Chapter Text
Ben first spotted her on a list of suggested videos attached to one of his own.
She popped out because he had been in this game for so long that he had gotten used to seeing the same videos show up again and again. He had watched all of them at some point. The artists were talented, entertaining even, but he still had the most views and subscribers in their space.
So when her video showed up on the sidebar with an unfamiliar thumbnail and image, he did a double take.
UNTRAINED SESSIONS - Rey Takes Requests
ReyPlays
Curious, he clicked.
She certainly hadn’t gotten views because of her stunning production value. In fact, it looked like a rudimentary guitar video from Myspace in 2004. It was just a girl against a white wall, sitting at a table, holding her guitar.
“Hi guys!” she said. “It’s Rey again! Today I’m taking your requests. I’ve gotten a lot in my videos’ comments, and today I’m going to try to play as many of them as I can.”
She was British, Ben noted.
“Finn has compiled me a list of some of these requests,” she said. “Say hi, Finn!”
The camera shuffled a bit and a dark hand stuck out in front of the screen and waved.
“I’ve never seen the list before. I’m nervous because I’m sure I don’t know a lot of them. So I’ve got Spotify here to play them first.” She tapped a laptop on the table.
“For those who haven’t seen any of my videos, I’ll give some quick background. I’ve never taken a real music lesson in my life. But I discovered growing up that I can play anything by ear, on guitar or piano. Today we’re going to find out if you guys can stump me for the first time.”
She picked up a white envelope and waggled it around dramatically before pulling out a piece of paper.
“Drum roll,” she said, shoving her strapped guitar aside and drumming on her jeans-clad thighs. “All right, first we’ve got a request from HappyHippo16 - well okay, then, I’m glad the hippo is happy - and it’s ‘Lover’ by Taylor Swift. I definitely don’t need to listen to that one.”
She smiled, and Ben rolled his eyes.
She put her guitar in place and played a bit of the song. Ben leaned in, watching her fingers carefully. She wasn’t bad. Unpolished, perhaps, but for someone (allegedly) playing on the spot, it was impressive.
“Next we’ve got zackr518 with ‘Needle in the Hay’ by Elliott Smith. I have no idea what that is, so off to Spotify we go.”
The video fast-forwarded here and went back to normal speed as Rey took a deep breath and began playing. Ben knew the song, so he could verify that she sounded near perfect.
She was either a prodigy, or was pulling their chains hard.
The rest of the video was the same. She played four more songs, two she knew, and two she claimed not to.
Ben clicked on the next suggested video - UNTRAINED SESSIONS - Rey Takes Requests Part 2. Then he clicked on the third, the fourth. There were a lot of videos in the series; it appeared she had found her hit format. Some of them were against that white wall, playing for Internet commenters, and some were on city streets, where she took requests from strangers passing by. A couple videos were of her in a piano store, impressing the customers.
Her comment sections were a mishmash of people amazed by her talent, and people skeptical that she wasn’t trained.
Ben, however, knew she was telling the truth about her lack of lessons. It was clear from her playing, especially on piano. Her fingerings were so odd that he couldn’t believe they even worked. If he had ever tried that, his piano teachers would have had a fit and forced him to do scales until his fiftieth birthday. But somehow, she made beautiful music happen.
He was far less well-positioned to comment on her guitar skills, having only taken a few lessons as a teenager. (He had quit once he could muddle his way through a few Dashboard Confessional songs, which he had played in his college dorms in an extremely misguided attempt to woo girls.
If there was something rattling around in the recesses of his brain that he could choose to pluck out and never revisit, it would be that, but the embarrassing memory still reared its head from time to time, usually at about three in the morning.)
Still, his limited experience was enough to convince him that she was truly untrained. Whether she was really playing off the cuff, or whether the requests were plants, was another question.
He clicked on another video. Rey played a song he didn’t know, and neither did she. She fumbled it at one point, and started laughing at herself.
She had dimples.
“Sorry, friends,” she said to the camera. “I lost my way a bit there. Country’s not really my scene, but that was a lovely song. I’m glad I got to hear it. What’s next?”
Ben’s phone buzzed. He leaped off his office chair, like whoever was calling him could see through the phone and catch him staring at his computer screen from an inch away.
It was Hux.
Shit. How much time had he spent watching these videos? He was supposed to be working on his arrangements, not bingeing low-production videos starring a talented girl with shining eyes…
He shook his head fiercely, and grabbed the phone on the last ring.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m on my way,” he said in a rush, skipping a greeting. He practically ran out of his apartment, snatching his coat by the door. “Sorry I’m late, subway delays, you know, damn MTA. Be there in twenty.”
He hung up without waiting for Hux’s response and ordered an Uber.
Inside the car, he barked out instructions to the driver before making a big show of sticking in his AirPods, lest the driver try to talk to him. He pulled up his YouTube history and found the video that Hux had interrupted.
He clicked on Rey’s info and looked for any way to message her, not examining his actions too closely. The only promising thing he could find was a link to an Instagram page. Hux usually took care of Ben’s Instagram, but Ben had access and had looked at it once or twice.
He scrolled through her photos, where she smiled at him from an alleyway, a piano store, a decrepit stoop, and Washington Square? Was she in New York?
He hadn’t recognized any of the places in her videos, but even a native like himself hadn’t been to every place in the city. His scroll speed increased until he found another photo, months earlier, of her playing for a crowd at Grand Central.
They were nearing Hux’s place, so Ben frantically sought the “message” button, riding out an impulse.
<message to ReyPlays from PlayingSolo> Hi, I saw your videos and I was impressed. I’m a musician with a YouTube channel, too. You can find the link in my bio if you want to check it out. Have you ever thought of doing a collaboration?
---
Rey regularly got DMs on her Instagram. They varied greatly, from young girls asking for tips on getting followers, to creepy old men asking if she’d film in the nude. Most of the time she deleted messages without responding.
She was going through a DM cleanse when she spotted his message. He had sent it a week before. It wasn’t the first request she’d gotten for a collab. She usually clicked on the asker’s page and quickly figured out that they were desperate for a leg up.
Not this time, though.
Her jaw dropped as she looked him up. Ben Solo was his name, but he called himself “The Soloist.” It made her wonder if Solo was even his real last name or if it was all a big gimmick. He was a pianist, an absolutely incredible one.
He had gained his following by doing elaborate piano versions of popular songs, ranging from famous movie soundtracks to pop music to classic rock. His arrangements were amazing, and his talent was other-worldly. Sometimes his fingers moved so fast she could barely follow them. She understood why he had so many views and subscribers. Upon further investigation, she found numerous studio albums on Spotify, and figured out that he had just wrapped up a successful tour.
Some of his videos were just him playing in a glossy studio, light gleaming off the polished black Steinway grand, his shiny black wavy hair quivering as he played with passion. He had an interesting face. On some of his more intense numbers, he looked positively murderous, his eyebrows knit and his lips tight. But on other, slower numbers, his face was serene and soft, making him look much younger and peaceful.
He was beautiful.
His other videos were practically Hollywood blockbuster-quality. He played on grand pianos atop a waterfall in Brazil, overlooking the Grand Canyon, under the Northern Lights… Rey couldn’t even imagine how much they cost to produce, but they gathered hundreds of millions of views.
What on Earth did he want with her?
As far as she could tell, as she fell down the rabbithole of every video he had ever posted, he had never performed with anyone else. He certainly didn’t call himself The Soloist for nothing.
The next morning, Ben Solo was all she could think about, and not just because she was tired from staying up late watching all his videos. By lunchtime, she had finally decided to reach out. He (or whoever had sent the message) had never followed up, but her curiosity burned too hot to let it go unanswered.
She typed out a response with one hand while she ate her sandwich with the other.
<message to PlayingSolo> Hey man, I didn’t see this when you sent it. Idk why you want to collab with me? Like i’m flattered and all but you seem to be doing okay on your own
She closed out of Instagram, but she had barely started reading an online article when she got a response.
<message to ReyPlays> Hi Rey. Thank you for responding to my note. Like I said, I am very impressed by your talent. I think the fact that you’re untrained would present an interesting contrast to my highly trained playing style. We could make a really neat video I think.
She scoffed at “highly trained playing style.”
<message to PlayingSolo> So you want me to make you look good
<message to ReyPlays> That’s not it at all! I’ve watched all your videos. You’re a natural. I’ve never seen anything like it, and I’ve been surrounded by musical geniuses my entire life.
He had watched all her videos? Her heart skipped a beat. She kicked herself for being stupid, and tapped out a cheeky response.
<message to PlayingSolo> Ooh, big fan, huh? What’s your favorite?
<message to ReyPlays> Probably when you played “Three Little Birds” by Bob Marley. My mom sang that to me as a lullaby when I was little. I hadn’t thought of that song in so long
Ignoring the fact that he was the type of guy to use proper quotation marks in a social media message, she smiled at the image of this clearly very large man thinking about his mom singing to him as he watched her video.
She wondered what that would be like, to enjoy music because of the memories it invoked, instead of using music as an escape from them.
<message to PlayingSolo> i’m glad
<message to PlayingSolo> wait hold up
<message to ReyPlays> What?
<message to PlayingSolo> is this Ben I’m talking to? Or a manager or
<message to ReyPlays> This is Ben. My manager Hux also has access to this account, and he usually deals with it, but I’ve sent you every message.
<message to PlayingSolo> but you’re like a celebrity
<message to ReyPlays> Hardly.
<message to PlayingSolo> whatever. Prove it.
<message to ReyPlays> Prove what?
<message to PlayingSolo> prove that you’re actually Ben Solo. Take a picture of yourself making the duck face
He seemed like the kind of guy who would despise such a pose. She was maybe burning a bridge with the guy who could help her get more views than she could dream of, but something about the way he was talking to her made her think that somehow, miraculously, she had the upper hand.
A moment later, he sent her a photo. Did he really do it? Excitedly, she opened it. Ben Solo himself had taken a terrible selfie, angle all wrong, with his abnormally plushy lips sticking out in a wretched imitation of a duck.
It was the ugliest, cutest thing she had ever seen.
<message to PlayingSolo> dude i can’t believe you trusted me with such a photo. I could blast this online in like five seconds
<message to ReyPlays> I guess so.
She noticed that he was sitting at his piano in the photo.
<message to PlayingSolo> I won’t spam it out on one condition. You need to film yourself playing something, just for me
<message to ReyPlays> I can do that. What is your favorite song?
<message to PlayingSolo> of all time?
She didn’t have a favorite song. How could one ever choose? She grinned, an idea forming.
<message to PlayingSolo> it’s a weird one
<message to ReyPlays> I can do weird.
<message to PlayingSolo> it’s that song from the muppets. Manamana
<message to ReyPlays> Manamana?
<message to PlayingSolo> yeah, you know, manamana doo doo doo doo doo…
A couple minutes went by with no response, and she figured she had sufficiently scared him off. Finn and Rose would be furious with her that she wasted what could have been an awesome opportunity, but she was still skeptical about the whole thing anyway.
She was tossing out her lunch wrappings when her phone buzzed.
<message to ReyPlays> Sorry that took a minute. I had to look up the song (which, by the way, I learned is is actually spelled Mahna Mahna, but Google figured out what I was getting at)
<message to ReyPlays> Now I’m trying to figure out how to send a video in this thing. Let me try.
VIDEO ATTACHED
Rey’s break was over, but there was no way she wasn’t watching this, right now. His video was about a minute long, a jazzy rendition of the weird Muppets song. At the end, his phone fell off wherever he had propped it up, and she got a final view of his panicked face from above the phone.
He was sure lucky that he wasn’t a one-man-show when it came to his real videos.
“Rey!” Her boss, Unkar Plutt, stuck his head into the storage closet that he called a breakroom. “Customer needs you. Looks like they have money.” He paused. “Don’t look too happy about it. You’re not on commission, girl.”
Even Plutt couldn’t bring her down. Still smiling, she went to help the customer. The second she could, she went behind the counter and sneakily pulled out her phone.
<message to PlayingSolo> omg. I can’t believe you actually played it
<message to ReyPlays> You asked me to. It’s your favorite song, remember? I can only imagine that I’ve brought a tear to your eye.
She grinned.
<message to PlayingSolo> yes, you’ve moved me, truly
The “rich” customer came up holding a hideous tiny fat baby angel figurine that she had once Snapchatted to her friends with the caption “who would ever buy this.”
“Would you take $3 for this?” asked the customer.
I would pay you $3 to take it, thought Rey, but she nodded slowly, like she was seriously considering whether to give the fifty percent discount.
She rang up the customer, noting with inward glee how disappointed Plutt would be when he found out how little she’d bought. Her eyes circled the now-empty storefront before dropping to read a message she had felt her phone receive.
<message to ReyPlays> I think it’s your turn. I played you a song. Now I think you need to play one, too
<message to PlayingSolo> sorry mate, i’m at work
<message to ReyPlays> You have a job?
<message to PlayingSolo> uhhhh yeah. I live in new york. It’s damn expensive ya know
<message to ReyPlays> Yes, I know. I’ve never lived anywhere but. What do you do?
Rey looked despondently around the pitiful shop.
<message to PlayingSolo> i work at a pawn shop. Not glamorous, but i gotta eat. And we get instruments a lot, so that’s cool. I play on them sometimes when things are quiet
Weirdly, Rey felt disappointed that Plutt was still somewhere in the store. She wanted to ask Ben what his favorite song was, and hopefully make him smile, too. Maybe he’d play along with the joke and send her an absurd song to play. He seemed to possess some level of a sense of humor.
She supposed she could message him when she got home. But then she had an even better idea, and she felt just bold enough to suggest it.
<message to PlayingSolo> tell you what tho. We’re doing a video at a park in upper manhattan on saturday afternoon. Come by, and i’ll play whatever you want
<message to ReyPlays> Tell me when and where and I’ll be there.