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"She's gorgeous," he said, and the lie rolled easily enough off of his tongue.
Phasma didn't look impressed, though Kylo supposed he couldn't really blame her. The figment of his imagination that he was "dating" sounded too good to be true even to his own mind, and maybe that was the point.
"Gorgeous, intelligent, and she's into you?" the tall blonde asked, and the disbelief in her voice was plain as day.
"Try not to sound so skeptical," he muttered in return, and it only stung a little. Phasma and Hux had been together for what felt like forever, and their constant barbs about his relationship status were starting to grate on his nerves.
A single lie about an out-of-state girlfriend had seemed a much better idea before his closest friends had grilled him constantly about her. And okay, maybe she didn't exist, but he had a good idea of what would be his type, and basing his fictional girl off of a short brunette with an interest in something intellectually challenging, like engineering, worked best.
"When will we get to meet this charming Bastila, then?"
"Hopefully never," Kylo said, and he didn't even need to feign his honesty at that.
-
The smugness on Hux's face did not bode well for Kylo Ren.
"You'll never guess where Snoke wants us to go for a networking conference," he said, and Kylo just barely managed to disguise his grimace as a yawn. Hux's favorite hobby was tormenting him.
“Where?”
“Jakku. It's held at that hotel right by Niima, a three-day retreat.”
This lie really wasn't worth perpetuating anymore, and he was about to give up the truth when Hux said in what was likely meant to be a teasing tone but sounded more like a cat retching up a hairball, "Aren't you excited to see your girlfriend?"
"Ecstatic,” he said instead, and withdrew his phone quickly to shoot a text that read, “Guess what? I'll be in Jakku next week!” to himself.
-
The flight was dreadful, and Kylo couldn't get his stomach to settle no matter how many cans of ginger ale he consumed. If his friends uncovered his lie, it would be more than embarrassing. Being single was one thing, but lying about a girlfriend was just downright awful, and he'd never recover from it.
They arrived in the early afternoon, and he jumped at the opportunity to escape the presence of Phasma and Hux.
“I've got to go – dinner date with Bastila,” he said haltingly, and at least Phasma seemed to accept his words as truth.
Kylo spent the rest of the afternoon locked in his hotel room.
-
The conference was miserable, as was to be expected. Networking was just as horrible of a buzzword as team-building, and although he now had stronger connections to Darth Industries, it wasn't an enjoyable experience.
The three of the First Order employees were well on their way to a celebratory drink at a bar downtown when it happened.
His head turned to snark at Hux, Kylo completely missed the fact that his large frame had collided with another, slighter, one. The girl fell to the ground, books clattering around her feet as she went down.
Kylo was about to snap at her about her clumsiness before their eyes locked. She was short and startlingly attractive with a fierce look set upon her features (as though it was his fault she had run into him), and her hair was in three messy buns atop her head.
Around her lay several astrophysics textbooks. A student, then.
This was probably an awful idea, but fuck it.
“I'll give you a hundred bucks if you play along with this,” he growled out quietly, as he offered her a hand up. She grasped it, and the money was apparently enticing enough because she gave him a quick nod and looked much more interested than she had sprawled out on the concrete pavement.
“I'm sorr – Bastila?” he gasped, hoping his voice sounded appropriately surprised. Hux made a soft noise behind him, and if they played this right, it could be perfect.
“Oh, no, it's alright... Kylo!” she said as she scrambled to pick up her books, and thank fuck he still had a messily-scrawled Hi, my name is Kylo sticker slapped onto his suit jacket.
“I knew you lived around here, but didn't think it was so close. This is perfect – Hux, Phasma, this is my girlfriend, Bastila. Crazy coincidence, right?”
To the girl's credit, her face only flashed in shock for the briefest of moments before smoothing into a pleased grin.
Once her books were properly collected, she offered a slim hand and introduced herself to the two of them.
Maybe if the astrophysics thing didn't work out, she could invest in an acting career.
“Care to join us for a drink?” Phasma asked the girl, and she shook her head frantically. Thank god.
“Sorry, I'd love to but I have an exam coming up that requires some cramming. Mind if I borrow Kylo for a moment before you head off?”
“Of course not,” Phasma said, because apparently Hux had lost his vocal cords sometime in the last five minutes.
Once they were a safe distance away, the girl held her hand out. “Alright, Kylo, pay up.”
Fortunately, his chest was broad enough to hide from his friends the fact that he was withdrawing his wallet and passing her a crisp bill. He truly couldn't stoop lower than this, could he?
“Thanks,” he said, maybe a bit too honestly, because hopefully this little tryst would satisfy his friends and he could falsify some kind of dramatic break-up once they were back home.
“No problem, baby,” she said, and her eyes sparkled with mirth. Before he could register it, she leaned up on her tiptoes to plant a kiss square on his mouth as her arms caught his hips. He was frozen on the sidewalk as she waved casually and called out, “Have a good night!”
It wasn't until much later, in the safety of his small hotel room with maybe a little too much alcohol in his system, that he realized she had slipped him a business card in the midst of their theatrical kiss. Rey of Plutt's Mechanics, hm?