Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Oh, wow. You got here quick.”

Rey can’t look at Ben standing in her doorway without thinking about the last time he stood there — how dark his eyes had been, how comfortably he'd grabbed her hip — so she turns away. Three steps later, she realizes the stress maybe made her sound unhappy to see him, and that she’s also abandoned him at her door, so she wheels around, a little jazzier than she’d like.

“Yeah. Sorry, am I too — I can walk around the block.” He stays hovered in the doorway, his tallness and broadness noticeable today. Last time, it just seemed like he fit perfectly into her space.

“I should actually probably do my mindfulness —"

“No, no. Come in.” Her third-time-in-thirty-seconds flashback of last time, since it’ll never happen again. She’ll never whisper a variation of that stupid little phrase into his ear again, immediately regretting it, because this was platonic, this was a favor, this was a means to an end, not a way to find out the things that made her very good friend Ben’s hips jerk against hers.

"So. I don't really know how to say this, but —" “Rey." He looks at her frown. "I know, I'm interrupting. I'm sorry. But — the podcast.” His throat moves, and there’s a flash of some big feeling that she’s worried is irritation or frustration, before he turns away. “It was wrong.”

“I know."

At her sigh, he whirls back to face her. There are small lines around his eyes, a tenseness in his mouth. He looks horribly handsome, too worried for platonic stress. He looks like he hasn’t been following the Huberman sleep protocol they’ve both been texting about.

"No, I mean.” He shouldn’t be stressed. It was meant to be easy for him. (She’d even offered to do all the work, that first time, in a valiant effort to make things even easier.) She was the one with the — very recently discovered — problem. “I mean, I just realized — I wasn't trying to — Rose went over the math with me last night. Very patiently."

Ben runs a hand through the luscious waves she'd optimistically hoped her child would inherit when she started this whole stupid thing. Back when they’d both been half drunk, one year out the first time they met (a friendly debate that had ended with both of them getting asked to leave the Cantina), nine months since he’d texted a three word “Thought of you” text and a podcast link about sprinting and realized they both had strong feelings about sprinting, back when she could say honestly that I mean it was objective, how hot Ben was — what do you mean, his ears? — but she’d appreciated him as a friend, and that was more important.

That night, she’d been flopped on his couch, explaining to him that it was one thing to have the money for a kid (well, if the Chandrila Buy Nothing group stayed at its level of bougie baby gear turnover for the next year), how she felt confident secure enough in her body — plus, her recently implemented Zone 2 cardio would ensure she’d be around for any future child for a reasonably long time — her job, with being single.

But it was another to pay money for the clinic and the IUI. But then he’d opened his phone and played a clip from the podcast they both now texted about, and they both listened to Huberman confidently explaining that if you had unprotected sex six times, you had a 120% chance of pregnancy.

“Well, okay. But who’s going to have sex with me six times?” She’d settled back into the couch, reaching for the blanket just out of grabbing distance, brushing Ben’s strong shoulder. “Who am I going to want to have sex with six times?”

“I’m sure you could find someone.” He shifted and she’d gotten a wave of his smell. He always smelled good, she’d suddenly remembered. His hand brushed her thigh as he grabbed his phone and she didn’t want to immediately shift away. All of these things seemed suddenly, hugely significant, a checklist in her mind shimmering into view, already filled out. “Especially if it was. Platonic.”

"Yeah,” Ben says now, short in a way she can’t parse. (And she’s gotten so good at parsing Ben. And he knows what all her frowns mean.) “Hux sent me a bunch of asshole Reddit posts."

"God, I’m so sorry. Just so you know, I don't expect you to —"

"No. It's my fault. I should have —” He sighs. “I mean, I did get a 5 on the AP Stats test."

Despite the new, awful stress crashing through her — is she going to have to go back to the donor clinic, is there any nonprofit in the greater Chandrila County area that actually covers IVF — she can’t help but smile. “Oh my god, that’s so impressive. Do you have any other high school achievements you want to brag about?"

He looks slightly put out, but a smile tugs at his lips. Which is one of the approximately five hundred things she’s realized she loves above him. "I mean, isn’t that why you picked me for this?”

"No. It’s because you were free.”

“Well, I think I’m worth it. I reminded you to stop taking your pill that one time.” He grins bigger, leaning against her door, his Sambas now an inch from her bare feet.

Her heart roller coasters at the memory: the second time, him grabbing her wrist as she rolled over and instinctively grabbed the foil packet, her pausing and realizing that for the first time in 13 years, she didn’t have to take her pill at 1:15 p.m.

A tiny little life change — not punching the blister pack, not reaching for her water — that had been accompanied by another one. That somehow, after having surprisingly sweaty, surprisingly quick sex with her platonic friend Ben — sex with an agenda, Evangelical-approved sex with the sole purpose of procreation — she might be falling in love with him.

Because look at how serious his face was as he held her arm gently away from the packet. It was a face for playground scrapes, for toddler-giggle-evoking faux seriousness, for gentle parenting, whatever that was. As her stupid brain had gurgled all this, Rey, her heart hammering, all post-orgasm bliss churned into cartoon-hear stres, Rey had neutrally said “Thanks.” And then he’d dropped her wrist.

"That was helpful. Maybe I’ll give you a raise.”

“Nah. The free Cheetos are enough.”

Somehow she's closer, and even if she didn't have the adware-clogged app on her phone, she'd already know she’s close to ovulating from the way she wants to bury her face in his neck and smell his sweat, from the almost embarrassing way she's already ready. (The way she's been ready for him all six times, and how he’d seemed surprised every time.) "I mean, I also picked you because you don't have a documented family history of eye issues.” She points at his brow. “All the money I don’t have to pay for glasses just goes into my Cheeto fund.”

He looks at her finger and she watches him swallow. "But we do have a documented family history of being annoying as shit. Like, every single one of us. But we do have pretty respectable hairlines. And I told you all the moles are fine, right? Like, I got them checked out."

"Oh, that's nice. And I'm glad for you. But — really. I know this is already a lot, and who knows how long, and you've already done —"

"I'm happy," he says slowly. "To get you. To 120%. Or — however long it takes. Only if you want."

"Oh. Thank you.” (Big hands splayed across her hips, the slight frown on his face as he fucked her with a purpose, how he sprung up every time, six different times, to get her water afterward. How easy it had been to get used to that kind of caretaking.) “I — I would be very. Appreciative."

Ben's eyes track down her neck, down her flushed chest, to where her hands twist in front of her stomach. She'd thought he'd make fun of her that first night, both of them sweaty and silent, her cheeks hot as she stared at the ceiling fan and reminded herself that it was the first time she'd ever let someone do that — inside.

Of course it would be normal to have a non-platonic feeling about it, especially when it turned out she liked it more than she thought (and Ben thought, if his noise when she came again was any indication) and then she found herself almost unconsciously settling her hands on her belly, even though it was too early, too silly, too — and he'd looked over, hair messy from her greedy hands, his full bottom lip curving into a smile.

She can't help smiling with relief. She doesn't have to pay a million dollars, she can just continue sleeping with her platonic friend and it'll be totally fine.

"But maybe after,” she starts, giddily stupid, but who cares, she can worry about her stupid non-platonic feelings later. “We could hang out and watch a movie — I know if might fuck up our sleep but—"

"I can handle it, I just made a bunch of cold brew. Did you know you can have 11.4 ounces of it when you're — when it happens? Anyway. Also, you fell asleep pretty quick last time."

"Well. I told you my subtitle rule and you ignored it. So."

"I just thought it made me a good choice for, you know." He waves a hand, preschool-magician style, vaguely around her stomach. "Like, foreign language exposure."

So what if she’s realized she has feelings deeper than his? She’s already scaled a million mountains of making do, of wanting less than the other person. What’s one more? She’s getting what she wants, isn’t she?

"Also. I —" Ben stares down at her, and she watches him exhale through his mouth, how his bottom lip juts out. Warmth curls in her stomach. Good. Focus on that, she reminds herself. The baby-making, not the baby-maker. "I think I'd like the baby to get the flu vaccine. I know what the podcast says. But. You know."

"Oh, god. Of course! Because I was actually just thinking about when the baby meets your parents, I want it to be super safe,” she says. “I actually might actually unsubscribe — like the first time I saw a dentist I was ten, fluoride toothpaste is basically why I’m not all-gum — but anyway. Yeah, of course. We’re getting all the jabs and all the tiny bandaids and all the little emotional support teddy bears who also will coincidentally be getting their DTap."

Ben’s now looking at her in some way she can't quite figure out, intensity that could be something she said, or a vaccine-related trauma from age 13, or one of the parent issues he mentioned to her during their walks home from the gym. "Obviously — with the parent stuff. As much or as little as you want. Whatever you're comfortable with."

He nods, slowly. His jaw pulses, like he's biting something back. "Right. Hey — do you want to go to bed? I know it's not the day, but I could probably — unless you don't —"

Maybe she'll suggest some position where she doesn't have to look at his face. She can survive, as she always has, with what she has. She can be grateful for what he’s already given her, what he gives her really quite competently.

She can focus on the wonderful, illicit feeling of her very good, very platonic friend Ben groaning into her ear as he comes inside her, so much that it drips down her thigh. She can ignore this new greed for all of him.

So she smiles, very normally, and says, "Sure! Totally. Um — couch okay?"

Chapter Text

Six months earlier

“Okay, so.” Ben sits on the bench, shifting his hips wide. He nods down at her feet. “How did you even know? That you were sure about the kid thing?”

“Jesus, again?” Rey bends, haphazardly retying her shoelace. Usually, Ben is comfortable asking — occasionally demanding — her opinions, her Taco Bell-allegiance justifications. Sometimes it’s annoying. But mostly, she finds it flattering. It’s funny, though. He keeps referring to what they’re doing tomorrow in vague terms, like it deserves an acronym: The Kid Thing.

But maybe it’s because “agreeing to have platonic sex with you six times so you can use your limited funds for Chandrila’s astoundingly expensive day cares instead of IVF” is awkward to say every time. “I didn't know. Like, I never gravitated towards teaching jobs and I sucked at babysitting. And, you know. For a long time I thought I was, like, too fucked up for it, you know?”

Normally, she’d immediately qualify something like that — oh, ha ha, I’m being self-deprecating, I’m so self-aware, of course that’s not what I really think, but somehow it is also basically the truth, but also don’t worry about me, don’t make it weird — but with Ben she doesn’t have to. Because he knows. He just nods, pulling down the machine handle. She watches him for a second. His form is perfect. Even firm strokes down. She always goes for speed, not perfection.

“Yeah. I still kind of worry that.” He nods again, expression serious. “Am I doing the shoulder thing again?”

“You’re wearing a teeshirt.”

He pulls off his shirt, and she watches the wide, pale expanse of his back, the muscles tensing and rippling.

“Yeah,” she says, watching his arms. “I see your biceps moving. I think you need the false grip. Also, really? You’re so patient. And so good at teaching things. And I feel like you have a good amount of like, lizard facts.”

“That girl wasn’t hitting on me, by the way. She just wanted some advice for her niece.” He puts his shirt back on. Rey realizes she’s once again using spotting Ben as a way to procrastinate on doing abs, and grudgingly walks to the other cable machine.

“She hung out at our table for like, three of Poe’s karaoke songs. Who does that for their coworker’s weird boyfriend unless they’re trying to — you know.”

“Anyway.” There's something nice about Ben’s firmness. She’s seen him mad, or scrambling, but when he’s relaxed like this, he has a comfortable certainty in the way he says things. A relaxed sweater kind of confident firmness, a sort of listen-to-me-the-tall-man power she’s both jealous of and impressed by. She feels like she usually has to scream to get a similar effect. “You were saying?”

“Also, like. Every kid needs therapy for something. Like even if you do everything right, all the most essential parent stuff and love them and put a roof over their head, they’re probably going to complain to their therapist about how you made them do soccer instead of capoeira.”

At least, that was what Rey hoped. But, come on. She could definitely do a better job than her own parents by actually wanting and loving her child. Wasn’t everything else just gravy?

“God, what if you have a kid and they do fucking stand up comedy.” Ben looks genuinely depressed at the thought as he pumps. “Is it like, ethically wrong to hate all kids but your own?”

“Or TikTok prank videos!”

“Instantly cutting them out of the trust.”

“Oh, right. Everyone has a trust.”

He turns and watches her. God, it’s so unfair how easy for men to get stupid big muscle gains. But Ben’s are even more excessive. “You’re doing it again. You’re going to destroy that machine”

Rey yanks harder. “Abs are so boring. I don’t care what you say.”

“It’s not as bad as leg day. And you know I’m right.”

“I know you’re annoying.” But she does try to slow down slightly, breathing through the entire twist. “But, yeah. In college I was — this guy and I, we weren’t even dating. Like, he hooked up with other girls sometimes. I think I fucked like the entirety of this band while we were on a break. But he would always shoplift these cards from CVS for me, and, you know, it was the first time anyone had ever given me a card so I thought it was so sweet. Even though he was stealing them. And he wouldn’t even write in them. Just do a heart and his name.”

“Oh, hi! How’s everything going here?”

Both of them stop and frown at the gym employee beaming nervously at them. Last time her and Ben were here at the same time, Rey had seen this loser guy come up and talk to the same obviously irritated girl three separate times, so Rey had called something out to him, but he’d just waved a dismissive hand at her, and then she’d jabbed Ben who had bitched about his kidneys, and then they’d both marched over to the guy and there had maybe been some raised voices, but whatever, this was a fucking warehouse gym, and if the front desk guy wasn’t top say anything, well, they were going to.

“Um. Fine,” Rey says eventually. Ben looks at the guy. Rey looks at the guy. He smiles, and quickly backs away.

“He sounds really cool.” Ben starts pumping again on the machine, faster this time. See? He sacrifices form for speed sometimes, too. “Your college guy.”

“Well, you know. He had these arms, and he’d drive us to the beach. But anyway. One time the condom broke. Or was old. And then about a month and a half later I realized I was pregnant. From a girl, actually, at the gym who noticed me throwing up multiple times. The first person who showed me how to actually activate my glutes. I thought I was just hungover a lot of days in a row.”

“Wow. What a — helpful friend to have.”

“I mean, at that point her and I were sort of hooking up sometimes, too. Anyway. I realized I was pregnant, freaked out, got an abortion — because I was 19 and had like three dollars and was trying to pass machinery vibration and rotor dynamics. But it made me think about it for the first time. And I was very clearly like, this is one hundred percent something I don’t want now. But for the first time, I was like, I think I hundred percent want a kid someday. And then eventually I realized I was okay with doing it without a partner." She thinks of it sometimes, the realization a sudden, surprising thrill: giving the baby her last name. "And then I didn’t want to wait any longer. And here we are.”

“And you’re not scared?”

Most people, she’d jump down their throat. A frown, a new tone: “Do you not think I can do it or something?” Rude, but bone-deep instinctual. Because even if it came from genuine curiosity, it was always something unpleasant and foreign for Rey to have to explain herself, her decisions, to someone else.

But Ben — well, they’d been through that. While discussing the latest Huberman episode, while interrogating her about her bent over row form. While asking her — while sticking his head in her freezer to find ice to make her a cocktail that would allegedly make her appreciate cocktails for the first time — to explain her reasoning about how mint and marshmallow could possibly be good together in an ice cream.

He asked. Sometimes rudely. But then he listened. With the frown that meant that he was really listening, with those little crinkles by his eyes when she made him laugh. He asked and he quizzed and he pressed and he followed up, noticing and noticing and noticing.

It was demanding being his friend, sometimes. It would have been easier, maybe, to stay in the friend-of-a-friend general dislike zone.

But it turned out to be worth it. Because Ben’s interest was — flattering, or something. Because he was obviously smart, with his way of somehow quietly analyzing stuff while also having the body of a creatine-guzzling gym bro. Because she liked that his attention wasn’t easily given, and she also liked how carefully he stacked all the dishes and brought them to the bus bucket after he challenged her to a sprint to the diner, when he ran as fast as he could against her, how she could see his genuinely frustration for a moment when she won.

Both of them fucked up sometimes. Early on, she’d corrected his interrupting and he called her on out about how she talked over him, and then they both frowned for a while, before entering into a debate about if cherry juice was actually good at muscle recovery, with Ben looking at the footnotes of Google Scholar to actually read the original charts in the article mentioned in the footnotes, while she rolled her eyes at the sight of his big thumbs pinching and scrolling and made a crass joke about the time she drank pineapple juice for her high school boyfriend.

For a half second, she’d worried that it was too far, that Ben was too serious for a joke like that. (She always did this, always did something wrong, why did she even try —) And then Ben, the expression on his face not changing from it’s default half-frown, said he couldn’t relate because his come had just naturally tasted good. It was the notes of sertraline.

They were friends. Who both liked the same weird workout shit, who both hated the same stupid twee indie games (“The point of video games is to win,” Ben had said, shaking his head as he showed her a review of some loser game where you were a sheep working at a coffee shop who needed to deal with a chocolate syrup shortage “To destroy,” Rey had agreed. “To dominate.”)  Who were grumpy in ways that were complementary until they weren't.

It was nice, being Ben’s friend. Understanding instantly what he meant when he tipsily said he didn't like sandwiches without some kind of crunch or spicy thing, because "You don’t want a sandwich that's too nice to you, you know?" Realizing how he thought she was equally as smart as him. Equally as strong.

So, even though she feels the automatic bristle, she tells him honestly. “Well, there’s the new Chandrila free pre-K thing which I qualify for because of my income level. And then my work has at least two daycares near it that haven’t been reported to the state and have good reviews on the forums. And Paige and her wife are going to start trying later this year, so maybe we can go in on some sort of something together, child care-wise. And I think my insurance does those group prenatal appointments, and I overheard someone talking about how the Reddits where people are all giving birth in the same month are good.”

She yanks the cable one more time, as hard as she can. “But, god. I mean, I think it’ll be easier almost in some ways, not having to divide things up. Like, just knowing that it’s all my responsibility.” It was how she preferred things. Well, most of the time. “But I know it’s going to suck sometimes. I know I’m going to be so jealous of people who complain about their parents or in-laws showing up too frequently to help out. Or people who actually confidently know their family history when the doctor asks. Or a rich partner with a stupid work from home computer job.”

“I do feel like Miatka has mentioned doing diaper changes during our camera-off meetings.”

“Oh, yeah, I meant to ask — how much is your guys’ family leave?”

“Ah—”

“You know, just for comparison.” She switches to a standing glute kickback. “Not, like — I’m just trying to get a ballpark,” she says quickly. It’s very nice what he’s doing, or is going to do. It’s so nice that it makes her feel that scrambly feeling, the impulse to assure him that they can make his legal-non-obligation official through the library’s free Lawyers in the Library program, to clarify that she doesn't expect anything more.

“12 weeks.” His eyes scan over her, and she tries to aim every kick at the same spot on the wall and engage her muscles perfectly each time. Turns out, having someone else to work out with does help her get better. “You’re dropping your hip.”

“See? This is why you join the bargaining committee. Don’t you feel so smug?”

“Well, I had someone very annoying telling me to be a good person. ”

“And now you have a union rep! Oh! How’s Bazine doing, by the way?” She kicks, hard, staring at the wall and trying to focus on her hip. From the corner of her eye, she can see Ben swing his leg around the bench and rerack the weights. He always does it carefully. No dropping, all his movements intentional.

“I have no idea. Good, I guess? I heard her tell someone she got a dog from Mexico?”

Rey switches legs. “Good for her.”

She finishes her set, and wipes down the machine while she waits for Ben to finish. He always does burnout rounds. She glances down. Today’s set seems especially brutal.

“You’re a masochist.”

He pauses, breathing hard. Fingertip pushups: why does he do these things to himself? She can see the sweat glinting on his forehead when he turns to look at her. “Maybe you’re right.”

She laughs, pulling up the app, even though she already knows it's the right time of the month. “Tomorrow still okay?”

Ben goes back down. She watches his legs strain, the muscles tensing and releasing. He doesn’t look at her, and she can see his muscles straining, can see sweat glinting, as he moves faster and faster. “It’s in my calendar.”

Chapter Text

“I did not listen,” Rey says the next day, walking into her apartment. “It seemed extremely boring. And two hours?”

“But the long episodes always have the interesting stuff.” Ben puts his keys and helmet on the table and follows her into the kitchen. He’s dressed nicer than she expected for this. She wonders if he wears that sweater on dates.

“Yeah, but your threshold is like, 4 hour history podcasts.”

He leans against the counter and gives her that look. Vague annoyance, slight indulgence. Rey, with her incredibly boring abandonment issues and no previous experience with the concept of being charmingly annoying, lives for this look.

Funny what a good friendship can do to you — now, whenever she sees Ben’s slight frown, his lips getting slightly pouty, it makes her feel safe. Like she doesn’t have to second guess what she says or does, because their friendship has enough holding power. Or, alternatively: even with her flaws, Ben thinks the rest of her is enough.

Then he looks away. “So. How do you want to do this?”

“Oh.” She hadn’t really thought about it, distracted by re-reading her insurance plan’s benefits summary and daydreaming about how nice it’ll feel, her and her kid, two Niimas against the world. The reminder of why he’s here makes her feel strange. Suddenly, she’s overwhelmed with a strange urge to offer him something. “I guess, bedroom? Or, did you want water or anything? AG1, maybe?”

Now he looks back at her. “You don’t drink that shit.”

“I do when I’m being good.”

He grabs the same mason jar he always does, and fills it at the sink. “I can’t believe you’d rather eat four disgusting, dry as shit protein Pop-Tarts than like, chicken and vegetables.”

She toes off her shoes and starts walking to the bedroom. “I would say that my lack of vegetables is actually your issue. You haven’t made the green pasta in a while. I’m getting scurvy, and it’s your fault.”

“It’s more of a kale pesto variant that I wanted to try, rather than hiding the vegetables like you’re a child. But okay.”

“Hey, I’m going to be doing that soon. For an actual child. I’ll need that recipe.”

“Right. Yeah.”

Ben’s voice is aggressively neutral again. He keeps coiling and uncoiling. Rey wishes he could just be normal about this. Ben has a tendency towards drama, toward seeing import and significance where Rey usually believes there is none. And while she knows he’ll never back out of something he agreed to — he’s stubborn, just like her — this really won’t be so bad.

Just a few minutes of sex. Sweat-wise, it probably be like the time they accidentally biked a century because he wanted to show her this part of the forest that was rainforest-y. (Him looking over his shoulder and giving her shit about her granny gear as they crested the hill, a smile so huge it surprised her.)

To push through the awkwardness, she sits on her bed and takes off her shirt. Then her bra. Her fingers are on her jeans button when she realizes that Ben is standing there, not moving.

“Oh, shit. Sorry, did you — were you thinking we’d do this with clothes on? We can totally do that.” Damn. She was sort of wondering how that new pullup hand grip had affected his back muscles. He’d said they’d had a big impact. While she’d seen a brief glimpse of them yesterday, she’d been looking forward to checking it out for herself.

“No,” Ben says firmly, suddenly a flurry of movement. “Clothes off.”

So she takes her pants off. After a second of deliberation, she takes her underwear off too. Then she sits back on the bed, politely looking at her taped-up dive bar photobooth pictures of her and Rose until Ben stops moving at the corner of her eye.

Something feels off. Suddenly she wants to run, to tell Ben to actually? Don’t worry about it. To bolt, to grab the first guy she can find on the street and do this with him instead.

Nerves. Fine. But why? She doesn’t mind being naked and she’s never been precious about nudity — she enjoys throwing her body around, forcing it to do new, harder things.

Plus, her and Ben are comfortable with each other’s bodies. They look out for each other at the gym. She knows what went into his ACL recovery. When her back was fucked, he leant her the spiky mat that fixed it. She already knows the smell of his deodorant. His sweat.

But despite all that — for some reason, there is a quivering feeling in her stomach, a new alarm bell awareness.

“You okay?”

“Yeah,” she answers in the direction of his (bare) shoulder. Maybe worry isn’t actually what she’s feeling. It’s more like — her entire body is thudding in preparation, and she’s mistaking it for stress. Which is dumb. Because this part doesn’t deserve her worry. She wants her body to save the worry for the next 18 years.

“We can—”

“No. Unless you—?”

“No.”

“Cool.” That’s it: she’s probably just stressed because it’s weird, having to rely on someone else for something so important. It’s always easier for her to do things, even difficult things (like, say, having a kid) alone, rather than asking for help.

But it’s Ben. Five minutes early; “I’m buying you this salt because you’re wrong, the flake does does contribute significantly, I don’t like eating without it, and you shouldn’t either;” helped Finn and Poe move upstairs, twice; too-honest (“I didn't realize it was a crop top dinner”) Ben.

He glances over at her now, hands on his knees and tilts his head, curious. “You keep looking at me. Do you normally do it with clothes on?”

“No,” she snaps, annoyed at how stupid she’s being. In college, she could fuck her friends and everything was fine. Is she getting old? And why is he drawing attention to her weirdness? She wants him to treat her the way they both treat the people who try to hit on them at the gym — politely distance, non-offensive disinterest. Instead, he’s treating her like one of those little rat-maze New York Times games he attacks every morning before coffee. (“It’s a challenge. I’m strengthening my willpower.”) “I’m not a pervert.”

“Is that perverted?”

Such open curiosity. And apparently it’s contagious, because what does he think is perverted? Suddenly, she wants a dossier on every person Ben has slept with. Every position.

“Sorry. It’s — it’s just not normally like this, you know?”

He leans back a little on his hands. He still has his boxers on. So it’s basically like the times when they’ve gone trail running. Normal. “What is it normally like for you?’

She laughs, quick and loud, at how polite he’s being. Ben-curiosity, now featuring her sex preferences. But he doesn’t smile back. (Even though she’s being normal. This is all normal.) “Oh, you know. I don’t want to beat you up like that.”

“Excuse me?”

“I’m kidding.” For some reason, she feels the need to say everything like a children’s book: I am kidding, I am normal, this is fine. As if all her layers of Ben friendship — the podcast that she loves because it makes her feel empowered, like she has the tools to improve herself despite lacking most government-euphemism “indicators of future success” and Ben loves because he’s a nerd who loves learning things; the inside jokes that came from the podcast; the surprisingly crass joke he made the first time they went to the gym together, his ears turning tomato red as he looked at her quickly, seeing if she was offended — have collapsed, leaving them jabbing in opposite directions. “You know. Just like, I’ve been known to scratch someone’s back, or bite their neck or whatever.”

“Ah.”

“Like, on occasion. Not all the time. Not in a weird way.”

“Got it.”

“But don’t worry, I won't with you. I’ll return you just the way you were. Like it never happened.” They should get started. But she can’t look at his chest. All she can do, it seems, is say these stupid things.

Plus, she has a sudden and terrible awareness of her elbows. Why are they are close, so close, to Ben?

Ben, who is so pale. Notably pale, which must be why she can’t help stealing the smallest glances at him, again and again. The third time she realizes she’s looking, she realizes what she’s doing, and that it’s weird. She’s seen Ben’s chest before. He’s very hot. A fine — normal! — thing to notice. It would be weirder if she didn’t notice, actually.

“Should we,” Ben starts. “Did you want to make some notes or anything?”

“What do you mean?”

“Tracking the different factors.” He shifts next to her, a sudden jerk. “I don’t know. Days or position or time.”

“Maybe.” From the podcast, it seemed pretty likely to just happen if they followed the schedule. “I’ll do it later.”

“Okay.”

“So.” Enough of her stupid thinking. “Ready to assume the position?”

He nods, saying nothing. He reaches for his waistband, and she looks away again. Then she turns. She scootches. She swings a leg over Ben’s thigh, getting ready to straddle him.

“Oh. Like this?’

Rey is now fully seated in Ben’s lap. His thighs are warm and very strong. Should she target her thighs before she has a kid? For like, the bending and bouncing parts of motherhood? “Yeah?”

“Isn’t that going to be a problem?”

Well, most times, for the metric that matters (likelihood of Rey-orgasm), it’s actually kind of the opposite? Except, Rey realizes, as she feels Ben shift underneath her, adjusting to her weight, which makes her place a hand on his shoulder for balance —

He’s right.

This isn't about the quickest way to her pleasure, a guaranteed orgasm that she usually pairs with some benevolent ball-fondling. This isn’t about Rey’s learned ability to wring an orgasm out of even the laziest, elementary-school-aid slash-skateboarder with a troubling Zyn habit that seemed unfamiliar with the concept of texting. This is about procreation. Ben’s orgasm.

Ben’s come.

And the best angle for her to take it.

“I mean, I don’t think it’s confirmed by like, peer-reviewed studies. Like, this could work.” Ben’s big hands are suddenly gesturing in front of her face. “But to be on the safe side, maybe you should be on the…downhill?”

Oh. The other part of this. Because of course Ben wants it to be as efficient as possible. Of course he wants to reduce the likelihood that they have to do this again.

Which is fine, because that’s her goal too, right? The quickest path to a two-line result?

“Right, right. Like missionary. Or.” Suddenly, her mind is filled with the image of them, doing this doggy-style, one of Ben’s big hands resting on either — both? — of her ass cheeks. Maybe doing more than that. “Ah. Sex from behind,” she says formally.

“Yeah.”

“No, that’s a really good point.” She climbs off Ben, bumping their knees, and then lays down flat beside him. “Okay!”

When he turns, it’s not to look at her. “Is that a sound machine?”

She follows his gaze. “Yeah. I got it at Goodwill. It was a good find, I think. Everyone online says that’s the one babies love.”

“Not just babies. I had one for awhile in middle school.”

“Did you like it? Did it work?”

“Sort of. I used to have these nightmares, and — ” He stands, his back to her. “Have you bought a lot of baby stuff?”

“No. I tried, with a scarf, figuring out the whole baby wearing thing.” Standing in front of the mirror, wrapping and unwrapping, imagining the heat, the weight, the perfect baby smell.

Right now, though, she’s thinking about teenage Ben. Maybe he’d answer. But it’s still probably not the right time to ask what the nightmares were about. If he still gets them. “But I didn’t actually buy anything else yet. Too soon.”

He turns toward her. His eyes travel down her body. She can see her nipples, stiff and pointed from being exposed like this. “Do you want anything? Like, before we start?”

For some reason, she can’t take her eyes off his mouth. Pink and plump, his lips slightly parted. A response pops into her head, fully formed: sure! 15-30 minutes of oral. From your mouth, specifically.

Which is strange. Because, okay, fine, it’s one thing to acknowledge that Ben is hot. It’s another thing, a new thing, to want that hotness applied to her.

But, still. No need to freak out. So what if she has a slight attraction to her good buddy? That won’t change anything. And it’s actually kind of a relief, because duh — this is why her brain was so agitated earlier. She was simply adjusting to Ben’s hotness at closer range than normal.

“Yeah. Let me grab the lube.”

It’s actually, she quickly discovers, more convenient for Ben to grab the lube. Otherwise, her breast will continue pressing into his shoulder like this. But what’s done is done, and she uncaps it, quickly rubbing a small amount while Ben averts his eyes.

As she rubs in the last of the lube, she watches him pass his hand over his briefs, squeezing once. It’s good that he’s still looking away, because it’s hard not to stare: the fabric stretched over hardness. The shape, the curve. Thickness straining the fabric.

“Do you need—” For some reason, when he turns back, she offers him some lube from her hand, not the bottle. “Or any other general fluffing?”

It’s a stupid joke. Because they’re friends. But neither of them are that objectively that funny, and her tone is a bit off, and Ben just shakes his head. “But thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” she says with equal politeness. When she turns to put the lube down, there’s a sound of clothes being taken off. She doesn’t see Ben take his clothes off, but she hears it. The slap of skin against skin. The sound of an erection. Of an erection that will soon be inside her.

When he climbs on top of her, she sees, at very close range, every single muscle in his arms. For a brief moment, she forgets why they’re doing this.

Okay, fine. She thought she’d realized a second ago how hot Ben was. How come she hasn’t adjusted yet? Because right now, her thoughts are slow and stupid, focusing mainly on his smell. (It’s just his stupid deodorant.) It’s always annoying to change her mind, but okay, she can do it: she will officially move Ben from the category of “basic everyday duh-hot” to “Hot in a way where he could be in those stupid movies everyone always watched at the group home” kind of way. It’s fine. Nothing to worry about.

That solved, Rey watches interestedly as he lines up his cock, feeling nothing but relief that she’s figured out her problem and general aesthetic appreciation for Ben. Then she feels the fat head of his cock nudge at her entrance and suddenly remembers. The slow splitting. Always the initial shock of someone moving inside her.

“Are you frowning?” Ben asks suddenly. “I know — well.”

All of Rey’s thoughts are variants of: good! Big! How does he smell so good? “Huh?”

“That I’m—it’s—big,” he says gravely.

Rey grins. “Huh.”

He cocks his head. “It's not?”

Well, yes. But I’m trying to remain chill, and I’m used to caring about a set category of things, and you being stupid hot with a dick that is not only long enough to feel everywhere, but thick in a way that makes her feel like her body is reshaping itself around them, which is dumb but that’s kind of where her mind is right now, but also, she can definitely take it, is not one of those things, and this is sort of a new and troubling development. Also, it’s kind of my job to give you shit since too many people seem weirdly intimidated by you. “Is that your normal feedback?”

He gives her that look again — the half-amused one from earlier, and she wonders if it’s obvious that she just got a little more wet.

He says nothing. But the next roll of his hips is a little faster, a little harder, and she’s reminded that while usually in sex, she’s merciless, furiously rolling her chips and chasing pleasure, dragging a guy’s hand impatiently to her tits, here she is by definition being passive. She is not here for pleasure. She is just here to take.

The idea is foreign to Rey, who is used to grasping, fighting, (shoplifting, FAFSA-fudging). But as she watches Ben move above her, his hips snapping efficiently against hers, again and again, feeling his hipbones brush against hers, feeling the press of his balls against her cunt — there is something pretty nice about it.

Because Ben is so tall and propped up on his hands, it’s easy for them to not make eye contact. She peeks up beneath her eyelashes and sees staring at the wall above her as he moves. Which is fine. Because it gives her a chance to admire the muscles from his neck stretching to his shoulders, the feel of his belly bumping against hers.

He pushes forward, a little more. But still not enough.

“I’m not going to fall apart.”

“I was being polite.”

“You don’t need to. It’s just me.”

He sighs, then puts a hand next to her shoulder. And then he nods, and then he — he really pushes forward, filling her completely. All other thoughts blink away. Her body feels like it’s completely absorbed in the new task of taking Ben into her body.

And maybe this is good, actually. Sure, it’s a little disorienting knowing that her good friend Ben has a cock huge enough to scramble her brian. But like, this is the point, right? His cock, inside her. Nothing else matters, right?

So she smiles. Which makes him frown, for some reason.

“You’re not breathing.”

“Yes, I am,” she snaps. God, she hates when he announces things like that, like he’s telling her about herself.

“You sure you’re good?”

“I’m fine.” And isn’t everyone into choking a little? This is in the same auto erotic asphyxiation neighborhood. “You can like. More actively fuck me.”

He shakes his head, and then moves again. In and out, Her breath is shaky. After a few breaths, she realizes his is too. Which is gratifying, and makes her relax into the bed. The pressure feels less of an intrusion, and now comfortable. A kind of smug awareness of his size: yeah, she can take it.

All of sudden, Ben looks down at her. For a moment, she feels embarrassed, but then he sighs, deeply. Now she’s annoyed.

“What’s wrong?” Is he going to lecture her again? Is he displeased by her perfect pussy?

He flicks his gaze down at her, then back up, looking past her. “I’m in a period of deep focus.”

“Like, you’re meditating again?” That’s cool he’s able to move past the traumatic uncle-meditation-summer-camp he told her about.

He frowns down at her. “No,” he says through clenched teeth, and she watches his throat move. “I’m trying very hard not to come.”

Perfect pussy! Perfect pussy! Rey takes a moment to congratulate herself. “Damn.”

“This is not a common problem,” he grits out. He thrusts once, cautiously. Then remains very still. “I didn’t — never mind.”

“What? No. Tell me.”

He remains stoic.

“You’re literally inside me. Just tell me.”

He sighs. He does that a lot. With their — her—baby be frowny? she suddenly wonders. “I didn’t…masturbate for a few days before this.”

Her heart careens. “Oh, Ben.”

“It’s supposed to be good. For this.” At that, she moves slightly, and he lets out a noise. “I just want to be very clear that this is likely to be a. Non standard event.”

She can’t help bursting into laughter. His frown deepens, almost as if he’s in pain. “I’ll add it to the historical record. Ben Solo is 100% not a two minute man. Except for that one time.”

He snaps his hips forward, a little harder, with enough force to make her laugh die out, to once again make her conscious thought disappear into a puff of dreamy Ben size-descriptors. Now he’s the one grinning down at her, one side of his mouth pulled up in a smug smile.

There is something there. A hint of what this could be: their competitiveness, the fun they have with each other, their compatibility transported from the gym, the trails, the children’s playground, to her bed.

Casual sex with Ben.

At that thought, Rey is overwhelmed with a rush of unidentifiable feeling. She pauses, trying to figure out its direction.

“Hey.” He stares down at her face. What happened to looking into the middle distance? “You okay?”

So much talking. She thought she could hide any weirdness, but she should have known better with Ben. “Um.”

“I can stop.”

His thrusts slow to something slow and shallow and awful. Not really aware of what she’s doing, just hazily realizing that the new feel of him moving deep inside her is one she doesn’t want to go without, she grabs his hip. He looks down at her hand and she immediately releases it. “I’m fine. You can go.”

Like always, he looks like he has more to say. She aims for a sunny smile, and he pushes forward. Withdrawing a few inches, he thrusts, gently.

And for a moment, that’s it. Ben fucking her steadily into the mattress, her hips opening wider, her sinking deeper into the mattress with every thrust. Neither of them say anything, and then Rey starts trying to figure out which she keeps having these weird blips of stress. Is she mad at Ben? No, neither of them do secret anger. (To their Cantina-popularity detriment.) Is she worried about being pregnant? Perhaps unwisely — no. Then what is it?

“Hey. Is there anything you want?” Rey barks.

Ben blinks. Her tone wasn’t that weird. “Oh, me? No.”

Suddenly, the most important thing in the world is figuring out what Ben likes in bed. “Like, that you need to — you know?”

He continues his even thrusts. Annoyingly even. Some excess emotion would be nice, Benjamin. “Yeah. I got what you meant.”

“So?”

“Well, the thing is — I’m very normal. So.”

Again, she can’t help bursting into laughter, distracting her from her emotional mystery.

He groans. “You’ve really got to stop doing that.”

“Oh, sorry!”

“I’m not giving you notes. I’m just—” The next thrust is gratifyingly sloppy, even as every-rep-with-perfect-form Ben looks irritated. “Can you actually just tell me what you need, maybe?”

Hadn’t they already been over this? “Oh, you don't have to!”

“What?”

“Like, I’m sure you’re great at it—”

“Jesus Christ.”

“I’m actually just sorry you have to do more work,” she babbles. The feeling hovers, just out of reach.

“It’s not”—he rolls his hips in a way that brushes something electric inside here, and it takes all her heritage British-ness to maintain her placid composure—“A hardship.”

“Well.” In a variation of this scenario, I could play with your balls, or wrap my legs around you, or tell you early and often how big your dick is. “That’s nice of you to say.”

“You know, I have done this before. I do this — I just want to clarify that this is not an uncommon situation for me.”

“Well, if you’ve got somewhere to be, by all means—”

“No. All I am saying—” And again, a sharper thrust that once again, does immediately shuts her up, and how did this become a ritual, and why does she like the feeling that he can take her over temporarily like this. She should hate it, not want to goad him into doing it again, or figure out how she can evoke the same thing in him. “You don’t have to act like I’m helping you clean your gutters because your landlord sucks. Which I’m happy to do again, by the way. Just. Give me a little credit here.”

“Ben.” She finds his face, decides a shoulder pat is okay. “I am incredibly grateful for this. I don’t think—just. Thank you.”

Cheeks pink, Ben looks away. “I’m not saying I need to be praised. And you know, do keep me aware of any…feedback.”

It’s perfect. She wants to do every variant of this, wants to grind her pussy against every part of her while he tries to hold her still. “I don’t have any.”

“Bullshit.”

“Well, on your neck form during pull-ups? Always.”

He purses his “I’m just not used to — I feel like I’m not doing anything.”

“You’re doing a lot. I’m the one just chilling and waiting for…you know.”

“No, like. I just want to make sure I’m…making it good. I’m not just some selfish guy.”

“Well, that’s very good to know.” She laughs a little, her mind spiraling off into a million directions. Awful, awful news. That conscientiousness. That slight frown, focused on her. She swallows, trying to remember that this doesn't actually mean anything. Ben has a precision about everything. Of course he applies it to the clitoris. “But you are, you know. Fucking me quite well.”

“Quite well.”

“Oh, fuck off. Do you think we turn off being British when we have sex?”

“I think for some people it’s probably the—anyway. Still not fishing for compliments. Just checking in.”

But she likes complimenting him, because now his neck is flushed, and she really, really, wants to lick it. “Also, you are doing a lot. You’re fucking me pretty hard.” His head jerks. That was a weird thing to say. “Or whatever.”

He stares at her for a moment. She can’t tear her gaze from his. Then, he drops from his hands to his elbows. “This okay?”

He starts moving again. Like this, his entire body is closer. His chest touching hers, his stomach bumping hers, his breath close to her ears. Everything, every motion, ever push, every hitch of their breath is magnified. And the height difference, at this closer angle — that must be it. It’s making Ben sort of grind himself against her clit, and it’s a lot.

“Like, for leverage,” he explains. Needlessly, because of course she gets it. It’s faster, now, their bodies slapping together, his cock driving into her, again and again. It’s better, giving him a better angle to drive himself into her. Her mind spins, almost like the reality of his body’s size — his wideness, the force of his thrusts, the strength behind them — makes it suddenly harder for her remain casual. Because now she’s thinking things like: wow, I could grab his ass right now. I can see his ears, and I wonder if they’re sensitive. It would be weird to touch his back. He is so tall. Will their child be tall?

And she thinks he might be going through the same thing, like this new, closer posture has unlocked something in him. Something less platonic. His eyes are glued to the bounce of her tits, and he’s making more noise than he was before, a satisfied grunt every time he bottoms out. There’s a comfortableness to it. Like now he knows he can just take whatever he wants from her.

“You’re good,” she croaks. Because oh god, she wants to let him.

And it’s that thought that makes her grateful for Ben’s face, now in the crook of her neck, almost like he’s going to do something, because — oh god, this is it. This is why she’s been feeling weird.

This is the weird feeling. No, the bad feeling. Because this is horrendous, what is flooding through her body: want.

Want of all kinds, surging and possessive and snarling. And not just vague lust, the generic zing of porn, enough of an interesting face, enough of a frown or erotically oversized nose to turn her on enough to get herself off before a Q3 budget meeting. This is some sort of grotesquely huge, alarming feeling, something pink and breathless and worst of all: soft.

This is more than lust. More than the realization that her gym buddy has some pretty rad sex moves. No! This is the awful realization that not only would she let Ben sexually wreck her, any day of the week, but (oh no) she wants to give him the ability to emotionally wreck her as well, because, because, because:

She wants to date him. She wants him to overexplain his sex choreography to her, to google the ingredients in her cereal for a too-early lecture, to feel him carefully watch her, in the gym, in the bar, as she flew over her handlebars mountain biking that one time. (Was the fact that she let him come into the waiting room, weak and grumpy and not friendship-ready another sign she’d missed?)

She wants to fucking make love to Ben.

Well, later. First, vitally, she wants him to turn her over and fuck her as hard as he can, to use ever single muscle he has built next to her at the gym in the service of holding her down and using her own very intentionally built body for his pleasure. And then after that, she wants to climb on top of him and ride him, to bite his neck hard enough that he groans and comes too quickly. And then after that, she wants to bend over the couch for him, to have him slot his cock between her thighs on a Sunday morning, to suck his dick instead of watching Wings of Desire or what the fuck ever and she wants —

A relationship big enough to encompass all of this. With him. Her AMRAP buddy! Who — maybe as a result of the strange shift from angry friend-of-a-friend to real friend — she had skipped usual do-I-want-to-fuck-you considerations. They’d bypassed the sizing each other up for “more, potentially?” that happened with so many people. People she cared so much less about.

And Rey hates changing her mind. She likes making a decision, and following that decision, stubbornly and steadily, until successful completion. (Or death.) For so long, her own level of commitment was her only safety net. And she’s found she thrives on firm decisions. (Oh god, what if Ben likes dating those people who smile attractively and say, I don’t know, what do you want to eat?)

Because knowing this now about herself — it's like a lock snapping. Okay, this is it. She’s going to feel like this forever for someone who doesn't feel the same way. Who she’d gotten this close to because Ben was like her. Both of them only really had three friends to rub together, and both of them knew that this kind of a connection was rare, and was definitely not a given, to feel understood, to be gross and smell of creamsicle protein powder and sweat after an AMRAP session, to be able to say that dark thing about your parents without someone laughing nervously, and now she’d gone and messed it all up.

“Rey. Hey.” Ben bends toward her face. His hand moves, closer to the pillow. He’s always getting in her face in the worst way, she thinks with a self-indulgent bitterness. Emotionally, physically. Why can’t he just leave and let her wallow in pathetic solitude? “You okay?”

“Yep. Just, you know, thinking.”

“About what?

She liked him demanding her feelings. (Like he was entitled! Which he truly did believe: “We’re fucking friends,” he’d spat once) but now she wants to rewind months of friendship, revert back to frowning at him over a table of empty White Claws and Modelos and asking him snidely if he was late because had to put in some overtime writing the code that was going to put all those people out of a job, and his big weird face screwing up in a mean smile to tell her, don’t worry about paying me back for the Lyft, Rey, I know you’re, well — just don’t worry about it, okay?

But now her friend Ben is very serious all of a sudden. Which he shouldn’t be. Because everything is fine. Just because his emotions are always near the surface, like the gold rush’s most easily tapped mountain, doesn’t mean she needs to do the same. It doesn’t look as good on her, and she’s not as practiced. She might show him exactly how she feels.

He looks too long. He knows, he knows, he’s going to say something — “Okay.”

Thank god. In celebration of the rare occurrence of Ben emotionally letting her off the hook, she shifts her hips toward him. He shoves his hips forward, and then they’re fucking again.

Okay, this is fine. Usually, any sort of desire makes her want to run the other way. Maybe there will be later, but right now it seems manageable. She’s able to distract herself with this diligent fucking, how he’s working himself against her.

And now he’s staring at her tits, mouth open. It makes more warmth spread in her belly. She likes, she realizes, him looking at her like that. Not just a friend, like someone he wants to fuck and possibly date —

Oh, no. Seconds later, and she’s already dumber, already reading more into this. She’s not fine, and Ben doesn’t like her like that. He has a friend level respect built upon their capacity to endure cutting and bulking cycles and brutal box jump routines rituals, that both of them savor with an eagerness that others have mistakenly characterized as “worrying” and “problematic.”

Ben doesn’t have a special interest in her cunt. He’s just generally a conscientious guy — he always has an extra towel for her, made his own acid in college because he wanted to try it but didn’t trust the vibe of any of the chem majors and triple checks parking rules. (Well, except when he’s in one of his dramatic bad movies and whips into parking spots like he’s in a movie)

“Oh, fuck.” His voice sounds unguarded. Good. He feels good from her cunt. The pleasure from that rolls through her.

He wants to fuck her, but as a body. It doesn’t mean he wants to be with her. Rey knows she’s hot and good at sex. If he is going to come fast, it’s because of that and the fact that anyone would after a few days of not jerking it. She should just enjoy the warmth of his skin, the slap of his balls, the rough thrust of his cock inside her.

But when she looks at his face, there's a new remove there. An evenness that she knows is rare for him. She has seen his face flash with anger, depression and sudden joy, but it never looks like this banal equanimity. He’s holding something back. And maybe she’s trying to keep her feelings for Ben from him, but that doesn’t stop this feeling, the itchy feeling of a crush, to gorge herself on his every thought.

And then she has a sudden irrational burst of anger. She doesn’t want him to be contained. She wants all of him. She can take it, she can.

So she closes her eyes, and lets out a small moan. To show him that it’s okay. He thrusts. She opens her eyes half way, and thankfully, he’s not looking at her anywhere. He’s looking down — oh, where their bodies are meeting. Where there’s nothing between them. Where’s he’s thrusting inside her again and again, and he’s not going to stop—

“It’s so weird,” he says, voice strained.

“Huh?”

“Like—” They both pause as he thrusts again. She tries very hard not to react. “I’m going to be coming inside you. Without a condom.”

“Yeah.” Ben and his annoying serial killer-esque habit of seeing patterns and significance where there are none, where she very intentionally doesn’t see them (What’s the point?), even when it’s awkward. “You sound like a high school boy.”

“No. Just, I always have. It's like instinct.” The remove is gone. Thank god. He bends his head, and she wants to drag her fingers through the dark waves. “Growing up — Actually, never mind.”

She grins, but inside she’s resigned. This is how it’s going to be. Wanting every story of his. Thinking the way he’s so randomly careful with her — not in strength, but on Mother’s day and now — is charming. “Yeah?”

“Every uncle I had told me to always wear a condom. Like, each of them separately.” One side of his mouth curls up as he looks down at her. His thrusts slow slightly, and she realizes she’s never talked this much during sex. “They all said it in the same tone, like it there was a story there. I chose not to ask.”

“I’m your first,” she sing-songs.

Instead of answering, he rolls his hips forward.

“It’s just weird,” he says eventually. “Remembering I don’t have to — pull out.”

Can he feel her getting wetter? Can he shut up? Does he always have to state the obvious? Rey, you didn’t deserve that. Rey, you’re still letting your parents affect you. Rey, it’s weird we’re friends and I’m about to creampie you.

It’s fine. It’s fine. It’s —

No, it’s awful.

How is he always walking around like this? With all these stupid feelings and emotions getting in the way of his life — in this case, of what’s objectively very fun sex? This is pathetic. One look at his right-side-of-his-mouth-mole and she’s one minute away from frustratedly screaming her feelings for him.

To distract herself, she decides she should move. After all, he's working hard. Grunting, sweating. She should. Do more. She doesn’t ever want to be lazy, especially when he's giving her some much. (And, as always, the competitiveness that’s always in the background of whatever they do together: okay, so turns out Ben’s a sex god. But does he know that’s Rey’s made at least two bassists and one Trader Joe’s sign designer cry from the force of orgasms she’s given them?)

She moves slightly, jutting her hips toward him, interrupting his rhythm. It annoys him. His mouth twists, and then he’s bending his body, to fuck her more directly. He feels like he’s everywhere inside her, and she gives herself over to the overwhelming. He exhales, sounding satisfied, as he snaps his hips toward her.

At this angle, it’s deeper. And his face is closer — his face is so focused on their bodies, she can feel his breath on her cheek now, and she wants to eat dinner on the couch with him on a Tuesdaty, only this time as a couple who fucks after, or before —

“I’m worried I’m not doing it right,” she blurts. Because, fine. He always gets her to say one more thing than she normally would.

“I think you’re doing” — he pushes again, deeper somehow — “good. “

At those words, her body relaxes against him, a little more, and his next thrust goes deeper. Rey can see the surprise on his face when he realizes, and she looks past him.

“Yeah?”

Too much. That was too much. He’s dong to know, he’s going to get weirded out.

“Yeah.” That firmness. “Very good.”

She can feel it in the way her body responds to that. Can hear it in the wet sound of their bodies, can see it in the slight change in Ben’s face as he looks at her — why is he looking at her so closely? Can’t he platonically focus on her headboard to make this easier for her? — she dazedly wonders what the line is from friendship to dating to love.

Because, did she skip it? Is love the word for wanting to keep talking this freakish amount during sex? Of being able to rely on him without the voice in her head assuming that he’ll drop the ball, drop her, and to always have a backup plan when it invariably happens? Is that the word for wanting him to come inside her even when she’s not trying for a kid, of wanting him to keep telling her she’s good, of wanting to know if he likes her boobs, and her ass and to shower him in compliments of the same?

“I hope it’s good for you.” Ben’s sounds like he does when he’s drunk, his voice thick, every word serious and intent. “I just wanted it to wanted it to be good. Like, when I was thinking about this, I was just hoping. That it would be good.”

She wraps her arms around him, forgetting for a moment to make it casual as she pulls him closer to her, the firmness of his chest against the softness of her breasts. Her other hand is on his head, pulling him to her shoulder, her neck, and she can feel his exhales against her neck, how rapid they are now.

And maybe it’s stupid, but it’s instinct, how she needs him to know, how both of them silently knew, somehow, from the beginning, how even though both of them go through the world snarling and frowning and scoffing at therapyspeak, that — well, you need this sometimes, don’t you? Everyone, Ben, should get this, probably more often than he does, because look at everything he’s done for her — giving her this friendship that was so good, she simply, until this moment, never considered anything more, because what could be better? “This is so good, Ben.”

His mouth parts, almost like he’s going to say something. But he doesn’t. Then it turns into something more desperate, more primal. Sweat coming off both of their bodies, the force of his motions pushing her into the mattress, the slap of their bodies loud. Rey is now wet to the point of oversensitivity. The kind of desperation where her heart is hammering, and her body is hot, begging for a touch.

Ben lifts his hand and looks down, and she wonders if he’s maybe going to touch her and it wouldn’t have to mean anything, and his cock is already inside her, how is touching her clit any different and then he’s moving his hand and — he puts it on her hip. More leverage. Makes sense.

“Rey.” He looks pained, and she can see all the different parts of him that are tensed. Jaw, forearms, the hands bunching her thrift-store duvet. “Rey, I’m—

The greed overtakes her. Every strangled moan, every grunt. She wants all of it, all of him, for as long as she can and can he feel her getting wetter? And he probably doesn’t even realize, so she’s going to use that focus of his — on coming inside her, on making a baby, on her into bed fucking her so full of his come deep inside her, of his come that she’ll be marked by this, forever changed by him — and even though that focus is what she loves, she’s going to take advantage of it to grind a little desperately against him, and he probably won’t notice. And when his eyes glance down to where they’re connected, it’s probably just random, and see? He didn’t notice, because he’s not slowing down, he’s actually going faster, and he pushes forward and it’s so good and —

She clenches around him, and his hips jam against hers, relentless. Her own hips are aching now, from being spread so wide for him. She loves it. Just like she loves the frantic shove of his cock, the little noises, like he’s using her for his pleasure — and that thought makes her even more wet and pliable for his thrusts— except for the fact that he keeps looking down., down at his cunt. Her clit? No, probably not. Then his rhythm stutters.

“Fuck, Rey, I —” He pauses, looking pained. And she smiles, because, she knows what he’s going to say.

“You’re going to come inside me?”

It’s, like, so funny. Ha, ha, ha! The two of them. Friends! Having sex! And isn’t it so weird to be this close, his hair brushing her shoulder, him splitting her in half with no barrier between them? Except her words don’t manage the tone. And his face is so serious, and he’s moving faster, and would this ever be platonic? Would it be platonic if his mouth didn’t look line that, tense with emotion but still so kissable? Would it be platonic if she wasn’t this wet?

Ben grunts. Then he freezes. For some reason, she clenches. He jerks his head up. Their eyes meet through sweaty hair — his, hers — for a moment. She can’t tell what’s on his face. She doesn't know what hers looks like, or even really how she feels.

And Ben’s face changes, to a look she recognizes. Like he’s going to say something that needs a response. Beseeching her. Probably the same thing as earlier, underlined by the fact that he seems moments away from coming: wow, this is crazy, right?

Sure. It's crazy for him. But it’s awful, life-altering, for her. Knowing how he looks when he’s about to come, how his patience stops and the aggression he tries so hard to bury resurfaces, snarling and safe under her hands. Knowing that she feels a way he doesn’t.

Despite all that, part of her, the part that always reaches for him can’t help but wanting to respond: yes, I feel it too. This is wild. Just not for the reason you think.

And then he bows his head, and she suddenly feels his hand on her hip. This time his fingers wrap around to keep her in place for him, his long fingers digging into the meat of her ass. Which would be surprising enough. But then he shoves into her, again, hard. Then his rhythm stutters. He thrusts once more and holds himself there, deep inside her, and then he’s groaning again, louder, and she can feel the warm pulse inside her. She squirms. Just a little, because it’s a strange feeling. In response, his hand clutches her hip tighter, holding her in place for him as he grinds against her in jagged, desperate movements, giving her the last of his come.

He looks at her. She looks at him. After a long few minutes, her heart thudding, he moves his hand from her hip. To avoid his gaze, she shifts on the bed, but feels him moving.

“Ah—maybe don’t move.”

“Shit, sorry.” He turns back to her, moving closer. His cock, and his come, push deeper inside her. “I wasn’t sure if —”

Okay, she can’t decipher his gaze or his tone right now. Makes sense. Right now, her entire body is shivery and tense with wanting, clenching in anticipation. She could come in thirty seconds. Easy. Even just his fingers brushing against her clit, paired with the intimate feeling of his cock softening inside her, still a little hard, would do it.

“No, no. You’re good. Maybe we should just — hang out a second.”

They both exhale. She could make this platonic again. Could joke about the come that has somehow ended up on her knee. But all she can think about there’s something kind of appealingly gross, grossly domestic, about his cock softening, her cunt full of his come, while they lie together in her bed in this late morning light. In a different universe, maybe they’d talk idly about their grocery shopping list right now.

Ben’s voice is quiet. “You didn’t bite my neck.”

She attempts a smile. “Well, you’re my friend. I wouldn't do that.”

After a moment, he nods.

“Oh, it’s probably safe now,” she remembers to say a few silent moments later. “If you want to — exodus.”

But Ben doesn’t move immediately. Instead, she feels Ben’s fingers on her inner thigh. Gently brushing, like he's careful not to be too rough.

“There’s a lot.” He sounds almost distressed.

Her heart has started thudding again. The skin there is so sensitive, and If he moved his hand ever so slightly, she could grind against the heel of his hand. He wouldn’t have to do much at all. “Well. That’s good.”

“Yeah, it’s just.” Finally, he pulls out, one hand next to her on the blanket, the other hand gripping his cock. The entire time, she watches his face, watching him stare at her cunt. She can feel more drip slowly down her thigh. “Is that bad?”

“Not for my purposes.” She shifts. More of it drips out, warm and messy. This should be so gross to her. “And I mean, I don’t think it’s going back in at this point.”

Ben continues staring for a second longer, then shakes his head, sitting up. Finally, she gets to see his back muscles. How they flex and stretch across his wide back. Looking at them reminds her how wet she still is, how her silly cunt is throbbing in desperate anticipation of something that’s not going to happen. “That’s true. I’ll go grab — where’s your linen closet?”

“As in, where do I keep my linens?”

“Are we doing a semantics debate?” He has a hand on his hip. (Even though he’s naked. It’s funny and domestic and it makes her want to almost cry.) They’re smiling, joking. His dick — still flushed, still wet from her— is irrelevant now. She should stop looking at it.

“I don’t have, like, a linen closet. It’s just that one closet.”

She hears him tramping around, moving things, while she just lies there. Thinking about his come moving through her body, thinking about him in the other room, grabbing something to help her clean up. All this work he’s doing for her, while she just lies here.

It’s strange and pleasurable. In a general sense, but mostly because it’s Ben. Her stomach twists with want she reminds herself is unreasonable. Look at how much she’s already getting from him. Look at how much he’s already doing for her.

And even now. He walks back in holding a Trader Joe’s dish towel, folded in a way she doesn’t bother with.

“Thanks,” she says, extending a hand.

He pauses, looking confused for a brief moment, then thrusts the towel toward her. She wipes at her thigh as he turns away, pulling on his boxer briefs.

She picks up her phone and mindlessly scrolls through the TTC Reddit to distract herself. “Did you want to shower?”

It’ll all be fine. It’s only six times. Only five more times, then she’ll be too distracted by growing a child — the priority, the thing she wants! — to let herself think about anything else she wants.

He shakes his head, pulling his shirt back on. She turns back to her phone to avoid staring at the part of his hips that juts over the waistband of his jeans.

“Oh, fuck,” she says without thinking, staring at her phone.

“Yeah?”

“Apparently lube can be bad? Like, for getting pregnant? Why is there all this stupid shit. I used to put all this effort into — “

“So, you’ll need,” Ben interrupts, his voice neutral. “Next time, you’ll need —”

“Oh, no!” Sure, Ben, can you actually go down on me next time, and do the tit-sucking and two-finger combo in the very particular order I’m partial to? Way to not make it weird with the friend you’ve recently discovered you’re probably in love with, Rey. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll figure it out. It’s — it’s not your problem.”

He turns away, running his hand through his hair. “Got it.”

And now he’s preparing to leave, having finished his polite, platonic, good-friend duty. She’ll be left alone with these sore hips and the feeling she hates most in the world: wanting more from someone who’s left. In preparation, she grins at him widely.

“So,” he says, sounding hesitant.

Thanks so much, Rey prepares herself to say sincerely. See you at the gym tomorrow, same time? In a few days, once she’s feeling less…fertilely possessive, maybe she’ll casually ask him if he has any dates planned for once she and him finish this thing. That would be good. It’ll be a good chance to re-train her brain away from this silly yearning, to let him firmly know that she doesn’t expect anything romantic or special from him.

“Do you want to maybe go on a walk or something?” he continues. “Might be good to stretch it out.”

“Oh, yeah! I was actually just thinking that,” Rey says, elated, reaching over to grab her underwear from the floor. When she looks back up, Ben is staring, quite hard, at her face. “Walking is such a key thing for mobility, you know?”

And see, it’s fine. Because now they’re talking about their mobility routines, and it’s only five more times of having the thing she wants, both so close and so very far away.

“And, oh,” Ben says. “I think I actually saw in your neighbor’s Little Free Library? That Emily Oster book about pregnancy?”

“What’s that?” Only five more times. With her very good friend.

“I just saw it. Like, across the street when I was turning into your parking lot,” he says quickly. “We don’t have to, but I read once — or maybe I heard her on a podcast when I was still listening to the New York Times ones — and she has this kind of Huberman, stats-based approach to baby stuff—”

She can handle this. “No, thanks. That’s. That’s a good idea.”

“I mean — anything that tells you it’s okay to eat a little cheese safely. That has evidence to back it up. Awesome, right? I just don’t want you to be cheseless for nine months. I mean, you just discovered double cream. I was going to buy some triple cream next time.”

“Totally.” And because it’s fine, and she doesn’t need to tell him, even though she feels like the feelings are about to burst out of her: I want you, I want you, I want you. She smiles at him, and he smiles back in relief, and she shoves her keys and phone very deeply into her pocket as they prepare to leave.

As they head out, both of them now talking about a protein mac and cheese recipe Rey saw on Reddit and is threatening to make for them both, and Ben telling her to just eat salmon and rice during the week and he’ll make her some famous lady’s mac and cheese recipe on their cheat day, and Rey forgets everything in the ease of talking to him, and then she turns back around from locking the door behind her to face the back of Ben’s head as they walk out of the door, and his hair is thick and dark and healthy looking and —

It’s wavy. Almost curly. Different enough than hers that she wouldn’t know what to do if, say, she was in the bathroom with a wailing toddler with hair like that, alone, with no one to ask how to handle it, with no one to take the hairbrush and kiss her on the cheek and gently shoo her out while he calmly spoke to their kid and sprayed, like, detangling spray (is that a thing?) and talked in a curious voice about did you know that some cows have curly hair just like you? And what noise do cows make, do you remember? Okay, cows go like woof, woof, right? Oh, no? Can you remind me? See, there you go, and now your hair is all done, do you want to show Mom?

And then Ben turns around on her doorway, that fucking hair glinting in the sunglight, asking if she got a charlie horse again, a stupid smile on his stupid lovable face and —

It’ll be fine. Only five more times. Right?