askbensolo

[askbensolo]

Hey, Ben. Your last post actually jogged something in my memory, so I thought I'd just... ask now, before I forget again.

Do you... uh... happen to know how old Pennie. Um. Is?

Like obviously the whole situation with her isn't,,, ideal,,, but I think I was like in the shower or something and was just. Overcome by this whole new level of sickness. If you get my drift

“I have lived twenty years,” Pennie said, the rasp in her voice making her sound older. “And you?”

“Twenty-four,” I told her. I watched her mash a soft-fleshed fruit with her fingers and dip her bread into it. “Is that, um…how Rylothians eat fruit?”

“I am pretending it is preserves,” she said with a sigh. “I would kill for a palmful of sweet preserves. Or…what do you call it in Basic?”

“Uh…jam, probably.”

“I would kill for some jam.”

“I’m sure you would,” I told her, and she chuckled with a nasty little smirk. To her, it was a compliment.

Still, the smile vanished from her lips almost as soon as it had appeared.

“How did you fall in love with him, Pen’awen?” I asked. The next few hours after midnight will embolden you like that (or just make you stupid).

She fixed me with a hard stare. “That is quite the inquiry, Ben Solo.”

“I’ll let you ask me something in return,” I offered. “I’m curious about you.”

“Hm. Your idea of a game amuses me,” she said melodically. “But not so fast. You must take me to dinner before you take me to bed.”

I stared at her, bewildered.

“Forgive me,” she said sweetly, not looking as though she wanted forgiveness. “It is merely a saying. It means I do not wish to jump in all at once. We must start with smaller questions. And…you ought to let me start. It’s only polite.”

I rolled my eyes at her. What a brat. But…it was oddly relieving to see her go back to being sly. To know she still had a little fight in her. True, maybe that was what I was afraid of…but I had to admit the alternative scared me a little too.

“All right,” I said. “What do you want to ask?”

“Why have you returned?” Pennie asked. “I had heard that you and my sister are no longer.”

She sounded strange as she said it, and she seemed to be making a concerted effort to appear nonchalant.

“Yeah, we’re just friends now,” I confirmed, and decided not to get into the details of why. “And I came here so I could visit Fannie, and Mikal—but also to get away from my family.”

She looked up. “You do not have a positive relationship with them. For what reason?”

“Well, the crux of it is that my mom is super overprotective and controlling, and it’s come to the point where I’ve just…stopped talking to her. Not forever. But…for now.”

“I do not speak with my mother either,” Pennie said wryly. “Though unfortunately I have not the luxury of putting entire star systems between us. Is it just your mother?”

“Well, my sister kinda hates me too.”

“You have a sister?” she asked, looking surprised.

“Yeah,” I told her. “She’s younger. A lot younger. She feels like she gets overlooked, while my mom focuses on me instead.”

A bitter look clouded Pennie’s face. “Imagine that.”

I could tell there was something there for her. I didn’t know what to say, so I nodded.

Pennie’s face contorted in anger. “You are lucky to have only one sister,” she spat. “I have the misfortune of having three. My eldest sister pretends I do not exist. The second eldest abuses me endlessly. And the third…well, the third I do not think I mind—at least compared to the others. I used to think her spineless, but now I think I find her cunning.”

“You can’t be mad that Fa’nakhra avoids you after what you did,” I told her darkly. “You hated her long before she stopped trying to save you. She tried to reach out for you for years, and you pushed her away. And then you did that.”

“I’m not sorry,” Pennie scoffed, her throat sounding tight, and a shock of revulsion ran through me.

“You don’t think that what you did was wrong?” I asked, but I don’t know why I was surprised. It was Pennie, after all.

“I don’t believe in right and wrong beyond doing what is right or wrong for me,” she said stiffly.

“Do you actually believe that?” I challenged. “‘Cause if that’s your standard…then you don’t have a right to be upset about anything anyone else does, so long as they’re doing what advances their own purposes.”

“Very well. Then maybe what I did was wrong, and yet I feel no sorrow for it,” Pennie snarled. “Can you say you’ve never felt the same?”

At least she was being honest. I picked off chunks of my bread and didn’t say anything.

She smiled, her lips dripping hatred, but I couldn’t tell which one of us it was directed toward. “You think I’m a bad person. Don’t you?”

“I think you’re a person, Pen’awen,” I told her, looking her right in the eyes. “With everything that entails.”

She frowned, and began to look uncomfortable. And I knew why. I knew because she was me. I knew it was far more uncomfortable to be understood than to be despised. When you were despised, you could set fire to your enemies and laugh. When you were understood, you were naked.

Fannie had a lot of understanding for Pennie. Definitely more than I had. But I understood Pennie—and Fannie never would.

Pennie’s eyes darted back and forth desperately, and I decided to throw her a line.

“It’s my turn to ask a question,” I said, hoping to interrupt her thoughts. “Tell me about Connie. As far as I can tell, the two of you seem pretty similar. I would have thought you got along.”

“It’s time for bed, actually,” Pennie said curtly, rising from the bench across from me. “Good night.”

“Oh, leaving so soon, huh?” I asked sarcastically. “It’s certainly not like you at all to throw away your end of a deal.”

“I could say the same about you,” Pennie returned haughtily. “You seem to know me well enough. You should have expected it. I know you only intend to collect this information to pass along to Fa’nakhra, the nosy haar’mak.”

“I thought you said Fannie didn’t care about you,” I pointed out. “So which is it? Does she care about you too much, or not at all? You can’t claim both. In claiming both, you prove that you only make up reasons to justify your hate, even if the reasons conflict.”

“I do not like you, Ben Solo,” Pennie sniffed—which was about the closest thing to an admission of guilt you could get from Pennie Pentarra. She turned on her heels to walk away, throwing herself off balance and narrowly catching herself again.

“Hey,” I said, and she stopped. “For the record, Fannie didn’t set me up to this. I meant what I said. I’m curious about you. So…see you tomorrow?”

She stood there, quiet. I think she could not believe I had asked.

“…Yes,” she replied at last, without turning around.

“Good,” I said. “Good night, Pennie.”

[askbensolo]

At least Snoke gave you SOME kind of purpose. Sure maybe not the best one, but it was something at least...

OKAY who sent this? No reason…I just wanna talk…

Fannie thinks I should go back home and accept the job with my mom. She says I do better with structure. She says that even though I didn’t really like my job last year, that I still always got up on time and went to work and it put me on a schedule and in a routine and it helped me take care of myself better.

I told her I’d think about it.

Last night, I wandered into the dining hall around one. Pennie used to walk in around midnight, but I think she started trying to avoid me. She finally came in around one-thirty, and looked at me more like how she used to: with disgust.

I asked her to sit with me.

Surprisingly, she did.

I had taken some of the bread and stuff already. Enough for both me and her. And we didn’t talk, really, but we shared the silence… I choked a little at one point and she glared at me like I had a plague and I had to explain that I’ve been feeling sick a lot and that screwing up my meal schedule hasn’t helped. She didn’t say anything back—which was about as good as an expression of sympathy, coming from her.

She doesn’t look so good, either. Her fingers kind of shake, and there are bags under her eyes.

I don’t really know why I sought her out. I don’t like her and I don’t trust her, and I still don’t think she’ll ever get better.

…I also feel like she is the only person here who would really understand what it’s like to be me.

[askbensolo]

sweater boy

When I was fifteen, I lived in sweaters. Even in the summer. I liked being covered up—it felt safer. I was uncomfortable with myself in more ways I can describe, and long sleeves and fleece lining seemed to protect me. Both from the outside world, and the things I held inside.

When I grew up and came out of my shell, I stopped wearing them as a defense mechanism, and just wore ‘em ‘cause I liked ‘em. I like how you can throw ‘em on without a fuss—no zippers, no buttons. I like when they wear in and pill up and get all soft and faded. I like letting my favorite people steal them and watching them sorta wear me, in a way. I chew on the strings and stick my hands in the pockets and I hardly ever use the hood, but I like that it’s there—it won’t do much in a storm, but it’s good enough for running to the bus stop from the library in a drizzle.

The sweaters I wear the most nowadays have my college name plastered across the front. I can’t carry my degree around, but I can wear a hoodie. I’m three years post-grad, but it still feels like my most recent accomplishment—and that kinda gives you an idea of how I’m doing.

I’ve really struggled in the past year. Things I thought I was done with began to come back. It felt like holding water in my hands. You can keep it there a while, but it always finds the cracks, and you watch in desperation as it trickles down your wrists. And maybe the water now soaking your sleeves is the life you built after two decades of pain, and maybe it was everything you’d dreamed and everything you’d hoped for, and maybe it was even better than that.

My buddy in college forced me to become his gymmate. I told him that gymbro culture was a load of toxic machismo, but he told me I was a tipyip, so of course I ended up going because my ego has the structural integrity of a saltine cracker.

I turned out to really enjoy lifting. Yeah, some guys get weird about it—but not all, or even most. I started working out and hitting more protein, and I remember how shocked I was when spring semester rolled around and mornings became bright enough to see myself in the mirror before I was dressed. I looked different—in a way that I liked, and a way that made me feel like I had finally escaped the shell of the guy I used to be. I emerged from the chrysalis, no longer pale and sickly, because I had finally learned about a thing called going outside and another called moving around.

Well, the last year or so’s been rough, and it’s felt like driving down the groundway in a speeder that’s falling apart. You watch your side mirrors fall and go dancing into the distance, and you can only hope you haven’t hit someone with ‘em and that you won’t hit someone now. The back left repulsor goes funky, and now the corner of your vehicle is kissin’ the pavement every few hundred feet. The transmission sputters. Something in the hood explodes. You sweat and grip the wheel and hope you make it there in one piece, even if the speeder doesn’t.

My physical training is one thing among many that have fallen by the wayside, and like most things that are good for you, you need to keep doing it to maintain its results. I haven’t been eating so well, either. My meds have done weird things to my appetite, and cooking feels difficult. But so does getting up to retrieve the food I didn’t even have to make. I’ve lost a lot of weight recently…but not in a sexy way. I look ill. The illness I thought I could hide because it lived in my brain has discovered a physical manifestation.

So, yeah: I’ve atrophied, and I don’t look quite so good anymore, and things that used to be easy to pick up aren’t so easy. I used to feel a rush of pride (maybe a little too much pride) when I flexed in the mirror, and now it sends me into a breakdown because all I see is what I’ve lost. And I’ve lost a lot this year. I hate the things I’ve lost that are outside of my control…but the things within my control hold a special kind of shame. Because I know the only one I can blame is me.

Sure, I’m on medication. And yes, I’m in therapy. But while both of those are great, there ain’t no pill that’ll make you do what you’ve gotta. A therapist can help you change your mind, but only you can exercise your will. There are tools that can open the door for you, but you’ve still got to decide to walk through. And then you’ve got to do it and keep on doing it, day after day after day, and the days never stop. So, then, sometimes you don’t…not because you can’t, maybe, but ‘cause you’re still not really used to having the option.

This is my first summer since leaving for Naboo that I’m sweating in my sweater—because I hate having to see my weakened body, soft and pale like the underbelly of a beached fish. Force, no wonder I’m single, I think—as if that was really the reason I’m single, and as if I even had an interest in anyone but her.

I know I’ve got to get back on track. Not just with this. With everything. But there’s a thousand forces pushing me into the ground, and I feel so lost sometimes.

Have you ever ridden a monorail? Have you ever wondered what would happen if you jumped out the window? Not to die. Just to get off the train. Would anyone notice you were gone? Would anyone come back to look for you? Or would the train just keep speeding away, while you watched from the bushes below?

I want to be able to look at my arms again and grin instead of grimace. I want to go back to feeling kinda good. Because…it’s true, unfortunately. You do feel better when you’re moving around and going outside and eating well. It won’t fix everything—and depending on what ails you, it may not even fix a lot. But, it’ll fix something…and something’s something, you know.

One of these days, I’ll bury Sweater Boy’s zombie for good, and just be a guy who likes sweaters again. But…in order to do that, I’ve got to start putting in the work again—in this, and in everything…and it’s just kinda hard when I’m fighting off the urge to bury myself instead.

[askbensolo]

Fannie texted me to say she hadn’t seen me at dinner in a while, and to ask if I was all right. I didn’t respond. I started getting flashbacks to last September, because this was literally exactly what happened last year.

Only…everything feels worse now, because this is just confirming to me I’d be a horrible parent and partner and I’m not good enough to be with her. How could I take care of anyone else when I am failing this hard at taking care of myself?

She ended up coming to my door. I let her in. She brought me lunch and she made me get out of bed and helped me do up the covers. She brushed my hair for me (it was super knotted up) and told me to take a shower. I did and she waited for me and when I got back out she said “Good job!”

“For taking a shower?”

“For doing something that was difficult for you to do.”

“Makes me feel pretty bad that taking a shower fell into that category. I have a college degree, for Force’s sake.”

“It doesn’t matter what it was you did, nor how silly it may seem. It matters that you did it when it felt hard. You’ve got to keep doing that.”

“But you’re not always gonna be around to force me to do things.”

“Precisely—which is why you must practice making yourself do them when there’s no one else around to make you. And I’m here to help.”

“It is literally so embarrassing that you’re seeing me like this.”

“I was hardly in a pretty state when you came to my rescue last year, if you recall. We’re friends, Ben. It’s all right.”

[askbensolo]

Oh, I’m cooked. Today I didn’t even leave to get food. Last night I brought up a bunch of bread and fruit to my room and that’s what I’ve been eating today and I’ve watched five hundred videos maybe and scrolled through a thousand posts but I couldn’t tell you anything I looked at.

I started to text Fan like, ten times today but deleted it every time because I was paranoid about sounding needy or whatever…

I know how dumb this all sounds and I am embarrassed about it, but I just…don’t…have a reason to get up anymore. Which is a perfectly horrifying state to be in. I don’t think sentients were meant to experience what I’m experiencing now.

But I ran into Pennie again last night in the dining hall, when I was hoarding up food so I wouldn’t have to leave my room.

I think she was doing the same thing.

We didn’t talk this time.

[askbensolo]

Day Two of rotting in bed doing not much of anything. This is bad. This is very bad. Did I sentence myself to death by coming here?

I have to do tomorrow differently. Or else I’m gonna get stuck in a rut again, and if I lose the battle, I gotta fight the war.

But ugh, leaving my room sounds too exhausting right now… Maybe after I watch another video—

[askbensolo]

I’m starting to question if coming to Ryloth was a good idea.

I say that because now I literally have no responsibilities, obligations, or connections, and the only person here who would check on me is my ex-girlfriend, who is still my best friend, but with whom I’ve established certain boundaries.

I say that because I spent all day in bed on my holopod today and no one stopped me. There was no boss to call and ask why I wasn’t at work, there was no Rey to make me drive her to the mall, there was no Mom to freak out over me and no Dad to say “hey kid let’s take a walk” and no Uncle Luke to invite me to Jedi lessons. There was no Poe or Beebee-Ate and there was no Treeso and there was no 8 AM lecture or 3 PM discussion and I only have therapy once a week and it wasn’t today. There are no work buddies, there are no gym buddies, there are no school buddies. I have no homework, I have no novel—all I have is this dumb blog and a never-ending job hunt that makes me ill just thinking about it. Fannie’s somewhere in this giant house, but she has a full-time job—and it isn’t to babysit me.

Yeah…things could get real bad for me real fast, unless I get in ahead of myself and give myself some kind of safety net. I am two bad days away from a downward spiral, and one downward spiral away from…who knows what.

I’m startin’ to feel a little scared. Now I’m wondering if all the people I pushed away and all the obligations I thought were putting too much pressure on me were actually protecting me from myself.

Maybe Snoke isn’t my biggest threat. Maybe it’s Ben.

[askbensolo]

Pennie sighting.

Weird Pennie sighting. But haven’t they always been?

I was sitting in the dining hall around midnight, scrolling endlessly on my holopod because lying in bed leaves me defenseless against intrusive thoughts. In walked Pennie, drifting barefoot through the hall like a zombie, making a beeline at a snail’s pace for the table of bread, fruit, and dried meat that gets left out between dinner and breakfast.

She walked right past and didn’t see me. I wasn’t sure whether I wanted her to see me…but she stood at the table and ate, desperate and ravenous, and it didn’t seem like she’d be leaving any time soon.

After a minute, I got up and slowly approached her. “Hey,” I said—and she jolted around like she’d been shocked, her mouth full, crumbs sitting on the top of her chest and her stomach (which stuck out more than the last time I’d seen her).

Usually, she had had some quip or expression of disdain for me. But this time she only stared.

At last her lips parted, and she asked me a question in Twi’leki, which she knows that I don’t speak.

“…What?” I asked.

“Are you real?” she asked again in Basic, her eyes large and glassy. “Is it really you? Or…is this another dream?”

She reached out and touched my arm. Then she recoiled and shuffled back, staring at me, before breaking into a run down the hall and out the doors.

[askbensolo]

I told Fan how I went on a date back in January. I promised I wasn’t gonna withhold things from her anymore, and I meant it. The date thing was kind of an accident, you see—okay, no, wait, let me take ownership—

I was…not being very self-aware, let’s put it that way. I had just moved back to Republic City, and was trying to meet friends the only way I know how (through the HoloNet). I agreed to meet up with this girl, and it wasn’t supposed to be a date, but I guess I kind of, like, found myself playing the part, and going through the motions to see how it felt—cleaned up nice and took her out to dinner and we sat in my mom’s speeder for a while—maybe she tried to kiss me, and maybe I turned my face away at the last second and pretended to have an asthma attack—well, I didn’t really like her. I don’t even remember her name.

Surprisingly, Fannie didn’t seem to be upset at me so much for going on a date, as she was about how I treated my date. I was really trying to get Fan to see I didn’t like this girl, so I mentioned how I left her on read for a week before telling her I didn’t want to meet up again—and boy, did Fan chew me out for that one (as well as “playing so flippantly with that poor girl’s feelings to begin with,” which I didn’t think I was doing, because usually guys do that to get in people’s pants or whatever, but I guess I’ve learned that being asexual and being a scumbag are not mutually exclusive). She said I “didn’t behave very gentlemanly”—and she’s right, I know I wasn’t nice—but I’m surprised Fannie cared so much about…me not being a good date to some other girl, who wasn’t her, who I shouldn’t have even gone out with in the first place.

Man. I forgot how weird Fannie can be. But, like…a good kind of weird. Find me another girl who goes to bat for the stranger her ex dated during no-contact—yeah, you can’t.

Why are Jedi like that?

[askbensolo]

On Being Friends With My Ex’s Ex

Earlier this year, I spent a couple months at the Jedi school. At least…I think it was a couple months. I don’t remember what months they were. See, I’ve got this thing where I lose my memories during periods of intense mental anguish. Sure, I could find out by scrolling back on my blog…but I’ve also got this thing where I’m lazy as hell.

I remember certain things. I remember when Amalia came to visit me. I remember sitting in class with the Jedi kids, and trying and failing to meditate. I remember Uncle Luke brought me hot chocolate once when I was Going Through It, and that my fingers were so numb I couldn’t feel the warmth of the mug.

I also remember that Deirak Champert was nice to me.

Deirak Champert is twenty-four years old. He’s a human guy—tall, blond—with glasses and a gangly frame. He is one of two Jedi students that have joined Luke as teachers after completing their training. Deirak is funny and smart and confident, and I like to think that Deirak Champert is who I would’ve been, were I not so mentally ill. He’s even a writer, too. But he writes musings on Jedi wisdom—not sappy poetry, nor meandering blog posts, nor six-month slapdash novels about how he lost his girlfriend.

Maybe he should. I mean…we lost the same girlfriend, after all.

Deirak Champert was Fannie Pentarra’s first boyfriend (but not her first crush, because that was me, and always was). Between the ages of sixteen and nineteen, Fannie Pentarra dated the guy who was a better version of me, but never quite managed to fall in love with him. She dated him because I wasn’t in love with her yet, and wouldn’t be for six more years.

It’s a shame she didn’t love Deirak. He loved her a lot better than I did…and for a lot longer.

But…hey. I like to think I gave her the best six weeks she ever had. At least, up until I totally destroyed her trust—but that’s another story, which is 126,000 words and twenty-seven chapters long, and you can read it on your own time.

…What was I saying?

…Oh yeah. (The longer I’m unemployed, the more my attention span decays.)

Deirak Champert was nice to me on Ossus. An observation that stunned me, because there was a period of time where he very clearly did not like me (not without reason). Maybe it’s because he’s a Jedi teacher now, so he’s supposed to be all full of goodwill or whatever. Maybe he was moved by pity for me. Or…maybe he’s just a decent guy.

About a mile away from the school, there’s this cliffside on the beach. Pretty much every day I could manage to get out of bed, I would walk to it and hang out there. Fantastic cliff—probably in the top ten cliffs I’ve ever seen. It’s great for standing on and looking dramatically into the horizon. (Don’t worry—that’s all it’s good for, really. It’s only ten feet high and juts out above the water, and unfortunately, I know how to swim.)

Sometimes, Uncle Luke would come out on a speeder bike to the cliffside and find me. (Yeah, old Jedi Master Luke on a speeder bike—isn’t that funny?) When Amalia came to Ossus, sometimes she’d come and find me.

And one time, but the time I remember most clearly, Deirak Champert came out to find me.

Deirak and I have known each other since we were seventeen. Or perhaps more accurately, we have known of each other since we were seventeen. He and I were never really friends except through Fannie, since he was Fannie’s boyfriend and I was Fannie’s boy-friend. We got along because of her…and she was also the reason why we didn’t like each other. Deirak didn’t like how close Fan and I were, and I didn’t like that it bothered him. I mean, c’mon! It wasn’t like I was gonna try to move in on his girl or whatever!

…Y’know, until I did—but that was years after they broke up.

The Deirak/Fannie breakup was big news at the Jedi school in 26 ABY. The school isn’t very large, so everyone knows everyone, and everything’s a big deal. Fannie and Deirak were, like, Jedi Mom and Jedi Dad to a lot of the younger students, and everybody thought they were gonna get married and have babies and stuff. But instead they broke up, and then they stopped talking, and it was years before they ever spoke again.

Deirak didn’t speak to me for a while, either. Mainly because after they broke up, I spent every weekend with Fannie until I left for college. I thought I was being a good friend. It turned out I was only making Fannie fall even harder for me.

That was four years ago. One year ago, I finally realized Fan was in love with me, and decided to fall in love with her, too.

Seven months ago, we broke up.

Two months ago, I was lying on my stomach on a cliffside on Ossus, peering down at the waves below.

“You all right?” came a voice behind, and I scrambled up abruptly to find Deirak standing there with his arms crossed.

“Uh—yeah,” I muttered.

I studied his stance, trying to figure out what his attitude toward me was, but then he uncrossed his arms and sat down next to me.

“You know…I never caught why you came back to Ossus, Ben,” he said gently, the breeze riffling through his shaggy bangs. “Do you still live on Naboo?”

“No,” I mumbled. “Moved back home with my parents at the end of last year. And then I couldn’t stand ‘em, so I ended up here.”

Deirak nodded. “Hm. I remember you always had a hard time with your mother.”

“Yeah, well. Some things never change.”

“Some things do,” Deirak said. “You seem pretty different.”

I looked at him. “You think so?”

“From when you were seventeen? Yeah.”

“How so?”

“I don’t know. You just seem…older.”

“Well…not as old as you. Jedi teacher and all.”

“Ah, please. I’m just a guy.”

“Yeah…a Jedi teacher guy.”

Deirak chuckled. “I owe a lot to Meliko. She’s an incredible partner.”

I turned to look at him, maybe with a little too much surprise.

“Teaching partner, I mean,” Deirak corrected. “We’re not together. If that’s what you thought.”

“No, uh…of course not,” I fibbed.

“I’ve actually taken a vow of celibacy,” Deirak said. And he sounded serious, but I still wasn’t sure if he was joking.

“You mean…like…actually?”

Deirak nodded. “Yes, actually. You know. Like the Jedi of old.”

“Uh…wow,” I said, scratching the side of my face. “Does…Fannie know?”

Deirak laughed. “She’d hardly be disappointed, I think.”

“So…she doesn’t know?”

“Well, I never told her.”

“Really? How come?”

“Oh, I’m not trying to hide it from her or anything,” Deirak explained. “Fannie and I just…aren’t part of each other’s lives anymore. She likely already knows. Through the grapevine, or however. But…she and I don’t speak much. Haven’t for years, you know.”

“Is…that…hard for you?” I choked out, and I think something in my voice revealed a little more than I wanted it to. Deirak looked at me curiously, and I began to regret opening my mouth. You never know with Jedi, after all. How much they can see into your head.

Deirak stared at me for what felt like forever before clearing his throat and rubbing his finger under his nose. “Are you, ah…are you and Fannie still close?” he asked slowly, and I grimaced and shrugged and flushed.

My reaction was too strange to not tip him off. Deirak sat back a little, blinking at the horizon. I felt so stupid—I knew he had me all figured out. Fannie had never told him about us, but it seemed I had given it away without even saying a word.

Well: what would he do now? Laugh at me? Chew me out? At least scoff.

But…he didn’t.

“…I’m sorry, Ben,” Deirak said at last. “I know how much you and she always enjoyed one another’s company.”

It was a horribly awkward thing for him to say, given our history. But…it was also extremely kind.

No “Serves you right.”

No “And how do YOU like it.”

Just…honest sympathy and naked compassion.

Was he really so over her that he could tell me that, and not feel any emotion? I didn’t know if he was. I can sense things about people too, sometimes, and I had a feeling he had partially made his vow of singleness because Fannie had been it for him. He’d loved her. I knew he had. I’d seen him look at her with stars in his eyes for three years straight. Even now, there was a tenderness in his voice when he spoke of her, that I couldn’t ignore even if I wanted to.

The Jedi confuse me. Fannie, Deirak, Luke…all of them. They don’t stay mad at the people they oughta be mad at. They’re nice when they shouldn’t be. And none of them should be willing to talk to me anymore, not after all the things I’ve done, and yet...

…I didn’t know how to finish the thought. Deirak was making direct eye contact with me. Not like how he used to before, back when we were seventeen and I knew he didn’t like me. The way he was looking at me now made me feel like a person. And…I hadn’t really felt like a person in a while.

“…Thanks,” I said.

“Of course,” he told me softly.

[askbensolo]

On Being Friends With My Ex

She’s still my best friend. I’m thankful for that, but it also makes things harder. It’d be easier to get over her if we just never spoke again. We’d already gone seven months without talking. Maybe if we went a whole year, I’d fall out of love?

It’s stupid. I chose to fall in love with her. Unlike what most people seem to experience, I made a conscious decision to see her romantically. “How did you fall in love, Ben?” I decided to.

…Unfortunately, I don’t think I can decide to fall out of it.

In some ways, our new era of friendship is exactly the same as dating. It took some time to get comfortable again, but we smile and we joke and we have deep conversations and we give each other encouragement and advice.

Still, there are the things that have been stripped away from our relationship, but imperfectly. Like a sticker that doesn’t peel away clean, leaving you with a sticky, papery smear.

I want to crush her to my chest. I can’t.

I want to see her every day. I can’t.

There’s…other stuff I wanna do, that I won’t tell you about. Can’t do none of that, either.

To make things worse…there are even parts of the pre-dating friendship we had for years that are gone.

We used to say “I love you” when we related like siblings.

We can’t now. It means something else.

We used to cuddle in the grass when we were sixteen and seventeen.

We can’t now. That means something else, now, too.

She used to kiss me on the forehead, and I used to rub her shoulders, and those things got even better while dating in a way I couldn’t have imagined…but now we can’t have them at all.

We no longer have the sloppy, puppyish, unabashed affection of teenage comrades. Nor the awkward, trembling, floundering passion of college kids in love. We are boring adults with a sterile friendship that is close but not-too-close, and we exchange high-fives and fist-bumps and rushed embraces that leave us embarrassed. She spends all her time thinking about the baby that might be hers at the end of the year, and I spend all my time wondering when I’m gonna find a job.

Exactly one year ago, I let her live with me. This summer, she’s doing the same. But…everything’s different. I miss my little apartment that sucked, and coming home to find her waiting for me. I miss hearing her voice when she took calls in my bedroom, and I miss tucking her in on the couch. Now I’m living where she lives, but I can go days without seeing her, and I never know where she is unless I text her. Every time I do, I wonder if I ask to see her too much.

When I was living at home this year, I slept on my parents’ bedroom floor. Because of that, I was privy to their intimacy—and no, I don’t mean that. I mean I heard them whisper at night and mumble to each other as they drifted off, and when Mom began to whimper Dad shook her awake saying “hey, Princess, you’re dreaming,” and when Dad couldn’t sleep Mom would reach over and stroke his hair till he did. “We’ll figure it out,” they said to each other a lot. “We’ll figure it out.”

“You’ll figure it out,” I promise Fannie, about the whole thing with her sister and the baby.

“You’ll figure it out,” she tells me about my career.

But…I don’t want “you” and “me.” I want “we.” I want “us.”

And yet…I don’t know if I’m ready for “us” if there’s gonna be three of us. I barely even know if I’m ready for the two of us. I screwed it up last time. I could screw up again.

As her friend, I hope she finds a guy who’ll be everything she needs. Who can help her raise a baby and give her everything her deserves.

As her ex, I hope she waits for me to catch up—but she’s always been older than me, despite being one whole year younger, and I’m sort of afraid I never will.

One last nail in the coffin: I can’t talk to my best friend about any of this. Because my best friend’s her, and there’s only so much I can vent to her about us without it taking a toll on the relationship we’ve still got.

Maybe the worst part is I know she loves me too. She wants me just as bad as I want her.

…But I’m the one who can’t say yes.

[askbensolo]

…

…Dude, my family has no right to criticize my style ever. I’m filing this holo away, right next to Princess Cinnabuns and Uncle Moptop. Next time any of them come for me, I’ll be ready.

[askbensolo]

Listen okay. Our parents got to have ALL the fun with their hair styles. I waited SO LONG for the mullet to come back and then I spent an extra three years growing it 😩 i love having longer hair but haaaaaate when it’s in my face so it’s perfect

Only downside is now I really look like photos of my dad from 40 years ago lol

If I had a credit for every time someone sent me a picture of their hairstyle, I’d have…two credits!

Okay, bud—now I know I’m never doing the mullet thing. Not because I’m a hater. But because I know I will never, ever manage to look as good as you. Like…damn.

Wanna see a holo of my dad from 40 years ago? He looks like a completely different person:

Like, he LITERALLY looks like a different person.

Don’t ask me for answers, ‘cause I don’t have any.

[askbensolo]

Hey man, I'm loving hearing about the little cultural things you pick up on Ryloth. It got me thinking about a trend I've seen coming back around lately.

Is there a version of the mullet for species with lekku? What about species with fur? Is "business in the front, party in the back" an intergalactic concept? :)

I cannot believe that someone asked about nonhuman mullet equivalents, and that it wasn’t @hey-its-starface. If I ever get an anon ask about mullets, bro is Suspect #1.

Hey—thanks sister, I’m glad to hear that! I find it really interesting too. I did minor in Nonhuman Studies after all.

My cousin Lumpy had kind of a mullet thing going on for a while. (Chewbacca’s kid. I forget how many years old he is actually, ‘cause Wookiees live a long time, but life-stage-wise he’s just a little older than me.) He didn’t cut his hair, though, because that’s not something Wookiees do. It’s like a sentient rights violation to them. He just kinda gelled it up so it was slick on the sides and poofed up on top. Auntie Malla was not a fan.

There are ways to “style” lekku, but not like hair. It’s not as if you can cut them. Lekku styling mainly consists of hats, headpieces, ribbons, and jewelry. I guess also tattoos? A lot of Twi’leks are born with lek markings, but some aren’t. Vataash, Fannie’s oldest half-brother, doesn’t have any natural markings, but he does have a tattoo. He boasts that he was awake when he had it done, but I have my doubts. Lekku are extremely sensitive, even though they hang out there in a vulnerable way. Kinda like…wait, no, I’m gonna behave and not say that actually.

Now that you’ve brought it up, I’ve spent all day trying to figure out what a mullet for lekku would look like. I think the closest approximation would be if maybe a Twi’lek bound their lekku together near the top, and let them hang down behind? But that would pretty much just be a ponytail, wouldn’t it?

Actually, manipulating lek position is kind of a thing. I don’t have the eye for it, but apparently it’s supposed to be sexier if lekku are lifted up and perky at the base, instead of heavy and drooping. Kinda like…nope, I’m not gonna say that either.

There is one thing that comes to mind though when I think of Twi’lek guys and popular style. It’s that they file their teeth down to points. I get that it’s supposed to be macho or whatever—and okay, maybe it’s a little badass—but still. It must be awful if they ever accidentally bite their tongues.

[askbensolo]

house of cards

I wonder how it works here, exactly.

I mean—I wonder at what point I would be overstaying my welcome.

From what I can tell, there are always several guests in the Pentarra house at any given time. How closely are they monitored? Who authorizes their stays?

Pentarra’s house is full of guards. The guards are not slaves, which makes sense, because they’re more likely to do their job if they’re paid. There are guards that stand at the gates and there are guards that stand at the door and there are guards that stand on either side of Pentarra’s table in the dining hall. And they’re armed.

Ruut Pentarra knows I’m here. I stick out, not being Twi’leki, and we have made eye contact in the dining hall a couple of times. Especially since Fannie’s mother’s table has been reinstated to its former place: the closest table to Pentarra’s on the right side of the hall.

Last year, it was the furthest table. Pennie Pentarra, who despises her family, had it moved.

Pennie Pentarra does not come to meals anymore.

Sometimes I sit with Fannie and her mom and sisters, and sometimes I sit with Mikal on the men’s side of the hall. In sitting with Mikal, I have sometimes found myself sitting with Vataash and Nabohri. They ignore me, which is probably for the best.

I’ve dropped a lot of names. I think most of Fannie’s family deserves their own posts, so I won’t analyze them all here. But…

Have you ever seen a sabacc deck with royal cards?

Here’s an easy picture for you: Ruut Pentarra is the King. Pennie Pentarra is the Queen. Vataash is the Jack, Nabohri is the Joker, and Mikal, I think, would be the Ace.

That’s the best way I can think to sum it up.

Fannie Pentarra, of course, is simply a Ten—but that may just be a personal opinion.

[askbensolo]

Yet again, i am strongly suggesting you get tested for autism

Okay but I just…don’t…really…think…I am.

or maybe I’m just too stubborn to consider the idea

But do you know who is? Mikal. I don’t think I even had a clear picture of what autism was till I met that kid.

Mikal is one of Fannie’s half-brothers. He’s fifteen years old, just a little older than my own sister. He’s unusual in a few ways. One of them is that he has red skin, which is rare in Twi’leks, almost like albinism in humans. “Lethan” is the word they use for it.

The other odd thing about him is that he just doesn’t seem to…get things. (Socially, I mean—he’s really bright otherwise.) He doesn’t register when his brothers are making fun of him (which is always), he doesn’t really know how to have conversations unless you lead, and his daily life is built atop a cobbled-together mesh of observed rules and social scripts. When I first met him, I’d ask him why he was doing certain things, and he’d say “it’s what I’m supposed to do.” But there wasn’t any emotion attached to it. It wasn’t like “I’m supposed to be like my brothers, or else they’ll make fun of me for being different.” He just literally doesn’t have a concept of what behaviors or actions to exhibit besides what has been taught to him and what he sees the people around him doing. I know autism can manifest in different ways in different people to different degrees…but Mikal is like, Autism Classic™ (hopefully that’s not offensive to say), and when I was writing my book and thinking over my interactions with him it became pretty obvious to me.

I’ve been working on breaking him out of some of the things he’s learned. Showing him he doesn’t have to be like his brothers or his father or anyone besides himself. I feel bad, because there’s not a lot of available support for someone like him. If only he lived in the New Republic, and had a good family and access to healthcare, he would’ve been able to grow up with a lot more understanding and resources. I don’t think they even have a word for it on Ryloth.

Even Fannie looked at me odd when I said Mikal was autistic. Well—at first she thought I was making fun of him, so I cleared that up right away. And then she asked me how I would be able to determine something like that, and I was like “bro just talk to him for five minutes and you’ll figure it out,” but I guess she thought I was, like, stereotyping him or something…

[askbensolo]

Dude, you're absolutely Not a bad person 🫂 Maybe you need some anger management, cuz yeah that thing with your uncle wasn't great but honestly otherwise, good grief people seem to be giving you a hard time for just like, being a person

...Thanks. Really, thank you. Like...actually.

I’ve been working on the anger thing. I swear. Maybe it doesn’t seem like it to my family…but Problem One is that my patience runs real real short with my family specifically, and Problem Two is that my family uses any sign of a strong emotion from me as an excuse to dismiss me and whatever thing I’m actually upset about. I have watched them do this to me many times. And I know I can get scary (picture a guy who stands at six-foot-three screaming at the top of his lungs and kicking things and slamming his fists against the wall; it ain’t pretty) but…it’s like any time I start to get mad, the focus immediately switches to “Ben having a tantrum,” and not…the…actual thing I was mad about. Even if I don’t melt down, everyone suddenly becomes all about “stopping Ben from melting down,” y’know?

And, ironically, that does make me really mad. I…just…want to be listened to. If I try to speak gently, Mom doesn’t take me seriously, and if I start to shout, Mom gets scared…

…Uncle Luke might actually be the one member of my family I’m not having issues with right now. Funny, that…