What to Expect, When You're Expecting Triplets in Pawnee
Title: What to Expect, When You're Expecting Triplets in Pawnee
Pairing: Leslie/Ben
Rating: R-ish
Timeline: Post season-Six.
Summary: Anonymous prompted - Ben and Leslie look at each others baby pictures while she is pregnant. I got a nice, sweet prompt on tumblr and then I made it weird. Sorry.
Notes: I didn’t really think I wanted to write too much pregnancy stuff, but it seems like I did.
"Oh, your mom sent me a package today," Leslie tells Ben as he pulls back the covers and gets into bed beside her.
"She did? What…um," Ben’s forehead creases. "She did?" He repeats. His mom didn’t mention anything about sending Leslie something the last time they spoke.
"You look concerned."
"Well…maybe. That depends. What was it?" In truth, he is a little concerned, but only because the soon-to-be grandmother-styles of both his mom and Leslie’s mother are turning out to be completely at odds and somewhat confusing-like whiplash levels of opposite. And honestly at this point, who knows what might have been in a package coming from Partridge, Minnesota.
Although, he’d actually be even more worried if Marlene Griggs-Knope had sent him a package.
During a recent phone conversation with his mom, she had mentioned that she was knitting some breastfeeding privacy covers for his wife, while in contrast, Leslie’s mom has recently taken to emailing him links to articles on perineum massage, complete with explicit diagrams and her accompanying directions on exactly how often he should be lubing up his index fingers and massaging her daughter’s…area in the coming months.
And if that wasn’t weird enough, Chris texted him just today about getting Leslie a Kernsten’s Nipple Kit, specifically recommending and raving about the special nipple pimple ointment.
Although, no matter how strange this is for him, he always tries to remember that it’s probably more so for Leslie-it’s her body that’s the subject of all the phone calls, emails, and texts. And per her new normal, she’s mostly handling everything in stride, while he’s prone to bigger moments of freaking out.
They’re actually kind of sharing the sham-wow duties at this point.
"It was…a bunch of…photos," she says as she leans over the side of the bed to get something off the floor and almost manages to fall over. Ben makes a gentle grab for her around the waist to keep her from tumbling off the bed, while she reaches down and retrieves a padded envelope. "Thanks, babe. My center of gravity is getting all off-kilter now and I can’t tell when I’ve gotten unbalanced until it’s too late."
"I know. I need to keep an arm near you at all times so you so that you don’t tip over."
Leslie nods, before upending the envelope so that a dozen or so photographs fall out and onto the bed. Most are baby pictures, but there are a couple featuring a small, plaid-wearing little boy with dark brown hair and a sweet, shy smile.
"Oh wow, this is me," he says, picking up a picture. In it, he’s crying and strapped into a stroller, while his dad tries to put a winter hat on him. Little Benji does not seem pleased by this action.
"It is," she grins at him, then pulls a specific image out from among the rest and holds it out to him. "I would recognize this perfect butt anywhere."
"Seeing that this is me as an infant, that’s kind of creepy, honey," he says, taking the photograph from her and studying it. He looks like he’s about six months old, definitely naked and on his stomach, laying on a big crocheted blue baby blanket. He’s smiling and trying to reach for a sharp, pointy, metal and plastic toy airplane on the floor in front of him. Ben is pretty sure that the airplane is a safety hazard for a baby-it was probably Henry’s toy. Someone should have moved that out of the way, he thinks.
Leslie shrugs. “I know, but I can’t help it. Just be glad there’s no full-frontal action here. Hey, we should do one of those projects where we re-stage this photograph in the present-day. Like a then and now thing.”
"Um. No. We should not do that."
"Oh, but it would be so cute! I can make a big baby blanket for you if I need to go on bed rest soon. Or maybe Ann can crochet it for me. I’m sure if I can explain what it’s for, she’d be happy to-"
"No. No photo," he gently cuts her off. "And definitely no Ann making a prop for this photograph that is never going to happen. But, if you really, really want, I can recreate the pose for you. On the comforter we have on the bed. Without any documentation. Maybe."
"I really, really want," she tells him with a grin. They look at the photos for a couple of minutes, Leslie ohhing and ahhing over his chubby baby cheeks and cute little toes.
"How old are you here?" She asks. Ben is in the backyard of the lake house, standing proudly by a large pumpkin.
"I’m not sure…I think around four?" He turns the photo over to read, Benji is a turd in orange crayon. He rolls his eyes and flips the picture back over. “Let’s say four.”
"Aww, you liked plaid even back then."
"Well, once I find a look that works, I stick with it. Hey, do you have any of your baby pictures around?"
"I do. Up in the closet, I think," she gestures to the sliding doors opposite their bed.
"Let’s look at them too," he says, getting out of bed. "Which side?"
She directs him to the location and Ben pulls down a shoebox, brings it over to the bed. When he lifts off the lid, he’s met first with an old photo of Leslie as a baby, swaddled up in a pink blanket, surrounded by her young and beaming parents. He’s pretty sure that his dad would say that Robert and Marlene look like hippies.
"Oh, look at you," he says, smiling at her while he lifts the photo up and brings it closer to his face. "You’re so adorable and little."
"I was. I think I’m just a few weeks old there. There should be a date on the back," she takes the picture from him and turns it over. "February 15, 1975-I was almost a month old."
They spend the next few minutes comparing baby pictures, finding images that were taken around the same time and matching them up together, as if little Leslie and Ben could have been best friends in 1977. Most of Leslie’s photos are dated on the back, about half of Ben’s are, while there are a couple where Henry, his older brother, has written notes like Ben smells like poo in crayon on the back.
"We haven’t talked about this much, but are you okay if we don’t have a natural-style birth?" He asks, setting all of the photos aside, and pulling Leslie back against him and wrapping his arms around her expanding middle.
"Yeah. I want to do whatever is best for the babies-"
"And you," Ben interjects.
"And me," she agrees. "Since it’s a high risk pregnancy, I’m okay giving birth however Dr. Saperstein thinks is safest. One nice thing, if it goes the way we’re thinking it will, my mom will stop sending you those emails."
"You know about those?"
"Yeah. She asked me if I thought you would be okay with doing that-the massaging. I said yes, but I’m sure she’s probably being a little too…my mom about it.”
"She is. But of course I would do that."
"It’s really not any area that your fingers haven’t been before."
"Right, I just feel weird that your mom wants to discuss the specifics with me."
"Oh," Leslie winces. "Sorry."
"No. It’s okay. You’re her only child. She’s concerned about your well-being. It’s very sweet…but at the same time, it’s fairly disturbing to have my mother-in-law sending me explicit instructions on how to massage and stretch out the area between your vagina and anus. Oh, and here’s a thing-once I start doing it, I think I’m supposed to send her weekly updates on how it’s going."
Leslie laughs and cringes before putting her hand over her eyes. “Oh...no. Well, that is definitely not happening. We’ll probably have confirmation about the cesarean delivery at our appointment on Friday. I’ll tell her to stop. And then any place you put your fingers in the coming months can remain just between us.”
"Oh, thank god. That is the way I prefer it. So…we’re also probably going to find out the sexes on Friday too," Ben reminds her.
At their previous appointment, Dr. Saperstein couldn’t quite make out what parts were there (for a few seconds, he thought he saw a tiny penis, but it was just a grape jelly smear), but at the upcoming 16-week visit, he’s assured Ben and Leslie that he should be able to see who’s got what type of equipment. And of course, Friday’s amniocentesis will also tell them what to expect too.
She smiles at him. “I know! I’m so excited. And I realize that I’m supposed to say that I don’t care, that I just want them all to be healthy, and I do, definitely. Of course. But I kind of want one of each. I mean, since we’ve scored triple cherries and everything, we should get a variety pack.”
Ben makes a confused face. “Okay, but what would the third one be then?”
"Ben! I mean at least one of each, and then the third would either be another boy or girl," She stares at him. "Seriously, babe?"
"Sorry. Yeah. Right. Of course, I knew what you meant." He’s heard of pregnancy brain, but he kind of thinks he may have sympathy-pregnancy brain. Like at their first ultra-sound, the idea of a baby with two bodies seemed unlikely, but not impossible-at least it seemed more plausible than triplets, or even twins.
Of course, now their three babies seem like the most amazing and perfect thing in the whole world.
"What about you? What do you want?"
"Any combination will be just what I want. But yeah, sons and a daughter, or daughters and a son would be great. If we do have a daughter, she’s going to be so beautiful, just like her mom," he says, holding up a picture of Leslie as a smiling, blonde-haired toddler, hugging what looks like a well-loved teddy bear to her chest.
”Bennnn,” Leslie says and then starts to cry. “You can’t…say things like that when I’m all emotional. That’s so…so sweet. Oh my god, you jerk,” she manages to get out before dissolving into loud, messy sobs. “I love you so much. If we have a son or sons they’re going to be so…so…they’ll wear plaid…and…adorable toes…” She struggles to turn around and falls forward to cry into his chest.
"Oh, honey, I’m sorry. It’s okay. You can cry," he wraps her up in a big hug and placing a kiss on her head. "Remember when the Price is Right made me all emotional?”
She nods against him. Hiccups. “But you were on drugs.”
"Well, you’re on a lot of pregnancy hormones. That’s kind of the same," He strokes her hair while Leslie hugs him and starts to calm down.
"There’s no one else on earth that I’d rather do this with, you know," she tells him after she stops crying enough to talk.
"Leslie, you are the only person that I have ever wanted to do this with," he pauses for a second. "My parents marriage was so bad. It was just such a shitty model, you know? I mean my childhood wasn’t horrible by any means, but it wasn’t great. So, I never really…but then I met this amazing, passionate, beautiful, pain in the ass and she just changed my whole outlook…on everything. She changed the course of my plans and my life, definitely for the better.”
"That’s me, right?" Leslie jokes, snuggling back into him.
"Yes, you goofball, that’s you. And I love you more than anything."
No matter what the subject matter of the calls, emails, and texts from family and friends have been lately, they’ve all been clear about one thing-make her happy and take care of her, which is something that Ben is more than willing to do.
"Do you want me to put the next Murphy Brown DVD in? We can lay in bed and watch a few episodes.”
Leslie sniffs, then pulls away to give him a smile. “Yes. We can cuddle and then pause it when you get up to make me hot cocoa with extra whipped cream and crumbled Oreos on top. And then we’ll probably have sex. I’m feeling…well, mostly like I want hot cocoa soon but also like I want to do it. I think it was all the talk about fingers.”
"Okay. That sounds like a plan."
Pairing: Leslie/Ben
Rating: R-ish
Timeline: Post season-Six.
Summary: Anonymous prompted - Ben and Leslie look at each others baby pictures while she is pregnant. I got a nice, sweet prompt on tumblr and then I made it weird. Sorry.
Notes: I didn’t really think I wanted to write too much pregnancy stuff, but it seems like I did.
"Oh, your mom sent me a package today," Leslie tells Ben as he pulls back the covers and gets into bed beside her.
"She did? What…um," Ben’s forehead creases. "She did?" He repeats. His mom didn’t mention anything about sending Leslie something the last time they spoke.
"You look concerned."
"Well…maybe. That depends. What was it?" In truth, he is a little concerned, but only because the soon-to-be grandmother-styles of both his mom and Leslie’s mother are turning out to be completely at odds and somewhat confusing-like whiplash levels of opposite. And honestly at this point, who knows what might have been in a package coming from Partridge, Minnesota.
Although, he’d actually be even more worried if Marlene Griggs-Knope had sent him a package.
During a recent phone conversation with his mom, she had mentioned that she was knitting some breastfeeding privacy covers for his wife, while in contrast, Leslie’s mom has recently taken to emailing him links to articles on perineum massage, complete with explicit diagrams and her accompanying directions on exactly how often he should be lubing up his index fingers and massaging her daughter’s…area in the coming months.
And if that wasn’t weird enough, Chris texted him just today about getting Leslie a Kernsten’s Nipple Kit, specifically recommending and raving about the special nipple pimple ointment.
Although, no matter how strange this is for him, he always tries to remember that it’s probably more so for Leslie-it’s her body that’s the subject of all the phone calls, emails, and texts. And per her new normal, she’s mostly handling everything in stride, while he’s prone to bigger moments of freaking out.
They’re actually kind of sharing the sham-wow duties at this point.
"It was…a bunch of…photos," she says as she leans over the side of the bed to get something off the floor and almost manages to fall over. Ben makes a gentle grab for her around the waist to keep her from tumbling off the bed, while she reaches down and retrieves a padded envelope. "Thanks, babe. My center of gravity is getting all off-kilter now and I can’t tell when I’ve gotten unbalanced until it’s too late."
"I know. I need to keep an arm near you at all times so you so that you don’t tip over."
Leslie nods, before upending the envelope so that a dozen or so photographs fall out and onto the bed. Most are baby pictures, but there are a couple featuring a small, plaid-wearing little boy with dark brown hair and a sweet, shy smile.
"Oh wow, this is me," he says, picking up a picture. In it, he’s crying and strapped into a stroller, while his dad tries to put a winter hat on him. Little Benji does not seem pleased by this action.
"It is," she grins at him, then pulls a specific image out from among the rest and holds it out to him. "I would recognize this perfect butt anywhere."
"Seeing that this is me as an infant, that’s kind of creepy, honey," he says, taking the photograph from her and studying it. He looks like he’s about six months old, definitely naked and on his stomach, laying on a big crocheted blue baby blanket. He’s smiling and trying to reach for a sharp, pointy, metal and plastic toy airplane on the floor in front of him. Ben is pretty sure that the airplane is a safety hazard for a baby-it was probably Henry’s toy. Someone should have moved that out of the way, he thinks.
Leslie shrugs. “I know, but I can’t help it. Just be glad there’s no full-frontal action here. Hey, we should do one of those projects where we re-stage this photograph in the present-day. Like a then and now thing.”
"Um. No. We should not do that."
"Oh, but it would be so cute! I can make a big baby blanket for you if I need to go on bed rest soon. Or maybe Ann can crochet it for me. I’m sure if I can explain what it’s for, she’d be happy to-"
"No. No photo," he gently cuts her off. "And definitely no Ann making a prop for this photograph that is never going to happen. But, if you really, really want, I can recreate the pose for you. On the comforter we have on the bed. Without any documentation. Maybe."
"I really, really want," she tells him with a grin. They look at the photos for a couple of minutes, Leslie ohhing and ahhing over his chubby baby cheeks and cute little toes.
"How old are you here?" She asks. Ben is in the backyard of the lake house, standing proudly by a large pumpkin.
"I’m not sure…I think around four?" He turns the photo over to read, Benji is a turd in orange crayon. He rolls his eyes and flips the picture back over. “Let’s say four.”
"Aww, you liked plaid even back then."
"Well, once I find a look that works, I stick with it. Hey, do you have any of your baby pictures around?"
"I do. Up in the closet, I think," she gestures to the sliding doors opposite their bed.
"Let’s look at them too," he says, getting out of bed. "Which side?"
She directs him to the location and Ben pulls down a shoebox, brings it over to the bed. When he lifts off the lid, he’s met first with an old photo of Leslie as a baby, swaddled up in a pink blanket, surrounded by her young and beaming parents. He’s pretty sure that his dad would say that Robert and Marlene look like hippies.
"Oh, look at you," he says, smiling at her while he lifts the photo up and brings it closer to his face. "You’re so adorable and little."
"I was. I think I’m just a few weeks old there. There should be a date on the back," she takes the picture from him and turns it over. "February 15, 1975-I was almost a month old."
They spend the next few minutes comparing baby pictures, finding images that were taken around the same time and matching them up together, as if little Leslie and Ben could have been best friends in 1977. Most of Leslie’s photos are dated on the back, about half of Ben’s are, while there are a couple where Henry, his older brother, has written notes like Ben smells like poo in crayon on the back.
"We haven’t talked about this much, but are you okay if we don’t have a natural-style birth?" He asks, setting all of the photos aside, and pulling Leslie back against him and wrapping his arms around her expanding middle.
"Yeah. I want to do whatever is best for the babies-"
"And you," Ben interjects.
"And me," she agrees. "Since it’s a high risk pregnancy, I’m okay giving birth however Dr. Saperstein thinks is safest. One nice thing, if it goes the way we’re thinking it will, my mom will stop sending you those emails."
"You know about those?"
"Yeah. She asked me if I thought you would be okay with doing that-the massaging. I said yes, but I’m sure she’s probably being a little too…my mom about it.”
"She is. But of course I would do that."
"It’s really not any area that your fingers haven’t been before."
"Right, I just feel weird that your mom wants to discuss the specifics with me."
"Oh," Leslie winces. "Sorry."
"No. It’s okay. You’re her only child. She’s concerned about your well-being. It’s very sweet…but at the same time, it’s fairly disturbing to have my mother-in-law sending me explicit instructions on how to massage and stretch out the area between your vagina and anus. Oh, and here’s a thing-once I start doing it, I think I’m supposed to send her weekly updates on how it’s going."
Leslie laughs and cringes before putting her hand over her eyes. “Oh...no. Well, that is definitely not happening. We’ll probably have confirmation about the cesarean delivery at our appointment on Friday. I’ll tell her to stop. And then any place you put your fingers in the coming months can remain just between us.”
"Oh, thank god. That is the way I prefer it. So…we’re also probably going to find out the sexes on Friday too," Ben reminds her.
At their previous appointment, Dr. Saperstein couldn’t quite make out what parts were there (for a few seconds, he thought he saw a tiny penis, but it was just a grape jelly smear), but at the upcoming 16-week visit, he’s assured Ben and Leslie that he should be able to see who’s got what type of equipment. And of course, Friday’s amniocentesis will also tell them what to expect too.
She smiles at him. “I know! I’m so excited. And I realize that I’m supposed to say that I don’t care, that I just want them all to be healthy, and I do, definitely. Of course. But I kind of want one of each. I mean, since we’ve scored triple cherries and everything, we should get a variety pack.”
Ben makes a confused face. “Okay, but what would the third one be then?”
"Ben! I mean at least one of each, and then the third would either be another boy or girl," She stares at him. "Seriously, babe?"
"Sorry. Yeah. Right. Of course, I knew what you meant." He’s heard of pregnancy brain, but he kind of thinks he may have sympathy-pregnancy brain. Like at their first ultra-sound, the idea of a baby with two bodies seemed unlikely, but not impossible-at least it seemed more plausible than triplets, or even twins.
Of course, now their three babies seem like the most amazing and perfect thing in the whole world.
"What about you? What do you want?"
"Any combination will be just what I want. But yeah, sons and a daughter, or daughters and a son would be great. If we do have a daughter, she’s going to be so beautiful, just like her mom," he says, holding up a picture of Leslie as a smiling, blonde-haired toddler, hugging what looks like a well-loved teddy bear to her chest.
”Bennnn,” Leslie says and then starts to cry. “You can’t…say things like that when I’m all emotional. That’s so…so sweet. Oh my god, you jerk,” she manages to get out before dissolving into loud, messy sobs. “I love you so much. If we have a son or sons they’re going to be so…so…they’ll wear plaid…and…adorable toes…” She struggles to turn around and falls forward to cry into his chest.
"Oh, honey, I’m sorry. It’s okay. You can cry," he wraps her up in a big hug and placing a kiss on her head. "Remember when the Price is Right made me all emotional?”
She nods against him. Hiccups. “But you were on drugs.”
"Well, you’re on a lot of pregnancy hormones. That’s kind of the same," He strokes her hair while Leslie hugs him and starts to calm down.
"There’s no one else on earth that I’d rather do this with, you know," she tells him after she stops crying enough to talk.
"Leslie, you are the only person that I have ever wanted to do this with," he pauses for a second. "My parents marriage was so bad. It was just such a shitty model, you know? I mean my childhood wasn’t horrible by any means, but it wasn’t great. So, I never really…but then I met this amazing, passionate, beautiful, pain in the ass and she just changed my whole outlook…on everything. She changed the course of my plans and my life, definitely for the better.”
"That’s me, right?" Leslie jokes, snuggling back into him.
"Yes, you goofball, that’s you. And I love you more than anything."
No matter what the subject matter of the calls, emails, and texts from family and friends have been lately, they’ve all been clear about one thing-make her happy and take care of her, which is something that Ben is more than willing to do.
"Do you want me to put the next Murphy Brown DVD in? We can lay in bed and watch a few episodes.”
Leslie sniffs, then pulls away to give him a smile. “Yes. We can cuddle and then pause it when you get up to make me hot cocoa with extra whipped cream and crumbled Oreos on top. And then we’ll probably have sex. I’m feeling…well, mostly like I want hot cocoa soon but also like I want to do it. I think it was all the talk about fingers.”
"Okay. That sounds like a plan."