Prompt fill: Papa Bear
“Ben, can I have a minute of your time?”
At the sound of Ron’s gruff demand, Ben spun around from the door to Leslie’s office. “Of course. Let me just …” He shrugged helplessly at Leslie, mouthed “I’ll be back,” and turned to follow Ron into his office.
Ron closed the door firmly, took a seat behind his massive desk, and folded his hands. Suddenly Ben didn’t feel like he’d been called in here on official business. And he certainly didn’t feel like the boss talking to the employee.
Hands shoved awkwardly into his pockets, Ben glanced back at the doorknob, considering momentarily if it was too late to flee, then turned back to Ron nervously.
The older man was now holding his cell phone, tossing it casually, ominously, from hand to hand. Oh, god, this again?
Finally Ron broke the silence. “You know how I feel about Leslie.”
“Um …” Wait, what? Ron had feelings for Leslie? This was … news. Yikes. “Oh … I guess I knew you guys were close. I’m not sure if I know … how close?”
“Close,” Ron said with finality. “Close. Like she’s my own daughter.”
Oh.
Right.
“Wait, daughter? Aren’t you a little too close in age to … ?” Ron glared, and Ben stopped talking. “Never mind. Doesn’t matter. Understood.”
Ron gave him another significant look, but Ben was still struggling to pick up on the significance-other than the fact that he might have to ask Ron’s permission for Leslie’s hand in marriage, he thought dryly. Except … he might actually ask Leslie to marry him someday. And he might actually have to go through her gauntlet of protective friends first. So, yeah, actually that wasn’t too funny.
Ben shifted his weight from one foot to the other, tried to make his voice strike the right balance between light but serious. “So … what is this? You want to check that my intentions are honorable?”
Ron raised his eyebrows expectantly, and Ben sighed in resignation.
“Okay, fine. They’re good. My intentions are good. Can I go now?” He sounded like-felt like-a teenager being cornered by an overprotective parent. I’ll have her back by 11. I’ll keep my hands to myself. Etc.
This was ridiculous. Leslie was a grown-up, for heaven’s sake. They both were. And Ron wasn’t anybody’s dad.
“Son, I can tell you’re a good person. You’re a smart person. And you seem to make Leslie happy.” Ron paused, choosing his words carefully. “I can also tell that you’re not thinking clearly. Probably haven’t been thinking clearly since Freddy Spaghetti.”
Fuck. Ben hadn’t realized anyone had been onto back then. What else did Ron know?”
Ron laced his fingers together, looking thoughtful. “She makes you do crazy things. I get it. I’ve been there.”
Tammy 2, of course. Well, Ben wasn’t exactly wearing cornrows and a kimono, but it was true, he hadn’t felt quite in control of himself ever since Leslie had insisted the building had feelings. Never in the history of the English language had a modifier been misplaced with larger consequences.
“My point is,” Ron’s voice was far from sympathetic, “I need you to get your head on straight. She’s worked too hard. If you care about her, you have to do that for her.”
“I’m … okay, I’ll try,” Ben said meekly, knowing Ron was right.
“Oh, you’ll do better than try. For starters, you’re going to stop looking at her at the office like she’s a bacon-wrapped turkey leg inside of an Angus steak burger.”
Blech. Ben would never look like that at a … but okay, he got the point.
“And you’re going to start thinking about a way to get her out of this, with her reputation and her job intact. She deserves that.” He locked eyes with Ben to punctuate the point, then waved his hand toward the door. “That’s it.”
“Right, um … okay, good talk.” Ben’s hand twitched upward, like it might go in for a handshake, then thought better of it and lunged for the door handle instead. Then he paused, feeling the urge to explain himself, to make sure Ron knew that he really did have Leslie’s best interests in mind. He’d do anything to make sure she got everything she ever wanted; he just hadn’t figured out how yet.
But he didn’t realize he was going to say this:
“I love her.”
He hadn’t even said it to Leslie, and now he was confessing it to her boss?
The words fell like so many errant marbles onto the floor, rolling quickly out of reach, and the silence echoed behind him. Ben finally dragged his eyes up from the doorknob to catch a hint of a smile twitching at the corners of Ron’s moustache, which had magically grown back inside a week of the fireball.
Feeling a little more encouraged than he should have at that, Ben blurted the question that had been on the tip of his tongue for weeks. “Do you think she feels the same way?”
Ron raised his eyebrows, and Ben instantly felt mortified at having asked it. It was one thing for Ron to know what sex games they played; it was almost worse to have his own cowardice and insecurities on full display.
“I wouldn’t be letting this go if I didn’t think so,” Ron finally said.
As he heard the words, Ben had the sudden realization that he had already known that. He’d known how much she loved her job, and that apparently keeping him meant more to her than keeping her job, so logically a person could deduce by some mathematical theorem he couldn’t recall the name of that she must love him. But emotionally it still didn’t add up. It didn’t feel real yet, and he didn’t understand yet what had won her over so completely.
Without returning to Leslie’s office, he fled back to his corner of the building.