(Part 2 of callsign #RogueRobin005, Going Home! -theweddingofthefoxes)
The kid seemed wary when the car pulled over next to him on the main road next to campus–he must be remembering his stranger danger skills from back in elementary school, Baze figured. But when he spotted Baze and Chirrut in the car, he looked a little less worried, though no less wet.
“Looks like you could use a ride,” Baze called cheerfully, and Bodhi smiled thinly, almost like he was sure he was in trouble.
“If he let you catch pneumonia, I’d have him fired myself,” Chirrut announced from the passenger seat. “I mean that.”
Bodhi hitched his backpack from one shoulder to the other. “I kind of live out of the way. I was just going to catch the shuttle at the stop on the corner.”
“The shuttle?” Chirrut tsked. “The number one complaint I get is that that shuttle is always late. As if there’s anything I can do about it at the help desk. Still, come on, now, we’ll take you home.”
There was just another moment of hesitation before Bodhi pulled open the back door of the car and slipped in, shivering. “I’m–oh, I’m dripping in your car, I’m s–”
“He’s dripping,” Chirrut said, deadpan. “I guess we’ll have to toss him out.”
The joke seemed to go over Bodhi’s head; he just seemed lost. “Mr. Imwe is being unfunny,” Baze said firmly, pulling away from the curb and down the street. “He thinks he’s hilarious.”
“I am hilarious,” Chirrut insisted, for the second time that afternoon.
“Where do you live, Bodhi?” Baze asked.
“The Jedha neighborhood? Not–not too far off campus, but not the closest, either–”
“We live there too,” Baze said. “Small world, isn’t it?”
“You do? Oh, thank God–I’m not taking you out of your way…”
Baze glanced in the rearview mirror at Bodhi, who was looking out the window through the rain, his backpack by his side. This was the most he had heard Bodhi say at any one time, ever, and it was odd to hear him speak without his group of friends surrounding him to provide a buffer against the world.
“Not at all,” Baze said serenely.
“We’re neighbors, now,” Chirrut decided.
“We were already neighbors,” Baze countered. “We just didn’t know it.”
“Well, we have to be neighborly now. Perhaps Bodhi would like to come over for dinner?”
“No!” Bodhi answered, so quickly that it created an abrupt and awkward silence in the car. All that could be heard was the tapping of the rain on the roof. Then Bodhi cleared his throat, though his voice got smaller as he explained. “I–sorry, that was probably–rude? Of me? I mean. I didn’t want to be rude. By coming in uninvited– I mean, I know you invited me, but you didn’t….have to…”
“We always make too much food,” Baze said, evenly. His suspicions that Bodhi was not used to the kindness of people he didn’t know very well were confirmed at that. “He’s trying to fatten me up.”
“I’m just a good cook,” Chirrut argued. “I don’t force feed you extra helpings.”
Baze grumbled agreeably at that.
“Anyway. I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable, Bodhi,” Chirrut went on. “If you don’t want to come over today, or ever, we won’t steal you away. But we’d be happy to have you.”
It was like a moment of psychic communication between Chirrut and Baze right then. This kid could use a place to come have dinner and conversation. His friends are doing a lot, but they can’t always be there. We can at least give him something to eat….
“Are…you sure you wouldn’t mind?”
“You’d be doing us a favor,” Chirrut insisted.
Bodhi seemed to be wrangling with the decision, fidgeting with the zipper of his backpack, but finally he said, “Okay. Thank you, really. Thank you.”
Chirrut beamed as Baze pulled onto the street where their townhouse was located. “How close are we to your place, Bodhi?”
“V-very, actually. If you, uh, kept going down the street instead of turning, I’d be the first apartment building in the Imperial complex. I could walk home.”
“We won’t ask you to do that, son,” Baze said, parking.
“All we are asking,” Chirrut added, “Is for you to come eat the ragu I’m making. Come on, let’s go inside before we get any wetter.”
Squadron Post can be found here!
