ಠ╭╮ಠ (the_scavenger) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2016-05-22 17:57:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | !complete, finn, rey |
I can pay my own way, you know.
Who: Finn and Rey
When: Sometime in April
Where: A place with food!
What: Finn and Rey’s first date - or so Finn thinks anyway!
Rating/Warnings:
Status:complete
Rey had never really had friends to go out with before, so she didn’t know what to expect. It wasn’t like her dreamself had been able to slow down and just enjoy Finn’s company. So she was a little excited. And she didn’t know what she was supposed to wear either, so she went with casual comfy - her best pair of jeans and an airy blouse. She was a desert girl after all. Apparently.
She then had to wait patiently for Finn to arrive.
He just wasn’t allowed to see the mess that was her flat.
Finn had fussed over what to wear like crazy. It’d been a long time since Finn had been on a date. Being in special forces on numerous deployments did that to a guy. He would have liked to have had Poe’s opinion on his wardrobe choices, but then he was afraid he’d have been texted endlessly by the man wanting updates and the like. He’d ended up settling on a casual comfy look as well, a pair of dark wash jeans and a buttoned shirt, not wanting to overdress in case Rey went casual too.
He turned the corner in his 2012 Dodge Challenger, a cobalt blue beauty with white racing stripes down the middle. He’d bought it back when he’d been in the middle of his days as a Navy SEAL, when the nice paychecks starting coming in and he decided to splurge just once. He was grateful that was the only time otherwise the money he saved wouldn’t be there and he would be able to do this date at all.
Pulling up he saw Rey standing outside looking cute as ever in her outfit. Good, he hadn’t overdressed. Finn rolled down the window and grinned. “Hey, which way to Jakku?” he teased.
“Back the way we came!” She bounced over, running her hand over the hood of the charger with obvious apprasial. “Your car is gorgeous. I love the colour!” For some reason it seemed to really suit Finn. Sort of like Poe’s jacket. Or a big smile.
Finn, not one to be rude, got out of the car and gave her one of those big smiles as she admired his ride. “Thanks. Got her while I was in the service. Saw her in the dealership near the base and knew I had to have her. Didn't get to drive her much, so she practically still has that new car smell.” He laughed. Watching her he couldn't help but love how Rey’s eyes lit up everytime she was around anything mechanical. It was the same look she’d gotten when Han had told them they were in the Millennium Falcon.
“Well, I hope you get to drive her hard!” Rey flashed him a grin. “She looks like she needs to be handled really well, just find a straight stretch of road and really let loose. But she also needs to be handled tenderly too.” Though she’d be willing to work on a car like that free.
Finn stifled a chuckle and bit his lower lip a little. Had he been with his SEAL buddies, that first comment would have been something they would have said with a completely different connotation. There would have been roars of laughter and further jokes. He knew what Rey meant, being a mechanic and all, but it was just further proof as to how innocent she was in comparison to the company he had kept.
“Yeah well, I’ve got nothin’ but time now, right?” he said, realizing actually, that he indeed did. Why hadn’t he done that by now? “Maybe if you’ve got an afternoon off you’d like to join me? Could be fun.” And if anything went wrong, she could figure it out without him having to call AAA.
“Yeah! Not tonight of course, we have a movie to see, and dinner! Oh what if we did a picnic? I’ve never done a picnic.” She spoke as though that was a wonderful sounding idea. “Do you think you’ll be willing to let me give her a spin?”
Finn blinked. A picnic? He’d never actually been on a picnic in his entire life. He was a city boy, born and bred. Stereotypical pictures of a picnic basket on a blanket on a sea of green grass appeared in his head. “Uh, wh- okay. I’ve never actually done...a..picnic.” He shrugged and smiled apologetically. He was game for it, just wasn’t sure where they’d picnic considering the stretch of road they’d have to use to really let his car fly would be a road surrounded by California desert.
“You mean like now?” he looked a little uncertain, but remembering from the dreams how badass a pilot Rey was, the skepticism vanished from his features as quickly as it came.
“Not now, I mean any time you want. And we don’t have to picnic, it was just an idea.” Rey shrugged her shoulders, then lifted her head and blinked at him. “Wait. Really? I could drive her now?” She looked at the car and chewed her lips. “Maybe after the movie?”
Oh thank God she said after the movie. It would give him enough time to grapple with the idea of someone else handling his car. But as he watched her bite her lip, he knew he wasn’t going to be able to say no. Everything she did was just so…Rey. And he really liked it.
“Sure, after the movie.” he smiled at her. “Well uh, you wanna get going?” They didn’t have reservations or anything, it was just a nice little Thai place he knew, and he wanted to have enough time for them to eat without shoving their faces full of food to make the film on time.
She clapped her hands together, then slid into the passenger seat. She loved the interior and she could see the dash, and the various controls and they were kind of shiny and new and she almost had to sit on her hands to keep from fiddling with the radio.
“It’s even nicer inside!”
Finn grinned from ear to ear like a proud papa. “Thanks. Like I said, barely broken in.” He could see out of his peripheral vision as he drove that Rey was itching to check out all the bells and whistles. “Go ahead. I don’t even know half of what this baby does when it comes to the dash. It does have Sirius radio, for now anyway.” Until he couldn’t pay the bill, but he wasn’t thinking about that right now. At the moment, they were on a date, for some good food and a decent (hopefully) superhero flick.
“Ooh. Fancy.” Rey somehow managed to sound posh for that particular word. She flipped through the stations until she found one that played alt rock. She shivered when the engine purred. Yes, she needed something like this. If not a charger, some kind of car with too big an engine. “You should take this car out to that one race track. That lady on the valarnet owns it.”
He chuckled at the ‘fancy’. Alt rock was cool with him. Finn liked all sorts of music, though he tended to shy away from rap and R&B thanks to his grandmother’s upbringing.
“Race track? There’s a race track I can take this baby to?” he said, eyebrows raising. He didn’t pay as close attention to the net sometimes as he ought to, clearly. “Maybe we can do that and then I dunno, picnic at the beach or something.” Did that even make sense? Do people picnic at the beach? He was just tossing ideas out there.
As they drove along, Finn was feeling more and more relaxed in Rey’s presence. He’d been worried he’d be nothing but a bundle of nerves, but as it turned out, thanks to the dreams, he was getting used to being around her and it felt right just spending time together.
“Yes! By Future Industries!” She really ought to research that more. Rey pulled out her phone to google it, mostly out of her own curiosity. “I really like that idea. A nice relaxing picnic at the beach after pushing your car to it’s limit!”
Of course, that would be romantic to most people, but just sound really fun to Rey.
Finn smiled, glancing over at Rey as she poked and swiped at her phone. That did sound like a good idea, and so in his mind that was exactly what he’d do for their second date. Provided this one ended well.
They made it to the restaurant with plenty of time to spare before the movie. It was a cute, intimate little place, with a short and succinct but delicious sounding menu. Finn didn't eat out much, being unemployed and all, but he’d found this place and eaten here once and really enjoyed it. “Have you had Thai before?” He asked, glancing up from behind the plastic clad menu. The small table had a tiny tealight candle going, and two small dishes with a sauce in one and flaky puffy fried crispy noodles in the other. He plucked one from the dish and munched on it. He’d already decided what he wanted. Pad Thai was standard fare and filling.
“Yes! But not since I left London actually. There used to be this really nice place near my foster dad’s shop and we’d eat there a lot.” She didn’t have many fond memories of him, but that was one of them. It was probably where she got her fantastic appetite from. That or too many nights going hungry both in London and in Phoenix. Mostly in Phoenix. Her dreams had only made that worse.
“Oh, this is so cute!” She’d go with Pad Thai too, since he was. She wasn’t very picky.
Finn smiled. “Glad you like it.” He wanted to ask about her being a foster kid, as that wasn’t something he’d known about her, but somehow now didn’t seem the right time. Start small, Finn. “So uh...how was work?”
“Pretty busy for once! I found a little shop that needed some extra help and there was this old carburetor that was giving them fits.” As she talked, she used her hands to describe the shape of the machinery as well as how difficult the repair was. Her face ran the gamut from frustrated to angry to absolute joy at finding the solution. “And then it purred like a kitten!”
Finn followed along with rapt attention. He liked the way Rey described things, with such passion and gusto. He knew enough about mechanics - at least First Order mechanics - to get partially what she was talking about. After all, whether you were in a galaxy far, far away or on Earth, a carburetor was pretty much a carburetor.
“You got skills, you know that?” he smiled, before taking a sip of water. “I don’t know how you do it. You’d make a helluva mechanic in the Navy, aviation or otherwise.” Not that he was trying to convince her to join up, but she did have that special touch when it came to such things.
The waiter came and took their order, which came out faster than expected - literally in under ten minutes. The steaming pile of noodles made Finn’s mouth water.
“You ever see any of the Batman or Superman movies?” he said, between forkfuls of Pad Thai.
“Thanks. I feel like it’s ingrained in me, part of my blood. I just… look at a machine and want to know how it works. Take it apart, put it back together. That’s where my frankencycle came from. I wanted to build something from scratch and whatever parts on hand.” She smiled and shrugged. “I would love to work on a plane. I wonder if the airport needs someone.”
Once she’d had … a large bite of her food, she answered, “I think I’ve seen one or two on tv?”
Finn nearly spat out his Thai Iced tea in a laugh at “frankencycle”, but managed to swallow it somewhat gracefully. “Wait...did you just call that awesome ride of yours a ‘frankencycle’?” He wasn’t much a connoisseur of bikes, but he thought her ride was pretty badass. The fact she’d built it from scratch was mind blowingly impressive.
“I don’t know how those jobs work. You could ask Poe, maybe he knows, since he’s Air Force.” Finn shrugged.
“I suppose it depends on which one or two. Some are pretty bad. Pretty bad.” he added for emphasis. “But I was always a fan of the Christopher Reeve Superman films. The old ones from the 80s.” he added for clarification. His hunger drove him to keep scarfing down forkfuls of pasta - he’d learned that Rey pretty much ate the same way and it was oddly comforting knowing he didn’t have to take tidy, polite bites of food all the time around her.
“Well it is! Spare parts just like Frankenstein's monster!” Did that make her the mad doctor? It was a good halloween idea, anyway. She looked down at her food and sighed as she realized it was all gone, already. What was ‘being full’ and she would like to know what that was, again. But it had been delicious so she wasn’t going to complain overly much. “I think I’ve seen some of those.”
Was it weird he thought it was amazing and kinda cool she could scarf down food that easily and not gain an ounce? Every time the three of them had been out Rey packed it away as easily as he and Poe. He’d remember to never challenge her to a buffalo wing eating contest.
Leaning back from his empty plate and rubbing his stomach absently, he replied, “Well at least you kinda have an idea then going in. I’ve heard good things and bad about this movie.” He waved the waiter down to get their check and stuck his debit card into the folio without even giving it to Rey. No way he was going to have her pay for the food on their first date. Even if his bank account fundage was evaporating.
There were times she packed it away so quickly she forgot to taste it. “Well, one man is super strong and the other dresses like a bat, that’s probably enough going in. Didn’t really have much opportunity for comic books when I was little.” She frowned, but the folio was taken away before she had the chance to do anything. “I can pay my own way, you know.”
“Don’t forget Wonder Woman. She shows up too.” he grinned. “I read Superman mostly, but not a ton.” Finn shrugged. “The movies were always on tv back in the day, so. But that sucks you didn’t have a chance to experience comics at least a little bit.” He saw her dissatisfaction at not having an option to pay and looked a bit concerned. She did realize this was a date...right? Maybe she was just one of those women who preferred to pay their own checks. “I know. I just…” he smiled a little, “thought it’d be the nice thing to do. Y’know, gentlemanly.” Was that a word?
He got up from his chair once the receipt came and stretched a little. “Ready for two hours and change of dark, brooding action in super comfy lazy boy chairs?” He’d found one of those theaters that had retrofitted the newest style of movie viewing - plush electric recliners.
“Wasn’t something I had much time to worry about.” No matter the universe, Rey hadn’t had much of a childhood. She often took delight in experiencing the things she missed, though. She pursed her lips. It was like the hand grabbing all over again. She pointed at him. “Next time we split it, deal?”
Finn grinned and held his hands up. “Okay, deal!” He chuckled and let her lead the way out. Once on the street he said, “Hey, why don’t you drive us to the theater?” And tossed her the keys before strutting over to the passenger side, then pausing to lean on the roof of the car to say teasingly, “Y’know, unless you don’t wanna?”
“Why wouldn’t I want to?” She flashed him a bright smile. “You’re a good friend, Finn, I love spending time with you.”
As he watched her disappear into the car Finn frowned a little. Crap, she used the “f” word. Now he was certain she didn’t realize this was a date! Well there was nothing to be done now, he figured. He didn’t want to sit through the movie feeling awkward if he pointed it out now. So he’d just roll with it, happy in the knowledge that she at least enjoyed spending time with him. He got into the passenger seat, buckled up and glancing over at her with a grin said, “Let’s roll.”