Chapter Text
Ben Solo dies on a sunny June afternoon.
No one calls Rey; no one pulls her aside. No one knows how much privacy would mean to her. They don’t know that she spent two days texting and calling him and worrying and panicking—because she’s sixteen, and he’s her gym teacher, and she’s pregnant with his baby.
Two days after Ben dies, the principal tells Rey’s homeroom, and she can’t react. She stares blankly at his messy handwriting still up on the white board and feels her chest caving in.
Then she feels nothing else.
♾
They were supposed to get married after graduation, which should be next year for Rey. She’s ‘advanced’. Smart. Kind of asocial and weird, but Ben was always her polar opposite in that regard, and he always balanced her out.
Now that’s all gone. She’s two months pregnant, alone, lying in her bed at her foster dad’s instead of snuggling with Ben in his tiny apartment.
Rey gazes at the cracked ceiling, too tired to cry anymore. She’s been crying for a week. She can’t even go to his funeral—can’t say goodbye. Now she’s going to have a baby alone and no one will know the father, because she won’t tarnish Ben’s name. She’s just like her mother. Alone, pregnant. Broke.
She rolls over, burying her face in the pillows. Now she’ll never go to college.
This is it. This is it. This is it.
♾
A week later Rey is throwing up in the girl’s bathroom on the first floor when she gets a call. She rinses her mouth out before answering, not bothering to hide her sniffles and coughs.
“Rey Niima?”
It’s a strange woman. Rey leans on the bathroom stall and nods, wiping her nose.
“Yes?” she croaks.
“I’m calling on behalf of Kylo Ren, Ben Solo’s older twin.”
“Wh-What?”
“He would like to invite you to the wake this coming Sunday.”
Wake? Rey blinks, rubbing her eyes as she slides down the side of the stall. Ben had a twin?
“But… but Ben didn’t have a—”
“A car will come by to pick you up around four in the afternoon. The driver will supply you with clothing appropriate for the wake.”
Before Rey can ask more questions, the woman hangs up.
♾
The sky opens up on Sunday morning, and Rey watches the rain pelt her window until the car from Kylo Ren arrives.
It’s a black Mercedes and looks really expensive. Unkar, her foster father, watches suspiciously from the dusty kitchen window as a tall man with red hair gets out and comes to the front door. Rey hangs back, wringing her hands and hiding under her baggy Plattsburgh hoodie from Ben. Ben didn’t know rich people.
Unkar lumbers out to the porch to pick up the clothes: a dress, stockings, and black flat shoes. He throws them inside, complaining about them while he does, and Rey quickly scoops them up.
“What’s this shit?” he spits.
“It’s—it’s from my friend.”
“What friend? You ain’t got any friends.”
He doesn’t follow her when she brings everything down the hall to her bedroom. Yes: generally, Rey doesn’t have friends. But she had Ben.
She changes into the long black dress that gives some extra space for her growing belly, and the comfy tights and wide black shoes. Whoever picked them must have known she’s pregnant. She looks nice. She’s never looked this nice, except when Ben got her a nice blue dress at Old Navy.
Unkar narrows his eyes when she leaves but doesn’t stop her. The red-headed guy is waiting next to the car with an umbrella, and he approaches to shield Rey. It’s fancy. He’s dressed in a black suit and wearing black shades like he’s in the FBI.
“Miss Niima,” he says. “My name is Armitage Hux—I’m an associate of Kylo Ren. I’ve been asked to bring you to Ben Solo’s wake.”
Normally Rey wouldn’t take risks like this. She doesn’t take risks. She likes planning and organizing and researching before trusting people.
But there’s a wide gaping hole in her chest where Ben used to be, and she can’t figure out how to fill it. She thought maybe the baby growing in her belly might expand far enough to ease the pain but nothing helps. Nothing makes it go away. It just hurts and hurts and hurts, and she can’t tell anyone about how bad it hurts.
So she smiles and nods and Hux open the passenger door. Maybe this will help.
♾
Ben’s wake is at a big funeral parlor and the parking lot is filled with cars. Hux parks and escorts Rey to the door and brings her in, and she’s lost in a swell of people dressed in black, and they’re dressed up and fancy and no one looks as sad as she feels.
It’s scary, but Hux sticks to her side. He brings her to the buffet in the side room and points to the food Kylo Ren wants her to eat—supposedly, Ben’s twin. Ben never mentioned a twin.
“Carrots,” Hux says. “For the baby.”
“Um… okay.”
“No deli meat or fish. Vegetables. You also need to start taking folic acid.”
She glances up at his hard stare and reddens, nodding. Jeez. Okay.
Rey munches on her snacks in a corner of the buffet room. She’s anxious to see Ben’s body and learn how he died—Google was no help—but she’s afraid to ask Hux or talk to anyone milling around. His body is here, so hopefully it wasn’t violent. It hurts to think of him dying and suffering through it.
It’s a nice wake, though. Some people are emotional. There’s a big picture of Ben grinning hanging in the main room over the casket and Rey can’t bear to look at it. She unfollowed him on Twitter and tried to add him back and sometimes sees the pending request and cries even more.
Hux doesn’t pressure her to move out to the wake when the service begins. He hangs nearby while she munches her carrots and tears roll down her cheeks and she can’t even go look at Ben’s body. He was always smiling. She can’t see him cold and stiff and lifeless when he was always—
“He wouldn’t want you to cry.”
Rey realizes she’s sobbing, but it stops immediately at the familiar voice. She turns, watery eyes wide, and sees a tall figure looming to her left. Her heart pounds and skips and threatens to leap out of her chest.
Ben has a twin. He never mentioned him, but Kylo Ren is standing right there, the spitting image of Ben with longer hair and a deep scowl and a pressed black suit. Ben never mentioned a twin but he hasn’t risen from the dead, so there’s no other explanation. Kylo is neat and stern and he doesn’t even look at her.
He adjusts his black tie. “Did she eat?”
“Yes, sir,” Hux replies. “A bit.”
“Fine. See she eats more.”
“Yes, sir.”
Kylo nods, and walks out into the ceremony. There’s a short woman speaking and she’s crying—she looks a bit like Ben and Kylo, and Rey wonders if she’s their mother. She isn’t sure. Ben said Rey would meet his mother after graduation.
Rey claps when Kylo walks up the stage. He nods and doesn’t smile in the least and flinches when his mother kisses his cheek. Maybe his mother.
Kylo grasps the edges of the podium. He clears his throat and pulls at his tie around his neck, and the big crowd watches in silence. Rey stares. Ben has a twin. And a mother. Ben had a life she wasn’t privy to, even though he always smiled after he was done fucking her, and she ran her fingers through his hair and he said he’d never lie to her.
Ben’s twin keeps his gaze on his speech.
“What can I possibly say about my brother?”