Parks fic: Take Me out of My Envelope Chapter 5, second half
( Chapter 5 first half here)
Ben watched the blur of Leslie’s yellow curls and blazer disappearing rapidly down the hallway, feeling as shell-shocked as he usually seemed to feel after their encounters.
For a terrifying moment back there on the bench by the mural, he’d thought she’d actually put all the pieces together and come up with the truth, or at least suspected it. And why not? He supposed he’d been pretty obvious approaching her table in the café that night. The fact she hadn’t immediately figured it out probably spoke to how much she didn’t want Nerd Boy to turn out to be him.
But seriously, to think even for a moment those letters had been written to her by Chris? Something about that smacked him in the gut. Not that Chris wasn’t a good guy, but why would her mind go there-why not to the other auditor who just happened to show up at the café at the right time? Even when she was considering the unlikely, Ben somehow didn’t qualify.
As he settled in back at his desk to try to work, he noticed that Chris now had two different relaxation soundtracks playing simultaneously. Ben winced at the harp music fighting to be heard over the sounds of the rainforest.
He did his best to tune it out as he usually would, but when Chris started throwing a relaxation ball against the wall, thuds resounding between twangy harp notes and what sounded like chimp noises, he couldn’t take it anymore.
“Chris. Is something wrong?”
“Ben, I’m so glad you asked. I am simply distraught over this Ann Perkins situation.”
“There’s a situation?” He really didn’t want to know. Not at the moment, at least, when he was having his own crisis of confidence.
“I want to ask her out again, but she hasn’t called me back. Leslie said she hasn’t mentioned me. And I thought we had such a lovely time on Tuesday night. It seemed like she really liked me. Didn’t you think it seemed like she liked me?”
Chris’s ability to read people could be off sometimes, but actually, Ben had to agree this time. It had seemed like they were hitting it off; it’s what had made it so depressing to watch, considering Ben’s own situation, which could be called the exact opposite of hitting it off.
“Well, look. It’s been less than 48 hours. Give it time, right? I’m sure she’ll call.”
Chris lit up like Ben had given him a signed and notarized guarantee.
“You think so? I’m sure you are right. Good things come to those who wait. I just cannot believe I have not heard from her, especially after the flowers I sent.”
“You sent her flowers?”
“Yes. I was at the flower store placing a belated order for your sister’s birthday, so I picked up a bouquet and dropped it on her doorstep while out for my morning run. Maybe I should call her again.”
Ben winced at the thought of what the note on those flowers might have said. Chris generally seemed to date two categories of women: ones who ate up his flowery words and ended up boring him, and ones who might hold his interest if he didn’t scare them off by coming on too strong early on. He suspected Ann might fall in the latter group.
“No, I wouldn’t … don’t do anything else, okay? She knows where you stand, so, I think the ball’s in her court.”
Chris frowned. “I suppose you’re right. It’s just too bad, because I was hoping we could all go out again together. That was fun, wasn’t it?”
Ben gaped it him. Sometimes when Chris was caught up in something, it was like he got tunnel vision.
“Maybe we could still arrange something,” Chris continued hopefully. “If you could get Leslie Knope to go somewhere with you, and make sure she brings the lovely Ann Perkins, I could bump into the three of you, and it would be just like Tuesday night. Where do you think we should go? Pawnee has a good zoo, I hear. Would Leslie want to show you the zoo?”
“No. No, no, no.” For a moment, Ben couldn’t seem to get his mouth past the word no. “No. That’s not, no.”
“Why not?”
“Okay, for one thing, if you just show up again, Ann will think you are stalking her. And for another thing …” Leslie would never agree to go somewhere with me, even though unbeknownst to her I am her secret online love interest. Good lord. “No, I’m fairly certain, Leslie does not want to show me the zoo.”
“I don’t understand why not. Leslie’s a wonderful tour guide. She’s the most knowledgeable local historian I’ve met here, and she would be more than willing to share her expertise with an interested party. All you have to do is show an interest, Ben.”
Wait, did Chris know something? Ben brushed the idea aside as absurd; this was Chris, for god’s sake. Tunnel vision.
“At any rate, the point is, Chris, you should wait for Ann to make the next move.”
Chris smiled resignedly. “Waiting it is then.” He put the stress ball in a drawer and turned off the harp music.
Ben tried to focus on the spreadsheet that was in front of him. Distractedly, he flipped over to a browser to check his email, out of habit more than any expectation of hearing from his online pen pal. Not since he still hadn’t written to her to explain his supposed absence.
But there it was. He had a message from Pawnee Lover.
With equal parts dread and hope, he clicked to open it.
Where are you? I’ve tried to be patient, but just now I almost made a complete fool of myself thinking someone I work with might be my Nerd Boy. It was an insane idea-he is nothing like you, and I would have been really disappointed if it had turned out to be true. Not to mention that it would have been a disaster, because my best friend is into him. Anyway, obviously he’s not, because you’re you, and you’re … I don’t really know, honestly, because you didn’t show up. Were you abducted by Eagletonians? Stuck in an elevator? Was it the raccoons? I warned you to stay away from the northern half of Harvey James Park after dark. I just hope you’re okay and that you’re current on all of your immunizations.
More than anything, I just want to talk to you again. I need to come up with a dozen good ideas by next week, or at least one really exceptional idea, and I don’t have anything. Meanwhile I have these very judgmental beets sitting in my crisper drawer and no idea what to do with them. Oh, and also, this guy I think I kind of like stood me up on Tuesday and I haven’t heard from him since.
But mostly I miss my friend. Are you still out there somewhere?
PL
Ben couldn’t help smiling at the screen, so happy to hear from her again. And he was struck by how much he could hear Leslie’s voice in the words, loud and clear-had it been there all along?
Of course it had been.
So she didn’t have any ideas after all. He supposed he should feel smug about that, but he didn’t-there was something endearing about it, that she was still trying, albeit less successfully than she’d led him to believe. (And why did she seem to care how he saw her? He had the strange thought again that she might not like him, but she was far from indifferent.)
Reading the message again, ripe with palpable frustration, he felt that impulse he usually felt toward Pawnee Lover-to be there for her, to encourage her, to be on her side. He wanted to root for her.
But that was problematic, because of his job. He couldn’t exactly cheer her on as she worked all weekend to come up with ideas that, more likely than not, he was going to have to veto as soon as they reached his desk.
How many times this summer, he wondered, had he done that without even realizing what he was doing?
Ben started to scroll through all her old messages, skimming the paragraphs and matching up things she’d written to him to things that had happened in City Hall.
At the beginning, the thing she was planning, the “ray of sunlight”-that must have been the children’s concert, he realized. Something he’d written had inadvertently inspired her to do all that, in between his real-life self telling her no and showing up to shut it down.
He read on, and it was absurd the level their lives had become entwined this summer, a strange push and pull between their online and in-person interactions.
The work stuff she had always been stressing about-that Nerd Boy had kept encouraging her not to give up on-that was the city budget crisis, of course. He’d seriously been getting her hopes up online and shooting them down in real life, all summer long. No wonder she was so frustrated.
One message jumped out at him. It was written the same day she had given that absurd presentation to the Emergency Budgetary Task Force-a day her message to him had sounded so sad and discouraged, he’d wanted to reach into his computer and wrap his arms around her and tell her it was all going to be all right. And then go out and do whatever he could to make that true.
There’s this person in my life right now who just … I can’t even explain it. It’s not just that we disagree. It’s like he doesn’t have any respect for me. He doesn’t even have any interest in hearing my side. And it makes me feel awful. And it makes me say awful things to him. And then I feel worse.
He remembered wanting to punch that person, or not punch, really; he wasn’t violent. But to hunt him down, to tell him how blind he must be not to see her for what she was, to make sure he knew he didn’t deserve her attention, that he was lucky to even be in the same room with her and a fool for not recognizing that.
And she’d been talking about him.
He’d been refusing to believe any of this had been his fault; he hadn’t gotten Pawnee into this situation, and he had no control over the numbers. But reading her words, he wondered … if maybe some of this, some of what she felt about it at least, if maybe that wasn’t at least partly his fault.
What had he said to her after the task force meeting to make her so upset? He’d been so angry at her, he remembered-angry because he’d felt like she’d directed her presentation at him, to make him look bad, to make his job harder. In retrospect, he thought, she probably had been talking to him-but to win him over. To tell him her side. And she was right, he hadn’t wanted to hear it.
Ben hit the reply button and paused with his fingers over the keys, torn. He so wanted to be Nerd Boy again, writing to Pawnee Lover, offering friendship and encouragement to his anonymous pen pal. The problem was that now he was Ben, writing to Leslie, under a pretense.
He experienced a wave of annoyance all over again at Kate, for getting him into this mess. But in the next moment, he remembered something else she’d said, something about how he should let himself be Nerd Boy … in real life.
He started to type.
I’m still here, trying desperately to try to think of a way to apologize to you. No luck yet, I’m sorry to say. I sincerely wish I had an explanation I could offer that would make up for the discomfort I caused you Tuesday night and since. But I promise you that I am missing you too, and that I hope to someday make it all up to you.
NB
PS: If it makes you feel any better, I have no idea what to do with beets either. Who eats beets?
Quickly, he hit send, before he had a chance to think through the all he wanted to make up to her, and the improbability of being able to do that.
But the prospect of helping her, of helping Pawnee, nagged at the edges of his thoughts for the rest of the day as he worked. He was far from convinced romance would be in the cards for them, no matter what he tried. But the possibility that he might leave Pawnee as something other than her sworn enemy-that he could at least avoid going out in any way that would quell the spirit of this relentless force for good-it was tempting to try.
What if he helped her brainstorm-if he had his own batch of ideas to bring to this meeting she was scheduling for Monday-would that win her over? It seemed unlikely-the last time he’d tried something like that had been Ice Town, and that had bankrupted his city. Not to mention that Pawnee was already practically bankrupt. He wasn’t sure he trusted himself to come up with any more big ideas.
He found himself wishing he had access to those binders of hers, so that he might see if he could tweak something into a cost-effective plan. But he didn’t want to get her hopes up if it wasn’t going to work out, so he couldn’t exactly ask to see them.
Suddenly Ben remembered he did have access to one of Leslie’s idea binders, sort of-the parks department’s Master Plan.
He dug it out of a box where the auditors had discarded all the budget plans that had been based on faulty data. On the cover, he noticed Leslie’s name appeared slightly larger than Ron’s-he was pretty sure this was her master plan, the things she had planned to do with her department if Pawnee’s City Council hadn’t screwed things up so badly. The bound document was at least three inches thick-if he could even give some tiny piece of her plan back to her, maybe she would accept it as an olive branch.
An hour later, he closed the book and rested his head in one hand, thoroughly discouraged. Most of the document consisted of plans to build a park on Lot 48-public hearing transcripts, estimates from playground vendors, information that would be needed for the environmental impact study, essays on the impact of parks on communities, and a lofty smattering of Jack London quotes. Riveting reading, but what could he possibly do with any of that?
He tried to put it out of his mind and get some work done, but as he was driving back to the motel that evening, he impulsively turned left where he would normally turn right. His Saturn rolled to a stop at the edge of the large empty expanse known as Lot 48. He got out of his car and leaned against it, looking out over the field that had apparently once been a pit.
The last time he had been here, it had been overflowing with children. Now the stage was gone, and it was just another empty lot-wide expanses of dirt with patches of scruffy-looking grass and weeds. It was a depressing sight compared to how he remembered it, and he imagined it was even more so for Leslie. It crossed his mind to wonder how this summer might have gone differently if only she’d known-
“Um … hello?”
The voice startled him, and he spun around, surprised to see a familiar dark-haired woman standing about six feet away, arms folded across her chest and eying him suspiciously. It was Leslie’s friend, Ann.
“Oh, hey, Ann,” Ben greeted her, and when she still looked confused, added, “It’s … it’s Ben Wyatt. From the sidewalk? And the …” He gestured vaguely to indicate the strange ways their paths had crossed this summer.
“I know who you are, Ben,” she said, looking half amused and half wary. “Why are you lurking across from my house?”
“Lurking? Across from your house?” He was confused for a moment before he recognized the ranch house across the street as the one that had served as a public restroom during the Freddy Spaghetti concert. “Oh. I didn’t realize that you lived here.”
She raised her eyebrows at him, clearly still demanding an explanation for his presence. Ben shook his head and kicked awkwardly at a clump of dirt, unsure of that himself.
“I don’t know what I’m doing, honestly. I was looking at Leslie’s old master plan today, trying to figure out if there was anything I could incorporate into our final recommendations, and the whole damned thing is about Lot 48, so somehow I ended up here.” He grimaced, not really directing his speech at Ann any more, just letting out his frustration. “I can’t build her a park. I couldn’t even get her a park bench without screwing over another department, and I can’t do that just because I-”
He trailed off, realizing how he was about to finish that sentence, and who he was talking to. When he looked back at Ann, she was giving him that look again-the one that made him feel like she’d picked up on more than he’d meant to give away, and he felt his ears grow hot as he waited for her to say something.
“Sorry I greeted you like a miscreant,” she said finally, with a twitch of a smile. “I thought Chris sent you to spy on me.” Now it was Ben’s turn to raise his eyebrows. Ann shook her head, as if clearing it. “It’s been a weird couple days.”
“Tell me about it.” Ben was about to excuse himself from this awkward conversation, but then he remembered something that Pawnee Lover had mentioned in her message to him-Ann was into Chris. And apparently also really creeped out by him? It struck him as too bad-she seemed nice and down to earth, and Ben liked the idea of someone like that for Chris.
“Um … weird how? If you don’t mind me asking.”
“Oh let’s see … he calls at weird hours, he sent flowers, and I swear I keep catching glimpses of him jogging past my house. And now you show up. You can see how I might be alarmed.”
“Right.” Ben could imagine how Chris’s behavior would appear to someone who wasn’t used to it. “Well, I’m not here to gather intel. I’d be terrible at that. Worst wingman ever. If it makes you feel any better, he sent flowers to my sister this week too. For her birthday, even though it wasn’t really her birthday. It’s a long story. She’s married, so that wasn’t … anyway, he sends a lot of flowers.”
She raised her eyebrows skeptically. “And is there a reason he seems to be circling my house?”
Ben shrugged. “He runs a lot.”
Ann shook her head, looking unconvinced. “You didn’t see the message attached to the flowers.”
Ben knew his boss, and he could imagine the message that was attached to the flowers-probably something that overused words like “love” and “ever.” It was so like Chris, but also-an incomplete picture of the guy. If Ann genuinely didn’t care for him, that was one thing, but … he was pretty sure they liked each other. And it seemed unfair that a misconception was standing in the way of that.
“Look … it’s not really my business, and I don’t care if you go out with Chris-” He paused, in case she was going to tell him to butt out, but she didn’t. “I don’t want it to be because you have the wrong idea about him. The thing … the thing about Chris is … is that he’s just like that. If he wants to call, he calls. If he likes someone, he tells them. It’s not personal.”
Ann was squinting and shaking her head, and Ben suddenly regretted saying anything-as if he was someone in a position to give relationship advice.
“Not personal? I don’t understand,” she said.
“No, he likes you, that’s personal, of course it is,” Ben scrambled to undo any damage he might have done already. “But … he barely knows you, right? I can see how the flowers and the words and the … everything, would seem like too much too fast. But it’s not like that. He’s not naming your future children, I promise you.”
“That’s good. Because it kind of seemed like he was naming our children already.”
Ben chuckled, relieved that she seemed to be taking this the right way. “He can be intense, I know, but he’s not crazy. He can get a little carried away sometimes, but he’s a really good guy. I’ve known him a long time.”
Ann shrugged offhandedly, but her expression was hopeful, and Ben thought she might give Chris a second chance after all. Helping to bring that about gave him a vaguely warm feeling, which quickly morphed into something more like an ache.
“You’re nice,” Ann said suddenly, considering him. “I can’t see why Leslie hates you so much.”
The words were like a punch in the gut. It was information he knew, pretty much, but it was something else to hear out loud, from the mouth of Leslie’s best friend.
“She hates me?” he asked, before he could stop himself.
Ann’s face twisted like she wished she could take it back. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that. Hate’s a strong word. She’s a really passionate person, and … let’s just say she gets carried away sometimes too.”
Ben started rattling his car keys. “It’s okay, I get it. I’m the guy who took her park away.” He tossed one more weary glance over Lot 48 and started to move toward his car.
“Hey, Ben?” He paused with his hand on his car door but didn’t look up. “You know, with Leslie … it’s enough to want to build a park.”
Ben managed a small smile in her direction, even though he suspected it wasn’t going to be that easy. Of course he wanted to build a park, or reinstate the full slate of rec programs, or expand the community center hours. But the Leslie he knew valued actions and results over flowery words and intentions, right? He felt like he still needed something more concrete to offer her.
“Thanks, and um, good luck with …” Ben trailed off with a vague gesture, since he didn’t want to presume that Ann was going to take his advice regarding Chris.
She smiled back at him. “You too.”
As he drove away, it occurred to him to wonder what Leslie’s best friend might be wishing him luck on.
--
“Okay, you have to update me fast, because Chris is going to be here any minute,” Ann said, as she and Leslie walked through the city hall courtyard to the table where they sometimes met for coffee before Ann had to start her shift. “What’s the news with … you know, the guy who … ?”
“Nerd Boy?” Leslie filled in helpfully.
“Yes, that one. Sorry, I still can’t bring myself to call him that. Can we give him a name? How about … Ben. Just to have something to call him, for now.”
“No!” Leslie blanched and narrowed her eyes at Ann. What was she playing at? “God, that’s a horrible name. We already know a Ben, and he’s terrible, facewise, and otherwise. Terrible, terrible name. Bad Ann.”
“Oh … right. That would probably be too confusing, two Bens. Jimmy, then. What’s the situation with Jimmy?”
Ann had her eyebrows raised slightly and was smiling pleasantly, looking completely innocent, and Leslie shook her head in disbelief.
“Jimmy,” she called Nerd Boy, playing along, although the name sounded all wrong to her and felt weird on her tongue, “wrote to me yesterday.”
“What did he say? Did he have a good excuse? Why wasn’t he there?”
“He, um-” Leslie bit her lip, trying to think of how to explain how a note that said so little could have meant so much to her. “He didn’t really give a reason, not specifically, no.”
“Well, did he at least apologize?”
“Not, well … I mean, his tone was very apologetic.” Leslie shrugged contentedly. “And he said he’d make it up to me.”
Ann looked far from convinced, though. “When? He’s leaving town at the end of summer, right?”
“I think so.” Leslie took a long drink of coffee and sighed. “Maybe we’ll meet, maybe we won’t, but we’ve had some great conversations, and I’m sure we’ll have more great conversations, and maybe that’s all we were meant to do. Or maybe I’ll run into him on the sidewalk after work and we’ll live happily ever after. I don’t know what’s going to happen, Ann, but I’m feeling very zen about it.”
“Did someone say zen?” Chris appeared, all smiles and shiny teeth, and sat down with them. “Ann Perkins, you are looking especially lovely today. And Leslie Knope, I am forever grateful to you that you are allowing me to intrude on your coffee break to share in the company of this wondrous woman.”
“I’m just glad you two were able to …” Leslie chose her words carefully, not wanting to appear to have any ulterior motives. “Let’s just say I’m happy if Ann’s happy.” And Ann did seem happy-she was practically glowing.
“I would say that’s something we have in common,” Chris said, beaming. “And I must say, it’s good seeing you looking happier as well.”
Leslie winced a little, realizing that Chris had seen her lose her cool more than once this week. “It’s been a tough week. But the government shutdown is almost over, right? So things are looking up.”
Slightly. Even after her department was reinstated, there would still be quite a few things to be unhappy about, with the bare-bones budget they’d be operating on.
“Yes, I know that’s been especially hard on you. Ann was just telling me last night about all the plans you had before we arrived. I’m truly sorry that we had to make so many cuts to your department.”
Leslie felt the usual pangs of regret, but she brushed them aside, wanting to keep any conversation about government funding clear of Chris and Ann’s fledgling romance. “If only we’d found our secret philanthropist, right?” she joked, trying to sound off-hand.
Chris squinted at her. “Secret philanthropist?”
What was going on? First, Ann couldn’t remember Ben was even a person after spending an entire evening with him, and now Chris had forgotten the single most inspiring event of the entire summer? Must be something in the Sweetums smog this week.
“The mysterious benefactor who swooped in to save the children’s concert and then selflessly disappeared from the public eye?” Leslie clarified.
“I remember it, Leslie,” Chris said. “I just thought you knew.”
“Knew what?” Leslie and Ann asked at the same time.
“Who made the trip to Eagleton to find Freddy Spaghetti at the last minute. There weren’t that many people on site that day who even knew the situation. And I just assumed, well, you two have spoken several times since then, right?”
Leslie’s heart fluttered in her chest. “I’ve spoken to him?”
Chris shifted uncomfortably. “It’s Ben.”
“Where?” Leslie’s head whipped around, as she tensed in anticipation of another encounter.
“No, Leslie. Ben is the one who paid Freddy Spaghetti.”
Leslie set down her coffee, opening and closing her mouth a few times, but no sound came out. She was speechless.
She looked toward Ann for emotional support, but bafflingly, Ann just tilted her head to one side and smiled. “Aww, I knew it. He has a soft spot.”
“Mean Ben does not-” Leslie started to protest. It just didn’t make any sense.
“You might have to stop calling him that, Leslie,” Ann chided gently, and Chris chuckled.
Leslie stared aghast at her best friend. When had she started taking Ben’s side?
And more importantly, when had Ben’s side started being so confusing?
“But … why … wha … why would he do that?” Leslie wondered out loud. “He tried to shut that concert down.”
“He didn’t tell me why,” Chris said. “I think he just wanted the kids to have their concert, like we all did.”
Leslie tried to picture Ben, with his dark sunglasses and his tan windbreaker and his frowny face, driving over to Eagleton to negotiate with a children’s singer.
“He’s really not that bad,” Ann said. “I was going to tell you, I talked to him yesterday, over by Lot 48, and he was nice. He actually encouraged me to give Chris another chance.”
“I’m so glad you finally came around,” Chris said. “The wait has been interminable.”
“It’s been three days,” Ann pointed out, even as she and Chris turned toward each other and started holding hands while staring gooily into each other’s eyes. It was nice and all that they were happy, but also kind of annoying because Leslie wanted them to focus. She needed to understand what was going on here.
“What was Ben doing at Lot 48?” Planning children’s concerts? Playing matchmaker? This was all so weird.
Ann looked doubtfully between Leslie and Chris, before returning her gaze to her friend. “I think you should talk to him, Leslie, I really do. I think you might have a lot to talk about.”
“Maybe I will,” Leslie agreed weakly.
Ann and Chris started to make plans for the weekend, as Leslie sipped distractedly at her coffee and grappled with all this new information.
This whole summer, she’d viewed Ben as the enemy-not because her city was bankrupt, but because he was bankrupt. Bankrupt of feelings.
And all this time, he’d been living this secret double life as someone she idealized-as someone kind and generous enough to save a children’s concert? This entire summer, she’d been holding onto the idea-a fantasy, really, a bit of wishful thinking-that Nerd Boy had been her secret hero of the summer kickoff.
But it had been Ben, of all people.
It was almost as if …
Viewed in some ways, it would seem like …
If she really made herself face the facts …
Oh, crap on a crab apple, and a rotten one at that.
She’d been wrong.
It was a deeply uncomfortable feeling.
--
Late Friday evening, Ben was alone in his office combing through a spreadsheet showing a detailed breakdown of the police department’s expenditures, when suddenly a rubber-banded bunch of beets landed in front of him, damp bits of dirt smearing across some line-items in the middle.
He grimaced in distaste, but it wasn’t the first time unappetizing produce had been thrown at him in the course of his work, so he took a second to mark his place with a sharp yellow pencil before looking up to find their source.
Leslie was staring down at him, a look of determination on her face. Startled more by her appearance than by the moist pile of vegetables in front of him, Ben sucked in a breath. He wasn’t ready to see her; he had no plan. And even if he had a plan … the plan wouldn’t look like this.
“Yes, Leslie?” he inquired as levelly as he could.
“Those are beets,” she said. As if that explained everything.
Belatedly, he realized they were probably the beets, the ones he’d seen her throw into her grocery cart a few weeks ago, after he’d yelled at her about responsibility. The memory made him wince-the way her reaction to him had hurt, the way he’d lashed out at her unfairly. He’d been hoping to start over with her somehow, but instead their past arguments were being thrown right back in his face.
Literally, almost.
“… and? What are they doing on my desk?”
“I don’t know. Don’t you want them?”
Her voice was obviously distraught, but it was oddly lacking in hostility toward him, and he noticed that she looked nervous … vulnerable even.
He relaxed slightly-whatever this was, it didn’t seem to be an attack. He looked back down at the beets, his annoyance turning to bemusement as he tried to figure out what was going on here.
“A bouquet of freshly unearthed beets. And here I thought you didn’t like me,” he said dryly, raising a tentative eyebrow at her.
She threw up her hands, flustered. “I don’t know what to do with them. What do people do with beets? What are beets? And you’re the one who likes vegetables. So I thought … I don’t know. I guess I just thought you would know what to do with them. Here, you don’t want them, I’ll take them back. I’ll throw them out.”
She reached for the beets, at the same time he covered them with his hand possessively, and their hands bumped, sending a little thrill up Ben’s arm.
Wait. Why was he trying to keep her from taking them back?
Pawnee Lover-Leslie-had mentioned in her note that she didn’t know what to do with these ugly things. And this apparently was her asking him for help with that?
It was almost like some sort of weird peace offering. Some tiny acknowledgment that she didn’t have all the answers, and that he might have something of value to add to the conversation.
Or maybe they were just beets.
Either way, she had withdrawn her hand, and she was looking at him all weird, and it seemed like he was committed to beet ownership.
“Don’t throw them out,” he said, trying to sound casual, as if he wasn’t really invested in the outcome of this weird situation. “I’ll find something to do with them.”
He actually had no idea what to do with them. He didn’t even know how to tell if they had gone bad. Tentatively, he leaned down to take a sniff, but they basically just smelled like dirt.
He looked up to see her staring at him intently, like he was a space alien or something. He stopped smelling the vegetables, realizing how weird that must look, but she was the one who looked caught.
“Okay. Good then. Right,” she said, turning to go. She paused in the door, looking everywhere but at him. “Oh, um, by the way … I’m sorry.”
“Sorry?”
“About … about your spreadsheet.” She lifted her eyes to meet his, looking oddly serious to be apologizing about a little smear of dirt, and he felt she was probably referencing more, but he wasn't about to ask.
“Oh. It’s okay. No permanent damage done. I mean, I’ll print out a new one. And anyway …” He took a deep breath and lowered his voice. “I’m sorry too. I mean … you know, it’s really my fault you had these beets anyway.”
Her eyes widened at him like she hadn’t expected that acknowledgment from him, and she nodded. “Good night, Ben,” she said.
“Good night, Leslie.”
She disappeared into the darkened hallway, and he stared after her for a moment. There was so much more he wanted to say to her, so much more he wanted to be able to do than this absurd little task she’d trusted him with. He had no idea where this was coming from, but it seemed like a start.
Doubtfully, he looked down at his unexpected bounty. This was fine. This was going to be fine. Now, all he needed was a recipe.
And some cookware of some sort, although he had no idea what.
And possibly an actual kitchen, something more than the hotplate and microwave he had access to at Pawnee Super Suites.
And maybe … maybe some new beets, because he really wasn’t sure about the viability of these.
It was a ridiculous amount of trouble to go to make a vegetable no one really wanted to eat, he realized, but Leslie Knope had asked him to do something. And his heart fluttered at the possibility of being able to actually find a way to do it for her.
--
tbc
Ben watched the blur of Leslie’s yellow curls and blazer disappearing rapidly down the hallway, feeling as shell-shocked as he usually seemed to feel after their encounters.
For a terrifying moment back there on the bench by the mural, he’d thought she’d actually put all the pieces together and come up with the truth, or at least suspected it. And why not? He supposed he’d been pretty obvious approaching her table in the café that night. The fact she hadn’t immediately figured it out probably spoke to how much she didn’t want Nerd Boy to turn out to be him.
But seriously, to think even for a moment those letters had been written to her by Chris? Something about that smacked him in the gut. Not that Chris wasn’t a good guy, but why would her mind go there-why not to the other auditor who just happened to show up at the café at the right time? Even when she was considering the unlikely, Ben somehow didn’t qualify.
As he settled in back at his desk to try to work, he noticed that Chris now had two different relaxation soundtracks playing simultaneously. Ben winced at the harp music fighting to be heard over the sounds of the rainforest.
He did his best to tune it out as he usually would, but when Chris started throwing a relaxation ball against the wall, thuds resounding between twangy harp notes and what sounded like chimp noises, he couldn’t take it anymore.
“Chris. Is something wrong?”
“Ben, I’m so glad you asked. I am simply distraught over this Ann Perkins situation.”
“There’s a situation?” He really didn’t want to know. Not at the moment, at least, when he was having his own crisis of confidence.
“I want to ask her out again, but she hasn’t called me back. Leslie said she hasn’t mentioned me. And I thought we had such a lovely time on Tuesday night. It seemed like she really liked me. Didn’t you think it seemed like she liked me?”
Chris’s ability to read people could be off sometimes, but actually, Ben had to agree this time. It had seemed like they were hitting it off; it’s what had made it so depressing to watch, considering Ben’s own situation, which could be called the exact opposite of hitting it off.
“Well, look. It’s been less than 48 hours. Give it time, right? I’m sure she’ll call.”
Chris lit up like Ben had given him a signed and notarized guarantee.
“You think so? I’m sure you are right. Good things come to those who wait. I just cannot believe I have not heard from her, especially after the flowers I sent.”
“You sent her flowers?”
“Yes. I was at the flower store placing a belated order for your sister’s birthday, so I picked up a bouquet and dropped it on her doorstep while out for my morning run. Maybe I should call her again.”
Ben winced at the thought of what the note on those flowers might have said. Chris generally seemed to date two categories of women: ones who ate up his flowery words and ended up boring him, and ones who might hold his interest if he didn’t scare them off by coming on too strong early on. He suspected Ann might fall in the latter group.
“No, I wouldn’t … don’t do anything else, okay? She knows where you stand, so, I think the ball’s in her court.”
Chris frowned. “I suppose you’re right. It’s just too bad, because I was hoping we could all go out again together. That was fun, wasn’t it?”
Ben gaped it him. Sometimes when Chris was caught up in something, it was like he got tunnel vision.
“Maybe we could still arrange something,” Chris continued hopefully. “If you could get Leslie Knope to go somewhere with you, and make sure she brings the lovely Ann Perkins, I could bump into the three of you, and it would be just like Tuesday night. Where do you think we should go? Pawnee has a good zoo, I hear. Would Leslie want to show you the zoo?”
“No. No, no, no.” For a moment, Ben couldn’t seem to get his mouth past the word no. “No. That’s not, no.”
“Why not?”
“Okay, for one thing, if you just show up again, Ann will think you are stalking her. And for another thing …” Leslie would never agree to go somewhere with me, even though unbeknownst to her I am her secret online love interest. Good lord. “No, I’m fairly certain, Leslie does not want to show me the zoo.”
“I don’t understand why not. Leslie’s a wonderful tour guide. She’s the most knowledgeable local historian I’ve met here, and she would be more than willing to share her expertise with an interested party. All you have to do is show an interest, Ben.”
Wait, did Chris know something? Ben brushed the idea aside as absurd; this was Chris, for god’s sake. Tunnel vision.
“At any rate, the point is, Chris, you should wait for Ann to make the next move.”
Chris smiled resignedly. “Waiting it is then.” He put the stress ball in a drawer and turned off the harp music.
Ben tried to focus on the spreadsheet that was in front of him. Distractedly, he flipped over to a browser to check his email, out of habit more than any expectation of hearing from his online pen pal. Not since he still hadn’t written to her to explain his supposed absence.
But there it was. He had a message from Pawnee Lover.
With equal parts dread and hope, he clicked to open it.
Where are you? I’ve tried to be patient, but just now I almost made a complete fool of myself thinking someone I work with might be my Nerd Boy. It was an insane idea-he is nothing like you, and I would have been really disappointed if it had turned out to be true. Not to mention that it would have been a disaster, because my best friend is into him. Anyway, obviously he’s not, because you’re you, and you’re … I don’t really know, honestly, because you didn’t show up. Were you abducted by Eagletonians? Stuck in an elevator? Was it the raccoons? I warned you to stay away from the northern half of Harvey James Park after dark. I just hope you’re okay and that you’re current on all of your immunizations.
More than anything, I just want to talk to you again. I need to come up with a dozen good ideas by next week, or at least one really exceptional idea, and I don’t have anything. Meanwhile I have these very judgmental beets sitting in my crisper drawer and no idea what to do with them. Oh, and also, this guy I think I kind of like stood me up on Tuesday and I haven’t heard from him since.
But mostly I miss my friend. Are you still out there somewhere?
PL
Ben couldn’t help smiling at the screen, so happy to hear from her again. And he was struck by how much he could hear Leslie’s voice in the words, loud and clear-had it been there all along?
Of course it had been.
So she didn’t have any ideas after all. He supposed he should feel smug about that, but he didn’t-there was something endearing about it, that she was still trying, albeit less successfully than she’d led him to believe. (And why did she seem to care how he saw her? He had the strange thought again that she might not like him, but she was far from indifferent.)
Reading the message again, ripe with palpable frustration, he felt that impulse he usually felt toward Pawnee Lover-to be there for her, to encourage her, to be on her side. He wanted to root for her.
But that was problematic, because of his job. He couldn’t exactly cheer her on as she worked all weekend to come up with ideas that, more likely than not, he was going to have to veto as soon as they reached his desk.
How many times this summer, he wondered, had he done that without even realizing what he was doing?
Ben started to scroll through all her old messages, skimming the paragraphs and matching up things she’d written to him to things that had happened in City Hall.
At the beginning, the thing she was planning, the “ray of sunlight”-that must have been the children’s concert, he realized. Something he’d written had inadvertently inspired her to do all that, in between his real-life self telling her no and showing up to shut it down.
He read on, and it was absurd the level their lives had become entwined this summer, a strange push and pull between their online and in-person interactions.
The work stuff she had always been stressing about-that Nerd Boy had kept encouraging her not to give up on-that was the city budget crisis, of course. He’d seriously been getting her hopes up online and shooting them down in real life, all summer long. No wonder she was so frustrated.
One message jumped out at him. It was written the same day she had given that absurd presentation to the Emergency Budgetary Task Force-a day her message to him had sounded so sad and discouraged, he’d wanted to reach into his computer and wrap his arms around her and tell her it was all going to be all right. And then go out and do whatever he could to make that true.
There’s this person in my life right now who just … I can’t even explain it. It’s not just that we disagree. It’s like he doesn’t have any respect for me. He doesn’t even have any interest in hearing my side. And it makes me feel awful. And it makes me say awful things to him. And then I feel worse.
He remembered wanting to punch that person, or not punch, really; he wasn’t violent. But to hunt him down, to tell him how blind he must be not to see her for what she was, to make sure he knew he didn’t deserve her attention, that he was lucky to even be in the same room with her and a fool for not recognizing that.
And she’d been talking about him.
He’d been refusing to believe any of this had been his fault; he hadn’t gotten Pawnee into this situation, and he had no control over the numbers. But reading her words, he wondered … if maybe some of this, some of what she felt about it at least, if maybe that wasn’t at least partly his fault.
What had he said to her after the task force meeting to make her so upset? He’d been so angry at her, he remembered-angry because he’d felt like she’d directed her presentation at him, to make him look bad, to make his job harder. In retrospect, he thought, she probably had been talking to him-but to win him over. To tell him her side. And she was right, he hadn’t wanted to hear it.
Ben hit the reply button and paused with his fingers over the keys, torn. He so wanted to be Nerd Boy again, writing to Pawnee Lover, offering friendship and encouragement to his anonymous pen pal. The problem was that now he was Ben, writing to Leslie, under a pretense.
He experienced a wave of annoyance all over again at Kate, for getting him into this mess. But in the next moment, he remembered something else she’d said, something about how he should let himself be Nerd Boy … in real life.
He started to type.
I’m still here, trying desperately to try to think of a way to apologize to you. No luck yet, I’m sorry to say. I sincerely wish I had an explanation I could offer that would make up for the discomfort I caused you Tuesday night and since. But I promise you that I am missing you too, and that I hope to someday make it all up to you.
NB
PS: If it makes you feel any better, I have no idea what to do with beets either. Who eats beets?
Quickly, he hit send, before he had a chance to think through the all he wanted to make up to her, and the improbability of being able to do that.
But the prospect of helping her, of helping Pawnee, nagged at the edges of his thoughts for the rest of the day as he worked. He was far from convinced romance would be in the cards for them, no matter what he tried. But the possibility that he might leave Pawnee as something other than her sworn enemy-that he could at least avoid going out in any way that would quell the spirit of this relentless force for good-it was tempting to try.
What if he helped her brainstorm-if he had his own batch of ideas to bring to this meeting she was scheduling for Monday-would that win her over? It seemed unlikely-the last time he’d tried something like that had been Ice Town, and that had bankrupted his city. Not to mention that Pawnee was already practically bankrupt. He wasn’t sure he trusted himself to come up with any more big ideas.
He found himself wishing he had access to those binders of hers, so that he might see if he could tweak something into a cost-effective plan. But he didn’t want to get her hopes up if it wasn’t going to work out, so he couldn’t exactly ask to see them.
Suddenly Ben remembered he did have access to one of Leslie’s idea binders, sort of-the parks department’s Master Plan.
He dug it out of a box where the auditors had discarded all the budget plans that had been based on faulty data. On the cover, he noticed Leslie’s name appeared slightly larger than Ron’s-he was pretty sure this was her master plan, the things she had planned to do with her department if Pawnee’s City Council hadn’t screwed things up so badly. The bound document was at least three inches thick-if he could even give some tiny piece of her plan back to her, maybe she would accept it as an olive branch.
An hour later, he closed the book and rested his head in one hand, thoroughly discouraged. Most of the document consisted of plans to build a park on Lot 48-public hearing transcripts, estimates from playground vendors, information that would be needed for the environmental impact study, essays on the impact of parks on communities, and a lofty smattering of Jack London quotes. Riveting reading, but what could he possibly do with any of that?
He tried to put it out of his mind and get some work done, but as he was driving back to the motel that evening, he impulsively turned left where he would normally turn right. His Saturn rolled to a stop at the edge of the large empty expanse known as Lot 48. He got out of his car and leaned against it, looking out over the field that had apparently once been a pit.
The last time he had been here, it had been overflowing with children. Now the stage was gone, and it was just another empty lot-wide expanses of dirt with patches of scruffy-looking grass and weeds. It was a depressing sight compared to how he remembered it, and he imagined it was even more so for Leslie. It crossed his mind to wonder how this summer might have gone differently if only she’d known-
“Um … hello?”
The voice startled him, and he spun around, surprised to see a familiar dark-haired woman standing about six feet away, arms folded across her chest and eying him suspiciously. It was Leslie’s friend, Ann.
“Oh, hey, Ann,” Ben greeted her, and when she still looked confused, added, “It’s … it’s Ben Wyatt. From the sidewalk? And the …” He gestured vaguely to indicate the strange ways their paths had crossed this summer.
“I know who you are, Ben,” she said, looking half amused and half wary. “Why are you lurking across from my house?”
“Lurking? Across from your house?” He was confused for a moment before he recognized the ranch house across the street as the one that had served as a public restroom during the Freddy Spaghetti concert. “Oh. I didn’t realize that you lived here.”
She raised her eyebrows at him, clearly still demanding an explanation for his presence. Ben shook his head and kicked awkwardly at a clump of dirt, unsure of that himself.
“I don’t know what I’m doing, honestly. I was looking at Leslie’s old master plan today, trying to figure out if there was anything I could incorporate into our final recommendations, and the whole damned thing is about Lot 48, so somehow I ended up here.” He grimaced, not really directing his speech at Ann any more, just letting out his frustration. “I can’t build her a park. I couldn’t even get her a park bench without screwing over another department, and I can’t do that just because I-”
He trailed off, realizing how he was about to finish that sentence, and who he was talking to. When he looked back at Ann, she was giving him that look again-the one that made him feel like she’d picked up on more than he’d meant to give away, and he felt his ears grow hot as he waited for her to say something.
“Sorry I greeted you like a miscreant,” she said finally, with a twitch of a smile. “I thought Chris sent you to spy on me.” Now it was Ben’s turn to raise his eyebrows. Ann shook her head, as if clearing it. “It’s been a weird couple days.”
“Tell me about it.” Ben was about to excuse himself from this awkward conversation, but then he remembered something that Pawnee Lover had mentioned in her message to him-Ann was into Chris. And apparently also really creeped out by him? It struck him as too bad-she seemed nice and down to earth, and Ben liked the idea of someone like that for Chris.
“Um … weird how? If you don’t mind me asking.”
“Oh let’s see … he calls at weird hours, he sent flowers, and I swear I keep catching glimpses of him jogging past my house. And now you show up. You can see how I might be alarmed.”
“Right.” Ben could imagine how Chris’s behavior would appear to someone who wasn’t used to it. “Well, I’m not here to gather intel. I’d be terrible at that. Worst wingman ever. If it makes you feel any better, he sent flowers to my sister this week too. For her birthday, even though it wasn’t really her birthday. It’s a long story. She’s married, so that wasn’t … anyway, he sends a lot of flowers.”
She raised her eyebrows skeptically. “And is there a reason he seems to be circling my house?”
Ben shrugged. “He runs a lot.”
Ann shook her head, looking unconvinced. “You didn’t see the message attached to the flowers.”
Ben knew his boss, and he could imagine the message that was attached to the flowers-probably something that overused words like “love” and “ever.” It was so like Chris, but also-an incomplete picture of the guy. If Ann genuinely didn’t care for him, that was one thing, but … he was pretty sure they liked each other. And it seemed unfair that a misconception was standing in the way of that.
“Look … it’s not really my business, and I don’t care if you go out with Chris-” He paused, in case she was going to tell him to butt out, but she didn’t. “I don’t want it to be because you have the wrong idea about him. The thing … the thing about Chris is … is that he’s just like that. If he wants to call, he calls. If he likes someone, he tells them. It’s not personal.”
Ann was squinting and shaking her head, and Ben suddenly regretted saying anything-as if he was someone in a position to give relationship advice.
“Not personal? I don’t understand,” she said.
“No, he likes you, that’s personal, of course it is,” Ben scrambled to undo any damage he might have done already. “But … he barely knows you, right? I can see how the flowers and the words and the … everything, would seem like too much too fast. But it’s not like that. He’s not naming your future children, I promise you.”
“That’s good. Because it kind of seemed like he was naming our children already.”
Ben chuckled, relieved that she seemed to be taking this the right way. “He can be intense, I know, but he’s not crazy. He can get a little carried away sometimes, but he’s a really good guy. I’ve known him a long time.”
Ann shrugged offhandedly, but her expression was hopeful, and Ben thought she might give Chris a second chance after all. Helping to bring that about gave him a vaguely warm feeling, which quickly morphed into something more like an ache.
“You’re nice,” Ann said suddenly, considering him. “I can’t see why Leslie hates you so much.”
The words were like a punch in the gut. It was information he knew, pretty much, but it was something else to hear out loud, from the mouth of Leslie’s best friend.
“She hates me?” he asked, before he could stop himself.
Ann’s face twisted like she wished she could take it back. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that. Hate’s a strong word. She’s a really passionate person, and … let’s just say she gets carried away sometimes too.”
Ben started rattling his car keys. “It’s okay, I get it. I’m the guy who took her park away.” He tossed one more weary glance over Lot 48 and started to move toward his car.
“Hey, Ben?” He paused with his hand on his car door but didn’t look up. “You know, with Leslie … it’s enough to want to build a park.”
Ben managed a small smile in her direction, even though he suspected it wasn’t going to be that easy. Of course he wanted to build a park, or reinstate the full slate of rec programs, or expand the community center hours. But the Leslie he knew valued actions and results over flowery words and intentions, right? He felt like he still needed something more concrete to offer her.
“Thanks, and um, good luck with …” Ben trailed off with a vague gesture, since he didn’t want to presume that Ann was going to take his advice regarding Chris.
She smiled back at him. “You too.”
As he drove away, it occurred to him to wonder what Leslie’s best friend might be wishing him luck on.
--
“Okay, you have to update me fast, because Chris is going to be here any minute,” Ann said, as she and Leslie walked through the city hall courtyard to the table where they sometimes met for coffee before Ann had to start her shift. “What’s the news with … you know, the guy who … ?”
“Nerd Boy?” Leslie filled in helpfully.
“Yes, that one. Sorry, I still can’t bring myself to call him that. Can we give him a name? How about … Ben. Just to have something to call him, for now.”
“No!” Leslie blanched and narrowed her eyes at Ann. What was she playing at? “God, that’s a horrible name. We already know a Ben, and he’s terrible, facewise, and otherwise. Terrible, terrible name. Bad Ann.”
“Oh … right. That would probably be too confusing, two Bens. Jimmy, then. What’s the situation with Jimmy?”
Ann had her eyebrows raised slightly and was smiling pleasantly, looking completely innocent, and Leslie shook her head in disbelief.
“Jimmy,” she called Nerd Boy, playing along, although the name sounded all wrong to her and felt weird on her tongue, “wrote to me yesterday.”
“What did he say? Did he have a good excuse? Why wasn’t he there?”
“He, um-” Leslie bit her lip, trying to think of how to explain how a note that said so little could have meant so much to her. “He didn’t really give a reason, not specifically, no.”
“Well, did he at least apologize?”
“Not, well … I mean, his tone was very apologetic.” Leslie shrugged contentedly. “And he said he’d make it up to me.”
Ann looked far from convinced, though. “When? He’s leaving town at the end of summer, right?”
“I think so.” Leslie took a long drink of coffee and sighed. “Maybe we’ll meet, maybe we won’t, but we’ve had some great conversations, and I’m sure we’ll have more great conversations, and maybe that’s all we were meant to do. Or maybe I’ll run into him on the sidewalk after work and we’ll live happily ever after. I don’t know what’s going to happen, Ann, but I’m feeling very zen about it.”
“Did someone say zen?” Chris appeared, all smiles and shiny teeth, and sat down with them. “Ann Perkins, you are looking especially lovely today. And Leslie Knope, I am forever grateful to you that you are allowing me to intrude on your coffee break to share in the company of this wondrous woman.”
“I’m just glad you two were able to …” Leslie chose her words carefully, not wanting to appear to have any ulterior motives. “Let’s just say I’m happy if Ann’s happy.” And Ann did seem happy-she was practically glowing.
“I would say that’s something we have in common,” Chris said, beaming. “And I must say, it’s good seeing you looking happier as well.”
Leslie winced a little, realizing that Chris had seen her lose her cool more than once this week. “It’s been a tough week. But the government shutdown is almost over, right? So things are looking up.”
Slightly. Even after her department was reinstated, there would still be quite a few things to be unhappy about, with the bare-bones budget they’d be operating on.
“Yes, I know that’s been especially hard on you. Ann was just telling me last night about all the plans you had before we arrived. I’m truly sorry that we had to make so many cuts to your department.”
Leslie felt the usual pangs of regret, but she brushed them aside, wanting to keep any conversation about government funding clear of Chris and Ann’s fledgling romance. “If only we’d found our secret philanthropist, right?” she joked, trying to sound off-hand.
Chris squinted at her. “Secret philanthropist?”
What was going on? First, Ann couldn’t remember Ben was even a person after spending an entire evening with him, and now Chris had forgotten the single most inspiring event of the entire summer? Must be something in the Sweetums smog this week.
“The mysterious benefactor who swooped in to save the children’s concert and then selflessly disappeared from the public eye?” Leslie clarified.
“I remember it, Leslie,” Chris said. “I just thought you knew.”
“Knew what?” Leslie and Ann asked at the same time.
“Who made the trip to Eagleton to find Freddy Spaghetti at the last minute. There weren’t that many people on site that day who even knew the situation. And I just assumed, well, you two have spoken several times since then, right?”
Leslie’s heart fluttered in her chest. “I’ve spoken to him?”
Chris shifted uncomfortably. “It’s Ben.”
“Where?” Leslie’s head whipped around, as she tensed in anticipation of another encounter.
“No, Leslie. Ben is the one who paid Freddy Spaghetti.”
Leslie set down her coffee, opening and closing her mouth a few times, but no sound came out. She was speechless.
She looked toward Ann for emotional support, but bafflingly, Ann just tilted her head to one side and smiled. “Aww, I knew it. He has a soft spot.”
“Mean Ben does not-” Leslie started to protest. It just didn’t make any sense.
“You might have to stop calling him that, Leslie,” Ann chided gently, and Chris chuckled.
Leslie stared aghast at her best friend. When had she started taking Ben’s side?
And more importantly, when had Ben’s side started being so confusing?
“But … why … wha … why would he do that?” Leslie wondered out loud. “He tried to shut that concert down.”
“He didn’t tell me why,” Chris said. “I think he just wanted the kids to have their concert, like we all did.”
Leslie tried to picture Ben, with his dark sunglasses and his tan windbreaker and his frowny face, driving over to Eagleton to negotiate with a children’s singer.
“He’s really not that bad,” Ann said. “I was going to tell you, I talked to him yesterday, over by Lot 48, and he was nice. He actually encouraged me to give Chris another chance.”
“I’m so glad you finally came around,” Chris said. “The wait has been interminable.”
“It’s been three days,” Ann pointed out, even as she and Chris turned toward each other and started holding hands while staring gooily into each other’s eyes. It was nice and all that they were happy, but also kind of annoying because Leslie wanted them to focus. She needed to understand what was going on here.
“What was Ben doing at Lot 48?” Planning children’s concerts? Playing matchmaker? This was all so weird.
Ann looked doubtfully between Leslie and Chris, before returning her gaze to her friend. “I think you should talk to him, Leslie, I really do. I think you might have a lot to talk about.”
“Maybe I will,” Leslie agreed weakly.
Ann and Chris started to make plans for the weekend, as Leslie sipped distractedly at her coffee and grappled with all this new information.
This whole summer, she’d viewed Ben as the enemy-not because her city was bankrupt, but because he was bankrupt. Bankrupt of feelings.
And all this time, he’d been living this secret double life as someone she idealized-as someone kind and generous enough to save a children’s concert? This entire summer, she’d been holding onto the idea-a fantasy, really, a bit of wishful thinking-that Nerd Boy had been her secret hero of the summer kickoff.
But it had been Ben, of all people.
It was almost as if …
Viewed in some ways, it would seem like …
If she really made herself face the facts …
Oh, crap on a crab apple, and a rotten one at that.
She’d been wrong.
It was a deeply uncomfortable feeling.
--
Late Friday evening, Ben was alone in his office combing through a spreadsheet showing a detailed breakdown of the police department’s expenditures, when suddenly a rubber-banded bunch of beets landed in front of him, damp bits of dirt smearing across some line-items in the middle.
He grimaced in distaste, but it wasn’t the first time unappetizing produce had been thrown at him in the course of his work, so he took a second to mark his place with a sharp yellow pencil before looking up to find their source.
Leslie was staring down at him, a look of determination on her face. Startled more by her appearance than by the moist pile of vegetables in front of him, Ben sucked in a breath. He wasn’t ready to see her; he had no plan. And even if he had a plan … the plan wouldn’t look like this.
“Yes, Leslie?” he inquired as levelly as he could.
“Those are beets,” she said. As if that explained everything.
Belatedly, he realized they were probably the beets, the ones he’d seen her throw into her grocery cart a few weeks ago, after he’d yelled at her about responsibility. The memory made him wince-the way her reaction to him had hurt, the way he’d lashed out at her unfairly. He’d been hoping to start over with her somehow, but instead their past arguments were being thrown right back in his face.
Literally, almost.
“… and? What are they doing on my desk?”
“I don’t know. Don’t you want them?”
Her voice was obviously distraught, but it was oddly lacking in hostility toward him, and he noticed that she looked nervous … vulnerable even.
He relaxed slightly-whatever this was, it didn’t seem to be an attack. He looked back down at the beets, his annoyance turning to bemusement as he tried to figure out what was going on here.
“A bouquet of freshly unearthed beets. And here I thought you didn’t like me,” he said dryly, raising a tentative eyebrow at her.
She threw up her hands, flustered. “I don’t know what to do with them. What do people do with beets? What are beets? And you’re the one who likes vegetables. So I thought … I don’t know. I guess I just thought you would know what to do with them. Here, you don’t want them, I’ll take them back. I’ll throw them out.”
She reached for the beets, at the same time he covered them with his hand possessively, and their hands bumped, sending a little thrill up Ben’s arm.
Wait. Why was he trying to keep her from taking them back?
Pawnee Lover-Leslie-had mentioned in her note that she didn’t know what to do with these ugly things. And this apparently was her asking him for help with that?
It was almost like some sort of weird peace offering. Some tiny acknowledgment that she didn’t have all the answers, and that he might have something of value to add to the conversation.
Or maybe they were just beets.
Either way, she had withdrawn her hand, and she was looking at him all weird, and it seemed like he was committed to beet ownership.
“Don’t throw them out,” he said, trying to sound casual, as if he wasn’t really invested in the outcome of this weird situation. “I’ll find something to do with them.”
He actually had no idea what to do with them. He didn’t even know how to tell if they had gone bad. Tentatively, he leaned down to take a sniff, but they basically just smelled like dirt.
He looked up to see her staring at him intently, like he was a space alien or something. He stopped smelling the vegetables, realizing how weird that must look, but she was the one who looked caught.
“Okay. Good then. Right,” she said, turning to go. She paused in the door, looking everywhere but at him. “Oh, um, by the way … I’m sorry.”
“Sorry?”
“About … about your spreadsheet.” She lifted her eyes to meet his, looking oddly serious to be apologizing about a little smear of dirt, and he felt she was probably referencing more, but he wasn't about to ask.
“Oh. It’s okay. No permanent damage done. I mean, I’ll print out a new one. And anyway …” He took a deep breath and lowered his voice. “I’m sorry too. I mean … you know, it’s really my fault you had these beets anyway.”
Her eyes widened at him like she hadn’t expected that acknowledgment from him, and she nodded. “Good night, Ben,” she said.
“Good night, Leslie.”
She disappeared into the darkened hallway, and he stared after her for a moment. There was so much more he wanted to say to her, so much more he wanted to be able to do than this absurd little task she’d trusted him with. He had no idea where this was coming from, but it seemed like a start.
Doubtfully, he looked down at his unexpected bounty. This was fine. This was going to be fine. Now, all he needed was a recipe.
And some cookware of some sort, although he had no idea what.
And possibly an actual kitchen, something more than the hotplate and microwave he had access to at Pawnee Super Suites.
And maybe … maybe some new beets, because he really wasn’t sure about the viability of these.
It was a ridiculous amount of trouble to go to make a vegetable no one really wanted to eat, he realized, but Leslie Knope had asked him to do something. And his heart fluttered at the possibility of being able to actually find a way to do it for her.
--
tbc