#so then the parentals pulled a han solo and stuck him in the fridge live or not

[gluteus-canis-familiaris]

MEEEEEEEEEEEELSHIIIIIIIIIIII

so that trailer huh

[eleanor-writes-stuff]

call now for a free gift! [part ii/iii]

Six years after Rey’s first Christmas with Ben and his family, unexpected gifts abound at the annual Organa-Solo-Skywalker(-Kenobi?) Christmas celebration.

Featuring: Organa-Solo-Skywalker shenanigans, a ton of major surprises, and fluff. Again with the fluff. It’s always the damn fluff.

Here we go again! Buckle up, friends, because it’s about to get fluffier than ever before. Leia and Rey have their annual Christmas breakfast, and Rey and Ben receive an unexpected gift from the twins.

Part I Also available on AO3.

“Where are you going?” Ben mumbles as Rey gets out of bed, barely awake enough to look up at her as she cards a hand through his hair.

“Christmas breakfast with your mother,” she reminds him, leaning in for a quick kiss before she drags herself out of bed and over to her bag in search of a sweater. “Don’t worry, you can keep sleeping.” It’s a longstanding tradition between the two women at this point, to enjoy a quiet Christmas morning while everyone else sleeps in. Sometimes Rey wonders just how her teenaged self would have reacted to the news that she would one day share a Christmas tradition with the Leia Organa, and it never fails to put a smile on her face.

Ben turns on his side to track her movements, and his lips are pursed in a distinctly pout-like manner – not that he’ll ever admit to it. “It’s our first morning as an engaged couple, and you’re leaving me in bed to go have breakfast with my mother?”

“Maybe you should’ve timed your proposal better,” Rey teases, voice muffled as she pulls a sweater over her thin camisole. “Besides,” she sits next to Ben, gives him a placating smile as her hand curves around his cheek, “we had a rather eventful first night as an engaged couple. That should tide you over for now.”

And with one final kiss – shorter than Ben would like, judging by the way he tries to reach for her and whines when she steps away –, Rey disappears into the bathroom down the hall to freshen up before breakfast with her future mother-in-law.

She walks into the kitchen to find Leia already comfortably settled at the breakfast table as always, two mugs of Irish coffee keeping her company as she waits for Rey.

“Merry Christmas,” Rey says as she reaches for the coffee out of habit. At the last minute she abruptly changes course and picks up some toast instead, but she knows there’s no way Leia didn’t catch that.

The other woman’s eyes twinkle. “Merry Christmas indeed,” she murmurs over the lip of her mug, and Rey busies herself with spreading butter and jam over two slices of toast while she gathers up the nerve to ask Leia a question that’s been on her mind since yesterday.

“Leia?” she finally calls, setting down her toast.

“Hmm?”

Rey smiles at the knowing look Leia gives her. “What made you propose to Han?”

“Oh,” Leia blinks, the slightest bit taken aback. “Well, there’s the short version: I saw him building a crib and my hormones got the best of me. And then there’s the truth: up until that exact moment, I wasn’t sure about anything. I never told anyone but god, I was so scared. I’d known Han for three years by then, but we’d spent the entirety of that time being outlaws, being rebels, always doing reckless and exciting stuff. It’s easy to form a connection, when you’re living a life like that, but I always knew in the back of my mind that it was a whirlwind of a thing, that it might not work in a real world setting.” There’s no hiding the sadness in her eyes at the prospect, even all these years later.

“And then things finally calmed down, and before we could even really get to know each other, suddenly I was pregnant. Han stuck around, I always knew he would, but I had no way of knowing if this was something he wanted or if he was just doing the right thing. My noble scoundrel, I’d call him in my head sometimes,” Leia shakes her head with a fond smile. “I knew he’d stay, knew he’d try his best, but… to see him there in the garage, first thing in the morning, building a crib for this baby he couldn’t have seen coming, this baby that had ostensibly ruined his whole lone wolf bachelor life… I knew then that we’d be okay. I didn’t know how we were going to make things work, exactly, but I knew that he loved the baby already and that was enough for me.”

“That’s all you need, really,” Leia tells her, that knowing look back in her eyes. “Just love them, and you can figure it out from there.” And then, before Rey can even think to act dumb, she asks, “So, how far along?”

Rey sighs, gives in with a tiny smile. “Five weeks.”

Leia hums, a small little thing in the back of her throat indicating consideration. Rey takes a bite of her toast as she watches the other woman get up and retrieve a bottle of orange juice from the fridge.

“I’ll take this,” Leia says as she trades Rey’s untouched Irish coffee for the orange juice and an empty glass. “So, does Ben know yet? Don’t worry - he asked for the ring ages ago, so I know it’s not a shotgun wedding.”

“No,” Rey whispers as she fiddles with said ring, wonders how something can feel so foreign yet so right. She’ll get used to it, she supposes; has all the time in the world to do so. “I haven’t told him. I just don’t know if we’re ready for this,” she admits quietly, letting all of her fear and doubt seep into her voice. This is Leia, after all – if there’s anyone who can help Rey through this (aside from Ben, who isn’t exactly an option right now), it’s her. “I mean, we’ve talked about it, of course, but it’s always been one of those someday things, you know? And now he’s just finished his PhD, and we’re both starting new jobs soon, and there’s still the move–”

“Rey,” Leia reaches across the table to still her shaking hand. It works almost as well as when Ben does the same thing to calm her down and keep her from spiraling. “There’s only one thing you need to consider right now. Do you want this?”

“I…” She lets her free hand drift down to her stomach, thinks of how every single vision of hers for their future had immediately started to change the second she’d found out, an automatic and instant instinct to accommodate this tiny new life. It’s only been four days, but Rey can’t imagine going back to any of those plans from before. So she tells Leia, confident and scared at the same time, “Yes. I do.”

Leia gives her a brilliant smile, squeezes her hand in reassurance. “Then you’ll be just fine, as long as you and Ben are there for each other.”

A sense of calm settles over her. Leia always makes things so simple, strips all of her worries and insecurities away until the bare truth remains: as long as they have each other, she and Ben will be fine. She can already picture it: the two of them as a team, taking on unexpected pregnancy challenges and the uncharted territory that is parenthood. She’ll worry about not being a good mom since she didn’t have one, and he’ll actively fear repeating his parents’ mistakes, but together they’ll guide each other and figure it out and–

The sense of comfort and peace lasts for all of five seconds before Rey remembers– “Oh god, I still haven’t told him.”

Leia pats her hand, gives Rey a gentle smile before she picks up her coffee. “You should probably do that.”

Christmas lunch is a quiet affair this year, just the five of them since all of the usual suspects are otherwise occupied.

“So,” Han says after a few minutes of comfortable silence, a novelty at this table, “what’s this new job about, kid?”

By the time Rey looks up, he’s already focused on his food, and so there’s no telling which of them the question had been addressed to. She and Ben share a look before he asks, “Which one?”

Han stares at them, a forkful of roast hovering just beyond his mouth. He looks almost confused for a moment, as if he himself hadn’t thought that through. It wouldn’t be the first time he’s blurted out the first thing to come to mind just because Leia gave him a gentle nudge to say something. “Both of them, I guess.”

“I’ve got a job teaching poli-sci and maybe another related class or two,” Ben shrugs between bites. “That’s about it, really. But Rey’s new job–”

“Hey,” Rey turns to him, “don’t downplay it. You’ve been offered tenure at the University of Theed pretty much right out of the gate, with only a few years of teaching experience in Coruscant. That’s amazing,” she tells the rest of the table.

“It is very impressive, Ben,” Luke chimes in supportively. “To be tenured in this day and age, especially with less than five years of experience – you’ve done well, Dr. Solo.”

“We’re very proud of you,” Leia tells her son, and to everyone’s surprise–

“Yeah, what she said, kid,” Han adds, with no trace of sarcasm and no sign of Leia having given him a slight kick under the table to say so.

He’s even smiling, and Rey’s heart warms to see Ben slowly smiling back at his father. “Thanks,” he tells the table, but looks directly at Han.

“Yeah, yeah,” his father says after a while, not quite able to hide his smile behind his usual gruff demeanor. “What about you, kid?” he asks Rey.

“It’s, um, it’s pretty exciting, actually,” Rey says hesitantly, weighs how much detail she can get into without boring everyone else. Luke, she knows, is always happy to talk shop – though a physicist by profession, he’s proven more than capable of keeping up with her aeronautical engineering tangents –, but she decides to just give everyone the highlights. “The government of Naboo and the University of Theed are setting up a new lab to look into more fuel-efficient crafts, and they somehow found out about me and decided to bring me in. It’s going to be a lot of actual engineering and research, which will be fun after two years of mostly technical trouble-shooting and paperwork.”

Luke looks just as proud of her as he was of Ben, and Leia and Han beam at her even if they don’t quite get the magnitude of what this offer means for her career. But Ben – “They didn’t just somehow find out about you,” he shakes his head at Rey with a patient smile, turns to his family with bright eyes. “Rey wrote this amazing thesis for her master’s about alternative fuel options she experimented with back in Jakku. It’s become sort of infamous in the right circles, and Theed has been keeping track of her ever since. She was one of the first people they contacted about the new lab, and they’re making her part of an elite team of eight engineers heading up the whole thing.”

She almost wants to contradict Ben and tell everyone it’s not as impressive as he makes it out to be, but then he turns to smile at her, all proud and supportive, and god, Rey loves this man. So she decides to just smile back at him and duck her head for a bit until her cheeks don’t feel that warm anymore.

“Sounds about right,” Han shrugs after a moment. “Always knew you two were pretty damn impressive.”

Luke seconds that, and Leia proposes a toast to the two of them and new beginnings. If Han or Luke notice that Rey doesn’t actually drink from her glass – the way she didn’t drink from any of her glasses at the party last night, simply handing them over to Ben whenever he needed a refill –, they’re tactful enough not to hint at anything that hasn’t been announced.

Rey eyes Ben as he sets down his half-empty glass and instantly gets roped into a conversation with Han about recent upgrades on the Falcon. After a while his hand reaches out for hers, but he doesn’t look her way, doesn’t catch her switching their glasses.

Still. Rey knows she can only keep this from him for so long.

After lunch she and Ben help Luke with the dishes while Han and Leia take a walk, and it takes them a little longer than usual to get everything washed and dried because they’re too caught up in reminiscing about life in Coruscant U.

“So when are you moving?” Luke asks almost reluctantly, having expressed for the tenth time how weird it’ll be not to run into either of them around campus anymore.

“End of January, most likely,” Ben says as he returns dried dishes to their rightful places. “They’re bringing me in after midterms as a mid-semester replacement, and Rey’s job doesn’t start till March. Figure that’ll give us enough time to get properly unpacked and moved in before work starts.”

Luke nods along to his nephew’s explanation. “Have you found a place yet?”

Rey sighs. “Not yet. Everything is either too far, too expensive, or too small. And we don’t want to sign a lease on a place we’re not happy with.”

“Housing in Theed is a fucking nightmare,” Ben grumbles to his uncle. “I know it’s been a while and it’s a major city, but I don’t remember it being anywhere near this awful back when we used to go there for the summer.”

“Well, things change,” Luke shrugs, and Rey thinks she catches the slightest hint of a grin before he turns back to the dishes with a forced and telling casualness. “But I wouldn’t be too worried if I were you two. I think Leia has an idea.”

Ben squints at his uncle’s back, and turns to Rey with a suspicious look. She simply nods in agreement and goes back to drying the dishes.

It isn’t until much later, towards the end of the night, that they find out just what Luke had been hinting at.

“So,” Leia announces once they’re all food-sleepy and eggnog-drowsy, “Luke and I have a surprise for you two.”

Luke’s entire face lights up as he claps his hands together gleefully. “Finally! I’ve been waiting all day for this.”

“Don’t ruin it,” his sister shoots him an admonishing look before she gets up and walks over to the Christmas tree in the corner, all twinkling lights and tasteful ornaments and not a single present under the tree, as per Organa-Skywalker-Solo tradition.

Rey and Ben watch Leia retrieve one single gift from the tree, nestled amongst its lower branches rather than placed under it. It’s a small box, all glossy red paper and classy silver ribbon, and upon spotting it last night Rey had mistaken it for a slightly-oversized ornament.

Now Leia holds the gift out to them, and Ben slowly reaches out to take it. “I thought this was a gift-free household,” he reminds his mother.

“Open it,” Leia simply tells him, returning to her seat between Han and Luke, both of whom appear to be leaning forward in anticipation.

Ben nudges her with his shoulder and holds the box out on one palm, and Rey carefully slips off the ribbon before she lifts the lid off the box and fishes out a set of keys.

It takes her a while to recognize them – Ben always uses his own set when they visit – but as soon as her eyes land upon the familiar address carved into the small wooden keychain, recognition dawns upon her. Ben too, if his tiny gasp is any indication.

“Mom, this is…”

Rey looks up at the twins. “You’re giving us…?”

Leia nods, a huge smile on her face. “Varykino, yes. I know it’s all the way out in Lake Country but honestly, given the traffic in Theed, this will make for a much more pleasant commute. The road from Lake Country into Theed leads right to the university, since it’s on the edge of the city anyway. And from there Rey should be able to easily take the train or a shuttle to work. So really, it’s not even that much of a drive.”

“You can either sit in Theed traffic for an hour,” Luke adds, looking horrified just by the idea of it, “or you can start your days with a scenic, traffic-free forty-minute drive.”

Rey and Ben turn to look at each other. It’s a wonderful idea, and they love Varykino, but…

“We can’t possibly accept this,” Rey tells the twins.

“It’s too much,” Ben agrees. “This is a whole house. This is your mother’s house. You can’t just–”

“Ben,” Leia interrupts him with a patient tone. “It was always going to be yours, anyway. And when you two got together, Luke and I agreed that it would be your wedding present. Now you’re engaged – so close enough, we figure – and you’re in need of a house in Naboo. So here you are.”

“Merry Christmas, happy wedding, and just don’t ever expect another gift from us for the rest of your lives,” Luke says with a grin.

They hesitate for a moment more, until Han decides to pipe up. “Just take it, kids. No one ever offered me a fancy house when I got engaged, but there’s no way I would’ve turned that down.”

So they accept the house, with a million thanks and tight hugs.

A little while later, as they’re all saying their good-nights and heading to bed, Leia suggests, “You two should take off for a while, spend the rest of your week in Varykino.”

“But we just got here–” Rey protests weakly.

Leia smirks at them. “Just go. I was young and newly engaged once too, you know. You need some privacy.”

From upstairs, Han calls down, “And we need some space from your celebrating!”

“Please,” Luke decides to chime in from the top of the stairs. “Please spare us from your celebrating.”

“Bunch of prudes,” Leia rolls her eyes at the men. “Just… stay for lunch, okay?” she tells Ben and Rey. “And after that you can go have a pre-honeymoon honeymoon or whatever it is you want to call it.”

Ben reaches out to pull his mom into a hug. “Thanks, Mom. For this, and the house, and just… everything.”

Leia leans into her son with a smile. “You’re welcome. Now, off to bed. You two have a long drive ahead of you tomorrow.”

They trade their good-nights, thank Leia one last time, and head upstairs. In bed, while Ben traces squiggly lines up and down her arm, he muses out loud, “We could have the wedding in Varykino.”

Rey, half-asleep already, lifts her head from its perch on Ben’s chest. “Hmm?”

“The wedding. Our wedding,” Ben smiles. “We could have it in Varykino, if you’d like. I know you don’t want anything big and flashy, but this should give us enough room to invite all of our closest friends and even house some of them overnight if we have to, and it’s got a great view, you love the lake–”

“Okay,” Rey yawns, presses a kiss to the hollow of his neck before she allows her eyes to close. “That sounds perfect. Let’s get married in Varykino.”

Distantly she hears Ben chuckle, feels his chest rise and fall as he stops caressing her arm and drops his hand to curl around her waist. “We’ll talk about it again when you’re not dozing off. Good night, sweetheart.”

“Good night, Ben,” she mumbles, and allows herself to drift off in his arms.

So the plan was to keep each chapter at about two-thousand words.

This is a little over three-thousand. Whoops, I did it again. There were bits and pieces in this chapter that I really debated taking out, but at the end of the day I want you guys to know what's going on with their lives, every tiny detail. Because that's the only satisfying goodbye I can give these two, I think - one where we know where they're headed and how their lives will play out. (And yes, this fic is really just one long goodbye to this 'verse. It's like a three-chapter epilogue, basically.)

Tune in tomorrow for the last chapter! Will Rey finally tell Ben her secret? Will they christen every surface of Varykino?? What if they - GASP - decide to elope right there and then??? (Spoiler alert: they don't.)

Anyway, see you then. As always, thanks for reading and feel free to like/reblog/comment/etc.!

[gretamaya]

Title: Back Porch

Summary: This is for @invaderhogtwopointohno, who asked for a new neighbors au in the rebelcaptain “May the 4th” exchange. I hope you enjoy the story!

AO3/2446 words

“How do I look?” Jyn asked, stepping out of the door onto the back porch. She didn’t stop to think about why she was asking for Cassian’s opinion. When he wasn’t away on assignment, he could normally be found on the back porch that stretched across both sides of the duplex.

“Good.” The warmth in his voice made the word sound more positive than it was - the lovely smile he gave her had the same effect.

“Thanks,” she said, smiling back. “Um.” Her purpose obtained, she suddenly felt the awkwardness of the situation. “Have a good evening,” she offered weakly. She suddenly wished she was staying here, on the back porch with him, like she normally did. But everyone in her life - her parents, Leia and Han, Bodhi - were urging her to ‘get out there’ and ‘not hide away in your house with no furniture, God, Jyn, you make me look good’ (“Thanks, Han,” she had said, no real thanks in her voice).

“Good luck,” he said, lifting his mug of coffee to her in a kind of salute.

As it turned out, she really should’ve just stayed on the back porch. How could she have trusted Han Solo to set her up on a blind date?

She didn’t know how she knew from one look at the tall, severe-looking man at the bar that things were going to go poorly, but she had. However, she also told herself not to judge a book by its cover.

She really should’ve judged, though, because her judgements were entirely correct in this instance.

“Do you really think watching men kick a ball around is a valuable use of your time?”

“Yes,” she growled. She really hated talking to men about sports. Normally, when they found out she liked football, they immediately started to try to catch her out, by asking her to explain the offsides rule or claiming she just liked it because the men were hot. Somehow this pretentious asshole, who didn’t even like sports, was nevertheless trying to make her feel inferior about sports.

“I prefer to spend my time reading John Chesterfield’s three-volume work on the Crusades. Are you familiar with it?”

“No,” said Jyn. She was frantically trying to think of a way out of this mess.

“It is far more exciting than a football match. Chesterfield’s scholarship is top-notch.”

“Actually, I prefer Niall Ferguson’s scholarship.”

Jyn was a bit surprised when he physically leaned away from her in horror, instead of reacting with glee. “Ferguson’s scholarship is appalling. His inability to build a cohesive narrative from his research seriously undermines any point he is attempting to make.”

“His research really isn’t all that, either.”

He frowned at her, confused. “You just said you prefered his scholarship.”

“Yeah, well, that doesn’t mean I like it.” She actually found Ferguson awful, she had just been hoping that mentioning him would keep Kay talking for awhile without any input from her. “I was expecting you to launch into a long soliloquy on his attributes. People like you normally like Ferguson.”

“‘People like me?’”

She was prevented from answering by Kay fixating on someone who had just entered the bar. For awhile now, he had been watching everyone that came in with an expectant look on his face. She had thought probably in hope that his real date would appear. Jyn frowned as she realized that she knew who was approaching them.

“Oh, good, my ride is here.” All at once, Jyn’s attention snapped back to the man sitting next to her.

“Your ride? You can’t drive yourself to your date?”

“I assumed there would be alcohol.” He looked down at her beverage. “You’re not driving yourself, are you?”

She snorted. “Of course I am driving myself home!” She could handle a drink. Well, at the moment, she felt like having a lot of drinks and then calling a cab, and feeling that intensified as Cassian approached them. Jyn was both mortified and angry. How did he know this asshole? “Kay… Jyn,” he said, greeting them in turn.

“You know her?” Kay asked, clearly taken aback.

“She is my neighbor.”

Kay looked her over, not for the first time that night. “You did not mention that she was extremely irritating.” Great, thought Jyn, he’s discussed me with this idiot.

“She’s not.” To Jyn: “I’m sorry.” When he offered to pay for their drinks and get Kay out of there, Jyn told him he sure as hell wasn’t doing that and she was going to stay there, drinking.

“But you drove yourself here! How will you get home?”

“It’s called a cab, Kay,” said Cassian and then to Jyn, “I can’t promise he won’t call the cops on you. Why don’t you let me take you home, now, and then we can worry about your car later?”

Before she could respond to that, Kay added, “You should listen to him. Cassian is a sensible person.”

‘Sensible’ was not how she would describe him, not if he had the role in this debacle she thought he did, but to get this over with, she agreed to go with them. Besides, it would give her a chance to confront him about all of this.

Kay, mercifully, did not live far away, leaving Jyn and Cassian alone in the car.

Jyn crossed her arms over her chest. “So how do you know Han Solo?”

“Who?”

“Don’t give me that. You worked with Han to set me up on that date.”

“I would never set Kay up on a date with anyone.”

Jyn had wondered how long he could keep the act up, wherein he looked horrified at this situation instead of enjoying it, but just maybe it wasn’t an act. She was still expecting Han to pull up in a car while they idled at a red light any moment, gleefully shouting about how he had played her.

Getting no response from her, Cassian added, “When he told me he was going on a blind date, I tried to talk him out of it. He doesn’t handle surprises well.”

“If you didn’t set him up, then who did?”

“His friend Cee.”

“Ah.” Cee. Who worked for Leia. Who knew Han. Yes, Cee definitely had the poor judgment required for this.

By this time, they were pulling into the spot in front of the duplex. “You know Cee?” Cassian asked, as he turned the car off.

“Yeah. That explains things. If I had known Cee was involved…”

“You wouldn’t have done it.”

She shook her head, sighed, and leaned back into the car seat. She heard Cassian get out, and wasn’t surprised when the door on her side opened. “I promise never to mention it again.”

“Can you get Kay to never mention it again?” she asked, swinging her legs out of the car.

“I will do my best.”

“Thank you,” she said, fumbling for her keys as she moved towards her door. She looked down at herself. “It’s a shame I got all dressed up for no one to appreciate it.”

“I wouldn’t say that.” Cassian had closed the car door behind her, and was moving towards his front door, so close to hers.

She looked up at him, startled. “You wouldn’t?”

He looked embarrassed. He had pretty much looked embarrassed from the moment he had shown up in the bar, but subtle changes in his expression told her he was somehow even more embarrassed now.

He stuck his tongue out slightly, a gesture Jyn had learned meant he had made up his mind about something, and said, “I appreciate it.” She was a bit too startled to say anything, but she didn’t run, so he added, “I know you didn’t get dinner, I could make some pasta if you’re interested.”

She had enjoyed Cassian’s cooking before, of course, when he had found her on the back porch they shared and offered him some of what he had been making. This felt different, though, like he was offering to cook especially for her.

She wondered briefly if he was Kay’s friend because he looked good by comparison, but she quickly shoved that uncharitable thought aside, he had done nothing to deserve it. She was still somewhat stressed out from the disaster her date had been, and she didn’t know how good of company she would be. On the other hand, she didn’t want to be alone, and she did want to eat, and Cassian was used to her moping on the back porch, and she really was dressed too nicely to drink whatever alcohol she had in the house while eating ice cream out of a container and cursing Han Solo’s name.

She realized she was taking to long with her answer when he said, “Look, Jyn, don’t worry-”

“I’m interested.”

His worried, embarrassed look was replaced by relieved embarrassment. He held his door open for her.

Jyn had seen plenty of his kitchen from the back porch but very little of the rest of his house. It was warm, inviting, comfortable - a lot like Cassian, really. He spent weeks away on assignment when reporting on the global effects of climate change - he had seen famine, drought, disease. He just liked to come home to something comforting, and alive, which is why their shared backyard was overflowing with greenery that went untended while he was away.

“Would you like something to drink?”

She was desperate for some alcohol but said, “I really need to eat something first.”

He smiled and in short order a plate of cheese, crackers and fruit appeared in front of her. Jyn had to stop herself from blurting out “How the fuck are you still single?” because she knew what his job required of him, she knew that was why he came home to an empty house and overgrown garden with an new, irritable neighbor who made him feel unwelcome the first time she saw him.

“So…” Cassian began, trying to sound casual, as he pulled food out of the fridge. “Who is this Han Solo?”

Jyn smiled. “A friend from college. Now that he finally got up the nerve to actually get engaged, he keeps trying to hook everyone else up. He’s terrible at it. I don’t know why he thinks he’d be any good, either, he danced around Leia for years before anything happened between them. I said yes to his latest offer just to get him to leave me alone.”

“Ah,” he said as he smiled at her. Then, changing the subject completely: “You okay with mushrooms?”

“Sure,” she said. But she wasn’t ready to let this go. “So you knew I was going on a date, and someone had set Kay up on a date, but you didn’t bother to check to see if it was with one another?”

“I thought it was too improbable. Besides, you didn’t tell me you were going on a blind date, just a date.” He looked over his shoulder at her, somewhat apprehensively. “How long are you going to blame me for this?”

“I can’t blame you, you’re too cute and you feed me.” Cassian’s answering blush told her he didn’t expect to hear those words any more than she expected to say them. He quickly turned back to his cooking - Jyn knew her cheeks must be burning as well. She wished she hadn’t turned down alcohol earlier, she could use some now to drown her embarrassment.

Instead, Jyn watched Cassian as he worked at the counter while she munched on the food he had already provided for her. Is there a particular reason you left out the fact that your new neighbor is really good looking? Leia’s words floated through Jyn’s mind. Leia had gotten a look at him one day when she stopped by Jyn’s house to drop some things off. Leia didn’t like Jyn living in an apartment with no furniture. Jyn didn’t mind - her old furniture had been too much of a reminder of her past life, that she was trying to move on from, and it had been cheap, anyway. Leia, the daughter of a senator, her life mapped out before her, did not do and had never done ‘cheap’.

Jyn had thought about answering Leia with glib remarks like ‘don’t let Han hear you say that’ or ‘I didn’t think it mattered’, but Leia never would’ve been satisfied with that. Leia dealt well with honesty, though, so Jyn had told her she didn’t want to talk about it, and Leia let the matter drop. Or maybe she hadn’t. Leia knew Han, knew Cee. Leia could’ve stopped this whole thing, only she didn’t. Maybe Leia had let it go through, so Jyn would realize she was interested in her cute neighbor. Fine, Leia. Jyn would admit that to herself. She was interested in her cute neighbor. Who was currently cooking for her. Sometimes Jyn felt that they were all being carefully manipulated by Leia, and there wasn’t anything any of them could do about it. Her missteps with Han had been caused mostly by the fact that Han was about as far removed from who Leia thought she should be marrying as possible (and also by the fact that Han was Han).

“Are you ready for that drink?” he asked, with a brief glance over his shoulder.

“Sure,” she said, standing up as she said it. “If you’ll tell me-”

“No, no, no,” he said quickly, leaving the food he was preparing to gently push her back to her chair. “I’ll get-”

Instead of letting him push her back further, Jyn pulled him towards her. He had already been leaning down slightly, making it easier for her to pull him down for a kiss.

Several minutes later, when he came up for air, he managed to say, “The pasta will get mushy.”

“You have more,” she said, turning off the burners. She wanted Cassian more than she wanted food.

(It turned out he did not have more.)

(She, however, had some. From a box of mac-and-cheese.)

(She’ll never forget the horribly cute distressed face he made at having to cook it. She laughed and kissed it off him. “Cassian, I’m hungry.” He grumbled, but was happy to accept her kisses.)

*

Han was there to greet her at work the next day. “Jyn, look, I can explain-” Han was out of his seat, moving his arm in a sweeping motion, as though to push away the debacle he was prominently involved in.

Jyn walked right up to him and kissed him on the cheek. Han, flabbergasted, sputtering, “Wha- what?”

Jyn just smiled at him and walked away. It was all he deserved, really.