Thank you for reading! I know this site has been making some changes, so I hope my updates are being seen by those that want to see them. If you're reading this, please know that I also posted a damerey drabble earlier this week called Morass. I never saw it posted and only a handful of people have read it, so I guess it got missed. I would stop posting on this site altogether, but I know I have some devoted readers here, so I'll stay. For now. I do post over at Archive of our Own, too, so if you want a change...

Happy Thanksgiving to those that celebrate!

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It was five o'clock before Poe got away from the horse show. It was still going on when he left, but his three students were done and packing up to head home themselves, all of them having had a successful weekend, so he felt he could slip away, too. He did it without notifying anyone, especially the mother of his youngest student, Bobby Bliss. The woman was very focused and was constantly hitting on Poe and asking him out; he had only agreed once, going out for coffee one quiet afternoon. That one 'date' had assured him the Zorri was not the woman for him, though she didn't seem to agree.

It was a little more than an hour drive back to Jakku, and when he was about fifteen minutes from town he called Rey's cell phone, informing her he was on his way to pick her up for their trail ride. She seemed startled, as if she had expected him to forget, but then laughed. "I'm already at the barn," she told him. "It's too lovely an evening to stay home."

Grinning, Poe responded. "I'm on my way!"

Once there, he found Rey in the grooming bay with D.O. She was quietly brushing his tail, her unseeing eyes focused somewhere off to her right, her mind obviously elsewhere. However, as he rounded the corner, she turned toward him and smiled. He couldn't be sure if she heard him, smelled him, or something else. Something more esoteric.

"So, where are we going?" she asked without any preamble.

"Do you feel up to a ride to the beach?" he asked. While it was only a little more than a mile away, the trail was occasionally narrow and low tree branches made riding a challenge for a rider with sight. "I promise to let you know when to duck."

Her grin got bigger. "I haven't been to the ocean since…" Her grin faded, but her eyes were still bright. "You know," she finished, shrugging.

"Let me get BeeBee ready," he told her.

Her smile became wistful. "You're gonna try him, huh?"

"Are you still okay with that?"

She nodded. "Yeah." She licked her lips and gave another little half-shrug. "You do realize that nobody but me has ever ridden him since he came off the track?"

"Really?" Poe said in wonder. "I guess I knew you'd done most of his retraining yourself, but I didn't know you'd done it all." He paused. "He's not gonna kill me, is he?"

She laughed softly. "Not unless you try and hurt me."

Poe did not think she was exaggerating.

Thirty minutes later, he wondered if he had made the right decision. BeeBee would not settle into a walk, instead prancing and tossing his head so much Poe was almost ready to get off and lead him the rest of the way. The first part of the trail was an easy ramble along a former railway into the forest of cypress and pine, and Poe almost missed the trail that drifted off of the road on the right because he was so distracted by BeeBee's antics. He had not been afraid while on the back of a horse since he was a child, but BeeBee made him nervous. Not only was the Thoroughbred big, powerful, and quick, but he was probably one of the smartest horses Poe had ever known, and that wasn't necessarily a good thing. Poe was very aware that with his own back the way it was, a fall from BeeBee could put him back in a wheelchair.

Rey had been quiet for most of the ride, her expression focused, and Poe knew she was becoming agitated having to pay attention to her own mount and yet also intent on her horse's misbehavior. Her occasional, "BeeBee, knock it off!" didn't seem to work. The horse knew she was there, but he also knew she wasn't the one on his back.

Poe started breathing exercises to relax his body, laughing at himself as he realized he was doing what he always told his own students to do in class when they became tense. He laughed out loud when he heard Rey say softly, "Breathe."

BeeBee finally responded to his rider's softness and relaxation and settled, just in time for them to reach the narrowest part of the trail. Poe was able to focus more on Rey than on his own mount, and directed her quietly through the trees. Instead of just ducking under the low branches, she let herself lay over Dee's neck, not sitting up again until Poe told her she was in the clear. As they rode into a more open area and Rey was able to stay upright, she turned to him, a huge grin on her face. He felt his breath catch, remembering the night before and his unplanned kiss on Rey's tear-stained cheek.

He couldn't regret the action, especially as she had seemed to welcome his touch. While a part of him still refused to admit he had any more feeling for this woman other than friendship, the other part was anxious to explore what more may be possible between them. He had never felt this in tune with a woman before, had never wanted to spend so much time with someone. It didn't hurt that her obvious trust in him made him feel special in a far different way than his success and fame as an international rider had. It also humbled him, and made him determined to never lose that trust.

Soon, the trees thinned and sand dunes replaced the loamy soil of the forest. The horses moved slower as the footing became deeper, and Poe rode up next to Rey again. She was focused once more ahead of her, her beautiful eyes wide, a small smile playing at her lips. She turned toward him briefly. "I can hear it," she said, and he knew she meant the ocean.

They rode over one last dune and the Atlantic Ocean in all its glory was before them. They continued to ride toward the water. It was almost low tide, and soon the horse's feet hit the firmer sand that the receding waves left behind them. Poe turned BeeBee north and he softly spoke to his companion. "This way."

Her head tilted toward him and she directed Dee to the left. For several minutes they rode along the shore, the waves pushing and pulling on their right, the sun low in the sky on their left. Rey had closed her eyes and was breathing in deep.

"Tell me what you feel," Poe said suddenly. "What you 'see'."

She smiled slightly and opened her eyes. "I smell the freshness of the air, and the staleness, too. Salt and fish and seaweed. It's strange, but the humidity almost seems less intense here, as if the ocean is sucking the moisture out of the air." She paused. "The sound of the waves and the distance we rode on firm ground tell me we're at low tide or close to it. And I can hear gulls. And a group of godwits," she added, turning her head to indicate the group of shore birds behind them. "I know the sun is low because it's cooling off," she continued. "But it's far from cold."

"I don't think Georgia in July could ever be cold," Poe chuckled.

"It must have been a big change from New York," Rey said, her expressive face turned toward him.

"It is very different from New York," Poe conceded. "But I had spent so many winters in Wellington training, that it wasn't a big change for me."

"Do you miss snow?"

"Sometimes," he said. "Especially around Christmas." He paused. "But mostly, snow makes me sad."

"Why?" she breathed.

"It reminds me of my mom," he said softly. "She loved the snow. And she died during the winter, so my last memories of her are surrounded by white and cold."

"How old were you?" Rey asked.

"Eight."

She nodded. "I was five when I lost mine. I don't have any memory of it. One day she was in my life. The next she wasn't."

They were silent for a while, then Rey asked, "Your dad never remarried, did he?" Poe knew she had met his father once, shortly after she had started riding with Poe and Kes had visited the farm his son was so proud of.

"No," he said. He remembered his father dated a few times when he was in High School, but nothing serious had ever come from it.

"My dad never did, either," Rey told him. "Maybe we should get them together," she added, a mischievous smile on her face. "They can commiserate over their shared loneliness and the trials of being a single dad."

Poe laughed. "Well, my dad is planning on visiting at the end of the summer, so maybe we should." He shook his head. "I've been trying to get him to retire down here, so he doesn't have to deal with winter anymore."

They rode on for a short time longer, then Poe called a halt. "We've reached the boundary." The stretch of beach where horses were allowed only extended for a mile. He considered Rey for a moment. "How about we switch mounts?"

Rey turned to him in surprise. "Really?"

"BeeBee seems pretty darn quiet right now, and he'll probably only get more relaxed with you on his back. I don't see why not." In reality, she could probably handle a sharp move from the energetic horse better than he could, even without seeing. She had always been able to foresee what her horse was going to do by feeling the tension in his body, and as she slowly regained that confidence, he knew she would probably be able to do so even better now.

She was grinning and nodding her head excitedly, anxious to be back on her own horse once more. "I'd like that," she told him.

Poe swung off of BeeBee, grateful he had chosen to ride in the old western saddle that he used to teach timid riders until they became comfortable enough to ditch the saddle horn and stiff stirrups. He stood at Dee's head and held him as Rey dismounted, then led Rey over to BeeBee's left side. She mounted without any trouble, and Poe realized with only a bit of dismay that he didn't need to shorten her stirrups; her legs were as long as his.

"Geez," she mumbled as she settled in the saddle. "You know how long it's been since I've ridden in one of these?"

"Twenty years?" Poe joked as he moved to mount Dee.

"Ha ha," Rey answered. "Maybe fifteen."

Poe laughed.

"Poe," Rey said as she turned BeeBee, who seemed inordinately happy now.

"Yeah?"

"Thank you."

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