Conflicted: A Reylo Fanfic

Paradise...

"You don't have to go away, you know."

Rey spoke into the weighted air around her. Although she hadn't spotted Kylo yet, she knew he was there. Ever since her chance run-in with Cerisse Ren, he had taken to checking in on her more frequently. It was highly unusual now for her to go a week without sensing his presence through their Force bond, though he rarely lingered or spoke. At first, she'd been annoyed by his refusal to interact with her but, after forcing herself to consider his behavior from his perspective rather than her own, she'd come to realize he was simply being polite. He knew she didn't welcome his presence, but at the same time she knew he had some inexplicable compulsion to assure himself that she was well. Once she'd thought of it in those terms, it had become clear that his occasionally popping in to check on her was his compromise. And his reticence to speak with her was out of deference to her desires, not his.

"I thought you didn't want to have anything to do with me."

She pondered that idea, turning to face him at last. Want. What a curious choice of word. There were so many things she wanted, things that couldn't possibly coexist. And, as much as she'd tried to convince herself that wanting him completely absent from her life was one of them, it had simply become too exhausting to keep up that charade. If nothing else, it was nice knowing that someone, somewhere cared enough to want to know she was safe, even if it meant incurring her ire.

"I've accepted that you're going to check in on me from time to time, whether I like it or not," she explained calmly. "Speaking with me when you do makes it seem somehow less...intrusive."

She could see in his tight nod that he felt guilty for having made her feel invaded, and she turned away from his unnecessary self-recrimination. Yes, it had irked her to no end, but she'd made her own peace with it. Surely, as he saw that in her, he would too. Leaning back, she tilted her face toward the sky, luxuriating in an activity that still felt to her like the height of decadence.

"Where are you?"

Rey stifled an amused smirk, recognizing immediately how strange this must look to him, given that he could see nothing of her surroundings, only her body. Deliberately toying with him, she answered in the broadest sense possible.

"Galea."

If her intent had been to tease him by withholding pertinent knowledge, she would have been disappointed, because the crease in his brow lifted abruptly as he understood what it was he witnessed.

"You're swimming," he stated in a tone of realization.

She nodded, her eyebrows suddenly rising sharply when he inexplicably smiled. Stunned by the sight of Kylo Ren, fearsome Emperor of the New Empire actually smiling, Rey found the expression to be quite contagious.

"What?" she challenged defiantly, fighting the upward pull at the corners of her mouth.

"It just looks so odd," he explained, settling into a crouch on the sandy bank. "You're floating in my floor."

She did smile then, imagining what that must look like. But then Kylo abruptly frowned again.

"Wait... You know how to swim?"

Rey laughed lightly, understanding his confusion. After all, she'd grown up on a world where water was precious and certainly not to be squandered on something as frivolous as full bodily immersion.

"No," she confessed, "not really. I'm using the Force to stay afloat. See?"

And with that, she released the tension she'd maintained, her head slipping promptly below the surface of the water for a moment before she reactivated her buoyancy.