It was the week before Thanksgiving when Rey was shaken awake by Jessa's hand on her shoulder, her friend repeatedly whispering her name with a heated urgency.

"Rey? Rey! Reynata! Reynata Parker-Solo, goddamnit how are you such a heavy sleeper?!"

It was still dark out, but Rey lifted her hand to shield her eyes from the lamplight. "Jessa, what is the matter with you? It's not time to get up yet."

Her friend knelt next to the bed, already dressed for work, but she had a wild look in her eye. Her long hair was still disheveled, but she wore her trademark heavy make-up for her shift at the perfume counter. Her eyeliner swooped up in a dramatic wing away from the corner of her eyes, giving her a feline countenance.

"I need you to do me a favor," Jessa pressed Rey's hand between hers to lend a sense of sincerity. "A… guy is going to come by a bit later to pick Jack up for work, and you have to make sure he goes."

"What guy," Rey was still half asleep and this wasn't making any sense.

"Someone in Jack's family, alright?" Jessa whispered. "I can't stand him, though, so I'm going to work early, it's too awkward to be here when he's around."

"Jess, what? This is one of your in-laws?"

Her eyes flew open as Jessa shook her hard once more. "Wake up, Rey," she commanded. "You're not listening. Jack won't want to go with, but you need to make him. I arranged for him to work for his uncle in the family business. He's never wanted to before, but I can't stand having him moping around all day anymore, okay? I pulled some strings."

"At… the mortuary?" Rey was incredulous. She could think of at least ten Irish-owned mortuaries in the west part of the city alone, and she was never sure which belonged to Jack's people. All of them had complicated, compound family names like Duggan-O'Hara or Fitzgerald-Kennedy-McCarthy. Jessa had once joked that the only thing the Irish could agree on was the business of procreating, drinking, and putting people in the ground.

Jessa rolled her eyes and sighed in exasperation. "Yes, the funeral home, what else could I possibly mean?"

"So you talked to his uncle? I just don't understand, why can't you be here to convince him yourself?"

"I talked to his cousin, his uncle Padraig's oldest boy, and he owes me one," Jessa huffed. "Can you please just do this one thing? Please?"

"Alright, my goodness!" Rey threw back the covers and sat up, rubbing the heels of her hands in her bleary eyes. The night sky was just beginning to fade to pink and a single star still twinkled towards the west, over the ocean. She had sat up quite late talking to Ben on the phone the night before, but now she remembered hearing Jessa returning even later in the evening. "Where were you last night, anyway?"

Jessa went very still and smoothed her palms down her thighs under her uniform's skirt. It was then Rey noticed how her hands were trembling slightly. Jessa glanced up at Rey a couple times and worked her mouth as if to speak before she finally said, "Rey, if I tell you this, you cannot tell anyone, do you understand me?"

Rey frowned and reached for Jessa's hands, but her friend snatched them from her and tucked them under her armpits.

"Of course not," Rey promised, "What's gotten into you this morning?"

"Look, Jack's cousin is…. An odd guy, alright? You'll see when you meet him. I honestly don't even know if he's really Padraig's son, or just a kid from their village in Ireland who they said was their relative so he could come to America, okay? All through school we all thought maybe he was a little touched, even?" Jessa's eyes darted around, but she never met Rey's eyes. "But, he was always a little sweet on me. So, I went to talk to him last night, and we… came to an arrangement."

"Okay…." Rey prompted her, drawing her own knees to her chest and encircling them with her bare arms. She didn't understand yet what was so secret.

Jessa's voice was a hoarse whisper. "I was faithful to Jack the whole time he was gone, right? And that counts for something. I know you know how hard it was. But, it's been so bad since he got back, we haven't really… it's not like it was for you and Ben. So I went over to the mortuary last night on my way here looking for Padraig, but he was already gone home, and I ran into Maitiú instead."

Rey had a sinking feeling now in her middle, but she waited for Jessa to continue.

"He's a big fellow," Jessa grinned sheepishly, "At least as big as Ben - you'll see when he comes over. He's got these meaty, calloused hands that are always kind of dirty from digging. We used to joke in school, you know, whether you could tell how... big a man is by the size of his feet or by his hands, and that's all I could think about while I was trying to convince him to ask Padraig to give Jack a chance, and then… he suggested another way I could convince him."

"So you…." Rey's eyebrows were in her hairline. "With Jack's cousin?"

"Not like that," Jessa flushed, "But I let him feel me up. And…" Jessa shook her head with a grimace. "Rey, I'm a terrible person, but I liked it. I didn't want to, but it's just been so long and he was kind of rough and I guess I've always been a bit curious about him? But now I can't even look at Jack this morning. And I can't stop thinking about it, either. The smug look on his dumb, four-eyed face when I came? It's all I can picture."

Rey sighed and looked at her knobby, scarred kneecaps. "What time is he coming by?" She didn't know what else to say.

"Seven-thirty," Jessa glanced at the alarm clock. "There's a funeral at the Irish cemetery down in Colma at nine this morning, and Maitiú said they need more diggers."

Rey looked reluctantly at the alarm clock. She had forty-five minutes to get ready before this person would arrive, and she didn't know how she would be able to look him in the eye.

"Look," Rey said firmly, "I have to be on the 7:57 bus to make it to work on time. If Jack's not up and out by then with his cousin, I have to leave. Jack has to take responsibility for himself sometime."

"Thank you," Jessa whispered earnestly. "Please, don't judge me, Rey - I just needed to tell someone. It's not a regular thing, and I did it for us. Really, I did."

"Of course," Rey replied, but she couldn't meet her friend's eyes. "I'll do what I can."

When the doorbell finally rang at 7:40, Rey had not yet seen Jack emerge from the bedroom. She pressed the buzzer to let Maitiú up. She was still pulling her hair into a ponytail when a sharp knock sounded at the door.

Rey peered through the peephole, only to see someone standing so close she couldn't discern their face at all. The person wore a grey-brown fisherman's sweater with an orange utility vest of some sort on top of it. She sighed deeply and opened the door a crack without taking the chain off.

"Hello," she said, looking up at the strange man outside their door.

He scowled at her through thick lenses in square wire frames, the prescription making his brown eyes look unnaturally large. His unkempt, wavy strawberry blonde hair stood on end, and she couldn't help as her gaze traveled down his arm to examine his thick, dirty paw that hung at his side. Jessa was right, he did have big hands. She swallowed imagining her friend beside this beast standing outside their door.

"Who're you?" he demanded, his deep voice tinged with a slight lilt that betrayed his origin.

"I'm Reynata, and I'm a friend of Jessa and Jack's," Rey explained, "And you must be Maitiú?"

He worked his ample lips as though her questions confused him and huffed. "Yeah, I'm Matt," he finally answered.

She closed the door quietly and removed the chain, swinging the door wide for him to barge through the door. He halted just inside the living room, clenching his fists at his side like he was looking for something to slug, and occasionally shoving his glasses back up his nose.

"Where's Jessa," he asked after a moment. "I gotta get Jack and get going."

"Right," Rey steepled her fingers in front of her as though she were reasoning with him. "Jessa's already at work, so I'm going to help you get Jack off with you. Alright?"

Matt looked slowly at her, almost as though he'd forgotten she was even there. "Where'd you come from, anyway?" he asked abruptly as gaze raked slowly up and down her frame, and she crinkled her brow in confusion.

"I lived in Bakersfield before I moved here, if that's what you're asking," she replied, edging around him towards the master bedroom door that was still firmly closed. His hulking size was making her uneasy, but she noticed how he hunched very slightly as Ben did. The timbre of his deep voice was uncannily close to Ben's as well.

"You're one of those Okies, then?" Matt nodded at her. "What's your family name?"

"It's Parker," Rey replied, wondering where this line of questioning was leading. She glanced at the clock and a pang of anxiety hit her stomach. She hated being late and time was running short.

"Parker," Matt repeated, shoving his enormous hands in the pockets of his vest. "Sounds English. You got any Irish in you?"

"I don't believe so, no," Rey answered.

Matt leered at her and pushed his glasses up once more. "Would you like some?"

Rey's mouth fell open in disgust at the insinuation. "I'm fine, thank you very much," she scoffed. "I'm married anyway, not that it seems to bother you."

Matt chuckled slowly, a grin stretching his odd, long face into a semblance of happiness. Rey noticed his smile never reached his eyes. "You can't blame a man for trying, can you?"

Rey scowled at him. "You're a monster!"

He only closed his eyes gently in response, one eyebrow raised in cool amusement at her show of anger. "Only one way to find out if that's true," he hinted relentlessly. With that he stepped past her and opened the bedroom door without knocking, barking something she couldn't understand in Irish at Jack.

"Oh, fuck yourself, you sheepshagger," Jack mumbled weakly from behind the door.

"John Joseph, you have six minutes to get dressed before I come in there and dress you myself," Matt continued in English. "We're due in Colma at eight-thirty to dig for Siobhan's cousin." His accent collapsed the t and the h of thirty into a breathy consonant so that it rhymed with dirty. He smirked at Rey and shook his head, mouthing nine.

"I thought Jessa said nine," Rey whispered furiously. She hoped they didn't plan on hanging around here any longer.

"Irish time," Matt whispered back, "Only way to get us anywhere on time."

Rey rolled her eyes at him and rapped gently on the door herself. "Jack?" she called. "Jessa really wants you to give this a try, alright?"

"Oh yeah?" Jack sounded sarcastic. "Then why isn't she here to get me up herself?"

Rey and Matt glanced at each other before they answered in unison, "Work."

"Uuuunnnnggggffff," Jack moaned, and Rey briefly pitied him, wondering if he'd had too much whiskey at the pub. Again.

"You don't wanna disappoint Jessa, do you?" Matt tried a different tact. "I mean, more than you already have? You know that girl would do anything for you." He glanced at Rey and she narrowed her eyes at him.

He knew. He knew that she knew!

As if he could hear her thoughts, Matt placed one thick index finger to his lips and shook his head at her. Rey glanced at the clock built into the back of the stove, across the hall in the kitchen. It was already nearly time for her to catch the bus.

"I don't want to make you late," Matt muttered. "Go, I've got him under control."

She hesitated for a moment before shaking her head and grabbing her lunchbox from the counter. "You'd better get him up," she lifted her finger in warning at Matt.

"I will," Matt replied. "And tell Jessa thanks for me." Tanks.

"You're disgusting!" Rey whispered vehemently, closing the apartment door between them. She paused for a moment, listening to Matt continuing to berate Jack in Irish, and then she bolted down the stairs as she heard the telltale stuttering whine of the electric bus coming over the hill down the street.

It was well after dark before Rey crept to the phone that evening and dialed Ben for the first time since she had returned to San Francisco. Her heart fluttered when his deep voice came across the line: "Solo."

"It's me."

"Oh, hey kid," he breathed. "It's late, I didn't think we'd talk tonight."

"Sorry, did I wake you up?" Rey set her teeth. She didn't want to annoy Han and Leia.

"Not at all," Ben said. "I was still working. What are you up to?"

"Just…" Rey stared at the ever-growing stack of his letters opened on her bed. "Reading."

"Anything interesting?" he asked. She heard some papers shuffling in the background.

"It's… your letters," she admitted. "They started arriving, finally."

There was a long silence from his end before he said, "No kidding. It's about time."

Rey chuckled. "No medals for the postal service, I guess."

Ben laughed sardonically. "Not right now, no. I'm glad they finally got there."

"Ben…" Rey scrunched her eyes closed. It was so hard to talk to him about anything serious like this. It was bad enough when they were face to face. "I want you to know, I waited for you. I did."

She heard his sigh, followed by another deeper sigh, like he was trying to keep from crying. The sound made her shiver and she drew her sweater tighter around her. When he didn't say anything in response, she asked, "How's it coming with finding work out here?"

Ben cleared his throat, but he still sounded hoarse as he answered. "There might be something at the city junior college, a lecturer position for the next semester. It would start in January."

"When will you know if you got it," Rey asked. She realized she had no idea what it took to get work at a college, or what the difference between college and university really was, either.

"Not until mid-December," Ben replied. "It wouldn't be much time to get out there, but I talked to Captain Dameron and he offered to let me stay at his place for awhile until I could find a place… or we could find a place."

Rey swallowed and closed her eyes at this suggestion. "We'll see what happens, I guess," she said softly. "I hope you get it. If you want to, of course."

"I do," he replied without hesitation. "Has Jack found work yet?"

Rey's heart sank a little at the mention of Jack. Neither he nor Jessa had returned from their respective whereabouts yet. "It's… complicated." She was loathe to divulge Jessa's secret, especially given the sentiment of Ben's letters and the general state of their own relationship. "Jessa arranged for him to work for his uncle's business for a bit. He just started this morning."

"The funeral business?" Ben sounded surprised. "I don't recall him being too excited about that."

"He's not," Rey confirmed, "But it's something, at least."

"I bet the work is steady," Ben said noncommittally.

Rey laughed despite herself and replied, "It's true, people are dying all the time. If I didn't know better, I'd swear the Irish had so many kids just to keep the funeral businesses going."

To her surprise, Ben brayed with laughter at her assertion. She realized how long it had been since she'd heard his laugh, and how much she missed it. "Rey, that is grim! Who knew there was a cynic inside you?"

"You say cynicism, I say pragmatism," she countered, picking at a ball of lint on the cable of her sweater.

"Maybe you're cynically pragmatic," he suggested, and she could hear the edge his voice took on. He loved to spar verbally.

"Is that better than being pragmatically cynical?" she asked, playing along even though she knew this was nonsense.

"I think that depends," Ben replied. "Maybe you need to write an essay comparing and contrasting the two modes of thought and come to your own conclusion."

Rey snorted. "Oh, so if I were your student, you would give me homework to figure it out?"

There was a beat of silence before he said, his voice quite low, "If you were my student, I... would have to wait until the semester was over to give you the assignment I have in mind."

Rey clapped her palm over her open mouth and closed her eyes. She squirmed as uncomfortable warmth began to build between her legs at his assertion.

"Are you still there," he asked softly.

"Uhh…. uh, huh!" Rey found she could barely think straight. "Um, and what ah…. What kind of final examination do your classes usually have?" She cringed at how this sounded, hoping she was using the right words.

Ben cleared his throat again. "Exams are usually written, but in special cases I can make an exception and have the student submit an... oral examination."

She looked at the painting of the goldfish and asked, "And have you ever…. made an exception like that?"

Ben huffed, and she heard a small, wet sound as though he was sucking at his lower lip. "No, but I've never had a student in your situation, either."

"I…. I hope you get the position here," Rey blurted out. She was breathing a bit hard, imagining what this exam might entail.

"So do I," Ben whispered, then: "You know, your absentee status doesn't prohibit you from doing independent study. I would certainly encourage you to… explore this topic at your discretion."

"Oh, really?" she said coyly. "Would I have to submit a report later?"

She could hear his smile in his tone when he murmured, "I would love to read that."

Rey felt her cheeks glowing as she replied, "Well, maybe I should get started, then. It sounds like you have things to take care of, too. I don't want to keep you."

"Enjoy your research, Rey," Ben said. "I wish I were there to supervise your methods."

She swallowed hard, the hot tension between her legs unbearable at the thought of him watching her. "My methods are sound," she managed.

"We can review methodology another time," he replied. "Good night, Rey."

"Goodnight," she whispered, placed the phone in its cradle and crawled to her bed to begin her independent work.