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Poe Dameron takes up too much space.
It was clear to Finn that his rescuer had never spent much time aboard a station, or a ship that wasn’t entirely his own domain. Poe was too big, too much, too loud. It was . . . impolite.
When Poe laughed, he laughed so loudly that people straight across the hangar would stop to see what was so funny. Nothing Finn ever said was that funny, but Poe laughed that loud all the same.
Poe’s loudness, Poe’s gesticulating arms, Poe’s elbows invading Finn’s sides, Poe’s hair irritating at Finn’s ears as he leaned in to whisper some briefing related tidbit, Poe’s very smell permeating Finn’s airspace.
Somehow, Poe was loudest when he was whispering, sharing what he knew of the Resistance, of the Republic, of the General . . . In those quietest moments, Finn was agonisingly sure he was drawing the most attention. For Poe, attention seemed to be its own reward. He would be happy to draw the gazes of every person in the room and heedless of Finn trying to burrow his way through the wall with his spine.
Poe’s first visit to Finn in the medbay was ostentatious and disruptive. He sat on the edge of Finn’s cot, picking at the gifts Finn hadn’t wanted or asked for, popping bright red tiny fruits into his mouth as he spoke. Poe spoke about Rey, telling Finn all the parts the droids and the generals had left out. He told Finn how she looked as she climbed on board the Falcon, how the General embraced her – Finn was glad she hadn’t left feeling alone – and how she had visited his unconscious body in the bacta tank. Poe said he’d been with her, had promised Rey he’d look out for Finn.
And then Finn reached out to punch his shoulder. Finn’s whole body rocked with the movement, rolling with the momentum.
But it was not a real blow, not bruising like back in Order. This was gentle enough that it might have felt like a hug.
Poe kept visiting and Poe kept talking. Through Poe the others learned he wasn’t one for the candied fruit peels and the small, sour black seeds that so many of the Resistance loved to snack on. The gifts people left him became more to his liking.
Did it mean that Poe spoke about him outside of the medbay? That Poe described his reaction to his first taste of the seeds? Did Poe describe how Finn had coughed and spluttered and spat them into his open palm while Poe laughed so hard he snorted through his nose? Why would Poe spend any time talking about him at all?
The Resistance had evacuated D’Qar before he was given a free pass from the medbay and Poe announced he would be on the Alderaanian Aria too. Finn began to apologise for his friend, to say that he was sure the General would allow him a transfer onto a ship that was more likely to see some action, and Poe held his hands up. He pushed his palms against Finn’s chest, heavy and silencing. “No, I want to be on the Aria, Finn. We all want you to get better.”
But why anyone in the Resistance thought that having Poe on the same ship as Finn would help . . . well Finn didn’t know how to ask and Poe didn’t seem to think it needed explaining.
It was on the Aria that Finn was released from the med droids and the fussing and within moments of stepping outside the medbay’s pristine walls he heard the slap of boots on the deck and pressed himself against the bulkhead. But only Poe rounded the corner, cheeks flushed and teeth bared in a grin. “Why didn’t you wait for me? Come on,” he laid his heavy arm across Finn’s shoulder and started walking down the corridor. Linked like this by Poe’s lanky limbs, the crew of the Aria had to circle around them. Finn couldn’t listen to more than a few words, captured in snatches from Poe’s discourse, and he tried to keep his gaze on the deck instead of meeting the eyes of those crewmembers he and Poe were displacing.
“And then of course the General wants to see you.” Poe’s tone dropped an octave at least, quieter and more confidential, and yet still easily overheard by every crewmember they passed. “Between you and me . . .” and perhaps for the first time in their short history, Poe seemed to hesitate. He guided Finn into an officer’s bunk. The room had a cot and serviceable locker. “No head I’m afraid,” Poe said, hands on hips and looking around the bunk. “But we probably won’t be here long.”
Finn nodded automatically. If only Poe could see what a Stormtrooper would have lived in, he wouldn’t have been so fussy about his quarters then. And then Finn smiled. He could say this to Poe, couldn’t he? If Poe could say these things to him? “Should have seen what the Stormtrooper officers slept in,” he ventured.
Poe grinned, and Finn felt his own smile stretching painfully at his cheeks. “Well?” Poe prompted after a moment, waving generally to the small bag of possessions Finn carried.
“Well . . . ?” Finn echoed, his fist clenching his bag a little tighter. What Resistance ritual had he misunderstood now?
“It’s your bunk,” Poe said gently, ducking his head a little.
The stark white walls and narrow cot, the locker that was big enough to hold all of Finn’s worldly possessions half a dozen times over, and the door that would close behind him and keep him apart and separate from the crew . . .
“If you don’t like it we can reassign you somewhere else,” Poe said, surveying the room himself. The two of them seemed to occupy all the space in the room and as Poe turned to look at the locker his elbow brushed Finn’s arm.
“No, it’s fine,” Finn said immediately, “I’m grateful,” he added, because it was true and also the right thing to say. He sidled around Poe’s body, feeling a creeping heat up the back of his neck. “I’m not sure why I should get it though,” he admitted, quietly, because spaceships were loud and small and quiet was good on a spaceship. Stowing his gear, he stole a glance behind him. Poe was leaning against the cot’s recess, his legs crossed at the ankles, watching Finn with a strangeness to him that Finn could not begin to interpret.
“I’ve said something silly again,” Finn murmured, shoving his tattered black undersuit into the locker. He should throw it in the garbage disposal but it never seemed to make it.
Poe was smiling, his eyes were twinkling, and he seemed to be keeping himself deliberately small in the tiny room. “No,” he assured Finn warmly. “Never.”
Their journey on the Alderaanian Aria was brief, and then it was a series of bases that never seemed to be fully operational. Finn found himself listening in briefings to the most important people in the Resistance. He found himself being asked for intel and then when he admitted he didn’t know, they asked for his opinion.
The long-threatened meeting with the General didn’t happen until they reconvened with her group on Dantooine. Poe walked with him to the suite of rooms she had commandeered as her personal command centre. Poe murmured facts the whole way, what she was like, what she liked, what she disliked, and when they waited outside the rooms for the door to open Poe placed his hand on Finn’s shoulder. “You’ll be great.”
The General stared him down with dark eyes, seeing all of him immediately. The parts of him that Poe seemed willingly blind to. She seemed to see his training and his cowardice, his sleepless nights alone and his half truths that he’d sold himself to the Resistance with. She stood behind a desk littered with reports and flickering holograms. Her droid was fussing over him, listing all the conveniences he might want. A drink, a meal, a seat, was the room warm enough, cold enough? He knew from the academy that these protocol droids were never wrong on the finer points of etiquette. Yet it took the droid a long time to turn to Poe after him, and the list of questions was much shorter.
“I think they’re fine, Threepio,” the General said. She circled around the desk and came to stand in front of him, needing to crane her neck upwards to look him in the eye. “I am sorry it has taken us so long to meet you,” she said, and she reached for his hands, holding them in hers. Her fingers were not as soft as he was expecting and they were cold, cold enough to make him grip her hands tighter. “And we must reward your efforts too. A medal ceremony. For both of you. I had hoped, perhaps,” she relinquished his hands and circled back to her desk, “that the young girl might be back too. But if she has found my brother he hasn’t seen fit to notify us.” Anyone else would have sounded bitter. The General stated it as fact. She studied the reports on her desk again.
“I don’t know if I deserve a medal,” Finn began, and he could feel Poe tense beside him, and the General’s gaze snapped back up to his.
“The bravest of us usually don’t get one,” the General said, but not unkindly. “It would do your friends so much good to have something to celebrate.”
“Yes ma’am,” he said, bowing his head, and Poe saluted beside him. They were dismissed, and for once, Poe was not vying for the audience, was not trying to draw attention to himself. Maybe he too didn’t feel he deserved the medal. Finn hesitated as Poe turned to leave. “General?”
She spared him a glance.
“I’m sorry,” he said, and wished for Poe’s volume and wit. Instead, Poe, Threepio and the General were all staring at him, until the General fixed a poor smile to her face and nodded.
“I shouldn’t have said that,” Finn whispered as they exited into the corridor.
Poe’s hand landed on his shoulder once more, squeezed tight, and then Poe seemed unable to resist hooking his arm around Finn’s neck and drawing him in close. “You do deserve a medal,” he said and they walked down the corridor. The members of the Resistance that they passed had to move around them, because they were taking up the space. “You were the only person who could say it, maybe,” he said after a moment and he released Finn, leaving a cool space where the heat of his arm had seeped into his bones.
“I think I’m learning from you,” Finn ventured, and he studied Poe out of the corner of his vision. The pilot was grinning.
“You’re adjusting pretty well,” Poe agreed. And they headed for the hangar, shoulders just occasionally brushing as they shared the space.