping tight against the wood as he kissed her and palmed her breasts, desperate, crazed, fingers moving to dig bruises into her hips.

Her hands tangled in his hair as he pulsed hot and thick against her thigh, foreheads pressed together, soft “oh”s as lifted her up, pressed her back against the lockers and slid inside her.

Synchronous, her legs tight around his hips as he kissed her deeply, as they moved in time, locked, lifted, held.

Ben Solo came with Rey’s name a desperate, broken cry on his lips, and she followed him easily, so easily, side-by-side.

After, he clung to her, his head laid against her breast as she clung to his shoulders. "Rey." 

“I know,” Rey murmured to him, carded her hands through his sweat-slicked hair. “I know.”

---

They disentangled themselves reluctantly some time later, sweat cooling and heartbeats normalizing.

Rey didn’t meet Kylo’s gaze as she pulled a towel from her locker, discreetly wiped his spend from between her thighs before dressing.

Kylo tugged his pants on, eyes never leaving her. "That was a mistake,” he said.

Rey nodded, straightening her shirt. “We got it out of our system, at least. We were probably both just keyed up from that routine today. It doesn’t mean anything.”

Kylo eyed her curiously. “No, I mean…” He grimaced, leaning up against the lockers. “This is… not how I wanted this to go.”

Rey stilled in the middle of rearranging the supplies in the first aid kit, slowly looking up at him.

“I mean… I’d at least wanted to buy you dinner first. Not just fuck you in the rink locker room.”

“Well, when you put it that way…” Rey rolled her eyes.

“No, I mean…” He scrubbed a hand over his face. “We’re doing this backwards, but I would... like to ask you to dinner.”

“Does it count now?” Rey asked rhetorically, crossing her arms over her chest.

Kylo frowned. “I’m not sure. Probably depends on the restaurant.”

“I like steak.”

“Well then.” He quirked a smile at her, and it was so bizarre, how she’d intended to skate to take her mind off everything with Kylo and here she was with him, knowing too much about his deepest scars, secretly calling him by his old name, freshly fucked by him and making dinner plans, for God’s sake.

Rey thought back to the first night when Leia had suggested her arrangement with Kylo.

She was fairly certain this was not what the Senator had in mind.

“Rey?” His voice was strangely soft, and she sighed.

“Eight o’clock, okay?” she said finally. “Don’t be late.”

---

Rey had minimal experience with dating. There had never seemed to be much time for it between hockey practice and classes and friends and work on her truck.

But she was still fairly certain that this counted as a not-particularly-fantastic date.

At least at first.

It had started well enough: Rey had returned to her shared apartment to retrieve the one dress she owned (Finn and Poe both thankfully absent for what would inevitably have been a thorough questioning) and the too-tight heels she’d worn to senior prom and had for some reason held onto through three apartments.

Kylo had picked her up in a sleek BMW, looking even broader in a suit than he did in his skating costumes, and it felt odd, not having known what kind of car he drove up until that point, even as she knew the tightness of his jaw as he launched into a salchow, the feel of his hands warm and wide on her bare breasts.

She’d coughed, let him open the door for her and crossed her legs.

Dinner was at a pretentious bistro downtown, and Rey’s eyes bulged as she skimmed the right side of the menu and looked for something that cost less than a new pair of skates.

The wine steward took one look at her twice-discounted bargain rack dress and served Kylo twice before touching her glass.

Her feet hurt from her spiked heels, even sitting down.

And her filet mignon was overdone.

Halfway through dinner, as Rey angrily stabbed at her steak, Kylo reached across the table and stilled her hand.

“This place sucks, huh,” he said, inclining his head towards the wine steward still tossing them disdainful glances.

“Well, I guess one of us had to say it,” Rey grumbled.

“I just went by the Yelp reviews. It was supposed to be a nice place for a first date.”

Rey flushed at his open, unflinching use of the term, and resumed stabbing her steak.

Kylo sighed, taking her hand again. “Rey. It's dead.”

“They gave me well. It’s very dead.”

Kylo cursed softly under his breath, reaching into his suit jacket, pulling a few bills from his wallet and tossing them on the table. “Come on.”

Rey allowed him to tug her along, the same way he led on some of their skating passes. “Where are we going?”

“Somewhere not here,” Kylo said, extracting his keys from his pocket.

His voice was soft, eyes dark as he looked to her.

“Who knows how many times you’re going to let me do this,” he said quietly. “I’d like to make it count.”

Rey swallowed hard at the intense look in his eyes, the way he stared at her like there was something burning just at the tip of his tongue.

As they walked back to his car, she held his hand.

---

There was a park nearby — the kind Rey had always dreamed of in the meager confines of her foster homes, all rolling, grassy hills, sloped paths, and rushing fountains. The moon was full above them, all silver-white light.

Kylo’s hand was warm in hers, his free hand carrying her heels.

“I came here a lot when I was a kid,” he said. “I was an only child, didn’t have too many friends, so I’d come to the park and run around until I was tired enough to go home.”

“I’d say that’s kind of sad, but I had an imaginary friend until I was ten. I don’t judge.”

Kylo flashed her an open, easy smile, and Rey felt herself returning it in full. “Thanks for carrying those, by the way,” she said, pointing to her heels.

“No problem. I still don’t understand how people walk in these things.”

“I was never any good at it,” Rey admitted. “Especially now that I’m spending almost every waking moment up on skates.”

“Did you miss it at all?” Kylo asked, swinging their joined hands gently. “Being away from the ice, I mean.”

Rey was quiet for a moment. “I guess I did,” she said finally. “I didn’t realize it at first. Not until… I mean, I’d never really planned on going back.” She sighed, pulling her hand from Kylo’s and walking to sit at the edge of a nearby fountain. It was cold, and she allowed Kylo to drape his suit jacket over her shoulders, pull her into a loose embrace. “I was never really the adventurous sort. Going from home to home… I just wanted stability. I wanted to stay in one place long enough to make it mine. When I got injured, I figured… that was the end of it. Time to move on, again.”

She absently toyed with one of the buttons on his dress shirt. “But I missed it. I missed it more than anything, and I didn’t even realize it until I started skating with you.”

“Are you going back to it, then?” Kylo asked, idly stroking her hair. “Hockey, I mean? Nationals aren’t too far away — you should think about going back to your old team afterwards. From what I’ve heard about how you used to play, they’d probably take you back in a heartbeat.”

“Are you that desperate to lose me as a partner?”

Kylo tugged her head back so he could look at her, a strange look in his eyes. “I never thought you were staying,” he said after a moment.

Rey bit her lip, looking away from his appraising gaze. “I didn’t mean to suggest… I mean, we aren’t going to be… we’re not…”

Kylo surprised her by laughing, a low deep rumble as he cupped her cheek in his hand. “It’s okay,” he said quietly. “I’m not very good at this stuff, either.”

His nose was cold against her cheek as he kissed her, and Rey brought her hand up to cover the one still cradling her cheek.

“We’re getting there, I think,” she whispered against his lips.

---

It was all practice, ultimately.

They kissed at red lights, passionate, clinging, their hands clasped between the seats.

Rey burst into laughter once they reached his apartment complex and he hoisted her into a platter lift, just as deft-handed off-ice as on it, and carried her up three flights of stairs to his condo.

She barely had time to take in the décor of the sprawling unit — all tasteful and understated neutrals, a curving sectional sofa, framed medals — before they were on his bed, Kylo’s fingers slipping beneath the shoulder strap of her dress, lips trailing across the side of her neck.

“I want to do this right,” he murmured against her skin. “This time.” He pressed a warm, lingering kiss to her pulse point.

“I mean… I thought we did okay. Last time.” Rey shivered as his tongue traced the shell of her ear.

Kylo’s eyes were dark and held her whole as he pulled back far enough to undo his tie and tug out of his jacket and dress shirt.

He knelt over her bare-chested, hands braced at either side of her head, dipping down just far enough to brush his lips over hers, feather-light.

“Hold on tight, sweetheart,” he said, and she could feel the curve of his smirk against her lips.

---

Their first encounter had been much like them: rough, inelegant, fierce. Kylo (Ben, her mind supplied, in some deep, warm, secretive corner she already held close in her heart) had pressed her up against a row of lockers, clutched at her hips and fucked her, frenzied, desperate, his face turned in against her neck.

This… this was different.

This was worshipful.

Kylo kissed her senseless for long minutes, all nipping teeth and soothing swipes of tongue, deft hands easily unzipping her dress and tossing it aside.

Rey clung to him as he sucked bruises into her skin, as he palmed her breasts and laved the rosy tips of her nipples with slow drags of tongue that made her toes curl.

When he tugged her panties off one-handed, she flushed, tried to pull her knees together even as they settled against either side of his ribs.

“Moving too fast?” Kylo murmured. Her lips were stung and kiss-swollen, and she brushed them against his.

“I…” Rey started, grasping his shoulders and pulling him down closer, so she could avoid his gaze. “I just haven’t… done this a lot.”

“Mm.” One hand stroked lazily at her abdomen while the other rubbed comforting circles over her hip. “We can stop if you want.”

“I…” Her flush deepened, and she tilted her hips towards his. “I didn’t… say that.”

There was a low rumble deep in his chest, a purr of contentment, and Rey smiled to herself as he kissed her, the hand at her hip moving to cradle her cheek.

Rey’s breath seized in her throat as his hand dipped lower, just brushing against the outside of her damp folds. He deepened the kiss, tongue curling along hers as he slid two fingers inside her, crooking them forward, thumb rubbing gently at her clit.

Kylo was breathing hard against her, his erection thick against her inner thigh through his dress pants. “Let me take care of you, Rey,” he managed, nudging at her cheek as he began to thrust his fingers in and out of her, slow, lazy. “Please.”

Rey could only nod, clutching at his back, hiding her face against his shoulder as his fingers moved faster.

“Harder,” she managed.

There was a slow inhale beside her ear, a nod as his thumb pressed more firmly against her, as his fingers brushed against that one spot that made her see stars, and she dug her nails into his skin, screamed something unintelligible against his shoulder as she came hard around his fingers.

Rey was panting, forehead beaded with sweat as Kylo drew back from her, cursed and fumbled with the button on his pants. “Drawer,” he nodded towards the bedside table. “Towards the back, left side.”

Still dizzy from her orgasm, Rey stared at him, uncomprehending. “…huh?”

“We already took one chance we shouldn't have,” he managed in a rough voice, tugging out of his pants and boxers and wrapping his hand in a loose hold around his erection. Rey ducked her head at the sight of it, desire already surging back as she pulled open the drawer. A flashlight, pack of matches, and… ah. Square foil packet.

Kylo took it from her, and she could swear she felt his hand trembling. His eyes never left hers as he rolled on the condom, as he smoothed his hands over her thighs and pulled her close.

“How should we…” Rey leaned up on her elbows as Kylo moved to kiss her.

He tugged her thighs around his waist, his arms wrapped around her back, and Rey gasped as he slid deeply inside her in one smooth, easy stroke.

“Just like this,” he said, voice deep and throaty. He kissed her cheek, trailed kisses along the line of her jaw, and Rey clung to his back as he rolled his hips against hers, thrusting deep and hard.

Rey trembled, her breath coming short and sharp. It had been so easy to deny any latent emotion during their locker room tryst — tension running high, exhaustion from practice, the dam bursting after a long, trying day and the revelation of his pain. It was just sex. No more, no less.

But this…

"Ben," she gasped, before she could stop herself.

But he just nodded and pressed his forehead to hers, unwrapping one arm from her back to trail warm fingertips down her throat, cup her breast. His eyes burned into hers, lips just brushing as he dipped his hand between them, just above where they were joined, and began to rub her in time with his thrusts.

Rey closed her eyes and surged up to kiss him, tangling her hands in his hair, muffling her cries into his mouth as she came again, pressing close as he wrapped tight around her, hips stilling, tremors shaking his back and shoulders as he came moments after her.

They were both trembling as they pulled apart, lips and noses still brushing, breathing hard.

No, Rey thought, brushing a stray tendril of hair out of Kylo’s eyes.

She wasn’t sure what this was.

But it wasn’t just sex.

---

Rey woke slowly, face-down against a pillow that smelled of pine and aftershave and something distinctly male, her legs tangled up in soft sheets and the smell of bacon wafting through the air.

Did I fall asleep in Finn’s room or…

“Hey.” A deep, amused voice sounded from the doorway, and her eyes flew open as she remembered.

Rey swore and pulled the sheets around herself even as Kylo leaned up against the doorway, completely naked, raising an eyebrow at her. “For the record, anything you're trying to cover, I’ve already seen. Twice.”

“Oh my God, Ben, put some pants on, would you?”

“And you’ve seen all this.”

“Doesn’t mean I want to see it now!”

Kylo rolled his eyes and walked over to the cherrywood dresser at the far side of the room, tugging open a drawer and extracting a pair of boxer shorts. “Happy?”

Rey huffed, flopping back against the pillows. “Sign up for a skating competition, wake up to Kylo Ren’s penis,” she muttered to herself. "I do not think this was part of the deal."

“You didn’t mind it last night,” he noted with a smirk, kneeling down next to the bedside and kissing her cheek. “Now come on, I made breakfast.”

Rey stared at him, propping herself up on her elbows. “I’m sorry, what?”

“I. Made. Breakfast. Nothing fancy — I’m not here too often, so there wasn’t much to work with in the fridge. Omelettes, bacon. Whipped up some quick hash browns, too.”

Rey kept staring at him, and Kylo cocked his head to the side a little. “I mean, you don’t have to eat anything. I just thought, well…” He shrugged. “After last night and all.”

“I…” Rey flushed, staring past him to the wall. “You didn’t have to make me breakfast. I mean… I wasn’t even necessarily going to sleep over. It’s just…”

Kylo’s face fell a fraction, and Rey moved closer, cupping his cheek in her hand.

“Actually,” she said after a moment, “did you say you had bacon?”

---

Halfway through breakfast, Kylo’s phone rang, and he excused himself.

Rey watched him go with a mouthful of omelette, trying not to stare as he wandered off, phone in hand, clad only in his boxers. Years of thinking of figure skating as the softer, gentler companion to hockey had left her with a very distorted view of what the male physique would look like from engaging in the sport, she realized. Kylo’s legs were thick and muscular, his back broad, shoulders and arms massive enough to lift her over his head one-handed.

She coughed when he noticed her staring, furrowing his brow a little, and she reached for another strip of bacon.

“…I mean, we could probably still do it, but a day off would be nice,” she heard him saying from the living room. “Rey’s tough, but I think she could use the downtime.”

A pause. “…no, she’s not here. It’s seven-thirty in the morning. Why would she be at my condo?”

Another pause. “…okay, no, she wouldn’t be here any time of day, but she…”

Rey raised a curious eyebrow at him as he scrubbed a hand over his face. “Fine. I’ll tell Rey when I see her to be ready for press lifts tomorrow. Yeah. …you’re wrong, but think what you want. Okay, bye.”

Kylo sighed and tossed his phone onto the couch. “Well, good news: Maz is giving us the day off. Thinks we could use a day of recovery before she skates us into the ice tomorrow.”

Rey nodded. “Probably a good idea. I’m exhausted.” She pointed her fork at Kylo as he opened his mouth to speak. “No filthy comments from you. I’m still mad that I started off my day looking at your penis.”

“And I’m the filthy one?” Rey's eyes widened as he grinned and leaned across the table to kiss her on the forehead.

Her stomach clenched at the familiarity of the gesture, how easily Kylo leaned back in his chair, his fingers playing over the back of her hand.

She delicately moved it away, finishing her omelette and avoiding his gaze. “So what are you going to do with your day off?”

Kylo was silent for a long moment. “I thought we could do something together,” he said finally. “Nothing major. We could go to a movie, check out that new art exhibit downtown. Whatever you want.”

Rey slowly dragged her fork against her plate, not meeting his curious stare. “A date?”

Kylo shrugged, crossing his arms over his chest. “Not if you don’t want it to be.”

He looked strangely vulnerable, despite his broadness: sitting at his kitchen table clad only in his boxers, hair disheveled, body covered in scars, eyes glancing to hers and away like a skittish puppy.

“How’s your chest doing?” Rey murmured, nodding at his still-bandaged torso.

His eyes darkened a little as he glanced down, and it was almost as if he’d forgotten about the gash beneath his bandages. “Fine,” he said shortly. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

Rey nodded, biting her lip. “I didn’t hurt it last night, did I? When we were…” She gestured.

Kylo smiled at her, slow and easy. “What, are you asking if you can kiss it and make it better?”

“Oh my God.” Rey rolled her eyes and collected her dishes, Kylo’s laughter following her to the sink.

---

Granted a reprieve from Maz, they spent the day together, first surveying the new modern art installation at a museum Kylo frequented, then taking to an outdoor rink at the large nearby park.

“Want to show off for the crowd?” Kylo had asked, sotto voce, squeezing Rey’s hand as they skated in easy laps. "Side-by-side triple lutzes, nothing fancy."

“And have to explain what we’re doing here together to all these people?” Rey laughed, pulling him to skate faster with her. “Not a chance.”

Kylo was quiet, even as he kept pace with her, his strides perfectly matching hers. “What are we doing, Rey?” he asked.

There was a weight behind his words, something she didn’t want to consider, and Rey kept her eyes forward, gracefully maneuvering past slower skaters, trying to ignore the cuddling couples along the boards.

“Skating,” she said. “Just like we always do.”

---

They made love again in his bed that night, Rey rising above him, her hands braced along his chest as she rolled her hips and rode him.

When he came, her name broke on his lips in a shout, and she held him close, her heart beating wildly.

“Stay,” Kylo murmured, after, thumb rubbing circles against her shoulderblade as she lay warmly cuddled against his chest.

“Mm,” Rey mumbled, closing her eyes, boneless and spent. “You drove and I’m not paying for a cab. Looks like I’m stuck here for another night.”

“…I want you to want to stay,” he said, very quietly, and there was a yearning honesty to it, here in the low light of his bedroom, against the soft sounds of their breathing.

Rey frowned a little, even as she nuzzled in against him. It was dangerous, how deeply he’d burrowed into her, the softness of his eyes as he looked at her, the way he held her tight.

How much she wanted him to.

But it had just been for one day (two, she thought, and pushed it away). One day off in a whirlwind of practice and preparation, a moment’s passing fancy. Tomorrow they’d return to reality, to the antagonistic tension that served them well.

But for now…

“Okay,” she whispered. "Ben."

Kylo took her hand in his, held their clasped hands against his chest and wrapped his free arm around her shoulders.

When Rey finally drifted off to sleep, he was still holding her hand.

---

ONE WEEK LATER

---

E! ONLINE EXCLUSIVE! KYLO REN AND REY KENOBI SPOTTED IN PASSIONATE LIPLOCK (PHOTOS)

November 15, 2016 – Staff

Looks like infamous figure skater Kylo Ren is getting ready to stuff something else this Thanksgiving.

Sources report seeing Ren at an undisclosed park getting cozy with his new skating partner, tasty 21-year-old morsel Rey Kenobi. The two were spotted in an increasingly-passionate embrace before retreating to another location (Ren may be notorious for his flings, but good to know he has enough class not to do the deed in a park!). Witnesses also spotted the two skating together incognito at an outdoor rink last week.

Looks like all this slumping skater needed all along to bring his career (among other things) back to life was a pretty little plaything to skate next to him, on the ice and off it.

---

NEW MESSAGE: FINN

Rey? Uh… you up?

            yeah – everything ok?

Make sure you’re sitting down, then read the article I sent you on FB…

Rey?

Rey, are you there?

---

Rey could barely see straight as she stormed into the rink on Monday morning, phone clenched in a white-knuckled grip.

Kylo was already on the ice, idly going through warm-up moves. His face brightened as he saw Rey, expression falling as she stalked over to him, thrusting her phone into his face.

“Read this,” she spat. She crossed her arms over her chest, flushed with anger and mortification as Kylo skimmed the article on her phone screen.

His eyes narrowed, glancing to Rey’s trembling form. He attempted to gather her into a one-armed hug, but she pulled away from him, scowling. “It’s okay,” he assured her, shooting a disgusted glance at her phone before handing it back to her. “I’ll call my lawyers this afternoon and see if they can do anything.”

“That’s just…” Rey sighed angrily, sitting hard on the bench and lacing up her skates with more force than necessary. “Did you read what they called me?”

“…I did, yeah.”

“Like I’m just some cheap… accessory to your skating career. I’ve worked too fucking hard over these last few months to get the same sexist crap I heard every day in hockey.”

She pulled her knees up to her chest, settling her chin against them as Kylo sat next to her, looping an arm around her shoulders. She glared at him but didn’t push his arm away.

“It’ll be okay,” he repeated, gently rubbing her shoulder. “Honestly, the tabloids are so used to running stories about me getting in bar brawls or getting pulled over for going 120 in a 35 that they don’t know what to do with something as ordinary as me kissing my girlfriend.”

Rey slowly turned to look at him, incredulous. “…your what.”

Kylo shot her a quizzical glance but remained silent.

Rey pulled away from his loose embrace, gesturing mutely between them. “This is not… I’m not your girlfriend, Ben,” she sputtered.

Kylo’s eyes narrowed a little. “Well, fine, whatever you want to call it,” he said, crossing his arms defensively over his chest. “We don’t have to label it.”

“There is no it! We skate together, we…”

“…sleep together,” Kylo interjected bluntly.

“Five times, okay? And the first one barely even counts, we said it was a mistake.”

“I said the way it happened was a mistake, not that it happened at all!” Kylo yelled, coming to his feet. “You slept at my condo for three nights in a row. We've been on dates together. You've even started calling me..." He trailed off, something deep and pained in his eyes. "You're telling me you regret everything that's happened between us?"

No, a small voice deep in Rey’s chest admitted. Not at all.

“Kylo—“ she started, eyes pleading even as he took a step back from her, features wounded and closed-off.

“To answer your questions, yes, I know about you two, and no, I do not care as long as I don’t have to see it and you can still execute your throw jumps.”

Rey reluctantly drew her gaze from Kylo’s as Maz stepped onto the ice. The old woman looked between them over her glasses, appraising and tsking quietly. “Lovers’ quarrel, hm?”

“We aren’t lovers.” Kylo fairly spat it, and Rey stared at him.

Maz shrugged. “Whatever you are. You’re still skating partners, at least for the next two and a half months. You’re also partners who could use some work on your lasso lifts, so hop to it.”

She shuffled back to her bench, queuing up their music and staring at them expectantly.

Rey looked at Kylo.

Kylo didn't meet her gaze, clenching his teeth hard and staring into the middle distance.

Wordlessly, they clasped hands and skated to center ice.

They didn’t speak again throughout the entire practice.

---

NEW MESSAGE: BEN

Rey, I think we need to talk.

…I’m sorry. I’m not trying to push you into anything. 

Just talk to me.

Please.

(seen: 12:16 am)

---

Layback.

Shotgun.

Scratch.

Sit spin.

Rey grit her teeth and skated into spin after spin until she was dizzy and cross-eyed, falling back against the ice.

The ceiling of the rink seemed to tilt at a hundred angles, unsteady, nauseating, like so many things seemed to be in her life right now.

Rey hadn’t planned on a last-minute midnight practice, but the series of pleading texts from Kylo had pushed her over the edge. She imagined him lying in bed, that giant, ridiculously comfortable bed she’d lain in with him three nights in a row, cuddled and warm, as he pressed delirious kisses to her temple, her cheekbone, her shoulder.

She could almost feel the phantom imprint of them against her skin.

She’d grabbed her skates and her keys and made a beeline for the rink.

Where she currently lay prone on the ice, staring up at the ceiling, and half-wishing that she could stay there until morning practice.

Her thoughts came to a halt at the sound of soft footsteps on the ice. Rey scrambled into a sitting position, still disoriented.

There was an elderly man standing just a few feet away from her, dark eyes appraising, sword-slash mouth unsmiling.

“You’re Rey, then,” Snoke said.

Rey’s eyes widened, and she struggled to rise back up onto her skates.

“I’ve heard a lot about you,” he continued, voice soft and disarming in the same way it had been the night she’d heard him with Kylo. “The boy can’t skate for thoughts of you. Distracting.” He gazed at her, slowly up and down, and Rey took a step backwards. “And so plain, too. I’d’ve hoped the girl proving such an interference to my work would at least be a great beauty. Pity.”

“I have to go,” Rey said quickly, starting to skate toward the edge of the rink.

She stopped as Snoke was suddenly in her path, far faster than she’d seen the man move.

“But I think there’s a benefit to you as well,” Snoke murmured, cupping a hand to his chin and staring at Rey, close, far too close. “You’re already receiving such positive press for your skating — such an oddity, they say. A hockey player who can skate in a dignified sport as well. So capable of being… taught.”

He reached out and Rey instinctively recoiled, narrowing her eyes. “Any part of you that touches me, you’re going to be retrieving from the incinerator out back,” she ground out.

Snoke smiled, a dark, ugly thing that chilled her blood. “And spirited, too,” he said. “I like that in a skater.”

“Do you?” Rey bit at him. “Because you seem to like Ben bloodied under your heel, beaten down so far he doesn’t even know how to get away from you anymore.”

“Ben?" Snoke laughed. “Ben Solo died long before you appeared by his side, girl. But Kylo Ren... that boy should have been my masterpiece. So promising. So powerful. He carries the legacy of the greats in his veins. But he’s volatile. Unstable.”

He leveled Rey with a dark gaze. “Kylo Ren has long since served his purpose to me. He’s dead weight now. A joke in the press, poison to sponsors. Even you can’t undo the damage he’s wrought. He thinks his love for you will heal the wounds he’s laid into himself. But he’s too far gone.”

Rey’s heart seized painfully at the word ‘love,’ but still she tried to move past Snoke.

“You could replace him, you know,” Snoke insisted, blocking her path. “With your malleability and my expertise…”

He stroked a quick hand over her hair, and Rey inhaled on a deep, shuddering breath, closed her eyes. “…we could be what Kylo Ren could only dream of.”

As he withdrew his hand, Rey opened her eyes, clenched a fist, and brought it up short and sharp against Snoke’s jaw in a swift uppercut.

There was blood on her knuckles, and she distantly heard the old man swearing behind her as she tore out of her skates, hefting them in her hands and running out to the parking lot barefoot, breathing hard, tears stinging at her eyes for reasons she wasn’t even entirely sure she understood.

---

Rey pounded her fist against the elegant door in front of her, keeping one arm wrapped protectively around herself.

She’d texted Kylo from the parking lot of the rink with shaking fingers before reversing out of her space so quickly her tires skidded against the asphalt. She knew Snoke wasn’t following her, but her skin still crawled from the old man’s deceptively soft voice, his predatory touches.

He’d texted her back when she was on the highway: “come over. I’m still up.”

Kylo finally answered the door, bleary-eyed and bare-chested, and wordlessly escorted her in.

It felt awkward now, after their fight, to stand in the same doorway where Kylo had hoisted her up and kissed her in days past. Kylo didn’t invite her to sit down or get comfortable, and she didn’t ask. They just stared at each other in the dim glow of the single bulb at the front entryway.

“Hi,” Rey said after a moment, arms still wrapped around herself.

“What happened?” Kylo asked bluntly.

Rey laughed humorlessly, digging her fingers into her ribs. “Your creepy-ass coach found me at a late-night practice and tried to recruit me.”

Kylo didn’t answer, merely stared at her.

“He told me that… you’d served your purpose, that you weren’t any use to him anymore. He wanted me to leave you and take up with him instead.”

“…in what way?”

Kylo’s voice was soft, and Rey stared at him in open disbelief. “Jesus Christ, Ben, not like that! As my coach.” She narrowed her eyes at him. “And we had this discussion already — we’re not ‘like’ anything, remember?”

His latent sleepiness seemed to be wearing off, and Kylo stood toe-to-toe with her, eyes boring down into hers. “Then why are you here?” he ground out. “What, you don’t care about me but when something goes wrong, I’m the first person you run to?”

“First of all, this is more than ‘something going wrong,’ this is something that directly affects you, and second, when did I ever say I don’t care about you?” 

“You just don’t want to be with me,” Kylo said flatly.

Rey muffled a frustrated scream into her palms before reaching up and grabbing Kylo’s shoulders, dragging him down to her. “Listen to me, you self-absorbed jackass. This is not about you and me, about us, about there not being an ‘us’. This is about your coach being a complete monster who has hurt you every which way, isolated you from your family, and does not care about you.” She pulled him down closer to herself in desperation as he tried to pull away. “Ben, he is going to use you up and throw you away when he’s done. He’s already started. Don’t you see that?”

Kylo stared at her for a long moment before pulling her hands away and taking a step back.

Then:

“I don’t believe you.”

Rey’s eyes widened, hands going slack at her sides. “What?”

“I don’t believe you,” Kylo repeated coolly, turning away from her. “I don’t believe that he told you that I’m no use to him anymore, I don’t believe that he ‘recruited’ you, and I don’t believe that he doesn’t care about me.”

“God, Ben!” Rey exploded, striding over to him and running her fingers roughly over the scars criss-crossing his bare chest. “What the hell do you call these? You think someone who cares about you would make you hurt yourself? Would hurt you?”

Kylo’s eyes were dark, and he opened his mouth to speak.

“And don’t you dare say that it’s the same thing with you and me. It’s not the same.” Rey bit hard against her lip, hands clenching into fists.

She took a deep breath. “Snoke said… something about you loving me," she said, almost to herself, and she saw Kylo freeze. "That he knew. And maybe I knew it too, okay? Maybe I started seeing it and maybe I didn’t want to. Maybe I didn’t want to know what that meant for me, that I’d have to put a name to things.”

She took a step forward, frowning as Kylo moved back, away from her. “But no matter what happens… we’re in this together, okay? And I care about you. I do. That’s why I’m telling you to get away from him. I can’t imagine what your mother went through seeing this for years. I’ve only seen it for a few weeks and it’s killing me.”

Kylo’s eyes were dark, gaze flat as he stared at her. “You know,” he said finally, “he was right about you.”

Rey’s brow furrowed in confusion. “Who?”

“He called half an hour before you got here, you know. Told me everything you’d say. Everything you’d said to him, how you told him what a joke I am, how much fun it’d been toying with me, how pathetically obsessed I am with you, how you’d planned all along to take the money and run.” His tone was flat, disaffected, and it sent a chill down her spine.  

Rey took a step forward. “I never said any of that, Ben,” she said, attempting to keep her voice steady. 

"That's not my name."

Rey froze, eyes widening.

Kylo shook his head, and his eyes were cold.

“Why did you have to ruin everything, Rey?”

The same words as the night he’d first kissed her, but now it was the man from earlier that evening, broken and beaten, so far beyond her reach. Beyond anyone's.

“I can’t help you,” Rey whispered, realization dawning, her eyes burning with unshed tears. “Your mother loved you and she couldn’t help you, and neither can I.”

“There’s nothing to help,” Kylo ground out. “We make it through qualifying, we go to Nationals, you collect on your payday and we go our separate ways. Just like you wanted.”

Rey glared at him, feeling an angry tear slide down her cheek. “You don’t know what I want, Kylo Ren,” she spat at him. "You don't know anything at all." 

She spun on her heel, tugged the door to his condo open and slammed it behind her.

She ran down the stairs, down the sidewalk, didn’t stop running until she reached her truck.

It took three tries to slot the key into the lock, until Rey finally found herself in the driver’s seat, slumped against the steering wheel, and allowed herself to cry in earnest.

I wanted Ben, Rey thought. I wanted you, and I didn’t even know it until he took you from me.

---

TWO WEEKS LATER

---  

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Asher & Asher Representation

Kylo Ren and Rey Kenobi Advance to Nationals

Cementing their status as the hottest rising stars in pairs skating, Kylo Ren and Rey Kenobi placed third in the Eastern sectional regional qualifying skate on December 1^st, posting a combined score of 211.45 (75.31 short program, 136.14 free skate). This represents a personal best for Ren at his tenth performance in qualifying US Figure Skating competition.

Coach Maz Kanata is unsurprised by the pair’s success: “They’ve put in a lot of effort,” the celebrated coach observed rinkside shortly after the competition.

Ren and Kenobi will next compete in the national finals on February 1^st.

---

skatesandscowls:

so, last night’s qualifying… is it just me or did ren and kenobi look really… off? :\\\

kylorensleftskate:

not just you…… their exhibition skate was all passionate and fiery. they had no spark this time. really surprised they scored as high as they did

biellmannsurprise:

they were good, technically; they got the scores they should have. they just looked dead. never seen a pair look so damn depressed after qualifying for nationals.

atwistofarabesque:

Cosigning all of the above. Ren looks sick. Kenobi looks overwhelmed. Looks like the Ren partner curse may not be over after all. :(

lutzesfordays: 

did they have a falling out??? we haven't heard anything since that story leaked about them dating......

kylorensleftskate: 

idk but i heard they broke up. maybe it's still raw :\

rendaily:

Mod Q here, reminding community members once again that we don't tolerate speculation about skaters' personal lives. Stay on-topic!

[PM]lutzesfordays: omg did they really break up? they were so cute together. :(

[PM]kylorensleftskate: sorry. :( i saw a post from a guy who works at the rink where they practice and apparently they won't even park near each other anymore. he said it's like they're total strangers. guess it was too good to be true 

[PM]lutzesfordays: :(

---

ONE MONTH LATER

---

“And… lift.”

Rey stared to the far end of the rink, absently bracing herself against Kylo’s shoulders as he raised her up into a waist loop lift.

“And down.”

She disengaged, and Kylo slid her gently down to the ice.

They didn’t make eye contact.

They’d barely spoken for the past month outside of quiet notes during their routines.

Maz frowned at them, rolling her eyes and sighing. “You know, we’re lucky that we made it out of qualifying alive with you two moping around like whiny teenagers for the past month. Whatever it is, get over it, kiss and make up, whatever you have to do. But knock it off. Let’s do it again, from the top.”

“Sure,” Kylo muttered, skating to center ice and looking at Rey expectantly.

Rey stared after him. He looked somehow worse than usual today, and for once, she didn’t look away as she skated over to him.

The infrequent dark circles he’d had under his eyes when they started skating together seemed almost permanent now.

Rey knew her own were likely just as pronounced — she’d poured herself into her studies with Luke with every ounce of energy should could muster, trying to drive out the lingering tension between herself and Kylo that seemed to grow more oppressive and gray as the days and weeks turned.

She couldn’t remember the last time she’d slept well.

Probably the last time she'd slept with…

“Go,” he muttered as Maz queued up their music.

The starting step sequence was complex, but not so much that she couldn’t steal the odd glance at Kylo as he skated. He seemed to have hollowed in on himself, skin turning even paler, and sometimes Rey could swear she saw him wince as he moved.

What has he done to you since he took you away? Rey thought to herself, moving with Kylo into a Chocktaw turn. What does he say to you, Ben? What does he tell you when he’s making you bleed onto the ice?

What does he say about me? About us?

But there was no ‘them’. She herself had made that perfectly clear, over and over, until Snoke had turned it into a weapon.

“Rey!”

She looked up distractedly as Maz cut the music, a deep frown on her lined features. “You missed two elements in a row there, girl,” the old woman said, leaning hard on her cane. “Wherever your mind is right now, can you bring it back to the ice?”

“Sorry,” Rey mumbled, avoiding Kylo’s curious stare as they skated back to center ice, to starting position.

Of course it had been the elements where she moved closest to him that she’d missed. Kylo expertly maneuvered her into a hand-to-hand hold, and Rey felt her heart beat faster at the way his hands wrapped around hers, warm even through his gloves.

He easily hoisted her up into a press lift, their hands clasping tight, arms braced against each other.

When he released her from the lift, they were supposed to move into side-by-side camel spins, then another step sequence.

Instead, the arms that came around her to secure her for the lift dismount held on just a fraction too long, then a heartbeat, and Rey wanted nothing more than to just rest her forehead against his chest, lean into him.

Let me stay, Rey thought, fingers digging into his shoulders. Let me have my Ben for just a little longer...

The arm around her shoulders lingered for the space of another heartbeat before spinning her out.

“Bad timing today!” Maz called across the rink, cutting the music again.

That’s always us, isn’t it, Rey thought ruefully, not looking at Kylo. Bad timing.

---

“Fuck,” Rey swore, exiting her Biellmann spin and jamming her toe pick into the ice. She’d over-rotated for the fourth time in a row, the sixth time that day.

Maz hadn’t been smiling when she finally told Rey and Kylo to call it a day, grumbling to herself and skimming the choreo binder for potential changes after they’d failed to complete three separate passes.

Everything seemed to be crumbling around them now, Nationals slowly fading from view, their scores at qualifying the only thin thread of hope they had left.

I’m sorry, Leia, Rey thought to the absent senator, sighing and pinning back an escaping tendril of hair. I’m sorry that I couldn’t help him, either.

She skated off-ice, tugged off her skates and made a beeline for the locker room.

She always kept her head down as she changed, showered, stowed her equipment.

It was impossible not to remember the first touch of Kylo’s lips to hers, his skin burning beneath her palms, his arms tight around her as he pressed her back against the lockers.

There was a lump in Rey’s throat as she exited the locker room, her equipment bag over her shoulder, and her heart froze as she saw the two figures quietly speaking at the rink’s edge as the Zamboni passed along resurfacing.

Kylo was hunched over, arms crossed. Defeated.

He didn’t notice Rey.

Snoke, for his part, did, dark eyes dispassionate as they met hers when she passed by.

He glanced to Kylo, appraising, before laying one cold, grasping hand along his shoulder.

When he turned back to Rey, his dark eyes were shining, and there was a smirk on his lips.

She stared at Kylo, heart twisting hard in her chest.

He didn’t look up.

Rey distantly heard Snoke speaking to Kylo in that familiarly-soft voice as she blindly made her way out to the parking lot, eyes burning.

She fumbled in her coat pocket, extracted her phone and dialed a familiar number.

“Rey? Is something wrong?”

“Luke.” She leaned hard against the cab of her truck, dropped her equipment bag at her feet. “I saw him. Them.”

Luke was quiet on the other end of the phone. “I see. How do you feel?”

“I wanted to kill him.” Her voice broke, and she drove her fist into the driver’s side door. “I wanted to slit Snoke’s throat with my skates and take him back.”  

“I wish I could say I didn’t know the feeling.” Luke sighed. “I have to believe we can still bring him home, somehow. Even after all this time.”

Rey laughed, dark and humorless as she swung her bag into the passenger seat. “It’s been a long time since you saw them together, I’m guessing. He’s not coming back. Snoke told me that Ben Solo was dead, and he was right.”

She rested her head against the steering wheel as she climbed into the cab, shoulders slack. “He smiled at me, Luke,” she said, and her voice was thick with exhaustion. “He had him right there, just far enough away that I couldn't get to him, and the bastard smiled at me.”

Luke didn’t speak.

Rey grit her teeth as she slipped the key into the ignition, sighing at the roar of the truck’s engine. “I’m going to take a raincheck on practice tonight, okay? I did some solo skating after our work with Maz and I’m just…”

“Rey. It’s all right.” Luke’s voice was gentle, and she hated him for it. “Take some time off. Regroup. And…” He hesitated. “I’m not willing to give up on him yet. You shouldn’t either.”

Rey murmured a distracted farewell as she stabbed at the ‘end call’ button and tossed her phone to the side, hands gripping the steering wheel tightly in her hands.

I’m not willing to give up on him yet.

She thumped her head against the headrest, staring at the rink through the windshield.

Luke’s wrong about you, she thought, ignoring the bite of tears at the corners of her eyes as she reversed. And I’m done mourning for you.

---

Rey lay back on her bed, laptop opened and propped up on her stomach, earbuds in. She wasn’t paying attention.

It had been almost a walk of shame as she drove back to her shared apartment for the first time in ages, hoping against hope that Finn and Poe were home.

When Finn opened the door, she collapsed into his arms, hugging him in a death grip and pressing her face to his shoulder.

"I’m sorry I haven’t been home,” she had managed, fisting her hands in his sweater. “It’s just... with everything... with him...”

“Rey... seriously, it’s okay," Finn shushed her, rubbing comforting circles against her back. "I’ve gotten mixed up with idiot boyfriends before, too.” He crooked a helpless grin at Poe. “Present company excluded, of course.”

Poe rolled his eyes a little and settled a hand along Rey’s back. “It’s not too much longer, right? This whole... arrangement?”

“One more month.” Rey angrily scrubbed a hand over her face. “We compete in Nationals and then I never have to see him again. His coach can keep torturing him until there’s nothing left, just like he wants.”

Poe and Finn had exchanged a look, but said nothing.

Rey adjusted the volume on her laptop, glancing at her closed door. Finn and Poe had ordered in pizza and queued up a movie for date night, inviting her to come out to the living room whenever she wanted to.

There was a congealing piece of pizza on the rickety end table at her bedside, untouched. Her latest Spotify playlist was open and on repeat. She’d heard the same songs over and over again and still couldn’t identify a single one of them.

There was a swell of laughter from the living room, warm and affectionate, and Rey’s heart clenched painfully as she settled back against the worn pillows on her narrow bed.

She and Kylo had only gone to the movies once. It had been a loud, bombastic action film, brainless, but she’d still acquiesced as he raised the armrest between them and cuddled her close to his side (and stole half of her popcorn, the bastard).

The unmistakable sound of a message alert from her phone pulled her from her reverie, and Rey frowned as she saw a new e-mail from Maz addressed to both her and Kylo.

“Hey, you two crazy kids,” it read. “Let’s be honest: you were awful today. Watch these files and we’ll try to be less awful tomorrow. Remember what you can do, together.”

Rey rolled her eyes, moving her finger over her trackpad and downloading the three attached video files.

What we can do, she thought, shooting an annoyed glance at the email as the videos downloaded to her hard drive. There is no ‘we’ anymore.

…if there ever had been.

Which was the whole core of the problem, really.

Rey sighed as she started up the first file, and she instantly recognized the professional taping of their exhibition skate.

She’d nearly forgotten how aggressive their first program together was, all hard lines and sharp moves, heavy throws and lifts. She and Kylo glared at each other, harsh and unsmiling, skating toe-to-toe and into tight spins, more combatants meeting on the battlefield than partners on the ice.

Rey stopped the video before they got to the final simultaneous spins that she knew ended with her skate scoring into Kylo’s face, biting her lip and staring at the paused frame, Kylo’s hands at her waist as he brought her down from a carry lift.

Even in the harshness of the choreography, the brutal battle between them… they still moved together, synchronous, in time with each other’s movements.

I’ve got the message, Maz. We need to work together again, Rey sighed, starting to close out the video player.

The second clip caught her eye, and a lump seemed to form in her throat as she recognized the thumbnail image.

She didn’t want to watch, didn’t want to be reminded…

Her hand moved almost of its own regard, opening the file.

It was lower-resolution than the first video. Maz liked to tape some of their practices for review but only had an off-the-rack point-and-shoot model for it. Good enough to shoot for reference...

…and, Rey thought, digging her hands into the blankets on her bed, heart pounding, good enough to see everything that passed between her and Kylo... between her and Ben as they skated through the first practice of their qualifying routine.

She’d felt it, that day, the breathtaking symmetry between them, the perfect timing, the utter completeness as they moved together.

But it was another thing entirely to see it from the outside.

The way his eyes followed her every move, helpless, awed.

The way her own closed as his hands moved over hers, over her hips and arms, and she leaned closer to him.

The way they skated together in hold, all yearning touches and burning stares, almost heedless of the music.

It was the effortless, impassioned skating of two people deeply in love and utterly unaware of it.

Rey shut her laptop with a firm snap, staring up at the ceiling with eyes gone hot and gritty.

She hadn’t needed to see the third video, doubtless their qualifying skate, to finally recognize the anemic performance for what it was.

Heartbreak.

Rey grit her teeth and shoved her laptop to the side, storming out of her bedroom and retrieving her equipment bag from the front entryway.

“Rey? You okay?” Finn fumbled for the remote and paused the movie, looking at her in concern.

“I…” She clenched her fists at her sides and ducked her head. “I’m going to head back to the rink. Practice for a little while.”

“Are you sure?” Poe asked, frowning. “It’s almost midnight.”

“Yeah.” She offered them a weak smile. “I just… have a lot on my mind right now that I could really stand to skate out.”

She clutched her bag in her hands and tried to will away the image of herself and Ben Solo clinging together at center ice, foreheads touching, eyes closed.

Tried to remember that the man in that video was lost to her.

One more month, she thought.  

---

Rey clutched an oversized latte in her hand as she made her way across the rink parking lot (this time with pepper spray attached to her key ring and brass knuckles in her bag — gifts from Finn and Poe).

She yawned widely as she crossed over the concrete barrier, scrubbing at her eyes with her free hand. It was a miracle that she and Kylo hadn’t had another incident like they’d suffered during exhibition, considering how exhausted they both always seemed to be.

(Rey frowned, recalling how Kylo had asked her about her nightmares that night in the ER, how she’d thrown his back at him. Little had she known at the time that her nightmares would soon be about him, always just inches away from her grasp, always ending with him bloodied and motionless on the ice, Snoke’s laugh echoing around them…)

Rey pushed the doors to the rink open, unease curling tight in her belly as she saw the lights on, heard the unmistakable sound of skate blades on ice.

She moved forward carefully, pepper spray in hand.

There, skating in careful turns and spins at center ice, was Kylo.

His eyes were dark and purposeful, mouth set into a tight line.

Snoke was nowhere to be seen.

Rey watched him for long minutes, the way he kept his head down, the way he dug his skates into the ice, punishing, the way he swore under his breath whenever he made a misstep.

He looked so tired, and her heart ached for him.

“You know, if you’re trying to kill yourself, exhaustion is probably one of the slower ways to do it,” Rey finally offered, leaning her middle against the half-boards, features schooled into a careful mask of indifference.

Kylo came to a slow stop, pivoting at center ice and staring at her.

Instead of the blankness she’d grown accustomed to seeing in his eyes over the past month, there was longing, hurt, wariness.

Rey silently sat on the bench at rinkside, slipping into her skates and lacing them up with deft fingers.

Kylo’s gaze never moved from her. He didn’t move at all.

Taking a deep breath, Rey stepped onto the ice, skating towards him, slowly, purposefully.

She hesitated but didn’t stop until their toe picks touched, until Kylo finally turned away.

Before she'd even realized she'd done it, Rey had wrapped her arms around his waist and rested her head against his chest.

He didn’t say anything.

“I miss you,” she finally whispered, voice breaking on the words, and it echoed across the ice, thundering. "I miss you so much, Ben."

The words seemed to break something in Kylo, and Rey gasped as his arms came tightly around her, his face buried in her hair, his shoulders shaking with fine tremors as she ran her hands, unsteady and hesitant, up his back.

“I quit, Rey,” he managed, voice muffled against the fall of Rey’s hair. “Tonight.”

Rey pulled back, stared at him in confusion. “You quit… skating?”

Kylo shook his head, reaching out to graze shaking fingertips across her temple. “Snoke.”

Rey’s eyes widened, heart stopping as his words registered. “…you left him?” she whispered. “Tonight? How?”

“He’s threatening legal action,” Kylo murmured, oblivious. “I knew he would. He says it's a breach of contract, that I'll be sorry, but... I didn’t have a choice. I couldn’t…”

His trembling hand curved around her cheek. “He gave me an ultimatum,” he said quietly. “Said I haven’t… been the same since I started skating with you. That I’m…” He took a deep breath. “…weak now. So he told me to choose: keep him as coach, or keep you as my partner.”

Rey’s eyes widened further as she stared up at him. “Ben…”

“No, just…” He pressed his fingers to Rey’s lips, scrubbing a hand over his face with his free hand. “Look, I… I need to apologize. For everything. With Snoke, with skating, with us, with my thinking there was an ‘us’… I’m sorry, Rey. I’m sorry for all of it. I'm sorry.”

He clutched her hand out of habit before loosening his grasp, casting an apologetic glance at her. "I know you only did this, skated with me because my mother paid you to,” he murmured. “ And I know I don’t deserve you. I know I hurt you.”

He swallowed hard, brushing his thumb over her cheekbone. “But if you could…" He was crying, and Rey laid her hand over his. "...if we can just... make it to Nationals... if you would just let me skate by your side, just one last time… that's all I need. That's all I'd ask for.”

Rey stared at him with damp eyes, clutching his hand.

“Rey?” Kylo managed. “What do you…”

He trailed off as Rey leaned up on her toe picks, as she threaded her hands through his hair and kissed him, hard, desperate, clinging.

Before she knew it, Kylo’s arms were wrapped tight around her, lifting her off her feet as he tilted his head and deepened the kiss, something between a cry and a groan tearing from his throat.

Rey broke the kiss first, pressing her tear-dampened cheek to his.

“I missed you so much," she whispered. "Every single day. I thought he’d taken you. Ben." She swallowed hard, inhaled on an unsteady breath. “I thought he'd taken you from me for good."

Kylo shook his head, pressed a kiss to her cheek and rested his forehead against hers. “I didn’t have a choice,” he murmured. “Snoke couldn’t keep me. I was already yours.”

---

ONE MONTH LATER

---  

“Team Ren and Kenobi, you’re up next.”

Ben rubbed Rey’s back as she placed her head between her knees. “I can’t believe we’re actually here,” she managed in between slow, steady breaths. “We made it to Nationals.”

“I can’t believe I’m back here,” Ben noted. “They’re still cheaping out on the refreshments.”

“Ben.”

“What? As much money as they’re going to make between our sponsorships, the least they can do is serve something better than crudites.”

“We can get something better after we win.”

Ben laughed, offering Rey a hand and helping her to her feet. “You’re that convinced we’re going to win? We placed third at qualifying.”

“No one who takes the top seed ever ends up winning it all. Mark it down. We’ve got this.”

Ben was quiet for a long moment, looking down at his and Rey’s clasped hands. “1970 Bruins,” he said suddenly, not meeting Rey’s curious gaze. “Did they have the top seed?”

Rey offered him a soft smile, squeezing his hand. “Second. And they hoisted the Cup by the time it was all over.”

“You know, if this skating thing works out I think you have a future as a hockey historian.”

Rey snorted. “Please. Like I knew that off the top of my head.” She rubbed her thumb over the back of Ben’s hand. “I read up on it. I figured you’d want to know about that year eventually.” She paused. “…and we can go see him someday. When you’re ready.”

Ben crooked a smile at her, leaning down to kiss her cheek. “Thanks,” he murmured. “Think I’d better learn a little more about hockey before I try a… reconciliation. Any plans on going back to it any time soon?”

“Mm, I don’t know,” Rey said thoughtfully. “Would you come to my games?”

“Would you want me to?”

Rey rolled her eyes. “No, why would I want my boyfriend to come and cheer me on?”

Ben froze next to her.

Rey grinned at him.

“…well,” Ben said after a moment, recovering, “if all goes well, I should be able to get back into singles competition by next year. I guess I could stomach some hockey if my girlfriend came to my programs.”

Rey squeezed his hand and reached up to pull his face down to hers. “I came to this one, didn’t I?” she said softly, closing her eyes and leaning into his kiss.

“Ren and Kenobi to center ice!”

They pulled apart, grinning, foreheads pressed together.

“Ready?” Ben asked.

“Ready,” Rey affirmed.

They clasped hands and skated forward.

---

Cinderella on Skates: Solo and Kenobi Capture Gold at US Nationals

February 1, 2017 – SkateZone Editorial Staff

Perhaps the greatest story ever told on ice comes to us from the world of hockey, not figure skating, as Al Michaels uttered five iconic words at the 1980 Olympics: “Do you believe in miracles?”

Tonight, at the finals for US National Figure Skating, figure skating saw its own “miracle” story, as the former Kylo Ren, once more skating under the name Ben Solo, and first-year partner Rey Kenobi took their place on the podium flashing gold medals after scoring a staggering 225.71 cumulative between their short program and free skate. After an anemic performance at last year’s qualifiers, the dynamic duo that shook the skating world with their early exhibition skate last fall were back in absolutely riveting form. Solo delivered hands-down the greatest performance of his career, and he and newcomer Kenobi, a neophyte skater no less, demonstrated the kind of synchronous skating and perfect timing partners who have skated for 10 years struggle to master, let alone a pair with only six months of practice time under their belts.

Let’s be honest: coming into tonight’s competition, the big story was whether or not fading star Kylo Ren would finally manage to redeem himself after years of scandal and failure. Needless to say, his return to the Ben Solo we watched rise through the ranks throughout the 00s and his performance with Kenobi tonight laid all those doubts to rest. Posting the highest scores of his career, Solo’s never presented such polished skating. Kenobi, for her part, showed none of the opening-night jitters that we saw from her in exhibition and qualifying. Her interplay with Solo throughout their program represented some of the best pairs work we’ve seen in years.

In the lead-up to this year’s competition, much of the dialogue skewed towards the skating duo as individuals: would Ben Solo/Kylo Ren finally conquer his demons and return to the strength of skating that seemed a distant memory? Would Kenobi rise out of the shadows and carve out her own space on the ice? Looking at tonight’s performances, what’s abundantly clear is that this never was a story about Solo or Kenobi as individuals, but rather the powerhouse duo they are together.

---

lutzesfordays:

okay guys I know we’re not supposed to ship real people, I KNOW, but you guys ben fucking PICKED UP KENOBI AND SPUN HER AROUND AND KISSED HER AFTER THEIR PROGRAM FINISHED. AM I NOT SUPPOSED TO SCREAM. IM SCREAMING YOU GUYS

bensolosleftskate:

did you see the way they looked at each other as they were waiting for their scores?? MY HEART

skatesandscowls:

my baby BEN SOLO is all grown up i'm so proud of him!!! *cries*

atwistofarabesque:

look I’m not saying they fucked in the locker room after they won but they totally fucked in the locker room after they won

bensolosleftskate:

*looks around* okay real quick before the mods get back…… do they have an official ship name yet????

skatesandscowls:

benobi??

atwistofarabesque:

That’s a little awkward… what about Reylo?

lutzesfordays:

im going reylo

rendaily:

Mod Q here, guys.

...

…actually, I’m gonna go Reylo, too.

---

ONE YEAR LATER

---  

“Go, Rey!”

She grins, keeps her head up as she gains the line, all crossovers and quick skating that she’s long-since perfected, keeping the puck on her stick.

Finn and Poe are on the wings with her, skating with her, holding formation and supporting her as she goes. It’s what they do, after all, on the ice and off it. They’d valiantly charged into the coach’s office a year back, demanding Rey be allowed to try out for the Ice Warriors again.

(They’d had no way of knowing that Rey had already aced the tryout, and that they’d told her she didn’t even need one, but it was very sweet just the same.)

Leia is in the front row of the stands, always in the offensive end, bundled up and grinning, forever bearing a series of signs cheering Rey on. She’s not always there, not with so much to do, so much to fix in the country, but it’s become one of the Senator’s favorite pasttimes.

Rey smiles as she sees one of the reasons why, sees her excitedly grasping her son’s arm and cajoling him to cheer with her. Ben is far too dignified to cheer his lungs out like his mother and the rest of the attendees, but he grins at Rey, applauds when she scores, kisses her senseless in the parking lot after they win and hugs her tightly when they lose.

Sometimes, if he’s in a particularly good mood, he buys nachos from the concession stand and saves them for her and the boys. He’s getting to know them, Finn and Poe — they still don’t trust him, not entirely, but he loves Rey and Rey loves him and that’s enough for now.

Rey is all but an official part of Ben’s family (how tangled up she’d been in all of them before she’d even known what she was getting herself into). Leia hugs her, tells her how she’s always wanted a daughter, cajoles Kylo about marrying her (“give it time, Mom, Christ”). Luke is terrible at hockey, but sometimes he joins Rey and the boys for pickup games just for the fun of it.

(Once, just once, she and Ben had held hands on a rainy Saturday as they stood by an immaculately-tended gravesite. They didn’t speak, but Ben had held her hand just a little tighter.)

Ben is back skating in solo competition after a scandal-free year. He's already the odds leader for Olympic gold in PyeongChang (he rolls his eyes at the effusive praise he receives, but Rey sends him every positive article she finds, reads them to him at night when they're in bed together). The tabloids, when they bother to report on him — he’s just not as interesting when he’s not in trouble — mostly credit his turnaround to his relationship with former skating partner Rey Kenobi.

(It makes them laugh when they see it — they both know Rey only helped. In the end, Ben had to save himself. She was just waiting to catch him on the other side.)

It’s a good life, Rey thinks, as she skates hard into the offensive zone. She has the ice beneath her skates, a stick in her hands. She has good, loyal friends.

And she has a still-healing man who looks at her like the sun rises and falls in her eyes, whose arms she wakes up wrapped in every morning, who makes her coffee just the way she likes it and keeps his skates neatly beside hers.

“Shoot, Rey!”

Slapshot, right shoulder.

They never learn, do they?  Rey thinks with a wry grin as the goal horn blares, as the cheer roars.

The team crowds around her, gathering her up in a group hug.

She finds Ben’s eyes in the stands, feels the smile he keeps just for her.

It’s almost funny, how just a year ago she’d pitied the girl who would skate beside him.

How a year later, she’d be the one who walks with him, side-by-side, hand-in-hand.

How she’d never want it any other way.

---

FIN

---