Chapter Text
Rey Niima had a rough start to life.
She’d been born in Hawaii, to two opioid addicts. They hadn’t been bad people, really, her mother moving to Hawaii from Britain to pursue that hippie, carefree lifestyle that made the islands so popular. There she met a local man, another hippie, happy go lucky soul who picked bananas and pineapple for a living. Two fools in love. They shared everything, and when Rey’s mother, going through withdrawals from lack of access to her poison of choice had disclosed her condition, they realized that they shared their addiction too.
Rey was born a year later, premature, a little underweight, at home because her mom could not afford hospital care. She’d been afraid that if they found traces of opiates in her system, her baby would be taken away. She’d tried very hard to stay clean, to birth a baby free of addiction, and she’d managed. Rey was small, but she came out of the womb with a fighting spirit that kept her going.
Her mother's sobriety didn’t last very long. A few months after Rey was born, her mother was using again.
As she grew, Rey got used to her parents disappearing for hours, and she’d keep busy, playing in the dirt next to their dingy, moldy trailer until one of them came home. Her mother was pale and drawn, too weak to move unless it was to go get her fix.
She was very beautiful, with green eyes and fair skin, fine boned. But she was thin, and sad too.
One day, Rey was four years old, her father didn’t come back home, and her mother didn’t move for days. Sleeping or crying, and then motionless, staring listlessly in the void.
For days her mother lay unmoving, even if Rey shook her, pinched her hand. Her mother wouldn’t wake up, cold and stiff.
Rey remembers the hunger, scratching at her insides like an angry animal. She was used to going hungry, her parents forgetting food for hours, sometimes entire days. Until she cried for it and her mother would apologize, kiss her hair and her nose, go to the convenience store and come back with a candy bar, a peanut butter and jelly sandwich wrapped in waxed paper. But this time it had been days on end, Rey’s mother unseeing and unmoving even if Rey cried as loud as she could.
After four days, Rey went digging through the trash outside to find something she could give to the raging beast in her belly. A neighbour at the trailer park came to check on her, finding her on her knees in the dirt, rifling through papers.
Alani Niima stepped into Rey’s trailer, making her promise to wait outside, and when she was out, two minutes later, her face was pale. Her velvety black eyes wet. But she’d smiled at Rey and took her hand.
“Come sweetie, you need a good bath and food in your belly.”
The young mother of two with the kind smile washed her in a bucket outside, her hair and her face, so gentle, and wrapped her in a warm blanket. Gave her a big bowl of steamed taro and rice and sat her in front of the little TV with her young twin daughters, while she went in the bedroom and made a phone call, her voice a soft murmur.
There were lights outside, blue and red, and a knock at the door. A tall police officer with sad eyes, speaking to Alani in hushed tones. Rey had been scared that the police man would take her away, but he was so sad when he patted her hair.
“You be good to Miss Niima now, Rey. I’ll come check on you in four weeks, okay?”
That day, Rey Nobody became Rey Niima, and Alani became her mother.
She had no birth certificate, no social security number.
Too many kids in foster care, too many mouths to feed. The government sent Alani a little pension to help, and the young woman did the very best she could to keep Rey out of the system.
Against all odds, she succeeded.
It wasn’t easy, a single mom of three, living in a trailer park. But Alani Niima was nothing if not resourceful. Rey was enrolled in school, and soon, she started to thrive. Burying herself in books, diligent with her school work, and hardly ever fighting with her little step-sisters Kalea and Akela. Helping around the house, babysitting when Alani had to stay at work late, and as soon as she was able, picking up a part time job at the nearby junkyard.
The boss was a greasy, oily and unpleasant man called Unkar Plutt. He was lazy and pay was terrible, but she could help her mother with the groceries, and put a little bit aside for something special.
Something just for her. Something she had seen in the window of a pawn shop on her way to school. A shiny, blue and white surfboard.
Rey was made for the water. Alani even purported that maybe she had been born in the ocean, like a sea lion, and that was why she swam like one. The little beach behind the trailer park was always littered with bottles and trash, but once a week, she and the twins, armed with plastic bags and rubber gloves, would clean the whole beach and spend the afternoon swimming in the blue waters.
Eyeing the waves breaking on the horizon with a hunger that went beyond the desire for food. One day, she would ride those waves on her little blue surfboard, and pretend she was a sea lion, one with the ocean.
It’s the first day with her surfboard she remembers the most from her childhood. Alani on the beach, the twins building sandcastles and chasing little red crabs under rocks. Wiping out more times that she could count but everytime she managed to ride the wave, her mother and the girls cheered for her on the beach making pure joy burst in the pit of her stomach.
She’s thinking of that day right now, boarding the small plane that will take her to the next step of her journey.
The small blue and white board hangs on the wall in her mother’s house in Hilo, proudly displayed next to her surfing trophies, and her shiny high school diploma from Waiakea High. She had no time for college studies, now that was surfing full time, but it had made her mother so proud to drape a brightly coloured lei around her neck on her graduation day. Alani had never finished high school, becoming a mother too young, but she’d worked hard, and gotten them all out of poverty.
When Rey would make it big on the pro-circuit, she’d pay off her mother’s mortgage. She had big goals to reach.
Poe Dameron had seen Rey surf for the first time on a little stretch of quiet beach in Hilo. He was just there to visit an old friend, minding his own business, trying to find a decent cone of shave ice when he saw her.
A little slip of a girl, in a pink and black rashguard and blue bikini bottoms, attacking a barrel like a shark chasing prey. Fearless, agile, zigzagging across the wave with an ease born of long hours in the water. He’d ran down to the edge of the water, shoving his Ray Bans up his forehead in pure disbelief.
As it happened, Poe Dameron had a champion on his hands. A natural one at that.
Rey Niima had been hard to convince by the ex-pro.
“I don’t know man, I’m fresh out of high school, my mom just got a new house and she’s gonna need help for the mortgage. I have to work this summer, not just chase waves.” she’d explained, strapping her well worn board on the roof of a little green mazda that had seen better days.
“What if you got sponsored? It would cover all your expenses…” Poe had pleaded and Rey had laughed, unzipping the old rashguard to bare a muscled expanse of tan skin with plenty of coral cuts, a geometric tattoo of polynesian birds flying down her ribs to settle on her hip.
Her rashguard was too thin, and she’d get nicked every time she wiped out.
“Me? Sponsored? You’re dreaming pal, I don’t know what Healani up there put in your shave ice but you’re tripping…”
Poe was getting a little desperate, so he got the big guns out.
“What if I film your next session, and send it over to my friend Luke Skywalker in Maui?”
Rey’s mouth had dropped at that, comically.
“Luke Skywalker...you mean, the Luke Skywalker. The big wave legend?”
Poe smirked, knowing he had her interest now.
“The very same. He trained me when I went pro, he’s still training some of the best people on the circuit. How about we ask him what he thinks, and then we’ll see.”
A light of determination had brightened Rey’s hazel eyes, the lithe girl offering a slim, calloused hand.
“You got a deal, pal.”
Poe sent a video and waited. In the morning, Skywalker’s instructions had been simple.
Bring her in. ASAP.
Rey’s nose was stuck to the small round plane window, eyes as big as saucers as the light craft that transported her and everything she held dear started it’s slanted descent towards Tahiti.
The list was short: Poe, her coach, and a brand new, sunny yellow and orange board sponsored by one of the best surf board brands in the world, Solo Surf, and Bebe, Poe’s orange and white corgi mix. All four of them would be landing in Papeete in less than ten minutes, and she could not for one second stop the crazy racing of her heart.
Here she was, nineteen years old, and ready to tackle her first big wave training in Teahupoo. Eight weeks ahead of the Tahiti Pro qualifiers. With a little luck, she’d make it through, and with even more luck, she’d get to compete.
“You excited, kid?”
“Look at that fucking water Poe! It's like...like staring at a pool of aquamarine. It’s so blue…”
“And it’s warm too, you just wait to dip your toes in there…”
Her stomach made happy somersaults at the thought.
Papeete was a pretty small town, but bustling with activity. Big luxury cruise liners would often stop on their way to other islands in the archipelago, and the airport was full of tourists wearing pastel shirts, panama hats and bright leis. Bebe, restless from the flight, pulled at her leash excitedly and sniffed the salt air, the floor and about every surface she could still her little nose on.
A pick-up truck was procured from the airport’s parking lot, conveniently leased ahead by her cantankerous mentor.
Luke Skywalker had stayed behind in Pe’ahi.
“You don’t need me to train Rey, it’s just eight weeks, Poe can handle it. I’ll come when the Tahiti Pro starts, with my sister. She says that my nephew might decide to compete again this year...I’d like to see him go at it, with my own eyes.”
Kylo Ren. Or as he was now known, Ben Solo. Heir to the Solo Surf empire.
Infamous on the circuit, a real shark in the water, climbing up to the coveted number one in the charts. A bright career.
Rey had always deeply admired his style, the ease of his movements, how he fearlessly went up to the biggest waves and showed the ocean who’s boss. She never really understood his attitude though. Not that Ben was not very sportsmanlike, respectful to a fault, but not exactly friendly either. Infamous for his angry outbursts. Rey knew his parents, Leia, the semi-retired sea shepherd activist, and Han, surf legend and crafter of the most magical boards Rey had ever ridden. They were kind, patient people.
Maybe that belligerent attitude had had more to do with his ex-boss, Snoke.
Rey had never really understood Ben’s decision to forgo training with his own uncle, to let an unknown promoter take charge of his career. Richard Snoke had not been a surfer, if anything, he had never been seen near the water at all. A bad injury in his youth, an encounter with a jelly fish on a boating trip, had badly scarred his face and body, and he had never been in the water since. His predatory interest in young surfers had been even more puzzling, knowing the magnate’s circumstances.
Luke had told Rey that the weight of the legendary Solo and Skywalker surfing legacies, coupled with his own anxious tendencies, had been too much for young Ben to carry on his shoulders. That Snoke had promised a shiny opportunity at freedom. It had been a golden cage, binding Ben in a contract for years.
And then there was the accident.
Rey had seen it happen, a bit less than a year ago.
She had been at Pe’ahi that day, along with Luke Skywalker himself, looking on from the cliffs at the nephew he hadn’t talked to for years.
Jaws was a peculiar surf break. Ever changing, a haven for unpredictable, monster waves that attracted big wave pros from all over the world. It was a routine tow-in session, or so it seemed, Kylo Ren, number one in the world, attacking the monster with usual gusto on his signature red and black board.
But something had gone wrong. A weird movement from his left knee, his leg giving out and he wiped out, horribly, underwater for a solid sixty seconds while the ocean pummeled him into razor sharp reefs.
Rey had watched with bated breath as the rescue team rushed in before the next swell, there had been blood in the water. So much blood on Kylo Ren’s face when he had been pulled out of the water, limp and pale as a ghost, unconscious.
Badly injured. Broken, his face disfigured by the reef. Airlifted out to Honolulu for surgery with Luke in tow. His boss had not accompanied him, heading back to california without a backwards glance.
Kylo Ren’s career had been done after that. Snoke’s chosen sponsors pulling out, his contract voided. He’d fallen into utter obscurity, not a single surf publication mentioning him for months, apart from the accident. There had been speculation, but no answers.
Rey had not been there the night Kylo, Ben, had called Luke Skywalker for the first time in years, but she remembers her mentor’s face the next morning.
There had been a lot of hope in the old man’s eyes.
She hadn’t been around the few times Ben and his mother came to visit Luke, but he was here in Tahiti, Han had left a board prototype in their care for him. She was looking forward to meeting him face to face, and maybe learning a few things from a true champion.
The drive out of town was a bit of a hassle, the small streets of Papeete backed up with traffic. Busses, cars, and even motorcycles hauling tourists and goods to and fro, Poe cursing behind the wheel. It took a solid two hours to get to Matiti, three kilometres north of Teahupoo, where Luke had procured some lodgings for his protégée. The little villa was one of the most beautiful places she’d even seen, right by the ocean, waves crashing right below the wraparound porch.
White stucco walls and red shingled roof, a wide open floor plan on the first floor, huge bedrooms on the second floor. Rey had her own bathroom, a godsend considering how particular Poe was with his haircare, and her bedroom had huge windows with ocean views. A queen bed with white sheets and blankets, and a ton of tropical plants in hanging planters and large concrete pots. She even had a little balcony, big enough to lay a yoga mat and lay in the sun.
Maz, the owner of the villa, lived in California most of the time, a little hippie old lady that had been Luke and Leia’s friend for as the earth had been around, or thereabouts.
She had graciously loaned her villa, provided they water her plants and perhaps send her a few bottles of the local rum…
After unloading the truck, separating luggage and settling in, the sun was already low in the sky, hurtling towards the blue water in orange and pink clouds.
“I’m gonna take the truck and pick up some groceries in Taravao, do you want to come with?” Poe asks, after a shower that had taken entirely too long.
Rey looks out the window at the sunset, towelling her own shower damp hair.
“I think I’m gonna take the bicycle in the shed and go down to Teahupoo village, check it out. I don’t think I can sit still any longer, I’ve been seated all day.”
Poe laughs, pocketing his wallet.
“No problem kid, sometimes I forget I have twenty years on you…my old bones are tired!”
“Come on Dameron, we both know you have plenty of stamina in ya...speaking of, maybe I’ll keep an eye out for you out there, find you a date or something.” she teases, grabbing the shed key from the hook.
“Oof good luck kid, if you can find someone that can stand me for more than 24 hours, I’ll marry them. Be careful out there, I don’t know how good that bike is, and if you get hurt we’ll be in trouble, won’t we?” he admonishes, getting a foot through the front door, “Don’t get home too late, tomorrow, we attack the wave.”
On the fridge door, there is a list of places and things that Maz left for them, attached with a little ceramic fish magnet. They’re neatly organized in columns, written in black pen and block letters: Fun places, good eats, best surf breaks, best places to get gear, people to know.
There’s a name that repeats in many categories: Café Tico. And in the People to Know column, a glowing recommendation: Paige and Rose Tico (they are darlings and Café Tico is the place to go in Teahupoo for coffee or late night drinks. Make friends, they know everyone!!!)
Café Tico it was, Rey decided, riding the white bike into the liquid sunset.