Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

For once in your life, you actually felt like you had your shit together.

That was a little dramatic, but lately, you’d take any win of seeming to ‘have it together.’ Your days were busy and while you kept on top of all the work you were given, you found yourself scrambling to do so at any given time, overwhelmed by every task handed to you. That’s why you had set so many goals this term that basically summed up to be ‘get it together.’

Your afternoon class had gotten cancelled, so you spent that time studying and even decided on a wardrobe change so you could look cute for the honors program gathering that evening.

The weather was still in that nice space of early November where it was warm enough to wear skirts but cool enough to wear sweaters, so you donned a cute white top tucked into a plaid brown skirt, a soft pink cardigan buttoned up over the outfit. You put on ankle-length cable knit socks that stuck out a little from the tops of your scuffed up brown boots, and finished the look off with some gold jewelry. You felt really cute as you left your apartment for office hours. It certainly beat your usual oversized sweater and leggings.

The leaves had only just begun to turn, and the drive from your studio apartment off campus to the old library where the honors office sat was filled with warm toned hues and a soft breeze. It was perfect.

One of the two jobs you kept was working for Maz (or Dr. Kanata, but she didn’t like that formality), the director of the honors program, in her office, filing papers and organizing meetings.

And you were early to said job for once.

Your “office hours” went from 3:00 to 7:00 every Tuesday and Thursday (1-5 on Monday and Wednesday), and you were always rushing across campus to get there five minutes late.

Dropping your backpack and cardigan off in her office, you chirped a quick “Hey Maz,” before hurrying down the hall to the doorway that led to the lobby of the building and the bathrooms.

This whole trying to get your shit together thing had you drinking a lot of coffee and a lot of water, meaning bathroom breaks were happening way too often.

Too concerned with getting to the bathroom and making it back to the office in time for your hours to start, you didn’t notice the tree trunk of a man that came through the doorway right as you opened it.

Apparently, he didn’t notice you either, because you crashed directly into his chest. He was hot. He was really hot.

No, like actually, something was burning you.

“Shit,” a voice said somewhere above you.

You had no time to process all six-foot-something of man in front of you when you jumped away and examined where the burning feeling was coming from.

Oh.

He had been holding coffee.

Of course he had been holding coffee.

Of. Fucking. Course.

It was hot, too. Like… McDonald’s lawsuit hot (okay maybe not that hot, but it hurt).

And it had soaked your entire front.

You tugged the fabric away from your chest to relieve the most painful portion of the burn, tears welling up in your eyes in both embarrassment and pain.

“Ow,” you whined quietly. You looked up at the man to look for an apology, but were immediately taken back by his beauty.

You knew that the patriarchal standards for aesthetic descriptors deemed “beautiful” and “pretty” inappropriate to describe a man, but “handsome” just would not cut it.

He was beautiful. His inky hair curled over his ears and down his neck, coiffed in a way that made his face look statuesque. Or maybe it was his aquiline nose that did that. Somehow, it was too big but just right for his face. His lips were plush and pink, his jawline firm and set. Under his dark brow lay two equally dark eyes, wide and looking directly at you in what seemed to be shock.

The goals you had written for the term of “be bold” and “don’t apologize when you did nothing wrong,” were thrown aside when your eyes met his, a now-limp hand still pulling your stained shirt away from your body.

You were like a deer in the headlights. Completely and totally frozen.

Until he opened his mouth to say something.

“Sorry!” you squeaked before he could say anything, and you quickly pushed past him to literally run to the bathroom.

Your bladder mostly forgotten, you pulled off your top and started desperately rinsing it in the sink, but it might as well have been a coffee tie-dye job.  You caught your gaze in the mirror above the sink. Tears streamed down your face, ruining your makeup. You didn’t remember when you started crying, but now found yourself unable to stop. Here you were, a tired, burnt-out college kid hunched over the sink in just a bra and a skirt, a bright red mark covering your breasts where the coffee had spilled, desperately trying to get a coffee stain out of your shirt you had treated yourself to on your last trip to Target, hesitating over the clearance tag that read $15.

“So much for getting your shit together,” you mumbled aloud to your reflection in the empty bathroom.

The coffee stain didn’t come out completely in the sink, but it would have to do for now. You were scheduled to give the guest speaker for the honors gathering a tour of campus at 3:30 and you didn’t want to make the wrong impression by being late. He was some rich business man who was an alumni of your college that you had been emailing back and forth through Maz’s address in order to organize itineraries and all the boring aspects of getting him to speak for thirty minutes at tonight’s event.

You stuck the shirt under one of the hand dryers, not wanting to give the poor old guy a preview of your submission to Alpha Delta Delta’s annual wet t-shirt contest (not that you’d ever go to an A Double-D party, as if you would ever get invited in the first place).

Once the shirt was reasonably dry, you pulled it back on and decided that your cardigan could probably cover most of the stain. A quick swipe under each eye helped fix your ruined makeup. You sighed, “This is as good as it’s gonna get.” Right before you left the bathroom, you remembered your full bladder, so you took care of that before heading back to Maz’s office.

Your mind briefly drifted back to the quick glance you stole of the coffee guy. He had been so handsome and you wondered why you had never seen him before. This was a small school, you knew just about everyone. He was probably a new professor or a transfer student. Thankfully, you’d never see him again and have to relive that embarrassment.

You shuffled in through the side door of the office, avoiding the other hallway you’d taken earlier, just in case that guy was still there. Said door had a tendency to slam, so you backed into the office to slow it down and close it quietly.

“Sorry for being late, Maz, some idiot ran right into me in the hall and spilled coffee all over me and I had to basically strip in the-”

You really needed to start being more aware when you walked through doors, you noted as you turned around and were greeted by Mr. Coffee himself sitting at Maz’s desk, staring right at you with a quirked brow.

You didn’t know whether you should cry, laugh, or scream.

“Your timing is fine, dear. I’d like you to meet Kylo Ren, tonight’s guest speaker,” Maz said, seated across from him.

Maybe vomiting was the best choice at the moment.

You swallowed back the bile rising in your throat.

This was not happening. This was just a really bad dream where you made a fool out of yourself and called a handsome rich dude an idiot to his face.

Mr. Coffee- Mr. Ren stood to greet you, holding out a hand for you to shake. You just stared at it. You swore that if you opened your mouth, you would puke.

Maz had really good intuition, and you silently thanked the stars for that.

“Kylo, this is my assistant,” she started, giving him your name. This shook you up enough that you finally took Mr. Ren’s hand, willing your grip to be stronger than you could manage in the moment. His hand dwarfed yours and your brain cleared up just enough to note the way it completely engulfed your fingers. “She’s a little shy at first, but a very hard worker. She’s the one who you’ve been in contact with these last few weeks. Very detail-oriented, as I’m sure you’re well aware of, and such a sweetheart. Come chat, dear, before you give Kylo his tour.”

“I don’t really need a tour,” Mr. Ren said in a deep baritone that made your brain go fuzzier than it already was. Was it possible for humans to malfunction? You hadn’t realized he was still holding your hand until he let go of it, but his eyes were still glued to yours. In this different lighting, you could see that they were the color of whiskey. You immediately missed the warmth of his touch, but walked around the desk to stand next to Maz.

“Sure you do, Kylo,” Maz insisted, “They’ve managed to pull enough funds to remodel three buildings and build two new ones since you’ve graduated! And you have your very own tour guide to show you around.”

“Not a very good tour if she doesn’t talk, is it?” he grumbled.

Your mouth fell open in shock. You mentally took back all the nice things you thought about how pretty he was.

Maz ignored the malice in his tone and chuckled quietly, “I’m sure she’ll do plenty of talking once you’re a little nicer to her. You’re very intimidating, you know.”

The way Maz spoke of you was like how a mother spoke of their child, which was sweet that she knew you like that, but this was not the time. You were supposed to be professional. Suave. Bold like your goal for the term.

You took a deep breath before speaking, “I’m sorry about that, Mr. Ren. I think the burn I got from that coffee jarred my head slightly. Would you like to start your tour now or do you have more catching up to do with Dr. Kanata?”

You didn’t mean for it to be as sassy as it was, but at least you didn’t throw up.

All those nice things you had just mentally taken back flooded into your mind when the man across from you smirked and let out a huff of amusement.

He was just too darn beautiful.

“I think I’ve done all the catching up I need to do. Let’s go,” and with that, he just walked out the door.

Your eyes went wide and you sent a panicked look to Maz.

“You’ll be fine, dear. Just don’t call him an idiot again, please,” She smiled at that statement and you grimaced. So she had figured out who the culprit was. Great.

You grabbed your backpack and turned to hurry out the door after him, worried he would leave without you.

“Maybe buy him a new coffee when you tour the university center!” she called out after you, laughing to herself.

Mr. Ren wasn’t right outside her door, so you went down the hall that led to the lobby again.

So concerned with finding your guest, you ran right into him as you barreled out the door.

You were going to scream. This was truly a nightmare.

He grabbed your shoulders and held you still before backing up slightly. Your eyes were glued to the ground, so he hunched over a little to make eye contact with you. His face was very close to yours and you noted he had several moles and freckles dotting his face like constellations.

“You need to pay more attention to your surroundings, you know,” he scrunched his brows together in what you hoped was amusement.

“I’m working on it,” you mumbled, straightening up so he didn’t have to crouch, and he dropped his hands from you in response, “College is about learning and improving, right? So I’ll add that to the list.”

“Are you always this cheeky?”

You bounced your head back and forth in indecision as if you actually had to think about it, “Not really, but you did ruin my new shirt, so I think it’s fair.”

Mr. Ren hummed in response.

“So, Mr. Ren, where would you like to start? The new humanities building or the upgraded science research labs?” You pulled your cardigan back on and buttoned it up in a way that hopefully covered the coffee stain that covered your front.

His eyes were glued to your every move. “Kylo is fine. What would you prefer?”

“Well… I spend a lot of time in the humanities building, so that would be a more impressive start, but I think you’d like the science stuff more,” you shrugged.

“Let’s start with humanities, then,” Mr. Ren started walking towards the exit of the building and you followed him, your legs struggling to keep up with his comparatively long ones.

You led him through the building, showing him the office, a cool statue of books, and your favorite chairs in the whole world.

“Okay so I know I shouldn’t base my favorite building on the chairs, but these chairs are the best, I nap in them all the time between classes,” you gestured to the woven egg-shaped chairs hanging from the ceiling that were full of pillows.

“They look like unsafe bird nests,” he seemed skeptical.

“They’re safe if you don’t swing in them. You should sit in one,” you beamed up at him.

“Absolutely not,” he shook his head.

You frowned, deciding not to push him too much, “You’re missing out, but okay.”

You led him back downstairs, showing him a couple of offices on the way.

“You said you’re in here a lot, are you a humanities major?” he asked as you left the building.

“Mhmm,” you nodded, “I started as a psych major but switched to linguistics and educational studies after my first term freshman year, psych’s my minor now.”

“Double-majoring?” He almost sounded impressed.

“Couldn’t decide,” you smiled, leading him next door to the remodeled science building. “I want to do speech therapy with kids or something similar. I had a stutter when I was a kid and I had to go to speech therapy for a while and for some reason I enjoyed it a lot. I think it would be nice to help other people like that.”

You felt Kylo’s eyes on you as you said this and you looked up at him, paused in the lobby of this building.

He eyed you up and down and nodded, “That makes sense for you,” his eyes caught yours before they snapped away.

You felt your cheeks warm, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Doesn’t mean anything,” he started to walk away from you, but you rushed to get in front of him to stop him.

“What did you mean by that, you don’t even know me,” you huffed in frustration.

Kylo looked you over, his eyes shining with something between curiosity and recognition. He bent down so his eyes were level with yours before speaking, “I know everything I need to know about you.”

“You-”

He cut you off with a wave of his large hand, “Let me guess. You grew up gifted and struggled greatly to make connections with your peers because you couldn’t relate to them. Your parents weren’t there as much as you would have liked, so you found out how to be independent at a young age. You busied yourself with books and hobbies that didn’t require you to get to know anyone, and each one came oh so easily to you. You came to college, probably out of state, hoping for a fresh start because everyone blossoms in college, and you did for a little bit with your new found freedom. And then you realized that you still couldn’t make friends.

“You probably have a cutesy journal with silly goals like ‘put yourself out there’ in it, if I’m correct, but every term, you fail to do so and feel worse and worse about how alone you are. Your only meaningful connections are with your professors who will forget you the second you leave their class. You work for Maz, but you want to be as financially independent as you are emotionally independent so you have another job at what, a bookstore? Maybe a boutique? You busy yourself with work and school, both of which you excel in, but you still feel so utterly alone that you can’t sleep at night. You’re still that brainy little girl who sits alone on the playground because no one wants to give her the time of day, aren’t you?”

Fire had settled into your veins, making your face feel like it was melting. The tears that were dripping onto your cheeks provided evidence that it was. Without you telling your body to do so, your hand came up in an instant, poised to slap him, and you almost did, but he caught your wrist mid-motion, inches from his face, his hand wrapping completely around your limb as he leaned in closer.

“I’m right, aren’t I?” he asked, and the tone of his voice told you he already knew the answer.

“You’re an asshole is what you are,” you muttered bitterly, tempted to spit in his face as you caught your breath and slowed your crying.

He dropped your now-limp hand and started walking away from you. As offended as you were, you would still do your job, maybe just with more malice now. He seemed surprised when you rushed to catch up to him, the streaks of tears rubbed from your face and replaced with red blotches. Maz told you to give him a tour, so dammit, you would give this supreme asshole a tour.

This was only your second time in this building since it had been updated, and as you went about your simplified tour that included minimal speaking, you were surprised to find an arrow pointing out a side door that said “greenhouse.” You paused in front of the sign and made the decision to detour slightly, not really caring if the handsome jerk was following you, more caught up in your own curiosity as you sped up towards the door, boots squeaking on the linoleum floors with every step. You pushed the door open, and sure enough, the courtyard had been turned into a large greenhouse that almost felt more like a small botanical garden.

The high ceiling was made of paned glass and there were tables covered in all sorts of tropical plants. The sides of the large room had been turned into beautiful displays of rocks and water features, like something you’d see at the zoo. You started walking around and observed all of the plants, careful not to touch anything, a bubble of anxiety growing in your mind that maybe you weren't supposed to be in there. The door slamming behind you caught your attention and you looked up to see that sure enough, Mr. Butthead had followed you in. He looked unamused as he glanced around, his eyes quickly finding yours. You jerked your head so you didn’t have to look at him, busying yourself with a neat looking orchid on the table. Crunching footsteps in the gravel approached you and you felt his presence closeby.

“What happened to my tour?” he asked, not sounding at all bothered by this distraction.

“We were touring this building. This is part of this building, so therefore, part of the tour,” your attention was turned to a set of small dinosaur figurines arranged in the moss of one of the displays, the cleverness of the decoration bringing a small smile to your face.

“Then why are you looking around like you’ve never been in here before? Aren’t tour guides supposed to be familiar with their routes?”

“Not a real tour guide, first of all. Second of all, this is my first time in here,” you glanced up to see he was only a couple of feet from you, much closer than you had thought. You briefly sized him up before turning your attention back to the display, “And you were wrong earlier.”

Kylo was obviously trying to tease you when he responded, “Oh was I?” Except it genuinely sounded like he was surprised at least a little. 

You nodded, “I work at a nursery. Not a bookstore. Though, we do sell books. But mostly plants,” your hand traced the leaf of a large Monstera plant.

You were embarrassed to say it, but Kylo’s quiet chuckle made your heart pound in your chest, especially when you realized just how close it was. You didn’t want to turn around to face him, though.

After a few moments of silence, where you pretended to observe the monstera and tried to ignore the eyes burning into your back, you piped up, your curiosity getting the better of you, “How… How did you know all that? Earlier, I mean. Genuinely asking, but… Am I that transparent?”

“I think if I didn’t know you as well as I do, I wouldn’t have known any of that outside of your shy bookworm persona,” Kylo responded.

You turned on your heels to face him, confusion and anger laced in your brow, but quickly faltered when you saw how close he was. Did this guy not know how to respect personal space or something? If you wanted to, you would barely have to reach out to touch him. You thought for sure that the warmth you felt on your face was from his breath.

“You don’t know me at all,” you hated how your voice cracked and how your eyes danced around his face to avoid the eyes that were staring intently into yours.

“I do know you, actually,” he leaned down again and you couldn’t look anywhere but those honey-colored eyes as they scanned yours. “I know you… Because I was you.”

The second you opened your mouth to say something, the door opened and a voice piped up, “Hey, you guys aren’t supposed to be in here, this room is for biology majors only!”

Kylo straightened up and stepped back from you slightly while you were stuck frozen in place, brow scrunched up in confusion, trying to understand what he had meant from that.

“Come on, let’s go,” he held his hand out to you, and for some reason, you took it, and let him lead you from the room, mumbling an apology to the guy that had interrupted you as you left.

It wasn’t until Kylo had led you completely out of the building that you finally shook your head to clear it and let go of his hand. He turned to face you like nothing had happened, “Where to next?” He asked simply.

You huffed, trying to form some sassy remark that wouldn’t come. You glanced down at your watch and saw you still had forty-five minutes until you had to be at the honors gathering to help set up for when it started in an hour. 

“Maz wants me to buy you coffee,” you grumbled, starting your way down the path to the university center that held the bookstore, a coffee shop, all the guest info desks, and other stuff like that, including the room where the gathering was going to be held.

The walk to the coffee shop was silent except for the scuffling of shoes on the pavement and the occasional hum of approval you would accidentally let slip when you saw a pretty leaf on the ground or a cute dog walk by. The entire time, you felt Kylo’s eyes on the back of your head as he trailed a foot or so behind you. You tried not to think about how easily he had read you, or how he somehow saw himself in you. If he thought he could relate to you, did that mean you would turn into him? You had always thought of yourself as a warm person, was he once like that? If so, what happened? Would that happen to you, too?

As if he had read your mind, Kylo spoke up from behind you, “When I was in my last year of college, I was offered an internship at the company I now run. The former CEO took me under his guidance and taught me well. I worked my way through the company, and shortly after I got my Master’s, I was a high-ranking employee. My mentor died in January, leaving me and another employee to run his business.”

You just hummed, trying to sound bored as you approached the coffee shop.

“You would do well to find yourself a mentor, you know,” Kylo hurried his pace to open the door for you and you walked in.

“Maz is kind of my mentor,” you responded, finding a place in line with him.

“Maz is wise, but she isn’t charismatic or tough enough to teach you how to rise through the ranks,” you heard your backpack’s zipper move and turned to see Kylo was fiddling with it.

“The front pouch was open,” he mumbled. His hand stayed on your backpack.

“I don’t want to ‘rise through the ranks,’ I just want a steady job where I can help people,” you observed the menu above the register as the line moved slowly.

“Don’t you want to have power? Money? Glory, for lack of a better term?”

You giggled at that, “I just want to be happy, Kylo.”

“Next!” the cashier called.

You walked up when she called you, giving her a friendly greeting and ordering a ‘White Knight’ (a.k.a. A blended mocha drink with caramel and white chocolate drizzle and five shots of espresso in it), before turning to Kylo and asking, “What are you getting?”

Kylo looked down at you, then back to the cashier, somehow seeming surprised that you were asking his coffee order while you were ordering a coffee. He, to no one’s surprise, asked for a large black coffee.

You already had your card out, and yet Kylo managed to beat you to it as he handed the cashier his card.

“I think I was supposed to pay for that,” you mumbled to him after the cashier handed his fancy-looking black credit card back to him. Your brain flashed on that one time you briefly considered trying to get a sugar daddy and read about the black credit card they only gave to really rich people, and wondered if it was that kind of card. Probably not, though. Dude was rich but it seemed like black was kind of his thing .

You walked over to the area near the register to wait for your sugary hell of a drink as Kylo received his simple order before joining you.

“You can let people do things for you sometimes, you know,” he sipped at his coffee, his face scrunching up slightly in response to what you knew was bad coffee (hence why you got yours full of sugar).

“But Maz said-”

“I think she was joking when she told you to buy me coffee,” he looked down at you, an eyebrow quirked.

“Oh,” the barista called your coffee order and you grabbed it and made your way out to the lobby of the building. Kylo led you to a small table and sat down at it. This wasn’t part of your plan, but you sat with him, taking your backpack off and putting it next to you on the ground.

“Show me your journal,” he said in between sips of coffee.

“My journal?” you asked, head tilting in confusion as you spoke.

“Earlier. I said you probably had a cutesy journal of goals. You didn’t deny that. Let me see it.” It wasn’t a question.

You hesitated a moment before reaching into your bag and pulling out the iPad you’d gotten for Christmas last year (after telling your parents you’d pay for half of it and it could count for your birthday present, too).

“I have a couple,” you mumbled, the device just sitting on the table, unopened.

“I want you to show me the most recent goal list you have,” Kylo nodded to you. To your surprise, the request wasn’t condescending; He sounded genuinely interested.

You nodded and opened up the iPad and flipped through your fancy notes app until you found the page with the green header of ‘Non-Academic Fall Term Goals!’ and glanced over the list to make sure it wasn’t too embarrassing before showing Kylo.

• Be Bold!

• Improve calligraphy

• Don’t apologize when you did nothing wrong

• Make a friend! (Please!)

• Stick to monthly budgets

• Drink 64 oz. of water DAILY

• Learn one (1) thing about fixing cars

• Get it together!

The man had already judged you a lot today, how much worse could it get?

You turned the device around to face him and watched as he read over the sloppy calligraphy and took in the pink flowers doodled all over the page.

“How many of these have you accomplished so far?” he asked, eyes still on the list.

You shifted in your seat, “Well… I’ve been doing pretty well with the water one. And I learned how to check my oil and change a tire, so I went above and beyond for that one. Um… The others… I… Well those are just long-term goals?” You didn’t mean for it to come out as a question.

“Well you can cross off ‘Make a friend,’ if you’d like,” Kylo commented, turning the iPad back to you.

Your brow scrunched, “I haven’t made a friend, though, so why would I-”

“I can be your friend.” Kylo’s eyes became very busy with the coffee cup he was holding. You felt heat rise through your chest and into your face.

“Why… Why would you want to be my friend? I’m like… half your age,” an exaggeration, sure, but he had the experience of someone at least twice your age.

“I didn’t know they let fourteen-year-olds into college,” he smirked, eyes still fixed on his cup.

“Wait, you're not even thirty yet?” That was surprising.

“I’m twenty-seven, actually.”

“Shit,” you muttered. You didn’t want to be impressed by him, but that felt impossible with what you now knew about him. “What’s in this for you?”

Kylo laughed. Well, it was almost a laugh. His eyes scrunched up in this beautifully sweet way and you caught a glimpse at the kindness that had probably once frequented his features. His teeth were a little uneven, but they looked perfect when framed by his plush lips. He really was gorgeous.

“You’re a smart girl, you know that?” he asked, finally looking up at you. For a moment, your heart fluttered at the praise before you realized what he was saying, and you had to fight the slump that wanted to settle in your shoulders. It was silly to think you could be friends with him. “I’m looking for a new intern, someone to mentor like my predecessor did with me. I think you would do well. While it wouldn’t be your normal `get pizza and watch movies' type of friendship, the position would suit you.”

Well… That was not what you expected. You didn’t really have room for another job at the moment, but it felt nice to be considered.

“Thank you, Kylo. That’s very kind of you to offer, but I’m already too busy as-is. Plus, I have no interest in tech stuff, I’m all humanities,” you trailed off, unsure of how to continue the conversation.

“I was a psych major and got my master’s in counselling, you don’t need to be into ‘tech stuff,’” he replied. 

Oh. So that certainly had something to do with how easily he read you.

“Thank you, really, but I’m not interested, sorry,” you said clearly with a nod.

Kylo hummed and his eyes squinted in disapproval. You had thought that he would keep pressuring you into the job, but instead, he reached forward and pointed to the iPad that was still unlocked in front of you.

“‘Don’t apologize when you did nothing wrong,’” he read from your list.

You felt your cheeks flush at being caught in the act. “Right, sorry.”

His eyebrows raised in amusement and you were confused for a moment before you retraced your words and found the error.

“Oh my God,” you groaned, and your head fell into your hands in embarrassment. “I said I’m working on it.”

Kylo chuckled and your head immediately left your hands so you could take in his smile in all its beauty before he made eye contact with you again.

“My job offer still stands if you change your mind. Until then, I would like to find a way to help you cross off some of those goals, so my original offer stands as well.”

“You mean… You want to be my friend?” You almost felt like a little kid again because of the way you asked. It felt unusual to ask someone to be your friend as an adult; usually it just happened . Kylo, however, had pointed out that plan wasn’t really working for you.

“Sure, if that’s what you want to call it. I suppose you’d prefer that title over ‘mentor,’ but I’d like to focus on helping you succeed rather than building emotional connections. You’re full of potential but lack ambition and drive,” Kylo hummed nonchalantly as if his sentence had not housed any offense.

“I think my advisors are supposed to do that,” you muttered, trying to not let your negative feelings towards this man seep out.

“Advisors don’t buy you food and coffee. I will,” Kylo leaned forward when you perked up at that. “You need to learn to let people help you, I can tell. So let me. You don’t have to be as independent as you want people to think you are.” You squinted at him instead of dignifying his statement with a response. Kylo stood up and threw out his half-empty coffee before facing you and saying, “Just think about it,” and then walked towards the meeting room for the honors event.

You glanced down at your watch and saw you still had five minutes until you had to be there, so you sipped at your drink before you opened up a new page in your iPad notebook and drew up a quick ‘ Kylo Ren: Pros and Cons ’ list.

Pros:

• I’ll have a friend

• He can help me

• Free food and coffee :)

• I’m struggling to meet my goals

• Probably has good connections

• Very smart

• Mentor!

• Sexy

Your brain wrote that last point without permission, and you quickly erased it before continuing:

Cons:

• He’s an ass

• Will read me like a book and hurt my feelings

• I already have no free time

• No “emotional connections”

• Will probably pressure me into the internship

As you made the list, you found yourself wanting to find more pros than cons, and you took it as a clear sign that you wanted to pursue friendship or mentorship or whatever it was going to be called with him.

You let out a sigh of something similar to resignation as you packed away your stuff and stood up, your backpack over your shoulder as you headed to the event room, drink in hand. With a quick glance around the room, you located Kylo talking to one of the professors attending the event, a handful of early honors students, and finally landed on Maz chatting with another professor. You approached her quietly and waited until she noticed you and paused the conversation to address you, the other professor walking off to join Kylo’s group.

“Have you been crying?” she asked. Of course she would start with that.

“No,” came the quick retort.

Maz hummed, squinting and taking in your face and forgotten, smudged makeup “Alright. How did the tour go?”

“It was... “

“He’s intense, isn’t he?”

You nodded and glanced over at him, only to find him looking at you. He just nodded and returned his attention to the professors.

“He worked your position when he was your age, you know,” Maz murmured, and it called your attention back to her. “I like you more, though. You’re friendlier. He’s been very impressed with your work, though.”

“Really? Did he tell you that, or-”

Maz laughed, “If you need to know anything about Kylo Ren, know that he is forward with everything except for his kindness, including compliments. I could just tell.”

You paused, not sure if you should tell Maz about any of your interactions with him, but decided it was relevant, “He offered me an internship.”

Maz’s hand was on your shoulder in an instant, and she pulled you closer to her, face suddenly more serious than you thought possible, “Do not take that internship. Promise me you will not take it.”

“I told him no, Maz,” you tried to hide your confusion, but she obviously saw it.

“He took that job, and it ruined him. I don’t want you to fall to that same fate,” Maz sighed, hand dropping from your shoulder. “I didn’t mean to scare you, my dear. I just want better for you than becoming obsessed with a job you hate.”

You nodded, unsure of what to say.

“Go ahead and get the powerpoint all set up, there are cookies on that table over there if you’d like one,” Maz pointed to a table on the other side of the room before joining the conversation with the other professors and Kylo Ren.

You sat down next to the projector station and pulled out your laptop, clicking through the powerpoint you had made for what felt like the millionth time, still adjusting text boxes and images because you needed it to be perfect, even though you knew no one would really look at it. You glanced up when the noise in the room got louder and saw that your fellow honors students were starting to file into the room.

“Shit,” you mumbled to yourself, turning to plug your laptop into the projector system and opening it to the first slide. You hummed to yourself, suddenly thinking about how you could’ve used a different font or different color scheme, even though you used the school colors of red, white, and grey, but what if you had done them differently and they stood out-

“Stop that,” a large hand was placed on your knee, stopping the bouncing you had started doing unconsciously. You glanced up to see, of course, one Kylo Ren.

“Sorry,” you mumbled, adjusting in your seat so it was harder for you to bounce your knee.

“I thought we weren’t going to be sorry anymore,” Kylo hummed above you as he pulled his hand from your bare skin. You instantly missed the warmth and weight it held.

“But I disturbed you, obviously, so-”

“You didn’t disturb me. The slides look fine,” he said, and you glanced up to finally meet his gaze. He was looking at you as if nothing else in the room mattered.

“Oh. Okay,” you didn’t really know what else to say.

“Here,” he held out a napkin to you, weighed down by something, and you held out your hands to take it. Upon opening it, you discovered a chocolate chip cookie and a lemon bar inside, and your eyebrows knit together in confusion. Kylo just nodded at you and walked up to the front of the room where a small stage sat.

You just stared at his gift, wondering why the hell he brought you cookies when you could’ve gotten them for yourself. Maybe they were for him and he just wanted you to hold them while he spoke? A quick glance across the room to the cookie table in the corner showed you that in typical college kid fashion, the table that held several hundred cookies minutes ago was now completely empty after hungry hands had gotten access to it. Surely he just wanted his share, so you placed them on the small table in front of you and you had to resist the temptation to eat the sweets, choosing instead to sip your coffee.

Your attention was called back to the stage as Maz started speaking, and you got comfy in your chair so you could click through the slides as she went. She highlighted some recent achievements of honors students and interesting events coming up on campus, her words supplementing the information you had on the slides that were more for visual representation.

After about thirty minutes of this, Maz switched to discussing class availability and electives offered through the program. This section only had one slide and was a lot of speaking, so you got to take a short break. When your eyes fell back to the sweets Kylo had brought you, you glanced up at the man. He had taken a seat near the bottom of the stage, and the moment you looked at him, his head turned so he could look at you. He gave you a nod before returning his attention to Maz.

What a weirdo.

Eventually, Maz finished her discussion points and introduced Kylo to the group, “Anyways, enough of me. It’s my pleasure to introduce our guest speaker tonight, Mr. Kylo Ren, president and co-owner of First Order tech. He graduated from our school four years ago and played a large role in the honors program. Please give him a big Knight welcome, we are honored to have him here tonight.”

Everyone clapped as Kylo joined Maz on stage. She gently patted him on the back before taking the seat he was just in.

“Thank you for that,” Kylo started. “My time at university was one that challenged me greatly, but it has only made me stronger and more capable than I ever dreamed of being.”

Kylo’s speech was… Basic, to say the least. You clicked through the few slides he’d had you prepare in advance as he spoke, not really paying attention to him all that much after he started talking about success, influence, and determination. Sure, maybe that was great advice for all the young students in the room who needed to have a lot of drive to find a job or for those wanting to be rich. You really just wanted a life where you were content with what you had, comfortable, and preferably not alone. A job was just a means to stay alive, not much else, and you were passionate about your interests and the career you wanted to pursue after graduation. You were driven, in a sense, but not in the same way Kylo urged the group of impressionable honors students to be.

Somehow, he managed to go on like this for at least thirty minutes before he started wrapping up, briefly mentioning an intern position that recently became open and how that was how he got his life off the ground. It was all very boring and you could tell he knew it too. He said his goodbyes and got off the stage to a round of applause. Maz took his place and encouraged everyone to hang out and mingle for a bit. The second the stage was emptied, you shut your laptop and started packing up to leave.

“You didn’t eat your treats?” A voice that was quickly becoming familiar to you asked from above you and you looked up right as you finished zipping up your bag. Surprise, surprise, it was Kylo again.

“I thought they were yours…” you picked up the neatly folded napkin and handed it to him.

“I don’t like sweets. They’re for you,” he pushed your hands back to you, desserts untouched.

“Oh… Um, thank you,” was all you said. Why was he being so nice to you?

“Did you think about my offer?” he asked after a moment of awkward silence. You suddenly became aware of a group of students lingering nearby,watching your interaction, and your face warmed at the thought. They were trying to hop on the internship and you were holding them up.

“Yeah, uh,” your voice dropped drastically in volume so the other students couldn’t hear you, “I’ll be your friend or whatever you want to call it. I think you already have my number, so you can just-”

He cut you off by replacing your sweets with his unlocked phone, “I have it on my work phone. Add yourself to my contacts.”

You blinked at him stupidly and nodded before creating a new contact in his phone, deciding at the last moment to put the bee emoji next to your name before handing it back to him. He didn’t even glance at his screen before slipping his phone back into his suit jacket pocket and handing you back the parcel of treats.

“I’ll be in contact,” he said way too formally before walking away to the group of waiting students, who fell on him like a swarm of locusts.

Shaking your head with amusement at how desperate these kids were for the same job you were offered without so much as an interview, you grabbed your stuff and turned to leave. Before you could make it out the door, a tall, gangly guy you’d had a couple of classes with freshman year stopped you in your path. You could barely remember his name, but certainly remembered how much of an entitled douchebag he was.

“Hey, what’s up? Do you need something?” you tried to sound casual despite the anxiety bubbling in your throat.

“You know you can’t get that internship by fucking him, right? That’s unfair to the rest of us and you aren’t even that hot,” he huffed.

You were too amused to actually be offended, “Thanks- what was your name again? Noah? Yeah, thanks for the advice, Noah , but he already offered me the job and I turned him down. And if you’re worried about me sleeping with him, feel free to do so yourself. He’s an asshole, so you’d get along great,” you tried walking away after you finished your almost-witty comeback, but the guy blocked your path again.

“I’m the vice president of Alpha Delta Delta. Try implying I can’t get any girl I want again and see what happens,” he tried to sound threatening, but you were too amused by how noodly his arms looked when he spread them out to block you.

“Are you sure you’re supposed to be in honors? Because I never implied that and now I can see it’s something you’re insecure about. I’ll keep that in mind for later. Can’t get me, that’s for sure. Now goodnight, Mr. Alpha Delta Delta. I need to go do something actually productive with my time,” you pushed past him and he stayed in the doorway as you walked down the hall. Deciding to be a little extra cheeky, you threw over your shoulder, “Good luck with that internship, I’ll make sure to tell my good friend Kylo all about how you just threatened and insulted his favorite little honors Knight.”

Although you feigned confidence, you pulled your pepper spray out the moment you were out of eyesight, clutching it tightly in one hand, keys in the other as you made your way through campus to your car in the parking lot nearby. Once you were safely in your locked car, you pulled out your phone to see you had a new message from an unsaved number.

---------------

[Unsaved]:

He won’t bother you again. Are you okay?

---------------

Well that sounded… Murder-y. You saved the number as “Kylo Ren” followed by a skull and crossbones emoji.

---------------

[Me:]

I’m okay, he’s just a jerk. You didn’t kill him, right, Kylo?

[Kylo]:

Not literally, but he definitely took a few steps down on the social ladder after I told him he would never be hired by my company after making an ass of himself like that.

Why a bee?

[Me]:

Bee-cause bees are cute?

[Kylo]:

Ok.

How does tomorrow at 7 work?

[Me]:

My cat and I were going to watch a Harry Potter movie at that time, so I’ll have to ask him.

[Kylo]:

I’ll buy you dinner.

[Me]:

Cat says it’s fine.

[Kylo]:

Bring your iPad and wear something comfortable.

---------------

The last text was all you could think about. How informal was this relationship going to be, if he wanted you to dress comfortably? For some reason, you had imagined him taking you to a fancy boardroom or even restaurant to discuss whatever it was he wanted to discuss. These plans… Seemed almost intimate.

That night, you couldn’t stop fussing over what you would be wearing the next day, wanting to appease Kylo’s directions while also looking cute (which didn’t actually matter, as you tried to keep telling yourself along with other lies). Even after you went to bed in what you deemed “comfortable,” (a t-shirt and underwear), you read through the brief text conversation you had shared, analyzing every word of it. Was the bee annoying? Did saying you planned to spend the evening with your cat sound crazy? Or did he read it as an innuendo? You barely slept as you fretted over your plans for the next day.

Chapter Text

When your alarm went off at 4:00 AM for your opening shift at the nursery, you debated on telling Kylo you couldn’t come.

At 12:45PM, when you got off work and rushed to class, your mind scrolled through excuses and lies to miss your plans (You got hurt at work. Your aunt was in the hospital. You had too much homework).

At 1:30PM, as you showered your day off, you went through conversation starters in your head ( ‘So, Kylo. How’s it hanging? Why are you the way that you are?’ ).

At 5:30 PM, as you did your makeup, you practiced the text you would send Kylo to tell him you weren’t coming to the address he had sent you ( ‘Hey, can’t make it tonight. Something came up. Sorry!’ ).

At 6:30 PM, as you got in your car and drove closer to the city, you mentally listed ways to casually crash your car so you wouldn’t get hurt but would have to cancel plans (slow down and just gently rear-end someone?)

At 6:57 PM, you sat in your car parked outside of the large brownstone that matched the address you had been given. You wore a dark red top that reached your belly button, black leggings that were so high-waisted they almost touched your bra, and a large black plaid flannel shirt that hit your mid-thighs hanging open over all of it. It felt way too casual, so you had tucked a nicer outfit in your backpack just in case. You really had no idea what to expect tonight. 

Looking up from your spot on the street, the door to what you assumed was Kylo’s house felt miles away, even though it couldn’t have been more than thirty feet. The stairs that led up to the daunting black door looked endless.

Your key had returned to the ignition at 7:01 PM, and just as you were about to start your car to leave, you caught movement in the corner of your eye and turned to see what it was.

There was the man of the hour, dressed in a black sweater and jeans, standing halfway down his steps, leaning against the railing. He looked painfully handsome but also annoyingly smug at the same time. He’d caught you in the act of trying to escape.

The little sedan you sat in let out a brief honk as your head hit the steering wheel, a groan coming from your chest. There was no escaping him now.

You took your key from the ignition, grabbed your bag from the passenger’s seat, and finally stepped out of your car into the frigid autumn night air. The stomping of your feet wasn’t intentional, just a side effect of wearing converse, but as you walked up to the bottom of the stairs, feeling Kylo’s eyes on you the entire time, it might as well have been.

“Were you going somewhere?” he asked, his voice sounding as smug as his face looked (not that you’d know, seeing as your eyes were very pointedly looking at the ground or anything that wasn’t him).

“No, I just, uh-” you scrambled for an excuse, “Needed to see how much gas I used?” It wasn’t supposed to be a question.

Kylo hummed, “Took you long enough. You know you sat in your car for almost ten minutes, right?”

“I don’t like when guests show up early, I thought you might not either, seeing as we’re so alike ,” you huffed, finally making eye contact with him, “Were you spying on me?”

“It’s my house and I was expecting you. I was up in my study,” he gestured vaguely to the tall building, “And I saw you pull up. I came down to greet you and you never knocked. No spying involved.”

Oops.

After a moment’s silence, you finally asked, “Are you gonna let me in or not? I’m fucking cold.”

“And there’s that attitude,” he turned and went inside, making no invitation for you to follow except for leaving the door open. You grunted and made your way in the house, closing the door behind you. The first thing you noticed was the warmth. At least compared to outside, Kylo’s house felt like a hug, which was only enhanced by the scent of a fireplace, wood, and old books. It smelled like an expensive library cabin, which made no sense but also described the house perfectly. Glancing down, you saw a small shoe rack by the door and decided to remove your shoes just in case that was a house rule (plus, walking around in your socks with multi-colored flowers on them was more comfy).

You heard movement in the room to the left of the front door and walked through the large archway that led into what you found to be a formal living room and dining area. The walls that weren’t covered in floor-to-ceiling bookshelves were made of the same dark vintage wood paneling that lined the entryway. The sitting area had a tastefully faded red velvet couch and matching loveseat around a coffee table, set to look out through the wall of windows onto the street. Along the wall sat a large fireplace that had a fire crackling in it, a rectangular dining table sitting adjacent to it. Kylo took a seat at the head of the table on the opposite side of the fire.

You were too busy looking around at the room to notice that he was looking at you until he cleared his throat. Your head turned a little too enthusiastically towards him, and when you made eye contact, he nodded to the seat to his right, “Sit.”

You moved around the table and sat where directed, placing your backpack on the floor as you did so. Through the archway behind you was a sleek black and white kitchen that was strikingly different from the living room in its modernity.

“What are your goals?” he asked, using your name to bring your attention to him.

You turned from examining the kitchen to glance at him before reaching into your backpack, “We went over this earlier, you saw my list.” You went to open your iPad and Kylo stopped your movements by placing his hand on yours.

“I mean life goals,” his eyes were so intense as they stared into yours that you couldn’t help but stare back at them. 

“I uh…” you shook your head quickly, finally pulling yourself from his molten irises and looking pointedly at the crackling fireplace, “I want to be a speech therapist. I told you that.”

“What else?”

“You’re nosey, you know that?”

He gestured to his own nose, “Comes with the territory. What else?”

You squinted at him, trying to figure out if he was making a joke or if he was offended. Deciding to move past it, you told him, “I wanna be happy. Like I said.”

“What does that mean for you?”

You scrunched up your face in confusion and asked, “Uh, being happy?” He nodded. “I don’t know? Just like… Not hating my job? And having friends?”

“Those aren’t questions, say them as statements.”

“Bossy too,” you mumbled and sighed before continuing, “Um… I would like to find satisfaction in my job and not be exhausted all the time from working too hard. I would like to come home and be able to relax and do things I enjoy. Have friends I see on the weekends. Have dinner parties… And go to brunch…” you didn’t know why you were getting embarrassed, but your cheeks heated up more and more by the second. “I’d like to have a garden with strawberries in it. And a bay window seat. Yeah. It’s boring, but it would be steady, you know?”

Kylo nodded, “And you’ll be doing all this alone?”

You didn’t want to tell him that the first thing that crossed your mind when he asked that was an image of him gardening with you and holding you in the bay window seat. Instead, you told him, “Well, I’d… I’d have my friends. And a cat… or two. Maybe a dog if I felt brave enough?” You started fidgeting with your fingers, scraping at your cuticles with your thumb nail. 

Kylo followed your gaze to your hands and saw the skin around your fingernails red and raw in some places, and he put his hand on both of yours, halting the motion, “Don’t do that.”

“It calms me down,” you pulled your hands from his.

“Why do you need to be calmed down?”

“You’re starting to sound like a therapist, you know that, right?”

“That’s a side effect of my degrees,” he took one of your hands in his, pulling it away so you couldn’t pick. “Why do you need to be calmed down?”

“This is personal stuff, it’s hard to talk about with someone I barely know,” you said and he gently squeezed your hand.

“I want to help you push yourself, and knowing this information will help me do that, is that okay with you? Or would you rather I just order us some dinner and we eat in silence? I want you to answer truthfully, either is fine with me. I don’t want you uncomfortable.”

You hummed, actually thinking about it for a moment, “You know this isn’t how most friendships are, right?”

“And you know because…?” He teased.

“That’s rude,” you huffed, crossing your arms and leaning back in your seat. “I have friends.”

“Then why was it phrased so desperately in your goals?”

“I... “ you sighed, “I had a lot of friends freshman year because I lived in the honors dorm. Everyone was friends, and we did everything together. And then I came back the next year after going home for the summer, and… And everyone had moved off campus and we didn’t have classes together. And… I was just so busy, I rarely reached out to any of them. Eventually, they stopped reaching out to me. We still chat at gatherings or when we happen to have a class together, but I’m even busier now, and I just feel like a burden when I reach out to them. Even just texting them makes me feel annoying. It’s just… I don’t know,” you sighed and let your head fall into your arms that rested on the dining table.

“It sounds like you’ve given up,” Kylo hummed.

“Honestly, I kinda have. Which I know sounds bad? But… It’s easier this way,” you sighed, “Lonelier, but… Easier.”

“So you want to live totally alone your whole life?”

“Well, I don’t want to. That’s just what I’ve been dealt,” you turned your head to look at him, “Are we gonna eat? You promised me food.”

“You’re changing the subject,” Kylo raised an eyebrow and leaned down so his face was closer to yours, “But what sounds good for dinner?”

“I don’t know what’s around here.”

Kylo leaned back from you and pulled his phone, scrolling through what you assumed was a delivery app, “There’s Chinese, Greek, pizza, vegan, burgers, some urban fusion place, whatever that means…”

“Is it like authentic Chinese or American Chinese?”

“American, but it’s not bad,” Kylo continued scrolling.

“Let’s do that, I guess,” you mumbled.

Kylo placed his phone in front of you, “Order whatever you want, I’m paying.”

“You okay sharing some stuff?” you asked, scrolling through the menu.

“Sure,” he watched you closely as you took his offer and added a couple of entrees and a generous number of sides to share to the order. If Kylo was going to sit there and make you expose your life story, he might as well buy you a buffet.

After he took back his phone and placed the order, Kylo asked you to show him your schedule. You tentatively opened your iPad to the calendar app and turned it towards him, ready to be reprimanded about some aspects of it.

“What’s ‘Wicket’s’?” he asked quickly.

“Nursery job,” you watched as he looked over your days.

“How many credits are you taking?”

“Only seventeen.”

“What do you do in these mornings here where you don’t work at 5AM?”

“I sleep in.”

“How much sleep are you getting a night?”

You flushed, “Uh… On a good night? About six hours.”

“And on a bad night?”

“Maybe three? I don’t really track it, but I’m such a night owl, I feel like I can’t do anything until it’s dark sometimes, so I tend to stay up late even if I need to be up at four for work.”

“I think you should quit your nursery job,” Kylo said bluntly.

You were taken aback by this statement. He said it like it was actually an option. Like it wasn’t your only path to financial independence. “What, so I can work for free for you? Don’t think so. Kylo, I can’t just quit … I need that job.”

“I’ve already found someone else for the internship. Tell me about your parents,” he closed the cover on the iPad.

“Tell me about yours,” you countered.

“No, this is about you.”

“Why do you care?”

“It will let me understand you better.”

With that statement, you realized how strange this whole situation was. You met this man less than twenty-four hours ago and you were at his house revealing intimate details about your life to him while you knew next to nothing about him. Sure, he was probably just as lonely as you and was just too guarded to have a normal friendship, but why did a twenty-seven-year-old successful business man want to hang out with a twenty-year-old college kid?

“Kylo, what is this? This is not how friendships are, really. Do you want to be my therapist? My employer? Why can’t you let things come up naturally? This is so weird, I shouldn’t have come,” you grabbed your iPad and shoved it back into your bag and you went to stand up, but Kylo’s hand wrapped around your arm firmly, and you turned to face him with a frown.

“I’m…” he trailed off, looking up at you with what you could only describe as puppy eyes, “Please stay.”

“Why?”

His eyes drooped down to the table, “What you said earlier. About being lonely being easier. It is… For a while… And then it just starts to…” he shook his head. “Please stay.”

You tentatively sat down, recognizing the same loneliness in yourself as he spoke. In order for this whole ‘making friends’ thing to work, you would have to be vulnerable and give him a chance. Maybe he would be slow to open up, but at least you could give this… whatever it was… a try.

“I still don’t understand what this is, Kylo. What is this relationship? And why me?”

“I don’t care what you call it. Maybe companionship would be best if you don’t like friendship,” Kylo finally let go of your arm.

“That… That makes me sound like I’m your sugar baby.”

“No, I don’t want that,” he shook his head, “I’ll buy you food and pay for gas, but I don’t want that unless you do.”

“I don’t,” you said firmly, “But why me?”

He hesitated a minute before saying, “I see myself in you… somehow. I want to set you on the right path.”

“Why though?” you pressed.

“I…” he groaned as if this was the hardest thing he’d ever done. “You’re still hopeful, which is… Good, in some ways, I suppose. But you don’t have ambition, and you don’t understand how the world works.”

“So you think I’m naïve?”

“Yes,” he said bluntly, “I just want to help you. Teach you.”

You leaned in, suddenly deciding to give him a taste of his own medicine. “Lemme see if this sounds right. You’re upset and bored with your life now that you’ve found a soulless job that pays well but doesn’t give you any satisfaction and while you think you want to encourage me to follow in your path, you just want to live vicariously through me. You’re starting to wish you had gone through with your job as a therapist so you found the first little lonely college girl you could get your hands on and decided she needed help to what? Save her? Use her? God, now that I think about this, you’re just trying to groom me, aren’t you?”

“Are you done yet?”

“No!” you said, and yet, his interruption had gotten you off track and you couldn’t remember where you were going. “Well! Maybe I am. But I’m right, aren’t I?”

“Some parts, yes,” Kylo hummed. “But I really do want to be your friend, and you don’t seem to be the type to get a beer with me like I do with my old rugby teammates, so this is what I can offer you. Insightful conversations and a listening ear.”

Kylo seemed to know how to get you off track, because you perked up at that and asked, “You played rugby?” 

Kylo let out a huff of amusement, “You’re getting off-topic again, but yes. I started the rugby club my sophomore year. I still see the guys from my year from time to time, my Knights.”

“That’s cool,” you commented, genuinely a little impressed. You shook your head to refocus. “Anyways, what do you get from all of this?”

“I think you’re an interesting girl,” Kylo got up and crossed behind you to the kitchen, rummaging around as he spoke, “I think I could enjoy spending time with you. Give you a place a little nicer than the library or your house to study. Help you stay on top of your work. Make sure you eat.”

“So you want to be my dad?” you giggled.

A cabinet door slammed behind you, making you jump and turn around. Kylo was getting water from the fridge, focusing intently on the glasses he held, and you swore you saw a slight pink tinge to his skin.

“Tell me about your dad,” he prompted quietly.

You groaned and turned back around as he re-entered the room and placed a glass in front of you. When he sat down, you looked at him and he raised his eyebrows expectantly.

“You’re trying to learn about my ‘daddy issues’ already? Can’t even save that for dessert?”

“Everyone has ‘daddy issues,’ get over it,” he sipped his water.

You let out an admittedly dramatic sigh, “So my dad didn’t like… abandon my family or abuse me or anything. He was physically present, but not emotionally at all. Growing up, I never learned how to regulate or even acknowledge my emotions, which really sucked because I was an anxious kid.”

“You’re still an anxious kid,” he gestured to your fingernails that you were once again picking at.

The attention to the nervous habit made you stop, “Anyways. He’s a very stubborn man, and never backed me up on anything; He always took everyone else’s side, even when I got bullied or harassed or whatever. Like I get wanting to see it from both sides, but when your daughter is crying about something mean someone said to her, shouldn’t you hug her? Kiss her forehead? Tell her she didn’t deserve it? That it wasn’t her fault?” You shook your head before you got emotional at the thought. “He also kind of… Stopped liking me when I was ten. I started getting boobs and suddenly he wanted nothing to do with me. Throw in some religious trauma, misogyny, and some other bad stuff and you’ve got a recipe for a messy relationship. On top of that, my parents weren’t around a whole lot, so I ended up basically raising myself, and nothing was ever good enough for them.” You looked up to see Kylo staring right back at you, expression blank but engaged. “I didn’t mean to rant, sorry. I just get… frustrated.”

“Is that why you went out of state for school?” Kylo asked, not seeming phased at all by your rambling.

“I never said I went out of state.”

“You have a little dialect that’s not from around here. You should know all about that, Miss Linguistics Major,” he smirked at you and leaned in a little.

You giggled and hummed at that, “Yeah, my family’s only like fourteen hours away, but I just wanted to put some distance there. I try paying for my own stuff so they can’t hold it over my head. Scholarships help a lot, but they’re still paying half the tuition bill, which is very kind of them, but I know they’re just doing it so they won’t end up in a bad nursing home in twenty years.”

“Yes, how kind of them,” he raised an eyebrow at you, using your own words against you.

“You know what I mean,” you sighed.

“I do. I wasn’t close with my parents, they were always too busy for me,” he leaned away from you again, “And that’s all you really need to know about that.”

“Don’t worry, I know all about how those Rens are,” you nodded with a mocking seriousness, leaning back in your chair and sipping at your water.

“I changed my name when I turned eighteen. I wanted to separate myself from them, and it was a silly act of rebellion because now I don’t care, but all the paperwork of changing it back isn’t worth it,” he chuckled at that.

“Can I know your birth name then?” you asked, just genuinely curious but not wanting to cross a line.

Kylo looked at you intently for a moment, searching for some form of malice in your eyes. Apparently finding none, he said, “Ben.”

“Thanks,” you didn’t really know what else to say, certain he’d be offended if you called his birth name ‘cute.’

“Don’t call me that, though. Only my mom calls me that,” he frowned.

“I won’t, I promise,” you held up your hands in defense. “Do you talk to your mom much?”

“Sometimes. I’ve… Forgiven her, I suppose. We get lunch every few months. She lives in the suburbs.”

“And your-”

“No,” he shook his head, apparently aware of where you were going with that, “We will not talk about him.”

Right as you were about to call him a hypocrite, the doorbell rang and he got up to answer it, coming back moments later with two giant bags full of takeout.

It was definitely too much food, but Kylo told you that you could take home any leftovers when you had both had your share for the night. You ate in relative silence, mouths too busy to talk much. When eating started to feel like a chore and you were rolling a piece of orange chicken around your plate, Kylo was the first to start up conversation.

“I think we should make these meetings regular,” he got up, taking both his plate and yours with him to the kitchen. You grabbed some of the takeout boxes and followed him.

“Me coming over so you can psychoanalyze me and feed me?” he handed you a fancy glass tupperware that you unceremoniously plopped pork fried rice into.

“Yeah,” he said plainly, rinsing off the plates you’d used. At least he was honest.

“Is this your way of kicking me out?” you asked, filling up another glass container with his leftover salt and pepper chicken (that you had eaten most of, even though he’d chosen it).

“No, not unless you want to leave,” he put the plates in the dishwasher. For some reason, you didn’t want to leave.

“Well what are we going to do now that you’ve fed me?” a box of noodles was put in the same container as sweet and sour chicken.

“I thought we could sit quietly and do some work,” he started helping you fill the last container with orange chicken and dumplings, “Why? Are you going to turn into a gremlin now?”

“It’s only eight, you have plenty of time before you need to worry about that,” you joked. Kylo grabbed a reusable grocery bag from a cabinet and you both started filling it with the containers of food. “Thank you for letting me take home leftovers. Are there any you want to hold onto?”

He shook his head, “If I want more, I’ll just order more. This should set you up for a meal or two.”

“Thank you, really…” you glanced up at him as his arm bumped your shoulder and found he was looking down at you, “I’ve gotten bad about eating, my kitchen isn’t big enough to cook in, so I only eat frozen meals. This is… A nice treat.”

“Speaking of treats,” he walked over to a cabinet and pulled out a box of oreos, “I didn’t know what you’d like, but I thought this was a safe bet.”

He handed you the package and you just stared at him. Had he really casually thought of you while he was at the grocery store? Did he even go to the grocery store? Why was he being so nice to you?

“You keep giving me sweets and I might start to think you have a crush on me, Mr. Ren,” you giggled, opening the package and taking a few out. You were too busy with your cookies to notice the blushing pout on Kylo’s face as you walked back to the dining room and sat down.

“Did you bring any homework?” he asked, moving through the hallway towards the stairs.

“I brought my whole backpack, so yeah,” you responded, hearing him go up the stairs.

“Start working on something, then,” he directed, his voice raised so you could hear him from a distance as he continued up to the third floor.

Groaning to yourself, you reluctantly pulled out your laptop and opened up your most recent linguistics project. You hadn’t started it and it was due in three days, but you had the rubric copied and pasted onto a document, so that was a good start, right? You heard footsteps coming back down the stairs and enjoyed the sound of the wood creaking until Kylo came around the corner, laptop and glasses in hand. He sat back down next to you and opened his laptop after putting his glasses on.

Oh no, he was actually genuinely extremely attractive. You already knew that, but the glasses made him look that much better. You slouched closer to your laptop, hoping the light would cover the redness you could feel rising into your cheeks as you listened to him typing away.

“What are you working on?” he asked, the clicking of the keyboard not stopping.

“I have a… A linguistics thing,” you glanced over the page in front of you.

“What kind of linguistics thing?”

“We have to make study guides for the final, for some reason they’re graded,” you sighed, “I mean, it’ll get me to study, but I don’t like the extra work.”

“Do you not study?”

“I do! I’m just… Bad at it. I kind of flip through my notes and call it good, hope for the best,” you admitted, knowing it sounded silly.

“And does that work for you?”

“I do well on tests, so I guess it does.”

Kylo just hummed and continued typing for a moment before he paused and looked at you, “Are you going to start?”

“I don’t want to,” you clicked mindlessly through a couple of tabs you had open, “I still have a few days to get it done.”

“Get it done now so you can relax and take care of yourself this weekend,” he suggested, but it didn’t really sound like a suggestion.

You held eye contact with him for a moment before giving in, “Fine, but only because I have nothing better to do with you holding me hostage.”

“I told you that you can leave at any time, and I meant it,” he went back to looking at his laptop.

You watched him for a moment or so, enjoying the way the light flickered on his face as he clicked through tabs and typed into a spreadsheet you could see reflected in his glasses. It felt like you could watch him forever, a relaxed pout in his lips and a small furrow in his brow, but then he glanced up at you and nodded down at your laptop, an indicator you should be working. With a dramatic sigh and one last glance at his handsome face, you started on the study guide.

You didn’t really keep track of time as you worked, but every once in a while, Kylo would get up to refill your water glass or ask you to show him your work and explain it. A couple of times, you had him show you his work, but the reports and spreadsheets were filled with data you didn’t really understand and jargon that went through one ear and out the other. After about an hour, Kylo told you to move to the living area because you kept squirming in your seat and it was ‘distracting.’ You curled up on the loveseat, legs tucked under you as you worked. The seat was comfier than it looked, but it still felt too formal for a twenty-seven-year-old to have in his house. Not long after that, Kylo sat adjacent to you on the couch, putting his feet up on the coffee table. You noted he wasn’t wearing shoes, just gray socks that were long enough to go under the hem of his jeans. 

When you finished your linguistics work, it was past ten o’clock, but Kylo made no move that showed he intended on seeing you out. You pulled up your to-do list and decided to work on some of the smaller tasks there, such as emailing professors and going over Maz’s powerpoint slides for her anthropology classes. By eleven o’clock, you were completely done with everything you had needed to do for the weekend that normally would have been procrastinated until Sunday night. You looked up to see Kylo focused on some body of text reflected in his glasses. A few pieces of hair had fallen from his perfect coif to hang over his forehead and temples. You watched as his eyes scanned the paper with a dedicated intensity until you were interrupted by your own obnoxiously loud yawn that caught Kylo’s attention.

“Maybe you should head home,” he commented, finally looking up from his work.

For some reason, you didn’t want to go home. It was cozier at Kylo’s, and you had company that wasn’t your cat, Boba. Despite the pang in your heart that wanted you to stay, you nodded, starting to pack up your laptop.

“What did you get done?” he asked, watching you.

“A lot, actually. The study guide, emails, notes for Maz, a couple of short quizzes, and a reading,” you looked up at him when your bag was all packed, “Thank you for having me over, this was a lot nicer than trying to study in the library or at home with my cat trying to ‘help’ me.”

Kylo nodded, “Sometimes having someone nearby can help with productivity because you feel like you’re being held accountable for doing your work.”

“I know,” you nodded, “But thanks for it.”

“Do you want to come back again next week?”

While you didn’t exactly have a blast at Kylo’s, you had been well-fed and got a lot done. You thought about it for a moment, realizing that it was actually a good idea because now you actually had some priceless free time to play Animal Crossing or clean over the weekend, “If you’ll have me, I’d love to.”

Kylo nodded and stood up, offering you his hand to help you get off the loveseat. You gladly took it, and let his hand envelop yours in a comforting warmth. His eyes met yours for what seemed like an eternity, and yet, all too soon, he dropped your hand and walked to the kitchen to grab the bag of leftovers you had prepared. You were frozen in place for a moment before walking to the front door and getting your shoes on. He met you right as you straightened up and he handed you the bag.

“If you need me, you can text me, but I’m usually too busy on weekdays to respond much,” his hand moved to rest on the doorknob, not yet opening it, “I’d like it if you told me how your day was before you go to bed each night though, just so I know what to expect when you come over next week.”

That was a rather intimate request, but you nodded anyway, “Do you want me over at the same time?”

“Yes,” he finally opened the door, “And maybe this time you won’t sit in your car until you’re late. You can come in whenever you get here.”

You breathed a heavy sigh and gave him a smile, “Okay.”

“Okay,” he returned your smile, but it was subtle and soft, dancing behind his eyes without moving to his lips. He held eye contact for a moment before he shook his head slightly and walked out onto the landing at the top of the steps, “Drive safe.”

“I will,” you started down the steps and felt a few small drops of rain hitting your scalp as he watched you go to your car. Right before you got in, you looked up to see he was still watching you, “Bye, Kylo.”

Kylo didn’t go inside until you pulled out of your parking spot.

--

For the next two weeks, you went over to Kylo’s house on Friday night at seven o’clock. You would eat dinner together (which he got delivered, ordering extra to send you home with leftovers), bicker a little, and end up in the living room to work on various assignments as he did whatever it was he did for his fancy company. He would go over your weekly goals with you and help you organize your work so you could keep track of it and you would provide him with company and witty banter that he seemed to enjoy. He also sat and let you rant about whatever it was you needed to rant about. Work frustrations and school stress were common topics, but you found that talking about things you were passionate about, such as plants, your cat, and your school studies, had him leaning towards you and smiling with encouragement. You learned about him, though he didn’t talk as much as you. His favorite color was surprisingly blue, not black. He went for a run every morning. He loved the rain. His mom worked for the government somehow. He had a coworker named Poe that kept trying to get him to go to parties, and another named Hux that he had to resist choking on a daily basis. Just a bunch of little things that made your heart feel warm and had you wanting to hold his hand. He was starting to feel less like a businessman and more like a person. More like a friend.

Every night you weren’t at his house, you would send him a quick text that usually summed up to ‘I had a busy day and I’m really tired,’ which he usually responded to with a couple of questions ensuring you ate, drank water, and were going to bed at a reasonable time. On your third Friday at Kylo’s, he tentatively asked you what you would be doing for Thanksgiving in the coming week. You shrugged and told him you didn’t see the point in driving fourteen hours home just for a fancy meal and getting harassed by drunk uncles, so he asked you if you wanted to celebrate it with him the day after. You agreed quickly.

The Friday after Thanksgiving, you let yourself into Kylo’s house at five o’clock instead of your usual time as he had directed you to do. You had told him not to bother trying to cook a whole Thanksgiving meal, but when you found him in the kitchen, he’d already made mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing, and of course, a turkey that was much too large for just two people. You’d helped him get everything on the table and ate, enjoying various conversations about everything from some new psychology research you were learning about to your progress in Animal Crossing (which he seemed to find somehow more interesting than the psychology stuff). He even tried some of the apple pie you had picked up at the store as you reiterated that you didn’t have enough room in your kitchen to cook.

Instead of working in the formal living room as you normally did, Kylo led you to the second floor for the first time and agreed to watch a movie with you. This floor had a much more casual living room with a black sectional taking up most of the space, a comfortable looking grey chair opposite it, a glass coffee table in the center of the room, and a huge TV mounted above a slim console. There were a few pieces of modern art hanging on the walls and the rug had a cool black and white design. It looked a little staged, but was still very comfortable.

While you wanted to impress Kylo by choosing some boring documentary, you were basically forced to choose ‘10 Things I Hate About You’ after he saw you hover over it for too long. He told you that he didn’t care what you put on, as long as it was what you wanted to watch. He sat close to you, his leg almost touching yours. You fell asleep halfway through it and he woke you up when the credits started to roll. At some point he’d draped a blanket over you. He offered up his guest room for you to sleep in, but you declined and drove home satisfied and ten tupperwares of leftovers richer, warmth bubbling in your chest.

Chapter Text

The next Friday was the week before finals week and you were stressed. You’d told Kylo just as much the night before over text when you went to bed at 3AM after accidentally staying up to work on a project due the next day. The weather had turned into heavy rains and almost freezing temperatures during the day, the road often slicking over with ice in the morning right before the sun rose. You spent all your time that wasn’t at work or in class huddled up in your tiny apartment with your nose in a textbook.

If your 6:30 alarm hadn’t gone off to remind you to leave for Kylo’s, you might have forgotten you were supposed to go. You almost went through with sending a text saying you couldn’t make it, but then remembered he had food and a fireplace and soft throw blankets. The promise of comfort was enough to convince you to leave.

After you said goodbye to Boba, you headed out. It had started to rain earlier in the day and didn’t stop on the drive over, but it was nothing that prevented you from driving safely. You made a quick stop at a Starbucks close to Kylo’s to get yourself a caramel latte, then arrived at 6:59 and let yourself in at 7:00 sharp. Kylo was already waiting for you in the downstairs living room, working on his laptop with his legs propped up on the coffee table.

Not wanting to bother him, you took off your shoes and coat in silence and sat in your usual spot on the loveseat, your feet tucked under you to warm them up and placed your cup of coffee on the table by his feet. You pulled out your laptop and a psychology textbook and got to work immediately.

“You can say ‘hi’ you know,” Kylo mumbled, not looking up from his screen.

You didn’t look up from yours either as you responded with a, “Hmm.”

Now you could feel his eyes on you and suddenly became self-conscious about your appearance. You had on leggings and what you might call a ‘grandpa sweater’ that was two sizes too big but was very warm and comfortable. Your hair was pulled back in a claw clip, strands falling into your face. You hadn’t given it a good wash in a few days, so dry shampoo was your only saviour. You didn’t even want to think about how tired you looked after getting only an hour of sleep the night before and three hours the preceding nights, and you hadn’t bothered with makeup at all. Usually prep week and finals didn’t affect you this much, but your two jobs were making it hard for you to find time to do much of anything but work.

“Are you okay?” Kylo asked after watching you for a moment.

You nodded, “Tired.”

“Maybe you should just rest tonight, you look like you’ve done enough for the week,” he closed his laptop and scooted over on the couch until he was at the corner closest to you.

“I still have a… A psych paper to write,” you yawned.

“How about we eat dinner first?” he asked and you just hummed in response, still looking at your laptop, “How does Indian food sound?”

“Sounds good,” you finished reading over your essay outline before starting on it. Kylo was still watching you, so you finally looked up. He had a look of concern etched into his features that you had never seen on him before. You raised your eyebrows at him, your face asking him ‘What do you want?’ without the words leaving your mouth.

“I’m just…” he shook his head and pulled out his phone to start ordering food, “You’re never this quiet.”

You just hummed at him and continued your work. He started asking you about what he should order and you just agreed to whatever he said. You could feel him looking at you again, but you didn’t stop working. Eventually, he opened his laptop and resumed his own work.

When the doorbell rang to signify your food had arrived around 7:45, he tried to close your laptop gently as he got up, but you stopped him with a hand, “Let me finish this paragraph.”

Kylo just sighed and answered the door.

Ten minutes later, he sat next to you, looking over at your screen, “That’s more than a paragraph.”

“I know,” you continued typing even as he started to close your laptop slowly.

“Our food is getting cold, c’mon,” he urged.

“You can start without me.”

“No,” he insisted, pushing your laptop screen until it was hitting the tops of your hands perched on the keyboard. You finally looked up at him to see he was giving you the same look from earlier. You squinted at him in a challenge.

When his concern turned into an almost pleading face, you groaned, “Fine, okay, just let me save.”

He watched you closely as you made sure the document had auto-saved and then he pulled your laptop away from you. With a snap, he closed it and walked across the room.

“Hey!” you called after him as he put the computer on the highest shelf of books where you couldn’t reach it.

“Come eat,” he said calmly as he moved to the dining area and sat at his usual spot opposite the fireplace.

You watched him for a moment, mouth open in shock while he casually started dishing food onto two plates. You had to admit it smelled amazing, but you were mad at Kylo right now.

“That was mean,” you said, not getting up from the couch.

“You’ll get it back once you’ve eaten and talked to me,” he nodded to the seat at his right.

After a minute of you pouting on the couch, he added, “Being a brat isn’t going to help you at all, you know that right? Just come eat. The food is getting cold.”

You grumbled but got up, taking your coffee with you, knowing he was right.

When you sat down, he hummed and placed a plate full of a bunch of different things that all smelled and looked wonderful in front of you and said, “Good girl.”

As much as it surprised you, it seemed to surprise him more, as if he hadn’t meant to say it aloud. His eyes went wide and he scrunched up his brow, and when he realized you were looking at him, your mouth open in a little ‘o’ shape and eyebrows raised, he cleared his throat and started eating.You watched him for a moment until he tapped his fork on your plate with a clinking sound, mumbling,”Eat,” as he did so.

You nodded slowly and did as you were told. It was hard to admit it to yourself, but it was undeniable how much that short statement had turned you on. Surely he hadn’t meant it like that , right? He was just being nice and encouraging you to eat, right ?

The second a piece of curried chicken hit your tongue, any thought of Kylo calling you a ‘good girl’ was wiped from your mind as you enthusiastically started eating the delicious food in front of you. You found that every item on your plate was somehow tastier than the last and you couldn’t seem to get enough of any of it. Kylo hummed in approval as he watched you eat, knowing better than to expect much conversation as you shoveled food into your mouth. When you started to feel full, you sipped your coffee, hoping that would help make room somehow.

“What’s that?” Kylo asked when you put down the cup.

“Caramel latte,” you mumbled, covering up your mouth as you chewed on some curried rice.

“No, that ,” he pointed to your cup, and you raised an eyebrow in questioning. Turning your cup around to see what he had pointed at, you saw some writing poking out from the cardboard wrapped around the hot drink. A quick push of the sleeve and you discovered dark ink saying, ‘ The next one is on me -Jake’ followed by a phone number and a drawing of a winky face. You let out a small gasp, staring at the writing. No one had ever casually given you their number like that before. Without your permission, a grin and a blush spread across your face.

“What is it?” Kylo asked, seeing your mood change before his eyes.

You turned the cup to face him, “My barista gave me his number.”

You swore you saw Kylo glare at your cup before he lifted the sleeve back up to cover the number, “Don’t call or text him.”

“What? Why not?” your brow furrowed and you went to look at the note again, but Kylo’s hand stopped you.

“You don’t know this Jake , you shouldn’t trust him,” Kylo huffed.

“I barely knew you when I showed up here, why can’t I just go on a date with this guy?” You were starting to get upset, feeling a different type of heat rising in your cheeks. It was one thing for Kylo to be genuinely concerned for your safety, but this felt unnecessary.

“You shouldn’t be dating right now, with how busy you are,” Kylo raised his voice slightly at you.

“Well, I wasn’t planning on going on a date with him, but maybe I should!”

“Oh, very mature, going on a date just because I said you shouldn’t,” Kylo grumbled.

“Can’t I date to be happy or whatever? Weren’t you just telling me a couple weeks ago that I shouldn’t accept my loneliness?”

“Well you shouldn’t! I just don’t think a Starbucks barista is your best option!”

“Oh, and who is my best option? You?” You regretted the words the second they left your mouth, solely because you would love for him to even be an option, and the thought of him knowing that made you sick. There was no way he’d ever feel that way for you. He’d made that clear when he told you there would be no emotional connection in your relationship.

Kylo got really quiet for a moment, mumbling something under his breath that you didn’t quite catch. You decided to ignore it, returning to your meal and ending the conversation there.

Kylo didn’t catch the memo when he continued a minute later with, “What does your dating life look like right now?”

You groaned, letting your head fall back for added drama. You didn’t really want to talk about this, especially not with him, but you couldn’t help but say, “Men suck.”

“Thanks,” Kylo huffed.

“You know what I mean,” you straightened up to look at him, “All they do is pump and dump. They don’t even buy you a meal anymore.”

“I think that’s just college kids that do that,” he responded coolly.

“Well, that’s the group I have the honor of selecting from. I’ll download tinder when I get bored and then go on one date and be very disappointed with the company and the sex in the rare occasion I let them even touch me. After that, I usually swear off men for a few months until I get bored again,” you shared, too upset by the topic to filter things out for Kylo’s sake.

“Tinder? Seriously?”

“Hey, don’t judge. I haven’t gotten murdered yet,” you mumbled, leaning back in your chair with a belly stuffed full of Indian food, “That’s why I got so excited about the barista guy giving me his number. That’s… That’s never happened to me before.”

“Really?” Kylo sounded genuinely surprised, “Pretty little thing like you, I would have thought you’d get hit on a lot.”

You tried to ignore the comment about your looks, passing it off as him just trying to be nice, but you still felt your cheeks heat up, and your words came out as a stutter, “I… Uh… No, not really.”

“Maybe you just don’t realize it when you are being flirted with,” he said casually before sliding a drink in front of you. “They didn’t really have any desserts, but this is a mango lassi,” he took the piece of paper off the straw and handed it to you, “Kind of like a smoothie.”

“I’m too full,” you whined, shaking your head, your previous conversation effectively forgotten.

“You have room for this,” he waved it in front of your face.

“Is this like a Hansel and Gretel situation? Are you trying to plump me up so you can eat me? Is that what all this is about?” you joked.

“Yes, it is. You’ve caught onto my master plan,” he said in a deadly serious tone that you knew meant he was joking, “Now drink. It has protein, it’ll be good for you.”

You groaned and took it from him, “Only because I want to taste good if you’re going to cook me,” you sipped the drink. Unsurprisingly, it was delicious. Of course it was.

Kylo started cleaning up the dining room table as you drank, denying your help when you stood up to offer it, insisting you sat down and finished your drink. You agreed, but moved to sit at the kitchen island instead. You pretended that you didn’t notice Kylo throwing out your Starbucks cup that still had some latte left in it and Jack (or was it Jake’s?) phone number on it. You didn’t really care. You had your mango thing and couldn’t even remember the guy’s name.

As he packed up the leftovers into containers for you to take home, he asked, “Do you always work yourself to death around finals?”

You sighed and let your shoulders slump slightly, “No… They just seem harder with everything else I’ve got going on and I feel like I’ve been slacking this term. But I did take this next week off from Wicket’s, starting tomorrow, and Maz won’t let me work this week, so I have some extra time.”

“That’s good. What do you have coming up for finals?”

You held up your hand to start counting on it, “I only have three actual tests, one for psych, one for my history of English language class, and one for an ed class. For my other ed class, I have a presentation and a ‘term-long’ project that I started last week-”

Kylo interrupted you with your name said in an admonishing tone, but you continued, “I know. Anyways, I have to finish my term project of designing a language for my other linguistics class, but I’m almost done with that because it’s a partner project. And then I have that psych paper on childhood-onset anxiety I was working on when I was so rudely interrupted.”

“That interruption made you a lot more alert, so you’re welcome,” Kylo huffed, “And that work sounds like a lot, but you’ll be fine.”

“I know,” you said, almost in a whisper because you weren’t completely confident in the statement, “I just… You know…”

“Get anxious?” Kylo finished.

“I was going to say overwhelmed, but yeah, that too.”

“When is your psych paper due?” he asked as he finished packing up the leftovers.

“Not until Thursday, right before the final.”

“And the other projects?”

“The presentation is Tuesday and the others are due Friday,” you took a long sip at your drink.

“How about tonight you just work on the presentation and psych paper, hmm? That way you can rest,” Kylo directed, and it was surprisingly gentle the way he said it as he leaned on the counter across from you.

“Both of them?”

“I think you can do it. Even if you can’t, I’m sending you home before eleven so you can sleep,” he moved around you and back into the living room and you followed him. You reluctantly agreed to his terms and got to work.

The rain outside was soothing, especially with the soft crackle of the fireplace nearby, as you started your presentation about classroom design and management. When Kylo refilled your glass of water around nine, he draped a soft blanket that he seemed to have pulled from thin air over your shoulders. You didn’t say anything as you snuggled into it. Within the next half hour, you became vaguely aware that the rain had turned into the beginnings of a storm. It called attention to itself not long after the wind had picked up with a distant booming (which you hoped was just a trash can being knocked over) that had you sitting up straighter and looking towards the windows covered by curtains. A glance towards Kylo told you he hadn’t heard it, or if he did, he didn’t care.

The fear of thunder made you sound childish, you knew that. You also knew that thunder brought lightning, which started wildfires and killed people, so it was practical to be scared of it. You also knew that, in a less practical sense, loud noises were scary and made your already anxious heart feel like it was going to implode and kill you at any given moment.

You tried to ignore the noise and the way the rain pounded at the windows as the wind whistled down the street and the trees groaned in response. It became impossible when there was an undeniable boom that sounded less like a trash can and exactly like distant thunder. Feeling your heart tighten in your chest as your pulse sped up, you let out a soft whine that could barely even be heard over all the noise from the oncoming storm.

You had almost forgotten Kylo was in the room until he said, “It’s getting closer,” quietly. You looked over to see him smiling softly at the ceiling as if he was enjoying it. When he turned to face you, his face instantly fell into a frown as he asked, “What?” as if he’d never thought someone could actually be scared of atmospheric rumblings.

“Nothing,” you said in a whisper, trying to return to your work only to find that your eyes wouldn’t focus on the page. The prickle on your neck told you that he was looking at you.

“Are you scared of thunder?” he asked softly. You had been expecting the question to sound mocking, but his voice was gentle and full of concern.

“Not scared,” you mumbled, glancing up at him, “I just don’t like it.”

Kylo nodded as if he didn’t totally believe you and went back to his computer, typing and clicking around a few times before he mumbled, “Shit.”

This got your attention, “What?”

He turned to look at you with a slight frown, “Do you want the good news or the bad news first?”

“Bad?” you didn’t know what he was going on about.

Kylo turned his laptop so you could see the screen, and there was a weather report open on it. “The storm is supposed to go on until at least three in the morning.”

You scrunched up your face, a pit of anxiety sinking in your heart. Right as you were about to ask for the good news, both your phone and Kylo’s chimed in sync from where that sat on the coffee table. You picked up your phone to see an inclimate weather warning, and as Kylo did the same and looked at you with concern, you knew he had gotten the same message.

“Well, the good news is that I have a spare bed,” Kylo said quietly.

“Maybe if I leave now, I can get home before it gets worse…” you mumbled, ignoring his offer and looking at the weather report on your phone.

“Just stay here, please. You don’t have work in the morning, I would prefer you to be safe,” Kylo stood up and moved to sit next to you on the loveseat.

“But my cat… He hates thunder,” you glanced towards the front door, hoping Kylo couldn’t tell you were lying through your teeth. You had no idea how Boba fared in thunderstorms. All you knew was that you were scared and you wanted to be safe. If you went to your apartment, you could hide under the covers, listen to music, and cry without feeling embarrassed.

“He’ll be okay, I promise,” Kylo hesitated for a moment before placing a calming hand on your back and rubbing circles. It was almost as if Kylo knew you were actually talking about yourself, not your cat.

Without realizing it, you leaned into his touch, worry still etched into your features, “You don’t know that, Kylo. You can’t promise shit like that.”

“Well, is he safe? Your apartment all secure?” he asked.

“Yeah, but what if he rips it up? Or cries all night? Poor little guy, he’s probably so scared, I should be there with him-”

Kylo sighed with the beginnings of frustration, “I’ll cover any property damage, but I’d prefer you to not die tonight because you tried to go home to see your cat.”

You huffed and turned to argue with him, but when thunder rumbled in the distance, you tensed before your shoulders slumped in defeat, “Fine. I’ll stay.”

Kylo’s hand moved to stroke some hair from your face, “Good g-” he cleared his throat, “Good. That’s good. How about we call it a night, hmm? You’re not going to get much done if the storm is scaring you like this.”

“But my psych-”

“Work can wait. How about you take a nice bath and then go to bed?”

You paused for a moment, “You have a bathtub?”

“Mhmm. A nice, big, soaking tub. With hot water and bath salts. And a rain showerhead if you want to shower, too. Do you want me to start a bath for you?” The tone of his voice was obviously meant to tempt you, and it was working.

A bath sounded amazing. You couldn’t remember the last time you had taken one, and with that realization, you nodded slightly with a, “Yes, please.”

Kylo stood up and held his hand out to you, and you took it to help stabilize you as you stood. He started walking upstairs, and when he glanced back at you and raised his eyebrows, you realized you were supposed to follow him, so you did. He led you to the third (and final) floor of his house, somewhere you’d never been before. The hallway at the top of the stairs had the same dark wood panelling the living room and hallway on the first floor had, but there were only two doors.

Kylo walked towards one and pointed to the other behind him, announcing, “That’s my study,” before walking through the door of his not-study.

You knew, logically speaking, that his fancy-ass tub and shower would be in the master bathroom attached to the master bedroom, a.k.a. his bedroom, but for some reason, it still surprised you when you stepped through the doorway and found exactly the bedroom you’d expected Kylo to have. The far wall was entirely made up of heavy black curtains that you assumed covered windows. In the middle of this wall sat a bed, probably a king size or bigger, with the fluffiest looking stack of pillows you’d ever seen. The color palette of his bed, to no one’s surprise, was grey, black, and white. The floor was the same dark hardwood that covered the entire house, and he had a charcoal grey rug tucked under the end of his bed. There was a sleek looking dark metal nightstand on either side of the bed, and on the walls without curtains sat some boring-looking art. There wasn’t much to the room, but it was probably the size of your entire apartment and felt somehow comforting in its simplicity.

Stupidly, the first thing out of your mouth was, “You have a bedframe.”

He turned to look at you, confusion obvious on his face. “Where else would my bed go?” He asked, and you had to cringe in response.

Your explanation was embarrassing as you said, “Right. Um… I suppose I’ve just gotten used to guys having their mattresses on the floor, or, even worse… Having an air mattress.”

“I see why you’ve given up on dating,” he said as if that were not a hurtful statement. Kylo glanced over at you for a moment, “Do you have a bedframe?”

You huffed in indignation, “As a matter of fact, I do, Kylo. I’m broke but I’m still civilized.” You decided to opt out of telling him that you found your bed frame on the side of the road.

Kylo hummed and walked towards an open door and flicked on the light inside the room. You could see the beginnings of a bathroom beyond his wide frame. “How hot do you want the bath?” He asked.

“I prefer being well-cooked, I guess? I can fill up a bath for myself though, Kylo,” you walked over to him and he let you into the bathroom. The wall behind the double vanity with black cabinets was covered in white subway tile that continued onto the wall to your right, where a giant glass shower sat pushed into the corner, a freestanding soaking tub right next to it. The other walls were painted a charcoal grey that matched the floor tile, and the toilet was in the opposite corner from the tub, one on either side of the door. You briefly wondered how even a toilet could look fancy, but your thoughts were interrupted by the water starting in the tub. Kylo was crouched next to it, a hand under the faucet to test the water, concentration in his furrowed eyebrows.

“There should be some epsom salts under the sink if you’d like those,” he said, plugging the tub drain when he found a temperature he was satisfied with.

You dug around in the cabinet he pointed to for a moment before pulling a bag of lavender epsom salts out. You held it to your chest as you watched him stand up. Even with the few feet between you, he stilled towered over you, even more so as he closed the gap. He held eye contact with you as his hand tugged at the bag in your arms until you let go.

"Come," was all he said as he turned back to the tub and dumped approximately an entire ocean’s worth of salt into the water. You stood next to him, eyes glued on him as he focused on your bath. No one had ever taken care of you like this. Not even your family. It had always been you taking care of yourself if you were overwhelmed or frightened, but now…

"Is this warm enough?" He asked, bringing you out of your thoughts. Your hand joined his under the stream that he was still checking, his fingers tracing the back of your hand as you let it rest in his palm. The touch seemed to echo through your body and you weren't sure if the heat you felt was from him or the water. A quiet breath slipped through your lips as his thumb came to stroke at your open palm before slowly moving down to your wrist. You couldn't look away from the way he held you so delicately, as if you would break under his fingertips. You felt warmth on your neck and realized Kylo had turned his head towards you and was close enough for his breath to hit your skin. Alarmed at the sudden awareness of the intimacy being formed, you pulled away as if something had burned you.

"Too hot?" He asked calmly, going to adjust the knobs.

You stared at him, eyes wide and heart threatening to jump out of your chest. What was he doing, touching you like that? If he kept it up, you'd have to acknowledge your growing feelings for him, and that would make it impossible to get things done. No. He was just handsome and kind to you. He cared for you, for some reason. That didn't mean he wanted to be with you in any way that he wasn't already with you… Right?

"Is it too hot?" He repeated at your lack of answer.

"Um… no, no. It's fine. It um… it can be a little hotter, actually," you managed to say, voice barely above a whisper.

You felt him look you over and a knob squeaked before he stood up, his slightly damp hands holding your elbows like he was trying to hold you still as he looked down at you, "Are you okay?"

With a nod, you lied, "I think I'm just getting tired."

Looking at his lips was about as close as you could get to looking in his eyes, which started dancing around your face as he gently held you. His voice had a hint of disappointed curiosity to it when he said, "Alright… feel free to shower while this fills, use any products you want. I'll find some clothes for you to sleep in and leave them outside the door. I'll be in my study, ok?"

He left before you could say anything, and you stood in the middle of the bathroom stupidly for a while after he left. You were having trouble wrapping your brain around his touches and soft care for you. It was hard for you to imagine he could want you in any way except for his weird idea of friendship. And yet his touches lingered, and his gaze was reliably on you at all times. 

You glanced at the door when you heard a soft thud against it and opened it to find a large black t-shirt and a pair of grey sweatpants you knew wouldn't fit you well, but no Kylo. Apparently he'd thrown the clothes against the door and ran.

You held the clothes for a moment before closing the bathroom door and stripping out of the ones you were already wearing. The tub had only filled up halfway, so you decided to take a quick shower just to wash your hair and rinse off your body so you weren't stewing in your own filth. The knobs were complicated, but you still managed to get both the rainshower working as well as the regular showerhead (which you couldn't help but notice was detachable, an appealing concept when Kylo had been so nice to you all night, but the thought of him finding you with his showerhead pressed against your pussy made your chest ache in embarrassment and was enough to deter you from entertaining that thought for long).

Kylo's shower was by far the best you'd ever been in. It probably helped that you were exhausted, but it was just the right amount of heat, and the warm woodsy scent of products you used to wash your hair could’ve pulled you to sleep right there. The image of Kylo showering here, water dripping down his chest as he spread soap over his skin made your own skin burn and your mind went fuzzy with need. You tried to clear the thought from your head, but it kept getting more and more tantalizing as the camera of your mind panned further down to his abs that were chiseled and soft at the same time, and you imagined the ‘v’ that would lead down to his-

The somewhat quiet rumble of thunder that rang through the room was almost welcome. It startled you enough to pull your hand from where it had drifted between your legs and turn off the water. You almost didn't want to take a bath, but you emerged from the shower, somehow both cleaner and dirtier than you'd ever felt before, and lowered yourself into the tub full of hot lavender-scented water. It was everything your body needed at that moment. You were grateful that Kylo had offered a bath to you, because you never wanted to leave the embrace of the hot water. You let your mind relax, acknowledging the thoughts of stress that popped up in your head, but didn’t let them consume you. You felt safe and cared for. The still-distant thunder was almost forgotten as you relaxed in the tub for an unknown amount of time, the placement of the bathroom muffling the sound. You realized you hadn't heard it in a while and thought maybe the storm had passed. The idea made you sigh happily and settle more into the tub. You even closed your eyes to take a quick little bath-nap.

Within moments of your eyelids closing, you heard the beginning roll of thunder that you tried to ignore before it gained volume and boomed with a force and length that seemed to shake the house. Your chest was tight. You didn't remember standing up in the tub, but you were. There was a new dampness on your face that you decided to attribute to the tub and not your head that was screaming for some sort of comfort. Your teeth chattered as the thunder continued its rumbling above you, quieter now, but still present and loud enough to speed up your breathing.

The noise ended with a quiet knock on the bathroom door. You were frozen in place when Kylo asked, "Are you okay?" From the other side.

You couldn't respond. What would you tell him? Lie and say 'yes' when all you wanted was a hug? Or say 'no' and have him walk in on you naked just to give you a pitying look?

Apparently, he took your lack of response as a 'no,' cracking the door open just a little so you could hear him better, and repeated his question.

When you responded with a low whine that was supposed to be a 'yes,' Kylo sighed in the doorway as if he was fighting with himself.

"Do you want me to come in there?" He asked.

You nodded to yourself, but then decided that it was a bad idea and finally managed to squeak out a quiet, "I'm okay, Kylo." As scared as you were, your brain kept its self-consciousness and the thought of him seeing you naked was more frightening than the thunder. You would be fine. You didn’t want to worry Kylo, and you could take care of yourself.

"Why don't you come on out, hmm? You've been in there almost an hour," he suggested.

The thought was appealing, but you were stuck in place. You willed your limbs to move, but your body’s only response was to let out a pitiful sob. Another roll of thunder began, seemingly louder than the last, and you started to cry in earnest. It was not cute or endearing in any way. You were terrified and couldn’t get your head to stop spinning. The thunder was the only thing your mind could focus on and it continued its rumbling as Kylo spoke again.

“Can you come to me?” he asked.

“I-I…” you stuttered out.

“Do you want me to come to you? I won’t look, I promise. I just don’t want you slipping and falling in there, sweetheart,” Kylo said the nickname so quietly that you almost didn’t hear it, but you did, and it made you forget about the thunder just long enough to squeak out an ‘ok.’

A brief moment passed, but when a steady flash of lighting peaked through the cracked bathroom door, Kylo stepped in, eyes locked on the ground as he neared you, his inky hair dangling low as he bowed his head. It briefly occurred to you that maybe you shouldn’t have taken his word when he said he wouldn’t look, but you were too shaken up to think much of it, and he was dutifully not looking at you. You hadn't even thought to cover up your body with your arms. He grabbed a black towel from the rack and handed it to you, eyes still on the floor. Just having him near you made you feel safe enough to finally move, even if it was just to take the towel and wrap it around your body.

“I’m covered,” you whispered once you felt secure. Kylo looked up, eyes searching for yours, and the moment they were found, he held on tight to that connection as if there was nowhere else in the world to look but in your red, puffy eyes. Your breathing slowed to a comfortable pace as his dark eyes calmed you.

He held out a hand and for a moment you couldn’t tell who was trembling more. “Let’s get you out of the tub, hmm?” He said in a gentle tone that instantly made your head feel like mush. You delicately placed your hand in his and let him help you out of the bath and onto a soft mat laying on the floor, eyes leaving his only to watch where you stepped. Once you were stable, you stood facing him, gazes still locked and hands joined. Your heart was pounding in your chest, this time out of excitement rather than fear.

He was so close. If he bent down just a little and you went up on your tip-toes, you could kiss him easily.

The way his eyes drooped down to your lips made you think he would kiss you.

For a brief moment, he started to close the gap, slowly inclining his head towards yours as you raised your chin up at an angle. His lips were no more than an inch from yours when the thunder rolled back to life, making its presence known, and you buried your head into his chest with a squeak and a continuation of tears. You felt his body fall below your head with a sigh before he wrapped you in his arms and held onto you tightly. As your hands clutched to the towel wrapped around your body, his rubbed soothing circles into your back as he shushed you quietly. You stayed like this until the thunder died out once again. When your breathing settled to a normal pace, you pulled away from his chest, but his arms stayed loosely wrapped around you.

“Are you ok?” Kylo asked.

You nodded.

“Do you want to get dressed? We can watch a movie until the storm quiets down, it might help distract you,” he suggested. Again, you nodded. He dug out a new toothbrush for you, then once again checked that you were okay before stepping out of the bathroom with a squeeze to your arms. He left the door open with the tiniest of cracks, probably so he could monitor you better.

You took a moment to catch your breath, unaware that you had lost it. Had he really been moments from kissing you or had you imagined it? What would have happened if the thunder hadn’t interrupted?

You already knew you found him insanely attractive, but thought it ended there. The thought of kissing his plush lips had your brain going fuzzy as you brushed your teeth. By the time you dropped your towel and started putting on the clothes he had left you, all you could think about was how warm his chest had been and how quick he was to take care of you. Your body heated up when you pulled the soft black shirt over your head and were enveloped in the woodsy scent of his house and whatever detergent he used. It was wonderful and soothing; you felt like you could get lost in his scent. You couldn’t stop yourself from pulling the shirt to your nose to get a deeper inhale of it. He hadn’t given you a dirty shirt, so it smelled like him without smelling like him . You imagined his worn shirts would smell like the expensive cologne you sometimes caught a whiff of, maybe with a hint of his musk at the end of a long day, and you almost wished he had given you something from his dirty clothes pile instead of a fresh shirt.

When you released the shirt from your face, it fell to your mid-thighs and you were reminded of how big he was. You weren’t exactly petite or delicate, but he was just so much bigger than you that you suddenly felt fairy-sized in comparison. The sweatpants he had given you gave you a similar feeling. They were much too long and fit very loosely everywhere except for through your hips where you naturally had a little more shape than him. Despite that, you had to pull the strings of the waistband tight to keep them from falling down your legs. You bunched them up at your ankles and observed yourself in the mirror.

You looked like a toddler that had raided their dad’s closet. All you needed was a giant pair of shoes for you to flop around in. Your wet hair didn’t help the look at all as it sat in stringy sections and dripped onto your chest. Sure, you knew that you weren’t trying to seduce Kylo, but you could at least look cute for him, right? You tried tucking the shirt into the sweatpants in a way that gave you some sort of waist definition, but found that you looked even bulkier than before, so you gave up on that.

That’s when a thought occurred to you. The plan hatched in your mind, and before you could stop yourself, the sweatpants were off of your body and you were left in just your underwear and Kylo’s giant t-shirt. It was how you normally slept, so it was comfier to you anyways (or at least you told yourself to feel less guilty).

You looked at yourself once more in the mirror and stepped out of the bathroom, preparing to be met with Kylo and whatever reaction your pantless body would elicit from him.

As luck would have it, Kylo wasn’t in his bedroom.

Of course he wasn’t. He said you’d be watching a movie, so he was probably on the floor below getting the living room TV set up. You nodded resolutely to yourself and put the sweatpants on the foot of his bed before going to the bedroom door and opening it.

Right as you walked through, so did Kylo, and your head met his chest and you were falling backwards before you could catch yourself. You scrunched your eyes closed to prepare for the pain, and your hands shot back to break your fall at least a little.

Thankfully, Kylo had faster reflexes than you and his hand wrapped around your lower back, stopping you mid-fall. When you opened your eyes, Kylo’s face was once again within kissing distance and you had to stop yourself from leaning forward and letting your lips touch his. He was looking at you with wide eyes and parted lips, an expression that was surely mirrored on your own face. He glanced between your eyes and lips for a moment, but then blinked hard and shook his head as if to clear it as he straightened you back up.

“That one was on me, sorry,” he started, pulling away from your body as he spoke. “Are you-” he glanced down to look you over and his face instantly tinged pink as he caught sight of your outfit choice. “Where are your um…  Do you… Are… Pants?”

Did you just make Kylo Ren nervous ?

There was no other explanation as his eyes danced between your body and literally anything but your face while he sputtered out that abomination of a question.

You realized you were blushing too when you spoke, “I uh… They,” you hummed in frustration because you also couldn’t seem to make a comprehensive sentence. “Um… The fit. They didn’t.”

“Oh,” was all Kylo said, and he finally met your eyes.

Unable to stop your nerves, you giggled.

And giggled.

And giggled.

Until it became a burst of unstoppable laughter.

You had no idea why you were laughing. Maybe it was a culmination of exhaustion, anxiety, stress, and embarrassment, but no matter what, you found yourself unable to stop. You felt silly and overwhelmed with a rush of emotions, and had your mind been more clear, you would have seen Kylo staring at you with a completely awestruck look on his face as you laughed. Maybe you would’ve noticed the way his hands twitched at his sides as he resisted the urge to hold you as you laughed for no reason. What you did see, despite the tears clouding your vision, was the way his lips twitched up in the beginnings of a smile. Not the little smirk that you’d usually get, but a real smile where his eyes wrinkled up at the corners.

The sight sobered you up long enough to catch your breath and let your shaky hands cup his cheeks. He was beautiful. More beautiful than he’d ever been before, but the smile was fading fast as your laughter died out.

It wasn’t fair, he had to keep smiling at you. It couldn’t disappear before you got enough of it.

“No,” you accidentally said out loud in protest. One of his hands moved to hold your wrist and he gently leaned into your touch before pulling your hand off. You whined in protest and his hand stayed wrapped around your wrist for a moment before dropping it. His face was back to normal and you wanted to scream. 

Kylo cleared his throat before he spoke again, walking over to his bed to put away the discarded sweatpants you’d left there, “I brought you some noise-cancelling headphones if you’d like to use those.” He held up his hand so you could see them and you were reminded of why you were here in the first place. Right. You weren’t here to kiss him, you were here because of the storm. 

Kylo walked through a door into what you assumed was his closet and called out to you, “Do you want to watch your movie here or downstairs?”

You didn’t really want to talk to him now that he’d taken away his smile, but you responded, “Either is fine, but where’s your TV in here?”

Kylo came out and pointed to a piece of modern art hanging on the wall across from his bed over a slim table, “Right there.”

You groaned slightly. Of course he’d have some fancy-ass TV that looked like art. You mumbled, “Rich people,” under your breath and Kylo chuckled at you.

Before you could pout at him for long, there was a beginning roll of thunder and Kylo made his way over to you quickly. He held out the headphones as an offering and you nodded, thinking he’d hand them to you. Instead, he pushed some of your damp hair back and slid the headphones over your ears, adjusting them into place.

“They won’t cancel everything,” his muffled voice spoke above you, “But they should help a little.”

You heard the clicking of a button and within a few seconds, you couldn’t hear anything, not even your own breathing. It almost felt magical, as if you were floating.

You looked up and met his eyes, which were soft and comforting, his hands still gently cupping the headphones, so close to your face. The thunder rolled by loudly and you could still hear it, but it was certainly quieter than before. Kylo seemed pleased that you weren’t crying again and gently stroked your cheeks with his thumbs as he held your head in place. He maintained eye contact with you and took measured breaths that you copied until the thunder died back down.

He pulled one of the cups off your ear just enough so he could ask, “Where do you want to watch a movie?”

“Here is fine,” you said quietly. Sure, it would probably be more proper to go down to his living room, but you were already pantless in his bedroom, so any sense of propriety was no longer an option, and his bed looked very inviting. 

“Would you like me to braid your hair?” He asked, pushing some of your wet hair from your face.

You were surprised by the question. “Do you even know how to do that?”

Kylo scoffed, “Of course I do.”

You eyed him suspiciously. “Can I braid yours?”

He smirked at that, amused by the idea. “Maybe later.”

He stepped into the bathroom and pulled a brush from a cabinet, then had you turn around in front of him. Kylo took the headphones off of you and started running the brush through your damp hair, gentle on the knots as he took his time going through it. It was soothing enough as it was, and then he moved his hands to your hair and you felt tears start to pool in your eyes for some reason. He was being so careful with you, and you swore you would fall asleep standing up as he tugged your hair into a braid. He took his time with each section of your hair, twisting them into place, and you barely had any brainpower left to wonder where he learned how to braid hair. You managed to hold back the tears even as he finished and gently smoothed his hands back and forth on your shoulders.

Kylo handed you the remote from the slim console under the TV and pointed to his bed, “Go get comfy.”

When he disappeared into his closet again, you realized maybe you had made a mistake. You were about to lie down on Kylo Ren’s bed and watch a movie with him in your underwear. This was an extremely intimate move and you were quickly rethinking your decision as you stood frozen in the middle of his bedroom.

Your brain started running through the worst possible scenarios. What if he tried to kiss you and suddenly you forgot how to kiss? What if he didn’t try to kiss you and you were getting the wrong message from him? What if the thunder scared you so bad you peed-

A hand came down to grab your shoulder and you actually screamed, pulling the headphones around your neck and turning to face your assailant, brandishing the remote as a weapon. 

Kylo gave you an amused chuckle and backed away with his hands up in surrender, “Just me, kid.”

“Right!” You said a bit too loudly. You cleared your throat and lowered the remote, repeating, “Right,” in a more natural manner. “Sorry, you just-” You trailed off the second your eyes landed on his chest.

His bare chest.

His bare chest that boasted pectoral muscles that looked bigger than your boobs in overall volume. His wide shoulders that were dotted in freckles and moles over smooth muscle. His abs that looked so soft but also so strong at the same time.

Oh no. He was perfect .

You couldn’t stop your brain from imagining how that body would feel against yours as he held you close in a hug, a cuddle, or a whatever he wanted. He could put you in a headlock and you’d probably thank him for letting you get so close to his muscles. You couldn’t even begin to imagine what it would feel like to be fucked by him and have that as your view.

You didn’t realize your mouth was open until Kylo tapped the bottom of your chin with a chuckle, “Trying to catch flies, sweetheart?”

The heat that had started pooling low in your stomach quickly rushed to your face and for a moment, you thought you would faint. Your face was probably beet red from being caught ogling his body, and all you could manage was a, “S-sorry,” before pointedly turning away from him.

Kylo hummed softly and circled you until he stood in front of you. “Don’t apologize,” he stated. To your dismay, he lifted up his hand to show you he held a shirt. Even worse, he started putting it on. Somehow worse (or maybe better?) than that was the way his body flexed as he pulled on the damned article of clothing. Your eyes were particularly drawn to the deep ‘v’ at the bottom of his abs that led down to his-

“Do you know what movie you want to watch?” Kylo’s head popped through the collar of his t-shirt, his hair animatedly poofing out around his neck once it was released.

You touched your mouth with your hand to make sure you weren’t drooling. By some blessed miracle, your mouth and chin were dry.

“Um… Maybe… Do you like period pieces?” you asked quietly, unable to meet his eyes.

“Sure, if that’s what you want to watch,” he said before making his way to the bathroom. “Go ahead and get settled, Princess, I need to brush my teeth.”

Did he just… Did he just call you Princess ?

Your heart was racing. You were really about to pass out now. Somehow, your legs managed to get you over to his bed before they gave out and you sat down cross-legged on his dark grey comforter. All you could do was listen as your brain repeated the nickname he had so easily used on you.

It could’ve been seconds or hours until you felt the bed shift with a new weight. Even without the noise cancelling headphones on, you hadn’t heard him come in.

“Did you find your movie?” he asked. You shook your head slightly, suddenly very interested in the fabric below you as you drew circles into it with a finger. Kylo sighed and tugged at your wrist a little, just enough to get your attention. “Are you okay?” he asked when you finally looked at him.

Apparently your nod wasn’t a sufficient answer, because he pressed, “I need you to be honest with me. Complete transparency. Knowing what’s going on in that little brain of yours will let me take care of you better.”

You whined and let yourself fall sideways onto the bed, physically avoiding the question. Kylo’s shirt rose up your thighs as you did so, but you could feel the fabric still covering your underwear enough to be modest.

“I won’t call you pet names anymore if you don’t like them, is that what this is about? I just wanted to try them out, if you don’t-”

You perked up at this, straightening back into a sitting position. “No, I… I like them,” you mumbled, blushing and looking down at your hands, where you were picking at your cuticles again.

Kylo took one of your hands and pulled it from the other so you couldn’t irritate your skin properly. “Then why are you so nervous?”

You let your hand go limp in his and he bought his other hand over to gently rub at your skin. “Why are you being so nice to me?” You managed to ask, avoiding his question.

“I’m always nice to you,” he countered. It wasn’t an entirely false statement—  his lack of niceness usually came with good intentions and reasoning—   but he was being extra nice.

“Yeah,” you started, unsure of how you would finish. “But you’re touching me a lot. And… And calling me cute names… And preparing a bath for me, and-and…” You gulped before continuing so quietly you were unsure if he heard you, “I think you almost kissed me earlier.”

The room was deadly silent besides the sound of the storm outside. Kylo’s eyes were looking off to the side as if he were thinking, and a frown fell into his lips. You worried you had upset him. It would be a reasonable response to your question, especially if you had imagined the way he leaned into you earlier.

“I like taking care of you… Princess,” Kylo whispered. For a moment his mouth moved as if he were determining whether or not he liked the taste of the name in his mouth. A slight upwards tug at the corner of his lips told you he did.

“Why though?” you asked, your hushed tone matching his.

Kylo brought a hand up to cup your cheek and you let yourself lean into his touch. His thumb stroked feather-soft over your lips and they parted at the feeling. You knew you weren’t imagining it this time when he leaned across the space separating you, eyes focused on your lips. With your pulse skyrocketing, you let your eyelashes flutter closed in expectation. Would he kiss you once? Twice? Would he use tongue?

What you didn’t expect was the way his plush lips would feel pressed softly against your…

Forehead?

No, that couldn’t be right! He was supposed to kiss your lips!

Your eyes shot open before you could revel in the experience that was a forehead kiss from Kylo, and he was pulling away and settling back against the pillows at his headboard, legs stretched out in front of him. You stared at him, mouth agape as he pulled a book and glasses from his nightstand and started reading, ignoring you.

“Kylo!” You huffed in frustration. He didn’t look up from his book as he hummed at you. You shifted from where you sat cross-legged on the bed until you faced him better and poked his leg shyly until he looked up at you over the rim of his glasses.

“Do you need something?” He asked smugly, as if he knew what he’d done to you.

You didn’t know how to ask for what you wanted, maybe what you needed, but you had to try. “I… I uh. Yes?”

“What is it that you need, Princess?”

“I need… Kylo…” you were shaking. Why couldn’t this asshole just kiss you already and stop teasing you? You were starting to doubt yourself and decided to voice your worries. “Kylo… Do you want to… Do you even want to kiss me?”

He looked you over for a moment before returning to his book, “Yes.”

Relief washed over you, but it was quickly followed by confusion, “Then why won’t you?”

Kylo let out a deep sigh and put his book facedown on his lap, “You’re exhausted, physically and emotionally. You’re distressed. It wouldn’t be fair.”

“But I... “ you groaned in frustration, “ I want to kiss you .”

Kylo hummed again and gently took your hand that laid next to his leg, pulling it up to his mouth. He pressed a soft kiss to your knuckles, his plush lips gentle and warm against your skin. His lips lingered on your skin and he whispered, “Later. Please just watch your movie.”

You clung to his promise of later when he dropped your hand and picked up his book again. With a sigh, you laid down on the bed, facing the TV on your stomach, your feet resting in the pillows near Kylo’s hips. Despite your brain screaming at you to turn around and climb into Kylo’s lap and kiss him until you were drunk on it, you used the remote to scroll through one of the streaming services Kylo had until you found a movie you liked.

“The one with Colin Firth is better,” Kylo chirped up. You glanced back to see he hadn’t even looked up from his book.

“Are you some kind of Pride and Prejudice connoisseur?” You snapped back, just wanting to enjoy your Kiera Knightley period piece in silence.

“Something like that,” he mumbled. You turned back to the TV with a sigh. The two of you were quiet again until the thunder began its starting roll. When this happened, Kylo leaned forward and grabbed the remote from your side as well as the headphones from around your neck. You didn’t pay much attention to him until he paused your movie and started fiddling with the settings.

“Hey, I was watching th-” you were cut off by him plopping the headphones back onto your head. The noise cancelling feature was on and it instantly cut out the low rumbling of the sky. Within moments, Pride and Prejudice resumed, only this time, it played through the headphones and Kylo once again reclined next to you. You watched him for a moment as he turned a page in the book he was reading, mesmerized by his large hands and the way they were so quick to take care of you. Kylo looked up to meet your eyes, then glanced at the TV and then back at you, as if telling you to keep watching it. It took a moment, but you managed to turn your attention back to the movie.

After several minutes, you felt the warm grip of Kylo’s hand resting on your calf. You ignored it until it started gently stroking your leg in a comforting manner with no sexual intent behind it. A look back at him told you that he just wanted to feel your skin, maybe soothe you when the sound of thunder rumbled, still audible through the headphones.

You weren’t really scared anymore. Having Kylo at your side seemed to be all you needed, and having the thunder muffled certainly didn’t hurt.

Halfway through the movie, you shifted back in the bed until you were sat next to Kylo, your bare leg pressing up against his as he continued reading. Not long later, you heard the grumbling of thunder and he draped his arm over your shoulders, pulling you closer and stroking circles into your arm as he did so.

By the end of the movie, you were starting to doze off in his arms. Had you been any less exhausted, you would have seen that Kylo stopped reading his book and was just watching you exist with him. The ending scene of Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth barely registered in your tired mind. You were vaguely aware of Kylo mumbling something into your head, the vibrations and movement your only clue that he was speaking. The feeling of his hand turning his face towards yours jostled you back to awareness as he met your eyes, lips moving softly as he said something you couldn’t hear.

“ And how are you this evening, Mrs. Darcy? ” Asked Mr. Darcy on the screen and in your ears.

You realized that voice was supplying the words coming from Kylo’s mouth when Kylo leaned forward and pressed a gentle kiss to your forehead, and this time, you let yourself enjoy it.

Mr. Darcy repeated his wife’s name in your ears and you watched as Kylo mouthed the words to it before pressing a lingering kiss to your cheek.

Before he could continue, you reached up to tug one of the cups of the headphones off just enough to hear Kylo better, right as he whispered, “Mrs. Darcy,” and kissed the tip of your nose.

Was this really happening? Was Kylo recreating a scene from Pride and Prejudice with you? Did you fall asleep and this was all a dream?

The next repetition of ‘Mrs. Darcy’ was replaced with your first name before Kylo kissed your opposite cheek, painfully close to your lips.

He repeated your name again after he’d pulled away, and the hand still cupping your cheek stroked your skin gently as he leaned in slightly and paused. You glanced between his lips and his eyes, mouth parted in wonder and excitement, a faint smile tugging at the corners of your lips. You wanted to take in every aspect of this moment because you already knew where the next kiss was supposed to be. Kylo’s hand was almost trembling on your skin when he finally leaned in and pressed his mouth to yours.

Imagining this kiss was nothing like the actual kiss. Kylo’s lips were soft and gentle against your own, his hand held you perfectly in place and helped ground you as your head started spinning. The headphones rested in a position where you could take in your surroundings but could still hear the sweet soundtrack of the movie playing softly.

It felt like a dream.

When Kylo pulled back too soon, his eyebrows were furrowed and he frowned. You realized he probably thought you didn’t want the kiss because you hadn’t even moved when he kissed you, freezing up with excitement. Your eyes were still wide open in shock.

“I shouldn’t have done that,” Kylo started to pull away from you, hands ripping away from your body as if you had burned him. “I’m so sorry, I-”

Kylo was cut off by you lunging across the bed to wrap your arms around his neck. You giggled quietly at the way he let you tumble on top of him, and both of you fell backwards onto the bed. For a moment, you just looked at each other, breathing in sync. He didn’t move to hold you or kiss you, and you knew he was still unsure that you wanted this, even though you’d explicitly told him you did.

You hesitated a moment, your shyness seeping through suddenly, but by some magical force, you kissed him back. Kylo’s hands pulled off your headphones completely and then found your back in an instant, pulling you closer to him until your chest was flush with his. He held you like you would disappear at any moment, pulling you into a sitting position and placing you sideways across his lap without ever breaking the kiss, his hands resting on your hips as yours wrapped around his neck.

The kiss may have lasted a few minutes or an hour and you would’ve had no idea. Kylo was gentle and soft with you while still making you feel good, the kissing passionate and smooth. He didn’t try to feel you up or anything. He just kissed you. He made you feel young and innocent and cared for. He wasn’t just using you for your body, he wouldn’t just ‘pump and dump’ as you had so eloquently said earlier. 

He pulled away too soon. You wondered if any touch of Kylo’s would ever feel long enough.

After a few minutes of gentle pecks and catching your breath, you let out a wide yawn and Kylo pulled his head out of kissing distance to say, “I’ll take you to the guest room, okay?”

Wait, what? Was he not just kissing you and holding you? He was just going to send you into exile after that?

“Oh,” was all you could manage to say. Your chest felt tight and you pulled away from him to climb off his lap. As much as it hurt, if he didn’t want to sleep with you, you couldn’t make him.

Both of you climbed off his bed in silence, unable to look at each other. You noticed yourself picking at your cuticles, but didn’t care enough to stop.

Your heart sank when he led you downstairs to a plain looking room, a queen sized bed with grey sheets in the center of it. The two of you just stood in the doorway, not saying anything, not moving. You wanted to ask to sleep in his bed with him, but didn’t know how to ask without making your growing feelings for him known and risk making him uncomfortable. If it meant sparing both of your feelings, you could sleep alone… Right?

Chapter Text

With a glance up, you tried to read Kylo’s facial expression, but were only met with cold neutrality. If you were paying any less attention to him, you would have missed the way his hand twitched towards you at his side. It gave you some semblance of hope. While you were unsure if you were reading him correctly, you had to take a risk if this was going to go anywhere.

“Kylo,” you mumbled, unsure of how to ask for what you wanted.

He hummed in response, eyes glued to the bed that sat in front of you.

By now, the thunder was distant and the winds had quieted to a low howl, but you would take any excuse to cuddle up with Kylo in bed. Or anywhere, for that matter.

As if fate were listening to your thoughts, a low growl of thunder started, probably miles off already, but still audible. You weren’t really scared of it, hardly startled at all, and yet…

“Kylo,” you repeated, this time in a quiet whine.

He finally looked down at you and something flashed in his eyes. Relief? Excitement? You couldn’t tell, but it gave you hope.

“Would you… Would you feel safer if you slept in my room? With me?” he said, obviously getting the memo and rolling with your act. He could probably tell you were faking your fear, he had an eye for that, but he was going with it either way.

“Yes, please,” you mumbled, trying to sound pitiful.

You swore you saw him smirk as he turned around to lead you upstairs, a similar expression falling into your features as you followed. The guest room was forgotten with the flick of a lightswitch

As much as you wished he would take your hand or pick you up to whisk you away to his room, you understood that you would have to be patient with him. You could tell that he was still hesitant to even show you a minimum amount of affection, so you didn’t want to push your luck. It would take him a while to warm up to the idea of casual affection, assuming this change in your relationship lasted past the morning.

You forced your mind to stop thinking about what would happen next, for once just wanting to let things play out.

To your surprise, his fingers laced into yours at the top of the stairs and you had to restrain a sigh of delight at the gentle touch. You could get used to the feeling of his strong hand completely enveloping yours, grounding you and reminding you that you were safe. You were cared for. You were wanted .

Kylo silently led you into his room. When you reached the side of his bed, he let go of your hand and nodded towards the sheets. An invitation?

For some reason, your brain didn’t want to get into his bed without him, it felt so foreign, especially with him watching. Kylo seemed to realize this too after he spent a minute staring at you expectantly.

He cleared his throat and walked past you, mumbling something about locking the front door before he left the room and headed downstairs.

Without Kylo just staring at you awkwardly, you were able to convince yourself to get into the bed. You couldn’t tell which pillows were decorative and which were practical in the massive heap he had, so you just started digging through them and shoving them towards the side of the bed where you saw his glasses resting on the nightstand. Eventually, you found a couple of normal-looking pillows and fluffed them up to your liking.

Kylo returned to the room and placed a glass of water on the nightstand, putting your bag on the floor beside it. You looked up at him, mid-fluff, to see he was watching you.

“I thought… I thought you’d want it by you,” he mumbled.

You blinked stupidly up at him, surprised by his thoughtfulness. “Thanks,” was all you could say.

He huffed in response and moved to the other side of the bed and started throwing all of the pillows on the floor. Meanwhile, you leaned over the bed to dig around in your backpack until you pulled out your phone charger and looked for a place to plug it in around the bottom of the nightstand. Apparently, this offended Kylo, because he stopped his pillow removal to stomp over to you and yank the drawer open, revealing a hidden outlet inside.

“Oh,” you said quietly, and as you straightened up, you felt the fabric of your shirt fall down your thighs and your face flushed in realization. Kylo had just gotten a front row seat to a show starring your ass clad in pink and white striped underwear. Awesome.

You tugged the hem of the shirt down as far as it would go and looked up at Kylo to apologize. While you had expected anger based on his stomping, he was looking at you with his usual stoney stare, and you were certain his cheeks were pink and his eyes had gone several shades darker.

“I-I didn’t mean…” you said, almost in a whisper. When Kylo didn’t say anything, you offered, “I can put on pants, I’m so sorry.”

You went to stand, but Kylo stopped you with a gentle hand on your shoulder. His Adam’s apple bobbed slowly as he stared at you.

“It’s fine,” he mumbled before he dropped his hand and circled the bed to fluff up the few pillows that remained, which you assumed were the ones intended for sleeping on. You watched him closely as he did this, wondering if you had done something wrong. Surely he would have told you if you had, and yet, his shoulders were tense and he was putting way too much care into fluffing the pillows.

“Kylo, if you don’t want me sleeping here, I can just-”

“No,” he cut you off harshly and you slumped into yourself at his tone. He must have noticed, because he sighed and pulled back the covers on his side. “I… I want you to stay,” he said hesitantly before he climbed into the bed. You still sat kneeling on the comforter, watching closely as laid on his side facing away from you and plugged his phone into the drawer and turned off the lamp on his side.

“Are you going to sleep or will you keep staring at me?” He asked, sounding both amused and annoyed, one an attempt to hide the other.

“Can I do both?” You asked with a smirk.

He rolled onto his back and turned his head to face you, an eyebrow raised and a slight frown on his face. “Just get in bed,” he demanded.

You finished plugging in your phone and turned off the light, the room dark except for the sporadic flashes of lightning in the distance. You lifted the covers and found that they were shockingly heavy, and you realized he must have had a weighted blanket in the mix of fabric. With an embarrassing amount of effort, you pulled them back and shimmied under until your head could rest on the pillow. Your shirt rode up in the process, bunching at your waist, but figured it didn’t matter because you were covered by the blankets. That being said, you were intensely aware of your bare skin touching his expensive linens.

In that moment, you realized that the scent you had been craving for earlier in his shirt, the scent of him , was completely surrounding you. You were in a cocoon of Kylo’s scent: his laundry detergent, shower products, cologne, and even the slightest hint of his natural scent. It was all woodsy, warm, and extremely comforting. The scents pulled you deeper into the blankets and you had to fight the temptation to throw the covers over your head so you could smell him even better. You ended up somewhere between laying on your side and on your stomach, facing Kylo.

“You’re wiggly, did you know that?” Kylo huffed through the darkness.

Instead of stilling your movements, you continued to snuggle into the sheets, wiggling as much as possible in the process. Kylo groaned at this and you giggled at what you were hoping was feigned frustration. “Sorry, it’s just really really comfy,” you signed in content.

He hummed at this and finally reached across the space between you to gently stroke your shoulder and down your arm. “Are you doing that thing with your face?”

You stopped squirming to look at where you knew his face was, even though you couldn’t see it, “What thing?”

Kylo grunted as if he hadn’t meant for you to hear that and now didn’t want to respond. 

“What thing? Kylo pleaseee,” you urged.

He grumbled something under his breath before saying, “Um... When you get comfy. Your eyes droop and you get this soft little smile… It’s um… It’s sweet.”

Blood rushed to your cheeks at that. You often caught him looking at you, but you never realized he was actually paying attention to you. You hummed quietly, touched that he noticed little things like that, and scooted closer to him. It was a large bed, so there was still distance, but it was enough for his hand to be able to reach the center of your back, where he put some pressure for a gentle massage.

“You work too hard, Princess,” he whispered as his hand kneaded the tense muscles of your shoulders and neck. He moved closer to you. You let out a sighing moan at the feeling of his hands on you as he worked your skin and the pressure increased at your noise of approval. As his hand moved over your tension, he mumbled, “Always worried about everything but yourself. When was the last time you relaxed , sweetheart?”

You mumbled something even you couldn’t make out and he let out a soft chuckle.

“Will you let me take care of you, Princess?”

You nodded but then realized he wouldn’t be able to see you, so you yawned out a, “Yeah.”

Kylo continued his rubbing for a moment before he closed the gap between the two of you and pulled your head onto his chest. When he asked if that was okay, you responded by nuzzling yourself further into his warmth and slinging one of your legs over his. His grip tightened around your back, still rubbing at the tense muscles there.

After a few minutes of laying like this, Kylo tentatively leaned forward to press a kiss to the top of your head. You let out a content hum and tilted your head to look up at him. When you made eye contact through the darkness, his hand that wasn’t already on you moved to stroke your hair. The second this happened, you pressed your lips to his, the strain in your neck almost welcomed as he held you and kissed you back. This kiss was somehow both hungrier and more gentle than the one you had shared earlier. The hand that was on your back dipped to your waist, where his large hand met your bare skin. At the discovery, Kylo groaned against your lips and squeezed at the soft flesh there.

Suddenly self-conscious, you pulled your lips from his and looked at him through the darkness. He must not have understood the problem, because his hand continued kneading at your skin. Your leg involuntarily tightened around him at the touch. It felt good, sure, but it was also making your cheeks hot with embarrassment. While you weren’t unconfident in your body, you were still working on loving your soft belly, and having a handsome man supposedly made up of pure muscle touching it made you squirm away from him until he figured it out and stopped.

“Did I… Was that too much?” he asked as he pulled his hand from your skin.

You shook your head and pressed a quick, chaste kiss against his lips and said, “No, the squeezing is just-”

“Did I hurt you?” he interrupted, his hand still hovering away from your body.

“No! I just… Um…” How were you supposed to tell this Adonis of a man that you were self-conscious? “I’m still um…” you tried saying but failed. His nose nuzzled against yours as a form of encouragement. “Self-conscious,” you finally managed to finish in a voice so quiet you thought he might not have heard you.

You prepared yourself for some lecture on how bad it was to not love the way you looked, or maybe some extravagant and unnecessary waterfall of compliments that would do nothing but make you uncomfortable. Instead, Kylo just returned his hand to your skin and stroked at it, mumbling, “Okay,” before he kissed you. “Is it alright that I’m touching you though?” He asked quietly.

You were impressed. Your somewhat limited experience with men had gotten you used to having to repeat your discomfort multiple times only to be met with annoyance and a continuation of whatever it was that you didn’t like. Kylo took your wishes without complaint and without pressure. This alone made your heart race, your core quickly warming with the promise of his respect. If he kept it up, you would let him do anything he wanted to you.

His lips met yours once again and you were unsure of who had initiated it. You let him pull you closer to his body, and when your leg brushed his hips, you felt the unmistakable hardness of his cock through his sweatpants. Your immediate reaction was to pull away and check in with him to see where he wanted to go, but one of his hands had cupped the back of your neck and was holding you tightly in place.

The feeling of his hardness beneath your leg was all your brain could focus on, and apparently that affected your ability to kiss Kylo, because after a moment, he pulled away to ask, “What’s wrong?”

You flushed and couldn’t help but giggle at the question, shaking your head in response as you leaned in to kiss him again.

Unfortunately, the hand that had been cupping the back of your neck tightened slightly and he effectively held you back. You huffed in response and met his eyes, which you could now see as you had adjusted to the darkness.

“Nuh-uh,” he chided, shaking his head. “Answer my question.”

You whined quietly at that. Couldn’t you just keep kissing him?

Instead of verbally responding, you let your leg gently rub against his length through his pants. He sighed at the feeling, his eyes never leaving yours as they darkened.

“Use your words.”

Suddenly, you were aware that your pulse had skyrocketed and you swore you felt it the most between your legs. You let out a soft whimper at the feeling and pulled yourself to be completely on top of him, an adjustment fully supported by Kylo as he helped pull you onto his chest, your hips meeting his as you straddled him properly. His hands found their place on your waist.

“Are you going to tell me what’s wrong?” He pushed some hair from your face. “Hmm?”

You giggled and leaned down to kiss him, but a hand came up to gently hold your throat, halting your motion. He gave a light squeeze to the sides of your neck, humming as he looked at your face in the darkness.

“Little princess is eager, isn’t she?” He chuckled before his voice turned dark, “Eager but silent. Can’t have that now, can we?”

Before you noticed yourself doing it, you shook your head.

This seemed to be the right answer because he responded, “Then tell me what’s wrong.”

“Nothing’s wrong,” you said quietly. Apparently, that wasn’t enough. When you went in for another kiss, he continued holding you back.

“Then what’s on your mind?”

You grunted with frustration, “Kylo, now isn’t really the best time-”

“Now is the perfect time, actually.”

“I wanna kiss you!” You whined.

“Then come kiss me,” he said simply, like you hadn’t already been trying to do so.

You leaned forward, but his hand stayed steady, and the pressure on your throat was too much, so you quickly gave up. With a few huffs of building frustration, you sat up straight, still straddling Kylo’s hips. You were acutely aware that all that separated you from him was your underwear and his sweats. His cock was firm below your center.

“What do you want, Kylo?” You crossed your arms over your chest.

“I want to help you relax,” his hands were on your waist again as he sat up with you. “Take care of you,” his lips met the tip of your nose before they dragged across your skin to whisper in your ear, “Make you feel good.”

Shivers went through your whole body at his words, and you couldn’t help but squirm on his lap, your hips involuntarily grinding against his.

“Do you want me to do that, Princess?” He asked when you didn’t say anything.

You nodded.

He hummed.

His lips traced kisses around the shell of your ear before trailing along your jaw and down your neck. When he got to the collar of his shirt you were wearing, he trailed back up to your lips.

He kissed you softly, his tongue almost immediately licking your lips for permission, which you gladly gave by opening your mouth and letting him explore. Usually, French kissing was not your thing, but he was so delicate and precise with his touches in a way that had you grinding on him in earnest. You didn’t realize you were moaning until he chuckled and pulled away just an inch from your mouth, a trail of spit still connecting your lips.

As he let you catch your breath, he stroked his hands up and down your sides over the fabric of his shirt. When you looked up towards his eyes, you found that they were trained on your chest, and he had pulled away from you a little more so he could watch it rise and fall with your steadying breaths.

While you were enjoying yourself, you really had no idea where Kylo wanted this to go. Even though you knew you wanted him in whatever way he’d give himself to you, the worry of losing him was still prevalent in your mind, and you didn’t want to make him do anything he didn’t want to do.

You’d have to ask, and you almost groaned at the realization.

“Hey um…” You started lamely. He looked up at you right as lightning softly flashed, lighting up his face enough to see his wanting expression. His pupils were blown wide and his lips were slightly parted. You gulped at the sight and shook your head to clear it. “When you said you wanted… You um… To… Um… To make me feel good?”

He nodded in encouragement, somehow understanding what you had meant to ask, and asked without words, “Mhmm?”

“Well um… What did you… What did you mean by that?”

“What did you want me to mean by that?” he asked.

Your face was hot. While it was surely too dark for him to see your red cheeks, you could certainly feel their heat, and he probably could too, with how close he was.

“I asked first,” you insisted quietly.

He leaned forward to gently nuzzle his nose against your jaw, “Do you want the truth or do you want me to hold back?”

“I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t want the truth, now, would I?” you countered.

He let out a breathy laugh through his nose against your skin, “That’s a good girl. You know you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do, right?”

You nodded, “I know. I won’t.”

He pulled away and gave you an appraising look, as if he was determining whether or not you were lying. 

When he was satisfied with his examination, he said, “Pretty little thing.” His hands traced over your ears, “Probably has never heard a dirty word in her life, hmm? Will you even be able to hear what I want to do to you?”

You were positively squirming in his lap, desperate for friction or relief. This was new. You had had sex before, but you never felt like you needed it. But, at that moment, you swore you’d die without something .

“I… I’ve heard dirty words before, Kylo. I wanna know, please,” you said in a whisper. Apparently, ‘please’ really was the magic word, because Kylo groaned at that, his hips rolling up to meet yours. He felt huge and hard beneath you, and a gasp left your mouth at the contact.

“Such a good girl, using her manners so well,” he grunted, his lips moving back to your ear. “When you ask so prettily, I guess I have to tell you, don’t I?”

At this point, you didn’t care what he wanted to do. You just wanted him to do it already. You nodded anyway and whimpered out, “Please.”

“Very well, Princess,” he kissed the shell of your ear before whispering into it, “I bet my sweet girl has never had her pussy eaten properly, has she?” The words made your hips rut against his, and you almost moaned at the thought of his lips sucking on your cunt.

You thought it was a rhetorical question, but when he didn’t continue, you mumbled, “I’ve been eaten out before.” Were you supposed to say that? Or were you supposed to tell him a lie and play into some fantasy? 

“But have you ever come from it?” He pressed.

You shook your head. “I’ve um…” You trailed off, unsure if you were doing this correctly. It was just a conversation, but you didn’t want to say the wrong thing and ruin it for Kylo.

“I want honesty, Princess. I don’t care about your sexual history, it won’t change my mind about you, I just want to know so I can make you feel good.”

When you pulled away enough to look in his eyes, you saw only honesty. You had to trust Kylo. There wasn’t really another option.

“I’ve never finished before with a partner,” you said quietly. When Kylo didn’t say anything immediately, you added, “I mean I’ve only been with, like, four guys total, which… is that a lot? Maybe that’s a lot, I don’t know, but I’ve gotten close before but like I’ve never finished because I get too in my head and kinda bored and then it stops feeling good and it starts taking too long and I start thinking about driving home or what I’m gonna eat for breakfast or—”

Kylo cut you off with a kiss. You quickly melted into it, letting his lips soothe your nerves and silence the chatter that came with them.

He pulled away too soon and asked, “Do you think I could make you come?”

While you knew this question would come up in some form, it still surprised you, and your eyes widened. If your body’s response to him earlier was any sort of indicator of his effect on you, he might have a shot. He was older, probably more experienced, and had those beautiful lips that could surely coax an orgasm out of you.

Ever the realist, you didn’t want to give him false hope, so you just shrugged and said, “You can try.”

His hands tightened on your waist. You hadn’t even noticed that they had slipped under the fabric of his shirt you wore and you felt his bare skin on yours. It sent sparks through your body.

“Do you want me to eat you out?” He asked quietly.

“Please,” was your simple response.

His lips were on yours in an instant. They tasted of the same charcoal toothpaste you’d used and were ferociously devouring every bit of your mouth he could find. You would let him take whatever he wanted, and he knew it.

Kylo’s hands were running up and down your sides under the shirt of his that you were wearing, and when he grazed the bottom of your breasts, he pulled his face from yours just enough to ask a question you wouldn’t let him voice as you nodded desperately and shoved your lips against his once more. He chuckled against your hungry mouth as his hands traced the outline of your breasts with his surprisingly gentle hands. When you grew impatient, you tried to tug his fingers up where you wanted them, but he resisted your touch as you gripped his wrists.

“Can I help you, Princess?” He pulled away to ask, the smirk evident in his voice. You groaned and thrust your hips against his, your hands still trying to get his touch on the peak of your tits.

“You’re a tease,” you muttered bitterly.

Kylo hummed and his hands finally grazed over your nipples, but the touch was soft and only lasted long enough for you to gasp and close your eyes.

“Kylo—”

“I like taking my time, Princess. Let me kiss you for a while, okay?”

As much as you wanted him to do things his way, you were tired and very very horny. You wanted to get to the good stuff.

“I don’t mean to rush you, because that sounds all good and fine, but—”

“You’ll get bored and antsy?” He finished for you.

You nodded quickly. He chuckled and let his fingers rest over your nipples again and you pressed into the touch.

“So we’ll have to work on your patience, then?” Kylo mumbled, pressing a kiss to your jawline.

“No!” You said too quickly. You could see Kylo’s eyebrow lift in amusement even through the darkness. “No,” you restarted, “I just… I’m already ready.”

It was true. You could feel the dampness building up in your underwear, and you were sure that if Kylo wasn’t wearing black sweatpants, there would be dark spots of moisture on them where you were grinding your cunt against him. Every touch from Kylo sent sparks through your body and you just wanted him to go to town with you while you still felt this way.

“No you’re not,” he stated simply.

A giggle threatened to burst from your throat as you pushed your needy center against him more, “I sure am.”

His hips rose to press his hardness into you. He leaned in to whisper against your neck, his voice gravelly and dark as he said, “Do you feel that, baby?”

You nodded with a slight moan as he ground himself into you.

“It’ll take a lot more than a little bit of kissing for you to be ready for it,” his tongue flicked out to lick at the soft spot on the side of your neck that made your back arch into him.

“Then do more than kissing,” you pleaded. The threat of Kylo’s cock being too big to fit inside of you made your stomach do flips and your whole body felt like it was on fire.

He kissed you, a hand coming up to cup around your neck, gently squeezing at the sides. By some miracle, maybe your hips desperately canting against his, he finally leaned you back until he was hovering over you on the bed, his mouth never leaving yours in the process. His free hand was under your shirt, and he finally started giving your nipple the attention it deserved. He stroked, tugged, and pinched your stiff peak with his dexterous fingers, each movement harder than the last, each eliciting a moan from your chest as you pushed your flesh further into his hand.

His hand left your breast to pull up the fabric of your shirt, revealing your reddening nipples to the chilly air of the bedroom. He pulled his mouth from yours to ensure your approval, and you gave him a small nod. You thought he would take off the shirt completely, but instead, his head dipped down and latched onto your nipple. His tongue felt even better than his fingers, and your back arched off the bed as he swirled it around the tip, alternating between that and broad strokes over it.Your hands were in his hair as he worked, pulling it and encouraging him. His hand came up to play with your other breast as he sucked. You felt the tug of skin being pulled into his mouth, your back arching deeply as he sucked a hickey onto your chest. And then another. And another. And another until you were dotted with them and little whimpers escaped from your mouth. His lips made their way across your skin until they reached your other breast and started licking and sucking that side.

“Kylo,” you whined, impossibly desperate for his touch.

He separated from your skin with a ‘pop’ so that he could look up at you. “Yes, Princess?”

“More…” Was all you could manage to say.

Kylo hummed and resumed his sucking, though more gentle and teasing.

Your hips left the bed to meet his. You needed to show him how desperate you were for what he said he’d do to you. If his lips weren’t on your pussy in the next two minutes, you would probably start crying.

“Please,” you begged, voice barely above a whisper.

“Please what?”

“Please…” you whined quietly. For some reason, you were more embarrassed to beg than you were to have his mouth on your body.

“Good girls ask nicely. Say it,” his fingers were tracing patterns into the sensitive skin of your chest, almost tickling you.

“Please just eat me out or touch my clit or something . Please!”

He hummed and smirked at you, his kisses starting to trace down your stomach. “Such a good girl,” he mumbled into your skin. Kylo’s mouth stopped at the hem of your underwear and he traced the line of it across your abdomen, sending shivers down your spine. “My perfect little girl. Smells so good already.”

You couldn’t help the way your hips bucked into his face at his words. No one had ever said something so deliciously deviant to you before, especially not with their face right above your pussy. And he had called you his , a prospect so endearing that your heart fluttered with something other than excitement.

Kylo placed a gentle kiss on the band of your underwear before looking up at you, his hands poised to pull them down your legs. “This okay?”

You nodded desperately, adding in a, “Please,” for good measure.

Kylo hummed and kissed the still-clothed area above your center and trailed the kisses down until he was met with the dampness that had soaked through your panties.

“My girl is so eager ,” he hummed and his hands started pulling the small piece of fabric down your legs. He moved with them until he was sat up between your spread legs, and his eyes never left yours. You lifted your legs into the air so he could finish pulling the ruined underwear off of your body to be quickly tossed to the side. Before you could lower your legs, Kylo’s hand wrapped around an ankle and kissed it, making you giggle. As he lowered himself back down to you, he kissed along your leg, muttering praise for your beauty and softness as he did so. The kisses were slow and soft, each one making you squirm towards him with anticipation. Whenever you did this, he seemed to slow down until you were still.

It took him what felt like an eternity to reach your dripping cunt, his eyes levelled with it for a moment before he pulled back just enough to get a good look at it through the darkness.

“Such a pretty little pussy, hmm? All wet and ready for me. I bet you taste delicious, Princess,” he muttered quietly, almost as if he were simply speaking to himself.

You tried to press yourself into his face, but he pulled away with a smirk and a demand of, “Be patient. Relax.”

You let your hips sink into the bed, fully aware that you would not get what you wanted if you didn’t do as he said. Once he was satisfied with your position, he wormed his arms under your thighs, wrapping them around to grasp at the tops of your legs, and pulled you closer to him, his large nose barely grazing your lips.

“You’ll be good, right?” He asked as he pressed a chaste kiss to the pink skin right above your clit.

You whined at the touch, practically panting with need.

“And you’ll make sure you feel good the whole time, right? If I do something wrong, tell me, okay?”

“Kylo, please, just—”

“Just fucking answer my question.”

“Yes, please, okay, right, whatever, please, just—” you were cut off by your own moan as he licked a wide stripe from your hole to your clit, his tongue huge and soft against your sensitive flesh.

You quickly became lost to the world as he licked at you, alternating between broad warm-up strokes and flicks against your clit until he found a rhythm that had you bucking into him. It felt amazing. Even by yourself, you had never felt this good. Sure, you expected him to be better than your previous sexual partners, but not better than yourself. It was uncalled for and the heat in your belly was quickly forming at the tip of his tongue. You weren’t even entirely aware of what he was doing—  some combination of sucking and licking and pulling that was turning you into a whining and moaning mess. Your hips struggled to still, and his hands flattened on the widest part of them to hold you down. It crossed your mind that if you bucked too hard, you could break his nose if you caught it just right, and the thought made you giggle and whine in the midst of your pleasure.

His hair and soft sheets were feeling the brunt force of your pleasure as you grappled with and pulled them, your hands indecisive in their movements. Had you been more aware of your surroundings, you would have seen that Kylo was desperately grinding his hips into the mattress in time with his mouth’s work. He needed to come just as badly as you did.

You were mumbling nonsense into the darkened room, and your body felt heavy and tight with need, the threat of your climax looming closer with each flick of Kylo’s tongue. You must have voiced the thought, because he started humming and groaning into you, his mouth working harder on your cunt than he had before, and it felt divine . Between the vibrations of his gravelly sounds and whatever it was he was doing with his mouth, your climax started with a sharp hiss and a thrust of your hips that Kylo couldn’t stop.

Kylo sensed what was coming (spoiler alert: it was you), and held you down so tightly that you were sure he’d leave bruises on your hips. After a deadly moment of silence, your body convulsed, your hips thrashing against his grip as it crashed down on you. Normally, your orgasms were nothing special, but this was something so different. Not an inch of your body was spared from the release of tension and the jolts of pleasure that rushed through you. You felt like your body was simultaneously floating and falling, and you couldn’t tell which was better. Someone was crying and yelling out. It was definitely you, but you didn’t realize it until your body crashed down on the bed with a soft ‘thump.’ You didn’t remember sitting up, but it had apparently happened somewhere in the throes of your orgasm.

Kylo didn’t let up on you until you looked down at him with squinted eyes and a whining plea of, “Kylo, Kylo, please , that’s enough, please please please. No more, I’m done, please.”

His lips graciously left your brutalized cunt after a chaste kiss to your clit that made you squeak from overstimulation. He trailed kisses along your body, starting from the apex of your thighs, each one earning a gasp or whine from your mouth as you caught your breath.

When Kylo got to your face, he hovered over your lips for a moment as he whispered, “You’re making your comfy face,” before you pulled him in to kiss you. Your taste—  tangy and salty—  was heavy on his lips. In any other circumstance, you wouldn’t want to taste it, but coming from Kylo, knowing what he just did to you? It was the best thing you’d ever tasted.

Kylo echoed your thoughts with a mumble of, “Taste so fucking good,” against your lips.

As he kissed you, he pulled down the shirt you were wearing until it covered you again and brushed some hair from your face. You let out a loud and long yawn while an arm wrapped around your back and he rolled until you were both on your sides, facing each other as you continued kissing.

Suddenly remembering how hard he had been, you tentatively dropped your hand down to trace over his erection through his sweatpants. You finally understood why people compared boners to steel, because Kylo’s cock felt heavy and impossibly hard for something made up of tissue and blood vessels. He let out a faint grunt, and before you could even take in how huge he felt, he was moving your hand up to rest on his hip.

When you pulled away to question him, he simply said, “Not tonight.”

You let out a little whine, “But… Doesn’t it hurt?”

“‘Blue balls’ isn’t real, so no. Besides, it’s nothing I can’t take care of,” he kissed your forehead and adjusted so he was on his back and you laid on your side, curled into him with your head on his chest. “You’re too tired.”

“It would probably just be a few pumps, right? I’m not that ti—” You failed to fight back another yawn, your eyes drooping from exhaustion and satisfaction.

Kylo chuckled, “Hmm, does coming make you sleepy?” He stroked your cheek before moving his hand down to stroke at your hair that still lay in a damp braid.

“Not usually,” you snuggled yourself against him, your hand drawing random patterns on his warm chest. “You did a good job, by the way.”

“Just ‘good’? Damn, I guess I need to practice more,” he pressed his lips to the crown of your head and you giggled. “You only lasted six minutes, by the way.”

“You timed it?” You scoffed with amusement.

He hummed at you and you revelled in the way it felt to hear it straight from his chest. “You said it would take awhile, so I wanted to see if that was true.”

“Well, apparently, you’re the pussy-eating champion,” you giggled into him. His hand fell to stroke circles on your back.

“Do I get a trophy for that, or…?”

“Do you want a trophy?”

“I have to break my record first, don’t you think? Create some competition. But yes, a trophy would be nice.”

Your eyes were heavy with sleep as you mumbled, “I can be your trophy, Kylo.”

His chuckle sounded so sweet under your ear. It was like your own personal lullaby.

“That sounds good to me, Princess.”

You were in that strange purgatory of being almost awake but also almost asleep when Kylo moved you under the covers properly and slipped away from the bed. A whine fell from your lips and he gave you a promise of, “I’ll be right back.”

The quiet moan from the bathroom told you he had finished himself off and you felt bad for a moment but knew there was nothing you could do about it if he wouldn’t let you.

Kylo kept his promise and was back under the covers with you in just a few minutes.

He turned you on your side, facing away from him as he curled behind you to spoon you. He was no longer hard and you let yourself relax into his strong arms as you drifted off.

Right as you fell asleep, you realized you had never felt so loved.

***

The alarm clock on Kylo’s nightstand read 2:51 am when you were woken by a loud booming from outside.

It took you a moment to catch your breath, and then it happened again. You sat up a little in bed.

Kylo stirred, his body still wrapped around you. You heard the whistle of wind and then the booming again

“‘S just a trash can,” he mumbled into you as he tugged you back down to lay with him. “Lid got knocked off or summn’.”

“It’s loud…” you whispered as you turned to cuddle into his chest.

One of his hands rubbed at your back, the other cupped over your ear.

“Think you can fall back asleep?” his nose nuzzled into your hair as he held you close.

With him pulling you into his being like this, you knew you would, so you nodded.

He nodded back at you.

You were asleep again within seconds.

Chapter Text

When you woke, it was still dark.

Your sheets were a lot nicer than you remembered, and they smelled of cologne.

And you were hot. Very, very hot.

With your eyes still closed, you tried kicking off the covers, but they were too heavy. You tried to sit up, but something wrapped around you and held you back. You scrunched your brow and finally opened your eyes.

You were met with the sleepy face of Kylo Ren.

His hair was fluffed up in a dark halo around his head and his eyes were open just enough to look at you, his lips in a relaxed pout as he gave you a tired smile.

The weak light of dawn peaked through the curtains, highlighting the freckles on his skin.

Oh.

Your brain seemed to short circuit when he reached out to stroke your cheek.

“You don’t have work today, remember?” He reminded you. His voice was husky and hoarse with sleep. It was probably the hottest thing you’d ever heard. “You don’t need to be up until you’re ready.”

You opened your mouth to respond, but all that came out was a puff of air before you buried yourself into his chest.

Kylo pulled you closer and rubbed your back.

“Go back to sleep, my girl.”

You kicked at the blankets again.

“Too much?” He asked quietly.

You nodded. He reached over you and pulled the covers off of you until you were left wrapped only in the top sheet and his arms.

You sighed contentedly and placed a kiss on his chest, nuzzling yourself into his warmth.

He was saying something to you, but you didn’t hear it as you fell back asleep.

***

Coffee.

That was your first semi-cognitive thought when you woke up.

You smelled coffee and opened your eyes.

The light coming through the curtains was a lot brighter than the last time you woke up, and it only took you a few seconds to remember where you were and what you'd done. With Kylo.

Who was no longer next to you.

His weight and warmth were missing from the bed and you were suddenly very cold at the observation, even though you'd been tucked back under the heavy blankets. You snuggled into the covers and looked around the room as you rolled over to face the nightstand where you had left your phone. Your glass of water had been replaced by a steaming coffee cup.

With a grin, you sat up and sipped from it.

Caramel latte.

He’d remembered.

It was still hot, so Kylo must have just been in the room. 

While your normal morning routine usually consisted of laying in bed until you had to pee or leave for school, you decided to expedite the process so you could find Kylo. It once again took an embarrassing amount of effort to get the blankets off of your body (it seemed like Kylo had bought the heaviest blanket in existence), but when they were off, you were out of bed and searching around the room for your underwear. After discovering they had vanished into thin air, you psyched yourself up for a moment before stepping into Kylo’s closet.

It was huge, to no one’s surprise. Also unsurprising was the color palette of grey, white, and an insane amount of black. With much purposeful ignoring of the designer labels, you looked through his drawers until you found his underwear. It felt scandalous and rude to do so, but his face had literally been in your vulva hours earlier, so you figured it was alright to borrow a pair of plain black Calvin Kein boxers. Hopefully.

They fit loosely, but you were still worried that you would stretch out the waistband on them. For such a big man, Kylo had a surprising lack of butt.

You glanced in the closet mirror and evaluated yourself. Your still-braided hair was falling apart in chunks, but that was the only thing that could be deemed ‘unattractive’ about your morning state compared to how you were at dinner last night. At least your hair was washed now.

You stepped out of the closet and grabbed your phone from inside the nightstand. It read 11:37 a.m. and you only had a few messages on snapchat and tiktok from your friends back home, which you looked through quickly as you drank some of your latte.

As you made your way downstairs, coffee in hand,  you decided to undo your braid. It was still damp and hardly the neat hairstyle Kylo had created last night. You hadn’t noticed before that he’d French braided it.

Kylo wasn’t in the kitchen.

Or the downstairs living room.

Or the second floor living room.

Maybe he went for a run? He did that in the mornings, so it was kind of late for that, but…

Footsteps above you caught your attention and you hoped that it was Kylo in his study and not a murderer. Either way, you climbed the stairs and paused at the door across from the bedroom and hesitated before knocking.

“Come in,” Kylo called from the other side. You let yourself in and found a gorgeous room that made you feel like you were in a fancy library. It was reminiscent of the formal living room with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, a fancy Persian rug, and a heavy wooden desk that you’d expect Scrooge McDuck to own, complete with a wingback armchair behind it. There was a bay window overlooking the street behind the desk.

You completely forgot Kylo was in the room, distracted by the grandeur of it, until he said, “You found your coffee.”

Your head snapped back to him, a sheepish grin on your face as you said, “It woke me up.” Blood rushed to your cheeks when you discovered Kylo was working at his desk shirtless with damp hair, likely from a shower based on the warm scent of his shampoo in the room, and his reading glasses were perched on his nose. A brief fantasy of him leaning you over the heavy desk that separated you flashed through your mind and you had to shake your head to clear it.

“I didn’t mean to wake you,” he glanced down at the screen of his desktop computer before looking back at you and taking off his glasses. “I made you a cup when I got back for my run, but you were sleeping so heavily that it was cold when I went to shower, so I tried again with the latte.”

Kylo had made you multiple cups of coffee instead of just reheating one? And to think that you thought him just pouring you a cup at all was special.

“It… It um…” The affection made you nervous for some reason. “Thank you. It has caramel?”

He nodded slowly, “I… Didn’t know how you liked your coffee, but I’ve only ever seen you drink stuff with caramel, so I uh… Bought some when you first came over. In case you ever wanted coffee.”

“That’s… That’s really sweet, Kylo.”

“I put too much in? Shit, I don’t eat that stuff, sorry, I had no clue how much to put in—”

“No!” You cut him off a little too enthusiastically. “No, I just… I meant it… It was kind. Thank you. The latte is perfect.”

“Oh,” was all he said before looking back at his computer. He didn’t do anything on it, just looked at it.

There was a long pause of awkward silence as you tried to think of something to say.

“Do you want some—”

“I feel bad about—”

You both spoke at the same time and cut off before briefly arguing over who would speak first.

“I was going to offer you breakfast. I have eggs, bacon, cereal…” Kylo started when he lost the argument.

You thought about it for a moment, “What kind of cereal?”

“It’s like Raisin Bran but—”

“I’ll take bacon and eggs, then,” you decided before he could finish explaining his gross cereal.

“You didn’t let me finish.”

“Does it have raisins in it?”

“Yes, but—”

“Then no thank you, I’d rather just have coffee.”

“It’s healthier than Raisin Bran,” he insisted, like some kind of gross cereal connoisseur.

“Is that supposed to make me want it?”

He grunted and stood up. You got to marvel in his beauty for a moment before he began walking downstairs. “Fine, I’ll make you breakfast, little Princess.”

You giggled at the nickname and followed him close behind like a puppy.

The kitchen was rather quiet as he cooked up bacon and eggs how you liked, and you sat watching from the kitchen island. After a few minutes, he placed a plate of food in front of you and another at the seat to your left. He grabbed a glass of water for you and another cup of coffee for himself before he sat down.

As you both ate, he asked, “Did you sleep okay?”

You nodded, “Your bed is really comfy. Could’ve probably slept another six hours there, honestly.”

He smiled a bit at that before shoving what looked like an entire egg into his mouth.

As much as you wanted to ask him for an encore of last night, or even just attempt to broach the topic, you had no idea how.

It was another few minutes of quiet eating before Kylo did so, even if it was accidental.

“You’re wearing my boxers.”

Your cheeks warmed at that. “Sorry, I um… Is that okay? I couldn’t find my underwear, and… Uh…” you trailed off.

“Oh. Yeah, that’s fine. You look nice in them,” he said quietly.

A giggle left your lips while you sipped more of your latte, “I’ll take note of that next time I go to a nice party. Wear a big strong man’s t-shirt and boxers. I’ll be a real hit, I’m sure.”

Kylo hummed with amusement and reached up to push some of your hair back as you smiled at him. “I think you’d only get away with that in my house, Princess.”

“Oh really? You don’t think this is acceptable formal wear?” You kept giggling as you gestured down to yourself.

“Only here. Besides,” he pushed some hair behind your ear and leaned over to kiss it before whispering, “I don’t want anyone else to see you like this.”

You hummed at his words and the warmth they brought to your body. Kylo being protective over you was normal, but this newer version was something different and special. You felt like you were really his.

He nibbled at your ear for a moment, making you sit up straighter, and then returned to his coffee and food like nothing had happened.

Your leg started bouncing on the foot rail of the stool.

You wanted more, but didn’t know how to ask. Didn’t even know if he wanted anything at all.

“You’re wiggly again,” he commented with a glance over at you.

As much as you would’ve liked to still your leg, you couldn’t. If anything, it started bouncing harder, and Kylo noticed.

“What’s wrong?” He asked with a look of concern on his face. “Do you need something?”

“I’m okay,” you lied, putting a piece of bacon in your mouth to occupy yourself.

Kylo watched you for a moment before putting a hand on your knee to still it. It didn’t work. Your brain was spiraling so quickly you couldn’t follow it clearly. Did he regret last night? What would happen next? Was he mad? You should leave, right? He wanted you gone. Did you—  

“Come back to me, Princess,” he said quietly.

“I need to go,” you stood up abruptly, unaware of your next steps.

He stood up with you, “Hey, Princess, let’s talk about this, okay?”

You felt like you were vibrating with nerves, “I need… I need…”

“Sweetheart, can you take a deep breath for me?”

You tried and found your lungs would barely fill up halfway. You shook your head. He wanted you gone. He needed you to leave. You were burdening him. Making him make you food, borrowing his clothes. He had made you coffee that you didn’t drink because you were sleeping in his bed. His bed that was so comfy but ruined because you’d slept in it. It wasn’t clean anymore, and— 

“Let’s sit down, okay? I need you to breathe,” Kylo said, but his voice was muffled by something. You understood ‘sit’ very well, though.

Sitting was easy. Sitting sounded good.

On shaky legs, you got down to the floor. Your hands removed themselves from where they’d been on your ears to balance you as you sat cross-legged beneath him. If he’d meant for you to sit in the stool, you weren’t aware of it at the moment. The floor was safe. He sat next to you.

Kylo’s breathing was calming, and you found yourself copying it with shaking breaths

“Can I touch you?” He asked after a moment.

You nodded and he reached out to rub gentle circles on your back.

It was a couple minutes before you caught your breath and the room stopped spinning. Kylo was mumbling praise as you finally looked up from the floor and around the room.

"You're okay. You're safe," he said quietly when you looked up at him. He didn't seem annoyed or concerned, his calm stare meeting yours as you continued following his breaths.

The tears started welling up before you could stop them, but they didn't seem to bother him as he swiped his free hand under your eyes, the other still rubbing your back. You weren't really crying, but the emotional toll of your panic attacks often brought you to tears.

"You wanna tell me where you went?" He asked when he saw that you were okay, just weepy.

"You're being too nice to me," you said quietly.

"You want me to be mean to you? I can, if that's what you want," he chuckled. There was hesitation in his eyes before he pulled you into his lap and held you sideways against his chest.

You giggled and let yourself snuggle into him. "I'm just not used to it is all. I guess… I guess I feel like I'm…" you didn't want to tell him you felt like a burden. You didn't want the pity that would come with it. "Being annoying or something."

"You're not being annoying," he kissed the top of your head. "I like taking care of you. I don't know how else to say that to get you to believe me, but I do. You deserve to be cared for."

You sniffled into his chest at that and cuddled into him more, your arms wrapping around his neck. He hummed and just rocked you until the tears stopped and your hands stopped shaking.

"I think I'm gonna cut you off on caffeine for the day," he chuckled and pushed some hair from your face.

"Coffee doesn't really wake me up or get me jittery."

"But it makes anxiety worse, and if you're already feeling anxious, then I don't want it to get worse," he insisted.

You whined into his chest that you suddenly remembered was bare before saying, “I wanna finish my latte, though.”

“If you can drink it slowly, then fine. But please don’t chug it, okay?”

“Fine,” you pulled him closer to you and placed a chaste kiss to the pulse in his neck.

“Do you wanna talk about last night?” Kylo asked after a few minutes of quietly holding you and stroking your back.

You flushed at the question, “What part of last night?”

“Any of it. All of it. Whatever you want to talk about.”

After a few moments of forming a sentence that didn’t sound weird, you said, “You took really good care of me. Made me feel so safe and cared for.”

“What did you like?” He kissed your forehead.

“Um… It was nice to sleep with you and be held by you. And the bath. And the movie. And the kisses. And the more than kisses.”

“The ‘more than kisses’?” He chuckled.

You blushed and scrunched up your face in embarrassment, “The pussy-eating, Kylo. It was cool.” You internally groaned at your choice of words.

“‘Cool,’ huh?” He chuckled and pinched your sides a little, tickling you.

You squeaked and squirmed in his lap, giggling out, “Shut up! You know what I meant!”

He hummed in amusement and his hands relaxed on your sides as he leaned down to kiss you. He was gentle, and you could feel his smile against your own. It was a quick exchange of pure happiness before he pulled away to kiss your forehead.

“How about you finish your breakfast?” He offered.

“How about you finish me?” You bargained. Your phrasing was poor, but he seemed to get the idea.

He smirked a little, “Eat.”

You groaned a little and got off his lap after he placed a few more kisses to your head. You both returned to your seats and finished your food. As Kylo requested, you took it slow on the coffee.

After breakfast, he retrieved your laptop from where he had hid it, and you sat cuddled into his side on the second floor couch as you worked on your psych paper. He worked on his continually full email inbox with one hand, the other firmly wrapped around your shoulders. Every once in a while, he’d place a kiss on your temple. Whether it was a form of encouragement, affection, or just a reminder that he was there, each kiss made you giddy and you couldn’t stop yourself from snuggling closer to him.

It was a perfectly quiet, rainy afternoon with Kylo, and while you would have loved for an encore of last night, you were content to simply revel in the affection he was open to giving you. When you got bored or needed ideas, Kylo would help keep you on track or engage in conversation about psychology and listen to your excited little rants about a movie series you liked or plants. You finished your paper in the late afternoon and decided to go home to feed your cat and continue working.

Kylo was as stoney faced as ever when he kissed you goodbye and watched you walk to your car. He waited until you were off his street to close the door.

Chapter Text

You sent Kylo your normal nightly updates throughout finals week.

On Sunday:

[Me]:

All done with my presentation! Spent some time studying for my History of English Language class, but now I'm just watching a movie and having leftover Indian food for dinner :)

[Kylo]:

Good girl. Sleep well.

On Monday:

[Kylo]:

How did the final go?

[Me]:

I think it went well? Idk she said they'll be graded by Friday so I hope it was good?

[Kylo]:

Alright. What are you working on now?

[Me]:

Both my ed class things are tomorrow. Studying for one, prepping my flashcards for my presentation.

[Kylo]:

Just focus on one at a time so you don't get confused.

[Me]:

That sounds boring

[Kylo]:

Princess.

[Me]:

Fine, fine. How was work?

[Kylo]:

It was fine. I'm going to bed early. Good night.

[Me]:

Good night, Kylo :)

On Tuesday:

[Me]:

Presentation sucked but I got an A somehow??? And the final was really easy, only took me an hour and then I got to come home and nap :D

[Kylo]:

Alright.

On Wednesday:

[Me]:

Finished my term projects early, so now I just have to take my psych final and turn stuff in. Thanks for keeping me on top of things.

[Kylo]:

You seem to be doing fine with that on your own.

[Me]:

Yeah but keeping you updated helps me. I know you'd get upset if I didn't stay on top of things.

[Kylo]:

A planner does that same thing, you know.

[Me]:

I know. They just never work.

… are you mad at me?

On Thursday:

[Me]:

I know you never responded last night so you're probably upset about something, but I did well on my psych final and turned in all my projects early.

[Kylo]:

Ok.

On Friday:

[Me]:

Did I do something wrong?

[Kylo]:

No.

[Me]:

You sure?

[Kylo]:

Yes.

[Me]:

Okay… I know the term is over so there's not much for me to work on, but I thought maybe tonight when I come over, you could help me prep for next term and we can watch a movie to celebrate? Or something?

[Kylo]:

I don't want you coming over anymore. You don't need to. And please stop texting me.

[Me]:

Wait Kylo what?

Did I do something wrong? I'm so sorry if I did. Can you call me or something so we can talk about this?

He never responded.

Chapter Text

“Shit, I forgot my wallet in my car. I’ll be right back, babe,” Jake said before kissing your cheek and leaving the restaurant.

You mumbled out a quiet, “Okay,” as he left. His curly brown hair bounced a little when he walked and you smiled to yourself.

It had been seven weeks since you had texted Kylo. Two of those weeks were spent back home for the holidays, a trip that had only meant to be ten days, but you couldn’t bring yourself to come back sooner. You’d wanted to spend the New Year with Kylo, and now he wanted nothing to do with you. Instead of starting the year with a kiss from the man you knew you could have grown to love, you sat with your fat black cat, a little tipsy off champagne you weren’t supposed to be drinking. You’d never felt so alone.

Maybe that’s why you went back to that Starbucks to get Jake’s number again. At the time, you barely remembered what he had looked like, but he was cute enough. On top of that, your best friend since third grade, Bea, thought you should go on dates to get your mind off of Kylo. It wasn’t really working.

Your first date, he brought you coffee and sat in a freezing cold park with you and told you all about his progress in various video games you didn’t care about. You had probably gotten in a total of five sentences during the date and ended up with a fever after being outside in the snow for so long. For some reason you agreed to a second date, where you’d gone to his house to watch a movie. Thirty minutes into ‘Toy Story 3,’ his hand insisted on reaching up your shirt. You didn’t stop him. You laid there while he humped the crease of your thigh for a couple of minutes until he came on your belly. He told you that it was, ‘The best pussy [he’d] ever fucked so hard.’ You didn’t tell him that he just ‘fucked’ your leg as he turned over and fell asleep. You cleaned yourself up and then left to get McDonald’s and cry in the parking lot.

This was your third date. The restaurant was nicer than you’d expected, and you were unsure of how this guy, always complaining about how broke he was, could afford to eat here, especially when he told you it was ‘his treat.’ You wore a cute little blue dress that fit your body perfectly and a warm black peacoat over it, taking the opportunity to get dressed up—  even doing a full face of makeup for it. You ordered the cheapest thing on the menu, but he ordered a really nice steak, appetizers, and dessert for himself. Because he was paying, he didn’t share, except for a few of his fries.

On every date you went on with Jake, your mind was continuously drifting to Kylo, despite your internal protests. Kylo would share. He’d keep you warm. He’d fuck you right. He’d clean you up and hold you afterwards. You knew this. But Kylo didn’t want you anymore. He got his fill and left you, just as you feared he would.

After ten minutes of anxiously waiting for Jake to get back from fetching his wallet, you decided this would be your last date with him.

After twenty minutes, you asked the waitress if she’d seen him come back. She hadn’t.

After thirty minutes, you sent him a text.

[Me]:

Did you get lost? lol

He responded ten minutes later.

[Jake]:

I went home.

You’re really annoying, you know that? Talked about plants for like a whole five minutes.

And you ate basically all my fries, so you can pay for dinner.

Your mind was screaming and your face was hot as you responded. There was no way this was happening to you. This wasn’t real. This was just a nightmare. A real weird, specific, bad nightmare.

[Me]:

Wtf is wrong with you??? Is this a joke???

You drove us here, how am I supposed to get home?

[Jake]:

Figure it out.

Your breaths came in short gasps and you could feel tears streaming from your eyes that glanced at the check the waitress had put down twenty minutes before. You’d just barely paid for tuition, rent, and five-hundred dollars worth of textbooks.

Your shaking hand picked up the check and you found that it came out to eighty-two dollars before the tip. Your bad taste in men was about to cost you groceries for the next few weeks. Last you checked, you had just barely enough money in your checking account to cover the meal. With a pounding heart, you pulled out your debit card and prayed that there was enough money in your bank account or that the waitress would have some sympathy for you.

“Hey, honey, is that check ready yet?” A kind voice asked.

You nodded and wrote in a fifteen percent tip. It wasn’t her fault that your date sucked. She took the book from you and practically skipped away to empty your bank account.

A few minutes later, she came back. “Sweetheart, it looks like your card was declined, do you have another?”

“Um…” You didn’t know what to say as you sniffled. “My date… He um… He was going to pay, I… I can’t…”

“That’s a real shame, sweetheart, but I can’t let you leave until that bill is paid,” your waitress smiled at you and you wanted to throw up. 

“Just um… Let me check my bank account again,” you pulled out your phone and checked. It felt like your body was on fire, you had never been this embarrassed before. To make it worse, the waitress just stared at you while your shaking hands transferred the little balance in your savings to your checking account. You had just enough to cover dinner.

She took the check again and the second she walked away, your head fell into your arms on the table and you started sobbing. This was not how you expected the day to go. You hoped that maybe this moment would turn out like a movie and some other person at the restaurant would take pity on you and pay for the meal. Maybe the chef would walk out and offer you a lifetime of meals at the place. Unfortunately, this was real life, and you just got played by a selfish asshole, and no one would swoop in to save you.

The best you got was the waitress returning your card and placing a little doggy bag in front of you.

“Chef saw you crying. We were about to throw these out for closing, but he said you could take them. It’s a lava cake and some cookies,” she beamed and walked away. You returned your card to your wallet and tried to figure out what to do next.

You were a thirty minute drive from your house. It was freezing outside with a forecast of snow, so you couldn’t spend much time outside. You didn’t have any friends to call to pick you up. Uber was way too expensive to even be considered with the few remaining dollars that sat in your bank  account.

You pulled up google maps to look at available bus routes, and that’s when you saw a little star on the map a few blocks away. Curious, you tapped on it.

Oh.

It was Kylo’s house.

Right now, while you were having the worst date of your life with pennies to your name, he was less than a mile away, probably drinking some fancy expensive alcohol and lounging in the bath while Yo-Yo Ma himself serenaded him.

That bastard.

You shook your head and looked at how to take public transport back to your apartment.

You’d take the trolley partway, then three different buses. Of course, with your luck, by the time you were done with the trolley, the transit services would be closed for the night.

So you were screwed.

Your eyes darted back to that little star on the map.

You couldn’t. It was rude to show up unannounced.

But so was cutting you off unexpectedly, you reasoned.

“Honey, I know you’re probably going through something, but I need to ask you to leave. We’re closed,” the waitress told you as she stopped by your table.

“Oh um… Yeah, sorry. Okay,” you grabbed your coat and purse and scooted out from the bench and went outside. The freezing air had you immediately shivering, and it didn’t stop when you pulled the coat over your shoulders. Your legs and nose were cold and your fingers shook as you buttoned up your coat to your neck, popping up the collar to brace against the wind.

You pulled out your phone and glanced at the stupid little yellow star.

A few blocks. A knock. An awkward conversation. You could do this. You had to.

As if the night couldn’t get any worse, it started pouring rain. The sobs poured from you and your feet started carrying themselves before your brain could protest anymore. Your once neatly curled hair was laying soaked against your clothes and your tiny little ballet flats were soaked through as you sloshed through puddles. Even without the rain, your makeup ran down your face. You’d never felt so pathetic.

With each block you walked, your heart started beating a little faster and the tears seemed more manageable.

Seeing Kylo’s little brownstone glowing in the dim light of a streetlamp made your feet speed up and your heart warmed with unwelcome affection.

He’d hurt you so badly that you couldn’t get out of bed for days except to care for your cat and use the bathroom. You had obsessively scrolled through your texts with him, trying to find what you had done wrong, and came up short every time.

You’d eventually figured out that he didn’t want you because you’d had a panic attack in front of him. He’d seen how weak and scared you were and decided that you weren’t worth his time. Maybe he thought you were annoying, like Jake had said. That, or he was disgusted by your body and the fact that you made him buy you so much food.

And yet, your heart knew those theories were wrong as you stood on his doorstep. You ran your hand under your eyes, hoping to at least look presentable before your shaking hand pressed the doorbell and you heard it echo throughout the house. It was followed by the squeaking of stairs. Footsteps by the door. A moment of hesitation. The unlocking of a latch and the turning of a knob.

And then, the most beautiful thing you’d ever heard.

Your own name—  reverent, relieved, surprised, and soft—  as it left Kylo’s lips.

And then a continuation of sobs from your chest.

After that, you felt warmth. Pure, comforting, and perfect warmth. It surrounded you. You felt like you had come home as Kylo wrapped his arms around you.

“I’m sorry,” you cried into his chest. “I didn’t know where else to go, and… And…” You were crying so hard now that your breaths were heaving from your chest and you could barely make out words.

Kylo tugged you into the warmth of his house and closed the door with his foot, his arms staying wrapped around your torso as he rescued you from the rain.

“You came back,” he said softly into your hair, voice like a prayer.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” you repeated, unable to say anything else.

He shushed you gently and stroked your hair, “You have nothing to be sorry for.”

“I should’ve…” your sobbing continued, nearly delirious now, “Shoulda…”

His hold tightened on you as he lifted you up slightly, and you gasped at the movement, your soaked shoes falling to the ground. With his arms firmly around you, he moved you over to the loveseat you’d spent so many weekends on, and gently sat you down on it, kneeling at your feet so that it was easier for you to look at him. “Who did this to you?” Kylo asked, voice barely above a whisper, and you could sense a deep rage bubbling inside of him.

“He was such an ass, and—  and…” Your chest heaved as you tried to explain yourself. “He just left and I was so scared, but…” A sputtering gasp. “And you were so close and I know you hate me so—” A loud whine. “And I had nowhere else to go, and… And—”

His hands gently took yours and his thumb stroked circles on them. “You’re okay. I’ll take care of you,” he pushed some hair that was stuck to your face with tears. 

You breath hitched in your throat and you made eye contact with him, “Aren’t you mad at me?”

“I could never be mad at you, Princess,” he cringed like he hadn’t meant to call you that.

“But you… You told me to leave you alone?”

“I know,” his voice was filled with regret.

“Why?” You dared to ask through your tears.

His hand squeezed yours,  “I’m not good for you, I just… I wanted better for you. After what I did to you that night you stayed over, I couldn’t—”

You crying paused long enough for your head to be clear, “What you did to me? What did you do to me?”

He looked at the ground so you couldn’t see the shame in his eyes. “You were so tired, I shouldn’t have touched you like that. I took advantage of you when you were vulnerable—”

“Kylo, what?” You wracked your brain to try and figure out what he was talking about and  the process helped the tears stop pouring from your eyes.

“I didn’t mean to ruin our friendship like that, I’m sorry,” he looked up at you with what you swore were puppy dog eyes. “I took it farther than you were ready for yet.”

It clicked for you. He regretted touching you because he thought he accidentally took advantage of you. How could he possibly think you didn’t want him like that? “Kylo, I was literally begging—” 

“I know. I just… You’re special to me, as a… As a friend.” It looked like the words were physically difficult to pull from his mouth. “I don’t… I don’t deserve your friendship.”

He didn’t regret it. Not in the way you had thought. He thought that you were too good for him . And so he told you to stop seeing him and texting him.

Yeah, because that made total sense (not).

“Hold on,” you tugged his hand when he tried to pull it from yours. “You’re telling me that you decided you don’t deserve me, so you ruined our friendship? Really? Are you kidding me? Damn, I knew you were the angsty type, but this?” You laughed at the thought, unsure where to land in the whirlwind of emotions. “Kylo, that’s a little stupid for someone as smart as you.”

His eyebrow scrunched as he watched you laugh, cry, and yell at him at the same time. It was a lot for him to unpack.

“No one in this world deserves anyone else. That’s the funny thing, isn’t it? Because it’s like… a two-way street.” Maybe it was your shitty night and the fact that you’d spent the last several weeks emotionally drained, but you started ranting. “You can think that as much as you like, but guess what? I can still show up on your doorstep, soaked to the bone with makeup running down my face, after my date ditched me and made me empty out my bank account to pay for his food, and I know you’ll—  ”

“That’s what happened?” Fury flashed across his features as he glanced towards the door, as if the asshole who’d hurt you stood beyond it. “Tell me who it was and I’ll—”

Your giggle cut him off and he looked at you again, his features softening when his eyes met yours. 

“And see, based on that response, maybe I don’t deserve you, going by your terminology,” you said quietly.

He looked half mortified at the idea and moved to sit next to you on the couch. “No, Princess. You’re…  Even when we’re sitting together quietly, you… I can’t explain it. You’re warm. Like sunshine.” He was blushing at the statement and you rejoiced in the way it made his face look.

When you gave him a wet smile, he smiled back at you and cupped your cheeks gently and wiped tears from your eyes.

“I know you shouldn’t forgive me, but… If you’d let me, can I take care of you again tonight? Clean you up and make sure you don’t catch a cold. It’s… It’s the least I could do,” he whispered quietly, eyes desperately searching your face.

You were surprised by his openness, but saw a need in his eyes that was reflected in your own.

He was worth another chance, even if he had hurt you before. Even if he could hurt you again. You knew it would be better to once again feel how you did falling asleep in his arms once more than it would be to never feel his care again.

So you nodded, “As long as we can watch a movie.”

He chuckled, relief clear in the sound, “Any movie you’d like, Princess.”

You thought about it for another moment before adding, “And you have to let me braid your hair.”

“Deal.”

And just like that, Kylo Ren was back in your life.

He sat with you on the loveseat, legs barely touching and your hand in his, until you stopped crying. While you wanted to feel the warmth of his arms, you wanted some time to readjust to the idea of being with him before he regained your trust. It certainly didn’t help that another man had hurt you less than an hour before. 

Once you were reduced to sniffles instead of sobs, Kylo nudged you up from the couch and led you towards the stairs. He took your coat from you before you could go up and hung it to dry on the rack by the door, and then led you to the master bathroom. It looked exactly like you remembered, and while you stared longingly at the tub, Kylo gently picked you up by the waist and sat you on the counter, bringing a surprised yelp from your lips as you grabbed onto him for balance.

“Give me a warning next time, Ren,” you mumbled, partially annoyed at the sudden displacement that made your sides hurt, but also very impressed that he did so with such ease.

He left a hand on your waist as he reached over to dampen a washcloth. “Ren, huh?” He chuckled.

“You’ve been demoted,” you said plainly, but a smile stretched over your lips.

Kylo hummed in amusement, a sound that you had missed so much that it made your heart race, and then gently pressed the washcloth to your cheek. The cold water on it soothed your skin, still puffy and red from crying, as he gently stroked it under your eyes.

“Can you tell me who ruined your pretty makeup like this?” He asked quietly, taking his time to erase the damage of the evening.

You sighed, knowing you were probably going to get reprimanded. “Will you get mad if I do?”

“No,” he lied.

“Let me rephrase that,” you insisted, sending a flicker of something across his eyes before he smirked at you. “If I tell you, you cannot get mad at me . Trust me, I’ve already told myself off enough for the both of us. And you can’t like… Murder anyone, okay?”

“That was an option?”

“I just want to cover all the bases. Do we have a deal?”

“Fine.”

You held eye contact with him for a moment to ensure he was telling the truth when he promised.

“So, uh… Remember that guy who uh… Wrote his number on my coffee cup?”

Kylo hissed out your name, clearly trying his best to restrain himself from getting mad.

“Yeah, I know, I know,” you made eye contact with him again and he was practically glaring at you. “Hey, you promised.”

He huffed with frustration and looked away from you. “I’m not upset. Keep going.”

You eyed him suspiciously, but continued anyway. “So I went back and got his number because I was um… Well, that doesn’t matter. I got his number and we went on a few dates and they kind of sucked, but he kept me company. And then we went to like… A nice restaurant tonight, right? The little one down the street with candles on the table?”

“The Venetian?” Kylo asked as he resumed pressing the cool cloth to your face.

“Yeah, that’s the one,” you nodded. “Um… But he said it would be his treat, and I guess it was his treat for himself in the end because he left to ‘get his wallet’ and never came back.”

“Asshole.”

“Yeah, he is. I texted him and he said I was really annoying and that I would have to figure out how to get home on my own because he drove me there and I started crying and the meal ended up being around a hundred dollars because he got so much food and… I couldn’t afford an uber and... And I think he planned this…” You trailed off at the realization. As much as it hurt to think about, this boy had just used you for a free meal. There was no way that this was not his plan from the beginning.

“You said murder was off the table, right?” Kylo muttered bitterly.

You giggled and nodded, “Who’ll take care of me while you’re in prison?”

He gave you a soft smile and shook his head, pulling the washcloth under your nose. “Good point.” With some obvious hesitation, he kissed the washcloth and pressed it to your forehead.

While you admired the respect he was giving you and your boundaries, you also wanted a real forehead kiss, so you leaned forward and looked up at him expectantly. He hummed softly and pressed his lips directly to your forehead, letting them linger for a moment before he pulled away.

“Why did you go back to him?” Kylo asked as he pushed some hair from your face.

You blushed, “Um… I was mad at you. And… I was really lonely.”

Kylo just nodded. “Close your eyes.”

You raised an eyebrow at him. “Why?”

“Just do it,” he insisted.

With an overly dramatic sigh, you closed them and he almost immediately pressed the cold rag to one of them and swiped at your remaining makeup with feather-soft touches before moving to the other eye. His free hand came to cup the back of your neck to help hold you still as he did so. The touch was intoxicating, and you had to stop your head from lolling forward onto his chest.

You were emotionally drained, more so than you had been after receiving that text from Kylo over a month ago. Part of you was vaguely aware that you were crying again, but Kylo caught the tears as they fell from your closed eyes.

“He won’t hurt you again,” Kylo said quietly. Somehow, it felt like he was making that promise about himself, too.

You sniffled and nodded. Kylo pressed another kiss to your forehead as reassurance. Reassurance that he was there. He was keeping you safe. He forgave you. He wouldn’t hurt you again.

With your eyes still shut, you blindly reached out until your arms wrapped around his neck and pulled him between your open legs. He was still for a moment before he wrapped his own arms around your waist and pulled you tight to his body. You buried your face into the hoodie he was wearing, relishing in the soft fabric of it. Kylo smelled so good. The same warm woodsy scent you had familiarized yourself with the night you spent here danced through your senses.

“I missed you so much,” you whispered into his chest.

His hands rubbed at your back and he responded almost silently, “I know. Me… Me too.”

You stayed like that for some time. He didn’t move to pull away or kiss you, just rubbed your back and whispered kindness to you.

So sweet… Soft and warm… Pretty girl… My pretty girl…

It wasn’t until you started shivering in his arms that he pulled away from you, only enough to look at your face.

“Shit, you’re soaking wet,” he sounded surprised for some reason.

“Did you fail to notice that when I came in, or…”

“I just forgot. Fuck! Okay, I’ll get you some clothes, stay here,” he said and kissed your forehead before stepping out of the bathroom.

He returned moments later with a stack of clothes in his hands and placed them next to you on the counter.

“Do you want to take a shower or bath to warm you up?” He asked.

You glanced over at the tub, and while it had sounded so nice earlier, something sounded even better now. “Maybe you could warm me up? If you want, I mean?”

“That’s bold of you to ask,” he gave you a small smirk.

“I just meant cuddles! Or something. I don’t know, I just want to stay with you,” you finished, each word coming out more quietly than the last.

Kylo nodded and gestured to the clothes. “Alright. Get changed.” And with that, he left, closing the door behind him.

You hopped off the counter and started tugging at the zipper of the dress you wore. You had managed to zip it by yourself earlier, but unzipping was proving more difficult with the soaked fabric sticking to you like a second skin. After an embarrassing almost-workout of trying to unzip it, you poked your head through the door. Kylo wasn’t in your eyesight, but you heard rummaging in the closet.

“Kylo?” You called quietly.

There was a thud and an, “Ow,” from the closet before Kylo matched your movements and poked his head through the door only feet from you. “Yes?”

You gave him a grin and giggled at his raised eyebrows and fluffed hair. “I can’t unzip my dress, it’s… Stuck to my body I think.”

“Oh,” he came out and you saw, to your delight, the beautiful washboard he probably called his chest and abs. Your stare must have lingered because he said, “I thought you needed help.”

“Yes!” Your eyes quickly shot up to meet his, your skin warming at the sight of his smirk and raised brows. “You just umm… Have a piece of fuzz, right there.” You swatted gently at his chest as if you were wiping something off of him, even though both of you knew you weren't. His skin was buttery soft and warm underneath your hand, and you marveled at how something so strong could be so soft. That seemed to be an ongoing theme with Kylo.

“Mhmm, turn around,” he insisted, and you gave him a big smile before you did so. He pushed your damp hair over your shoulder, and his big hands quickly found the tiny zipper on your back and started pulling it down slowly. You had to be mindful of yourself and keep calm, because you wanted nothing more than to bounce with excitement at the intimacy of the movement. The mirror in front of you showed the stunning image of Kylo dedicating every ounce of his focus to your back, eyes never leaving it as he unwrapped you like a present.  If you paid any attention to your own reflection, you would have seen that your skin was tinged pink and your hands twitched towards him.

When Kylo had pulled the zipper all the way down to your lower back, his hands rested on your hips for a moment and he finally met your eyes in the mirror. You  rewarded him with a shy smile and a, “Thank you,” before he kissed your temple and pulled away from you a little.

“This color looks good on you,” he said quietly, observing you in the mirror.

You nodded, “Thanks, it’s probably because of my skin tone.”

He hummed thoughtfully as one of his hands traced over your hip. “I suppose that helps, too.”

“Too?”

You saw the hesitation in his expression—  an eye twitch, lips shifting to the side, jaw clenching—  before he cupped your shoulder and leaned down to place a kiss on it. “You’re wearing my favorite color,” he said quietly. “My color on my girl.”

Your whole body seemed to clench as he whispered those words in your ear. It was normal for your heart to beat several thousand times a second, right? His voice had practically been a growl and it sent warmth to your core and you had to resist the way your knees begged you to fall to the floor as they turned to jelly. A quiet whine fell from your mouth as he placed another kiss on your shoulder before walking out of the room. You greatly missed his touch, but knew that the sooner you got changed, the sooner you could touch him again.

The second he was out of eyesight, you released a breath that had caught in your chest somewhere in the process of him helping you. With great difficulty, you managed to peel the tight dress off your body and let it fall to the floor with a soggy slap. Your bra quickly followed and you hesitated a moment on your underwear, but decided that leaving them on wasn’t worth risking an infection, so they joined the pile on the floor. Now completely naked, you used one of Kylo’s soft, fluffy towels to remove any excess moisture on your skin before you pulled on the t-shirt and sweatpants he had given you, this time leaving the sweatpants on despite their awkward fit.

When you stepped out of the bathroom, you found Kylo waiting by the closet with a grey shirt on and a hoodie in his hands. You gave him a quick frown and pointed to his chest, “Now what am I supposed to pick fuzz off of?”

He huffed with amusement and tugged the hoodie over your head before you could protest, “I’m sure you’ll find something.”

You whined into the fabric until your face was free and the fabric pooled at your neck, and then he grabbed one of your arms and guided it through the armhole.

“Aren’t you supposed to get naked to prevent hypothermia?” You questioned as he pulled your other arm through the hoodie. It was warm, and it dawned on you that he had been wearing it earlier.

“You’re not going to get hypothermia,” he said firmly, concentrated on getting your hand through the hole.

“Well I could ,” you protested as he finished with your arms. When he pulled away to observe his work, he gave you a nod as if he was satisfied with the way he had cocooned you before he pulled up the hood and tugged the strings until only your nose poked out.

“Perfect.” He chuckled as you grappled with the strings, unable to undo the knot.

“You’re an asshole,” you huffed, but there was a lilt of amusement in your voice.

He undid the knot and revealed your pouting face to the world. Right as you opened your mouth to tell him off, he placed a kiss on your forehead and pulled you into his arms. Your mouth closed in an instant and you sighed, relaxing into his touch and nestling safely under his chin.

You started humming with content as he rubbed your back and held you tight.

“I’m so sorry I ever let you go,” he said quietly.

“It’s okay,” you mumbled into his shirt. “You got me back, so it’s okay now.”

“I didn’t want to hurt you,” he continued.

“I know.”

“I got… I was overwhelmed by having you,” he said, his voice just above a whisper. “And the way I needed you.”

“Me too,” you admitted.

“I’ll make it up to you, I promise.”

You nodded and let him hold you for a while longer until he pulled away just enough to look at you and ask, “What movie do you want to watch?”

With a whine, you tucked your head back under his chin and said, “The one where you keep holding me and giving me kisses.”

“I don’t think that’s a movie,” he chuckled as he picked you up and walked you over to the bed.

“Fine, then. Princess Diaries .” You decided as he laid you out on the warm sheets and helped you crawl under them.

“That’s a movie?” He threw some of the decorative pillows on the floor and crawled in next to you, grabbing the remote from his side table.

“Mhmm, a very good one.” The second he was close enough to you, you curled into his side and wrapped your arms around him. He pulled you closer with one hand and used the other to find your movie choice.

After about ten minutes, Anne Hathaway discovering she’s a princess was demoted to background noise as you and Kylo caught up on what had happened since you last spoke as you twisted several tiny braids into his hair.

Schol:

“I got A’s in all of my classes, even psych!”

“Good girl. All that work paid off, then.”

Work:

“I cut back on my hours a little just so I had some time to breathe. Maz is so understanding and is letting me do most of it from home.”

“That’s good. I’m thinking of taking Fridays from home, at least half of them. Maybe we could have more time together now.”

“I’d like that.”

The holidays:

“I saw my parents for dinner and a couple of my uncles for a Hanukkah/Christmas thing.”

“Wow, Kylo, both of them?”

“Yeah.”

“Was that okay? With Han there?”

“It was fine. He seems to be less of an asshole the older he gets. Having my uncles there helped.”

“Good. I was worried you’d be alone for the holidays.”

“Were you?”

You shrugged, “My cat kept me company. My family, not so much. They kinda forgot I was there after a day.”

It wasn’t until the topic got brought back around to Jake and your failed dates with him that you had hope that maybe Kylo would kiss you again tonight.

“Wait, he really thought your thigh crease was your cunt? Are you serious?” He asked, a barely contained laugh gracing his features.

“Deadly. At least I can say I didn’t have sex with him, right?”

“I’m impressed that anyone could make that mistake, especially with how delicious yours is—  Wait, shit.”

“No, continue!” 

He flushed and tried to change the topic. “You said your cat’s name was Boba?”

“Nice try, what was that about my cunt?”

He groaned and threw his head back, “I thought we were going to try to take this slow.”

“I never said that and neither did you, Kylo Ren.” You pointed an accusing finger at him, a smile on your face as said finger poked his cheek. “I wanna hear all about how delicious you think I am.”

“Princess,” he warned.

“Or maybe I should taste you first, and then we can argue about who tastes better, hmm?” His affection was making you bold, and that boldness was quickly rewarded as he rolled you onto your back and boxed you in with his arms, his hips resting between your legs. There was a distinct hardness pressed against you through the layers of fabric.

His teeth nipped at your jaw in warning before he said, “Since when did you get so brave, my girl?”

You giggled and kissed his nose as it brushed against your lips. “Probably since I found out you think my pussy is delicious,” you leaned forward to tug his earlobe with your teeth, which made him groan in response, “And you’re starving for more.”

Kylo’s mouth was on yours in an instant, devouring every inch of it that he could reach with his lips, teeth, and tongue. He truly was a man starved, and you were the only thing that could satiate him.

His hands desperately tugged at his sweatpants you wore as he sucked a hickey into your neck. It wasn’t until you moaned out his name that he pulled away and looked up at you, panting. Your glossy eyes met his and he looked you over.

“Shit,” he mumbled as he practically fell off of you and scrambled away.

You whined at the loss of touch and turned to face him. He looked like he had just sprinted from a pack of wolves, his face full of fear and his chest heaving with breath.

“You okay?” You asked quietly.

“I didn’t mean to do that,” he said quietly.

“Do what?” You were once again confused.

He shook his head and held his arms open for you to crawl into, which you gladly did. He laid back with you and held you to his warm body. “I just want to hold you tonight, okay?”

His reaction was making your heart beat loudly with anxiety as worry crept into your mind. “Do… Do you not want me like that?”

Kylo shook his head, “I do. I really do, I just…” He sighed and squeezed you. “You’re tired and have had an emotional day. We can wait until you feel better.”

“I feel better now, though,” you stated, sure that you wanted this.

“Not tonight, sweetheart.” Kylo shook his head. “Last time I touched you and you were exhausted, I…” He trailed off, but you understood what he was saying. He felt he had taken advantage of you last time and then cut you off. It made sense, but you wouldn’t push him into doing something that he’d regret.

“Well, when you change your mind and want your dick sucked—”

He hissed your name in reprimand, but there was a hint of amusement to his tone.

“Let me know, and I’ll be first in line. Or for anything really, as long as it’s you,” you finished.

Kylo let out a dramatic sigh and squeezed you close to his chest, the sheets tangling around your legs as you intertwined them with his.

“As long as it’s me?”

“Mhmm.”

“And as long as I don’t try to have sex with your thigh crease, right?”

“You can do that, if you want,” you kissed his chest. “I just want it to be you.”

The sigh he let out after that was content, not an ounce of annoyance to be found in it.

He held you against his chest, rubbing circles on your back and pressing kisses to your head until you fell asleep in his bed. The warmth of his arms reminded you that you were safe and cared for now. For some reason, you knew that it would last this time.

Chapter Text

Warmth tickled the ends of your consciousness and your dream started to fade into nonexistence. It took you several moments to realize that it was actually the sleeping breaths of Kylo that woke you. You didn’t need to open your eyes to know it was him tucked against your chest and breathing on your neck; you could tell from his scent and the strength in his arms.

When you did finally open your eyes, you were unsurprisingly greeted by Kylo’s handsome face resting against your breasts, his face tilted towards yours as he slept. He looked peaceful as his breaths fanned against your skin, his hair damp and his torso lacking a shirt, a sight which you marveled at. Lying on your back with him curled into you was the opposite of how you’d fallen asleep with him, but it let you admire his beauty and stroke his back.

Kylo didn’t stir until you ran your fingers through his damp hair. He nuzzled his nose into your breasts before looking up at you with a sleepy smile.

“Hi,” you said quietly.

“Hi,” he responded, voice thick with sleep in a way that made your heart race.

“Did you shower or something?” You asked, still combing your fingers through his hair.

He nodded, “Went on a run, but you looked so comfy when I got back that I had to get in bed after I showered.”

You hummed, “Your shirt is missing.”

Kylo looked down at his torso as if he had forgotten, “I guess it is, sorry.”

With a smile, your hand fell to where his thick arm was wrapped around you, “I don’t mind. You’re hotter like this.”

“Hotter?” He smirked.

You blushed, “Well, yeah. I mean you’re always hot, but this is a nice treat. Also, I guess, physically, you’re very warm. Kinda like my own personal toaster oven, and—”

He cut you off with a kiss and you could feel his smile against your lips as you giggled. Both of his arms twined around your waist as he moved until he was fully on top of you, resting his hips between your legs and pressing his chest to yours.

When Kylo pulled away after a few minutes of sleepy kissing, he said, “I want to take you to breakfast.”

You looked at his face and let your fingers graze over the soft wrinkles around his eyes. “Like… On a date?”

“Yeah,” he bumped his nose against your cheek. “If that’s okay with you.”

“What if it wasn’t?”

“Then I would want to take you to breakfast as a non-date.” Kylo mumbled and kissed your temple. “Either way, I want to buy you breakfast.”

You nodded and hesitantly said, “It can be a date.”

“Yeah?” He confirmed.

“Yeah. But my dress is probably still soaked and I’m not going in your sweatpants,” you insisted.

“Why not? You look cute in them.”

“I also look crusty in them.”

Kylo hummed and tucked his nose into your neck, “Well good thing the dryer should be finishing any minute now if it isn’t already done.”

You looked down at Kylo, surprise painting your features, “You dried my clothes?” He nodded and you wanted to cry. “... Thank you. Wow.”

“I also washed them, if that’s okay. Your shoes are kind of ruined, though, and your coat is at the dry cleaner’s.”

Tears started leaking from your eyes as he spoke, and it wasn’t until you sniffled that he looked up at you.

“Hey, what’s that about?” He kissed the wetness on your cheek.

You rushed to wipe at your eyes with the sleeves of his hoodie you wore, embarrassed that you were crying. “Sorry, I just. Oh my God, Kylo…”

If your eyes had been open, you would have seen the terror spread across his face, “Sorry, is that wrong?”

You rapidly shook your head, “It’s so kind, Kylo. Oh,” you giggled, “I’ve had that coat for years and it’s never gotten more than a spritz of fabric freshener and maybe an attempt to freeze the bacteria away. Thank you.”

“Oh. No problem.” He relaxed above you and tucked his nose back into your neck as he drank in your scent. “You smell good,” he said after a moment.

You hummed and combed his hair back, “I smell like you.”

“My hoodie you’re wearing smells like me, but,” Kylo sniffed behind your ear, tickling you with his nose in the process and making you giggle. “You just smell sweet. Smell like sleep.”

“Sleep doesn’t have a smell,” you tugged his hair gently until he looked at you. His pupils were blown wide but his expression was soft and sleepy.

“Then maybe sleep smells like you ,” he said as he pressed sleepy, slow kisses all over your face and neck and you let out quiet noises of approval as he did so.

When he made it to your lips, he just brushed his against yours, taking in their softness and the feeling of being near you. A quiet whine of need left your lips before you said, “If you keep doing this, I’m gonna jump your bones, I hope you know that.”

“Jump my bones? What are you, sixty years old?” His tongue traced your bottom lip, something that might have seemed weird if he didn’t make it feel so good.

“Yeah, you ready for bingo?” You giggled as he nipped at your lip.

“Actually, I’m ready for breakfast,” he said and kissed you one more time before sitting up. Kylo straddled you for a moment, head cocked as he admired the way you looked splayed out beneath him on his bed, whining for him to come back to you. “I like you like this,” he thought out loud, eyes roaming your body hungrily.

“Like what?” you asked shyly, even though you knew the answer. You just wanted to hear him say it.

“Under me.” He leaned down just enough so he could pin your wrists to the mattress on either side of your head. “Helpless.” You moaned quietly at the way his grip tightened on you. His hands easily wrapped around your wrists and then some. “Wanting more.” Kylo leaned down and bit at your earlobe. “Needy,” he groaned in your ear before he sat back up, once again taking in your figure and dilated eyes. “Absolutely pathetic.”

Your face fell in despair at those words. Everything he said had sounded so sexy, but that seemed harsh. You weren’t sure if he was trying to make it sexy or if he really thought you were pathetic.

Your answer came in the form of his lips on your jaw and his hands gripping your sides. “It’s so fucking beautiful,” he continued as your breaths turned into soft pants. “How pathetic you are for me. You’re probably dripping and I haven’t even touched you.”

This was doing something to you, and Kylo was absolutely right—  you were dripping for him.

“And based on what I threw in the washer this morning,” his eyes trailed down to the hem of his sweatpants you wore, one of his hands leaving your wrist to follow the same path. “You’re getting all those sweet juices on my sweatpants. Dirty little thing wanted to leave her mark so she went without panties, huh?”

You whined and arched your back into his touch as it traced over your belly.

He paused to look up at you until you met his eyes. “Is this okay?” He asked quietly.

You nodded. The dirty talk was not what you were used to, but it was so hot and you needed more . More words, more touch, more Kylo . This much was voiced in your desperate whimper of, “ Please .”

He hesitated a moment, and a couple of his fingers dipped below the hem to toy with the fabric. “Can I touch you?” He asked quietly.

You nodded.

“Use your words, Princess.”  He demanded gently.

“Please touch me. Can I touch you?” Besides having his hands all over you in the worst way possible, the only thing you wanted was to wrap your own hands around his cock and make him come for you.

Kylo looked at your pleading face. “Maybe, if you’re good.” He leaned down to kiss you as he gathered both of your wrists in one hand and pinned them above your head. You squrimed below him as his hand moved under your sweatpants and traced along you slit, mumbling, “Fuck, you’re so wet.”

With all the wonderful luck you had been having, it made sense that your stomach would choose that moment to growl loud enough to be heard over your whimpers.

In an instant, Kylo’s hands were off of you and he got off the bed, “Come on, let’s get ready to go,” he said as he walked towards his closet.

You sat up in shock and called out, “Hey!” as you chased him into the walk-in.

He looked up at you as he rifled through a drawer. “Can I help you, Princess?”

You huffed indignantly and said, “As a matter of fact, you can.” you tugged one of his hands away from the drawer and brought it back to the waistband of your sweatpants.

Kylo chuckled and looked up at you, “We have to eat, darling.”

“I have some lava cake downstairs,”  you suggested as his fingers traced along your waist. “That could be breakfast. Or I could be breakfast.”

“I promised you a date.”

“Yeah, but you also made me embarrassingly horny, so I think maybe you should do something about that before we eat.”

He looked you up and down, taking in your messy hair, flushed cheeks, and the way you squirmed towards him. “You’re telling me that getting off is more important to you right now than a big, fluffy, delicious stack of pancakes?”

Your stomach growled and he grinned. “Breakfast first,” he tugged at the hem of his hoodie you wore when you whined at him. “I’ll go get your clothes and help you change, okay?”

With an unnecessary amount of drama, you gave him your best pouty face, “But… But I want…”

“I know,” he said gently as he stood up fully to look at you. You had to look up at him to meet his eyes, only enhancing the effect of your pout. His thumb traced your cheek as he looked at you, “Such a sweet girl, hmm? But I want to take my time with you.”

“It can just be a quickie?” You bargained.

Kylo shook his head, “I won’t fit if we rush it,” he kissed your temple when your eyes went wide. 

“Okay, then we don’t rush it! We can just skip—”

“We are not skipping breakfast so I can fuck you.” He said definitively, and you knew there was no point in arguing, so you just let out a dramatic sigh instead. “Good girl.” He cupped the back of your head and pulled you to him so he could press a kiss to your forehead before he left, presumably to go get your clothes.

The second you heard the stairs squeak as he descended them, you flopped down onto the cool floor of the closet and laid on your back, arms spread at your sides as you whined to yourself. You were starting to feel like you were guilting him into having sex with you, but he seemed eager, just very particular about the circumstances in which he had sex with you. Would it be too forward to wait for him on your knees with your mouth open waiting for his— 

“Why are you on the floor?” Kylo’s deep voice echoed throughout the closet.

You brought your hands to cover your face, “You know how some people take cold showers to stop being horny? This is my cold shower.”

The floorboards by your head squeaked, and even though your eyes were covered, you could tell Kylo was squatting above you. “I know it’s hard to be patient, and I’d praise you for doing a good job, but this is genuinely a little pathetic.”

“Can you blame me?” You uncovered your eyes to peek up at him and were greeted by his face, upside-down above you, smirking at you like a smug little bastard. “The last guy I had ‘sex’ with tried to fuck my thigh crease, and you keep talking about how gargantuan your cock is.”

“Your words, not mine.” He dropped your clothes onto your face before he stood up. “Get dressed.”

With a couple more dramatic sighs, you finally got up and stood to face him. Kylo had taken off his sweatpants and was left in his black boxer briefs that were just the right color to show you the sizable bulge at the front of them without giving too much detail.

You had never wanted to throw a temper tantrum more in your life. Kylo must have caught you staring because he chuckled and made his way over to you. “You need some help?”

Too quickly, you responded, “Yes please.”

You weren’t sure what ‘help’ he was offering, but you would take it regardless. To both your delight and dismay, he meant helping you get changed and he tugged his hoodie off of your body, leaving you in his shirt and sweatpants. Both of you knew that there was no underwear or bra underneath, so he paused at the hem of the t-shirt you wore. He didn’t have to say anything as he looked at you. You nodded, and suddenly the shirt was on the floor with the hoodie.

Kylo looked at your now bare torso with a hum of approval as his hands caught your waist. “My pretty girl,” he said quietly, tracing your figure with light touches. His hands brushed the bottom of your breasts as he looked down at you, who was trying to get as close to him as possible.

“Kylo, I don’t think I’ve ever wanted to put something in my mouth more than I do in this instant, if I am being completely honest with you,” you whispered quietly.

His eyebrows shot up and his lip twitched to the side in amusement. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Kylo hummed and he brought a hand up to cup your cheek and his thumb traced over your bottom lip. “Then open,” he commanded softly. Your jaw went slack as his thumb pushed into your mouth where you started sucking on it. “That’s a good girl.” He watched you intensely as your mouth worked his thumb, his eyes almost black with desire. His other hand dropped to the waistband of his sweatpants that you were wearing. “Can I take these off, too?” He asked quietly and you nodded, your eyes never leaving his.

With one smoothe tug, the pants were on the floor and you stepped out of them carefully, exposing yourself fully in front of Kylo. You shivered, partially from the cold air in the closet, but mostly from excitement as you stared into his dark eyes. His hand gripped your face slightly, his thumb never leaving your mouth as he pulled you closer to him. “I’m going to give you five minutes, and if you don’t come in that time, you don’t come at all. Understand?”

Desperately, you shook your head and tried to say something like, “No, I’ll get too stressed, that’s not enough!” but his thumb pressed down on your tongue so all that came out was garbled nonsense.

Kylo dropped to his knees in front of you and looked up at you as he nudged your legs apart.

“Kylo, I’m so glad you’re doing this, but I don’t think—”

“Then don’t think,” he mumbled as he pressed a kiss right above your slit in a way that made you squirm. His large hands came up to grab at your ass cheeks to hold you still. “Just let me make you feel good, okay?”

Despite how desperately horny you were, you truly didn’t believe that five minutes would be enough. Sure, he’d done it before in six, but that was a different time and— 

Oh.

You had forgotten how delicious his tongue felt when it dipped into your folds, but you were quickly reminded as he started lapping at your cunt like he was savoring a particularly drippy ice cream cone. Emphasis on the drippy . Your juices were quickly coating his face as he moved slowly through you, warming you up before he latched onto your clit.

He sucked and licked at your sensitive nub like a man starved, and you had to grip his hair tightly between your fingers to prevent you from falling over in pleasure. Your moans were echoed by his animalistic grunts that felt divine against your flesh.

He didn’t pull away to ask for feedback, just listened to your noises and pants of, “Yes yes yes, please , right there, oh my fuck,” to know what he was doing right.

And he was doing everything right in a way that made your legs tremble, barely holding you up.

“Kylo, Kylo, Kylo , I’m gonna fall,” you nearly doubled over to grab at his shoulders for support at the same time that his hands gripped your ass harder, surely bruising it, as his arms tightened around your thighs.

He shook his head, using a breath in between licks to say, “I’ve got you, just relax, Princess,” before he dove right back in.

To say the least, you were a mess. You were getting so close, heat building in your stomach with each lick and suck he gave you. Every breath came out as a whining moan or strangled gasp as you pulled at his hair and focused on the feeling of having a gorgeous man between your legs. A gorgeous, kind man who seemed to want nothing more than to make you feel good and cared for in a way you never had been before.

The thought alone had you mumbling out, “Fuck, fuck, Kylo, Kylo , I’m gonna, I’m gonna—”

Kylo did exactly what you wanted him to in that moment: He changed absolutely nothing about his already perfect movements until you were scrambling at his back, doubled over in ecstasy as you hit your intense peak. You let out all of the noises trapped in your chest, resulting in something between a whine and a sob as you came, but he kept going .

“That’s—” A push at his dark locks as you panted to catch your breath, “Too much, too much, too much,” you mumbled over and over. Your clit was overworked and oversensitized and while his movements felt good, you couldn’t take it with the way your legs had turned to jelly.

“Do it again,” he mumbled into your pussy, his voice thick and needy.

You whined and shook your head. “Lemme lemme—  oh fuck, God, Kylo—  Lemme catch my breath please.”

He mirrored your movements as he shook his head and delved deeper into you, obscene slurping noises coming from his mouth like he was enjoying some good soup. You thanked the stars that Kylo had fast reflexes and a strong body, because when your legs finally gave out on you, he caught you and helped you to his lap before you could get hurt, immediately stopping his ministrations to your cunt. The wild mix of hormones and emotions flooding your body was bringing tears to your eyes as your muscles shook from overexertion.

His arms wrapped around your middle and he held you tightly to him, your shaking legs on either side of his lap while he shushed you.

“Was that too much?” Kylo asked after a minute.

“Yeah,” you answered honestly, nuzzling your nose into his neck and inhaling his scent. It comforted you. “Too much.”

“Sorry,” he kissed your head. “I forgot to ask for your safeword.”

You giggled and kissed his ear gently, “I don’t have one.”

“Oh,” he said, sounding surprised. “You… You know what they are, right?”

You nodded into him, “I’ve just never needed one, and why have one if you know it won’t work?”

“You date really shitty guys, you know that, right?” Kylo rubbed circles on your back.

“Yeah,” you sighed. “I know.”

Kylo quickly changed the topic. “You should have one.”

“Okay,” you nodded. “What’s yours?”

“I do the stoplight system, do you know that one?”

“Yeah, I think so. Just like with cars, right?”

He nodded, “You can use that one too, if you’d like.”

You thought about it. “Nah, I think I should just have one, I don’t think I’d ever use yellow or green.”

“Okay. Then what should it be? Maybe a food, a place, a flower…”

“Strawberries.” You nodded resolutely.

“Strawberries?”

“Yeah!” You tilted your head back to smile at him. “They’re red, so it’s like the stoplight thing, but different and cuter.”

Kylo smiled back at you. “Strawberries it is, then, my good girl.”

With a hum of content, you tucked yourself back into his neck as he held you close. Kylo didn’t let go of you until your body stopped shaking. He helped you stand back up and got you dressed before he picked you up and put you on the bed so he could get changed and you could be comfortable, insisting that, “My Princess shouldn’t be standing for too long.”

When he came out of the closet, he was wearing a grey sweater and dark jeans with a black rain jacket. He was holding another item of clothing in his hands. “Your coat won’t be done until later, so you can wear this,” he said as he tossed it to you.

You caught the jacket and inspected it before putting it on. It was a black denim jacket with a fleece lining that, of course, smelled like his cologne and was perfectly warm. It was also huge on you, covering your hands, but Kylo helped fold the cuffs a little so that at least your fingers could poke out.

He led you downstairs and handed you some ankle-length rain boots and socks that were both not yours, your rain-drenched flats nowhere in sight.

“Um, Kylo?” You asked as he knelt down to put on his own shoes and you stood in front of him lamely.

“Yes?”

“Where are my shoes?”

Kylo chuckled, “They were ruined. I guess the water messed up the glue somehow, but the soles fell off when I went to hang them to dry. I got you these ones for this morning. They’re more practical in the snow.”

“So you just… Bought me new shoes?”

He shrugged and stood up to face you, “Do you not like them? You can pick out different ones—”

“No, I like them, but I could’ve worn the others… Wait, did you say it’s snowing?”

He nodded and gestured to the door, “It was earlier, it might have stopped.”

You squeaked and raced to the door, flinging it open with excitement. Sure enough, a thin layer of snow lay on the ground, everything coated in delicate white flakes as they fell from the sky.

“Whoa,” you said quietly, barefoot on the frozen porch. It didn’t snow in your hometown, so the occasional snowfalls here were exciting and wonderful to you.

A large, warm hand wrapped around your fingers and urged you into the arms of its owner with a mumble of, “Pretty girl, you’ll catch a cold like that.”

You hummed and returned to Kylo, your eyes still trained outside on the stillness of the morning snow. Without breaking your moment of awe, he got you to sit on the steps inside and left the door open in front of you so you could look out on the street as he tugged on the socks and shoes he had gotten for you.

“Can we walk to breakfast, Kylo?” You asked quietly.

“Your legs will get cold,” he pointed out as he got one of your feet into a boot.

“That’s okay. It’s too pretty to be cold,” you finally looked down at him to see he was already looking up at you. You gave him a smile.

“I guess it’s not too far…” He returned your smile and got your other boot on before giving you a hand to help you stand up. “But if you get sick, this was your idea.”

You nodded, beaming up at him. “Yessir,” you giggled and gave him a little salute.

He glanced over your body and gestured for you to do a spin, which you gladly did to show off your dress, his jacket, and your new shoes, all of which went together surprisingly well. You’d never felt as beautiful as you did with him gazing at you like the most beautiful thing in the world, even with your messed up hair and lack of makeup.

“Perfect,” he mumbled, pulling you forward to kiss your head before leading you outside.

The walk was wonderful. Your nose, lips, and legs were freezing cold, but Kylo kept you tucked close to his side as you walked together, his hand occasionally coming up to brush some flakes from your hair before they could melt and dampen it. The breakfast restaurant was way fancier than a Denny’s, but you still felt comfortable in the cozy environment, especially with Kylo holding your hand from across the table and stroking his thumb over your knuckles. You ordered the most amazing stack of french toast, and he ordered you sides of bacon, eggs, and strawberries with a knowing look when you said you didn’t need all that food (you ate all of it and some of his omelette and sides, too). The snow had stopped by the time you left, and with your full belly, Kylo decided he didn’t want you to walk, so he ordered an Uber to take you back to his house.

Even though you gave him your best puppy dog eyes, Kylo kissed your head and said, “Next time,” when you asked him for an encore performance of earlier that day the second you walked into his house. You sighed and nodded, giving him a very long hug and telling him you should go home to take care of your cat and do homework.

“Wait here,” he mumbled quietly after you let go of him. Confused, you pulled back and let him hurry up the stairs. He didn’t make you wait long before he was coming back to you, his hands behind his back.

“Um… I ordered this for you as a Christmas gift. I was never able to give it to you, though, so it’s been sitting in my study for a month,” Kylo said, looking kind of nervous and barely making eye contact with you before he pulled a gorgeous pink and green plant from behind his back. With wide eyes, you took it from him, admiring it and doing your best not to cry. “It’s called a pink princess philodendron,” he said, and you nodded because you already knew. It was at the top of your list of plants to buy when you miraculously got rich. “It… It reminded me of you, so I bought it,” he finished, a hand coming up to comb through his hair nervously.

Tears welled up in your eyes, fogging your vision as you responded weakly, “It’s beautiful, Kylo, oh my gosh…”

“You like it?” He asked stupidly, and you could only nod, your lip wobbling as you held back your emotion. It was the sweetest gift anyone had ever gotten you. A perfect mix of things you loved and thoughtfulness.

“I-I got you something too,” you sniffled, holding the pot close to your body, scared to drop it. “It’s not nearly as nice, though…”

“You didn’t have to get me anything, Princess,” he said and kissed your forehead.

“Yeah I did,” you looked up at him. “You’re special to me, so of course I had to. I just… I wish it was nicer.” You glanced back down at the plant that you knew easily cost over a hundred dollars.

Kylo held your face and wiped his thumbs under your eyes to get rid of your tears. “Well I’m sure I’ll love it.”

Once you stopped crying, Kylo led you to his car, which was of course a fancy Tesla with fancy customizations that probably cost more than you could imagine. Rich people .

“What does this do?” You pointed to something on the screen as he pulled out from the garage hidden under his house.

“Don’t touch that,” he swatted your hand away.

“It’s like you have a whole ass TV screen for you to drive with,” you commented. “Can I play music?”

“No,” he said firmly.

“Whoa why is my butt so hot?” 

“Genetics, I assume.” He pressed a button on the giant screen. “The seat heater was on.”

“... That’s a thing?”

You almost felt bad about annoying Kylo, but you just liked talking to him. You left the car alone after the few minutes of excitement wore off, then just chatted with him about life and tried to understand his job more (it seemed to be mostly looking at other people’s work and criticizing it and then responding to emails).

When he pulled up to your apartment, your heart fell in your chest. You didn’t want to leave him. Even though he was being so nice to you, what if he cut you off again? The thought terrified you and you were frozen in place when he parked in front of your house.

“You okay?” He asked after a minute.

You nodded, then quickly shook your head. “I’m scared.”

“Why… Why are you scared?”

“You’re gonna leave me again…” you sniffled and looked at him.

His eyes went soft as he stroked your face. “Not like last time. I’m just dropping you off. I’ll see you on Friday, if that works for you.”

“But…”

“I promise. I won’t leave you again,” his eyes danced between yours. “I’ll prove to you that that was a mistake I could never repeat.” When you looked unsure he said, “Really. I mean it.”

You let out a little whine and nodded slowly.

“Plus, you have to go get me my present, don’t you? And find a place for this,” he said, pointing to the plant in your lap. “And I have to give you back your coat once it’s done at the cleaner’s.”

“Then after that?” You muttered.

“Well, then, I guess I’ll just have to keep finding reasons to be with you. Even if it’s as simple as wanting to see you laugh again.”

Kylo seemed to know that that would work, because you let out a sad little giggle and nodded. “Let me go get your present. Stay here?”

He nodded and watched as you ran from his car to your apartment. You rushed to greet Boba, who was meowing happily at your return before you threw open your closet and found what you’d gotten him, which was easy because you’d worn it to bed the night before. And the night before that. And really, every night since he’d sent that dreaded text. You threw it in the bag you’d originally gotten to wrap it in and then ran back outside, leaving the plant on your coffee table. His car had not moved an inch since you left, but he was now standing outside it, leaning against the door.

You almost slipped on the icy ground as you made it over to him, which only made the way you shoved it into his arms that much more dramatic.

In between puffs of air, you said, “Okay, it’s kinda lame because I’m broke,” you had to pause to swallow deeply. “Shit, sorry, I haven’t run in months. Um.” You held the bag out to him. “You said your favorite color was blue, but you don’t own anything blue, so I got you blue stuff. There was originally some blue candy in there, even though you don’t really eat sweets, it was just for the effect, but I ate it all already. Sorry. You can open it now.”

He took the bag from you and pulled out a thick woven sweater in a deep blue-grey color that you’d gotten for eight dollars at the thrift store. He grinned at you and rested it on his shoulder while he pulled out a pair of blue Adidas running shorts and an abstract blue, grey, and white painting (both of which you’d also thrifted).

“They should fit, I remembered your size. And I know that you already have a lot of art, but I thought this would look nice with them because there’s that grey and white in there like all of your decor, and—”

Kylo leaned in and kissed you gently to shut you up. It only lasted a moment, but it made your heart race and your fingers tingle in a way that you knew wasn’t from the cold or from running.

“They’re amazing,” he said, inches from your lips.

You gave him a shy smile. “Really? Or are you just saying that.”

He shook his head, “Really. I mean it. I’ll put the painting in my kitchen.” He glanced at the sweater laying on his shoulder. “And the sweater looks warm. These clothes smell like you, did you know that?”

You flushed pink and giggled nervously, “I’ve been sleeping in them. Um… They’re really comfy and remind me of you, I guess. I would’ve washed them if I had known I’d be seeing you…”

He smirked, “Then I guess it was for the best that you didn’t.” He sniffed the clothes in a way that made your heart clench and soothed your mind about all those moments you’d smelled his clothes. “These should hold me over until Friday.”

“If they don't, you can always call me…” you hinted in a very not-casual manner.

“I might just have to do that, Princess.” He put the gifts back into their bag so his hands were free to wrap around your waist and pull you close as he kissed you. In the freezing air, you were warm pressed against him. 

Too soon, you were saying goodbyes and exchanging multiple “last kisses” until a car drove by full of frat guys that honked and whistled at the two of you kissing in the street, effectively ruining the sweet mood.

“Oh, your jacket,” you realized as you pulled away from him. You went to take it off, but he stopped you with a hand and a shake of his head.

“Keep it. It looks good on you,” he whispered before kissing you, this one really the last one of the day.

“Okay. I’ll see you Friday?”

Kylo nodded. “Or earlier.”

You smiled. “Or earlier.” And with that and a firm nudge from Kylo, you made it back to your apartment.

Thirty minutes later, you got a text that you were scared to open.

[Kylo]:

I miss you already :(

(Did I do that right? Is that the right emoji?)

Can you come over Monday?

You giggled at your phone and held it tight to your chest.

He wasn’t going to leave this time.

When you didn’t respond, you got a notification from Venmo:

[User KyloR19 has added you as a Friend!]

[New Payment: KyloR19 paid you $1000. - Sorry for being a jackass and sorry about your date. Can I see you Monday?]

With wide eyes, you called Kylo.

Chapter Text

“ Hi Princess, you miss me alread— ” Kylo’s smirk was obvious through the phone.

“Kylo, what the hell ,” you hissed quietly.

“Yeah, I miss you too, sweetheart.”

“Kylo, you just venmo-d me one-thousand fucking dollars, don’t ‘sweetheart’ me, take it back!” Your heart pounded in your chest as you thought about just how much money that was.

“ It’s just a thousand, calm down. I haven’t made you my sugar baby or anything.”

“Kylo, that’s as much as I make in a month, you can’t just—”

“ Well I did. I hate seeing you worry about money like that. It would make me feel a lot better if I could help you out. If it’s too much, you can donate it or something, but I don’t want you to be stressed about money on top of everything else. I’m not taking it back.”

When he said it like that, it sounded so reasonable, but there was nothing reasonable about sending someone $1000 on an apologetic whim. “Thank you, I appreciate that, but… Kylo, it's too much.”

Kylo sighed on his end of the phone, and there wasn’t any annoyance in it, just mild disappointment. “ Then put it in savings or donate it, like I said. Please, just keep it. I don’t want anything in return except for the knowledge that you won’t cry over a meal again.”

Your stomach twisted and you hesitated before you asked quietly, “You don’t want… Like… Sex from this?”

Kylo scoffed incredulously, “ Fuck no.” He caught himself before you could be offended, “ I-I mean, maybe, eventually, when you want it, of course. But completely and totally unrelated to the money. The money is just money, and you’ve googled me, you know I can afford it.”

It was true, he most certainly could afford it. In fact, he could easily pay you twenty times that a month and still live his comfortable, rich-person life, probably (you didn’t know how much it cost to be a rich person, but you had faith in his salary).

“You sound like an asshole when you say that, just to let you know.”

“ I’m fully aware, but thankfully, I’m your asshole and you have to put up with me and all of my money now. Including your apology venmo.”

Your cheeks flushed when he called himself ‘yours,’ even if it was in the context of sounding like a total douchebag.

The thought of accepting the money made your stomach do backflips, but you knew there was no way out of it, not really.

“Okay, fine. I’ll keep it. But you can’t do this again.”

“ Alright, deal. I’ll make it more next time.”

“Kylo.”

“ Okay, okay.”

“And money does not equal apology, understood?”

“ Well I did apologize in other ways, so this is okay this time, right?”

You groaned. He was cute when he got cheeky like this, but it was also annoying in the best way.

“Fine.”

“Maybe you could use some of my charitable donation to get yourself a new dress for our date Monday.”

“Wow, so I’m your charity case now?”

“My favorite one,” he laughed, and you could tell there was no malice in his joke. “Who can maybe add another pretty blue dress to her wardrobe for me?”

“You think my dress was pretty?”

“I think you’re pretty, so yes. The dress is included.”

You giggled quietly and rolled onto your back on your bed, propping your feet up against the wall. “That’s cheesy, Kylo.”

“Oh, and I guess you’re lactose intolerant then? Can’t take any cheese?” Kylo hummed with amusement.

You snorted, “Ha-ha, very funny.”

“So, Monday night? You, me, and a pretty little blue number?”

You put him on speaker as you pulled up your calendar app, “So I guess I could, but…” You glanced out the windows of your apartment at the gloomy weather outside. “I can’t drive in this weather. Icy roads and I don’t mix.”

“I can pick you up.”

“I meant that I can’t go to the mall to get a dress to wear for you…” You explained lamely, sighing quietly. You wanted to use the money he’d given you to do nice things for Kylo, like buy him non-thrifted presents and dress how he wanted, but that was hard to do on a two-day notice.

“ Oh, that’s okay. I was kind of joking about that. Get as many clothes as you want, but they’re for you, not me. I just want to take you on a nice date where you don’t end up soaking wet and sobbing for me.”

You giggled at the obvious innuendo, “Oh really? Then I guess I shouldn’t bother showing up.”

Kylo chuckled your name and said, “Okay, I walked into that one. But really, I want to spoil you a little. Please?”

“Okay, then. Monday at…?”

“I’ll pick you up at six-thirty.”

“Okay. Should I…” you paused, wondering if you were too bold. “Should I bring stuff for like… overnight purposes?”

“I would like you to stay the night, yes. I like you in my clothes and I have a spare toothbrush, but sure, if there’s anything else you need.”

Your cheeks warmed at that. Maybe he would finally have sex with you. “Okay. I like sleeping in your bed. But what about when you go to work?”

You could practically hear Kylo’s shrug through the phone, “I’ll figure it out. You just worry about finding shoes that don’t fall apart the second they get wet, okay?”

You huffed, “Will do. Six-thirty on Monday. See you then?”

“See you then.”

“Okay.”

“Send me a picture when you decide where to put your plant. I want to see it in your space.”

Your eyes welled up with tears that Kylo cared to ask that, and you squeaked out, “I’d love to. Thank you.”

“Thank you.”

“Okay. Bye?”

“ Bye.”

“Bye,” you whispered.

Kylo chuckled, “ Text me later.”

“I will. Bye.”

“ Bye.”

Boba let out a loud and long meow as you finally went to hang up the phone and you groaned quietly.

“ What was that?”

“My dumbass cat starts screaming the second he wants something. He says ‘hi,’ I guess.”

“ Hi dumbass cat. You’re a lot like your owner, huh?”

“I’m his mom, actually.”

“Oh, really?”

You nodded, even though Kylo couldn’t see it through the phone. “Birthed him myself and pushed him out of my body. Seventeen hours of labor for a little bastard who scratches at me when I give him smooches.”

“I thought you found him in a parking lot?”

“Well, I guess you could call it that, but that’s a little rude to my uterus.”

“Very funny. I’ll see you on Monday.”

You giggled, “See you Monday.”

After another round of trying to hang up after saying ‘bye’ like some dumb teenager, you finally managed to do so and held your phone to your chest. Your mind drifted to how you hoped the date would go—  lingering touches, good food, hushed conversation in a busy restaurant, wandering eyes, and Kylo taking you home and railing you into another dimension.

Your heart raced at the concept until you were rudely interrupted by your cat screaming and jumping on your stomach.

“Fine! Okay! I’ll feed you, geez!”

Chapter Text

After four hours at Wicket’s, five hours of classes back-to-back, and then three hours with Maz in the office, you were absolutely exhausted, practically collapsing on your bed the second you returned to your apartment around five forty-five Monday night. The sun was already set and you’d walked home in the snow, too scared to drive on the icy roads and risking the cold, dark walk instead.

Boba was certainly happy to see you as he jumped on your chest and started kneading at your soft skin under layers of warm fabric.

“Boba, how the hell am I supposed to go on a date when I can barely stand, hmm?” You asked him.

“ Brrrr-meow !” He responded.

You groaned and covered your tired eyes with your palms, letting the pressure soothe your aching head for a moment. “My thoughts exactly,” you mumbled. Your hands plopped down at your sides so you could stare at the ugly popcorn ceiling. “I don’t wanna cancel on Kylo, but… Fuck, why did he choose Monday?”

“ Yrrow! ” Boba chirped.

“You’re right, men are idiots,” you sighed, scratching between his soft black ears.

You pulled your phone out of your coat pocket with your free hand to glance at the time. You had about forty minutes before Kylo arrived, and you groaned at the thought. Look. You really really wanted to go on a nice, real date with him and spend time at his house, but you really felt like a Sim whose needs were all in the red.

Nevertheless, you hoisted yourself out of bed, taking Boba with you so you could drop him in front of his food bowl and feed him dinner before you showered. Your water pressure was lacking, to say the least, and the freezing weather outside had made it so the water didn’t get above room temperature. Despite this, you took your time getting cleaned up after a long day. You sat at your desk and did your makeup, which wasn’t exactly a “full-face” but made you look dressed up enough for a date, then emptied out your backpack and threw in a phone charger, a change of clothes, and some basic hygiene stuff for overnight.

Your phone blinked open with a new message right as you pulled on a nice wrap dress (sadly, it wasn’t Kylo’s favorite blue, but instead a deep red color). 

[Kylo]:

I’m here. Which unit is yours?

You texted back quickly. 

[Me]:

Oh, I’ll come out to you. Let me get my coat and I’ll be right out! :))

[Kylo]:

Okay.

:)

You grinned at his use of emoticons . Boba’s head was kissed briefly before you rushed out the door with your overnight bag in one hand, Kylo’s jacket he’d let you borrow tucked under an arm, and shoes in the other hand. While you should have put them on before rushing downstairs, your frozen feet were forgotten when you raced out to see Kylo leaning against his car right outside your complex, holding a bouquet of flowers. He looked impossibly handsome in a fitted black button-up shirt and black slacks

“Your shoes!” He instantly exclaimed as you threw yourself towards him with open arms and a wide grin. Kylo wrapped his arms around you the second you were in range and lifted you up until your feet barely skimmed the ground, the brown wrapping of the bouquet you hadn’t even acknowledged crinkling against your back. “What’s my girl doing running around barefoot, hmm?” He gently kissed your cheek and nuzzled his nose into your hair.

“I wanted to see you!” You giggled, tucking your face into him. You felt silly, but Kylo didn’t seem to mind as he carried you to the passenger’s side and placed you in the car, putting the beautiful bundle of soft pink, blue, and white flowers in your lap.

“You’re going to get hypothermia like that,” he mumbled, barely suppressing a smirk as he buckled you into the seat.

“But you have butt warmers in your car,” you said as he closed the door and quickly circled the car to get in on the driver’s side.

“Yes, butt warmers. Not foot warmers.” Kylo said, giving you a side-eye as he started the car.

You wiggled in the seat until your feet were under you. “Foot warmers.”

Kylo swatted your leg and started driving. “Feet on the floor. I don’t want you getting hurt.”

You groaned but did as you were told, knowing it was genuinely for your safety in the event he got into a car crash. Instead, he invited you to play around with the controls until you had hot air blowing on your toes.

With a sigh of relief, you asked, “So where exactly are we going?”

“You’ll see.”

“That’s a non-answer. I don’t like surprises.”

“It’s a restaurant I like,” he responded coolly.

You hummed and finally examined the flowers in your lap. They were gorgeous. A simple bouquet, but much nicer than anything you could find in a grocery store. He definitely went to a florist for them.

Kylo glanced over at you as your fingers brushed over the petal of a peony. “I don’t really get the appeal of something that will die in a week, but… They’re pretty like you, and… I thought… Thought you’d like them,” he said quietly, eyes staring determinedly at the road.

You flushed as pink as the peony and nodded. “I love them.” You turned to give him a smile and saw his brow relax a little when you affirmed his choice. “No one… No one’s ever gotten me flowers before,” you confessed quietly, looking back to the bouquet.

“Really?” Kylo sounded appalled at the thought as you nodded. He reached over to stroke a thumb on your hand before twining his fingers into yours. “Well… you deserve them.”

Your eyes welled up with tears and you were reaching over the console to plant a kiss on Kylo’s cheek before you registered that you’d even moved. You plopped back into your seat with a mumble of, “Thank you,” before you continued to admire your flowers.

After a few minutes of comfortable silence, you asked Kylo about his day and he said, “The usual. Boring meetings. Too many emails.”

“Is that Poe guy still trying to get you to go partying with him?”

Kylo groaned, “Only every single day. I wish I could slap the party animal out of him.”

“Mm, violent,” you giggled.

His eyes flickered over to you before they turned back to the road. “What about you, how was your day?”

You sighed, “The usual. Been up since four for work then had class and then office hours.”

He was quiet for a moment before he said, “You must be exhausted.”

You shrugged noncommittally, “I’ll survive.”

The car slowed to a stop at a red light and Kylo turned to fully look at you. “We don’t have to go out if you’re too tired.”

You stroked his face gently and gave him a soft smile, “I’ll be okay, really. I just wanna spend time with you. Please?”

Kylo sighed and looked over your face, looking for any hint that you were lying. When he couldn’t find one, he leaned in to kiss you until a car behind him honked. He jumped slightly and turned to look up at the now green light as he continued driving.

“Oh, I think I might be able to make a friend at work!” You exclaimed after a minute of quiet driving.

“Yeah?” Kylo encouraged.

“Mhmm!” You beamed at the memory of training a new hire at the nursery that morning. “Her name is Rose! She goes to my school, but she’s a fancy engineering student so we would never have classes together.”

“Is she nice?”

You nodded, “Super nice! And smart. And she likes plants, too. She’s into some of the nerdy stuff I like and we exchanged numbers so we can get coffee or something this week!”

Kylo turned to you with a genuine, gentle smile, “That’s amazing, Princess.”

You hummed happily, “I hope she wants to be my friend. You’re cool, but it would be nice to have another one, too.”

“It would be nice,” Kylo said quietly and placed a hand on your thigh. You sighed at the warmth it brought to your body and leaned towards him slightly. It was difficult to be cuddly in a car, but you wanted to be as close to him as possible. You let one hand rest on his wrist and used the other to trace over the veins and ligaments in his hand, studying it carefully even in the dark car. You wanted to memorize the way his hand felt against yours, the width of his fingers, the shape of his nails.

“You have pretty hands,” you mumbled quietly as you wrapped your fingers around his thumb, marvelling at the way it was longer than your hand was wide.

“Thank you?” He chuckled, using the opportunity to tangle his hand into yours.

“You could be a hand model,” you joked, squeezing his fingers with yours.

Kylo snorted a laugh and squeezed back.

The rest of the thirty minute drive was filled with bouts of your nervous chatter, his affirming hums, and occasional comfortable silence as you took in the view of rainy streets and houses that had yet to take down Christmas decorations.

“Get your shoes on, we’re almost there,” Kylo said at one red light.

“I can do it when we park,” you argued.

“No, I do valet parking. Put them on now,” he practically demanded.

“Wow, fancy,” you grumbled as you tugged on your socks and ankle boots (the ones Kylo had gotten you) in a moving car. “So we have to take everything in the car with us into the restaurant?”

“What?” Kylo asked.

“For valet parking. We can’t leave stuff in the car, right? Because they like…” You realized you didn’t really have a good concept of valet parking and were sounding dumber by the second, yet you still continued, “So they can vacuum it?” You asked slowly.

Kylo let out a little laugh and glanced at you, “No, they don’t clean the car. They just park it. Your stuff should be safe, and if not, we report it to the police.”

“Oh,” you blushed, knowing you must sound silly to him.

Instead of making you feel stupid, he reached over and squeezed your knee as you finished pulling on your shoes. “Now you know,” he said quietly.

You nodded. Within seconds of you straightening in your seat, he pulled up to the valet and quickly circled to greet you as the valet opened your door. The valet looked younger than you and way too excited to drive a Tesla when Kylo handed him the key card that started the vehicle.

Apparently, being the fancy man that he was, Kylo had a reservation and you got to your table before you could even read the name of the place. It was nicer than any restaurant you’d been to before with sleek tables and modern lighting pieces. The front wall was made up of industrial-looking windows that would certainly give you a lovely street view during the day.

Your nervous chattering only got worse when the waiter handed you a menu and you saw the prices. Sure, they weren’t ridiculous , but they were certainly more than you were expecting. Instead of studying the menu, you pointedly avoided it, choosing to look at Kylo and talking about your current favorite class, theories of language acquisition in adolescents as you rapidly bounced your leg and picked at your skin. You were on a fancy date with a fancy rich man who didn’t want a sugar baby but was spoiling you more than you were used to and taking you to fancy restaurants so he could take you home and see you naked and it was all very nerve-wracking.

“And Cornelia is just wonderful, I’ve never met a professor who—”

You were cut off when Kylo placed his hand over where yours were joined on the table and asked, “What’s wrong?”

Your leg started bouncing harder and you shook your head, “I’m okay! It’s just…” Suddenly, the room felt like it was louder and you had to squint through the bright light to see Kylo. Your neck was itching really bad and you couldn’t stop yourself from reaching up and scratching it.

“We can leave,” Kylo said quietly.

“I’m okay, just give me a second, I’m so sorry,” you mumbled as you took deep breaths. Kylo nudged a glass of water in front of you and you gladly took it, taking a few hefty gulps. You shook your head and let your eyes meet the concerned look on Kylo’s face. “Sorry.”

“You’re okay,” he practically whispered and you realized his thumb was stroking at your wrist. “Do you want me to order for you?”

You giggled and shook your head, “I’m too picky for that, but thank you.”

Kylo nodded and seemed to physically relax when he saw that you had calmed down.

The waiter stopped by your table and Kylo ordered some kind of appetizer that you had agreed to share and a bottle of wine. Your eyebrows perked up as you met Kylo’s gaze and shook your head. He scrunched his brow in silent confusion as he finished ordering.

The waiter glanced over at you, sizing you up. “Can I see your I.D.?” He asked.

You gave Kylo a look that said, ‘SEE!’ as you shook your head at the waiter. “I’m not twenty-one yet. Wine’s not for me.”

Kylo was the awkward one now as he let out an uncomfortable laugh and said, “Shit,” under his breath before turning to the waiter and saying, “Just a glass for me, then.”

The waiter eyed you both suspiciously before walking away.

You raised an eyebrow at Kylo, “Trying to encourage underage drinking now, are we?”

“I forgot,” he confessed, cringing and letting his head tilt back for a moment, exposing his neck in a way that made you want to lick it. After a few seconds, he quietly asked, “Am I too old for you?” And, as if he hadn’t meant to say it out loud, his eyes went wide and he straightened up to look at you, but didn’t say anything.

You just giggled and shook your head, “I don’t think so, Kylo. And I’m gonna be twenty-one next month, so you can wine and dine me then, how’s that?”

Kylo once again relaxed and took your hand and flipped it palm-up so he could stroke your delicate skin there similar to how you’d done in the car. “I’ll wine and dine you so much, you’ll be sick of it,” he joked quietly.

You sat like that for a while, your nervous chatter dying down to meaningful conversations about life and the world with Kylo until the waiter brought out a platter of seafood you’d never tried before. Kylo observed the white wine that had been poured for him with some weird swirling motion and sniffing before he sipped it and nodded to the waiter, requesting he bring the rest of the bottle out because it suited his needs.

When Kylo finally looked back at you, he let out a quiet chuckle. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

You met his eyes and realized how wide they had been as you looked at the lobster that was staring right back at you. “Maybe I have,” you said, glancing back at it.

“If this isn’t what you were expecting, we can order something else, too.”

You shook your head. “I just… I’ve never had any of these, I don’t know how to eat them.”

Kylo gave you a slight smile. Apparently, teaching you how to act rich was enjoyable for him as he joined you in eating everything on the plate, explaining what each was before showing you how to eat it. You didn’t feel particularly nervous, but your neck was itching even more than before, and it seemed to get worse by the second. Casually rubbing it seemed to do the trick, and thankfully, Kylo was so engrossed in eating his fifth oyster that he didn’t seem to notice.

“So these are clams, and they basically work the same as oysters,” Kylo explained after a few more minutes of you both eating. The itching was getting much worse.

“Oh, I can’t have clams. I’m allergic. Get really bad hives and stuff,” you stated simply, giving Kylo an awkward smile.

He froze, a piece of clam meat in that silly little fork halfway to his mouth. His eyes darted to where you were rubbing your neck, then back to your eyes.

“Are you serious?” Kylo asked, deadly quiet. 

Your face scrunched up, “Yeah, why?”

Kylo hissed your name and looked around the restaurant, a panicked look in his eyes as he put down his food to look at you sternly. “Are you fucking stupid?” He asked, and you barely had time to be hurt before he continued, “I’m sorry, shit I—  You just ate half a plate of things related to clams.”

“But I’m only allergic to clams, so—”

“But you said you’ve never had any of these, so how would you know what you’re allergic to or not?” Kylo said in a hushed, panicky tone that made your skin tingle with nerves.

“Well, I found out through clam chowder, so I know I’m allergic to tha—”

He tugged your hand away from your neck and clicked his tongue in admonishment, “Well, I think you can add some stuff to the list of things you’re allergic to. Maybe all shellfish would be a good start.” His eyes studied your neck and you looked down at your chest to see it was covered in bright red hives. Your face flooded with heat as you tried to cover it up.

Kylo waved down the waiter as he was walking by and asked for the check. The waiter eyed both of you suspiciously before he left.

You whined in embarrassment and let your face fall into your hands. Tears were welling up in your eyes as you sniffled out, “I’m so sorry, I really didn’t know.”

“I’ll call an ambulance.” Kylo pulled out his phone and you almost swatted it out of his hands.

“No! No, don’t do that,” you pleaded and he looked up at you, confused. “I just need benadryl. I don’t react that badly.”

He eyed you for a moment, but before he could say anything, the waiter came back and gave him the bill, which he signed off on without looking at it. The second the waiter returned with his card, Kylo slapped a handful of cash in his hand and ushered you out of the restaurant with the bottle of wine in one hand and the other wrapped firmly around your shoulders as your crying got more steady.

Honestly, you were doing everything you could to not panic. You just ruined your fancy date with a fancy man by not realizing that being allergic to one thing meant you were allergic to other things. In the past, your allergic reactions had never gotten farther than hives and maybe some throwing up, but you weren’t sure if other shellfish would treat you differently. You were scared that this one would be worse.

Kylo turned you into his body and wrapped his arms tightly around you as you waited for the car. His big hands came to rub circles on your back with just enough pressure to ease your panicked, shaky breaths.

“I’m sorry I snapped. I’m just worried. How are you feeling?” He asked into your hair.

“Itchy,” you mumbled into his chest. “Feels like my skin is full of fire ants.”

Kylo nodded and kissed your head. After a few minutes, the valet pulled up with his car and he tipped them before ushering you in and making sure you were secured before he climbed in. He held your hand as he drove, and you knew he was doing it to make you more comfortable but also to prevent you from scratching at your skin as you did with the other.

After a few minutes of driving, you noticed, even through your bleary eyes, that you weren’t driving in the direction of his house. “Kylo, where are we going?” You asked hesitantly.

“Hospital,” he said simply as he kept his eyes pointedly on the road.

You gasped, “Kylo, no! I said benadryl was fine.” You did not like hospitals and did not want the fuss that came with them, especially on a date. It was moritfying to think that your first real date with Kylo ended at a hospital.

Kylo shook his head. “I don’t want to risk it. Even if they just give you prescription strength antihistamines, it’s worth it.” He glanced over at you. “Just let me do this for you, okay?”

The soft concern in his eyes made you nod your head slowly and slump into your seat.

You were only a block away from the hospital when your stomach made an ungodly noise and you frantically patted Kylo’s arm. “Pull over. Pull over.”

Kylo glanced at you, hesitating, “We’re almost there, though…”

“Do you want me to puke in your fancy ass car?” You whined, grabbing your stomach and taking deep breaths to control the feeling.

Kylo hadn’t even come to a full stop on the side of the road when you opened the door and threw up your expensive dinner-date meal right outside the door. You hated vomiting. Of all bodily features, it was by far the worst. You managed three heaves before your stomach felt cleared enough for him to finish the drive to the hospital. The taste in your mouth was vile and you whined the whole time. Kylo held your hand until he parked in the designated urgent care spots and led you inside.

You threw up once in the parking lot trash can. Again in the receptionist desk trash can. And then another time in a bucket that they gave you as you filled out some paperwork with a sniffly nose and tears streaming down your face. Kylo didn’t leave your side once, rubbing your back and braiding your hair away from your face multiple times, undoing and redoing it as he fidgeted over you. When they called your name, he tried to go with you but was told only family could go. Somewhere in your gross, fuzzy brain, you heard him tell the nurse he was your husband. She laughed and pointed to the paperwork you’d filled out that was in her hand and said, “Single.”

Kylo grunted and flopped back into the waiting room seat, a pouty look on his face as he kissed your hand and you left him.

They took your vitals and led you to an examination room. The doctor confirmed it was an allergic reaction and hooked you up to a couple of IVs, explaining that one was filled with antihistamines and the other was to rehydrate you after all the vomiting. They left you alone for a while and you rummaged around into your purse that Kylo had made sure to grab until you found your phone.

[Kylo]:

What did they say?

Are you okay?

What did they do?

Did they have to epi-pen you?

Did you go into shock?

You typed out a response with a soft smile on your face.

[Me]:

I’m okay. They confirmed it was an allergic reaction and have me on a couple of IVs for the reaction and the vomiting.

Sorry I ruined our first date :(

[Kylo]:

You didn’t ruin it. I should’ve known or at least asked.

And it wasn’t our first date.

[Me]:

Oh, really?

[Kylo]:

Breakfast the other day was our first. This was just our first dinner date.

[Me]:

Alright. Saturday’s breakfast will have been our first date, then :)

[Kylo]:

I was enjoying it up until you broke out into hives and almost threw up in my car.

[Me]:

Well, thanks to a generous donor, I can pay for an auto-detail for you if you need it

[Kylo]:

:o How thoughtful of you.

[Me]:

Good use of emoticons

Doc’s back, brb

A nurse came back in and ensured you were less puffy then unhooked you from the IV bags before she handed you a slip. “It’s a prescription for stronger antihistamines than you’d get over the counter. You can pick them up from the pharmacy desk while your ‘husband’ pulls up the car,” she said, laughing at her own joke. She let you brush your teeth and rinse off your face, saying, “That man is pacing like a caged animal out there, you’re gonna want to smell decent when he kisses you.”

She escorted you back to the waiting room where, sure enough, you found Kylo pacing. The second you came up to him, he stopped and wrapped you up in his arms, planting nervous kisses all over your face. You heard the nurse chuckle behind you before she called the next patient back.

Once you managed to unlatch Kylo from his vice-like grip, you said, “Let me check back at the desk and then we can go pick up my drugs.” You shook the slip to show what you were talking about.

Kylo shook his head, “I already took care of it.”

You huffed indignantly. “Kylo. You just gave me a thousand bucks a few days ago, I can pay my own medical bill.”

He shrugged, “I was already planning on buying you a meal, this will have to do instead.”

“Kylo.”

He chuckled, “Relax, your parents have good insurance for you, it was nothing.”

You grumbled and buried your head in his chest, deeply inhaling his scent for a moment to calm you. “Fine. Let’s go get my drugs.”

He led you down to the pharmacy. Thankfully, Monday nights weren’t exactly prime time for hospitals, so there were very few people in the pharmacy, just like it had been in the urgent care room.

Your body was getting more and more heavy by the minute, and you found yourself heavily leaning on Kylo for support in line. By some miracle, you managed to stay upright and comprehensible as you picked up your prescription and got to Kylo’s fancy car (now scented with a slight acidic tinge that made you want to cry).

The second he had you buckled and holding your jacket like a pillow, you fell asleep.

Whatever they’d pumped into your body was quite the drug, seeing as you didn’t wake up until Kylo was scrubbing makeup off your face in his bathroom for what you wished was the first time. Your mind was fuzzy as he helped you change into one of his hoodies, pants be damned when you whined at any attempt he made to put them on you. “I can’t, they’re scratchy! Fuck pants!” You mumbled, making Kylo chuckle and throw his hands up in defeat before he helped you into bed.

The one thing you were fully aware of was how gentle he had been with you as he tucked you in and crawled into bed behind you. It couldn’t have been any later than ten p.m., and yet he still wrapped his arms around you, pulling your back tight to his chest as he kissed your head and said good night.

You nodded, head dizzy with exhaustion as you said, “Thanks, daddy. You’re the bestest friend I have,” and fell asleep.

Chapter Text

You let out a low whine and curled into the warmth next to you.

Something was buzzing nearby and you dug your head deeper into the warmth to block it out.

The warmth groaned and your brain slowly registered that it was Kylo when it moved to reach over you and grab the incessant buzzing. The brightness of your phone screen managed to reach you, even though you were buried in Kylo’s chest, and you let out another whine of complaint.

“‘Wicket’s’,” Kylo mumbled sleepily as he pushed the phone towards you.

You groaned and took your phone from his hand blindly and asked, “Can you swipe the thingy so I can answer?” You didn’t want to look at the screen. Pressure bumped up against your hand and the phone stopped buzzing. You held it to your ear and mustered all your strength to not sound too tired as you asked, “Hello?” 

The voice of your boss rang a little too loud through your ears. “ Hey, where are you? Your shift started a half hour ago! ” He asked and you could practically see him in his makeshift office pouting in a way that made his long beard and hair puff up.

You managed to pull your phone away to squint at the time. Sure enough, it was already 5:30 a.m., and you were late for work. “Shit, I’m so sorry Wicket, I must’ve overslept, I’ll be there—”

You weren’t able to tell him when you’d be there because Kylo took your phone from you and held it up to his own ear.

“Kylo, what—”

Kylo shot you a sleepy but still grumpy look and said, “She spent the night in the emergency room, she can’t come in.”

You gasped and tried to stop him, “Kylo, no! I don’t have enough sick hours, it’s fine, I’ll just—”

You were able to hear Wicket’s voice clearly with the proximity you had to Kylo, “ Who is this, exactly? ”

“I’m her friend. She had a bad allergic reaction last night and they put her on some heavy medication, she won’t be able to work.” Kylo stroked at your hair with his free hand as he spoke. Your chest warmed at the touch, but you were steadily getting upset by the way he was making decisions for you.

“ Oh, I had no idea. Let her know I’ll excuse this one, but she has to tell me in advance next time she can’t come in, kapeesh?”

“Kapeesh,” Kylo mumbled and shot you a tired smile.

“ And please take care of her. She works her ass off here and I want her back here bright eyed and cheery the second she’s better, ” Wicket finished before hanging up on his end.

Kylo made eye contact with you again and let out a huff of amusement at your boss’s comment.

“What the hell, Kylo?” You hissed, glaring at him through the darkness as best you could with what little energy you had.

“I just did you a favor, you can say ‘thank you,’ you know,” He mumbled back as he tried to pull you back into his chest.

You wiggled away from him just enough so you could look at him. “Let me make myself clear, Kylo. You do not make decisions for me on things like that. You’re already stepping on my toes with the money, and the hospital, and when you decided to not be my friend for a bit. You cannot call in sick for me.”

Kylo’s face fell and he turned his head away from yours for a moment to sigh deeply. “Okay. I thought I was helping, but I… I overstepped. I’m… I’m sorry.”

When he turned to look at you, his eyes were wide and his brow furrowed. His plush lips were in a soft pout that made you want to kiss him. You couldn’t stay mad at that face and decided to kiss it instead. Once on the nose, once on the lips. Kylo brushed his nose against yours after you pulled away from where your lips had been locked.

“You should sleep some more,” he whispered against your delicate skin.

“I want you to kiss me some more, actually,” you responded, voice even quieter than his.

Kylo huffed in amusement and pressed his lips to yours gently and slowly. His breath was not good and you were sure yours wasn’t any better, so you pulled away when it became a little gross.

“Barracuda breath?” He asked when you tucked your face back into his chest. You nodded slightly and he squeezed his arms tightly around you.

Your body was still heavy with sleep as you curled into his warmth and you couldn’t remember the last time you felt so comfortable. Even the low throbbing in your head was tuned out by Kylo’s heartbeat. “I like sleeping with you,” you said into his chest.

Kylo’s hands rubbed at your back and he kissed your head. “Me too. Now go back to sleep. I know what I want to do with you on your day off.”

Your heart sped up at that, which should have been enough to keep you awake, but you were asleep again within minutes.

A hand pushed hair from your face and your eyes began to register the light coming from the windows even through your shut lids.

“Why?” You groaned before turning away from the light and the hand.

Kylo climbed over your body until his large one was caging you in. “Come on, we’re going to eat breakfast and then we’re redoing our date.”

“Our date can be sleeping in a soft pillowy wonderland,” you grunted, face shoved deep into a pillow.

“I guarantee you’ll like this more,” Kylo’s hands stroked at your back and down your arms until you let out a huff of indignation.

“Only if I get coffee and ice cream out of this.”

“Deal. Now get up!” Kylo almost sounded… Excited as he climbed off of you.

It took you several more minutes and a lot more encouragement from Kylo, but eventually you were padding downstairs to Kylo making breakfast.

He glanced up when you walked in and shot you a look of bemusement. “I didn’t know they made corduroy overalls in adult sizes.” Kylo chuckled.

“Shut up,” you huffed as you sat at the island, crossing your arms and laying your head in them so you could watch him cook.

Kylo hummed and crossed the island to place a kiss on your head. “They look cute.”

“Are they okay for whatever we’re doing? I brought clothes for work, not a date…”

Kylo nodded and returned to the stove, where he was making eggs how you like them. “They’re perfect, actually.”

You nodded, even though he couldn’t see you. You were supposed to spend the morning watering outside at work, so you’d dressed accordingly—  black mock neck undershirt, a sweater with thick stripes of white, yellow, pink, and green, and green corduroy overalls. You kind of looked like a toddler, but in a socially acceptable way. Overalls were very practical for holding snacks and being low-maintenance.

“I thought you had work today,” you commented as he finished up cooking.

Kylo placed a plate of eggs and toast in front of you and then one at the seat to your left before he grabbed two coffee cups and placed them in the same way. “I did. But I called out sick, too. Tuesdays are pretty slow, I can just work from home this evening.”

“Oh,” you said quietly, unsure of how to feel. It was sweet he was taking time for you, but you didn’t want to get in the way of his work. He crossed the island and sat next to you. When you raised the coffee to your lips, you discovered that it was, once again, a caramel latte.

“I’m not trying to, like, guilt you or anything, but last time you surprised me with a date, I did end up in the hospital, so maybe you should tell me what this one is,” You said as you enjoyed your breakfast.

Kylo took a long, thoughtful sip from his coffee. “It’s like that game you told me about.”

Your face scrunched up in confusion as you thought about it. “... You mean Animal Crossing?”

“Yeah, that one.”

“We’re doing… Landscaping?”

Kylo chuckled and placed his hand on the side of your head to pull you a little closer and kiss you on your temple. “Yeah, exactly.”

Once you had both finished breakfast, Kylo ushered you to his car and started driving a route you didn’t recognize until you pulled into a parking lot. Your eyes went wide and you shot Kylo a huge smile.

“The aquarium?” You asked, practically squirming in your seat with excitement.

“Mhmm. This one does animal rescue and education, so I thought you’d like it,” he explained as he unbuckled you and then himself. You giggled and hopped out of the car quickly, which elicited a groan from Kylo before he came out to meet you. “You know you’re supposed to let me open your door, right?”

You were bouncing a little on your toes in front of him with a grin. “I don’t care about chivalry and stuff. It’s sweet, but I just wanna see the animals please.”

Kylo sighed and kissed you quickly. “Are you warm enough?”

“Yeah,” you said as you shoved your  hands into your pockets. Kylo quickly tugged at your wrist until you held his hand and then he started walking to the entrance.

When you pulled out your card to pay for the tickets, Kylo shot you a glare but let you pay anyway (you got a student discount with your ID, so tickets were pretty cheap). As you walked in, he nudged his nose by your ear and said, “I’ll just find another way to spoil you.”

The aquarium was amazing. They had all sorts of native fish and everything was about education rather than showing off the animals. A lot of the animals were unfit to live in the wild and were saved by the aquarium. Kylo was patient as you spent several minutes in front of each exhibit. You easily spent twenty minutes in front of the giant kelp tank, pointing fish out to each other and relaxing on a bench. The sea otters and seals were probably given even more time than that as you gushed about how cute they were and even got to see the keepers feed them. Kylo didn’t let go of your hand for almost the whole trip, only letting go so you could touch the animals in the tidepool exhibit (an activity which Kylo whole-heartedly abstained from). The aquarium had a little cafe with a few smaller exhibits in it where Kylo bought you some ice cream as promised.  You sat and talked as you ate but also enjoyed moments of comfortable silence as you watched the fish together.

Once you revisited your favorite animals to say goodbye, Kylo insisted that he wanted to see the gift shop. You had been planning on avoiding it so he wouldn’t buy you more stuff, but couldn’t say no to Kylo’s pouty face.

The moment you walked in, you saw the cutest fat seal stuffed animal and you felt your face go soft as you made eye contact with it across the store. Kylo must’ve noticed because he walked right over to it and held it out to you. “Here, I’ll buy it for you.”

“Kylo,” you said quietly, eyes still locked with the seal’s.

“Please? It’ll make me happy to know you have something I gave you to sleep with every night. And look at its cute little face,” He said as he squeezed its cheeks.

You let out a little whine and nodded, holding your hands out to take it from him. Kylo gave you a grin and placed it in your arms where you squeezed it tight to your body. “I wanna get you something, too.”

Kylo smiled and kissed your head. “You already paid for the tickets.”

You let out a huff of frustration. “Let me buy you something.”

He sighed and took in your pouty expression before nodding and wandering around the store. When Kylo’s face lit up with deviancy, you knew he’d make you regret your insistence. He walked over to a display, picked something up and turned to you with a smirk.

“This,” he stated simply.

You groaned as you saw what he was holding. It was an empty clamshell with googly eyes and a felt tongue sticking out.

“You’re the worst,” you said as you tried to take it from him, but he pulled it back.

“I don’t want you touching it, you might break out into hives,” he said and you laughed until you saw the concern etched into his features. He was serious.

“Kylo, I don’t think the shell will make me have a reaction, especially if I’m not eating it.”

His brow furrowed. “I’ll just walk it to the register for you. No touching.”

You shook your head and rolled your eyes, but let him lead you to the register. You bought him the stupid little five dollar clam and he bought you the forty dollar seal stuffed animal that was easily bigger than any of your pillows.

It was pouring rain when you left the aquarium. Kylo tugged off his rain jacket and draped it over your head, which made you giggle. “It’s just water, Kylo, I’ll survive,” you said as you shrugged off his jacket and handed it back to him. He huffed and put it back on, but pulled one side out to hold it over your head as a makeshift cover.

“You ready? Got your seal and everything?” He asked, looking at you with a smile in his eyes. You gave him a big grin, scooted in close to his body, and nodded.

Kylo pressed a kiss before stepping out into the rain, you tucked into his side to keep you dry. You had to take two steps for every one he took, and by the time you were both sitting in his car buckled in, you were a little out of breath from rushing to keep up.You tucked your face into your seal as Kylo started driving.

“Thank you for taking me out,” You said quietly after a few minutes. “I don’t think I’ve ever had that much fun on a date before.”

Kylo reached over and pried your hand from your seal so he could hold it. “I’m glad you enjoyed it. Sorry they didn’t have a whale shark like in your game.”

You beamed at the fact that he remembered how excited you were over two months ago when you caught a whale shark in Animal Crossing and told him all about it. “It’s okay, I think I’ll survive.”

“Maybe someday we can go to Mexico and swim with them,” He offered.

You laughed and shook your head. “Even though they wouldn’t hurt me, that sounds kind of terrifying. Those things are huge .”

Kylo chuckled and a comfortable silence fell in the car until you asked, “Are we gonna do anything else today?”

Kylo shook his head. “You have class this afternoon and I need to get work done.”

You sighed and slumped a little in your seat. “I could just skip class.”

“No, you could not.” He squeezed your hand. “Can’t reward you if you don’t do well, now, can I?”

Your cheeks heated at that and you sat in thought for a moment before quietly asking, “Are we… When are we gonna… Um… Will we have sex ever?”

Kylo glanced over at you before looking back at the road. “Why? Is my girl horny right now?”

Your body felt impossible hot as you whined in embarrassment and buried your face in your seal.

Kylo chuckled and squeezed your hand. “I was planning on it last night, but with your reaction and you being so drugged up, there was no way we could’ve done it.”

“We could do it today?” You offered.

He shook his head. “I need to get you to class.”

You sighed with frustration. “I just wanna make you feel good, Kylo.”

“You already do, Princess.” He glanced back over at you. “How about this. We can see each other on Friday like we used to do. I’ll order takeout, something you’re not allergic to, and we can work or watch a movie and see where the night goes from there. Does that sound good?”

You nodded slowly.

“Think you can wait that long?” Kylo joked.

You shook your head. “No, but I guess I have to.”

Kylo hummed. “Maybe ask for Saturday off so I can keep you in bed all morning, too.”

You let out a needy gasp and pressed your thighs together. You really wanted Kylo and it was hard to wait, but you knew he’d make it worth your while.

It was difficult to say goodbye to Kylo as he dropped you off at your apartment and even more difficult to sit through a three hour lecture thinking about him. Thankfully, he’d stowed a blanket and hoodie in the trunk of his car to let you borrow for the next few days. The only thing that would get you through this week was the knowledge that at the end of it, Kylo would make you his .

Chapter Text

The door was locked.

You jiggled the handle a few more times to no avail.

Oh.

You stepped back from the steps to look up to the third story. The lights were on and you could see the shadow of Kylo pacing in his study. He was home, maybe he just forgot to unlock the door for you?

No, that wasn’t it. He hated you and never wanted to see your face ever again. Or maybe he’d forgotten about you and just didn’t care.

You pulled out your phone to glance at the time and double-check the message Kylo had sent you the night before.

[Kylo]:

I’ll leave the door unlocked for you just in case I’m unavailable. Let yourself in at 7 p.m., dress comfortably.

So, yes, he definitely hated you. You didn’t want to ring the doorbell and disturb him, so you turned around with shaking breaths and started walking back towards your car. This was a bad idea, you knew it was. He didn’t want you. Why would he want you? Why—  

A window opened above you. “Did you forget something?” Kylo called from his study and you turned to see him poking his head out. Even through the darkness and the distance, you could see he looked tired and even stressed.

“The door’s locked.” You called back.

“Shit,” You heard him mumble as he dug through his pocket. “I got stuck in a call, can you catch?” He held his keys out the window and jingled them.

“Kylo, I don’t—  Ah!!” You were cut off as his keys fell towards you, and by some miracle, you caught them.

“Hurry up before you catch a cold,” He finished before shutting the window and getting back to his work.

You grumbled something under your breath about how he shouldn’t throw keys at pretty girls as you went back up the steps to his door and unlocked it.

The house had that same warm woodsy scent you’d fallen in love with and you locked the door behind you and made your way upstairs to the study. Before you were even halfway up the stairs, you could hear Kylo talking frustratedly to someone on the phone.

You tentatively approached the office and found the door open and Kylo, still dressed in his work clothes of a white button up and black slacks, pacing as he spoke into his phone.

“I understand that the files are missing, Hux. I’m just trying to figure out why you’re only bringing this up with me now and not three days ago when it happened?” Kylo shouted into his phone.

You knocked quietly to get his attention and his head shot up, his face instantly changing from frustration to something softer as he approached you. The man on the other side of the conversation became background noise as Kylo wrapped an arm around your lower back and tugged you close to him so he could kiss your forehead.

He held the phone away from his face as he spoke low to you. “Sorry, Princess, I have to take care of this, it could be awhile. How about you go get a snack and put on a movie?”

You nodded and he kissed your lips before he let you go, turned away, and proceeded to yell at the man on the phone some more. It was amazing how quickly his attitude could change.

With a quiet sigh, you went to his bedroom, closing both doors behind you so that Kylo’s volume was tuned out. You were already comfortably dressed in leggings and the hoodie Kylo had let you borrow, so you climbed onto his bed, fluffed up some pillows, and tucked yourself under a bunch of blankets as you found a movie to watch. You settled on Tangled and got comfy as you anxiously waited for Kylo to finish up.

The movie was almost over when Kylo shuffled into the bedroom, closing the door behind him as he made his way to you. Though you were lying on your stomach facing the TV, you turned so you could open your arms to greet him, and he practically fell into you like a big ragdoll. Your arms wrapped around his broad torso as he got comfortable laying on the bed and tucked his face into your neck while you scratched at his head and back.

He grumbled an apology for taking so long into your pulse before he started kissing there as his arms snaked under your body to hold you tightly.

“Is everything okay?” You asked quietly.

He nodded and then shrugged. “Work went to shit this week and I’ve been cleaning up everyone’s messes. I didn’t leave the office until midnight last night and then woke up at five because I was already getting calls from one of my assistants.”

You hummed and kissed his head. “I’m sorry, that’s awful.” You couldn’t help but flash on how he’d called out of work to spend time with you earlier in the week and felt guilt building in your stomach. “Do you think it’ll get fixed?”

Kylo nodded. “It will.” He pressed a kiss near your ear. “I just wish I wasn’t the only competent person in the office.”

You hesitated a moment as he continued kissing around your neck and jaw. “Anything I could do to help?”

Kylo shook his head and you felt his arms squeeze you a little more tightly.

“You know there was a point in time where you wanted me to work for you,” You teased.

Kylo nodded and you felt his nose bump along your skin. “Because you’re smart and hardworking. But I think I prefer this. I can kiss you and not have to worry about HR finding out.” He dug his face out of your neck to kiss your lips, nose, and cheeks until you were giggling. Both of your hands found his hair and you tugged him back so he’d look at you.

“Can I do anything to help you de-stress, then?” You asked as you placed a kiss on his nose.

He let out a thoughtful hum and looked you over, tilting his head to the side for added effect as if he were observing some strange artifact. “I think…” He trailed off so he could kiss you again. “We could order a pizza or burgers or something greasy,” he kissed you again. “And watch any movie you’d like.”

Kylo’s lips were back on yours as he kissed you deeply and you had to turn away from him to talk. “I was thinking more along the lines of… Something else?” You teetered the line of being playful and suggestive, merely testing the waters.

Kylo’s lips traced down your neck. “Let’s eat first before it gets too late, hmm?”

Right as you were about to argue, your stomach growled and Kylo pulled out his phone to start looking for food to be delivered. After him debating over burgers or pizza, he decided to order pizza with half of your toppings and half his. In the process of ordering, he discovered that they had something called ‘cheeseburger fries,’ which were kind of like nacho fries but with typical burger toppings instead, so he ordered a side of that. The second he was done, he put the phone down and resumed kissing you. His lips tasted of coffee and something minty, maybe chapstick. Kylo’s hands didn’t wander as his mouth got more passionate against yours, but he did turn the both of you until he was properly perched above you with his hips resting in between yours.

When your hips instinctively rocked into his, you felt a growing hardness there and pulled away from the kiss just barely to ask shyly, “Can you let me take care of you for once?”

Kylo chuckled and pressed his lips back to yours. “I thought I said we would wait until after dinner?”

“We have some time to kill…” You trailed off as one of your hands slid up and down his back in soothing motions.

Kylo studied your face closely for a moment. His dark eyes looked between your own eyes and mouth. You gave him a sweet smile as he looked at you.

“Fuck,” He groaned as he kissed you again.

“I wanna try sucking your cock please,” you mumbled into his lips, causing another groan to leave his chest as his hips bucked into yours slightly.

Kylo tugged your bottom lip into his mouth and sucked on it, earning a choking gasp to escape your throat. “You wanna suck my cock? Hmm?” He asked huskily and you couldn’t help but squirm beneath him and nod. His hips started rocking into yours. “Can you ask nicely for it, Princess? Can you say ‘Please, please let me suck your cock’?”

This was so deliciously dirty. You’d never spoken like this before, but the thought of doing what he wanted was turning you on like nothing else. You whined quietly at the friction he was creating between your hips as you nodded and said, “Please, please let me suck your cock, Daddy.”

Oops. That didn’t come out the way you’d planned, and your eyes widened in fear the second it did so you could gauge Kylo’s reaction.

His breathing stuttered before it deepened, and you swore you saw his pupils dilate at your words. In an instant, his mouth was on your neck, sucking a hickey into it as he rolled over until you were on top of him.

“See,” Kylo started as he continued kissing down your neck. “I thought I heard you call me that the other night.” His hands found the bottom of his hoodie you were wearing and he got a nod from you before he pulled it over your head, revealing the lacy blue bralette below it that you’d bought with his money just for him. Kylo let out a low sigh as his hands grazed the sides of the fabric. “I also thought I was losing it when you said that, but I guess someone is a little more naughty than she lets on, hmm?”

Your cheeks flushed with heat as he leaned into you to suck another hickey onto the top of your breast. “I-It just felt right,” You managed to mumble out.

Kylo hummed as his lips traced the top of the lace that covered the swell of your chest. “You wore my color, so I think… That makes you mine.” He pressed a few more soft kisses to your chest then plopped backwards onto the pillows and his hands smoothed down your sides until they rested on your hips. You sat up to see him better and he admired the view for a moment before asking, “So, Princess, you really wanna help Daddy relax?”

You nodded eagerly and gave him a smile. “I’d love to help you relax and feel good… Daddy.”

Kylo chuckled at your hesitation. “You don’t have to call me that if you don’t want to.”

You shook your head. “I want to… But… Are you okay with it? I’m kind of interested in that dynamic, not just the title, I guess…” You said hesitantly. This was kind of a big deal to some people, but Kylo was already caring for you in a way that made you feel comfortable enough to be interested in… any kind of dynamic with him.

Kylo nodded slowly. “I like taking care of you, if that’s what you mean.” He stated and you confirmed with a nod. “We can figure out the details later, okay Princess? Right now, you can call me Daddy or Kylo or whatever feels natural, okay?”

You gave him a mischievous grin and leaned down to kiss him. “Okay, Ben ,” You said quietly against his lips before he groaned and turned his head away from you.

“Okay, anything but that ,” Kylo said as he made a face as if he’d tasted a spoiled glass of milk. He shook his head to clear the expression as he gave your hip a squeeze. “Are you gonna be good for me or are you gonna be a little brat tonight, hmm?”

Blush rose in your cheeks as he looked at you with his intoxicating dark eyes. “I wanna be good for you.”

Kylo hummed and his hands moved up to your hair. You could feel him tugging on it until he reached to your hand and pulled the hair tie off of your wrist. He made impressively quick work of putting your hair into a ponytail before he released you.

He unbuttoned his shirt and tossed it onto the floor, giving you a chance to marvel at his toned chest for a moment and said, “Then be a good girl and make me feel good, sweetheart.” 

You nodded slowly and started scooting backwards down his legs as you said, “Okay so I haven’t done this in awhile? I mean, it should be… like… muscle memory I guess?” You were blushing furiously now as the nervous rambling started. You’d offered to make him feel good and now the possibility of you being bad at this was sinking in. “So if it doesn’t feel good, please tell me, or—”

Kylo chuckled and moved to be sitting up in bed. He reached out and cupped your face softly, his thumb tracing over your cheek. “Can you look at me?” Your wide eyes went to his and he gave you a soft, encouraging smile. “You’ll do fine. And you don’t have to take the whole thing, either. Just… see what works for you and I’ll tell you if it’s good or not. Can you do that for me, my good girl?”

You nodded and got comfortable laying between his legs, your face hovering over the straining bulge in his pants. When you went to undo the button, your hands were shaking so bad that Kylo had to move his hands over yours and help you unbutton.

“We don’t have to do this if you’re nervous, Princess,” He said quietly as you managed to pull the zipper down.

You shook your head. “I really, really want to. I just… I really want to make it good for you. You make me feel so good, I just—”

Kylo’s hand brushed your cheek again and you looked up to see kindness in his eyes. “You’re so good, sweetheart. Just enjoy yourself, okay? And you can tap on my thigh if it gets to be too much, alright?”

You nodded slowly. Giving blowjobs was not something you’d normally consider enjoyable, but you wanted to do nothing else. Your nerves were still getting to you, so you asked quietly, “Can you take it out for me? I don’t wanna hurt you.”

Kylo let out a low chuckle and nodded. “You won’t hurt me, baby.” He batted your hands away and tugged at the waistband of his trousers and underwear at the same time until his cock sprang free.

“Oh!” You accidentally said aloud when you saw it. It was big. Wide and long with a slight upward curve to it. The tip was cut and the tender flesh was the same pink as his lips and it had a few prominent veins along the shaft that your mouth practically watered at.

Your nerves were getting to you and you started giggling. This was not good. You knew the worst thing you could do to a man’s ego was giggle at their dick, but you were so nervous and your whole body felt hot.

“If you’re just going to laugh—” He started but you shook your head.

“Kylo this is the prettiest dick I’ve ever seen,”  you managed to say. “I’m so sorry, I’m just insanely nervous, it’s so pretty, I don’t mean to laugh, I just—  fuck I’m nervous. You’re so pretty, Kylo.”

You looked up as your giggles faded into a blushing smile and met Kylo’s soft eyes. His hands came to stroke at your hair and there was a definite red tint to his cheeks as he looked down at you.

“No one’s ever called my dick ‘pretty’ before,” he said quietly.

“Well, it is,” you nodded at him and then looked back at the length sitting inches from your face. “Can I…?”

Kylo nodded and continued stroking your hair as you got closer to him and finally managed to wrap a hand around the base of his cock, earning a deep exhale from him. You gave it a few experimental strokes, marvelling at how your hand couldn’t even fully wrap around it. Your nerves were definitely getting to you, but all you knew was make him feel good .

After receiving an encouraging nod from Kylo, you licked a stripe from base to tip on the underside of his cock. Kylo groaned above you and shifted in his seat as he watched you suck the tip into your mouth. You let your tongue trace his head a few times before you popped it out of your mouth, licking your lips to taste the saltiness of his precum on your skin. Once you felt acquainted with his length, you took it into your mouth, as far down as you could. It was only halfway in when it hit the back of your throat and you whined in frustration. You promised him you’d make him feel good, but the damn thing was too big for your mouth.

Kylo’s voice spoke softly above you, “Breathe through your nose, Princess. You can take more if you relax.” You huffed through your nose and the reminder that you could still breathe was somewhat soothing as he pushed your head further down. Tears stung at your eyes, but you let him go deeper into your throat until your nose was tickled by the trimmed hairs at the base of his cock. “There you go. Good girl. Doing so well for me,” Kylo praised quietly.

The second he stopped putting pressure on your head, you got to work bobbing your mouth up and down on his length. You started slow, testing the waters, but quickly sped up as you watched the effect it had on Kylo. His face was flushed a bright red that you could see even through the dimmed lighting, and you noted that it spread down his neck and over his chest. His eyes were dark and fixed on you as you gave him everything you could. 

You read once on twitter that humming made it impossible to gag, but you were finding that to not be true. There was a non-stop humming moan coming from your mouth, and while it helped, each time he slammed into the back of your throat made your chest heave as you gagged. You weren’t even taking the whole thing anymore, but your throat was being brutalized by your own efforts. If it weren’t for the constant stream of, “Good girl. So fucking good. Fuck , just like that, sweetheart. Perfect sweet girl,” leaving Kylo’s mouth, you would’ve had to stop.

When your jaw started to cramp up, you let your mouth pop off of his cock and quickly replaced it with a pumping hand. Your mouth was still connected to him through strings of saliva that had also drenched his length and your chin. Kylo carded his hand through your loose ponytail and kept mumbling praise to you. His glassy eyes caught the light as he looked down at you and for a moment you thought he was crying.

“You’re so perfect. So fucking perfect, my sweet girl. So perfect and so mine .” He mumbled shakily. His free hand came to rub at the hinge of your jaw gently, easing some of the ache there. “Think you can make me come with this pretty little mouth?”

You nodded and asked honestly, “Is it good, though? Am I doing a good job?” 

Kylo chuckled and responded with his own nod. “I wouldn’t be praising you like I have been if it wasn’t good. You’re good. So good for me.”

You let out a needy whine at his words and a wave of embarrassment that was totally out of place rushed over you when your hips grinded into the bed.

“My girl likes that, huh? Likes being told how good she is? How perfect she is?” You squeezed the base of his cock in response and he groaned, letting you admire the way his chest heaved with every breath. “Good girl.” His hand returned to the back of your head as he pushed you towards the head of his dripping cock. “Now suck.”

It was almost unnatural how fast you got back to work. You worked your hand in rhythm with your mouth and Kylo let out a series of restrained groans above you. Both of his hands tangled in your hair as he helped you bob your head roughly over him. Each time, you took him a little deeper and he mumbled praise in between noises of pleasure. You let your brain zone out a little as he helped you work. There was no doubt in your mind that your mascara was running down your face because you felt hot tears streaming from your eyes.

It should’ve scared you how much you liked it. All the sex you’d had had been gentle and awkward. This was nothing like that. Kylo was rough and took whatever he wanted, and you loved it. It hurt a little and was very overwhelming, but you trusted Kylo enough to let him do this. To let him use you. You distantly felt your hand grasping at his thigh and his hips began to stutter, his thrusts now erratic.

He was close.

It only took a few more pumps and a combined effort before he pulled your head all the way down until you felt like you were choking and he came down your throat with a roaring groan. Your body shook and he finally released you and your head felt like jelly as it fell to rest on his thigh. You didn’t even have to swallow his cum—  it was already so far down your throat that there was no way you could spit it out, not that you’d ever want to. It was so thick that it sat like a piece of gum lodged in your esophagus and you managed to swallow all the excess spit in your mouth to help move it down. Kylo undid your ponytail and combed his hands through your hair as he caught his breath. You pressed kisses to the inside of his thigh as he came down.

It was a few minutes later that he finally asked, “Are you okay?”

You nodded hazily and continued with your lazy kisses. Kylo hummed and managed to get his arms under yours so he could pull you up to straddle his lap and rest your head in the crook of his neck. His hands stroked at your back as he mumbled more praise to you. “You did so well, my girl. Thank you. You made me feel so good, my perfect, sweet girl. Do you need anything right now?”

Your voice was hoarse as you responded, “‘M hungry.”

You felt Kylo’s chuckle more than you heard it as his shoulders shook with it. “Food should be here any minute now. How about we go get cleaned up?”

With a nod, Kylo helped you climb off of him and he ushered you to the bathroom. He helped you lean against the counter and you heard water running before a cool cloth ran under your eyes and over your cheeks and chin, collecting the tears and spit that was left there. A wave of discomfort rolled over you and you had to take off your leggings, the tight fabric feeling restricting the longer you waited. 

“I swear, it’s like you’ve waged war on pants,” Kylo joked as you whined at the fabric. He helped pull them off and stepped out of the room momentarily before he returned with the white button-up he’d been wearing earlier. “Put this on.”

You shook your head. “I feel itchy.”

“I know,” Kylo threw the fabric over your head and started worming your arms into the huge sleeves. “I’ll take care of that after we eat. I don’t want to be interrupted by the delivery guy. I also don’t want you getting cold, and you’ll look really pretty walking around in this.”

You let him button it up and felt like the pinnacle of a woman fresh from sex, like something you’d see in a movie. His shirt hit your mid-thighs and it smelled wonderfully of his expensive cologne. Right as Kylo stepped out of his slacks, the doorbell rang.

“I can get it, Kylo.” You said as you walked through the doorway.

“Princess, you look like you just gave a rough blowjob.” You turned and raised an eyebrow at him as he followed you, tugging on sweatpants. The doorbell rang again. He paused and looked you over. “Actually, yeah.” Kylo handed you the twenty dollar bill in his hand that he must’ve just fished from his wallet. “Here’s the tip. Go answer the door.”

You hesitated, observing his determined expression to see where he was going with this and then it clicked. He wanted to show you off. Parade you around someone who could never have you and make sure they knew you were his. You tentatively took the money and hurried down the stairs as the doorbell rang again. Kylo was close behind you but lingered on the bottom of the stairwell to watch as you opened the door.

The kid behind it was younger than you, maybe eighteen. He was gangly and exactly what you’d expect of a pizza delivery driver. The way his eyes almost immediately trained on your boobs was not lost on you.

“I uh… I have um…” He stuttered out. “A large pizza, half and half… and um…” His gaze flicked over your body and you tried not to giggle. “Some cheeseburger fries?”

You nodded. “That’s right.” He handed over the pizza that had already been paid for and you mumbled a few curse words as you tried to hand him his tip with your arms full.

"If you need help, I could—" The kid started but was interrupted by Kylo coming down the stairs, looking just as disheveled as you as he took the big box from you with one large hand and let you hand the twenty to the delivery guy. Kylo used his free hand to wrap around your waist and then pressed a kiss to your head.

The delivery driver flushed a deep red as he took in the state of you and Kylo, realization settling in as he took in your appearances. He nodded and stumbled out a good night before retreating to his car.

"He was ogling you," Kylo said the moment the door closed.

"Wasn't that what you wanted?" You asked and headed to the kitchen to get plates and napkins. Kylo followed you closely.

“Yes, I wanted him to see what’s mine,” He responded as he placed the box on the counter and snaked his arms around your middle from behind you, tucking his face into your neck.

“So you’re into… Like… Would that be exhibitionism or—”

“I like knowing you’re mine. I like the rest of the world knowing you’re mine.”

You hummed at that, trying to keep your cool because that sounded like a lot more than the casual hookup friend you thought you were. “Well, I am yours. So I guess that works out.”

Kylo hummed and released you so he could grab some plates and napkins. He put them on top of the pizza box that he picked up before he gently tapped your leg with his foot and nodded towards the stairs. “Living room or bedroom?”

“I don’t really want to eat greasy food in bed or have the room smell like pickles and cheese all night.”

Kylo nodded. “Living room it is, then.”

You followed him up to the second story and immediately got comfy on the couch. As he set up the food, you chatted about how your days had been and he even inquired about your cat, Boba, by name, which made your heart flutter for some reason.

“Do you have new photos of him you can show me later?” He asked as he handed you a plate filled with pizza and fries.

You beamed as you accepted the food. “I have a picture of him sleeping on Selene, the seal you bought me. It’s really cute, just remind me to show you.”

“You named her Selene? Like the moon—”

“Like the moon goddess,” you interrupted accidentally right as he was about to say it. “Yeah, exactly. Because she’s round and gray… Like the moon.”

“That’s cute,” Kylo said as he plopped next to you on the couch and slung an arm over your shoulders. “What movie do you wanna watch? Anything you want.”

You thought about it for a moment. “Well, what kind of movies do you like?”

Kylo shrugged. “Artsy, indie movies I guess. Political thrillers. I just like any movie, really.”

You stared at him, thinly veiled distaste evident on your face. “Political thrillers? That’s a thing?”

Kylo nodded. “I’m not in the mood for one right now, though. You choose something.”

“Are you sure? My brand of movies is kinda… The polar opposite.”

“I like the movies you’ve picked before.”

“Have we watched Legally Blonde yet? That’s… Kinda like a political… A political thriller, is that what you called them?”

Kylo nodded. “Political thriller, yes. I would certainly not call that one, though. And no, we haven’t. ”

“Well, it’s law and stuff…”

He chuckled and kissed your head. “It sure is. We can watch that.”

“Is that okay?”

“Yeah,” Kylo held a cheese-covered fry to your mouth and you ate it happily. “I don’t think I’ve watched that since high school. I don’t remember hating it.”

"We can watch something else—"

Kylo took the remote from your hands and quickly found the movie you'd chosen. "When I say 'anything you want' and tell you something is okay, you need to believe me, alright?"

"But—"

"No 'but's. It was a yes or no question, so let's try that again. When I say I want to watch what you want, or buy you what you want, or anything like that, will you believe me? Yes or no."

Tentatively, you responded, "Yes."

"Good. I don't do things I don't want to do, so I will never offer to do something I don't want to do. Understand?"

"Yes."

"And I want you to do the same. You never have to do anything you don't want to do, alright?"

You had to look away as you lied, "Alright."

"No, look at me."

You did.

"Good girl. Never do something you don't want to do. I can take a 'no' if it's for your sake. Got it?"

"Got it." This time, it wasn’t a lie.

"Good. Now we're going to watch your version of a political thriller and eat all the greasy food we want and you're going to cuddle with me. How does that sound?"

"I like that plan," you said as you turned yourself into his chest a little. "Can we have sex after?"

Kylo chuckled and put another cheesy fry by your mouth. You took the bait and he said, "Good girl. We'll see."

"I'm really wound up from earlier," you added.

"I know. I'll take care of you, don't worry."

You pressed a kiss to his shoulder. “Thank you.” Kylo’s hand moved to cup the side of your head as he pulled you in to kiss your temple in response.

It was only about an hour into the movie before you and Kylo started to get handsy with each other. Once your food had settled in your stomachs (and his heartburn passed, something you teased him for as he chewed on Tums), it started with your legs draping over his lap. Then his hand tracing your calves, then your thighs. His other hand trailed down your rib cage until it was caressing the side of your breast. Your fingers stroked the warm skin of his hands. Your eyes lingered on his chest as he watched your hands intertwine.

“Do you want to maybe go upstairs?” You asked quietly.

“I thought we were watching a movie, sweetheart.” Kylo turned to tuck his nose into the side of your neck, where he placed gentle kisses.

“Yeah, but…” You shifted in your seat and he looked at you with dark eyes. Your heart tightened as your pulse sped up. You wanted him so bad. “I’ve seen this movie a million times, I’d rather… Watch you on me?” That came out much more stupid than you’d intended.

Kylo snorted and pulled your head in to kiss you. “Very smooth.”

You huffed indignantly and climbed off his lap as you said, “Look, I’m really worked up, and if you aren’t gonna do anything about it, I would like to take a cold shower and go to sleep because my skin feels like it’s covered in ants and—”

Kylo cut you off by tugging you back to his body and kissing you deeply. His touch relaxed you and you remembered that he promised he’d take care of you.

His lips separated from yours and a needy whine managed to escape your chest. Kylo traced a large hand over your cheek and said, “I need to clean up here. Go upstairs and get comfy, okay? I’ll be right up.”

“Promise?” You asked hesitantly.

Kylo nodded and kissed your forehead. “Promise. Now hurry up.”

You beamed at him and hurried upstairs, and you swore you heard him chuckling behind you as you did so.

Chapter Text

The sound of the bedroom door closing behind you was too loud. So was the sound of Kylo’s shirt on you as you moved through the room.

Too loud.

And itchy.

You were itchy.

But not in an allergic reaction to shellfish kind of way. More in an…  Overstimulated way, which made no sense because Kylo had barely touched you.

Your feet shuffled along the hardwood floor, your thick cotton socks paired with the oversized button-up making you feel like Tom Cruise in Risky Business , a movie you’d never seen yet still had the audacity to mentally reference. A mirror stood before you, but you didn’t remember stepping into the bathroom. 

You took the shirt off.

No. What if Kylo changed his mind and just wanted to nap, making you look silly?

You put the shirt back on, but left it unbuttoned.

That still made it look like you were expecting sex. Which you kind of were.

Why am I so fucking nervous? You asked yourself silently as you buttoned the shirt back up part way.

A different part of your head supplied, Because you actually like him.

Oh. Oh, right. That made sense.

You’d had meaningless sex with a few other guys, but that’s all it ever was. Meaningless. And bad. You lost your virginity because you felt obligated to. You hooked up with a couple other guys after that because they bought you food and said that they deserved compensation, which made no sense at all. Jake didn’t even really have sex with you, but it was still meaningless.

Kylo was anything but meaningless to you. He cared about you so much that it made your head spin, and he never asked for anything in return. He just gave, and gave, and gave—  orgasms, food, gifts—  and never expected you to do anything for him. Kylo just enjoyed your company , a sentiment you never thought could be granted to you by a man. 

You whined with frustration as your shaking fingers unbuttoned the shirt again. Your cheeks were hot and you couldn’t see straight.

What if you fucked up? What if he saw you naked and decided you weren’t worth it? What if he didn’t like the bra and panty set you’d picked out for him? What if he had you do some position you’d never done before and you weren’t flexible enough and you got a cramp or farted or something? 

Your face fell in horror and your body decided that it needed to move. Shaky legs carried you through the room as you started to walk around the room fruitlessly.

Am I pacing? You thought to yourself as you paced, buttoning the shirt back up again. Who the fuck paces, that’s— 

Warm hands found your shoulders and pulled you into an even warmer chest that vibrated with the statement, “We don’t have to do this if you don’t want to. You know that, right?”

You nodded, deep breaths finally making their way into your lungs. “I think that’s why I’m nervous.”

“You’re nervous… Because you have a choice?” Kylo asked quietly. His hands smoothed over your back.

You managed to look up at him, and he looked down at you with soft, concerned eyes. “You’re just… You’re different , maybe, and I… I know it sounds silly, but I just… I really don’t wanna fuck this up.”

Kylo let out a breathy laugh that made you furrow your brows. “There is no way in hell you’re fucking this up, I promise.” One hand held you tightly so the other could push some hair from your face. “We could finish this night with me in the emergency room for a broken dick and I’d still ask you to kiss me.”

“You say that, but—”

“What did we talk about earlier, hmm?” He kissed your forehead and his hand returned to your back. “If I say I want something, that means I want it. I won’t lie to you. I want you and your bouncing leg,” he bumped his knee against yours to make you aware of your leg shaking with nerves. “And your off-kilter buttoning job,” he nodded down to your chest where you’d buttoned one side of his shirt a button hole too high. “And the broken dick you gave me in my example.”

You sniffled as tears filled your eyes. “I’m a handful, I’m sorry.”

Kylo chuckled and pulled away from you just barely, his arms tracing forward until he held both of your hands. “I have two hands, though, so I think I can manage.”

The tears slid down your face and a sad choking sound came from your throat. Kylo leaned forward to kiss the dampness under each eye, making you sniffle some more. There was a confession dancing in the back of your throat that you refused to let slip in fear of scaring him off. It was too soon. You would have to wait. Instead, you said something stupid. “You keep bringing up a broken dick, is that like, some kink of yours you want me to perform tonight?”

Good job ruining the moment.

“Not that I know of,” Kylo said softly as he pulled you back to his chest. “So you’re sure you want to do this?”

You nodded.

“We can stop any time, okay?” Kylo pressed.

“I know. And I—” You pulled away to look at him better. “I know I’m nervous, but please don’t let that stop you. It’s not because I don’t want to do this, I just… I’m just an anxious kid, right?”

Kylo let out a faint chuckle. “Yeah. And that reminds me, I brought up some wine. It always calms me down, and you’d help me in my life-long passion of encouraging underage drinking.”

Your eyes widened. “You’re nervous too?”

Kylo snorted and shook his head too quickly. “No! No. No, I’m just.” He huffed and looked at you as you began to giggle. “I thought you’d like some.”

You hummed thoughtfully. “Is it gross wine?”

Kylo shook his head. “It’s the bottle I got when you almost died.”

“I did not almost die. I just… Blew up a little.”

“Mhmm, okay.” Kylo kissed your head. “Do you wanna try some? Might stop the shaking.”

You nodded and he let go of you to walk over to his nightstand where he’d placed a bottle of wine and two glasses. By some miracle, you managed to walk over to the bed and sit next to where he stood.

“How much do you want?” He asked, holding up one of the glasses.

You held up your thumb and index finger only slightly apart to show him. “Just a sip” You scrunched up your face and deepened your voice for your best Anton Ego impression. “‘If I don’t love it , I don’t swallow .’”

Kylo quirked an eyebrow at you and asked, “What’s with the voice?”

You giggled. “You know! From Ratatouille !” Kylo just blinked at you and your face fell. “Oh my God, you’ve never seen Ratatouille .”

Kylo looked a little sheepish as he said, “Well, who’s in it? Maybe I have and just forgot?”

“It’s a Pixar movie, I don’t really know who’s in it.” You looked up as he poured you the tiniest splash of wine.

“Maybe we can watch it later,” Kylo said as he handed you the glass of wine.

You took it with two eager hands and copied him as he swirled his own glass. He must’ve noticed, because he looked down at you with a grin and sat beside you. 

“What does that do, hmm?” Kylo asked as he sniffed the wine.

“Uh… Makes it smell better?” You guessed, and to your surprise, he nodded.

“And what do you smell?” Kylo gave you a small smirk.

You held the glass up to your nose and gave it a hearty sniff. It smelled tart, alcohol-y, and generally… “It smells like wine.”

Kylo snorted. “Smell any citrus? Pear? Florals?”

With another big inhale, you tried to smell any of those. “It smells like old grapes, Kylo.”

He gave you a bit more of his smile as he shook his head. “You’ll learn.” He sipped some of the wine and kind of… Garbled it in his front lip like mouthwash. While it looked a little silly and he was definitely showing off for you, you couldn’t help but watch his beautiful pink lips as they swished the wine.

Kylo must’ve caught you staring because he made eye contact with you and swallowed before asking, “Do you know what that does, kid?”

A puff of breath escaped your nose and you looked over at him with a pout. “It mixes it, duh. And I’m not a kid,” You said firmly before tipping the wine into your mouth, only to immediately spit it back into the cup with a whine.

Kylo laughed heartily. It wasn’t his usual chuckle or amused hum, but a real laugh. It was music to your ears, even if you were the object of his humor. His whole face crinkled beautifully and he tipped his head back a little so his loose curls brushed the back of his neck. You admired the way his throat moved with the sound before he tilted his head back towards you and tugged you to sit closer to him.

I love you.

The words were so close to slipping out of your mouth that you physically had to swallow to keep them down.

Kylo pressed a kiss to your forehead and let his lips linger there as his laughter died out.

“You’re my sweet girl, huh?” He asked, his breath warm on your skin.

You nodded slowly.

“It doesn’t mix it,” He hummed. “It makes it hit all of your taste buds so you can taste it better.”

“I don’t like it,” you said, finding your voice to be unable to go above a whisper.

Kylo took your glass from your hands and put it and his own glass back on the nightstand. “You don’t have to drink it, it’s pretty dry.” When he turned back to you, a soft smile still dancing on his lips, you looked up at him with wide eyes.

“I wanna kiss you,” you said almost silently.

Kylo’s warm body leaned into yours until his face was perched just inches away from you. “Then kiss me,” he mumbled.

You closed the gap slowly, eyes darting between his lips and his dilated pupils. 

Pretty pretty man. That was all you could think before your lips finally connected with his, only for him to pull away immediately, causing a whine to come from your throat in protest.

“‘Pretty pretty man’?” Kylo asked with a sly grin.

You flushed red. You really needed to get your thoughts under control before you said something much more stupid to him on accident.

“I said that out loud?” You whispered quietly.

Kylo snorted and nodded. “It seems like you do that a lot, Princess.” His lips were framed by his smile lines like parentheses (holding some vital information).

Your cheeks felt impossibly hot. This man was going to ruin you.

When his lips finally met yours, you moaned into his smile. He was so beautiful, and wonderful, and his lips were so warm on yours.

Kylo’s large hands cupped under your butt so he could pull you into his lap, and you shifted with him until you straddled him, your arms wrapping loosely around his neck. His fingers settled on your hips, where he traced delicate patterns into your skin—  a sharp contrast to the way his mouth tugged on your bottom lip with his teeth, pulling a moan from your throat.

“You make such pretty sounds, sweetheart,” Kylo mumbled, his lips ghosting down over your chin and onto your neck. “Can’t wait until you’re making those sounds with my cock in you,” he whispered against your ear and you couldn’t help but whimper and buck your hips against his.

“ Please ,” was all you could say in response.

“Please what, my girl? You need to learn to use your words or else I won’t understand what you want.”

You whined in frustration and continued rocking your hips against him. It felt so good and you were so wet, you just— 

“Please just fuck me, I’m ready,” you mumbled.

Kylo’s hands squeezed your hips until you were sure they’d bruise, stopping your motions.

“You’re ready when I say you are, Princess.” Kylo sucked on your pulse and you tried to buck into him to relieve some of the pressure building in your core, but his hands were unyielding as they stopped you. “Can you be good for me? Only good girls get to come, and I don’t want you going to bed unsatisfied, hmm?”

“I can be good,” you breathed as his mouth trailed lower.

“So if I let go of your hips to unbutton this shirt, you’ll sit still?” Kylo looked up at you from where he was hunched to kiss your skin. 

You nodded.

“Words, kitten.”

You whined at the pet name and nodded again, this time saying, “I’ll be good.”

It was a struggle to keep still, and Kylo only made your job harder by unbuttoning his shirt you were wearing at a glacial pace. To make matters worse, it seemed every button on the shirt (all five that you had buttoned, at least) had a direct line of pleasure to your core. Watching his fingers work the tiny pieces of plastic with his giant fingers made you shake with need.

“Kylo…” You said in a low, warning voice as he teased his way through the second button. Your hands rubbed anxiously over his shoulders.

Kylo didn’t look at you, too focused on his work as he demanded, “Be good.”

“I’m trying,” you whispered. Sitting still on his lap with his hard cock pressing against your cunt through the thin fabric of sweatpants was a lot easier said than done.

“I know, Princess,” he mumbled, glancing up at you for the briefest of moments. “And you’re doing such a good job. Just a little longer, okay? And then I’ll make you feel really good. I promise.”

You nodded desperately.

Kylo chuckled low and soft as he moved down to the third button. “Do you have any hard limits?” He asked quietly. “Stuff you have no interest in trying?”

Your chest shook with a deep breath. “Skydiving sounds absolutely terri—”

“I meant with sex, darling,” Kylo chuckled, pausing his work to look at you.

Your cheeks flushed pink. “Right. Um… Nothing with bodily fluids like… Like pee or… Stuff like that. That’s a thing, right? A piss kink?”

Kylo snorted a laugh and nodded. “It is a thing, and it’s a thing I’m not into. What about spanking?”

Your cheeks warmed more. You had had to practically beg the guys you’d been with before to spank you, and they’d never given you more than a little smack on the butt. “I-I… I’d like that, yeah.” An image of Kylo’s big hand hitting the skin of your ass flashed through your mind and you bucked against him slightly without even thinking about it.

Kylo ‘tsk’ed before you could apologize and his hands fell to hold your hips again. “I thought you said you’d be good?”

You whined and buried your face in his neck with a shake of your head. “I’m sorry, it’s just really really hard and I thought of you spanking me and I—”

You hadn’t even registered that Kylo’s hand had left your hip until it came down hard against your ass with a loud smack . You yelped loudly at the stinging impact and, on instinct, your arms wrapped tightly around his neck so you could pull yourself to be flush against him. Your hips must’ve rocked into his, because he groaned near your ear.

“I know, Princess,” Kylo shushed you, the hand that had just spanked you coming up to stroke your hair. “Is that what you wanted? Hmm?”

You nodded into his neck. Kylo’s other hand came to stroke at the spot he’d just hit, simultaneously intensifying the sharp tingling there and soothing it into a dull ache.

“You’ve never been spanked that hard, huh?” He asked gently and you shook your head. “Did you like it?” You nodded. “We can work up to more, okay? Do you like the idea of being punished like that for misbehaving?”

“Yeah,” you mumbled into his skin. Your own skin was hot from the idea of Kylo bending you over his knee and spanking you when you misbehaved. If you weren’t already drenched , you certainly were now.

“Do you remember your safeword?” Kylo asked quietly.

“Um… It was either red or… strawberries?”

Kylo chuckled and kissed your head. “It was strawberries, but if you say red, I’ll still stop, okay?”

You nodded. 

“You wanna lean back so I can finish undressing you?”

Without words, you did just that. Both of Kylo’s hands came up to stroke your cheeks. You hadn’t even known they were damp until Kylo said, “I’ll be more gentle next time. Not every spank needs to make you cry, I’m sorry.”

“It felt good, though,” you mumbled. “I… I like being used like that.”

Kylo tilted his face closer to yours. “Being used?”

You nodded shyly. “I just wanna make you feel good. I… I want you to do whatever you want, and I’ll tell you if it’s too much.”

Kylo stared at you for a moment and your heart thudded loudly in your chest. Had you said something wrong?

Right as you were about to take it back or laugh it off, Kylo asked, “So if I wanted to tie you to my bed and strap a vibrator to your clit and just leave you like that for a couple hours, I could do that?”

You nodded shakily. “Yeah, I could like that.”

“What if I said I wanted to edge you until you were sobbing for me? Could I do that just to hear your pretty little noises?”

You whimpered and nodded, looking deep into his dark eyes.

Kylo hummed. “Or if I woke up hard in the middle of the night, I could roll over and fuck you as you slept?”

Your cheeks felt like they’d melt off, they were so hot. The thought had crossed your mind a few times, but you didn’t know that was something people did. “That’s… Yeah, I…” You whined quietly and straightened your posture so your center rubbed against him a little. “I’d like that.”

Kylo groaned and his hands finally, graciously, returned to the last couple of buttons on the shirt, which he all but ripped open before throwing the fabric to the floor. His mouth was on your skin before he could even admire the matching set of light blue underwear you wore. He sucked bruises into the swell of your breasts and his hands grabbed both of your ass cheeks to help you grind against him.

He mumbled something into your skin and you just hummed in response. His mouth detached from your skin so he could look up at you, panting. “I asked if you’re on birth control.”

“Oh,” you said quietly. Your hands found his hair as you tugged him back to your skin. He didn’t kiss you yet, just looked at you for a response. You huffed and said, “Yes. I’m on the pill and I recently got tested and I’m clean.”

Kylo nodded. “I’m clean, too. Are you good about taking your pill on time?”

“I used to not be, but since I met you, I… I have motivation to take it on time.” You blushed again at the confession.

“Good girl.” Kylo’s mouth returned to nipping, sucking, and licking at your chest. “Can I come inside of you, then?”

You whimpered loudly and tried to push him onto his back, but he was a brick wall under you.

Kylo grunted and kneaded at your ass. "I believe I asked you a question."

"Please," you mumbled, letting your mouth find the skin of his neck.

"Please, what ?" Kylo hissed, his breath fanning across your skin deliciously.

"Please… please come in me… daddy." You all but whispered.

"Good girl. Good fucking girl." He leaned over, tipping you onto your back so he could hover over you. Kylo helped you adjust until your head was on the pillows and you could comfortably lay below him. His mouth bit and sucked at your chest as pleasure flooded your whole body. His hands searched to find their place, scrambling over your arms, hips, waist, thighs, breasts, until they landed with one gently culling the side of your neck while the other reached behind to hold your back. You weren't even naked yet, but you felt like you were on fire from how he was touching you.

"Can I make you come, sweet angel? Hmm?" He hummed against your skin.

"Yes please," you mumbled.

Kylo looked up at you with a smirk as he unclasped your bra with one hand and pulled it off your chest. "Good girl, learning how to use your words."

Your head turned to look forlornly at where he carelessly tossed your bra onto the floor.

"What is it, hmm?" Kylo’s mouth became surprisingly innocent for someone who just ripped off your bra, kissing softly on your neck.

You shook your head slightly. "It's nothing."

Kylo bit your sternum, making you yelp. “Tell me.”

You giggled and pushed at his hair. “You didn’t notice that my bra and underwear match!”

Kylo chuckled and let his head fall against your chest. “That’s what my girl is upset about? I certainly noticed, I just didn’t say anything.”

“... Do you like them?”

“I think I prefer you naked, but yes, I like them.” He kissed the swell of your breast. “It’s my color.”

You nodded. “I bought them for you.”

Kylo hummed. “You did?”

“Yeah! I wanted to buy you something nice with the money you gave me, and this felt like a good option.” You beamed up at him.

“Very pretty,” he smiled and leaned up to kiss you before trailing his kisses down until he reached the hem of your underwear, where his fingers traced the fabric.

You were nervous again, but you didn’t want Kylo to know.

People talk when they aren’t nervous, right? That makes sense. Because if I was nervous I’d be too shy to speak. So I should just talk! Was your thought process.

“Yeah, the store had so many options. I didn’t know there were so many shades of blue or so many types of lace. They had some traditional lace, a million floral laces, and—”

You were cut off by Kylo nipping your inner thigh, pulling a yelp from your throat. “You’re nervous.”

Fuck .

“No.” You said stupidly.

“You get chatty when you’re nervous.”

“Well, maybe I’m just chatty, hmm? Maybe I want to tell you all about my online shopping—”

Kylo nuzzled his nose into the wet spot on your underwear and you whined, pushing yourself closer to his face.

“Why are you nervous?” He asked as his nose began to trace the outline of your underwear.

“It won’t fit.”

“Wrong.”

You huffed with frustration. “Have you seen yourself? It won’t—”

“It will,” he stated simply. “We can make it fit. What are you actually nervous about?”

“It’s supposed to freeze over tonight—”

“No.”

“I have a seven page paper to write by Monday and I haven’t even read the prompts?”

Kylo’s head popped up from in between your legs just so he could glare at you. “Please tell me that one’s a lie.”

“It’s not.”

Kylo groaned and buried his face back between your legs so he could start licking your cunt through your underwear.

You sighed, glad he’d dropped the topic.

His teeth pulled at the delicate skin of your clit and you squeaked and tried to pull away.

“Tell me,” He said into the crease of your thigh.

You paused and breathed for a moment. It was Kylo. You had to trust him. He had his face in your cunt for the entire duration of this conversation.

“I just really… Care about you, Kylo. I’ve never cared about the people I’ve had sex with, not really. I’m scared it’ll make a difference.”

“Because rejection hurts more when you’re invested?”

You nodded. “Yeah.”

Kylo’s thumbs hooked into the waistband of your underwear so he could slowly tug them down your legs, sitting up as he did so until he knelt between the knees of your bare body.

He admired your body for a moment. His eyes traced over every inch of skin, and you felt every ounce of intensity from his stare.

“We’ll just mutually agree to never reject one another, hmm?” He asked as his hands rubbed over the smooth flesh of your thighs.

“That sounds a lot like marriage,” You giggled.

“No, it doesn’t.”

“... But it does.”

“Marriage is a mutual agreement to never leave one another. You can be married and still get rejected.”

You huffed and rolled your eyes. “Sure, but—”

“Do you want to keep discussing this, or do you want me to eat your pussy?” Kylo asked, almost sounding bored.

Your cheeks warmed and you nodded quickly. “Please eat my pussy.”

He raised an eyebrow at you.

“... Daddy.”

“Good girl,” Kylo hummed.

He was on you in an instant, practically diving into your body. His mouth started with broad strokes of his tongue along your entire slit, which quickly turned into tight circles on the sensitive nub.

You were instantly lost to the world—  whimpering, moaning, and rocking your hips in time with Kylo’s movements—  at his ministrations. His big hands moved up your torso until he could cup each of your breasts and knead them desperately.

And yet, you needed more.

“Kylo,” you whined quietly.

He hummed into your pussy in response.

“Kylo, I want…” You were cut off by your own moan.

“I know what you want, Princess,” Kylo mumbled, his lips barely parting from you to speak.

The loss of contact made you bury your fingers in his hair to try to tug him closer. Kylo chuckled and returned to his work.

“I want your fingers, Kylo,” you said softly.

Kylo hummed and wordlessly removed one of his hands from your breasts to trail it down your body until he could stroke it over your needy center.

“You’re so fucking wet,” he groaned into your clit, the vibrations immediately making you whimper.

He drew circles around your hole until you were whining, begging him to stop teasing. “Kylo, Kylo please , I-I… I need it, please.”

After what felt like hours, he finally slid one thick finger into your greedy cunt. It felt huge compared to the nothingness you’d felt before, and to your surprise and pleasure, he didn’t make you wait long for a second finger to slide in.

“Shit, I had no idea you were this tight, baby,” he whispered. His lips separated from your clit for a moment so he could watch his fingers pump in and out of you slowly.

“ Kylo, ” you moaned. 

“Let’s see what my girl likes, hmm? How about…” he crooked his fingers forward so he pressed on your g-spot. “This?”

You let out a whiny moan in response.

“Hmm, okay. How about this?” He kept his fingers crooked and rocked in and out of you. The pleasure that surged through your body was unlike any you’d felt before. Maybe it was the angle, maybe it was him—  you couldn’t say—  but all you knew was that you were so close to breaking apart for him.

You were buzzing with pleasure, but the little noises you had been making stopped. You couldn’t catch your breath.

Kylo must’ve noticed. He didn’t stop his fingers as he mumbled, “You gotta breathe, my girl. Can you take a big breath for me?”

You did as you were told, but immediately needed to release the breath with a loud sigh of pleasure.

“Keep breathing, baby, okay?” His hand on your breast moved over to rest on your ribcage. You whined at the loss of attention to your boob, but quickly realized he was monitoring the rise and fall of your chest as his mouth latched back on to your clit. Kylo’s fingers and mouth worked with differing rhythms that meshed together perfectly to build pressure and heat in your core.

“Kylo , ” you said breathily.

He nodded into your cunt, not stopping his fingers or the way his tongue flicked and circled over your clit.

“ Kylo, ” you keened, your orgasm quickly approaching.

“Wait.” Was the simple demand Kylo said against your clit.

You were grinding desperately against him as his movements slowed. “ What? Kylo, I—” Your controlled breathing turned into desperate panting as you tried to speak.

“Wait. Just a little longer, okay?” His fingers were moving at a snail’s pace and his tongue just ghosted over your clit.

You whined with frustration and tried to push yourself into his face, but the hand on your ribcage held you still.

“No, Princess. I said wait.”

“I can’t , Kylo,” you whimpered.

He licked a single stripe over your clit and you wanted to scream with frustration.

“It’s alright, let it out. I know it’s hard, my sweet girl. I wanna hear you. Can you let me hear you?” Kylo breathed against your aching flesh and you felt tears fall from your eyes.

“Please just let me come,” you whispered.

“You will, baby,” he hummed. His fingers pulled apart inside you, and you felt a wonderful stretch as he did so. When his lips met your clit for a few teasing sucks, you let out a sob. “I know, sweetheart. I know. You’ll get to come, I promise.”

“Please,” was all you could choke out.

He flicked his tongue over your sensitive bud, then gave it a stroke with his tongue soft and wide. You moaned loudly, unable to hold it back.

Kylo’s fingers resumed their lazy strokes in and out of you. The squelching sounds of your own slick made your brain go fuzzy.

“You’re so good, baby girl. So fucking good,” Kylo muttered and his hot breath fanned across your skin. You were only able to whine in response.

“You wanna come?” He asked as if you hadn’t been begging for it just moments ago.

You nodded, unable to speak with how fuzzy your brain had gone.

Kylo tsked. “Words, Princess. I don’t want to have to leave you like this all night just because my baby couldn’t remember how to use her words.”

“Yeah,” was all you could manage to say through the TV static playing in your head.

“‘Yeah,’ what , Princess?”

“ Kylooo ,” you sobbed pathetically, squirming under his hold.

His fingers sped up inside you, and all you needed to come was his tongue, but—  

“‘Kylo’? Sweetheart, I need more than that.”

You groaned with frustration when his lips connected with your clit, giving it featherlike strokes that weren’t enough to help you get over your impending peak. “Kylo I —  fuck —  please just—  Kylo —  God , let me come . Please!”

Kylo hummed and you felt the vibrations low in your body. “Good girl. You can come.”

His movements were deliberate. He sucked gently at your clit as his fingers hooked into the soft patch of skin inside of you. He wasn’t rough or fast. Instead, he chose to coax an orgasm out of you with the tenderness one would expect from a lover.

And what an orgasm it was. You were already just at the edge, and his movements held you there for a moment until he escorted you over it. You came with a loud moan and bucking hips that both stopped for a moment of pure bliss before you sunk into the bed with jelly-filled limbs and a series of pitiful whimpers.

But Kylo didn’t stop.

If anything, his movements got harder and faster, which felt like murder to your clit in somehow the both the best and worst ways possible.

“ Kylo ,” you warned. He kept going.

You couldn’t take anymore.

And yet, you had no intention of using your safeword and making him stop.

Sharp pleasure ripped through your body, and your almost-too-fast orgasm tore right after it. Your back arched dramatically and you let out a cry that was bordering on becoming a scream before you fell onto the pillows, panting for breath.

Kylo gave a few languid licks before he pulled himself off of you and his fingers out of you. He stuck both in his mouth and sucked your juices off of each with a ‘ pop. ’

You whimpered beneath him at the sight and he looked up at you. “My girl did such a good job, hmm?”

You nodded sleepily, exhaustion quickly settling into your bones.

Kylo climbed up your body until he could kiss your lips. You tasted yourself—  tangy, sweet, and salty—  on his skin, but didn’t really mind the flavor.

He pulled away just barely to ask, “Is my girl tired? Hmm?”

You nodded.

“You wanna sleep? You worked very hard for those orgasms, you deserve it.”

You shook your head.

“No? Oh, hmm. Then what does my baby want?”

“Wanna fuck,” you mumbled. Your arms wrapped around his neck and you pressed your lips to his.

Kylo’s arms reached under your back so he could hold you close as he kissed you. It felt right, the way you fit so perfectly in his grasp. How safe and warm you felt with him. It scared you how right it felt.

His lips were gentle but hungry and passionate against yours. Kylo’s tongue traced your lips and he let it dip into your mouth to taste you better. You didn’t know whether to giggle or moan at the feeling of it licking and digging into your mouth like there was lost treasure to be found, so you did both.

Kylo pulled away with a satisfied hum to look at you, large nose barely touching yours. You beamed back at him.

“Such a pretty little thing, hmm?” He mumbled as he pressed kisses to your nose and cheeks.

You giggled and nodded.

His lips traced back to the sensitive skin around your ear. Even just the feeling of his breath sent heat to your core, and the gentle licks and kisses he placed there made your toes curl. “Pretty things are always so fun to ruin,” he mumbled softly into the shell of your ear. You whined in response and let your hips grind up into his. “Would you like that? You want me to ruin you, Princess?”

“Yes please,” you said quietly, and then thought to add on, “Daddy.”

Kylo groaned and sat up to pull his sweatpants down to his knees. From there, he leaned back over you and kicked them off his legs. You glanced down to see that he was rock hard and the tip of his cock glistened with precum. Kylo lowered himself on his elbows so his face was inches from yours again.

“Do you want me to put on a condom or are you still okay with me coming in you?” He asked before his lips connected with your neck to gently kiss your skin.

You thought for a moment. You were both clean. You were good about taking your birth control, but you’d never put it to the test. That being said, the thought of Kylo’s cum inside of you and dripping out made your breath stutter with need.

So you shook your head. “I want you to come in me.”

Kylo nodded and he let his hand ghost down over your skin until he reached your cunt. He must’ve found you dripping, because he sat up and said, “I’m going to get a towel. You be good and sit still, okay?”

“Okay,” you confirmed quietly.

You watched with warm affection as he climbed off of you and walked to the bathroom in all his naked glory. He had a cute little butt that made your shoulders shake with a giggle and briefly distracted you from admiring the wide stretches of beautifully toned skin. When he came back, towel in hand, your mouth watered at the sight of his cock bobbing with each step.

He paused at the foot of the bed. “You’re so fucking gorgeous,” he echoed your own thoughts. 

You nodded in agreement. “Some day, I’m gonna map out all your freckles and moles with my tongue,” you said quietly.

Kylo chuckled at that and came over to put the towel under your hips before he climbed back over you. “I’ll take you from behind later to see that plump little ass jiggle, but I think I want to see your face when I make you come on my cock for the first time. How does that sound?” He muttered quietly, his face inches from yours.

Your cheeks heated and you nodded, “I’d like that, yes please.”

“What’s your safeword?” He asked as he lined his cock up with your entrance.

“Strawberries,” you said quietly, watching where your bodies were about to connect closely.

Kylo pecked your nose with a kiss. “Good girl. Look at me?”

You whined and looked up at him to be met with warm pools of black pupils that had drowned any color in his eyes. He hummed and took both of your hands in his to pull them over your head, where he laced his fingers with yours.

“Is my girl ready?” He asked.

“Yeah,” you said in a breath.

“Hmm, yeah you are.” Was all he said before he finally sunk his cock into you. The stretch was immediate and you couldn’t stop the shaking moan that came from your throat as he slowly took you inch by inch. He muttered praise the whole time and his eyes never left yours as your brow scrunched and your mouth opened.

When he finally bottomed out, you glanced down to see he wasn’t in you all the way, but you knew you couldn’t take any more.

“It’s too big, I-I’m sorry—” you whined as he kissed your head. His cock was pushing up on your cervix almost painfully.

“Don’t be sorry, baby. You feel so good. You’ll open up some more, hmm? Just relax and take some big breaths for me.”

You nodded shakily and took some deep breaths while looking at him. He gave you a smile and his lips met yours for one quiet moment before he started to thrust.

Anyone looking at Kylo Ren would be able to tell he fucks hard. You guessed it had to do with the nose and the beefy shoulders. What most people didn’t know was that it felt divine .