Take Me out of My Envelope, 4/?
Title: Take Me out of My Envelope (4/?)
Word Count: ~9,000 (this part)
Spoilers: AU version of Freddy Spaghetti through Go Big or Go Home
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Shop Around the Corner AU in which Nerd Boy and Pawnee Lover fall for each other as online pen pals, as Ben and Leslie fight in real life. This chapter: Nerd Boy and Pawnee Lover make plans to meet.
A/N: Sorry for the delay on this! This chapter takes a few elements from GBOGH, except that the government shutdown hasn't ended yet. Hope that's not confusing. Thanks to cypanache and saucydiva for the help with this, for making sure I finished it, and for being generally awesome.
Previous Part
The moment Ben stepped out into the courtyard at Pioneer Hall, he saw Leslie Knope and stopped short, wondering if it was too late to turn around. But she’d spotted him already, and that would look weird.
Also, he was supposed to be walking with Chris to a meeting with the city planners. So, no, that would definitely be weird to suddenly turn around.
Unfortunately, while he was hesitating, Chris had also noticed Leslie and started making a cheerful beeline straight toward her. Reluctantly, Ben trailed behind, feeling like one of those toy puppies being tugged along on a red string, like the one he’d gotten his nephew for Christmas last year.
“Oh, no,” he overheard Leslie say to someone. “Incoming.”
Belatedly, Ben realized she wasn’t alone. There was a brunette woman at the table, someone who looked vaguely familiar.
“Leslie Knope! And the lovely Ann Perkins!” Chris greeted them. “How are you doing on this resplendent midsummer afternoon?”
Ben nodded awkwardly at Leslie, trying to muster a smile, but she ignored him, instead looking directly at his partner.
“Not very good, Chris. My department is in shambles. Shambles.”
Well, that was putting it a bit dramatically, Ben thought. Seriously, she hadn’t lost a single fulltime employee.
“I know, it’s terrible.” Chris tsk-tsked sympathetically. “Ben, is there anything we can do about that?”
“No,” Ben answered immediately, annoyed at having to remind Chris of something he very well knew.
Chris shrugged, once again happy not to take the blame. “Ben says no. Sorry about that. Ann, could I have a moment of your time?”
Before he knew what was happening, Chris had stepped away, leaving him alone with Leslie. Ben stared after him for a moment, realized his mouth was hanging open, closed it, and reluctantly turned back.
“So … how’s it going?” he asked tentatively, looking down at the padfolio he was clutching against his stomach like a shield.
Should he apologize to her? Maybe he should apologize. He had kind of gone off on her in a grocery store, and he did feel bad about that. Really bad.
Then again, he also felt bad about the fact that she’d made him feel so awful that day, he had totally lost confidence in himself, and in his cooking abilities, and hadn’t been able to follow through with his plan to offer to make dinner for his online pen pal. He’d ended up eating his soup on a bench that night. Alone.
Leslie didn’t look very receptive to an apology anyway, and he was getting so tired of defending himself to her.
“Oh, no you don’t,” she responded to his halfhearted attempt at small talk. “I’m not falling for that.”
“Okay, I was just trying to … ” He started backing away.
“Go!”
“Go, apparently, okay,” he mumbled, turning away from her.
Luckily Chris came back just then, and they were able to finish their journey across the courtyard before Leslie called in the bouncer to physically throw him out. Not that City Hall had a bouncer. But he imagined Leslie had people who would do that sort of thing for her.
“She likes me,” Chris non-sequitured once they were inside. “She just doesn’t know it yet.”
“Who?”
“The beautiful and charming Ann Perkins!”
“Oh.” Somehow Ben kept forgetting that Ann was a person.
Chris stopped in the hallway outside the planners’ office, leaning in enough that Ben was forced to lean backward slightly, and pointed his fingers enthusiastically at Ben’s face.
“Don’t worry, I won’t be discouraged. My motto is, ‘If at first you do not succeed, try again, and you are absolutely guaranteed to eventually succeed.’ It applies to dating, as well as every other possible situation in life. Isn’t that wonderful?”
“Great,” Ben muttered, feeling a wave of sympathy for this Ann person.
Inside the room, Chris started making small talk with the city planners, telling them how valuable their work was to the city, et cetera, et cetera. Ben got out his Blackberry to kill a few minutes until his partner had everyone in the room feeling like best friends so they could all sing a round of camp songs before discussing the plans for the crosswalk by the library.
He had two new messages, the first from his sister with the subject line “Adventures in Verb Tense.” It contained an amusing list of appallingly constructed sentences his 3-year-old nephew had uttered.
The other one was from Pawnee Lover. It was a short inquiry about what he was wearing, followed by a description of what she had on, which sounded suspiciously similar to what last night’s newscast had shown Hillary Clinton wearing on her latest trip to the Middle East.
Did she really have the same pantsuit as Hillary Clinton, or was she trying to impress him? Either way, he thought it sounded an awful lot like flirting-terribly endearing flirting.
Maybe he should ask her out. He could take her somewhere, or cook her something other than soup. Not everyone liked soup, apparently.
Frowning, Ben put away his Blackberry and refocused on the meeting.
Who was he kidding? He probably needed something like four more direct confirmations that she liked him in that way before he’d ever get up the nerve to meet her.
And he wasn’t going to be in Pawnee much longer anyway.
--
Leslie watched Ben until he was all the way out of the courtyard. Then she kept watching him, through the windows, until he disappeared from sight, in the direction of the city planners' offices. She just needed to make sure he was really gone and that he wasn’t going to jump out from the shadows or something and ruin the perfectly lovely lunch she was trying to have with her best friend.
When she was sure, she turned back to Ann, who looked slightly puzzled as she followed Leslie’s gaze. But Leslie didn’t want to talk about Ben, so she quickly changed the subject.
“So … what’s the scoop? Did Chris ask you out again?”
“Yeah, he did. I said no. I’m just too … and he would be … it’s not a good time. Right?”
“That’s probably best,” Leslie agreed, nodding sympathetically. It had been just two months since Ann had broken up with Mark, and Ann didn’t even seem to be able to form complete sentences about the situation yet.
“Are you sure? He’s really hot. No, you’re right. I shouldn’t do it.” Ann visibly shook the thought out of her head before changing the subject. “So what’s going on with you and that Ben guy?”
Leslie swallowed, for no apparent reason that she could think of, other than the fact that’s what people do with their throat parts. “What do you mean, what’s going on?”
“I don’t know, you were staring at him earlier, and it seems like there’s some kind of tension there. I’m picking up this vibe, like you’re totally going to chase him down and kick him in the shins at recess or something.”
Leslie almost choked on her chocolate milk. “What? No, Ann, that’s … ugh.” Come to think of it, she kind of did want to kick Ben in the shins, but not for the reasons Ann was suggesting. “Of course there’s tension! He’s out to destroy my department. He hates everything I love. He’s a horrible person.”
Ann casually took another bite of her salad, not nearly as perturbed as she should be about Ben’s existence. “Are you sure? He’s just doing his job, isn’t he?”
Leslie realized she had been so caught up in fighting for her department and writing to her online pen pal, she had been neglecting to keep Ann adequately informed. Exasperated, she tried to explain. “You should have heard him the other night. He almost ran over me in the produce department at Kroger’s.”
Ann shook her head, brow furrowed. “Wait. You bumped into each other in the produce aisle?”
Leslie didn’t see why she was having to repeat that detail. Was she stuttering? “Yeah. At Kroger’s.”
Ann looked like she was trying to suppress a smile. “Just … nothing. It’s nothing. Go on. What did he say?”
“And … and … he said people should eat their vegetables, because they’re nutritious. Or something like that. It was awful.”
Ann gestured meaningfully to her medical scrubs, then looked from her own salad to the pile of whipped cream Leslie was spooning from her fruit salad. “I love you, Leslie, but I think I have to side with Ben on the vegetables. You should probably be eating more of them, don’t you think?”
“What? No, Ann. I mean, yes, you’re probably right, but the way he said it … he was very judgmental.”
“Okay. I’m not following, though. Why does he care about your nutrition?”
“He doesn’t.” Leslie didn’t know how to explain it without getting into how Ben thought she was irresponsible, and how he had no faith in her department, and she didn’t want to think about that, and anyway, she didn’t know why it mattered what he thought. “He was just being obnoxious and condescending, like a … condescending turtle face.”
“Got it.” Ann looked less than convinced, but Leslie let it go. Sometimes Ann, beautiful and amazing as she was, could be really naïve about things. “I should probably get going. I have some errands to run before my shift starts.”
“Yeah. Oh, oh, wait, Ann! Don’t leave yet. Don’t go anywhere.”
“I’m not going anywhere. What is it?”
Leslie rooted around in her bag, shifting around folders and binders and notepads. She knew it was in here somewhere, she had just seen it, it was probably … there! “Here! You have to read this book. Nerd Boy recommended it to me, and it was sooo good. I know you don’t usually like the history books I give you, but this one’s different. It’s about food, and everyone likes food. You’ll love it, trust me. Promise me, you'll give it a chance?”
Ann dutifully accepted the copy of The American Foodies: How Washington, Jefferson, and Franklin Revolutionized American Cuisine, and eyed the cover doubtfully.
“Who did you say recommended this to you?”
“It was …”
Crap.
Now she understood why Ann was looking at her weirdly.
Oh boy.
“It was … someone who knows things about books, who recommends books. At the library. A librarian! Yes, it was a librarian.”
“You don’t go to the library.” Ann flipped over the book, noting the lack of a bar code. “And this isn’t a library copy.”
Double crap. “Right! A librarian who works at the bookstore. I misspoke.” Why hadn’t she just said bookstore employee? Triple crap.
“Leslie, what’s going on?”
How was she supposed to stand up to that kind of pressure?
“Fine. He’s not a librarian.” At least, she hoped he wasn’t. She still didn’t know what Nerd Boy did for a living. “He’ssomeoneImetonthedatingsite.” She ran the words together, barely moving her mouth.
Ann clapped her hands, dropping the book in her delight. “That’s so great. Leslie, you’re dating someone! Why didn’t you tell me? I need details. Spill it! What did you say his name was? Nubai? What nationality is that?”
Leslie was thrown for a second that Ann had misheard what she called him, then latched onto it. “Alban … kuwa… zakstanian?” What? She had no idea where Nerd Boy was from, but she was pretty sure he was from an actual country, probably this one, considering his vast interest in US history.
“You don’t know?” Ann asked incredulously.
“Fine! He’s not … whatever I just said. His name isn’t Nubai. It’s … Nerd Boy.” Leslie practically whispered it, looking at the ground.
A beat passed. Then another. “Nerd … Boy?”
“It’s not his real name!” Leslie threw her hands up defensively. She had known Ann wasn’t going to understand this. “It’s a user name. We’ve been writing to each other all summer, a lot, and I really like him, really really like him, but we haven’t met, and we’re probably never going to, the end.”
There. Okay. It was out there. Leslie took a deep breath, while Ann stared at her.
“You know how crazy that sounds.”
“Yeah. It sounded that way, when I said it, just now, out loud.”
“Okay … so … if you like this guy, why haven’t you met him? You know how dating sites are supposed to work, right?”
Leslie had been going back and forth on that. She had tried to hint heavily at one point that she was going to be at JJ’s eating waffles from 6:35 to 7:35 on a particular evening, hoping he’d stop by and, possibly, maybe grab a bite with her. But he’d sent her a really weird message about how great she was and how he was really enjoying writing to her-on the internet, online.
It seemed like the idea of meeting in person made him uncomfortable, and she’d convinced herself all over again it was probably better this way.
“He’s only in Pawnee for the summer, on business or something,” she told Ann. “It was my idea to keep things impersonal. I don’t know, it made sense at the time. I didn’t want to get too attached … he’s going to leave, and it would be Dave, all over again.”
“How could it be Dave all over again? You haven’t even met him. He could be anybody. He could be like weird MRI guy or Jean-Ralphio or”-Ann shuddered-“Tom.”
“Tom’s not that bad. But no, he’s not … he’s really … I just have a feeling, this one’s different.”
“I don’t get it, if you haven’t met him. What is it about this guy?”
Leslie didn’t even know where to begin. “There are things you can tell from his e-mails. He’s sweet. He makes me laugh. He cares about things that I care about. He appreciates nice towels and he likes to take long morning walks and he knows all the state capitals. We get each other.”
Ann was continuing to give her a skeptical look. “He sounds great.”
“He is,” Leslie said dreamily, getting swept away for a moment in the thought of him.
“Leslie.” Ann’s stern voice broke into her reverie. “You have to meet him.”
Now, see, this-this was exactly what Leslie had been afraid of. Maybe she should have stuck to pretending she had a boyfriend named Nubai.
“Are you sure? That’s crazy. Why would I? I don’t know, Ann. Maybe it’s better this way. We can keep writing to each other no matter where he is, and I never have to give that up.”
“Yes. I’m sure about this. If you don’t, you could spend all this time pining for someone who’s probably not who you think he is. And if he is … I don’t know. Maybe you could make it work. But you have to find out.”
Leslie sighed. She did really want to meet him, find out his name, see how handsome he was (she was so sure he’d be so handsome, like an old film star probably). And maybe make out with him a little on his face …
“Okay. Yeah. Maybe.”
“Leslie.” Ann had this way of saying a person’s name that was really persuasive. It probably came from being a nurse.
“Okay! I’ll do it.”
“Good.”
“You’re going to come with me, right? Just in case?”
“Of course I will come with you,” Ann said, smiling encouragingly as she collected her things to leave. “But it’s going to be fine either way.”
It was going to be fine, Leslie repeated to herself. “Thanks, Ann, you’re such a good friend.”
Halfway through the door Ann paused and looked back over her shoulder. “Nerd Boy?”
Leslie glared at her, then as soon as she was gone, logged on to check her messages. She smiled when she saw that Nerd Boy had written back to her already.
What am I wearing? Well, I’ll tell you, I wish I was dressed like a Jedi Knight, because I’m having one of those days where I feel like I need something more protective than business casual. Not that Jedi Knights wear armor; their powers are more spiritual. Maybe a Batman suit? That’s it, actually. That’s exactly what I want to be wearing today. You should picture me as Batman. And I’ll picture you as Wonder Woman, bringing peace to the Middle East in an elegant power suit.
NB
Leslie laughed at the image, realizing happily that he’d seen through her bit of flirting and had been watching the same news report as she was last night. She wrote him a short encouraging message telling him that the most protective thing he could wear was a smile, sent it, and then started to think about how she was going to word her next message.
No hinting this time. Ann was right. She was going to ask him to meet her for real.
--
Ben Wyatt was standing in an alley, listening to the sound of his heartbeat and willing it to slow down, berating himself for leaving his motel twenty minutes early when he knew it would only take him five minutes to get to the restaurant.
He guessed he could go in. But then he’d have to be on constant alert, ready for her to walk in at any moment, and that sounded too intense. What if she startled him, and he spilled coffee all over his shirt? Not that he’d necessarily be drinking coffee, he could just be sitting there, but what would he be doing with his hands? Suddenly they looked comically large, and he couldn’t think of what he usually did with them all the time.
No, it was better this way. He’d just casually wait here out of sight. And he’d let her get there first, then walk in just after 7, casually. He’d have more control over the situation that way.
Anyway, she was the one who was supposed to bring a book so he’d be able to recognize her. So this made sense. Loitering in an alley totally made sense. There was nothing creepy about being a guy she met on the internet who was now loitering in an alley waiting for her.
Shit. What was wrong with him?
It’s not like he hadn’t been on first dates before. He’d been on lots of first dates (although not many second dates).
He just hadn’t been on a first date where he was already this emotionally invested in the outcome. And he was. He hadn’t even met her, and he already felt like … this could be something. It had to be something, or else … would she still write to him if they didn’t hit it off tonight?
So it seemed really important that the woman he still knew only as Pawnee Lover like him, the real him, the awkward skinny dork who most people seemed to find … unlikable.
Oh god. What if she didn’t like him?
Ben pulled out his phone to look at her last message one last time before steeling himself to go in.
I’ll be the woman with blonde hair and a copy of The Autobiography of Eleanor Roosevelt. If you see more than one woman who fits that description, ask J.J. to point out his favorite customer, and that’ll be me. Don’t tell me what you look like-I feel like I’ve come to know you so well, there’s no way I wouldn’t recognize you on sight.
PL
Blonde hair. It was the only thing he knew about her appearance, but he really liked the idea of it. He didn’t even usually go for blondes, but for her to have bright yellow hair, like the sunlight that reminded him so much of her personality… it was exactly how he would have pictured her.
He wondered briefly how she pictured him, how he’d measure up against her idea of him. But time was up. Snapping his phone shut and straightening his tie, he turned the corner and walked into JJ’s.
It took him a moment to become acclimated to the indoor light and get his bearings.
“Can I help you, son?”
Ben snapped his gaze to the man behind the counter, a portly middle-aged guy who he guessed was J.J. The older man was eying him warily, a look Ben had seen in business establishments in small towns and cities all across Indiana. It was the way people looked at an outsider.
He swallowed hard.
“I’m just … looking for someone. Someone I’m supposed to meet, to … just … I’ll just look around, if that’s okay.”
“Feel free to order something off the menu.” J.J. looked like he thought Ben was just there to case the place, or steal the restroom key, or something.
“Of course,” Ben said softly, scanning the restaurant.
There. At a booth toward the back, a woman with blonde hair. But she was turned around talking to someone in the booth behind her, so he couldn’t see her face.
After taking a deep, useless breath, he started to walk the length of the restaurant toward her, mentally practicing his introduction. Hi, I’m Mr. Ben Wyatt. I’m Ben. Nerd Boy. I’m a huge nerd, you must be …
When he was a few feet from her table, the woman turned around, flicked her eyes toward the door, then landed on him. Every feature on her face hardened, and he stopped short.
It wasn’t his date. It was Leslie Knope, and she looked as startled to see him as he was to see her.
“Yes?”
“Oh, um …” Disoriented and embarrassed, Ben started scanning the room for someone else with blonde hair. “I was just … um …”
Where was she? He didn’t see anyone else who fit that description. Was there a doorway somewhere to another section of the café?
“‘Um’ is the sound in dumb,” Leslie said, but in this weird voice like she was doing an impression of someone insulting him and not actually insulting him. “What are you doing here?”
“That’s a little harsh, Leslie,” someone else said, and Ben noticed the person sitting in the next booth. It was that woman Ann, the one Chris liked. Ben momentarily wondered why she and Leslie weren’t sitting together, but he was a little preoccupied at the moment to care.
“Let me handle this, Ann,” Leslie answered. “You don’t know who we’re dealing with.”
Ben finished his third complete scan of the restaurant. No doorway. No other blonde. Maybe she was late. He just needed to get away from Leslie, before she gave him a total crisis of confidence again, and go wait by the …
As soon as he turned back to the table to excuse himself, his eyes landed on the book that was sitting next to Leslie's purse.
The Autobiography of Eleanor Roosevelt.
His mind emptied of whatever words he’d been about to say, and everything started to go a little bit fuzzy around the edges, until all he could see was that book. It was a nice copy, maybe a special edition, with a textured cover and glittery metallic lettering, and it looked like it was purchased by a person who really loved Eleanor Roosevelt. But that couldn’t be …
“Are you okay?” It was the other woman’s voice. He couldn’t remember her name again all the sudden, and her voice sounded really far away.
“Um … I was … I’m just going to … go this way … sorry,” Ben mumbled as he backed away from the table. He promptly backed into another table, rattling the silverware, then turned and fled for the door.
On the sidewalk outside, he doubled over, his hands on his knees, and tried to get the blood to drain back to his head.
It’s not like he had to ask J.J. to point out his best customer to him-it was obvious now; he’d seen the takeout boxes in the task force meetings. Leslie bought a lot of waffles.
Pawnee Lover was Leslie. Leslie was Pawnee Lover.
Well, that settled one thing, he thought miserably. She didn’t like him. She hated him.
“Are you okay?”
Ben was startled to feel a gentle hand on his back and looked up to see the brunette woman. Ann. Her name was Ann.
She frowned at him in concern. “It’s okay, I’m a nurse. Do you need some kind of medical attention?”
“What? No, I’m …” Ben tried to shake it off and straighten up so he didn’t have to explain himself to this woman, who still had a finger on the keypad of her cell phone as if she was ready to call 911 if needed. Was he really that pathetic? “I’m okay, really. Thank you, though.”
She smiled sympathetically at him, and through all the white noise in his head at the moment, the thought crystallized that she seemed nice, and he should do a better job remembering her name.
“Is it Leslie?” she asked.
He widened his eyes at her, wondering what she knew, but she was still talking. “Don’t let her get to you. She’s waiting for a first date tonight, and she doesn’t do well with first dates. Really doesn’t do well. It’s making her tense. She’s not usually like that.”
Ben scoffed at the pavement. “She’s usually like that when I’m around.”
Ann looked at him oddly, and he felt like he might have just given something away, but he wasn’t sure what.
And he didn’t have a chance to figure it out, because Chris Traeger chose that moment to jog up.
“Ben Wyatt! Ann Perkins! Two of my absolute favorite people,” he greeted them in typical Traeger fashion, jogging in place. “Are you two together?”
The grin didn’t leave Chris’s face, but Ben noticed the flicker of doubt cross his partner’s eyes and realized how this might look. At least to Chris, who would see two near-strangers conversing on a sidewalk and assume they must be falling deeply and madly in love with each other.
“No. We’re not … at all. We were just …” Suddenly Ben had no idea how to explain what had just happened. He couldn’t even explain it to himself.
Luckily, Ann stepped in. “We were both at J.J.’s, Ben stepped out for some air, and I came out to see if he was all right.”
Chris extended a heavy hand to Ben’s left shoulder and looked him deeply in the eyes. “And are you all right?” he asked, with an extreme seriousness that struck Ben as almost comic, if he were in the mood for comedy just then.
“Great,” Ben answered flatly, flinching a little bit under the weight of Chris’s hand.
“Wonderful! I’ve just run 18 miles, and I could really use some fuel. Would you two mind if I joined you?”
“Oh, um, I think I’ll just … I’m not really …” Ben started to flounder for an excuse, at the same time as Ann was doing the opposite.
“Oh, okay, if you really want to, I mean, that’s probably okay, yeah,” she was saying, then appeared to catch herself. “Wait. I’m actually supposed to be backup for Leslie tonight. In case her date doesn’t show up or doesn’t live up to her insane expectations. Honestly, she’s probably going to be a mess later no matter what. Probably I should be there for her … so I shouldn’t …”
“Ann Perkins.” Chris looked at her like his heart was about to burst with affection. “What a truly wonderful friend you are. It’s an honor to just eat in the same restaurant as you.”
“Thank you.” Ann smiled up at him girlishly, her head cocked to one side, and Chris turned to Ben.
“I hear the waffles in this place are simply to die for, and I think we could get a table with the best view in town.” Chris winked at Ann. “What do you say, partner?”
“Um …” Ben glanced through the window. He could see Leslie across the restaurant, eyes flicking nervously between her book and the door, and wondered what kind of ‘insane expectations’ she had for this evening. Wondered what he could possibly do in this situation.
He could stand her up. He could tell her the truth. Either way seemed to guarantee that he’d lose his online pen pal. He wasn’t quite sure how sticking around would change that, but ….
He wasn’t quite ready to face the alternative either.
“Come on, you should eat something anyway,” Ann added, putting on her concerned-nurse face again.
“I guess I am a little curious about those waffles,” he mumbled, and let himself be ushered back into the enemy’s lair.
J.J. glared at Ben momentarily before noticing his present company and giving them a welcoming smile. Ann headed back to her booth next to Leslie’s, and Chris grabbed a nearby table, one with a direct view, as Ben wondered how he got away with this sort of thing without coming off as a total creep.
Leslie immediately turned away from them for a consultation with Ann, her blonde curls bouncing as she shifted, and Ben was riveted for a moment.
“She’s beautiful, isn’t she?” Chris commented.
When they had first met, Ben had noticed she was attractive, objectively speaking. All blue eyes and shiny curls and an aura of intelligence and passion. It was obvious to anyone who met her, and it didn’t necessarily mean he was attracted to her.
If Pawnee Lover looked like Leslie … and obviously Pawnee Lover did look like Leslie … oh god, he was so confused.
“And nursing is such a noble profession,” Chris was saying, and Ben realized he hadn’t been referring to Leslie anyway.
“Yeah, she seems nice,” he agreed distractedly.
J.J. showed up to take their order, and Chris ordered “waffles all around,” which Ben went along with. He usually would have gone for something more savory, but hardly had the interest in looking at a menu just then. His brain was working overtime to process the information that Leslie Knope, the woman who made him miserable every time they crossed paths, could be the same person who had written all those warm, compassionate, adorable messages to him this summer.
While he was pondering this, Ann wandered over to chat with Chris.
“How are things?” Chris asked her with intense concern.
Ann frowned compassionately, glancing back at Leslie, who was drumming her fingers on the table with increasing intensity while she watched the door. “It doesn’t look good. He’s twenty minutes late. I don’t think he’s going to show.”
“How is she taking it?” Ben asked, in what he hoped was the casual voice of a disinterested party.
“Not great. She had pretty high hopes for tonight.”
As Chris and Ann continued their conversation, Ben discreetly watched Leslie. She had stopped the manic finger drumming and was slumped over the book, her head snapping up every time the café door chimed. The hopefulness and vulnerability turned something over inside him, and from this distance, without her yelling at him, he could see it. What he’d been seeing all along but hadn’t really been paying attention to, because it tended to make his job more difficult to pay attention to people like Leslie.
Not that he'd ever met anyone quite like Leslie. She was this passionate person who loved her city. Someone who worked hard and cared about people and cared about doing the right thing. Someone who had high hopes to hang out with a guy named Nerd Boy tonight.
She was Pawnee Lover.
She just wasn’t that person with him.
“Would you excuse me?” Ben stood up from the table. “I have to … make a phone call … to my sister. It’s her birthday. I just remembered.”
“Tell Kate happy birthday for me! I should send her something,” Chris said brightly, then suddenly replaced his smile with a look of concern as he returned his attention to Ann. “And tell Leslie our hearts are with her tonight.”
In the near-privacy of the hallway next to the bathroom, Ben dialed information to get the number of J.J.’s and asked to be connected.
“Hi. I was wondering if you could do me a favor. There’s a woman there. A blonde … Leslie Knope. I’m supposed to meet her, but … I’ve, ah, well I’ve been detained. I won’t be able to make it after all. Could you let her know?”
“And you are?”
“Oh, um …” He couldn’t exactly give his name. And he wasn’t about to give J.J. his user name either. “She’ll know who it is. And …” Ben sighed, a quick exhale of breath that he tried to direct away from the receiver. “Tell her I’m really sorry.”
He walked back to the table in time to watch J.J. walk over and give Leslie the news. Leslie frowned and nodded as J.J. talked to her. After he left, she stared off into the distance for a few moments, looking thoughtful. Then she visibly put on her stiff upper lip, collected her things, and walked over to Ann, who was still hovering near Chris.
“Well, that’s that,” Leslie announced. “He called J.J. He’s been detained.”
Ann reached to put an arm around her. “Oh no. Detained by what?”
Leslie shrugged. “Didn’t say. I’m sure he’ll write to me later. At any rate, it looks like I won’t be meeting him tonight after all. You ready to go?”
“Oh, yeah, of course, um …” Ann looked between Chris and Leslie, obviously torn.
“Leslie, Ann, why don’t you join us?” Chris piped up. “The more the merrier!”
Leslie looked warily at Ben, then back to her very eager-looking friend, to the exit, then back to Ann. He watched the reluctance on her face shift to something else, something more generous. “I suppose … okay. I am hungry.”
As she started to put her things down next to him, Ben felt a wave of panic at going through with this. Maybe he should just go. She could eat the waffles that Chris had ordered for him, like some kind of consolation prize for her ruined night. It was the least he could do.
But just then J.J. inexplicably showed up at the table with four plates of waffles, pretty much putting him on the spot.
“What outstanding service this place has!” Chris observed.
“Only the best for my favorite customer,” J.J. said, carefully setting down the plates and casting a fond look at Leslie that prompted an unexpected spurt of jealousy in Ben’s gut. “I thought you might still want these.”
“I thought you didn’t like waffles,” Leslie said to Ben when J.J. had left.
“I never said that,” Ben mumbled apprehensively.
“You said they lack nutritional value,” Leslie pressed.
Ann glanced nervously between Leslie and Ben, but Chris seemed oblivious to the tension. “These waffles are fantastic. I don’t treat myself often, but even the healthiest diet has room to try a local delicacy,” he interjected. “It’s all about balance.”
Leslie nodded approvingly, Ann beamed at Chris, and Ben scooted the pile of whipped cream over to the side of his plate and took a bite. Of course he liked waffles. Who didn’t like waffles?
Chris turned his attention back to Leslie. “I don’t think you should let tonight get you down. You are brilliant and passionate and a very good friend to Ann. There will be plenty more first dates in your future. Just ask Ben! He’s been on more than anyone I know.”
After that cheerful overshare, Chris refocused his attention on Ann. “Tell me every single detail about your day. I want to know everything.”
Since it was clear their half of the table was no longer being included in that conversation, Ben cleared his throat and glanced nervously at Leslie.
She broke the silence first. “So you’ve been on a lot of first dates, then.”
“Chris sets me up a lot,” Ben admitted, shifting his napkin around in his lap. “Nothing much ever comes of it. I, uh … don’t … always … make the best first impression.”
“Who, you?” She laughed, short and quiet, and the teasing seemed surprisingly more gentle than mean.
“Yeah, I know,” Ben said, with his own quiet laugh. As much as he didn’t want to be talking about his horrendous dating history with her, it was probably the most relaxed moment they’d shared in a long time, so he continued, in a voice only Leslie could hear. “I’m uncomfortable meeting new people. I never know the right thing to say, or how to get to know them. It’s always just … painfully awkward. I wish I was better at it.”
She looked back at him, and for a moment their gazes locked, and he thought maybe … maybe … but she looked away quickly, and he felt the door closing again.
“You should try harder,” she said unsympathetically, opening her book and fanning out a set of cards that had been tucked inside the cover. He noticed what was written on the top few: Egyptian debt relief, ring-tailed lemurs, breakfast cereal. “Make an effort. That’s why I always come prepared with conversation topics.”
That got Ann’s attention again. “Leslie. I thought we talked about this. You promised you weren’t going to do that anymore.”
“No. No. I said you made good points, but I never promised. I still think a guy appreciates when you put some forethought and preparation into a date. The right guy would, at least. And this way, there are never any awkward silences!”
She glanced at Ben, and he couldn’t help but smile at her, because it was charming, in that same way he had always found Pawnee Lover charming. Which made sense, because they were the same person. But she quickly swept the cards back up and snapped the book cover shut over them. Clearly they weren’t for him.
“What a simply delightful evening!” Chris declared as everyone finished scraping the whipped cream off their plates. “I’m overjoyed that the four of us had the chance to enjoy each other’s company over a delicious meal.”
“Yes. Too bad it’s almost over and we’ll all be parting ways for the evening,” Leslie said with a lack of sincerity that was lost on Chris. “I wish we could stay longer, but … Ann.”
“That’s a fantastic idea, Leslie,” Chris said, grinning over at Ann, who seemed to have missed Leslie’s pointed look. “There’s no reason to call it a night yet. Let’s take this date plus two other people into the stratosphere!”
Ann flashed him a pleasantly surprised smile, looking like she might actually really like Chris. Ben did his best to ignore the fact that the date was supposed to be him and Pawnee Lover … Leslie, apparently … and the two other people should have been … nobody. Nobody else should have been here tonight.
Ben watched Leslie’s face as she looked between Chris and Ann. Her grimace suddenly shifted into something else, and it wasn’t generosity this time. He could tell by the light that flashed in her eyes that the wheels were turning.
He recognized that look. It was the one she got every time she thought she had figured out how to get her way at work. Except this time it wasn’t directed at him. She was looking at …
“Great idea, Chris. I know just the place.”
Oh no.
--
If anyone could salvage a seemingly ruined evening, it was Leslie Knope.
So fine, tonight hadn’t worked out the way she had hoped. She wasn’t currently on her way out to have after-dinner drinks with Nerd Boy. They weren’t going to be gazing into each other’s eyes and talking late into the night, the notecards long forgotten because the conversation flowed so easily that they kept going, long after they’d worked out a plan to guarantee Egypt’s future economic stability and debated the merits of Trix versus Lucky Charms.
She’d been pretty sure they would have been in agreement that Trix were not just for kids. But Lucky Charms have marshmallows. So it could have gone either way.
And then there would have been a kiss on her doorstep. Probably kisses, plural. Maybe she would have invited him in. Probably not. But maybe. It’s not like it would have been a typical first date.
Except that it hadn’t been anything. So none of that had happened.
He probably had a good reason. Probably. Honestly, it was hard to think of anything that would have kept her away tonight, and so it hurt to think this hadn’t been as important to him.
Maybe that was it-he’d been hurt. Maybe he’d been detained at the hospital.
She’d have to ask Ann later to find out if any sweet, intelligent Eleanor Roosevelt fans had been admitted. She hoped that was it! Actually … no. She didn’t want him to be hurt. She just wanted him to be here. Or to have a really good reason for not being here.
Anyway, clearly he wasn’t. But it was nice to see Ann so happy with Chris, and Leslie had been willing to sit next to BentheJerk and play nice over breakfast-for-dinner as a favor to a friend, even though Ben’s favorite breakfast cereal was probably vegetables. Ugh. Also J.J. had remembered to give her extra whipped cream.
Leslie had hoped to excuse herself as soon as the waffles were gone, but when she’d realized how well Chris and Ann were hitting it off, she’d thought maybe …
Maybe that could be useful.
Ann was a beautiful woman, and men had been known to do generous things for very beautiful women before. Generous things like … recommend that the rainy-day fund be used to fund projects for her best friend’s department?
Okay, maybe it wasn’t the best idea Leslie had ever had. But she was running out of ideas, and out of time, and as long as they liked each other … she might as well let nature take its course. At least something good might come out of tonight.
So when Chris had wanted to keep the night going, she’d suggested going to The Bulge. The place where inhibitions seemed to shed faster than John Edwards’s fan base when he cheated on his sick wife.
Oh, John Edwards.
Inside The Bulge, Leslie used her status as a gay hero to snag some free drinks, ignoring Ben’s quizzical look because there’s no way someone like him would understand why penguin weddings were cute (Nerd Boy totally would have thought they were cute), then headed out to the dance floor.
“This place is outstanding!” Chris said when they were all getting into the music. “Great call, Leslie Knope. Look, even Ben’s dancing.”
Leslie thought that what Ben was doing could hardly be described that way-he was standing stiffly, barely bobbing his head, like the stick in the mud he was. But she was glad that Chris was having a good time, and the same generous nature that had called that dancing might benefit Leslie later.
Ben wandered away in the direction of the bar, apparently giving up creating a new dance craze based on being stiff and boring. Soon after, Leslie excused herself to give the lovebirds a little more time to connect before putting the rest of her plan into action.
Taking the stool next to him, because it was the last one left, she tried to swallow back the disappointment that this condescending life ruiner had pretty much ended up being her “date” for the evening. Plenty of things were Ben's fault, but Nerd Boy standing her up was not one of them.
As the bartender handed her a new drink, Ben looked up from whatever he had been rapidly keying into his cell phone.
“Oh, hey,” he greeted her, in too familiar of a voice, like they were suddenly friends or something.
“What is with you and that cell phone?” Seriously, he always had that thing. Like he was a 14-year-old girl with a texting addiction. But who could he possibly be texting?
He raised an eyebrow skeptically. “Now you have a problem with cell phones?”
She rolled her eyes. “I have a problem with people who’d rather hide in their electronics and their gadgets, rather than communicate face to face, and have actual conversations, with people around them, in person.”
Ignoring the slightly hurt, then startled, look on his face, she impulsively reached across the bar and grabbed the phone out of his hand. “Who are you always writing to anyway?” she blurted.
As she brought the screen up to her face, close enough so that she could see it in the dim light of the bar, the shocking thought flashed through her brain that she was going to see a message to Pawnee Lover. It was an insane idea, but he had shown up at J.J.’s at the exact moment that she’d been expecting Nerd Boy.
Her heart racing, she focused on the little screen.
Hey, Kate,
Just wanted to warn you that you might be getting a birthday card or a singing telegram or something from Chris. It’s a long story. I’ll explain la
Quickly, she handed the phone back to him, disappointed. Then she was immediately disgusted by her disappointment. She should be relieved. It was Ben, for crap’s sake. There was no way he could have been Nerd Boy.
He took the phone back from her, raising his eyebrows.
“So who’s Kate?” she asked, smiling sheepishly.
“My sister.”
“It’s her birthday?”
“Nope.”
“Why does Chris think it’s her birthday?”
Ben laughed, but not like he thought it was funny. He held up his phone pointedly. “It’s a long story. Maybe I’ll tell you later.” He glanced down at the phone, brow furrowed, and shook his head slightly. “Or not,” he added quietly.
“I didn’t know you had a sister.” It seemed weird that Ben had a sister. It was like … finding out Greg Pikitis had a mom. Or that librarians had children. Of course even the worst people had families, but … weird, just the same.
“What, I’m not like an android or a … cyborg or something. There’s probably a lot we don’t about each other.”
Leslie supposed that was true. They weren’t exactly close. “I’m an only child,” she volunteered, for no reason at all.
“Now, see, that’s something I didn’t know.” He looked directly at her again, and she was struck by the gentle curiosity in his eyes, like he actually cared to find out something about her. It made her kind of curious about him. Anyway, she was stuck here with him, so she might as well make the most of it.
“Tell me something else I don’t know about you,” she said.
Ben’s eyes widened slightly in surprise and then he considered for a few long moments, as she waited in suspense. Suspense? No, she didn’t actually care what he was going to reveal.
“I’ve read that book,” he finally said, glancing away from her and shifting on his stool like he was embarrassed. “The biography, the one you had at the diner.”
“The Autobiography of Eleanor Roosevelt?” He nodded, but that was ridiculous. There was no way both Ben and Nerd Boy appreciated the same historical heroines she did. “No. I don’t believe you. What, does every guy secretly read Eleanor Roosevelt books? No way.”
Ben shot her a skeptical glare. “Yes. We all keep them under our mattresses with our Playboys.”
“Really?”
“No. I mean, I can’t speak for the rest of mankind, but I actually do admire her. I find her … she’s an inspiring person. And I really have read her book.”
He seemed genuine, but then he looked away from her again, and that made her doubt him again. It did seem highly implausible that someone like him would appreciate someone like her. Eleanor, she meant. “Prove it. Tell me something Eleanor Roosevelt said that inspired you.”
Ben looked startled for a moment, then thoughtful. His lips started to move slightly, like he was inwardly reciting Eleanor’s greatest hits and selecting just the right one. Leslie leaned toward him a little, but only because the music at the bar was so loud, and she wanted to hear this.
“She said … to do whatever, because people will criticize you no matter what. I … have found that to be true.”
Leslie bristled, leaning back on her stool again. “She didn’t say do whatever. She said do what you feel in your heart to be right.”
“Good lord. You’re going to take offense that I got a few of the words wrong? I don’t have the book in front of me.”
“No, I’m taking offense that someone like you can twist the words of Eleanor Roosevelt to justify your own … ugh, just stop.”
Leslie turned away with renewed disgust. Luckily, Chris and Ann had taken a break from dancing and were standing at a table a short distance away with their drinks. Leslie went to join them, surprised and annoyed that Ben abruptly jumped up to follow her.
Ignoring him, Leslie made polite chit-chat for a few moments about how wonderful the gays were, exclaimed over how great it was they had all become friends, and then started to subtly segue into some of her ideas for the parks budget.
Just as she was getting going, Ben’s hand landed on her upper arm, firmly grasping her there. “Excuse me. I just need to talk to Leslie over here for a second,” he said as he forcefully pulled her away from the table.
“What do you think you’re doing? Let go of me!” She squirmed angrily, trying to get away from him, but he had a pretty solid grip on her still.
“Look. I know what you’re doing. And I know you don’t want to do that.” His voice was calm, but he was looking straight into her eyes, really intensely, and his hand was still on her arm, and for some reason her heart had started beating really fast. He cocked an eyebrow. “Right?”
Leslie scoffed. “You don’t know anything. You don’t know me. What could you possibly know?”
He loosened his grip on her but left his hand there, a light but steady presence that wasn’t helping whatever thing that was going on in her chest. It must have something to do with the pink drinks they’d been serving her at the bar all night, on the house. What was in those?
“I think I know you … better than you realize,” Ben said, imploring her with his eyes in a way that made her flinch. “And I know you’re better than this. You’re just having a bad night, Leslie. Think this through.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She set her jaw stubbornly and glared at him.
His fingers shifted slightly against her arm, almost gently, and it made her skin tingle. Dammit, why wouldn’t he just let go of her?
“I think you do. Look.” He nodded back toward Chris and Ann, who were already engrossed in flirty-looking conversation again. “Chris is my friend … sort of. Ann is your friend, your good friend, it seems, and … she seems like a nice person. And they seem to really like each other. Do you really want to ruin that for them?”
“Of course not,” Leslie snapped. “I wasn’t going to ruin anything for them. I was just going to subtly, you know, make my case. It was going to be fine.”
He looked at her skeptically, and she hated that, how he always thought he knew better than her. “You were not being subtle.”
“Yes. I was. I was being very subtle.”
“No, Leslie, you are not that sneaky. Take my word for it. I could see your plan, written all over your face, the moment you agreed to go out after dinner.” He finally seemed to notice that his hand was still on her arm and abruptly let go of her. “Don’t do this.”
She had intended to move away as soon as he let go, but instead she found herself inexplicably leaning toward him. “Why do you care? What’s it to you?” Her voice came out much shriller than she intended. Yeah, those pink things were definitely hitting her now. “You’re like a … heartless numbers robot. I bet you don’t even have a heart in there. Just a calculator probably.”
She thumped him on the chest with her fist, and he jumped backward slightly, and deep inside her she knew he didn’t deserve this, but it had been one disappointment after another tonight, one disappointment after another this whole summer, and he was the one standing in front of her, being infuriatingly right again, foiling yet another one of her plans, and she couldn’t stop herself.
“Look at you. You don’t have a soul, you have a suitcase! You do all this damage, and then you just leave. You don’t care what you leave behind. You’re like a …. traveling soulless suitcase monster." She started to poke him in the chest with her pointer finger to punctuate her words. "Stop trying to tell other people to stop trying. Just because you stopped trying doesn’t mean the rest of us have to. We were fine before you got here, and we’ll be fine after you leave. So just … stop it. Okay?”
“Okay,” he said, backing away from her, his hands up in the universal sign of surrender.
The look on his face kind of killed her in that moment. Yelling at him didn’t make her feel better. She felt worse. Dammit, why did he have to have feelings and a family and a really cute mouth?
She did not just think that last thing.
Whirling away from Ben, she made her way back over to Ann and Chris, who at some point must have been able to tear their eyes away from each other, because they were now looking at her with some concern.
“I’m fine. Ann, it’s been a really long night, I think I’m just going to head out. I’ll take a taxi.” Looking between the two of them, their pretty mouths both still gaping at her, she smiled, feeling her eyes start to tear up. “You two are going to have very beautiful children.”
Nodding at Chris, shooting a quick backward glance at Ben, Leslie made her way to the door.
And that was that.
No Nerd Boy.
No money for her department.
But tomorrow was another day.
--
( continue to Chapter 5 here)
Word Count: ~9,000 (this part)
Spoilers: AU version of Freddy Spaghetti through Go Big or Go Home
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Shop Around the Corner AU in which Nerd Boy and Pawnee Lover fall for each other as online pen pals, as Ben and Leslie fight in real life. This chapter: Nerd Boy and Pawnee Lover make plans to meet.
A/N: Sorry for the delay on this! This chapter takes a few elements from GBOGH, except that the government shutdown hasn't ended yet. Hope that's not confusing. Thanks to cypanache and saucydiva for the help with this, for making sure I finished it, and for being generally awesome.
Previous Part
The moment Ben stepped out into the courtyard at Pioneer Hall, he saw Leslie Knope and stopped short, wondering if it was too late to turn around. But she’d spotted him already, and that would look weird.
Also, he was supposed to be walking with Chris to a meeting with the city planners. So, no, that would definitely be weird to suddenly turn around.
Unfortunately, while he was hesitating, Chris had also noticed Leslie and started making a cheerful beeline straight toward her. Reluctantly, Ben trailed behind, feeling like one of those toy puppies being tugged along on a red string, like the one he’d gotten his nephew for Christmas last year.
“Oh, no,” he overheard Leslie say to someone. “Incoming.”
Belatedly, Ben realized she wasn’t alone. There was a brunette woman at the table, someone who looked vaguely familiar.
“Leslie Knope! And the lovely Ann Perkins!” Chris greeted them. “How are you doing on this resplendent midsummer afternoon?”
Ben nodded awkwardly at Leslie, trying to muster a smile, but she ignored him, instead looking directly at his partner.
“Not very good, Chris. My department is in shambles. Shambles.”
Well, that was putting it a bit dramatically, Ben thought. Seriously, she hadn’t lost a single fulltime employee.
“I know, it’s terrible.” Chris tsk-tsked sympathetically. “Ben, is there anything we can do about that?”
“No,” Ben answered immediately, annoyed at having to remind Chris of something he very well knew.
Chris shrugged, once again happy not to take the blame. “Ben says no. Sorry about that. Ann, could I have a moment of your time?”
Before he knew what was happening, Chris had stepped away, leaving him alone with Leslie. Ben stared after him for a moment, realized his mouth was hanging open, closed it, and reluctantly turned back.
“So … how’s it going?” he asked tentatively, looking down at the padfolio he was clutching against his stomach like a shield.
Should he apologize to her? Maybe he should apologize. He had kind of gone off on her in a grocery store, and he did feel bad about that. Really bad.
Then again, he also felt bad about the fact that she’d made him feel so awful that day, he had totally lost confidence in himself, and in his cooking abilities, and hadn’t been able to follow through with his plan to offer to make dinner for his online pen pal. He’d ended up eating his soup on a bench that night. Alone.
Leslie didn’t look very receptive to an apology anyway, and he was getting so tired of defending himself to her.
“Oh, no you don’t,” she responded to his halfhearted attempt at small talk. “I’m not falling for that.”
“Okay, I was just trying to … ” He started backing away.
“Go!”
“Go, apparently, okay,” he mumbled, turning away from her.
Luckily Chris came back just then, and they were able to finish their journey across the courtyard before Leslie called in the bouncer to physically throw him out. Not that City Hall had a bouncer. But he imagined Leslie had people who would do that sort of thing for her.
“She likes me,” Chris non-sequitured once they were inside. “She just doesn’t know it yet.”
“Who?”
“The beautiful and charming Ann Perkins!”
“Oh.” Somehow Ben kept forgetting that Ann was a person.
Chris stopped in the hallway outside the planners’ office, leaning in enough that Ben was forced to lean backward slightly, and pointed his fingers enthusiastically at Ben’s face.
“Don’t worry, I won’t be discouraged. My motto is, ‘If at first you do not succeed, try again, and you are absolutely guaranteed to eventually succeed.’ It applies to dating, as well as every other possible situation in life. Isn’t that wonderful?”
“Great,” Ben muttered, feeling a wave of sympathy for this Ann person.
Inside the room, Chris started making small talk with the city planners, telling them how valuable their work was to the city, et cetera, et cetera. Ben got out his Blackberry to kill a few minutes until his partner had everyone in the room feeling like best friends so they could all sing a round of camp songs before discussing the plans for the crosswalk by the library.
He had two new messages, the first from his sister with the subject line “Adventures in Verb Tense.” It contained an amusing list of appallingly constructed sentences his 3-year-old nephew had uttered.
The other one was from Pawnee Lover. It was a short inquiry about what he was wearing, followed by a description of what she had on, which sounded suspiciously similar to what last night’s newscast had shown Hillary Clinton wearing on her latest trip to the Middle East.
Did she really have the same pantsuit as Hillary Clinton, or was she trying to impress him? Either way, he thought it sounded an awful lot like flirting-terribly endearing flirting.
Maybe he should ask her out. He could take her somewhere, or cook her something other than soup. Not everyone liked soup, apparently.
Frowning, Ben put away his Blackberry and refocused on the meeting.
Who was he kidding? He probably needed something like four more direct confirmations that she liked him in that way before he’d ever get up the nerve to meet her.
And he wasn’t going to be in Pawnee much longer anyway.
--
Leslie watched Ben until he was all the way out of the courtyard. Then she kept watching him, through the windows, until he disappeared from sight, in the direction of the city planners' offices. She just needed to make sure he was really gone and that he wasn’t going to jump out from the shadows or something and ruin the perfectly lovely lunch she was trying to have with her best friend.
When she was sure, she turned back to Ann, who looked slightly puzzled as she followed Leslie’s gaze. But Leslie didn’t want to talk about Ben, so she quickly changed the subject.
“So … what’s the scoop? Did Chris ask you out again?”
“Yeah, he did. I said no. I’m just too … and he would be … it’s not a good time. Right?”
“That’s probably best,” Leslie agreed, nodding sympathetically. It had been just two months since Ann had broken up with Mark, and Ann didn’t even seem to be able to form complete sentences about the situation yet.
“Are you sure? He’s really hot. No, you’re right. I shouldn’t do it.” Ann visibly shook the thought out of her head before changing the subject. “So what’s going on with you and that Ben guy?”
Leslie swallowed, for no apparent reason that she could think of, other than the fact that’s what people do with their throat parts. “What do you mean, what’s going on?”
“I don’t know, you were staring at him earlier, and it seems like there’s some kind of tension there. I’m picking up this vibe, like you’re totally going to chase him down and kick him in the shins at recess or something.”
Leslie almost choked on her chocolate milk. “What? No, Ann, that’s … ugh.” Come to think of it, she kind of did want to kick Ben in the shins, but not for the reasons Ann was suggesting. “Of course there’s tension! He’s out to destroy my department. He hates everything I love. He’s a horrible person.”
Ann casually took another bite of her salad, not nearly as perturbed as she should be about Ben’s existence. “Are you sure? He’s just doing his job, isn’t he?”
Leslie realized she had been so caught up in fighting for her department and writing to her online pen pal, she had been neglecting to keep Ann adequately informed. Exasperated, she tried to explain. “You should have heard him the other night. He almost ran over me in the produce department at Kroger’s.”
Ann shook her head, brow furrowed. “Wait. You bumped into each other in the produce aisle?”
Leslie didn’t see why she was having to repeat that detail. Was she stuttering? “Yeah. At Kroger’s.”
Ann looked like she was trying to suppress a smile. “Just … nothing. It’s nothing. Go on. What did he say?”
“And … and … he said people should eat their vegetables, because they’re nutritious. Or something like that. It was awful.”
Ann gestured meaningfully to her medical scrubs, then looked from her own salad to the pile of whipped cream Leslie was spooning from her fruit salad. “I love you, Leslie, but I think I have to side with Ben on the vegetables. You should probably be eating more of them, don’t you think?”
“What? No, Ann. I mean, yes, you’re probably right, but the way he said it … he was very judgmental.”
“Okay. I’m not following, though. Why does he care about your nutrition?”
“He doesn’t.” Leslie didn’t know how to explain it without getting into how Ben thought she was irresponsible, and how he had no faith in her department, and she didn’t want to think about that, and anyway, she didn’t know why it mattered what he thought. “He was just being obnoxious and condescending, like a … condescending turtle face.”
“Got it.” Ann looked less than convinced, but Leslie let it go. Sometimes Ann, beautiful and amazing as she was, could be really naïve about things. “I should probably get going. I have some errands to run before my shift starts.”
“Yeah. Oh, oh, wait, Ann! Don’t leave yet. Don’t go anywhere.”
“I’m not going anywhere. What is it?”
Leslie rooted around in her bag, shifting around folders and binders and notepads. She knew it was in here somewhere, she had just seen it, it was probably … there! “Here! You have to read this book. Nerd Boy recommended it to me, and it was sooo good. I know you don’t usually like the history books I give you, but this one’s different. It’s about food, and everyone likes food. You’ll love it, trust me. Promise me, you'll give it a chance?”
Ann dutifully accepted the copy of The American Foodies: How Washington, Jefferson, and Franklin Revolutionized American Cuisine, and eyed the cover doubtfully.
“Who did you say recommended this to you?”
“It was …”
Crap.
Now she understood why Ann was looking at her weirdly.
Oh boy.
“It was … someone who knows things about books, who recommends books. At the library. A librarian! Yes, it was a librarian.”
“You don’t go to the library.” Ann flipped over the book, noting the lack of a bar code. “And this isn’t a library copy.”
Double crap. “Right! A librarian who works at the bookstore. I misspoke.” Why hadn’t she just said bookstore employee? Triple crap.
“Leslie, what’s going on?”
How was she supposed to stand up to that kind of pressure?
“Fine. He’s not a librarian.” At least, she hoped he wasn’t. She still didn’t know what Nerd Boy did for a living. “He’ssomeoneImetonthedatingsite.” She ran the words together, barely moving her mouth.
Ann clapped her hands, dropping the book in her delight. “That’s so great. Leslie, you’re dating someone! Why didn’t you tell me? I need details. Spill it! What did you say his name was? Nubai? What nationality is that?”
Leslie was thrown for a second that Ann had misheard what she called him, then latched onto it. “Alban … kuwa… zakstanian?” What? She had no idea where Nerd Boy was from, but she was pretty sure he was from an actual country, probably this one, considering his vast interest in US history.
“You don’t know?” Ann asked incredulously.
“Fine! He’s not … whatever I just said. His name isn’t Nubai. It’s … Nerd Boy.” Leslie practically whispered it, looking at the ground.
A beat passed. Then another. “Nerd … Boy?”
“It’s not his real name!” Leslie threw her hands up defensively. She had known Ann wasn’t going to understand this. “It’s a user name. We’ve been writing to each other all summer, a lot, and I really like him, really really like him, but we haven’t met, and we’re probably never going to, the end.”
There. Okay. It was out there. Leslie took a deep breath, while Ann stared at her.
“You know how crazy that sounds.”
“Yeah. It sounded that way, when I said it, just now, out loud.”
“Okay … so … if you like this guy, why haven’t you met him? You know how dating sites are supposed to work, right?”
Leslie had been going back and forth on that. She had tried to hint heavily at one point that she was going to be at JJ’s eating waffles from 6:35 to 7:35 on a particular evening, hoping he’d stop by and, possibly, maybe grab a bite with her. But he’d sent her a really weird message about how great she was and how he was really enjoying writing to her-on the internet, online.
It seemed like the idea of meeting in person made him uncomfortable, and she’d convinced herself all over again it was probably better this way.
“He’s only in Pawnee for the summer, on business or something,” she told Ann. “It was my idea to keep things impersonal. I don’t know, it made sense at the time. I didn’t want to get too attached … he’s going to leave, and it would be Dave, all over again.”
“How could it be Dave all over again? You haven’t even met him. He could be anybody. He could be like weird MRI guy or Jean-Ralphio or”-Ann shuddered-“Tom.”
“Tom’s not that bad. But no, he’s not … he’s really … I just have a feeling, this one’s different.”
“I don’t get it, if you haven’t met him. What is it about this guy?”
Leslie didn’t even know where to begin. “There are things you can tell from his e-mails. He’s sweet. He makes me laugh. He cares about things that I care about. He appreciates nice towels and he likes to take long morning walks and he knows all the state capitals. We get each other.”
Ann was continuing to give her a skeptical look. “He sounds great.”
“He is,” Leslie said dreamily, getting swept away for a moment in the thought of him.
“Leslie.” Ann’s stern voice broke into her reverie. “You have to meet him.”
Now, see, this-this was exactly what Leslie had been afraid of. Maybe she should have stuck to pretending she had a boyfriend named Nubai.
“Are you sure? That’s crazy. Why would I? I don’t know, Ann. Maybe it’s better this way. We can keep writing to each other no matter where he is, and I never have to give that up.”
“Yes. I’m sure about this. If you don’t, you could spend all this time pining for someone who’s probably not who you think he is. And if he is … I don’t know. Maybe you could make it work. But you have to find out.”
Leslie sighed. She did really want to meet him, find out his name, see how handsome he was (she was so sure he’d be so handsome, like an old film star probably). And maybe make out with him a little on his face …
“Okay. Yeah. Maybe.”
“Leslie.” Ann had this way of saying a person’s name that was really persuasive. It probably came from being a nurse.
“Okay! I’ll do it.”
“Good.”
“You’re going to come with me, right? Just in case?”
“Of course I will come with you,” Ann said, smiling encouragingly as she collected her things to leave. “But it’s going to be fine either way.”
It was going to be fine, Leslie repeated to herself. “Thanks, Ann, you’re such a good friend.”
Halfway through the door Ann paused and looked back over her shoulder. “Nerd Boy?”
Leslie glared at her, then as soon as she was gone, logged on to check her messages. She smiled when she saw that Nerd Boy had written back to her already.
What am I wearing? Well, I’ll tell you, I wish I was dressed like a Jedi Knight, because I’m having one of those days where I feel like I need something more protective than business casual. Not that Jedi Knights wear armor; their powers are more spiritual. Maybe a Batman suit? That’s it, actually. That’s exactly what I want to be wearing today. You should picture me as Batman. And I’ll picture you as Wonder Woman, bringing peace to the Middle East in an elegant power suit.
NB
Leslie laughed at the image, realizing happily that he’d seen through her bit of flirting and had been watching the same news report as she was last night. She wrote him a short encouraging message telling him that the most protective thing he could wear was a smile, sent it, and then started to think about how she was going to word her next message.
No hinting this time. Ann was right. She was going to ask him to meet her for real.
--
Ben Wyatt was standing in an alley, listening to the sound of his heartbeat and willing it to slow down, berating himself for leaving his motel twenty minutes early when he knew it would only take him five minutes to get to the restaurant.
He guessed he could go in. But then he’d have to be on constant alert, ready for her to walk in at any moment, and that sounded too intense. What if she startled him, and he spilled coffee all over his shirt? Not that he’d necessarily be drinking coffee, he could just be sitting there, but what would he be doing with his hands? Suddenly they looked comically large, and he couldn’t think of what he usually did with them all the time.
No, it was better this way. He’d just casually wait here out of sight. And he’d let her get there first, then walk in just after 7, casually. He’d have more control over the situation that way.
Anyway, she was the one who was supposed to bring a book so he’d be able to recognize her. So this made sense. Loitering in an alley totally made sense. There was nothing creepy about being a guy she met on the internet who was now loitering in an alley waiting for her.
Shit. What was wrong with him?
It’s not like he hadn’t been on first dates before. He’d been on lots of first dates (although not many second dates).
He just hadn’t been on a first date where he was already this emotionally invested in the outcome. And he was. He hadn’t even met her, and he already felt like … this could be something. It had to be something, or else … would she still write to him if they didn’t hit it off tonight?
So it seemed really important that the woman he still knew only as Pawnee Lover like him, the real him, the awkward skinny dork who most people seemed to find … unlikable.
Oh god. What if she didn’t like him?
Ben pulled out his phone to look at her last message one last time before steeling himself to go in.
I’ll be the woman with blonde hair and a copy of The Autobiography of Eleanor Roosevelt. If you see more than one woman who fits that description, ask J.J. to point out his favorite customer, and that’ll be me. Don’t tell me what you look like-I feel like I’ve come to know you so well, there’s no way I wouldn’t recognize you on sight.
PL
Blonde hair. It was the only thing he knew about her appearance, but he really liked the idea of it. He didn’t even usually go for blondes, but for her to have bright yellow hair, like the sunlight that reminded him so much of her personality… it was exactly how he would have pictured her.
He wondered briefly how she pictured him, how he’d measure up against her idea of him. But time was up. Snapping his phone shut and straightening his tie, he turned the corner and walked into JJ’s.
It took him a moment to become acclimated to the indoor light and get his bearings.
“Can I help you, son?”
Ben snapped his gaze to the man behind the counter, a portly middle-aged guy who he guessed was J.J. The older man was eying him warily, a look Ben had seen in business establishments in small towns and cities all across Indiana. It was the way people looked at an outsider.
He swallowed hard.
“I’m just … looking for someone. Someone I’m supposed to meet, to … just … I’ll just look around, if that’s okay.”
“Feel free to order something off the menu.” J.J. looked like he thought Ben was just there to case the place, or steal the restroom key, or something.
“Of course,” Ben said softly, scanning the restaurant.
There. At a booth toward the back, a woman with blonde hair. But she was turned around talking to someone in the booth behind her, so he couldn’t see her face.
After taking a deep, useless breath, he started to walk the length of the restaurant toward her, mentally practicing his introduction. Hi, I’m Mr. Ben Wyatt. I’m Ben. Nerd Boy. I’m a huge nerd, you must be …
When he was a few feet from her table, the woman turned around, flicked her eyes toward the door, then landed on him. Every feature on her face hardened, and he stopped short.
It wasn’t his date. It was Leslie Knope, and she looked as startled to see him as he was to see her.
“Yes?”
“Oh, um …” Disoriented and embarrassed, Ben started scanning the room for someone else with blonde hair. “I was just … um …”
Where was she? He didn’t see anyone else who fit that description. Was there a doorway somewhere to another section of the café?
“‘Um’ is the sound in dumb,” Leslie said, but in this weird voice like she was doing an impression of someone insulting him and not actually insulting him. “What are you doing here?”
“That’s a little harsh, Leslie,” someone else said, and Ben noticed the person sitting in the next booth. It was that woman Ann, the one Chris liked. Ben momentarily wondered why she and Leslie weren’t sitting together, but he was a little preoccupied at the moment to care.
“Let me handle this, Ann,” Leslie answered. “You don’t know who we’re dealing with.”
Ben finished his third complete scan of the restaurant. No doorway. No other blonde. Maybe she was late. He just needed to get away from Leslie, before she gave him a total crisis of confidence again, and go wait by the …
As soon as he turned back to the table to excuse himself, his eyes landed on the book that was sitting next to Leslie's purse.
The Autobiography of Eleanor Roosevelt.
His mind emptied of whatever words he’d been about to say, and everything started to go a little bit fuzzy around the edges, until all he could see was that book. It was a nice copy, maybe a special edition, with a textured cover and glittery metallic lettering, and it looked like it was purchased by a person who really loved Eleanor Roosevelt. But that couldn’t be …
“Are you okay?” It was the other woman’s voice. He couldn’t remember her name again all the sudden, and her voice sounded really far away.
“Um … I was … I’m just going to … go this way … sorry,” Ben mumbled as he backed away from the table. He promptly backed into another table, rattling the silverware, then turned and fled for the door.
On the sidewalk outside, he doubled over, his hands on his knees, and tried to get the blood to drain back to his head.
It’s not like he had to ask J.J. to point out his best customer to him-it was obvious now; he’d seen the takeout boxes in the task force meetings. Leslie bought a lot of waffles.
Pawnee Lover was Leslie. Leslie was Pawnee Lover.
Well, that settled one thing, he thought miserably. She didn’t like him. She hated him.
“Are you okay?”
Ben was startled to feel a gentle hand on his back and looked up to see the brunette woman. Ann. Her name was Ann.
She frowned at him in concern. “It’s okay, I’m a nurse. Do you need some kind of medical attention?”
“What? No, I’m …” Ben tried to shake it off and straighten up so he didn’t have to explain himself to this woman, who still had a finger on the keypad of her cell phone as if she was ready to call 911 if needed. Was he really that pathetic? “I’m okay, really. Thank you, though.”
She smiled sympathetically at him, and through all the white noise in his head at the moment, the thought crystallized that she seemed nice, and he should do a better job remembering her name.
“Is it Leslie?” she asked.
He widened his eyes at her, wondering what she knew, but she was still talking. “Don’t let her get to you. She’s waiting for a first date tonight, and she doesn’t do well with first dates. Really doesn’t do well. It’s making her tense. She’s not usually like that.”
Ben scoffed at the pavement. “She’s usually like that when I’m around.”
Ann looked at him oddly, and he felt like he might have just given something away, but he wasn’t sure what.
And he didn’t have a chance to figure it out, because Chris Traeger chose that moment to jog up.
“Ben Wyatt! Ann Perkins! Two of my absolute favorite people,” he greeted them in typical Traeger fashion, jogging in place. “Are you two together?”
The grin didn’t leave Chris’s face, but Ben noticed the flicker of doubt cross his partner’s eyes and realized how this might look. At least to Chris, who would see two near-strangers conversing on a sidewalk and assume they must be falling deeply and madly in love with each other.
“No. We’re not … at all. We were just …” Suddenly Ben had no idea how to explain what had just happened. He couldn’t even explain it to himself.
Luckily, Ann stepped in. “We were both at J.J.’s, Ben stepped out for some air, and I came out to see if he was all right.”
Chris extended a heavy hand to Ben’s left shoulder and looked him deeply in the eyes. “And are you all right?” he asked, with an extreme seriousness that struck Ben as almost comic, if he were in the mood for comedy just then.
“Great,” Ben answered flatly, flinching a little bit under the weight of Chris’s hand.
“Wonderful! I’ve just run 18 miles, and I could really use some fuel. Would you two mind if I joined you?”
“Oh, um, I think I’ll just … I’m not really …” Ben started to flounder for an excuse, at the same time as Ann was doing the opposite.
“Oh, okay, if you really want to, I mean, that’s probably okay, yeah,” she was saying, then appeared to catch herself. “Wait. I’m actually supposed to be backup for Leslie tonight. In case her date doesn’t show up or doesn’t live up to her insane expectations. Honestly, she’s probably going to be a mess later no matter what. Probably I should be there for her … so I shouldn’t …”
“Ann Perkins.” Chris looked at her like his heart was about to burst with affection. “What a truly wonderful friend you are. It’s an honor to just eat in the same restaurant as you.”
“Thank you.” Ann smiled up at him girlishly, her head cocked to one side, and Chris turned to Ben.
“I hear the waffles in this place are simply to die for, and I think we could get a table with the best view in town.” Chris winked at Ann. “What do you say, partner?”
“Um …” Ben glanced through the window. He could see Leslie across the restaurant, eyes flicking nervously between her book and the door, and wondered what kind of ‘insane expectations’ she had for this evening. Wondered what he could possibly do in this situation.
He could stand her up. He could tell her the truth. Either way seemed to guarantee that he’d lose his online pen pal. He wasn’t quite sure how sticking around would change that, but ….
He wasn’t quite ready to face the alternative either.
“Come on, you should eat something anyway,” Ann added, putting on her concerned-nurse face again.
“I guess I am a little curious about those waffles,” he mumbled, and let himself be ushered back into the enemy’s lair.
J.J. glared at Ben momentarily before noticing his present company and giving them a welcoming smile. Ann headed back to her booth next to Leslie’s, and Chris grabbed a nearby table, one with a direct view, as Ben wondered how he got away with this sort of thing without coming off as a total creep.
Leslie immediately turned away from them for a consultation with Ann, her blonde curls bouncing as she shifted, and Ben was riveted for a moment.
“She’s beautiful, isn’t she?” Chris commented.
When they had first met, Ben had noticed she was attractive, objectively speaking. All blue eyes and shiny curls and an aura of intelligence and passion. It was obvious to anyone who met her, and it didn’t necessarily mean he was attracted to her.
If Pawnee Lover looked like Leslie … and obviously Pawnee Lover did look like Leslie … oh god, he was so confused.
“And nursing is such a noble profession,” Chris was saying, and Ben realized he hadn’t been referring to Leslie anyway.
“Yeah, she seems nice,” he agreed distractedly.
J.J. showed up to take their order, and Chris ordered “waffles all around,” which Ben went along with. He usually would have gone for something more savory, but hardly had the interest in looking at a menu just then. His brain was working overtime to process the information that Leslie Knope, the woman who made him miserable every time they crossed paths, could be the same person who had written all those warm, compassionate, adorable messages to him this summer.
While he was pondering this, Ann wandered over to chat with Chris.
“How are things?” Chris asked her with intense concern.
Ann frowned compassionately, glancing back at Leslie, who was drumming her fingers on the table with increasing intensity while she watched the door. “It doesn’t look good. He’s twenty minutes late. I don’t think he’s going to show.”
“How is she taking it?” Ben asked, in what he hoped was the casual voice of a disinterested party.
“Not great. She had pretty high hopes for tonight.”
As Chris and Ann continued their conversation, Ben discreetly watched Leslie. She had stopped the manic finger drumming and was slumped over the book, her head snapping up every time the café door chimed. The hopefulness and vulnerability turned something over inside him, and from this distance, without her yelling at him, he could see it. What he’d been seeing all along but hadn’t really been paying attention to, because it tended to make his job more difficult to pay attention to people like Leslie.
Not that he'd ever met anyone quite like Leslie. She was this passionate person who loved her city. Someone who worked hard and cared about people and cared about doing the right thing. Someone who had high hopes to hang out with a guy named Nerd Boy tonight.
She was Pawnee Lover.
She just wasn’t that person with him.
“Would you excuse me?” Ben stood up from the table. “I have to … make a phone call … to my sister. It’s her birthday. I just remembered.”
“Tell Kate happy birthday for me! I should send her something,” Chris said brightly, then suddenly replaced his smile with a look of concern as he returned his attention to Ann. “And tell Leslie our hearts are with her tonight.”
In the near-privacy of the hallway next to the bathroom, Ben dialed information to get the number of J.J.’s and asked to be connected.
“Hi. I was wondering if you could do me a favor. There’s a woman there. A blonde … Leslie Knope. I’m supposed to meet her, but … I’ve, ah, well I’ve been detained. I won’t be able to make it after all. Could you let her know?”
“And you are?”
“Oh, um …” He couldn’t exactly give his name. And he wasn’t about to give J.J. his user name either. “She’ll know who it is. And …” Ben sighed, a quick exhale of breath that he tried to direct away from the receiver. “Tell her I’m really sorry.”
He walked back to the table in time to watch J.J. walk over and give Leslie the news. Leslie frowned and nodded as J.J. talked to her. After he left, she stared off into the distance for a few moments, looking thoughtful. Then she visibly put on her stiff upper lip, collected her things, and walked over to Ann, who was still hovering near Chris.
“Well, that’s that,” Leslie announced. “He called J.J. He’s been detained.”
Ann reached to put an arm around her. “Oh no. Detained by what?”
Leslie shrugged. “Didn’t say. I’m sure he’ll write to me later. At any rate, it looks like I won’t be meeting him tonight after all. You ready to go?”
“Oh, yeah, of course, um …” Ann looked between Chris and Leslie, obviously torn.
“Leslie, Ann, why don’t you join us?” Chris piped up. “The more the merrier!”
Leslie looked warily at Ben, then back to her very eager-looking friend, to the exit, then back to Ann. He watched the reluctance on her face shift to something else, something more generous. “I suppose … okay. I am hungry.”
As she started to put her things down next to him, Ben felt a wave of panic at going through with this. Maybe he should just go. She could eat the waffles that Chris had ordered for him, like some kind of consolation prize for her ruined night. It was the least he could do.
But just then J.J. inexplicably showed up at the table with four plates of waffles, pretty much putting him on the spot.
“What outstanding service this place has!” Chris observed.
“Only the best for my favorite customer,” J.J. said, carefully setting down the plates and casting a fond look at Leslie that prompted an unexpected spurt of jealousy in Ben’s gut. “I thought you might still want these.”
“I thought you didn’t like waffles,” Leslie said to Ben when J.J. had left.
“I never said that,” Ben mumbled apprehensively.
“You said they lack nutritional value,” Leslie pressed.
Ann glanced nervously between Leslie and Ben, but Chris seemed oblivious to the tension. “These waffles are fantastic. I don’t treat myself often, but even the healthiest diet has room to try a local delicacy,” he interjected. “It’s all about balance.”
Leslie nodded approvingly, Ann beamed at Chris, and Ben scooted the pile of whipped cream over to the side of his plate and took a bite. Of course he liked waffles. Who didn’t like waffles?
Chris turned his attention back to Leslie. “I don’t think you should let tonight get you down. You are brilliant and passionate and a very good friend to Ann. There will be plenty more first dates in your future. Just ask Ben! He’s been on more than anyone I know.”
After that cheerful overshare, Chris refocused his attention on Ann. “Tell me every single detail about your day. I want to know everything.”
Since it was clear their half of the table was no longer being included in that conversation, Ben cleared his throat and glanced nervously at Leslie.
She broke the silence first. “So you’ve been on a lot of first dates, then.”
“Chris sets me up a lot,” Ben admitted, shifting his napkin around in his lap. “Nothing much ever comes of it. I, uh … don’t … always … make the best first impression.”
“Who, you?” She laughed, short and quiet, and the teasing seemed surprisingly more gentle than mean.
“Yeah, I know,” Ben said, with his own quiet laugh. As much as he didn’t want to be talking about his horrendous dating history with her, it was probably the most relaxed moment they’d shared in a long time, so he continued, in a voice only Leslie could hear. “I’m uncomfortable meeting new people. I never know the right thing to say, or how to get to know them. It’s always just … painfully awkward. I wish I was better at it.”
She looked back at him, and for a moment their gazes locked, and he thought maybe … maybe … but she looked away quickly, and he felt the door closing again.
“You should try harder,” she said unsympathetically, opening her book and fanning out a set of cards that had been tucked inside the cover. He noticed what was written on the top few: Egyptian debt relief, ring-tailed lemurs, breakfast cereal. “Make an effort. That’s why I always come prepared with conversation topics.”
That got Ann’s attention again. “Leslie. I thought we talked about this. You promised you weren’t going to do that anymore.”
“No. No. I said you made good points, but I never promised. I still think a guy appreciates when you put some forethought and preparation into a date. The right guy would, at least. And this way, there are never any awkward silences!”
She glanced at Ben, and he couldn’t help but smile at her, because it was charming, in that same way he had always found Pawnee Lover charming. Which made sense, because they were the same person. But she quickly swept the cards back up and snapped the book cover shut over them. Clearly they weren’t for him.
“What a simply delightful evening!” Chris declared as everyone finished scraping the whipped cream off their plates. “I’m overjoyed that the four of us had the chance to enjoy each other’s company over a delicious meal.”
“Yes. Too bad it’s almost over and we’ll all be parting ways for the evening,” Leslie said with a lack of sincerity that was lost on Chris. “I wish we could stay longer, but … Ann.”
“That’s a fantastic idea, Leslie,” Chris said, grinning over at Ann, who seemed to have missed Leslie’s pointed look. “There’s no reason to call it a night yet. Let’s take this date plus two other people into the stratosphere!”
Ann flashed him a pleasantly surprised smile, looking like she might actually really like Chris. Ben did his best to ignore the fact that the date was supposed to be him and Pawnee Lover … Leslie, apparently … and the two other people should have been … nobody. Nobody else should have been here tonight.
Ben watched Leslie’s face as she looked between Chris and Ann. Her grimace suddenly shifted into something else, and it wasn’t generosity this time. He could tell by the light that flashed in her eyes that the wheels were turning.
He recognized that look. It was the one she got every time she thought she had figured out how to get her way at work. Except this time it wasn’t directed at him. She was looking at …
“Great idea, Chris. I know just the place.”
Oh no.
--
If anyone could salvage a seemingly ruined evening, it was Leslie Knope.
So fine, tonight hadn’t worked out the way she had hoped. She wasn’t currently on her way out to have after-dinner drinks with Nerd Boy. They weren’t going to be gazing into each other’s eyes and talking late into the night, the notecards long forgotten because the conversation flowed so easily that they kept going, long after they’d worked out a plan to guarantee Egypt’s future economic stability and debated the merits of Trix versus Lucky Charms.
She’d been pretty sure they would have been in agreement that Trix were not just for kids. But Lucky Charms have marshmallows. So it could have gone either way.
And then there would have been a kiss on her doorstep. Probably kisses, plural. Maybe she would have invited him in. Probably not. But maybe. It’s not like it would have been a typical first date.
Except that it hadn’t been anything. So none of that had happened.
He probably had a good reason. Probably. Honestly, it was hard to think of anything that would have kept her away tonight, and so it hurt to think this hadn’t been as important to him.
Maybe that was it-he’d been hurt. Maybe he’d been detained at the hospital.
She’d have to ask Ann later to find out if any sweet, intelligent Eleanor Roosevelt fans had been admitted. She hoped that was it! Actually … no. She didn’t want him to be hurt. She just wanted him to be here. Or to have a really good reason for not being here.
Anyway, clearly he wasn’t. But it was nice to see Ann so happy with Chris, and Leslie had been willing to sit next to BentheJerk and play nice over breakfast-for-dinner as a favor to a friend, even though Ben’s favorite breakfast cereal was probably vegetables. Ugh. Also J.J. had remembered to give her extra whipped cream.
Leslie had hoped to excuse herself as soon as the waffles were gone, but when she’d realized how well Chris and Ann were hitting it off, she’d thought maybe …
Maybe that could be useful.
Ann was a beautiful woman, and men had been known to do generous things for very beautiful women before. Generous things like … recommend that the rainy-day fund be used to fund projects for her best friend’s department?
Okay, maybe it wasn’t the best idea Leslie had ever had. But she was running out of ideas, and out of time, and as long as they liked each other … she might as well let nature take its course. At least something good might come out of tonight.
So when Chris had wanted to keep the night going, she’d suggested going to The Bulge. The place where inhibitions seemed to shed faster than John Edwards’s fan base when he cheated on his sick wife.
Oh, John Edwards.
Inside The Bulge, Leslie used her status as a gay hero to snag some free drinks, ignoring Ben’s quizzical look because there’s no way someone like him would understand why penguin weddings were cute (Nerd Boy totally would have thought they were cute), then headed out to the dance floor.
“This place is outstanding!” Chris said when they were all getting into the music. “Great call, Leslie Knope. Look, even Ben’s dancing.”
Leslie thought that what Ben was doing could hardly be described that way-he was standing stiffly, barely bobbing his head, like the stick in the mud he was. But she was glad that Chris was having a good time, and the same generous nature that had called that dancing might benefit Leslie later.
Ben wandered away in the direction of the bar, apparently giving up creating a new dance craze based on being stiff and boring. Soon after, Leslie excused herself to give the lovebirds a little more time to connect before putting the rest of her plan into action.
Taking the stool next to him, because it was the last one left, she tried to swallow back the disappointment that this condescending life ruiner had pretty much ended up being her “date” for the evening. Plenty of things were Ben's fault, but Nerd Boy standing her up was not one of them.
As the bartender handed her a new drink, Ben looked up from whatever he had been rapidly keying into his cell phone.
“Oh, hey,” he greeted her, in too familiar of a voice, like they were suddenly friends or something.
“What is with you and that cell phone?” Seriously, he always had that thing. Like he was a 14-year-old girl with a texting addiction. But who could he possibly be texting?
He raised an eyebrow skeptically. “Now you have a problem with cell phones?”
She rolled her eyes. “I have a problem with people who’d rather hide in their electronics and their gadgets, rather than communicate face to face, and have actual conversations, with people around them, in person.”
Ignoring the slightly hurt, then startled, look on his face, she impulsively reached across the bar and grabbed the phone out of his hand. “Who are you always writing to anyway?” she blurted.
As she brought the screen up to her face, close enough so that she could see it in the dim light of the bar, the shocking thought flashed through her brain that she was going to see a message to Pawnee Lover. It was an insane idea, but he had shown up at J.J.’s at the exact moment that she’d been expecting Nerd Boy.
Her heart racing, she focused on the little screen.
Hey, Kate,
Just wanted to warn you that you might be getting a birthday card or a singing telegram or something from Chris. It’s a long story. I’ll explain la
Quickly, she handed the phone back to him, disappointed. Then she was immediately disgusted by her disappointment. She should be relieved. It was Ben, for crap’s sake. There was no way he could have been Nerd Boy.
He took the phone back from her, raising his eyebrows.
“So who’s Kate?” she asked, smiling sheepishly.
“My sister.”
“It’s her birthday?”
“Nope.”
“Why does Chris think it’s her birthday?”
Ben laughed, but not like he thought it was funny. He held up his phone pointedly. “It’s a long story. Maybe I’ll tell you later.” He glanced down at the phone, brow furrowed, and shook his head slightly. “Or not,” he added quietly.
“I didn’t know you had a sister.” It seemed weird that Ben had a sister. It was like … finding out Greg Pikitis had a mom. Or that librarians had children. Of course even the worst people had families, but … weird, just the same.
“What, I’m not like an android or a … cyborg or something. There’s probably a lot we don’t about each other.”
Leslie supposed that was true. They weren’t exactly close. “I’m an only child,” she volunteered, for no reason at all.
“Now, see, that’s something I didn’t know.” He looked directly at her again, and she was struck by the gentle curiosity in his eyes, like he actually cared to find out something about her. It made her kind of curious about him. Anyway, she was stuck here with him, so she might as well make the most of it.
“Tell me something else I don’t know about you,” she said.
Ben’s eyes widened slightly in surprise and then he considered for a few long moments, as she waited in suspense. Suspense? No, she didn’t actually care what he was going to reveal.
“I’ve read that book,” he finally said, glancing away from her and shifting on his stool like he was embarrassed. “The biography, the one you had at the diner.”
“The Autobiography of Eleanor Roosevelt?” He nodded, but that was ridiculous. There was no way both Ben and Nerd Boy appreciated the same historical heroines she did. “No. I don’t believe you. What, does every guy secretly read Eleanor Roosevelt books? No way.”
Ben shot her a skeptical glare. “Yes. We all keep them under our mattresses with our Playboys.”
“Really?”
“No. I mean, I can’t speak for the rest of mankind, but I actually do admire her. I find her … she’s an inspiring person. And I really have read her book.”
He seemed genuine, but then he looked away from her again, and that made her doubt him again. It did seem highly implausible that someone like him would appreciate someone like her. Eleanor, she meant. “Prove it. Tell me something Eleanor Roosevelt said that inspired you.”
Ben looked startled for a moment, then thoughtful. His lips started to move slightly, like he was inwardly reciting Eleanor’s greatest hits and selecting just the right one. Leslie leaned toward him a little, but only because the music at the bar was so loud, and she wanted to hear this.
“She said … to do whatever, because people will criticize you no matter what. I … have found that to be true.”
Leslie bristled, leaning back on her stool again. “She didn’t say do whatever. She said do what you feel in your heart to be right.”
“Good lord. You’re going to take offense that I got a few of the words wrong? I don’t have the book in front of me.”
“No, I’m taking offense that someone like you can twist the words of Eleanor Roosevelt to justify your own … ugh, just stop.”
Leslie turned away with renewed disgust. Luckily, Chris and Ann had taken a break from dancing and were standing at a table a short distance away with their drinks. Leslie went to join them, surprised and annoyed that Ben abruptly jumped up to follow her.
Ignoring him, Leslie made polite chit-chat for a few moments about how wonderful the gays were, exclaimed over how great it was they had all become friends, and then started to subtly segue into some of her ideas for the parks budget.
Just as she was getting going, Ben’s hand landed on her upper arm, firmly grasping her there. “Excuse me. I just need to talk to Leslie over here for a second,” he said as he forcefully pulled her away from the table.
“What do you think you’re doing? Let go of me!” She squirmed angrily, trying to get away from him, but he had a pretty solid grip on her still.
“Look. I know what you’re doing. And I know you don’t want to do that.” His voice was calm, but he was looking straight into her eyes, really intensely, and his hand was still on her arm, and for some reason her heart had started beating really fast. He cocked an eyebrow. “Right?”
Leslie scoffed. “You don’t know anything. You don’t know me. What could you possibly know?”
He loosened his grip on her but left his hand there, a light but steady presence that wasn’t helping whatever thing that was going on in her chest. It must have something to do with the pink drinks they’d been serving her at the bar all night, on the house. What was in those?
“I think I know you … better than you realize,” Ben said, imploring her with his eyes in a way that made her flinch. “And I know you’re better than this. You’re just having a bad night, Leslie. Think this through.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She set her jaw stubbornly and glared at him.
His fingers shifted slightly against her arm, almost gently, and it made her skin tingle. Dammit, why wouldn’t he just let go of her?
“I think you do. Look.” He nodded back toward Chris and Ann, who were already engrossed in flirty-looking conversation again. “Chris is my friend … sort of. Ann is your friend, your good friend, it seems, and … she seems like a nice person. And they seem to really like each other. Do you really want to ruin that for them?”
“Of course not,” Leslie snapped. “I wasn’t going to ruin anything for them. I was just going to subtly, you know, make my case. It was going to be fine.”
He looked at her skeptically, and she hated that, how he always thought he knew better than her. “You were not being subtle.”
“Yes. I was. I was being very subtle.”
“No, Leslie, you are not that sneaky. Take my word for it. I could see your plan, written all over your face, the moment you agreed to go out after dinner.” He finally seemed to notice that his hand was still on her arm and abruptly let go of her. “Don’t do this.”
She had intended to move away as soon as he let go, but instead she found herself inexplicably leaning toward him. “Why do you care? What’s it to you?” Her voice came out much shriller than she intended. Yeah, those pink things were definitely hitting her now. “You’re like a … heartless numbers robot. I bet you don’t even have a heart in there. Just a calculator probably.”
She thumped him on the chest with her fist, and he jumped backward slightly, and deep inside her she knew he didn’t deserve this, but it had been one disappointment after another tonight, one disappointment after another this whole summer, and he was the one standing in front of her, being infuriatingly right again, foiling yet another one of her plans, and she couldn’t stop herself.
“Look at you. You don’t have a soul, you have a suitcase! You do all this damage, and then you just leave. You don’t care what you leave behind. You’re like a …. traveling soulless suitcase monster." She started to poke him in the chest with her pointer finger to punctuate her words. "Stop trying to tell other people to stop trying. Just because you stopped trying doesn’t mean the rest of us have to. We were fine before you got here, and we’ll be fine after you leave. So just … stop it. Okay?”
“Okay,” he said, backing away from her, his hands up in the universal sign of surrender.
The look on his face kind of killed her in that moment. Yelling at him didn’t make her feel better. She felt worse. Dammit, why did he have to have feelings and a family and a really cute mouth?
She did not just think that last thing.
Whirling away from Ben, she made her way back over to Ann and Chris, who at some point must have been able to tear their eyes away from each other, because they were now looking at her with some concern.
“I’m fine. Ann, it’s been a really long night, I think I’m just going to head out. I’ll take a taxi.” Looking between the two of them, their pretty mouths both still gaping at her, she smiled, feeling her eyes start to tear up. “You two are going to have very beautiful children.”
Nodding at Chris, shooting a quick backward glance at Ben, Leslie made her way to the door.
And that was that.
No Nerd Boy.
No money for her department.
But tomorrow was another day.
--
( continue to Chapter 5 here)