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babbushka · 3 years

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Burnt Bridges and Goodnight Kisses

Flip Zimmerman x Reader x Kylo Ren

5k, cw: ANGST (severe depression, grief, mentions of the war, Flip going away to war, hurt/comfort)

(A/N: This is much more melancholy than my usual sort of writing, so I completely understand if it’s not everyone’s cup of tea. No pressure at all to read, I’ve just been Going Through It, and needed to get the sads out of my system. I won’t be tagging anyone because of the subject matter, but I hope that if you read it, it’s cathartic in some way.)

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It’s a sunny day, and Kylo’s at the shop. Elbow deep in the engine of a motorcycle for a customer that doesn’t deserve it, he huffs and puffs around a cigarette to keep the nerves in his skull from going on the fritz. They’ve got the windows open, too good of a day to be completely holed up in the garage, they’ve got the front door open too.

When a shadow falls over the engine, in the shape of a tall man with broad shoulders, Kylo doesn’t bother looking up to greet him. He’s sure it’s the customer, and he wasn’t supposed to be there until three – it’s not even a quarter past noon, who the fuck does this guy think he is?

Against his better judgement, Kylo squints into the backlit silhouette of the man before him, and his brain takes a moment to process what the fuck he’s looking at. The face is familiar, the stature even more so…but this, that couldn’t be…was it really?

“Flip?”

He’s bald, hair shaved down as close to his skull as they were able to get it. His face is bare too. It’s the first time Kylo’s ever seen Flip without his goatee. The man in front of him is Flip, but it’s wrong, it’s not the Flip he knows. Could be a twin brother for all Kylo fuckin’ knows, but that’s not his Flip.

Until this not-Flip sighs, and his shoulders sag in the way that Kylo has seen too many times for it to be refutable, and the not-Flip becomes Flip and Kylo’s stomach clenches, because what the fuck have they done to him?

“Don’t laugh.” Flip says, still standing there in front of Kylo, blocking the sunlight. He’s got his arms at his sides, hands fidgeting. His thumb rubs against the inside of his wedding ring, and it’s only then that Kylo takes in what he’s wearing.

Instead of the flannel and jeans and those cowboy boots of his, Flip’s in a matching green number with black combats on, and he’s bald and clean shaven and that means it’s really happening.

Kylo’s going to be sick.

He doesn’t laugh.

He can barely muster anything at all as he stands up, only able to choke out a pitiful, “Are you…?”

“Yeah.” Flip knows what he asking, knows that he’s asking if Flip’s leaving. There’s a hardness in Flip’s eyes that didn’t used to be there, and the room spins around Kylo.

“I’m sorry.” Is all Kylo can manage, hating himself for not being better at this. He never was good, at this, at the whole talking thing, communication. You had always teased him for that, teased the both of them.

Flip wasn’t very good at it either.

“I uh,” Flip makes an automatic move to scratch at his goatee, but then aborts the mission halfway through when he realizes that there’s nothing to scratch. Kylo wonders when he got that scar on his chin, how it happened. “I came here to say goodbye and...to ask a favor.”

“Anything.” Kylo finds himself breathing around his cigarette. Flip watches the movement, and almost without thinking, Kylo passes Flip the zippo lighter that he keeps in his pocket. Flip accepts it gratefully, lights up a camel and mulls over it in his lungs for a moment or two.

“I need you to take care of her for me.” He says quietly, on the exhale.

“Flip —” Kylo’s eyes widen, his stomach dropping. He has to brace himself, because this can’t be happening, it has to be a dream, some fucked up nightmare. He pinches himself hard on the muscle of his arm, certain that he’ll wake up with your body sandwiched between the two of them but the more he pinches himself the more frantic he starts to get.

“I mean it, Kylo.” Flip steps out of the light, walks around the bike that’s separated their bodies, puts his hands on Kylo’s shoulders and steadies him. Flip’s always been the one to steady the two of you, what the fuck is he going to do without him? “I...I need her to be okay, understand? I need to know she’ll be okay. When I’m gone.”

“You know that she won’t be.” Kylo blinks back tears, furiously denies ever letting them well up in his eyes. He’s not sure what he’s feeling, devastation or red hot anger. He’s not sure it isn’t both, as he clenches his jaw and his hands shake, “Has she seen you like this yet?”

“No.” Flip’s voice is quiet quiet quiet and it freaks Kylo the fuck out, how can a man so quiet go off to fight in such a loud war? Flip sighs, he looks tired already, exhausted. “I said goodbye before getting the cut, I didn’t want her to have this be the last memory she might have of me. Wanted her to remember me the way I always looked.”

“You’re talking like you’re not coming back.” He settles on angry, his voice starting to raise, his cheeks starting to grow hot.

“I don’t know if I will.” Flip responds with a tight pain constricting the back of his voice that has Kylo shouting, has him starting to make a scene.

“Shut the fuck up —!” Kylo throws the wrench he’s holding, throws it hard enough to shatter the one fucking window they left closed, everyone in the garage looking at him.

Flip does the thing he’s always been so good at doing, grounding Kylo. He drags Kylo into a hug, tight and firm and sturdy. Flip’s always been so fucking sturdy, steady. Kylo hates him for going away, he hates him.

“Kylo you have to listen to me. This war is fucked up, and nasty, and some boys don’t come back. Most of us won’t. I’m going to do my goddamn best to come home but there’s a chance I don’t.” Flip tries, but Kylo doesn’t want to hear it, he doesn’t want any of this.

“No you listen to me!” Wrenching out of Flip’s grip, the tears have starting to sting hotter now, and Kylo almost wants to hit him, wants to knock some sense into him as his vision blurs around wetness on his lashes. “You’re not allowed to fucking die over there, okay? You’re not. You can’t.”

“Will you do it?” Flip closes his own eyes, still not having gotten an answer from Kylo.

Kylo’s heart begins to pound, begins to thud dangerously loud in his chest. He can’t say yes, he doesn’t want to say yes, because the second he says yes then Flip will leave. If Kylo can just keep him here, maybe if Flip misses the bus to the airport, maybe if Flip misses his flight he won’t have to go overseas and can stay.

“She doesn’t love me the way she loves you.” Kylo admits, and it’s an admission that hurts. He’s known it for a long time, he’s known it ever since the day you chose him after that boxing match all those years ago. It still fucking hurts.

“But she loves you.” Flip licks his lips, starting to get desperate in his own right, starting to grow tense when he scowls, “Don’t you love her?”

“Don’t you?” Kylo shoots back, rage coming in full force again, a dangerous and nauseating see-saw. Everyone has cleared out of the garage by now, it’s just the two of them. Somewhere in the back of Kylo’s mind he can hear the door clicking shut, everyone giving them privacy, and so Kylo starts shouting again. “She’s your fucking wife! Don’t you love her enough to not go?”

At the insinuation that Flip could be something other than completely devoted to you, he grabs Kylo by the collar of his black-tshirt, shoves him back against a wall, shoves him hard. Flip’s face is two inches away from Kylo’s, and Kylo wants to kiss him so badly that he could cry. Maybe he is crying. If he is, Flip doesn’t say anything, he only bares his teeth in a snarl.

“Look! I’m sorry that I’m not the son of a senator who could afford to put me through college so I could sit around and fucking tinker in a garage all day. I got drafted I didn’t sign up for this fucking war, I don’t want to fucking go, and I don’t appreciate you making it sound that way.” Flip snaps, shouting back, face shaking from it.

Kylo sees it then, the terror, the sheer and utter fucking terror in Flip’s eyes. Something about that, something makes him break, and suddenly Kylo’s doubled over, hands on his knees, trying to hold himself up with the force of his own fear; because if Flip – sturdy reliable formidable Flip – is afraid, then who among them wouldn’t be?

“I’m sorry.” Kylo cries, and Flip holds him, even though Flip’s crying now too.

“Will you take care of her for me?” Flip asks again, and Kylo’s still not willing to give him the yes, not yet, just a few more minutes.

“What exactly does that mean?” Kylo demands, vision going spotty as he tries to get a grip on himself. He can feel his sinuses going, and he sniffles and sniffles and sniffles until he just fucking wipes his nose with the sleeve of his tank-top, not giving a shit anymore.

“Just...keep her safe. Make sure she’s okay, happy. Love her.” Flip says it so quietly that Kylo thinks he’s imagined it.

“Love her?” He presses, and the two of them look at each other, really looking. Kylo frowns for a minute, before he catches Flip’s real meaning, and he’s afraid he’s going to be sick all over again, this time with shame – because he’s wished for that before, wished that he could have you all to himself late late at night when he was sure no one was listening.

He never meant like this, he doesn’t want it like this.

“If she wants to.” Flip nods in confirmation, “I’m not going to make her suffer and be starved of touch just because I’m gone fighting for Uncle Sam.”

“And what happens when you come back?” Kylo emphasizes on the when, not an if, because he has to believe that Flip’s coming back. He has to, it’s going to break everyone in this fucking town if Flip doesn’t come back.

“We’ll burn that bridge when we get to it.” Flip decides, as the clock strikes one-o’clock. When Flip looks from the clock, back to Kylo, there’s an urgency in his voice as he asks, “Will you do it?”

That’s it, Kylo thinks, he can’t drag it out any longer.

“Yeah, I’ll do it.” Kylo whispers. He looks down, watches as one of his tears lands on his reflection in the mirror shine of Flip’s boots. He hates them.

With that, Flip’s done what he’s come here for, and there’s nothing left. There’s nothing left but for him to hand back the zippo lighter that Kylo had handed to him, so he does, and Kylo takes it even though his fingers have gone numb.

Flip’s walking away then, and Kylo watches him go, watches him for a minute or two before he’s sprinting out of the garage and into the sunlight, the dizzying bright yellow golden sunlight. It bathes everything in a glow that it doesn’t deserve, the world doesn’t deserve to be so beautiful when it’s taking Flip away.

Kylo sprints, a desperate last ditch effort, asking for something he doesn’t even know he needs, using a name he’s never called Flip before, shouting out, “Phil?!”

Flip stops walking, turns to face Kylo, only to get tackled by the biker in a hug so fierce and tight that it makes Flip grunt. Flip holds him back, the two men clinging to one another in broad daylight, right there in the driveway in front of the shop, out in the open, sun washing all around them.

“She’s not the only one who loves you.” Kylo whispers, face shaking, eyes flicking down to Flip’s lips for a split second.

Flip grabs Kylo by the face, a hand on his jaw, and crashes his mouth against Kylo’s. Their eyes close, and for a moment, Kylo can pretend they’re back at the big house up in the mountain, or in the little motel a town over, or even on Kylo’s own couch. But they aren’t, because you’re not here with them, and the reason you’re not here is because he’s leaving.

Something cold presses into Kylo’s palm – it’s the zippo. They break the kiss, and now there’s tears in Flip’s eyes too. Kylo can only wonder what the conversation must have been between you and him. If Flip’s crying in front of Kylo, Kylo can only imagine he had a nervous fucking breakdown in front of you.

Kylo pushes the zippo back into Flip’s hand and before he watches Flip walk down the sidewalk, headed towards a bus that will head towards a plane that will head overseas, Kylo tells him to, “Give it back to me when you come home.”

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That had been a week ago.

He feels shitty about it, about the whole thing. He should have gone to you that same day, right after work. He should have gotten on his motorcycle and driven to your house and held you like he knows you need.

He hadn’t done any of that. Instead, when the work day had ended, and that customer picked up the fucking bike, Kylo went home. Maybe…Kylo didn’t know. Maybe he thought he could pretend everything was alright. That it was normal. Going home after work just like any other day.

When Friday comes around the calendar again, Kylo has almost forgotten that Flip’s gone. He had almost forgotten, until he started getting dressed for Shabbos dinner, and then remembered that there wasn’t going to be a Shabbos dinner with Flip for a long long time. And when he checks the calendar, he realizes it’s been a week since Flip left, and he hadn’t checked on you.

So he’s furiously ripping through the streets, half-dressed and terrified of the state he’ll find you in, blowing red lights and cutting around cars like the asshole he is, hating himself for not even so much as giving you a fucking call. The trip up the mountain is the same as it always is, but it’s different at the same time, different because he keeps expecting to see Flip pass him in that truck of his and it doesn’t happen.

The truck is under a tarp, when he finally makes it to your drive-way, the mailbox is filled with letters that you haven’t brought in. That’s not a good sign, none of this is a good sign.

There’s leaves on the porch, they crunch under Kylo’s heavy footfalls as he makes his way up to the front door. Knocking once, twice, three times in the little pattern that’s all his, Kylo tries not to chew his lip until it bleeds.

“Sweets? it’s me. Can I come in?” Kylo stands outside the front door, tries jiggling the handle. It’s locked, no give.

Kylo knocks again, this time a little harder, even goes so far as to ring the doorbell.

“Y/N?” He calls, this time a little louder.

Still no answer from you, and he begins to panic. Your car is in the driveway so he knows that you should be home, you should be. You didn’t like to go for walks by yourself in the woods, always worried about mountain lions, always teased Flip that one day he was going to get eaten. They used to tease you for your fears. Kylo wonders if Flip getting drafted had ever been one of them.

Kylo breaks into the house, breaks the window on the side of the house that he knows leads into the living room. He doesn’t break the glass, just the latch that keeps it locked, and manages to shove himself through the small square opening, crawling through the space headfirst, toppling onto his chest as he pushes himself into the living room.

“Fuck.” He sucks in a breath when he sees how much of a mess the place has become.

It looks like everything that was once on a bookshelf, table, credenza, desk or counter has been shoved to the floor. There’s boxes all around the living room, stacks and stacks of case files, of clothing. It smells like camels, there’s one smoldering still in a little ashtray on the coffee table. It doesn’t look like it’s been smoked once, just simply left to burn steadily, the ash long and undisturbed.

You’re on the couch, face tucked against the cushions, facing away from him. Despite it being bright outside, the living room is pitch black, all the shades drawn.

“Oh sweetheart.” Kylo sighs softly, as he very gently so as to not scare you, sits down on the floor next to the couch.

He switches on the little lamp on the side table, and you wince against the light, curling in on yourself. Kylo begins to rub soothing circles to your side, and you let out a shuddering sob, something wordless that catches in your throat. Kylo hates himself for not coming to see you sooner, he wonders how long you’ve been here, how long you’ve been on the couch like this.

“I know baby, I know. I’m here.” Kylo whispers, before trying to coax you up. It’s telling that you let yourself be manhandled without much resistance, too out of it to care. It breaks Kylo’s heart, he’s never seen you like this, not even when you were sitting by his bedside in the hospital after the big crash. A stab of guilt rings through him; you had sat by his bedside every night for a month then, and it had been a full week since he had even called you. “Baby we gotta get you put together, okay? C’mon.”

Kylo swallows the guilt, and stands, guiding you up up up with him. The moment you’re on your two feet, your arms cling to Kylo, your face shoving itself into his neck. Kylo just holds you, kisses the top of your head, tries not to wrinkle his nose at how your hair is in desperate need of a wash.

“I — what day is it?” You shiver around a hiccupped sob, red hot sorrow branding his throat.

“Friday.” Kylo responds, wondering what day you think it is.

“Oh, shit.” Is all you say, and that’s all that Kylo needs to hear.

“C’mon, we’re going to shower.” He tells you, but when you try and take a step forward it’s hard for you to stand up without his help. He makes the mistake of not supporting your weight and you go teetering over to the side, stumbling out from under yourself like you’ve forgotten how to use your legs. Kylo catches you, holds you close close close, deciding, “Fuck — okay, bathtub instead.”

You sit in the dark, in the bathroom. Kylo goes to turn the light on but you panic and stop his hand, not wanting him to see you, the state of you. You don’t say it, but Kylo thinks you’re more afraid of you seeing yourself. He doesn’t say it either, but the both of you know it. Kylo keeps the light off.

He sits behind you in the bathtub, your face away from him, knees drawn up, arms wrapped around them. You brush your teeth, and Kylo doesn’t even care when you spit the toothpaste out.

Carefully, gently, he washes your hair, uses all the products you’re too sad to even think about right now. Carefully, gently, he listens to your sighs as he washes your back, your arms and legs, soapy hands sudsing up the water. Carefully, gently, he cradles your body as you lean back against him, his legs bracketing your sides.

He tries not to scream.

You try too, but you fail.

He’s got his arms wrapped around your chest as your head thunks back against his shoulder and you wail wail wail. Your body shakes and trembles until you have no more tears, until the water’s run cold, until you let out a sigh that sounds like you’re done. Kylo unplugs the drain.

The two of you sit in the tub for a long time still, long after the tub has drained. You’re both too scared to stand, unsure if your knees will hold you up.

Kylo doesn’t know how much later it is when the two of you get up and get dressed. Kylo ties the sash of your robe tight enough but not too tight. He puts himself in a pair of sleep clothes that he’s left at your house for impromptu sleepovers like this, even though this isn’t nearly as happy of an occasion as the sleepovers usually are.

When the two of you are dressed, he takes you by the hand to your bed, tucks you in. It’s bright, in the bedroom, the late afternoon sun dipping behind the mountains. It’s golden hour, Kylo realizes, and once again everything is too bright. In the sunlight your face looks…awful. You look like you’ve been crying for a week straight, and Kylo knows it’s because you have been.

Your stomach rumbles, and you look sheepish about it, which worries Kylo. Everything about this worries Kylo.

“When’s the last time you ate something?” He asks, not accusatory, just concerned.

“I don’t know.” You shake your head, voice just barely above a whisper. Your hair is wet, and in the moonlight, he can see your eyes shining.

Your stomach growls again.

“I’m going to order something from the deli.” Kylo announces, and you nod, a small good sign.

Kylo knows your order like the back of his hand, always brings you over a big hero when he passes the deli, likes to bring you and Flip things. It’s only after he hangs the phone up that he realizes he ordered Flip’s hero too, wonders what the fuck he’s going to do with that.

Flip’s sandwich has extra pickles.

Neither of you like pickles.

You burst into tears then, because you’ve just realized it too, and your face is buried in your hands now, and Kylo feels like he’s going to scream. Maybe he does, this time. Maybe he takes one of the pillows on Flip’s side of the bed and shoves his face into it and screams. He doesn’t know, he’s so out of his fucking depth.

Not for the first time, shame bubbles up inside Kylo’s chest. He remembers an argument that he had once had with Flip about his late undercover nights, how you had been so worried about the danger he puts himself into when he goes out like that. Kylo remembers shouting red in the face, veins popping out of his neck, that if you had picked Kylo, if you had been Kylo’s girl instead, if you had married Kylo instead, then maybe you wouldn’t be so worried all the time.

He remembers Flip throwing it back in his face that you hadn’t. You hadn’t picked him, and Kylo had to deal with it. Kylo had been bitter for a long time about that, he thinks. He’s not so sure now though, he’s not sure now what would have happened. There isn’t a man alive who loves you more than Flip, and not a woman who loves Flip more than you. Kylo sees that now.

You had picked Flip, and now Flip is gone, and Kylo is filled with shame, and you’re miserable.

“I’m sorry.” You’re crying crying crying, and Kylo doesn’t even know what you could possibly be sorry for, when all of this is his fault.

“Don’t you dare,” Kylo shakes his head, pulls you against his body because you’re shivering, and you’ve always teased Kylo for being so warm. “Hey, hey look at me. Don’t you dare apologize.”

“I just miss him so much.” There’s a tremor in your voice, and your pitch goes higher and higher that way it does when you’re starting to spiral, as you shake harder and harder, “He’s out there alone, and god knows what he’s doing, if he’s okay, if he’s going to come back — fuck what the fuck do we do if he doesn’t come back? How do we live without him?”

“He’s okay.” Kylo cuts you off, because that’s a line of thinking he hasn’t even let himself go down yet, and he can’t deal with that, not right now. So instead he wills it, he puts it out into the universe, “I promise. You have to breathe, stop holding your breath.”

You shudder out a breath, not realizing you’d been holding it until he said something.

“You can’t know that.” Your chin wobbles, and Kylo envelops you, smothers you with love. He’s not sure it’s the right thing to do, but he hopes that if he just…if he just holds you tight enough, it’ll be okay.

“I do though, I do know. I promise you, he’s going to come back. I’ll go over there and get him myself, if I have to.” Kylo tries to joke, but it falls flat.

You’ve stopped crying, at the very least.

Kylo doesn’t let himself think about how he’s going to keep this up for as long as he might have to. It’s only been a week, but what happens when you’re still sad a year from now? What happens when Flip isn’t back in two? What happens if he really doesn’t come back at all? How do you move on when your entire world is built around the one person you love more than anything?

Kylo doesn’t have you the same way that Flip gets to have you, but at least Kylo gets to have you in some way. At least you weren’t taken from him and put on a plane, taken far away, not knowing if you’ll ever return. How does anyone ever recover from that?

They don’t, he supposes.

But he can’t think about that that, not now. Especially because you’re turned towards him, and for the first time Kylo sees something other than misery in your eyes.

“Will you stay with me tonight?” You ask, voice soft, apprehensive and hopeful.

“I’ll stay with you as long as you need me.” Kylo promises, knowing that at the very least this is one promise he can keep.

“Will you kiss me?” You whisper, and Kylo’s heart breaks. You never used to ask before, would just pucker your pretty lips and smile at him and he’d give you one without thinking.

You pucker your pretty lips now, but there’s no smile, and Kylo’s heart breaks. He presses his lips to yours, and the sigh that pours out from your chest has Kylo guilty all over again – he knows for a fact that Flip kisses you at least a dozen times a day, and because Flip was gone, because Kylo was too terrified to do anything about it, you’d gone a whole week without them.

The kiss isn’t heated in a passionate sense, it’s longing, yearning. Kylo’s mouth opens and his tongue slides against yours, tastes the minty toothpaste that lingers there. You wrap your arms around his neck, and Kylo wraps his arms around your middle, and you kiss and kiss and kiss one another, until your breathing evens out and you’re no longer taking those shuddering shivering gasping breaths.

“He asked me to, you know…” Kylo smears the words against your mouth, smudges them with his lips, making them all fuzzy.

“Yeah?” You raise an eyebrow, knowing what he means.

“Yeah. If you want.” Kylo swallows around a lump in his throat, unsure of whether he wants you to want it or not.

“I don’t think I do.” You say, hushed hushed hushed like he can hear you, like someone is listening, “It doesn’t feel right without him.”

“I know. I just thought I’d mention it.” Kylo finds himself relieved, he doesn’t know why. He does, but he doesn’t want to say it. He doesn’t want to say how much he misses Flip too.

“I’m sorry.” You say again, and Kylo shakes his head, telling you not to be with another small kiss. This one feels closer to normal, and even though there’s food on the way, you’re starting to fall asleep. Kylo wonders if you’d been awake this whole time, waiting and waiting for a goodnight kiss. Your grip on him begins to loosen as you mumble out, “You’ll stay?”

“I’ll stay.” He promises, and this too is another one he can keep.

He doesn’t know how many others there will be, but he knows that at the very least, this is one that he can keep. You fall asleep in his arms, your hair on the pillow, shining in the last of the sunlight. Kylo lets one of his big scarred tattooed hands rub against your back, and he begins to hum out a little tune. Something soft, gentle under his breath, hoping that wherever you are in dreamland, the music will soothe you.

And if, when the delivery guy leaves the food out on the porch some time later, when Kylo extracts himself from your arms to bring the heroes inside and pay the kid, if he brings Flip’s hero into the kitchen and eats it so he can start getting used to the taste of pickles so that you’ll have someone to give yours to, then that’s his business.

And if, when he strikes up a cigarette and finds that he’s missing his zippo, wishing he had it back again, wishing he had Flip back again, wishing and wishing and wishing, wishing so hard that you must hear it upstairs because you come down to hold his hand and rest your head on his shoulder as he lets big fat tears slip down his cheeks, well.

Kylo decides he’ll burn that bridge when he gets to it.

#kylo ren x reader #flip zimmerman x reader #flip zimmerman #flip zimmerman x reader x kylo ren #angst #modern kylo ren #yes this is set in the personal au lol #but its also just a regular ol angsty fic too #adam driver fanfic #adcu #my writing

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