Chapter Text
It was nearly the end of a long, tedious day at work, and it was only the first day. Opening day, as they call it at a ski resort. Kylo sighed, helping yet another small kid onto the chairlift. How he got stuck with the bunny hill lift on the first day of the season was a mystery to him. Most of the time, newer lift attendants would be stationed at the chairlift at the ski school area. Lifties who had been there a long time only had to work it a few times a month. Somehow, the universe was punishing him. Or the owner, Mr. Snoke. Whichever. Same thing. After Kylo had stopped helping Snoke terrorize the land owners surrounding the resort in an attempt to buy out their properties to expand, Snoke seemed hellbent on making Kylo quit. He couldn’t legally fire him for not being the muscle in his side projects, but he was making it very tempting to quit his job as a lift attendant and work elsewhere.
There was really only one thing keeping him at First Order Mountain. Or only one someone, rather. Rey. She worked in the ski school as an instructor, and Kylo had been enamored with her since he first laid eyes on her. She’d begun working only last season, and although they didn’t talk much anyway, Kylo had missed her terribly over the summer. When the ski season was over, he worked at a lumber company, clearing woods in southern Ontario where they lived. Rey worked at a local bakery during the summer. Thankfully, his workload as a lumberjack allowed him a large daily calorie intake, so he didn’t gain any weight despite his nearly daily visits to the bakery. He usually came up with some sort of excuse, like he was taking some bread over to his parents’ house, or he would pick up a box of donuts for the guys at work. He was worried that Rey saw through it, but she was always nice to him. Nicer than he deserved.
Now that the ski season had rolled around again, he’d get to see her every day. They only had full staff meetings with lifties, rental, patrol, and the ski school employees once a week, but he managed to run into her quite often. Lifties and ski school instructors shared the same locker room, and he managed to get a locker near hers, but not so close that it seemed intentional.
“So you’re back this season!” she said to him in that damn adorable chipper mood of hers on the first day back.
“Yeah,” he responded meekly, too intimidated to say much.
“It’s nice to see a familiar face. It looks like there’s a lot of turn around in the staff this year.”
“Snoke probably scared a lot of people off,” Kylo said with a frown.
“Hm,” she said, cocking her head in curiosity, “he doesn’t scare me.”
Kylo hoped that was true. That Snoke hadn’t found some sort of purpose for Rey yet, and was leaving her alone.
“I’m glad,” he said seriously.
Rey turned back to her locker, grabbing her gear for the day.
Before Kylo turned to leave, a sudden urge made him say something that maybe he shouldn’t have said.
“Hey…”
“Yes?” Rey asked, turning back toward him with that cute, innocent expression.
“If he ever does, tell me.”
“You mean Snoke?” she asked.
“Yeah.”
“But-...”
“I gotta go,” he interjected, already regretting saying too much. He practically ran from the locker room, not waiting to hear if she was calling out for him.
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That Kylo guy was weird. Why would Mr. Snoke scare her? Sure, he wasn’t the warmest, fuzziest guy, but Rey had dealt with much worse people before. You don’t age out of the foster system without meeting some really shitty people. She could handle Snoke. He didn’t even really seem to know her anyway. She’d only been on staff for one season, and hadn’t done anything in particular that would attract his attention. She was a good ski instructor. She was still only Level One, the lowest certification within the national ski instructor association, but she was planning on passing into Level Two that season, which would give her more credentials to teach intermediate skiers. Now, she mostly got never-evers and beginners, most of which were children. It was a good thing she loved kids. It made her job enjoyable.
She scoffed as she closed her locker, wondering if Kylo thought she was some sort of weak-spined doll, unable to hold her own against a mildly intimidating boss. It was out of character for him to say something like that to her. He was normally really nice. Quiet, but nice. She’d first noticed him last season. There were some good looking lifties, but he was definitely the hottest, at least to her. He had sort of a smoldering, brooding thing going on. She'd become even more attracted to him over the summer, when he came into the bakery in his flannel, sleeves rolled up to expose his forearms. She never got to see that kind of skin in the winter. But she noticed he didn’t really talk much with the rest of the staff. He was a bit of a loner. She also never saw him on break. The staff’s breaks throughout the day were scattered, so it was unlikely for them to have break at the same time often, but she’d never even seen him once in the cafeteria or the locker room during the day. The most she saw him was at the beginning or end of the workday, and when he was working the chairlift on the bunny hill, where she taught most of her lessons. Sometimes she would purposely avoid eye contact with him, just to make it seem like she didn’t notice him every time she went up the lift. She always noticed, though.
“Rey- don’t forget that you're on schedule to clean up the locker room today,” she heard a slick voice say from behind her.
She turned around to find none other than Armitage Hux staring at her from across the room. She couldn’t stand that guy. For some reason, he thought he was in charge just because he’d been working as an instructor the most number of seasons. But he wasn’t- Mr. Skywalker ran the ski school. Hux was just a bossy prat. And sometimes got way too up into her personal space. She couldn’t decide if he was hitting on her or trying to bully her.
“Yes, I know,” she replied in an even tone, hoping to end the conversation.
“The liftie scheduled for clean up today is Ren. Sounds like a riot- having to spend extra time with the staff freak,” Hux sneered, stalking toward her.
“Do you want me to wait for you, make sure you finish up ok? I could take you to dinner afterwards…” he said lowly, invading her personal bubble.
Really? It was opening day and he was already annoying her.
“No thanks, I’ll be fine,” she said curtly, shoving her way past him with a shudder. What a creep.
Hux always seemed to slip Kylo into conversation, spewing out what seemed like well-practiced insults. He said he hated the guy, but if that was so, why did he always bring him up? Sounded like a crush, if you asked Rey. The idea made her blush. She wouldn’t blame him for having a crush on Kylo. He had a bad boy with a heart of gold aesthetic that was hard to resist.
She checked the daily schedule on her way out of the locker room. It looked like people were hitting the slopes eagerly on the first day of the season- she had two private lessons and a group lesson. Busier than normal for the beginning of the season. It normally didn’t pick up so much until it got closer to the holidays. But Rey was thankful- more lessons meant more tips, and she was saving up to buy a motorcycle in the spring. She probably should prioritize replacing her shitty car which only made it through the snow to work about half of the time, but the motorcycle wouldn’t leave the front of her mind. It was impractical, but Rey was tired of having to be practical. She was forced to be practical her entire life, having to fend for herself as a child. She deserved something completely unnecessary but completely awesome.
She trudged out of the locker room with her skis and poles, making her way to the ski school meeting area to find her first client. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Kylo arguing with Ms. Phasma, one of the staff managers. She saw him let out an exasperated sigh as he hung his head and turned around to walk toward the bunny hill. No wonder he was in such a bad mood, he was stuck with what everyone on staff called the “shit lift”. It was the chairlift that serviced the beginner’s hill where most parents took their small children and where ski instructors brought newbies to learn how to ski. This meant that the lifties would have to slow or completely stop the chair basically every other person, lifting kids on and off the chair, picking them up out of the snow when they fell off face-first. It was hard work lifting kids all day and helping beginners untangle their skis when they inevitably failed to get off the lift gracefully. Rey felt bad that he’d be stuck working it on the first day of the season, when everyone was trying to get their ski feet back under them by starting on the bunny hill. He’d be busy today.
Rey let out a little chuckle as she remembered how ridiculous he looked dealing with kids last season. He lifted them up as if they were baby with a dirty diaper, as far away from his body as possible. For some odd, unknown reason, they all loved him. Even some of the older kids managed to convince him to help them onto the lift despite being big enough and experienced enough to do it themselves. Rey guessed it was because he didn’t coddle them. Kids can tell when you treat them like an equal, and Kylo always spoke to them like they were adults, like they mattered. He was probably completely ignorant of how much the kids loved him and how often they asked Rey to go on whichever lift he happened to be working that day during lessons, and that kind of made Rey like him even more. Was it weird for her to imagine her coworker as a dad? That was doing weird things to her mind.