Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“I think he loves you.” Rose slurs with a drunken, mischievous grin, wrestling Rey, who is struggling to force her to lie down in her bed.

For context: Rose, Finn, Poe, Armitage, and Ben went on a ‘crazy’ bender for the night. Rey received several invites from Poe, but she’d declined, which she’s glad she did, since the drinking that the group partook in resulted in cases of projectile vomiting, highly inappropriate comments, and questionable actions that caused all of them to be booted out of three different bars in Manhattan. 

Of course, Rey was subsequently dragged into the whole thing, receiving a hundred missed calls, voicemails, and text messages from Rose, who’d demanded to be picked up from 35th Street at 3 a.m. 

Rey sighs with relief as Rose finally gives in and falls back onto her bed. “Come on. You’re drunk out of your mind, and you need to sleep it all off.”

Rose twists and turns with frustration, her bangles and jewellery clacking together and jingling loudly as she does so. 

“No, no. You don’t understand; he definitely, truly loves you, and I promise that he confessed to it right in front of me, Armie, Finn, and Poe!”

“Ben Solo loves nobody other than himself, Rose. We all know that. You’re probably imagining things again. Plus, I’ve only met him once, remember? And he was a total, and utter, dick.”

Rey is unsure where all of this stuff came from. It’s all Rose had been blabbering about since getting back from her drinking spree.

“I know what I heard, Rey!” She insists angrily.

Rey steps back from the bed, staring amusedly down at Rose, who is now lying in a starfish position, staring up at the ceiling with a dazed expression and her hair half-covering her face. She’s in an absolute state, but this isn’t her first rodeo, and it most certainly won’t be her last. 

“Fine, I believe you. Will you just go to sleep now? We both have an early shift tomorrow, and I’m pretty sure Unkar is going to beat both of us with a rusty wrench if we show up to the shop late again.” 

She’s met with silence—either as a result of Rose being upset with her or having fallen asleep with her eyes open again, which Rey must admit is really creepy. 

Either way, sleep is something they’re both in dire need of, and she can’t spend the rest of the night caring for a drunken Rose. So, she turns on her heel slowly, steps around the clothes and shoes scattered around the floor, flicks off the light, and closes Rose’s bedroom door behind her with a gentle click.

———————

“Don’t you want a drink!?” Poe screams at Ben, having had a million drinks tonight already. He slides into the barstool next to him, motioning for a bartender to come over.

Ben doesn’t want to drink at all. Him, Poe, Armitage, Finn, and Rose have been to three different bars in Manhattan already, having been thrown out of every single one, except this one, of course. This isn’t the worst one they’ve entered, but it’s also not the best. It’s loud, the lights are a weird, lime green colour, and it smells of PVA glue. 

It’s safe to say there’s too much going on for Ben’s brain to comprehend. Plus, he’s been wanting to leave for a few hours now. This whole night for him has felt as though he’s been fifth wheeling the others, watching on as they keep to their couples. Finn with Poe, Armitage with Rose. It sucked, royally. Especially because the person he thought would show up didn’t. 

He watches silently as Poe gets two drinks ordered for the both of them.

“I’m going to be honest, Poe. I don’t want a drink, unless it’s water.” Ben grumbles, fiddling with the top button of his shirt. He’d never gotten the memo to wear more casual clothes for this occasion.

Idiot.

“C’mon, Ben. Why are you all mopey? Is it ‘cause your crush isn’t here?” Poe jests, taking a moment to brush a hand through his gel-lathered curls.

“Shut the fuck up, Poe.” 

They both go silent, until the silence is broken by Poe slurping his drink aggressively. Ben groans, covering his face with his hands. He’s fucked up. He just wants to go home, curl into a little ball, and die. In silence.

Poe places his glass down with a slam after chugging it all in one go. “I’m sorry she didn’t show. Rose said she would; I thought we’d be able to set you two up for the night.” He winks.

Ben shakes his head and scruffs up his hair before getting up off of his stool. “I’d better go.”

“Don’t, just stay for a second. What if she shows up? Rose sent her the name of this bar and everything!”

“Poe, I’ve stayed for loads of fucking seconds waiting for her to show up, alright? I’ve made myself look like an idiot, following you guys around Manhattan like a lost dog all night. I’m going back to Brooklyn.”

“But you like her! What if you leave and she shows up, then what!?” Poe says desperately, coming to a stand.

“What, is Rey going to magically appear next to us or some shit at 2:30 am!? I shouldn’t have even bothered with this shit; she doesn’t like me back anyway.” Ben seethes in response, turning swiftly on his feet in the hopes of making a beeline for the door.

Once he does turn around, he’s met with three pairs of eyes gawking at him. Rose and Armitage have their arms linked, and Finn is just standing there idly. It’s pretty awkward. 

Ben’s awkward. 

He makes everything awkward.

Ben has felt attracted to women before. But what he feels for Rey is different. He didn’t even need to talk to her to know that he liked her. He didn’t even need to see her. All it took was a description of her personality given to him by Poe, and he was down bad for her. 

However, when they met in person, she was far more… difficult than Poe had previously let on. Ben also happens to be difficult, meaning that their interaction didn’t go the way he’d expected for it to go. 

It was terrible.

He never wants to talk about it ever again.

Deep down, he was hoping that tonight he could make it up to her, that he could show her a different side to himself instead of the side that she had to experience. He’s moving to the Netherlands in a few weeks for work, and desperately needs a reason, anything, something, someone, to keep him here in New York. 

Turns out that nobody here needs him. Poe has Finn. Armitage has Rose. He has no reason to stay. 

He has no one. And that’s why he needs someone.

“You might as well tell them about the Rey thing now.” Armitage says dryly, cutting into the awkward silence whilst unlinking his arm from Rose’s to pick at his nails. Typical.

“Rey thing?” Finn mutters with a skeptical tone, glancing between Poe, Ben, and Armitage.

Poe looks from Finn to Ben. Armitage looks from his nails to Finn. Rose stares blankly into space.

Great, this is just great.

“It’s not really anybody’s business but my own, Armitage.” Ben utters, adjusting his collar and stuffing his hands in his pockets to avoid strangling somebody.

“I mean, it is their business, considering the fact that they’re her closest friends.” Armitage muses. He’s a cruel person, but an even crueler drunk.

It’s all going downhill from here. 

Ben’s blood begins to boil, and he’s pretty sure he can feel his cheeks and ears going bright red. This is the last thing he wanted to talk about tonight. 

Now everybody Rey holds dear will think he’s a creep, if he decides to tell them about his feelings, that is. In all fairness, he is attracted to a woman who doesn’t care for his existence, and that is slightly creepy of him. But that’s exactly why he doesn’t want anybody other than Poe and Armitage to know about it.

“I’m going home.” He manages to force out, pushing through a gap in the human wall that is Finn, Armitage and Rose. Before he can get away, he feels a hand on his upper arm, causing him to freeze.

“Ben?” Finn blurts out quickly, pulling Ben back. “You like her?”

“Like who?” He responds over his shoulder, playing coy. 

Finn gives him a look. A ‘You really think I’m that stupid?’ kind of look.

“Rey. Do you like her?”

Ben stands there frozen, like a statue, like an idiot. A stupid, lanky, pretentious idiot Finn quickly pulls his hand away from his arm. He makes a few quick observations before saying anything. 

All four of the people he’s with are drunk. That means that they’ll most likely forget whatever he says by morning. Armitage and Poe knew about it already, so they don’t matter.

There is always a possibility that Rose and Finn remember, and then they tell Rey all about it. 

Two out of the four people he’s with also happen to have big mouths, especially when drunk—Rose and Poe, so if either of them see Rey at any point tonight, whilst at their peak amount of mouthiness, they’ll tell her. 

Especially Rose. She will definitely say something. She is Rey’s roommate after all.

“Do you like her!?” Rose slurs loudly, getting a good grip of Ben’s shoulders, then shaking him with extreme aggression. Armitage is quick to pull her away.

“No.” Ben responds quickly, deciding to play it safe. 

“You do.” Armitage huffs under his breath without a second thought. 

Ben glares at him. “I don’t.”

“Yeah, but you do. Come on, just admit it at this point.”

“I don’t, Armitage.I barely know her! She barely knows me,”

“Yeah, but you do like her, though.” Poe cuts in, staggering closer to have his say in the situation. 

“Shut the fuck up, Poe.” Ben growls warningly. “I’m going home.”

“You don’t just like Rey,” Poe begins to tease, swaying from side to side, “you loveee Rey—”

It’s the horrific concoction of annoyance, bright lights, loud music, and ridiculous amounts of stress, and the teasing from his own friends that finally tips Ben over the edge.

Don’t, Ben. They are drunk and disorderly, and you’re sober, and sulky. You have no excuse to cause a scene. Be responsible—

“So what if I fucking do!?” Ben snaps, his balled-up fists in his pockets tightening with anger.

The whole bar falls silent— or maybe he’s just burst an eardrum from the volume of his own voice. Ben catches his breath, noticing that he’s just made a complete ass of himself in front of everybody. Finn and Poe glance at each other. Rose gasps dramatically. Armitage scratches the back of his neck.

He turns away from the group, storming out of the bar and onto the street. Nobody makes an attempt to stop him from leaving, which tells him that it’s definitely time to go.

He’s better than this. He knows not to act like a dick, but sometimes it just… slips out. Honest attempts are made by Ben to prevent scaring people away. He makes lists of what not to do, he tries to keep to himself, he tries to socialise, he takes cold showers, he takes hot showers, he goes to therapy sessions every so often. No matter what, none of it ever seems to pay off. He can’t keep his cool, ever.

His mind swirls into a trance as he makes his way down 35th Street, an effect New York has always had on him. He could walk the streets for hours, and it would feel like two minutes to him.

His favourite thing to do whilst in a New York City trance is fantasise. Ben imagines what it’s going to be like when he moves to the Netherlands. What it would be like to no longer be surrounded by loud city traffic. What it’ll feel like to no longer be able to get on a subway so he can purposefully get lost somewhere in Manhattan, or Brooklyn, or Queens, and try to find his way back home without the use of Google Maps. That’s cheating, and he doesn’t know how to make it function anyways.

He thinks about how he’s always made a point to claim that he hates it here, even though it’s a lie. He loves this city, really. It keeps him busy, keeps him entertained. His guilty pleasure is to walk around Times Square and people watch, because people are weird. And that’s funny.

He’ll never admit any of this, because he's supposed to be the man who hates everybody around him. The man who huffs and puffs at the slightest bit of human interaction. He’s not quite sure how that stereotype fell upon him, but it did. Maybe it’s his anger issues.

Maybe it’s his resting bitch face.

Something else he begins to imagine is what it would’ve been like raising a family here. Taking his kids to see the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade, or to the top of the Empire State at night so they can see the skyline and the lights, or to watch a Broadway show with them, and buy them everything they want from the gift shop.

He imagines what life would be like with kids and a family of his own quite often, even when he isn’t stuck in the New York City trance. It was always his aim to meet the woman of his dreams here. To be successful, travel, get married, and have kids. New York is supposed to be the city where all dreams come true.

Dreams don’t come true here.

Ben looks up, and he’s already managed to autopilot himself to Brooklyn Bridge from 35th Street. He walks slowly across it, staring through the gaps in between the planks of wood. Often, he wonders if he could just fall through them and disappear into nothingness.

The first time he’d walked across it, he accidentally dropped his credit card through the cracks.

Ever since that moment, he’d hoped that he was next to fall through them.

Tonight especially, he wanted to fall through the cracks in the walkway of this damn bridge like his poor credit card did seven years ago. That’d do everyone a favour and put a quick end to his sorry life.

Ben shakes off that thought, emptying his mind and dragging himself all the way back home. 

Alone.

Chapter Text

Rey and Rose did not get beaten with a rusty spanner by Unkar Plutt when they arrived at work in the morning, despite being thirty minutes late to their shift— courtesy of Rose refusing to get out of bed. 

Unkar wasn’t even there to beat them in the first place. Rey had looked everywhere for him. Out in the scrapyard, in the ‘break room’, which is more or less a prison cell of sorts, sporting no windows, a microwave with a broken bulb and a grimey fridge containing food older than her. She even checked under the counter, but knew deep down he wouldn’t even be able to fit under there. However, Rey now knew she made sure to check everywhere, and Unkar was nowhere.

Rose just leans against the wall with a lethargic expression, blinking her eyes open every time they close shut.

Rey huffs frustratedly, swiftly shaking her awake. “Come on, wake yourself up. We’re lucky Plutt isn’t around to see you like this, but if he does wind up showing his ugly, scabby face, and catches you looking like a zombie, he won’t be happy.” 

Rose relents, pushing away from the wall, crossing her arms and tapping her foot against the floor as she watches Rey frantically head into the storage room. She eventually emerges with a bashed up cardboard box, which rattles and clinks with every step she takes.

Rey has a strict routine when it comes to her job at Scrapheap City. Greet Unkar, talk to him about new stock, then restock the stock, give the stock to Rose so she can display it, then sell the stock— there’s a lot to do with stock in her routine. But Unkar not being around has thrown her off. All she can do is carry on, and hope he appears at some point. 

She places the box on the counter, shooting Rose a side glance before taking herself out of the back door, and into the scrapyard. Piles upon piles of scrap metal, car parts and other trinkets shine in the morning sun. There’s been way less scrap piles than usual, which Rey had attempted to explain to Unkar, yet he refuses to address it.

Rey knows that it’s a big issue. She’s not only in charge of stock, but is also in charge of finding and keeping track of any expensive scraps which are too good to be kept in the piles and compacted. Unfortunately, she’s only found two spark plugs in the span of a month, when usually there’s about seven every two weeks, and there’s absolutely zero gearboxes and engines, not even fridges in those damn piles. Nothing.

When she returns from eyeing the scrap piles, and rummaging a bit, Rose is rearranging display cases, having already placed the parts from the box on the counter in their assigned places.

“No Plutt?” Rey squints around, scratching her head.

“I’m not shaking violently out of fear, so, nope!” Rose replies, sounding occupied as she fiddles with some tangled wiring before moving to the bike part aisle. “We should beat him for being late.”

Rey smirks. It’s pretty out of character for Unkar to just.. not be around. He’s usually standing behind the counter menacingly, waiting for them to show up so he can berate them relentlessly for being two microseconds late. They’re convinced that he sleeps on the scrap piles out the back, so he can rise early and be there waiting for his most hated, and only, employees. 

On one hand, Rey hopes that he’s suddenly dropped dead, and that she’ll never have to see him, hear him or smell him ever again. On the other hand, if he drops dead, the shop closes, she loses her job, her salary, and consequently everything she’s worked for so far. Too many negatives for her liking.

After thirty minutes, and no sign of Unkar, the shop bell jingles, causing Rey’s gaze to jolt to the door briefly, but she makes sure to look back down at the spark plug she’s been inspecting for ages. It’s bound to be Unkar, so she at least has to try and look occupied.

“Hey, Rey.” Poe’s voice rings out in a sing-song tone. 

Rey sighs as she recognises who it is, slumping in her seat and looking up in Poe’s direction. He winks, then proceeds to do finger guns in her direction, something that only he would do. He looks out of place as he swaggers in, sporting his crisp Levi jeans and grey plaid shirt. Terribly out of place. His eyes dart around at the interior of the store, and it’s obvious he thinks it’s a shithole. Which it is.

“If you’re looking for Rose, she’s over there, by the bike parts.” She points to the left nonchalantly, looking back down at the part in her hand. Iridium spark plug, very good. 

“I’m not looking for her, actually. I’m looking for you.” He chimes cheerfully, approaching the counter and looming over her.

For a moment, Rey becomes a bit anxious. Nobody ever comes into the shop looking for her— ever. Especially not Poe. They barely ever speak, mostly because he’s a bit too cool for her, and she’s a bit too… well, her. 

“Why are you looking for me?” She becomes skeptical, placing down the spark plug gently and actually paying attention to Poe. 

“I need you to talk to Ben.” He says with a low tone, looking into Rey’s eyes. “My Big Ben. Big boy Ben—”

Suddenly, she drowns out Poe’s blabber, and something pops into her mind. Rose’s drunken words about Ben from last night.

I think he loves you.

“Why?” She asks slowly, trying to read Poe’s expression.

“Eh, I don’t know. Just one of those things. You’re decently close with all of us except for him, and he might benefit from having you as a friend.” Poe’s response sounds robotic. Rehearsed. 

“I don’t see why I should be his friend. We don’t get along.” Rey moves to pick the spark plug back up, becoming disinterested.

She hopes that if she sounds dismissive enough, he’ll move onto speaking about something else. 

He doesn’t.

“I know you’re a bit busy staring at your metal, but I’m just gonna…” Poe reaches into his back pocket, rummages around for a moment, then pulls out a crumpled piece of paper, sliding it across the counter in her direction. 

She stares at it for a second, then moves her gaze to meet Poe’s. He looks hopeful, nudging the note even closer. Scrawled onto it is a sloppily written string of numbers— a phone number. It’s been a hot minute since Rey has received a note with someone’s number on. 

Feeling bad, she snatches it up, stares at it, puts on a face of false intrigue, then shoves it into the pocket of her jeans, with absolutely no intention of looking at it ever again. She’ll probably end up washing her trousers with it still in there, and the paper will crumble all over her lovely clean washing, but she won’t be able to afford another wash cycle, so will walk around with mushy, dry paper balls stuck to her until she does another wash. Yep, sounds accurate.

Rose emerges from the bike part aisle, blissfully unaware of Poe’s presence, grumbling under her breath. Something about bars and idiots.

“Poe? What are you doing here?” She says with surprise, coming to a halt and rubbing her face. When she pulls her hand away, a massive oil stain remains smudges on her nose, forehead and cheek. She’s been fiddling with the bike chains, clearly.

“Just hanging around. Why haven’t you answered the messages I sent on the group chat?” He pulls his phone out of his pocket and shows the screen. His phone case is a bright fuscia, which Rey cracks a smile at.

Then she gauges what he said. Group chat messages? What group chat? They have a group chat? She isn’t in a groupchat. They’re all in a group, chatting, without her? Not like she cares, but still. A group chat?

Rose groans loudly. “I left my phone at home, sorry. We were too scared that our boss was going to kick our asses for being late, and I had no time to grab it on the way out.”

“Well, make sure to get your ass back online ASAP. It’s about… last night.” His tone has an edge to it, almost like he’s insinuating something. 

Now Rey is intrigued. Poe is being mysterious and showing up to give her Ben’s number, they’re all in a group chat that she’s not in, and they’re now making prolonged eye contact with one another, which implies they have some sort of inside info that Rey isn't in on. Rey is not usually prone to be upset about being left out— she’s become too used to that ‘left out’ feeling to be impacted by it. There are more important things to worry about that being left out, like whether she has enough Lucky Charms remaining to last her the rest of the month, or whether Unkar is going to scream at her again for not finding enough lucrative scrap metal in the heaps, even though she’s literally told him there’s been no good scraps in a while.

“Look, Poe. Like you said earlier, me and Rose are really busy.” Rey starts, but is cut off.

“You don’t look it,” Poe retorts lightly, placing a hand on his hip and perking a brow, “unless there’s something interesting going on with that filthy scrap you’re staring at so intensely.” 

Rey scoffs. “Firstly, it’s a spark plug, they’re really good, and this one is iridium tipped, the best of the best, so Unkar will be satisfied and won’t berate me. Secondly, you’ve come to our job to give me the number of a guy who doesn’t even like me.” She retorts, holding the spark plug to her chest.

Poe stands there, relaxing his stance and letting his hands dangle by his sides. There’s something deeper in his expression. “Just shoot him a message, okay? And don’t tell him that I gave you his number. Actually, tell him that you despise me to the point you pray for my downfall every night before you go to sleep. Then he won’t suspect anything.”

Rose is simply standing there, taking in the interaction silently, too hungover to have an input. She and Rey make brief, awkward eye contact. Poe gets the hint, slumping his shoulders. 

“I’ll leave you guys be. Just hear me out though, alright, Rey?” He points to Rey, giving yet another wink before turning and sashaying out of the shop. The little bell chimes, signaling his departure.

When Rey goes to give Rose an amused look, she realizes that Rose has already made her way to the other end of the store, leaving Rey alone.

All alone.