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One benefit of retiring obscenely young was that, slowly, tentatively, Poe remembered how to rest. The first time he overslept, he spent the remainder of the day overwhelmed with phantom guilt - for what responsibilities he didn’t know - and struggled that much harder to sleep the night after. The guilt was like a strange, slow wave that swept over everything. He slept worse, the dreams crept in a little easier, unchecked, and then the next day he woke silently in the early hours to compensate. He drifted through those early days weary, face numb, wandering the hills around their home in his old uniform before the suns came up. Like all things it simply took practice. He let Rey and Finn hold him at night. He slept through any potential cataclysms until it no longer mattered. The fourth or fifth time he overslept, he felt only a very gentle comfort as he woke in the bed alone and got up slowly. All of it was gentle, and unbearable; the first time he let someone else make him food, it was hard to swallow. The first time he let someone help him to bed when he was tired, he felt as though he was a burden. The first time he let Finn help undress him or Rey press the ache out of his shoulders, the first time he asked for help to bring home what he had traded at the market, the first time he came home to a home that wasn’t just a bunker, a bed, a mattress on the floor, or bodies upon bodies shivering - all of it was indescribably painful, until one day, having done it enough, he woke up, and it wasn’t.
Such was the morning he woke in mid winter in a warm bed on an empty mattress. Distantly he heard people squealing and laughing. The house was stuffy and he could smell food cooking. He turned to reach for his father’s watch and found he didn’t need to check it. Instead he lay back down and stared at the ceiling, feeling the heat in his toes; notoriously the hardest part of his body to get warm after years of nerve damage flying hundreds of miles an hour through sub zero temperatures. He sat and pulled on a shirt. He went to the little kitchen. The power on the planet was in its infancy so they had to cook everything with gas and sometimes the circuitry from a junk ship Finn had brought back from his last mission. It had been a hard reset, to let go of his reliance on replicators, of canteen food, but it was good, too. Rey and Finn had their own recipes they carried with them, and both wanted to learn more given the twin lonely paths they had taken to him. The pot on the skeletal hob was steaming. He lifted the lid and stirred whatever pink soup was heating through. Out of the window there was a flickering. He set the lid down and went to the glass.
There was snow all around the house. The deep, powdered kind, as though the gardens around them had filled up with sugar. He watched as Finn and Rey ran around each other kicking great tufts at one another. Finn went up from behind to kiss her neck, her jaw, her cheek. Lingering on her mouth, he suddenly twisted his hand and threw a handful of snow down her shirt. She screamed and hastily made a ball with her two hands. She was slow but her aim precise. Finn was halfway down the grass and it still hid him square in the head. They fell about themselves laughing.
Poe’s breath steamed the window. He hadn’t realised he was smiling open-mouthed, grinning widely. He put a hand to the glass to wipe the condensation. Far away, near forgotten, the guilt crawled out of its monstrous cave and told him he should really stay warm. If he went out, he may not come back. Not everyone comes looking in a storm. Fingers bitten by cold can’t fly. Reaction times stiffened by ice and lethargy get people killed. The thought of the winter months on D’Qar - mild as they were - kept him hesitating in that little kitchen. Then Rey saw him and waved. Finn, still sprawled in the snow, loose-limbed and laughing, sat up and gestured to him. The guilt bowed its head. It seemed small and fragile, at the window. It seemed quiet.
Poe dragged on his coat and tugged on a pair of Finn’s boots. He stumbled towards them. They were laughing at him, he realised, the closer he got.
‘You’re not gonna break a bone if you go faster.’ Rey’s smile was bright, though she was shaking in her coat, her shirt wet through.
‘I’m an old man!’ He felt his ankle, as if to prove a point, give a little underneath him.
‘You can do it.’ Finn stood. ‘Just try.’
He took a breath and then dug his heels deeper into the snow as he walked. His shuffle became firmer until he was jogging. Finn and Rey gestured, reaching, calling him forward.
He ran through the snow, feet kicking it about as he went - a fine ice spray that caught the sunlight in the morning. He stopped to feel it against his face, his hands. He stuck out his tongue. The heavier stuff falling like soft chalk. Things were very beautiful, he thought, when you could stop for longer and watch them change. He had not seen a full seasonal cycle on any planet since he had been maybe fifteen or sixteen. By then he was already pulling away from home, into the arms of his general, her family, and everything that followed. Had he and Ben ever played like this as children? He could not fully remember. Sometimes that was age, but as Finn and Rey often liked to tease, he wasn’t there yet. Not old, only worn out. Memory was tricky like that, and often full of holes.
He skidded as he reached them. They spread their arms out. He slipped, and with slight horror watched Finn try to catch him, saw his own fingers scrape Rey’s shoulder, and felt himself bring the three of them down.
For a moment he lay there watching the sky. The snow was cold. He could feel it seeping in through his trousers and shoes. Then he began to laugh.
‘You’re terrible,’ said Rey, and pressed a kiss to his cheek.
‘Sorry.’ He rubbed his neck with his hand. ‘Lost my balance.’
Finn helped him up. ‘You think?’
It was kind, and warm. Finn squeezed his hand and pulled him close.
Poe squirmed away, laughing. ‘Don’t pull that on me. I saw what you did to her.’
Finn shrugged and tried to drop the snow he had already gathered in his other hand.
‘Thank you.’ Poe leaned in to kiss him, a hand on his waist, and left it long enough to let Rey drop snow down the lining of Finn’s coat. Finn yelled and shoved him away, and the three of them began to throw snow at one another. Rey ran down to the edge of the garden to climb the fruit trees. From their branches, her aim was near unstoppable. He watched as Finn tried to dodge her snowballs and slip in the process. Eventually he reached her feet and trying to tug her down. Poe stopped for a moment. Laughing in the cold made his chest feel clear. The clouds were thick above them and the snow kept coming down, heavy and cold. He shut his eyes and knew, if he could feel himself breathing, he was okay.
Later in the cottage he remade the bed whilst Finn and Rey changed. Together they poured the pink soup - which apparently was a drink from Finn’s favourite New Republic placement - into the clay mugs his mother had left him. He was surprised that it was so sweet. He swallowed and caught them looking at him.
‘What?’
Finn smiled and played with the handle of his own mug. ‘You seem—’
Rey took each of their hands over the table and pulled them towards her.
‘You seem better,’ Finn finished.
Poe shrugged and sipped his drink. It burned a little, or maybe it was the sweetness that threw him off. It was hard to accept the good things. It was hard to rest. But it was also —
‘It’s better here.’ He smiled. Toes warm in his socks, legs brushing up against each other. ‘Because of you.’
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