Ben closed the door softly behind Rey and leaned his forehead against it. He stayed that way as he listened to her steps recede from his room, until he heard her own door click shut down the hallway. He raised his head, only to let it fall with a thunk against the painted wood once more.

"Fuck," he breathed. "Idiot!"

Truly, there was something wrong with him. He turned away from the door and grabbed a piece of paper off the desk, crumpled it in his fist, and flung it at the far corner of the room. Three more sheets followed it but he felt no better.

Taking Rey's book had been a rash, impulsive move. He could've just asked her like a civilized person, but no- he'd stolen it, then lied to her when she'd confided in him. He admitted it was childish.

Kissing Rey, though...

The pile of paper balls grew in the corner. Their weightless, uneven flights did nothing to soothe the rage he felt at himself and only served to hurt his shoulder as he whipped them even harder.

Ben flopped on his bed and punched the spare pillow with the back of his fist before pulling it over his face and releasing a fierce growl that faded into a groan of self-disgust. He peeked over the edge of the material, scowling at the underside of the roof. A storm had blown up late in the evening and a light rain pelted the house. Normally it would've been soothing, but the staccato, uneven sound was making him stir-crazy even before the interruption.

What was she doing in her room, down the hall? Why did he care? He didn't care what she was doing.

No, he didn't. He didn't care, not one bit.

But if he didn't care, then why could he not stop picturing her look of surprise when he pulled away from her? He clenched his fist as he thought how her weight had swayed against him. He could still feel her necklace, the one she never took off, pressing into the palm of his hand.

She wanted him to kiss her!

It was incomprehensible to him. He'd expected her to resist, to slap him for even trying, but instead…

He had never felt like he would be satisfied to merely kiss a woman, but he could've stood here all night, just kissing her. The look in her eye when he'd told her to go, like a startled deer in the headlights, confirmed she had wanted more, too.

Ben covered his face with the pillow once more and let out a muffled yelp of frustration. He tossed the pillow against the wall and stood in one smooth motion, returning to his desk to continue working.

Two hours later, amendments swam in front of his eyes and he couldn't recall a single thing he had read. The clock read two-fifteen in the morning and the storm still battered the roof. The pile of crumpled papers he'd unfolded and smoothed lay before him, and he felt ashamed just thinking of the face Maz would make when he handed them to her to type up his corrections next week.

He could picture it now, her lined old face puckered around the cigarette between her bright pink lips. "Long night, Senator?"

Ben folded forwards over his desk and lay his head on his forearms. A tree branch scraped against the siding of the house but he detected no movement inside down the hallway. What was he listening for? She wouldn't come back, not when he'd sent her away like that.

Against his better judgement, he went to his door and turned the handle slowly to release the latch before opening it. He peered out the crack down the hallway.

It was dark under her door.

Ben didn't know if it was disappointment or relief that flooded his body that she wasn't still awake.

July 5, 1964

The inlet was completely still aside from their sculls skimming over the water, a pair of herons standing on one leg in the cattails and the occasional cry of a seagull wheeling overhead. The storm let up overnight but a light fog lay in over the water.

He and Hux had had their ups and downs, but rowing was their constant. Ben sighed as he looked at Hux's back, their movements in sync and honed by years of practice. They'd begun as an unlikely pair at prep school, matched because of their similar gangly heights but had grown into a team of dedicated oarsmen. While Ben's frame had filled out as he'd reached his early twenties, Hux had remained thin as a rail but was deceptively strong and a more determined competitor. They routinely took top honors in the congressional intramural rowing club.

Of course, it also didn't hurt that they were at least twenty years younger that most of the other participants and took it somewhat seriously instead of as a chance to drink and slap backs out of sight of their wives.

A patch of sweat was just beginning to darken his friend's shirt between the shoulder blades when Ben interrupted the silence.

"Armitage," Ben began. "You owe me fifty bucks."

His assertion didn't cause Hux to break his rhythm at all. The slightest tilt of the ginger's head was all the more acknowledgment Ben got.

They slowed and began to turn at the end of the inlet before they reached the stand of cattails and it was then that Hux glanced back at him.

"I don't owe you spit. The convention's not for another twenty days."

Ben didn't meet his friend's steady gaze. They drifted over the water pointing back towards the house and the two men began to pull in unison without a word.

They were halfway back when Ben spoke again. "Actually, I have a feeling like you're going to win."

Hux abruptly stopped rowing and turned, dipping the tip of his right oar into the water. It was enough to create perceptible drag on that side and Ben stopped rowing too.

The boat skidded slightly sideways and came to a slow stop.

"What?" Hux's eyes narrowed in suspicion and he combed his sweaty hair back from his forehead.

Ben shrugged. "I just have a hunch."

Hux stared at him. "A hunch? What does that mean?"

"It's not like she wanted to work for us to begin with."

"But she does, and she's good, so why would she quit now?" Hux's eyes were practically slits now. "Unless you did something shitty to her again?

Ben couldn't meet Hux's eyes, but the accusation rankled him. Resentment bubbled in his gut. "How come I'm automatically the one who's been shitty?"

"Are you asking rhetorically? I hope?"

When he didn't answer, Hux turned away and swiped his face with the inside of his elbow. "How long?" Hux sounded defeated.

"It's not like that," Ben retorted. "Nothing's happened."

"Yet," Hux finished. "Nothing's happened yet."

"Why do you always act like I have no self-control?"

"Well, prove me wrong once and I might start believing you do," Hux spat, grabbing his oar handles and beginning to pull without waiting for Ben.

Ben let his friend pull his dead weight for five stokes before picking up his own oars and beginning to row once more. He deliberately rowed at a different timing, his oars dipping at the exact opposite point of Hux's stroke. It caused the boat to move unevenly, jerking through the water.

Hux caught on to his trick immediately and paused mid-stroke to allow their rhythm to sync once more.

"I knew this was going to happen." The wind carried Hux's voice away but Ben could still make out what he was saying. "You're so predictable, it's ludicrous."

Ben tucked his chin to his chest and rowed harder, relishing the burn in his thighs and upper arms. Since when was predictability a bad thing? In his experience, voters preferred stability to chaos.

"Phas said you spent the entire party staring at her like a creep," Hux went on. "You won't be able to just cast her off like one of your flings, Ben. Not this one." Hux's tone struck him as protective, an older brother flexing his muscles at a sister's suitor.

It annoyed Ben deeply, this assumption of Hux's that he was always the one at fault.

"Well, I'm not the one who came to my room last night," Ben retorted. "Did you ever think of that?"

The scull hitched again as Hux's rowing paused. Ben narrowed his eyes at Hux's back.

"I thought you said nothing happened?!"

"Nothing happened!" Ben shouted, causing the herons to start and flap their wings. They rose a short distance in the air before settling back into the thicket at the shoreline. Their elegant heads turned towards the boat and they froze, tensed on high alert.

"Then why are you even telling me this?!" Hux cried, turning back to him again.

Ben stopped pulling and they drifted. They were nearly at the dock anyway.

"We just kissed, that's all," Ben admitted with a shake of his head. "It was-I was-stupid."

The boat bumped softly into the piling of the dock and Ben wanted to dive into the water to hide from Hux's withering gaze. It was moments like these when Hux most resembled his father, a career military officer whose disappointed stare could freeze ice cream in hell.

"Only you would count that as nothing," Hux's tone was surprisingly gentle despite his expression. "You like her," he stated.

Ben secured the oar in its place rather than answer Hux's charge. It wasn't a question, but rather a statement of fact as Hux saw things.

"It can't happen." Ben stood in the boat and reached to the edge of the dock, pulling them to the edge.

"What do you want me to do here, exactly?" Hux shifted into business mode. "I can't let her go because you can't keep your lips to yourself. She's been great."

"I know that," Ben scoffed. "And I don't need you to do anything, except maybe act like a human being instead of a robot for once and hear me out!"

Hux stood now too and leapt up onto the dock. He crouched down and they were nearly nose-to-nose. Ben looked at Hux's boat shoes, fraying at the edges of the opening.

"If I didn't know you, I would sock you for saying that," Hux's eyes glittered with amusement. "This is the most interesting thing you've told me in years."

Ben looked up at his friend.

"It can't happen," he repeated, taking Hux's outstretched hand to step up onto the wood platform. They set to dragging the boat to its moorings.

They were nearly back to the house and Hux had made no further remark when Ben asked, "Don't mention this to her."

"Mention what?" Hux's tone was light. "And I think you're going to win our gentleman's wager after all, if you don't go and fuck it up."

They were up the stairs of the porch and into the house when Ben heard Rey's laugh in the kitchen. The smell of coffee permeated the downstairs and Tony was chattering up a storm to her. He had lived a lot and seen a lot, and while he never told stories without being asked, their butler could charm the pants of anyone with his dry humor.

"She's up early," Hux remarked. "I wonder why?"

Ben glanced at his friend and they entered the kitchen together to find their press officer and his family's butler seated at the kitchen table. To his surprise, Rey was fully dressed in a light sweater to ward off the chilly morning and her duffle bag lay on the chair beside her, zipped and ready to go.

"Good morning, gentlemen!" Tony shot out of his chair the moment they peeked through the door. "Would either of you care for a coffee?"

"Please," Hux yawned his response. "I need a vacation from this vacation. Morning, Rey."

Rey nodded at Hux in acknowledgement. Her eyes flicked up to meet Ben's for a split-second before she stared into her mug of coffee instead. Ben couldn't be sure in the early morning light, but he thought he saw her cheeks flush a shade or two darker.

"I'll take a coffee too," Ben replied. "Thanks, Tony."

Hux took the heat for him. "You going somewhere, Rey?"

"I'm going to take the train back to the city, to see my friend before the weekend is over," Rey said quickly. "She's keeping my extra stuff and there's some things I need now that it's summertime. I just haven't had a chance to get up there before now, and it's on the way home."

She glanced at Ben again and to his credit, Hux did not follow her eyes.

"That's too bad, but we'll see back at the office on Monday," Hux said smoothly.

"Yes, Miss Rey asked if I would drive her to the station," Tony added, pouring coffee into waiting mugs.

"I'll drive you," Ben blurted out. "Tony's got things to do here."

"Oh, my- breakfast isn't for hours, it's no trouble!"

"No, I'll do it," Ben insisted. "When's your train?"

An awkward silence hung over them and he purposefully ignored Hux's lone raised eyebrow.

"I was planning on the eight o'clock," Rey finally replied. "But, you're not dressed so-"

"It's fine, we're not going to see the Queen," Ben pulled out the chair at the end of the table and sat. The clock on the back of the range read seven twenty-five. Plenty of time to cool off, drink this cup of coffee and still get to the station with time to spare.

Rey's lips formed a line and she took a sip of her coffee without comment.

"Well, if you insist, Ben," Tony shrugged. "You know where the keys to the wagon are."

"It's fine," Ben repeated.

They arrived at the station without having spoken a word, and if Ben thought he had known the meaning of pain and suffering before, this three mile drive through the sleepy estates to the depot surpassed his idea in spades.

He pulled into a parking spot underneath a tree and cut the engine, leaving the keys dangling in the ignition, and Rey made no move to get out beside him. The train wasn't yet at the station anyway.

He had learned to drive in this car: a shit-brown, post-war land barge with varnished wood paneling and a hatchback big enough to fit an entire family's luggage for a road trip. His father had bought it in a fit of practicality and partially, he suspected, to irritate his mother. Leia was unusual, a woman who had learned to drive during the Great War as part of her training as a nurse, but she loathed the vehicle they affectionately called the Brown Bomber. Perhaps she hated its looks, unbecoming of an upwardly mobile American political family, or maybe how it handled, more like a boat in its steering than an automobile, but Ben had thrown a fit during law school when Han mentioned the possibility of divesting it from their garage. He loved this car for the memories it held, some of the few with each of his parents from his teenage years.

Thus, it came to live the beach, out of Leia's sight for eight months of the year and imminently practical for ferrying guests to and from the train or running errands with Tony at the helm.

"Listen," Ben finally broke the silence. "I'll tell my parents you had an emergency and had to go to the city."

Rey's shoulders rose and fell once before she answered, "You don't need to lie to them. Just say I already had other plans."

"Did you?"

She looked out the passenger window and that was all the answer he needed.

Ben huffed and squeezed the leather-wrapped steering wheel until the brittle old casing squeaked under his hand.

"Rey, I don't know how to say this," he began. "I know I should keep my feelings to myself, but I hope it's not too forward of me to say I know this is… difficult. Maybe for both of us." He ventured the last part and glanced at her.

Rey's lower lip curled inwards and she bit it. He shifted against the heat that shot to his groin at the sight.

When she made no further acknowledgment, he went on. "I can only speak for myself, but I've struggled in the past month to keep my feelings for you professional. I wanted to hate you," he admitted, and noticed how her eyelids fluttered at the word. "I thought you would be naive, a silly, young girl that wouldn't be up to the job. We all did," he hastened to add, the bet nagging in the back of his mind.

Rey slipped her hands beneath her thighs and her face shifted, but she didn't look over to him.

"But you've proven me wrong, and I don't think I'm alone in saying we wouldn't have gotten this far without you."

She was scowling now, and the heat he felt a moment earlier was replaced with a nervous tension that gripped his gut. He was not on firm ground here, and he knew it.

"It was foolish, what I did last night," he continued, almost wincing to admit his mistake. "It could never work between us, Rey."

She crossed her arms and finally turned towards him, shifting in her seat so that she faced him.

"And why is that?" Her tone was icy.

"Because! We're-" He gestured between them, searching for words. "We're different, too different. Our families, our ambitions-"

"What do you presume to know about my ambitions?!" Rey cried. Her mouth fell open and she shook her head at him.

"It just can't happen, Rey," he finished, ignoring her question.

"Well, thank you for explaining your feelings Ben." Her tone oozed sarcasm. "I'm glad I finally know where I stand, and I'm sorry my class status has caused you such difficulty in acting like a gentleman!"

"It's not about that-"

"Of course it's about that," Rey spat. "But I'm sure you can find the willpower to resist my charms, few as they are!"

"Rey, I-"

"No!" Rey practically shouted at him now, and he glanced around for fear of someone overhearing them with the windows rolled down.

The station was still deserted with four minutes until the train.

"You had me followed!" Rey's eyes were glistening, and her voice wavered in a way that almost certainly indicated tears were to follow. "You took my property, you lied to me, then you act like I should be grateful just to be in your presence?"

She paused to let this sink in and he could only look at the gear shift between them.

"You're right, it's been difficult for me, too. For… for a bit now. But maybe," she went on, "If you'd ever been in the real world, you would know there's a whole lot more people like me than there are like you. So quit acting like you're doing me a favor, okay!?"

With that, she flung open the passenger door and retreated to the rear of the station wagon.

Ben sat perfectly still for a moment until he realized she was waiting for him to open the trunk. He hastened out and rounded the vehicle, opening the hatch without a word. Her raised eyebrows told him she expected him to get her luggage, too.

Her duffle bag was light as he handed it to her.

"Have a safe trip, Rey." It was the only thing he could risk saying without further offending her.

"Thank you, Senator," Rey said. "I'll see you on Monday."

A/N: Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed!