Chapter Text
"My coach is going to be who?" Rey asked, as the shock slowly wore off from Luke Skywalker, the man who taught her how to cartwheel, telling her he was no longer her coach.
"Ben Solo, my nephew."
"Ben So- wait, Kylo Ren?" Rey asked, following Luke as he walked into his office
"He doesn't go by that name anymore, hasn't in years." Luke replied, not looking up from the paper in his hand as he sat behind his desk.
"But you're my coach!" Rey said, her voice just below a shout.
"Rey, it's not that I don't want to, but when you were injured I took on coaching two new juniors and I can't just abandon them because you're back. Besides, you have everything already in you. You know your skills, you just need to create new routines. Ben was an incredible gymnast and he's been working with several of the level 10s and I think you and he would be a good match. Why don't we look at it this way, we'll try it for a couple months, see where we are about two months before verification and then we can change things up if need be." Luke said diplomatically while gathering the papers on his desk.
Rey sighed and Luke looked up at her.
"Rey, you know I only want what's best for you. I believe in you and I believe that this is a great course of action. I'll still be around the gym and I'll still be here for you whenever you need. But splitting the time that this sport demands between you and others isn't fair to anyone. I've gone down that route before and it didn't end well."
Rey's brow wrinkled at that statement. She could barely remember a time when she wasn't his sole pupil. Sure, he had a gym full of gymnasts but she was the only one on the elite path.
"Okay, I'll do it." she said, knowing she didn't have much of a choice. Skywalker's Gym had given her everything. When she was younger her adoptive mother could pay for basic classes, but it wasn't until she started to show promise that Luke stepped in with a "benefactor" that awarded a scholarship of some kind so Rey could keep training. It wasn't long into her junior career that she learned the benefactor was Luke himself. That was the biggest fight they had ever had. In the end Rey knew that she could never have afforded to continue without him and gymnastics was everything to her. She was good at it and it gave her a purpose. And after her discovery she knew that she didn't just want to be the best for herself, she wanted to be the best for Luke, for everything he had done for her. Luke had never steered her wrong before, well, beyond the "let's try an Amanar" that left her with torn ligaments in her knee and almost two years of recovery time.
That most certainly had not been her plan. The difficulty of her bars routine her first year as a senior secured her a spot as an Olympic alternate, and she had been a national team member every year since then, earning medals at world championships. The next Olympics that came around was supposed to be her year. Her time. Until everything went very wrong. Now she was two years into the new quad and almost 22 years old. She had competed a watered down bars routine the past year at nationals just to show that she was coming back, but that was it. Luke had found time to work with her when she was only doing one apparatus but she could admit that they'd had to work around his schedule with the young juniors he was training. And after all, despite using the little sponsor money she had left after her gold medal wins on bars and beam at worlds the year before her injury, he was technically still paying for the majority of her training.
"Why don't you start warming up and he'll meet you soon." Luke said, effectively dismissing her.
Rey left this office and walked out to the floor, beginning her everyday stretches before grabbing a jump rope. Out of the corner of her eye she saw a large figure looming outside Luke's office and she turned to face it. It was a man, a massive man. Rey wasn't sure if this gymnastics academy had ever seen a man as tall as him inside its walls. However, as soon as he turned his head she knew instantly that the man was Ben Solo, her new coach. She wasn't sure why she didn't recognize him immediately, she'd watched him enough growing up, either on television or in many youtube videos while being amazed at the power of his gymnastics. Perhaps she didn't recognize him because his once long hair that he was famous for pulling back into a manbun that buzzfeed had once dedicated an entire post to was now cut. It was still thick and luxurious as ever, it just looked more professional. Or perhaps simply because it was undeniable how TALL this man was, and she wasn’t sure how it was physically possible for him to have performed the skills she had seen with her own two eyes that he had performed. He had retired right at the height of his career, which was when hers was just getting started.
Suddenly, his gaze met hers and she looked away immediately before cursing herself. As if she couldn't be any more obvious that she was staring. Feeling the heat rising to her face, she made herself look at him once more, his gaze hadn't moved. And it didn't move even as his body propelled forward towards her. She froze with the jump rope still in her hands, unused as he stopped in front of her. Rey craned her neck up to look at his face. He had light brown eyes, a long nose, his lips were wide and plump and she was jealous of their hue. It wasn't until his mouth started to move that she realized she was staring once again.
"Skywalker tells me that he's informed you of this arrangement," he said, his voice even deeper than she expected. It caused her stomach to tighten but his words led her to crinkle her brow. Arrangement?
"He said you're going to be coaching me, if that's what you mean."
"It is," He said before reaching into the bag on his shoulder, pulling out a piece of paper and handing it to her, "I've created a schedule for the next two weeks that I want us to go over and I'd like to discuss your goals-" He turned around and kept talking while Rey glanced over the schedule in her hands.
"This is just a schedule for cardio, conditioning and weight training?" Rey said confused. "I barely clock any time on the bars and beam."
Ben turned around and leveled his gaze at her.
"You'll be doing plenty of press handstands and practice swinging, but especially now at the beginning I want to focus on conditioning."
"I'm in perfect shape." Rey said hotly, pretending not to notice his eyes run down her body.
"I never said you weren't," his voice low before he cleared his throat and spoke again, "You've been doing physical therapy and light training in addition to your bar work but we need to ensure you can handle tumbling passes again. I want to make sure your endurance is back."
"It's not like I'm going to be throwing a double double right off the bat" she scoffed.
"Not at all. Because it won't matter how difficult your 3rd or 4th tumbling pass is if you cant even get to it because you're out of breath. I know you're in great shape. but you're about to exert your body in ways you haven't in over a year, and it's my job to make sure that you're ready and safe."
She bit her tongue. She wanted to shout at him that she's ready. She'd been ready, but she held it in for the sake of Luke.
"Now, come on," he nodded his head over towards the office and began to for a lack of a better word, stalk over there, never looking back to check that she was following him. She paused a moment to glare at the schedule in her hands before continuing after him. He walked through the door of an office she had never been in. It was strange to think that there was a room in this gym that she had never set foot in. It was across from Luke's. It was a small room with a measly overhead light. She wouldn't be surprised if it had at one point been a storage closet. He took up most of the space as he squeezed himself around a small desk that had been shoved in the corner and he extended his hand to a chair across from it. The chair was pressed against the wall with barely any room between it and the desk for Rey to settle herself into it.
"So Rey, I'm sure you have had plenty of time to think about your goals." He said. She chuckled at his words. That was an understatement.
"Plenty of time is right. Well, obviously as you know,' she gestured to the schedule in front of her, "that I want to get back in the all-around. My goal for this year is to do verification, get a world cup assignment, medal at a world cup. Qualify to nationals, make the national team and go to worlds. Ideally medalling individually there as well."
He didn't say anything. He just typed on his laptop before suddenly looking up. In the dim light of the office his eyes were much darker.
"And you think you can do that?"
"Excuse me?"
"Do you think those are attainable goals?"
"Of course I think those are attainable goals. I accomplished those exact things the past four years I competed."
"Yes but that was before. I know you've competed bars recently but I'm sure you realize that there are things your body just can't do after an injury like that."
"So I won't do an Amanar. I was never a vault specialist anyway."
He's quiet for a moment as he just looks at her. She's used to schooling her face into a blank gaze for when the cameras were on her after her routines in competition, but for some reason with him it feels almost impossible.
"All right then. Let's get started."
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She spent the day stretching, jumping rope, running laps around the gym, climbing rope, walking on her hands across the floor. She does leg exercises and sit ups. The only time she spent on the beam was doing press handstands and turns. She's allowed to swing on the bars and he had her practice pirouettes and transitions between the bars, but no major releases. It's more of the same the next day. And the next. And the next. Finally, on the fourth day he let her do some tumbling. However, only into the foam pit and only the simplest passes. She ran down the tumble track to do roundoff back handsprings into double backs. It felt like a small miracle when she can do aerials across the floor.
He didn't talk much, but neither did she. She promised Luke she would give this a shot even though it had been five days and she hadn't so much as twisted her body in any way. It's not until Ben had her do her vault run the first day of the second week that she realized he may have a point. She kept getting her steps wrong and having to run off the track. At one point she even tripped and went headfirst into the vault. Luckily everything was extremely padded so she was fine but Ben was at her side in an instant, he turned her over onto her back and asked her if she was okay.
"I'm fine," she said before she attempted to sit up. He kept her down for a moment longer until he helped her up himself. He was in a crouched position beside her and he still was so massive. He handed her her water bottle and she took several pulls before he spoke again.
"When was the last time you vaulted?"
She looked at him for a moment as she chewed on the spout of her water bottle.
"I think you know when," she finally answered.
He nodded before standing up and extending his hand to her.
Her chalk covered hand grasped his large one as helped her to his feet. For maybe the first time in her life, she felt delicate.
They tabled vault for the rest of the day, but Rey knew that was a horse she'd have to get back on eventually.
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He's not over complimentary. He was more likely to nod at her when she'd done something well then pat her on the back and say "good work!" the way Luke would. Sometimes she considered Luke too coddling, but now, even a smile would be nice. However, three weeks into their time together, while she was now practicing her acro series on the beam that's closest to the floor his voice came from her left. He was right next to her, spotting her and she had just nailed her front aerial+ back handspring+back layout.
"I still can't believe they're making you do verification."
"What?" She turned her head and on this beam she was only a few inches shorter than him, rather than a full ten. He was so close. His hand was resting on her back and she noticed immediately when he removed it. It was something that happened more frequently. Rey was used to having coach's hands on her, and Ben's was no less a professional touch than Luke's. However, she found herself noticing Ben's touch more. How his hands almost circled her waist when he lifted her to the high bar or how they wrapped around her shins as she did sit ups while hanging from the beam. One time she fell on her tkatchev release on bar and he caught her so early that she spent a moment in shock at how she went from flying to suddenly being cradled in his arms. She had wanted to wrap her arms around her neck and… she wasn’t exactly sure what she wanted to do but she knew she had never felt like this before. Due to the lifestyle she led, she had little time for any outside interests. Sure there had been cute male gymnasts that she had kissed at gym galas or parties after competitions but she could say that she had never had a boyfriend. She'd experienced attraction before, but she'd never wanted a boyfriend the way she wanted an Olympic medal. She could admit to herself that she found Ben handsome, but he was her coach. And she was his athlete. They needed each other if they both wanted to be successful.
"I can't believe they're making you do verification." Ben repeated.
"Well, it's been a while since anyone's seen me do more than a bars routine-" Rey starts before Ben cuts her off.
"With the amount of medals you've won for this country you should be able to call the federation and say 'hey I'm back, what's my assignment?'" Ben said shaking his head.
"Well, I um, I mean uh" Rey stuttered before closing her mouth completely. Her head felt hot, as though she'd been hanging upside down for ten minutes straight.
He patted her back.
"Well, you've been doing good work. You have that series down so do you think we ought to give vault another try?"
Rey just nodded before she hopped off the beam and headed to the vault runway. In that moment running towards an inanimate object felt a lot like she was running away from something else.