Advent Fic: Relationships Are Like Scuba Diving
Title: Relationships Are Like Scuba Diving
Pairings: Leslie/Ben, April/Andy
Word count: 1,600
Description: americnxidiot prompted "Leslie and April have a discussion about marriage" for my holiday advent thing. It turns out there's not much discussion in this, but I hope you like it anyway.
Timeline: This takes place in spring of Season 4, but there are references to Season 3 that assume a weird version of the timeline in which events took place as they aired. So Fancy Party was in April. I have my reasons, but I recommend not thinking too hard about it and just going with it.
Standing in the middle of April and Andy's living room, aka Knope 2012 Campaign Headquarters, Leslie watched the seconds tick down on her watch. At the appropriate time, she tapped a spoon against her champagne glass to get the room’s attention.
“Everyone! I need you to stop working now. I know, I’ve never said those words before-I can’t believe it either. Does everyone have a glass?” Good, it looked like Ben had remembered to make sure they all had their champagne. “Excellent. As you all know, it was one year ago today, at this moment, in this very room, that our dear friends, Andrew Maxwell Dwyer and April Roberta Ludgate, exchanged wedding vows in the most shocking surprise ceremony of all time.”
Andy snickered at the mention of April’s middle name, and April bumped his arm with hers, but she was smiling. Leslie grinned at them and continued.
“Now, I know some of us here had doubts about the wisdom of two underemployed youngsters impulsively binding their lives together for all time after only dating for a few short weeks. Some of us even tried to stop the wedding-Jerry.” Leslie glared pointedly at Jerry, who shrugged in bafflement.
“What, what did I do?” Jerry said. Then he smiled at the happily wedded couple. “I thought it was a lovely ceremony, guys.”
“Sorry, Jerry, I don’t know why I said that. It was me,” Leslie backtracked. “I tried to talk April out of going through with it that night.” Andy’s face contorted into dismay. “Sorry, Andy, it was nothing personal. It was just so rushed. You were so young, and you barely knew each other … but my point! My point is … I was wrong. So wrong. And I usually hate to be wrong-Ben can back me up on this.” Ben nodded in vehement agreement.
“But in this case,” Leslie continued, feeling herself starting to get emotional, “I have never been so happy to be wrong in my entire life. Seeing you two together, how in love you are, how better you are together than apart … April, you’re not wearing so much black. And Andy’s not living in a pit. Well, not an actual pit. And I can tell how happy you both are, how happy you make each other. We should all hope to have a love as true as yours.” Her eyes drifted from Andy and April over to Ben, who gazed lovingly back at her, and she decided to end the toast before the feelings overflowed from her eyeballs. She thrust her glass high into the air, splashing a bit of the champagne in her enthusiasm. “To April and Andy! We will now have twenty minutes of socialization in honor of your first year of marriage.”
Cheers and applause broke out around the room, probably as much for the opportunity to take a quick break as in celebration of their friends’ wedding anniversary. Everyone had been working so incredibly hard on this campaign. They deserved this--at least this.
After a few minutes circulating, Leslie wandered over to the couch where April and Andy were cuddling.
“You know, you two should take the night off,” she said. “You only get one first anniversary. You probably want to celebrate just the two of you, and the campaign can manage without you.”
“Campaign headquarters is in our house,” April pointed out.
“You could leave your house. Go out! Do something special.”
“Nah, we’re broke,” April said off-handedly.
Before Leslie could offer them money-how much? She had no idea what April and Andy might want to do to celebrate-Andy spoke up. “It’s cool. We’re hanging out with friends.” April nodded. “And April wrote me a really sweet love poem already. It doesn’t rhyme, but it turns out, not all poems have to rhyme, did you know that, Leslie?” Andy was pulling a wad of notebook paper out of his jeans pocket. “It’s really good. Do you want to read it?”
Before he finished his offer, April had jumped on top of him and started pummeling him with her fists, and Andy quickly stuffed the wrinkled paper back where it came from and threw up his hands in surrender. “Did I say poem? April doesn’t write. She probably doesn’t even actually love me. Sorry, babe, I forgot you told me that was private. It’s just so good. You should let me put it to music.”
She was rolling her eyes in addition to glaring now, but she looked a little pleased anyway. The punching let up, she slid off his lap, and nestled comfortably back into the crook of his arm. Andy dropped a kiss onto the top of her head, and she buried her head in the sleeve of his shirt.
To give them their moment of privacy, Leslie glanced around the room, basking in the warm chatter of her friends. Her eyes settled on Ben, who was standing in the kitchen area, laughing at something that Donna had said. His sleeves were still rolled up from working, and his hair was falling forward over his forehead-he’d mussed it up earlier that evening during a heated conversation about campaign finance.
God, he was good-looking-and brilliant, and hard-working, and generous. And she was so, so in love with him. Had it really been a year since she’d asked him to stay, and he told her he was staying? It felt like forever ago-in that time they’d fallen in love, and broken each other’s hearts, and put them back together again, and ended up here, together, with so much to celebrate. And yet, she remembered the details like it was yesterday. The nervous, hopeful look on his face, the way his chest had felt under her fingers as she pushed him into the next room to save him from Orin, how he'd shuffled his feet and glanced at her lips when they'd found themselves alone in the hallway.
The feeling of sheer possibility in the air.
Suddenly, Leslie felt the overwhelming urge to ask him to stay all over again. Which was absurd, because he wasn’t going anywhere. But she wanted … god, she wanted to ask him to stay forever.
It was this big, fantastic, slightly scary idea that had been bouncing around in the back of her head for a while now, and at times, like tonight, it took a shape-and she reached out to toy tentatively with its contours.
Andy was standing up. “I’m getting a drink. Babe, Leslie, you guys want anything?”
“What? Oh, no, I’m good. Thanks.”
“What’s with you?” April was eying her with mock disinterest, scraping some old polish off one fingernail with another.
“Nothing, I just … I was thinking. About the way things happen, how sometimes you take a risk, and it works out … better than you ever expected.”
“Andy wasn’t a risk,” April answered simply, rotating her wedding band fondly around her finger.
“How did you know?” Leslie blurted abruptly. “With Andy … that he was … that you were ready.”
April looked at her oddly, and then shrugged. “I don’t know. I read my horoscope and asked my Magic 8 Ball and had some guy on a street corner read my palm … he looked psychic.”
“You did?” April raised an eyebrow. “No, right, you didn’t do any of that. Okay then.” Leslie glanced over at Ben again, and this time he looked up and caught her eye. He smiled at her, and she wondered what he was thinking, if he had any idea what she was thinking. When she turned back, she noticed April following her gaze.
Andy came back just then with a soda for April and settled in next to her on the couch again. Their bodies-his so large, hers so slight-slid together like two interlocking puzzle pieces.
April elbowed him lightly. “Babe, Leslie wants to know how you knew you wanted to get married.”
“I wasn’t … I don’t …” Leslie mumbled ineffectually, her face twitching.
“Well, that’s easy, I just, you know, didn’t have to think about it, and that’s how I knew. I didn’t even know I was going to ask, I just asked, and then it felt right.”
“So you just knew,” Leslie echoed.
Andy leaned forward slightly and set his chin on one fist, looking intensely thoughtful. “I think it’s not something you know, so much? It’s a feeling. You don’t know it, you feel it, and that’s how you know it. Why are we talking about this?”
“Oh, you know, it’s your anniversary, so … just idle curiosity. And I’m asking for a friend.” Leslie clapped her hands against her knees and stood up. “It’s probably time to get back to work, you think? Not you two. You two should do what you want, but yeah, the rest of us who aren’t married yet, we should probably …”
April stood up too, leaned forward and engulfed Leslie in a brief surprise hug. When her mouth was close to Leslie’s ear, she said softly, “You’ll figure it out.” As she stepped away, she tossed Leslie a sly look and added, “or Ben will.”
Leslie swallowed hard. Just then, Ben appeared by her side, looping his arms around her waist, and she turned into his embrace. He leaned in for a quick kiss, then started to pull back again. “Ready to get back to work? We’ve got a lot to do yet tonight.”
Leslie instinctively tightened her arms around him, drawing him back in. “Stay … just a moment longer.” Forever, her gut whispered.
Ben didn’t object at all. He kissed her again, looked shiftily around the room like he wished they were alone, and then smiled down at her.
She wondered if he had big thoughts rattling around the back of his head too lately. When he looked at her like that, she suspected he might.
After the campaign, she told herself firmly, after things have quieted down.
Just one giant life-altering endeavor at a time.
And then …