Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

The stiff, rayon fabric of his suit scratches against his legs and the collar of the dress shirt rubs against where shoulder meets neck to the point of blistering. Yesterday, his mother pulled the suit from the attic. It’s cold in the foyer of the church, snow outside still clinging to the asphalt, and the ancient HVAV unit can’t seem to keep up with this chill. Reality hasn’t quite set in yet despite the viewing, despite the dozens of calls from relatives and friends, the condolence texts from old acquaintance. The messages from Hux unanswered.

Idly, Ben wonders if this was what Han wanted. He was never religious, but they both went to church with mom when he was younger. Ben took his first communion in front of this altar, had his first confession in the corner confessional. In high school, he was confirmed to make his mom happy, and Han went along with Catholicism in much the same way. It was important to Leia, so they both made practiced motions every Sunday. Stand, sit, kneel. They would spend an hour looking for secrets in the stained glass windows and pretending to listen to Father John’s homily.

It’s a different Father now who greets them as they walk into the sanctuary. Leia takes holy water, makes the sign of the cross, and Ben follows her more out of rote practice than any real belief.

Some people find religion in tragedy, but all Ben sees in this building is colored sunbeams and shadows, empty space. Early morning daylight is shining in through the left bay of windows, painting large, white tiles with disjointed, warped figures, each one a different Jesus, a new Station of the Cross. There’s a statue of Mary in the back, a few lit prayer candles flickering at her feet, the staple of every Catholic church. Somewhere, a grandmother stands in a kitchen frying fish even though it’s Tuesday and Lent is months away.

Standing here, listening to his mom talk in hushed tones with the priest, Ben can almost imagine his dad sitting in the first pew. He pretends he’s four feet shorter, that they’re just late for church. He could run down the aisle and make the climb into the pew, put his tiny hands on even knobbier knees and ask if they can get ice cream on the way home. Han will say yes, because he always does, and they’ll play Statue and do their best stone imitations, like the gargoyles on the basilica downtown. Leia will shush them as they drive each other into silent fits of laughter.

After ice cream, they’ll leave Ben in the office of the restaurant with a coloring book as they prepare for the week, cutting vegetables and par cooking pastas and immersion blending sauces. When he’s old enough to reach a cutting board and dexterous enough to handle a knife, they’ll let him help, dad teaching him how to hold the handle and mom showing him how to claw his fingers, so he doesn’t cut himself.

“Ben?” His mother asks, and the illusion he’s in fades, his combination of memories separating and the reality of his situation settling back into weary bones.

“Just thinking about church,” he tells her. He won’t lie to her, but dragging up these memories right now doesn’t serve them. In an hour, the casket will be placed in front of the altar and the funeral mass will begin. Will he take communion, Ben wonders, or just cross his arms for the blessing? It’s not something he thought to worry about when he had nightmares about losing his parents. Communion wine is out of the question; no doubt his mom has already told the priest.

“This isn’t how I hoped to get you back here,” Leia admits, a small, sad smile settling even deeper on her face. It’s the only expression he’s seen since pulling into the hospital parking lot to find her waiting by the doors. She hasn’t let him see her cry, and he doubts she ever will. For all that his parents divorced, there was still a love between them. They fought, but they never hated each other. Still, her pride remains. “I always just assumed I could con you into a Catholic wedding by promising to plan the whole thing.”

For a moment, Ben tries to picture Hux in this building, places a mental image in the last pew, but the Hux in his head won’t turn around, won’t face him, staring straight ahead with tight shoulders. Good, Ben thinks. He should be uncomfortable.

“No weddings for a while,” Ben tells her, and it’s honest. For months, Hux put meeting his parents on the back burner, and now, he never would. How could he forgive that? Months of avoiding the one thing he wanted, the only thing Ben ever asked of him. He won’t be someone’s last priority.

Despite all his rage, when his mom reaches out to grab his hand, Ben finds himself wishing for paler skin, wishes for different arms to hide in as he cries. 

-

The funeral is family only. Hux hadn’t expected to be invited, but it hurts to hear it from Poe, rather than Ben. All of his calls and texts from the first few days went unanswered, so he stopped calling. They’re open on limited hours while Ben takes some time off, and Hux is doing his best to help Rey handle closing the front and back of the house. He cashes out servers and checks side work, staples reports and wonders what will happen when the semester starts, when he doesn’t have spare time to help the restaurant limp along. How much time can he buy everyone while not putting his scholarships in jeopardy?

Each shift, his coworkers look less haunted. There’s an empty space in the window and no one is brave enough to fill it, so Hux tries. He lets Rey clock him in at an hourly wage and stands where Han stood, hands servers plates and tells them table numbers, wipes stray sauce, calls for entrées, does his best to lose himself in the rhythm of it, the cycle of the dining room as tables are seated and cashed out.

No one tells him he’s doing a good job, but Rey looks grateful as he does it. It’s easier for him, Hux decides. Seven years working with Han and he never quite figured out the man’s sense of humor, never talked to him about anything beyond work. Asked about his schedule, menu changes, but never how their days were. Another attempt at compartmentalizing his entire life, keeping his life inside this building separate from his life outside.

Because obviously, he’d done so well at that in the end

Hux thinks about the walls of Ben’s house, the child-drawn family portrait. He wishes he could tell Ben with certainty that things will be okay. Even if Ben was answering his calls, though, he doesn’t want to lie. 

-

The 86 list is unmanageable in the wake of Ben’s absence. No one wants him to rush back to work, but Rey is struggling. Morning shift is writing their own prep lists, and things keep getting lost in the shuffle. Sauces, ingredients, containers, everything is missing, and the two people who always know where to find it are gone. One of them will never walk through the front door again.

Servers talk each shift about how they should be closed, about how struggling to stay open doesn’t do any good. No one’s made a notification to the public, either; regulars notice Han’s absence, some of them even know what happened, but each day they get more calls, more inquiries. Mitaka has broken the news to more people than the family has, probably. For all that Han didn’t want to be the face of the restaurant, he’d ended up one, and no one really know how to handle his loss.

-

For three days, Hux has been trying to find a part to the bread warmer. It got sent back to the dish pit one day on accident, and has been missing ever since. Surely it had a spot, and someone knew it, but everyone he’s asked has been equally clueless. Out of habit, Hux opens his mouth to suggest calling Han and has to swallow the words down, all but chokes on them.

He just remarks that they need Ben back, instead. Hux knows at this point that Ben’s only returning to the restaurant, though, and not him. The silence has been clear enough. On the way home from work, he buys a pack of cigarettes and chain smokes in his car, trying to make up for lost time. 

-

His car door slams, echoing in the parking lot as Ben steps into the chill of the winter afternoon. Already, a shiver is curling at the base of his spine despite his layers. The embroidery on his left breast is still unchanged: Ben Solo, Kitchen Manager. Legally, he was the owner now. While Han left a portion of the business to Rey, he left operations to Ben, and no one had objected during the reading of the will.

He knows people will stare, if he steps in the front. Instead, he pulls out his keys and lets himself in the back. His first move should be checking in with Rey, but Ben enters the walk in, peruses the shelves. It’s largely organized, no small feat for a restaurant running itself ragged. There’s an unlabeled six pan of ketchup a server left behind and a Cambro of au jus cooling without a lid, but no empty pans, no dirty dishes hidden behind cases of lemons, no rotten produce or mold on the shelves.

Turning to leave, his eyes catch the sign above the door. It has the information of the company, date of sale, and there, just at the bottom, Built By: Han Solo. Ben remembers it still, sitting in the corner of the then-spotless walk in, sticking plastic veggies onto plastic bread and holding up his toy sandwich with pride. His mom brought up the video any time she wanted to brag about how long Ben had been cooking.

The walk in door opens, and in the entrance stands Hux. He looks tired, Ben notes, and wonders idly how he’s been sleeping, wonders if he stays up at night for the same reasons. Ben has to remind himself why it doesn’t matter, has to put himself first if Hux won’t.

“I didn’t know you were scheduled today,” Ben says, trying to keep his voice neutral. He keeps a completely blank affect, gives away no emotion, and hopes to fool Hux into thinking it’s the truth.

“Sloan needed me to cover for her,” he replies, his voice cracking. Hux clears his throat. “Family emergency.”

Lots of those going around, Ben wants to say. He keeps the thought to himself for fear of breaking down.

Hux slides by, hugging the shelves to keep the maximum distance between them. A second of looking and he’s found the ketchup pan, muttering something about trainees.

Ben should leave. The break up was as smooth as it could be, given the circumstances. Hux couldn’t make him a priority when it mattered, and now it’s too late.

"You never answered my calls,” Hux says. He’s not looking at Ben, staring instead at a case of apples.

“There was nothing to say.”

“So that’s it?”

His hand twitches. The muscles in his arm want to reach for Hux, and it’s a conscious effort to stay still, to hold himself back. In another life, Ben knows, his dad is still alive. Hux finds the time to have dinner with his parents and they live happily ever after. Hux walks the stage at graduation and Ben in sitting in the crowd. He would make space for Hux in his home, clear out cabinets for his mugs and closet real estate for his clothes.

Ben doesn’t live in that world.

“That’s it.”

Hux huffs a laugh, but Ben can see the tear falling down his cheek. It’s wiped away before he meets Ben’s eyes.

“There’s a twenty-five top at five-fifteen and a fourteen top at six-thirty. We’ve been 86 onion rings all day waiting on produce, but it turns out Rey just forgot to order them. I hope the shift goes smoothly.”

Just like that, Hux slides by him again, the walk in door opening and closing. Ben ignores Phasma’s glares during line check, keeping his eyes glued to the clipboard instead. By the time he’s finished, Hux has already walked out the door. 

-

Hux promises himself, when he stumbles into Ben in the cooler, that he’ll make it home before he breaks down.

He doesn’t even make it out of the restaurant.

-

Hux knew what would happen the second the pile of sauté pans fell from the top of the range. Hears the shout, feels the same, familiar tension. It’s been months, but he hasn’t forgotten the procedure for when Ben has a meltdown. The more seasoned servers stand still, all of them listening for the tell-tale sound of the back door slamming. When it rings out, a collective breath is let out.

“How do you all do it?” his trainee asks. This is her third day, and with each shift, she’s seen a worse side of Ben. “It’s as if Gordon Ramsey was even more of an asshole.”

There’s so much Hux could say. He isn’t always like this? True, technically, but historically, the last few months have been an aberration. Have they started over or simply regressed to the mean?

“It’s been a hard month,” Hux settles on. What else is there? How does he begin to untangle his last few months to an outsider while also trying to explain how to wait tables and carry three glasses in one hand?

Phasma comes from the kitchen, the door swinging behind her.

“I’m going to kill him,” she grits between clenched teeth. “If that son of a bitch yells at me one more time, I’m going to stick a chef’s knife between his ribs.”

Ben’s rage has never been contagious before. Then again, Hux supposes, he’s never yelled at Phasma before. And there’s a good reason for that; Phasma is unerringly competent. Working so long in the same kitchen grants an institutional memory that should never be underestimated.

Hux gives her a moment to calm down, sending his trainee to check on table thirty-two and inquire about refills in their section. She’s almost at the end of her training, surely she can handle this.

“It’s always something, now,” Phasma tells him. “I can deal with actual emotion, but his constant nitpicking is too much. He was so distracting with his commentary, I didn’t notice the falling stack of pans.” She huffs. “Then of course, it was my fault when they fell.”

There’s the urge to defend sitting on the edge of his tongue, but Hux holds it back, deciding it’s no longer his place. Besides, while Ben has raged at everyone else, he’s ignored Hux. At some point in the two weeks he was gone, Ben learned to stop letting emotions play across his face.

“I’ve never seriously wanted to quit before,” Phasma admits. “I’ve had bad shifts, but never just wanted to take off my apron and walk out the door midshift.” She stops, looking up at him. “I can’t leave you here alone, though.”

He pauses. They’re friends, yes, but even though he’s spent Thanksgiving with her family, their relationship isn’t particularly sentimental. They’re cold people. Ben may have brought out some warmth in him, but those feelings are being slowly pushed away, skeletons shoved onto the topshelf of his closet where they’ll be out of sight and mind.

“You can’t stay just for me,” he settles on. His tone doesn’t convey how touched he is by the gesture, but it’s an unnecessary one. Phasma shouldn’t set herself on fire to keep Hux warm. “I just have to make it through the semester, I’d be fine if you needed to go somewhere else.”

Phasma shakes her head.

“You’d tell all of us you’re fine,” she says, then scoffs. “Like you’ve ever told anyone how you actually feel.”

It’s true, but that’s not what hurts. It sounds so much like something Ben would say, some careful request. Hux turns away, looking for his trainee to act as a distraction, only to see her crying as Ben stalks away.

He’s across the restaurant in seconds, just as she’s taking off her apron.

“This place isn’t fucking worth it,” she bites, wiping her eyes. Hux feels badly for forgetting her name, especially in this moment, but he doesn’t try to convince her to stay. Instead, he takes a twenty out of his server book and hands it to her, helps her clock out, and promises to tell Rey about the incident.

And he does. After the doors are locked and the silver is rolled, he sits in the office with Rey as she cashes him out.

“That’s the third person this week,” he whispers. She nods, slowly, and they both look out the window of the office to the restaurant, where they can watch Ben scrub at the equipment with earbuds in, the last one in the kitchen.

“I don’t know what to do,” she admits. Rey lets out a deep breath, her shoulders slumping, and she almost curls in on herself, her best impression of a pill bug in the dirt. Hux feels much the same.

Neither of them mention that there may not be anything to do. This may simply just be another fact of their lives. 

-

The entire act is a fever dream even before he’s had any alcohol. In the morning, between the headache and the regret, calling his sponsor and pouring the rest of the bottle down the sink, Ben will have forgotten the finer details of the evening. He’ll forget what about work made him so upset, forget watching Rey and Hux lean in during a quiet conversation that’s surely about him. He’ll just remember feeling too much, and wanting to feel less. That’s how it always starts.

Still in the process of making the decision, his hands are shaking as he pays. He climbs back into his car, sets the bottle of vodka on the passenger seat, and tries not to feel like a corpse in the ground is disappointed in him. Rotting flesh doesn’t have feelings, can’t remind him of the reasons why this is a dumb idea. Lando would want him to call, but Lando’s not who he wants to talk to right now. One option is dead and the other is unreachable and out of the question.

Weeks ago, in the aftermath and the silence, Ben deleted Hux’s number. At the time, it seemed like a good idea, the best way for a clean break. Now, it means there’s no outlet for his anger after the first drink, no way to air his grievances after the second, no ear to hear him crying after the third.

By the fourth, he’s scrolling idly though his phone contacts, resigning himself to calling a random number, and there, nestled in between their ham supplier and Home - Mom, is Hux - Home. He’d added it as a joke, a way to continue making fun of Hux for having a land line in the first place, and now, it serves as his lifeline.

Hux isn’t home. Even drunk, he remembers overhearing the server’s plan to go out, and Hux decided to go alone. While he’s seemed to keep it together, Ben knows Hux, knows that may not be the case. Hopes it isn’t. In his altered state, the rage his stronger than the despair, and he hopes Hux is hurting. Hopes each steps tears at his skin, pulls limbs out of socket as Hux contorts himself into who the world thinks he should be.

The phone rings for an eternity until Hux’s voice on the answering machine tells him to leave a message, that he’ll return the call at his earliest convenience.

“I hope your happy.” His voice is unsteady, a combination of the alcohol and the emotion.  “All this fucking time you spent with me, and you couldn’t do one stupid thing for me. Couldn’t meet my fucking parents, and now, you’ll never be able to. I just wanted them to be happy for me, you selfish, heartless asshole. Do you know how hard it is, to see your face every day? How much it hurts to try and act like I don’t fucking know you? Like you’re just a stranger? Fuck, I can’t fucking believe you, you piece of shit, I hope you-“

The tone tells him he’s run out of time and Ben lets his phone fall to the ground in front of the couch after he deletes the contact, cutting of his last way to reach Hux. One last cut, another clean break.

Tomorrow, Ben will wonder who he called last night. Will stare at the number and try to place it before settling on the idea that he dialed random digits in an attempt to vent his problems to a stranger. 

-

As is so often the case, Hux returns to his apartment worn to the bone. Each day, he drags himself through the motions of his shift with the promise that in four short months, he can leave this restaurant and all it’s memories behind. Sharp, brown eyes may haunt his dreams for the rest of Hux’s life, but they won’t glare at him from the kitchen at least.

None of that is why he’s tired now, though, a welcome change.

Mitaka chose a terrible moment to come of age, but Hux fulfilled his years old promise, serving as both alcohol Sherpa and designated driver. He shepherded a small group of servers and hosts from bar to bar, made them all drink water and talked Mitaka out of attempting to take 21 shots. No one got their stomached pump on his watch.

In the hallway, his answering machine light blinks and he hits play without thinking, heads into the kitchen for a glass of water as the message loads.

Ben’s drunk. That’s all he registers; Hux can’t smell his breath, but he knows what intoxication sounds like, has just spent the night surrounded by it. The words are lost on his first listen, so he comes back to the hallway and hits play again, making sure to save the message in case he can’t decipher it. What if Ben needs help, what if something else happened, what if-

Then, after the beep of his answering machine, Hux actually listens to what Ben’s saying. He did this. Not intentionally, never intentionally, but he has literally driven Ben to drink.

With shaking hands, Hux braces himself against the wall of the hallway and lets himself slide down to the floor. One deep breath after another, the breaking in half of a pill and a bitter taste clinging to the back of his throat as he swallows it dry. Tomorrow, Hux will walk into every restaurant in the city until he has a new job. He will submit his resignation as a courtesy to Rey, finish out his two weeks, and never bother Ben again.

He taps his fingers and sits in the silence of his apartment until the shaking in his hands stops.

-

In retrospect,  Hux thinks as he sits in yet another parking lot, the half a Xanax may have been overkill, especially given he had to take one yesterday. He steps out of his car with loose shoulders and looks up at the sign to find three of the letters barely hanging onto the side of the building. Maz’s Cafe, with a few strong gusts of wind, would become Az's Af.

Perhaps outside maintenance wasn’t their forte, though. Surely, inside was a perfectly well-run restaurant. All the reviews Hux read spoke of warm staff and good food, but most of them were a few years old. Hence, the Xanax. If he’d taken one before his interview at the First Order, perhaps all of this could have been avoided. With little reason to delay, Hux makes his way to the front door and steps inside.

Shouting is the first noise that reaches his ears. It’s not in anger, not an outburst of rage. No, instead there’s concern and fear. Mentally protected by a bensodiazepine shield, Hux finds himself less concerned than usual. He can’t drive for another half hour, so he might as well walk inside and find out what’s going on. So far, all he can make out is fire. Luckily, there’s a fire extinguisher by the host stand, so he grabs it, holding it up.

“Do you need this?” he asks, doing his best to project his voice over the shouting. No one seems to be screaming in pain, so he assumes it’s just equipment on fire. Not ideal, but also not his problem, since he doesn’t work here. Yet? Maybe ever, he thinks. He remembers what Ben said about fire suppression systems and wonders how a place this dingy can afford to pay off the fire marshal.

From out of the kitchen comes an ancient woman, her eyes so droopy Hux can’t imagine they’re actually open. Her glasses are so thick they’re falling down her slight nose, and her hair is wrapped up in a tie-dyed bandanna. Without a word, she takes the fire extinguisher and throws it through the window to the kitchen where it clangs against the stainless steel wall. A small, muffled ‘thanks” comes from out of sight, and the woman turns back to him.

“We aren’t open,” she says, and then she checks her watch, must realize it’s three in the afternoon. “We are temporarily closed due to inclement weather.”

“I’m here for an interview,” he tells her, deciding to ignore her previous, insane statement. Inferno in the kitchen is not a weather pattern, and he’s a man on a mission.

“You’re hired,” is all she says. She turns away, takes a step, and then faces him again. “What were you interviewing for?”

Surely, there must be someone in charge besides her. There must be someone with a planner and a binder, a Rolodex even. This woman can’t be the one in charge.

“Server,” Hux replies. “I have a document with my resume and availability, for ease of scheduling.”

“Schedules,” the woman says, almost as if the word itself is an ancient secret. And then she looks at him, somehow manages to squint even further, and Hux feels her gaze passing through him. “You’re still hired, but I don’t imagine you’ll actually work here.” She pauses. “Call when your two weeks are up, I’ll add you to the schedule if I’m wrong.”

And with that, she walks away from him and into the back. The screaming in the back ceases as the noise of the fire extinguisher starts up, and Hux stands there for a moment, trying to remember when he’d told the woman, who at this point he can only assume is Maz, that he had a two weeks to finish out.

Regardless, he has a job. Even if the money is mediocre, Hux has enough savings that he can limp through the next few months. His tuition is covered, he has most of his rent, and if all else fails, he’s always been terrible at eating, anyway. He sits in his car for the rest of the time until he’s safe to operate a motor vehicle and pens his resignation letter on his phone. Tonight, he’ll hand it to Rey with his sincerest apologies, and the world will keep turning even if it’s a bit dimmer. 

-

Another day, another shift that Ben doesn’t want to be here. Lando wishes he hadn’t come to work, either, something about how routine is important, but so is taking time. It’s been a month, and while January is a blur of grief, the clock still ticked forward. The world continues its revolutions, the grass still grows, and Ben still comes into the restaurant.

Phasma’s been cold to him. Some of the line has been gracious, but her rough edges butt up against his more and more frequently; it’s starting to become a problem.

It’s not like Ben doesn’t know why; she’s Hux’s best friend. No matter how cordial their working relationship, Ben would never delude himself that she might side with anyone but Hux is a dispute. He doesn’t really know what he did, besides break up with Hux, but maybe that’s enough.

Still, it’s strange to look down to pantry and see her ignoring him with the same blankness he’s avoiding Hux, his own tactic turned back at him.

“He said he walked in and they offered him the job on the spot,” Phasma says, leaning through the window to talk to Mitaka. Curious, Ben pauses his music. The ethics of him eavesdropping on his coworkers in questionable, and his subordinates more so, but Phasma so rarely talks about things beyond work.

“Do you think he’s going to take it?” Mitaka asks, and Phasma laughs. “It’s not that crazy a question!”

“Listen, I understand you’ve missed a decent amount of the gossip, standing at the host station, but surely you can understand why he’d want to leave.”

“You know Hux and I don’t really talk about his personal life,” Mitaka insists, and suddenly, Ben finds himself incredibly interested in the green onions he’s chopping. Hux was looking to take another job?

“Still, you know enough.” There’s a silence, and Ben knows it’s a shared look, and he’s fairly certain they’re looking at him. He cleans his cutting board, doing a poor attempt at looking busy.

“It’ll be weird without him,” Mitaka muses. “It’s only been a month since Han, and now Hux leaving?”

The walk in is, historically, is the place one goes to cry in a restaurant. Ben has never worked a job where he escaped the custom, spilling saltwater onto nonslip floors that don’t get cleaned enough. Under the pretense of putting back the rest of the case of green onions, he leaves the line and the gossip behind and takes solace in the cool quiet, leans against the shelves and takes one deep breath after another. His jaw shakes despite his efforts and tears well in his eyes. As mad as he is at Hux, as heartbroken as Ben still remains, he doesn’t want Hux to go. It's stupid, it's illogical.

That doesn't make it less true.

He’s able to collect himself, able to drag himself back onto the line. Mitaka is gone from the window, but Phasma is still there, leaning with gloved hands against her cutting board.

It sounds like Phasma says something, but Ben can’t hear it over the noise of the restaurant. He looks over, and she meets his eyes.

He doesn’t have to hear her to know what she said. The word coward paints itself on the inside on his skull, and he agrees without understanding. 

-

His clock ticks on the wall as the rising sun imprints the shadow of his blinds on the far wall. From bed, Hux can pretend he’s stuck in a world out of time, that seconds falling away are just beats on a metronome, not the passage of his finite life on Earth, just rests in a song he’ll jump in when his part begins. Fingers twitch phantom notes, a combination of concertos he played, when he still had the time. There’s a keyboard sitting in the corner of his room, dust coating the plastic. It never had the right feel.

Hux took the day off to focus on school work, gave his shift to Finn, but his alarm goes off anyway, phone ringing in the room. He’s been up for a few hours, laying in bed and staring into the middle distance. It feels like he should get up, feels like he should climb into the shower and start his day, but his limbs are heavy and his mattress magnetic.

How easy it would be, Hux knows, to hide under his blankets from the light of the world. He could curl into his sheets and disappear, leave his phone across the room and let hours pass in a haze, only the beating of his heart and the breathing of his lungs to prove he’s even alive. How nice, he thinks, to just stay in place, pretend he is a statue and wonder if he’d be art or simply decor.

Still, he needs to silence his alarm, so he claws his way from the comforter and stands, trudges the few feet to his dresser and unlocks his phone. Since he’s already standing, Hux makes his way to the bathroom, eases the weight in his bladder and splashes water over his face. It’s not a full clean, but it pulls him out of this feeling a little bit, allows him to make his way down the kitchen and pull granola from his cabinets, pouring himself a bowl to eat dry because finding milk is too much effort.

Ben bought him this, he knows. It’s an idle thought, something he sits with as he shovels toasted oats and almonds through his lips and chews. Everything tastes like dirt, but Hux knows that’s his mood and not the food, so he keeps eating, lets himself get lost in the repetitive motion.

Idly, Hux wonders how Ben is. Is he yelling at someone? Is he fine? Is the restaurant busy, or is today just a slow and lazy Wednesday morning?

Out of the corner of his eye, the light for his answering machine blinks, reminding him that one saved message is in the cordless phone’s small data bank. It’s a relic, something Ben had made fun of, but Hux is grateful for it, even now when it serves only to haunt him.

Selfish, Ben had called him. Heartless.

Hux doesn’t want to leave. He’s been dreading his last day, dreading saying goodbye to all his friends. But if his presence is killing Ben that much, Hux will go.

In a trance, Hux sets his bowl down, going over to the answering machine and hitting play. The saved message is the only thing left to play, so Ben’s voice fills the room.

“I hope your happy,” Ben’s voice slurs, just like it had the first time he’d heard it. There’s a rage in it, one Hux hasn’t heard in months. It feels ironic, for them to be back right where they started. He took the long way around just to end up standing in the same place, nothing gained and everything lost. “All this fucking time you spent with me, and you couldn’t do one stupid thing for me. Couldn’t meet my fucking parents, and now, you’ll never be able to. I just wanted them to be happy for me, you selfish, heartless asshole. Do you know how hard it is, to see your face every day? How much it hurts to try and act like I don’t fucking know you? Like you’re just a stranger? Fuck, I can’t fucking believe you, you piece of shit, I hope you-“

And the voice mail cuts off, and it’s a moment before Hux realizes he’s crying. Tears run from his eyes to his cheek, dripping onto his thighs as he sits on the floor in front of the answering machine. He has a week left of torturing Ben, of torturing himself, and then they’ll both be free. He wont be happy, but despair is a feeling he’s growing used to, and so is the heaviness in his heart as his quiet crying turns to violent, wracking sobs. 

-

Logically, Ben knows why he’s sitting on this park bench, knows why Lando is next to him. He can follow the series of events that led him to walk into a liquor store, and he knows this is the next step. Dad always liked to remind him that recovery isn’t linear, it wasn’t climbing a staircase until one reached the top. So here he is, one week out, listening to a children’s soccer game in the background.

He just doesn’t want to talk about it. For the last few minutes, Lando’s let him get away with it. They’ve existed in silence next to each other and watches a pair of squirrels fight over a stray graham cracker.

“Do you think he’d be disappointed?” Ben settles on. He doesn’t need to be specific; he knows Lando will understand.

“No more than you are in yourself.” It’s a fair point. “He’d hope it wasn’t because of him, though.”

Ben shakes is head.

“I just got overwhelmed, I think. I-“ he pauses, debating lying for a moment and finding he doesn’t have the energy for fabrication. “I was seeing someone, at the restaurant. Kept asking him to get dinner to meet mom and dad, had been for months. Invited him to Thanksgiving, invited him to Christmas. And when it all happened, I realized I didn’t want to be with someone who couldn’t do that for me. Who couldn’t make the time.

“Even though I ended it, I think it’s obvious I’m not dealing with the separation particularly well. I let everything overwhelm me, and I just wanted to stop feeling for a bit.”

It’s true, too. He still sees things and thinks about texting Hux, still wishes he could call in the middle of the night. Hux continues to be the sun at the center of it all, no matter how Ben tries to break free from orbit.

“Seeing him every day can’t be easy,” Lando says.

“He’s leaving for another job, soon, so it won’t be a problem any more.” Ben pauses. “I think it’ll be harder not having him there, though.”

“Did you ever find out why?”

Ben pauses, looking at Lando for the first time since they sat down.

“What?”

“Why didn’t he want to meet you parents?”

“Does it matter?” Ben asks, and Lando shrugs.

“Maybe, maybe not. But if this is gonna eat you up that much, it might be worth asking.”

He thinks about it, looking back into the park. The squirrels are gone, but some ducks from the pond have left the water to laze at the shore.

“I’m not sure the answer would change anything,” he settles on.

“Do you blame him?”

It’s a leading question, even if it’s not phrased as one. There’s a right answer, and there’s the answer Lando expects, the one he would have given a few years ago.

“No,” he says. “I’m responsible for my own actions.”

“You can’t quote your dad back at me, kid,” Lando says, but he lets it go. “It’s up to you whether or not you ask, then. Just call me, next time you decide to do something stupid.”

“I will,” Ben says, and he’s surprised that he means it. 

-

Hux is smoking the last cigarette of his break up pack when Ben comes outside. For a moment, he thinks Ben will just turn around and go back inside, that the awkwardness of the situation will stop him from staying. Instead, he pulls up an empty keg to prop the door open and stands like an obstacle.

“I thought you quit,” Ben says, and Hux sighs. He’s only half way through this cigarette, but he puts it out anyway, throwing it into the sand bucket and cursing himself for his own pity purchase.

“Times of stress can bring back bad habits. I’m sure I don’t have to explain that to you.”

“If changing jobs is that stressful for you, maybe you should just stay here.”

So that’s what this is about. Hux should have known Ben was too earnest, too open, to just let him disappear into the city and try to pretend he didn’t ruin this. Ben couldn’t let him fall with grace, he had to push Hux on the way down, a reprisal of the act.

“I’ve wondered about serving at other places for a while, I’ve just never had a reason to try it.”

“And now you do?”

A small, bitter laugh claws its way from his lips. Desperately, he wishes there was still a cigarette between his fingers, smoke filling his lungs. Anything to pull him out of this conversation for a moment, to stall for time.

“Now I do,” Hux agrees. “The hours won’t be as good, with school, but I should only have to graduate a semester late. Nothing, in the grand scheme of my life.”

“Or you could stay here,” Ben says, and there’s something in his voice, an emotion Hux can’t quite place. He would call it hopeful, but what would Ben have to hope for? That Hux can stay here and continue to watch Him fall apart? Watch the person he fell in love with continue to ignore him, treat the people around him like punching bags, fall into a pit of grief so deep that light won’t reach him at the bottom?

“I can’t be here, I can’t keep doing this. So I’m taking control of the situation.”

And like the coward he is, Hux stands, pushing his way past Ben and into the restaurant. He washes the nicotine off his hands like it’s evidence of a crime and reminds himself that there’s only three more shifts between himself and freedom. Ben isn’t even scheduled on his last shift. Two more days of the consequences of his fuck ups, and he can try to forget that he met the love of his life and absolutely fumbled his chance at happiness. He’ll graduate from school, wait different tables, and wonder for the rest of his life what might have been if he’d just said yes the first time. If he’d let his feelings be more important than a job.

Standing in the server alley and polishing his silverware, Hux tries to ignore the knowing look from Phasma, doesn’t move when she gestures for him to come over and talk. Hux must look truly awful, because she lets him stay there, lets him wallow in his failure.

“Three shifts,” he mutters to himself. “Just three more shifts.”

-

Ben knows that today is supposed to be Hux’s last shift; he added himself to the schedule just to make sure he would be here, the only benefit of having full control over the back of the house. Even if they still weren’t talking beyond clipped sentences, even if being in this building still hurt, Ben wouldn’t dare be somewhere else.

Some of the servers have been passing a card around, Ben knows. No one has asked if he wants to sign it, almost as if they know why Hux is leaving. At this point, Ben isn’t sure which one of them is to blame, something which he’s had an increasingly hard time grappling with. Hux is guilty about something, which contradicts terribly with the way Ben’s feelings have become conflicted. He did, after all, never push the issue, never say why it was important to him.

As the door opens and the first customers trickle in, Hux sets coffee in Phasma’s window. They chat about something, and Ben decides to be polite and not eavesdrop for once in his life. His mother would be proud of him, but with a small pain, Hux knows his father would be disappointed. It’s at least a familiar feeling, by now.

The entire shift, Hux doesn’t speak to him. He lets Rey handle the window, running the plates he’s handed and nothing more. Ben’s trying to picture the restaurant without him, and it’s hard. Hux has become an integral member of the space, practically part of the building in the same way Sloan is, in the same way his dad was.

“You could say something, you know,” Rey tells him during a lull in the service. She’s wiping down the window as Ben is topping of the water on his steam table.

“What is there to say?” he asks, and he means it. Hux has made it clear that he’s leaving. Ben can’t forgive him for dodging meeting his parents, and now his dad is dead.

“You could ask him why, for one. Even if you don’t like the answer, it might be important for you to hear.” Ben wonders if Lando talked to her, or if all the good influences in his life just sound the same.

Then, she walks away, heading out into the dining room as if trying to protect herself from a bomb blast, but Ben doesn’t have the energy to explode. He’s just sad.

-

It happens as Hux is refilling the ketchup in the walk in, the third pan balanced on his hip so he can tip it down without spilling too much on the floor. He’ll have to wipe the lip of the pan, but it’s faster than using a ladle, and Hux is desperate to clock out, desperate to leave Ben and his looks behind. He wasn’t supposed to be here, why on Earth was he here, why-

And then, the person he’s avoiding is standing in the doorway to the walk in, two hotel pans of portioned vegetables in his arms. For a moment he doesn’t seem to notice Hux, so he stays still, wondering if he can escape the awkward situation unscathed. 
Ben’s eyebrows furrow as he realizes Hux is there, and he sets the pans down on a shelf, standing there in the silence.

“You could stay,” Ben says, a tired refrain. Each time, Hux’s resolve breaks an inch more, dragging him along. A few more days and he may have relented, a feeling Ben often inspired in him, but the tight feeling in his chest as he spots Ben from across the restaurant is suffocating him, and his service is suffering for it. After everything, now isn’t the time to be sentimental.

“I really can’t,” Hux replies.

“Rey hasn’t processed your paperwork,” Ben tells him. “It’s not too late to change your mind.”

Hux sets the ketchup down, puts the lid on the ketchup container, and sets it on the shelf, too.

“You can’t forgive me, and that’s fair. But don’t try and force me to stay. You know why I’m leaving. I got your voice mail.”

There’s a confused look on Ben’s face, and Hux has a horrifying realization, in that moment.

Ben doesn’t remember calling, doesn’t remember the words he said. In another world, Ben would have let himself be eaten alive by his emotions.

Hux desperately doesn’t want to untangle that ball of issues, to uncrumple the ball of guilt in his stomach and add more to it, so he’s grateful that Ben ignores his last comment.

“Because you wouldn’t meet my parents,” Ben says, as if it’s something simple. As if meeting the parents is a thing he can still do, rather than meeting the parent, and something in Hux breaks.

“In the only conversation I had with your father unrelated to work last year, he wondered why you’d never dated anyone at the restaurant. Said it wouldn’t be a problem until we broke up, all but implying I would have gotten fired. Laughed as he said it.” Hux picks the ketchup back up and tries to brush past Ben in the narrow walkway between the shelves. Instead, Ben grabs his arm, and the container falls to the ground. “Let go of me.”

“When was this?” Ben asks, and there’s an intensity to his expression. Anger? Confusion? It’s hard to tell, when Hux won’t look him in the eyes.

“A few days before you asked me to dinner,” Hux says, and it’s true. The memory is crystallized in his brain, now, standing by the butchering table as he opened ketchup and tried not to have a panic attack at the idea of losing his job. The words out of Han’s mouth are lost, but the intent Hux got from them is still imprinted.

Suddenly, Ben is laughing. On the bright side, he lets go of his bruising grip on Hux’s arm. It’s also concerning, though. Has Ben finally cracked under the stress?

“You’re really dumb,” Ben tells him between gasps for air. “Oh my god, Hux, you can’t truly be so stupid.”

He pushes even further past Ben, then, trying not to show how much those words hurt.

“Sorry not all of us have a stable job and a house as a gift from their parents,” he says, hand on the door to the walk in. “God forbid, Ben, that I didn’t want to risk my entire livelihood on your father’s whims. What’s next, in that case? We get in a fight and suddenly I’m unemployed.”

A hand on his shoulder turns Hux around.

“He was joking with you, Hux. He knew before I even asked you; I’m a keyed manager, I have to run the idea of dating an employee by someone before I do it.” Ben pauses. “I’m not your manager, so dad didn’t think it would be an issue, especially with how close you are to graduated. He assumed you’d put in your two weeks after you graduated, so at most we had six months of problems.

“He thought the savings on dishes was worth the potential issues,” Ben admits, his voice quiet, sad. Hux wants to reach out, but he can’t risk shattering this moment. God forbid he lose whatever weird peace they have in this moment that will allow him to leave with some sort of closure.

So of course, his mouth goes and ruins it anyway.

“I know you’re not supposed to speak ill of the dead, but your father wasn’t funny, apparently. Jokes make people laugh, not worry about financial ruin.” Ben gives him a small, lopsided smile, and even now, Hux’s heart finds a way to break even more. “It’s not fair to look at me like that,” he mutters, leaning against the shelves of the walk in. Goosebumps have fully settled on his arms under the rolled up sleeves of his button up, and the chill seeping into his bones is only half the reason. And then, Ben has a hand on his jaw, thumb brushing loosely over his stubble.

“That’s why you didn’t want to meet my parents?” Ben whispers, and Hux almost doesn’t hear him over the fan.

“What other reason would I have?” he asks, trying his best not to lean into the touch, not to hope for more than he deserves.

“I thought you just didn’t think I was worth it,” Ben admits, and the last of his resolve crumbles like chalk in his hands, the dust of his will falling to the floor to live with the dirt and the worms.

“A few more minutes, and I would have said yes,” Hux says.

Ben leans in, his other hand coming to rest on Hux’s hip, a mirror of that night in the parking lot where the entire trajectory of their relationship changed. Where Ben went from bitter coworker to something more. Their lips meet softly, gently, each of them walking on egg shells, and Hux wraps him arms around Ben’s neck, pulling him closer. It’s a lazy kiss, comfortable in a way Hux didn’t think he’d get to have again, and he relishes it, fearing it might be the last, a parting gift. He tries to chase Ben’s lips as they pull away, but the hand on his jaw keeps him back.

“Don’t leave,” Ben says. “Stay here, graduate, move in with me, meet my mom.”

“Just like that?” Hux asks. “If this is a joke, I will stab you.”

With a shake of his head, Ben leans in, pressing one more quick kiss to his lips.

“Just like that.”

“We’re going to have to talk about this at some point.”

“I’ll make dinner,” Ben says, and Hux thinks for a moment.

“No, come over to my place. I’ll order take out.”

“It’s a date.”

-

When they leave the Millennium Falcon, Ben won’t let go of his hand. Hux would try to fight it, make an argument about propriety, but Rey had just smiled and fed a piece of paper into the shredder. They drive separately, leaving Hux alone with his thoughts. 

This is, of course, a terrible idea. His hands twitch and the only thing on his mind is fear. Ben could change his mind, he could still leave. This could all have been one last cruel act. Had Rey been in on it? Perhaps she shredded his employment file, and not his resignation letter.

Hux keeps one hand on the wheel and taps a four count on the gear shift with the other, thankful that changing gears at least forces him to think about the act of driving. He can’t autopilot himself from one location to the other on sheer terror alone. It leaves him aware as he pulls into the parking lot next to Ben’s car.

“My favorite place only does pick up, so I’ll have to go grab it,” Hux tells Ben. It’s only half a lie. The Chinese place he intend to order from doesn’t do delivery, but they aren’t his favorite. This is the one he thinks Ben will like, which matters more in the moment than his preferred General Tso’s chicken. “It’s just up the road, I’ll only be a few minutes.”

And then he leads Ben to his apartment door and they step into his living room. Its walls are still bare as the day he moved in, a couch he collected from the dumpster and a TV stand and TV he bought at the thrift store. Compared to Ben’s house, it’s a prison cell, and it’s hard not to be embarrassed by the state of it.

“I don’t spend much time here,” Hux says, mostly in his own defense. “So decorating seemed like a waste of money when there were books to buy and class fees to be paid.”

Ben spends another moment looking around, and for a moment, Hux thinks he’s going to just leave. Surely, Ben is going to realize that Hux is too boring, too practical, find some reason that this was all a mistake.

“This is perfect,” he says instead, putting his hands on Hux’s waist and leaning in close. “We wont even have to rent a U-Haul when you move it. Imagine how much money you’ll save.”

They have to talk, but for a moment, Hux just lets himself be held. After they’ve eaten, surely. It’s not an attempt to distract when he hands Ben the menu, calls in their order, it’s just buying time. He just needs a moment to breath, to think, and once that moments up it’s time to get there food, and then Hux is out the door.

-

It’s strange to be alone in Hux’s apartment, to walk the living room and wonder how the lack of decoration didn’t make him sad. Something tugs at his heart as Ben thinks about Hux sitting alone on the couch.

In the hallway, the relic Ben has only heard about sits on a small table. They had a home phone growing up, but Ben was too young to know how to use it, and a part of his hind brain wants him to press the flashing button. Alone, with no one to judge him, Ben gives into that urge.

It’s a surprise when his own voice greets him. He’d expected a pharmacy call, something banal.

“I hope your happy,” a past version of himself says. He doesn’t remember saying these words, doesn’t remember the cruel tone of his words, but he knows what they mean. Knows when he made this call.

And it makes sense, then. Two weeks ago, he relapsed. Apparently, he called Hux, and the next day, Hux put in his resignation. Ben stands there, plays the message again, as if through the act of listening, he can pay penance for his words.

“I thought I’d deleted it,” Hux says quietly from his place in the door. Ben hadn’t even heard it open. “Sorry.”

“That’s why you were leaving,” Ben mutters. He hasn’t taken his hand off the play button.

Hux comes in, sets the food down on the counter.

“I drove you to drink,” Hux tells him. “I couldn’t risk doing it again.”

“No one drives me to do anything,” he says. Hux won’t look him in the eyes. “You didn’t, my dad dying didn’t. I didn’t process my emotions for long enough that my brain shut down. Hux, you didn’t-“ his voice cracks, and he hates it, because this is important. “You know that wasn’t your fault, right? You didn’t walk me to a liquor store, you didn’t hand the cashier money.”

“It sure sounded like it was my fault,” Hux whispers, and Ben almost doesn’t hear him. He comes closer slowly, wraps his arms around Hux. It’s strange, really. No one has ever blamed themselves for his issues before. It’s as touching as it is misguided.

“It wasn’t. And I hope it won’t happen again, but these things are linear. Relapses are part of recovery, unfortunately, but they’re never anyone else’s fault.” He’ll say it as many times as he needs, until the information finally sinks it’s way into his stubborn skull.

“I just thought bringing it up would be worse,” Hux says.

“And I thought asking you why you wouldn’t meet my parents wouldn’t change anything.” He had, too. So convinced there was no logic besides indifference between Hux’s decision. “I’ll just ask next time, if you will, too.”

Ben feels Hux nod more than sees it, given his face is currently buried in Ben’s neck. 

-

Deja vu, Hux knows, is about the idea that one has lived through an experience before, but isn’t certain. That’s not what this is. Hux remembers being here, remembers sitting in the same seat with Ben on the other side, the sound of the coffee grinder and the steam wand, part of the din of the coffee shop that fades into the background a little more every second. He’s working on different project and Ben is reading a different book, but the details are less important than the familiarity of it all. It’s a return to normalcy, something Hux didn’t think was possible a week ago, didn’t think he even deserved.

So he sits, lets his hand rest on the table as he reads through his essay and hopes that Ben will notice. He does, and their fingers tangle loosely on the wood. Ben’s thumb rubs small circles on the back of his hand.

They’ve had more conversations, since that night in Hux’s apartment. Most of them have been about how they got here, but some have been about where they’re going. As insane as it feels, he may actually move in with Ben. It won’t be difficult to find someone to take over his lease, and he’s spent every night at Ben’s anyway. Might as well make it official.

Work has been, for lack of a better word, interesting. Phasma still won’t stop glaring at Ben, and it’s not really Hux’s place to tell the whole story, so he just tells her to stop being ridiculous. It’s different, without Han there, but Ben will adjust to the pressure of running the whole place by himself. It’s just a matter of time.

When the bell above the door rings, Hux looks up from his laptop to find Ben smiling at whoever’s entering. Rey comes to stand by their table, and Hux gives her a small wave with his unoccupied hand.

She’s stop to chat, she tells them, but she’s got to get to the restaurant. They both bid her a good day and then return back to their plans, but Ben squeezes his hand and their eyes meet for a smile. 

-

“She’s going to love you,” Ben says, grabbing Hux’s hand, pulling it away from pinching his thigh.

“She’s already met me, Ben. She hired me, she can’t hate me.” His words are confident, but his voice shakes as he says them, crushing Ben’s hand in his grip. “This was a mistake. I’m going to say something stupid and she’s going to buy the restaurant again just to fire me.”

They’re both in the kitchen. Ben has something in the oven, and this time Hux recognized half of the ingredients and chopped the onion without cutting his hand open. Slowly, he’s migrated his things into Ben’s place. His few mugs are on the shelves, his coffee machine is at the end of the counter, and his coat is hanging on hooks by the door.

Today, they’re having Leia over for dinner, a prospect that still terrifies Hux. His comment about getting fired was only half a joke. But Hux was now living with her son, which meant they’d have to meet at some point; controlled conditions were preferable to her dropping by one afternoon when Ben wasn’t home.

The doorbell rings, and Ben leaves him in the kitchen to answer it. Hux is thankful for the moment it gives him to gather his bearings. When the pair walk back into the living room, Leia pauses.

“I thought I was meeting your boyfriend.”

“You are,” Ben says, his smile crinkling the corner of his eyes.

“No, no.” Hux stands frozen as Leia moves closer. “Hux is a sensible young man, and you’re a hooligan.” She’s grinning right back as she says it, and then she’s hugging him. This, he had forgotten from his time working with Leia; the woman was a hugger. “It’s good to see you.” She pauses then, pulling back. “I’m glad that Maz was right.”

He looks at her for a moment, trying to place that name, but Ben has already started laughing.

“You were going to leave to work at Maz’s?” he asks, wiping at his eyes with one hand as he leans on the counter with the other. “That place is insane. You would have made it two days, tops.”

“I watched her throw a fire extinguisher through the window,” Hux says, and they both nod like this is normal behavior. “It’s probably for the best that wasn’t necessary.”

-

It’s a normal dinner, really. Leia asks about his classes and his plans for after graduation and Hux gives the same answers he’s given everyone else: he’s going to work at the Falcon until he finds an engineering job in town, because he’s not looking to relocate. It means he’ll be job searching for longer, but not uprooting his life is worth the wait.

Leia gives them both another hug as she leaves, which Ben assures him is just something he needs to adjust to.

“Was it everything you feared?” Ben asks, his hands deep in dishwater. Hux is on drying duty, which so far has served as his way of familiarizing himself with Ben’s insane system of storing dishes.

“I think you know it wasn’t,” he replies, coming to rest his head on Ben’s shoulder.

Every day, it settles in more and more than Hux gets to have this. No one is going to fire him and Ben’s not going to leave. There will be different fights, new misunderstanding, but they’ll use their words instead of assuming they know what the other is thinking.

“What are you thinking about?” Ben asks, drying his hands off and pressing a kiss to the top of Hux’s head.

“Tomorrow,” Hux tells him. “And every day after.”

*