Fic: Two Hearts Are Better than One (3/4)
Title: Two Hearts Are Better than One (3/4)
Pairings/Characters: Ben/Leslie; ensemble
Word Count: 3600
Rating: PG-13
Setting: Post-Jerry's Painting
Summary: Chris decides to interfere in Ben's love life. Shenanigans ensue.
A/n: A million thank yous to shornt and americnxidiot for reading through this for me and giving me feedback. I'm beyond grateful for your help and encouragement! And thank you to everyone who commented on the last part. One more to go after this!
Part One || Part Two
Are you still here?
It takes longer than it should to type four words, but Ben feels tipsier now than he did an hour ago. Something about the crowd here, the insistent pulsating beat of the music and the stale smell of sweat and alcohol makes his head swim. Chris is already bouncing along to the music, ready and willing to be swallowed by the crowd and swept away; Ben just wants to find Leslie. He looks at his message again, carefully checking its coherence, and then he hits send.
“Should we dance?” asks Chris, apparently not noticing that he’s already doing so. Ben blinks at him and shakes his head. “I don’t think-“ he starts, but Chris grabs his arm and drags him further into the crowd before he can finish his protest.
Chris dances like he’s having a seizure, not necessarily drawing people to him but rather around him. The moment he starts flailing his arms and legs and jerking his head, the crowd parts to give him a wide breadth. And still people can’t seem to help but stare and smile, mostly because it’s obvious that Chris is having fun. Even with six beers pulsing through his veins, Ben is not that uninhibited, but at least it makes it easier to melt back into the crowd and watch.
“Dancing literally makes you feel alive,” Chris shouts at him, spinning around in a circle and waving his arms. “Don’t you think?”
“I tend to feel alive even when I’m not dancing.”
Chris laughs, pointing at him and then moving his arms like he’s doing a backstroke. There’s a sudden wail of pain, and Ben catches sight of Tom holding his hand to his head and darting out of the way. “He hit me!” Tom yells, though Chris doesn’t seem to have noticed. In fact, he just steps forward and grabs Tom by the elbow, pulling him back in and twirling him around in a circle. When he lets go, Tom stumbles backward into Ben, who catches him awkwardly.
“Is he drunk?”
“No,” says Ben, rolling his eyes and righting Tom. The other man is still rubbing his head as though he’s actually been wounded. “He just feels alive.” For a second, he glances back at Chris, now doing what appears to be a demented version of the hokey pokey, and then turns to Tom. “Hey, have you seen Leslie?”
“Yeah, she was here.”
“Was?”
“Actually,” says Tom, ignoring his request for tense clarification, “I’ve been looking for you.”
“I just got here.”
“Yeah, well, I need your help.” Tom grabs him by the elbow and tugs him through the crowd on the dance floor toward the bar. It’s littered with shot glasses and various bottles labeled with numbers, but that’s not what grabs Ben’s attention. “Sit here.”
“Uh, Tom?” Ben continues to stare at the man who lies curled in a fetal position next to the barstool as Tom shoves him into the seat. “Is he okay?”
“Who?” Tom follows Ben’s line of sight and nods. “Oh, my boy Jean-Ralphio? Yeah, he’s fine.”
Ben raises an eyebrow, but Tom has already settled in the seat next to him, apparently unconcerned. “You don’t think we should help him?”
“Dude, I tried, but he’s not going anywhere right now. Don’t worry about it. He always gets like this when he drinks too much.”
From the floor, Jean-Ralphio whimpers. “Will someone cuddle me?”
“Uh…”
“Here. Drink this.”
Ben lifts his eyes from the grown man on the floor to the amber-colored liquid Tom has placed in front of him. It’s a toss-up between which of them he wants to ignore more right now. “What is this?”
“This is the next big thing. The only drink guaranteed to change your life.”
“Is this what he was drinking?”
“Look, I need someone to be my lab monkey and try this. I have to perfect it before we go live next week.”
“Okay.”
“So you’ll do it?”
“No.”
“Ple-e-e-e-ease. It’s just three shots.”
Ben looks down at Jean-Ralphio. “Three shots of what?”
“I can’t say. This is a blind taste test.” Then, as if just noticing that Ben’s still concerned, he adds, “Oh. Don’t worry. He had way more than that.”
In some wild hope that someone is going to intercede, Ben glances around the bar, but Chris has been swallowed by the crowd on the dance floor-many of whom now seem to be cheering for him-and Leslie is still nowhere in sight. Ben looks at his phone, but there aren’t any new messages.
Tom nudges the shot a little closer, and Ben sighs. What difference does it make at this point? “Yeah,” he concedes. “Okay. Just three.”
“Just three, I swear.”
Five shots later, Ben is ready to join Jean-Ralphio on the floor. Tom keeps scribbling notes in a notebook with a dragon on the cover, and then insistently pushes another shot toward Ben-“You can’t just say they all taste the same. Try this one again.”-at which point Ben completely understands why Jean-Ralphio crawled under the bar to get away.
“They’re good. All good,” he says, pushing the shot away and stumbling off of his barstool. He grabs Tom to regain his balance, but Tom just wrenches his arm away and jots something else in the notebook. For a moment, Ben stands there swaying, and then he remember his legs are there. “I am going over there now,” he says, pointing nowhere in particular.
“Fine. Thanks for being absolutely no help,” snaps Tom.
As Ben walks away, he can hear him begging Jean-Ralphio to get up, which is stupid because lying down is clearly the better option. In fact, Ben thinks he might do that himself. Just until he can feel his legs again. Or at least control the muscles in his face that won’t seem to stop smiling. He lifts his hands to his face and tries to pull his smile down to a more neutral expression, but it doesn’t seem to work.
“You think I won’t use a human shield?”
Two hands grab Ben’s arms tightly, jerking him around to face the way he just came. He stumbles over his own feet, nearly falling down, and catches a glimpse of Andy. Awkwardly, he cranes his neck back, and in the process, knocks his head against April’s. Her claw-like grip on his arms tightens.
“Hey,” he says, trying to blow some of April’s hair out of his face and mostly managing to spit on her. “What are you doing?”
“I think he’s drunk, babe.”
“So?”
Ben laughs, relaxing his body and leaning back into April’s arms. It’s not exactly comfortable, but it’s better than standing on his own. “What are you doing?” she hisses, moving her hands from his arms to his back. She shoves him and he lurches forward into Andy, who is, unsurprisingly, a more comfortable if sweatier pillow.
“Sorry about that,” says Andy. “April likes to use human shields when we play tag.”
“You’re playing tag?”
“Yeah. Well, I mean, I’m chasing her because she said if I catch her we can make out in public, so it’s like tag. It’s the hunt for foreplay. Or the hunt is foreplay. I can’t remember.”
“Oh god. This is going to end with you having sex on the couch again, isn’t it?”
“Man, that would be awesome! But April wasn’t so happy when you walked in on us the other day.”
“Neither was I.”
“Yeah,” Andy laughs. “You screamed so loud and turned all red. That was hilarious.”
“Right.” Ben leans into Andy a little more, still a bit concerned by the way his legs don’t seem to be working. “Can you help me find a couch?” he asks. “I think I need to lie down.”
“Sure.”
Andy half-carries, half-drags him across the club, Ben taking in the action around him like one watching life through a fishbowl. He sees Chris snapping a picture of himself with a couple who look half his age and Donna making out with a guy with a lot of muscles; April flits by, scowling at them, probably annoyed that her game was interrupted. Back at the bar, Tom has apparently coaxed Jean-Ralphio into a sitting position.
And there’s still no sign of Leslie.
“Here you go,” says Andy, dumping Ben onto the couch. He slouches down, resting his head against the back of the couch and splaying his legs out in front of him. “Dude, are you gonna be okay?”
“Maybe.” He blinks as Andy sits down next to him. “It’s been a weird night.”
“I know. Did you see those two guys get in a fight over Donna? That was awesome. They made that Jean-Ralphio guy cry.”
“Yeah, no. I missed it.”
“Too bad. It was hilarious.”
Ben nods, frowning as April walks past and makes a threatening gesture, but Andy just laughs.
“Oh hey, did you find Leslie?” he asks, as if suddenly remembering something he forgot. He gives April a small wave, apparently unconcerned that she obviously wants to continue their game, and she rolls her eyes and stalks toward the bar. “She was looking for you.”
“Is she still here?”
Andy shrugs. “Probably. How’s that going anyway?”
“Not great.” Reflexively, Ben reaches for his cell phone, but the only message is from April, telling him to go away. “Chris is trying to set us up without knowing he’s setting us up and I went along with it and it’ll probably end up blowing up in my face because everything always does, you know?”
“I have no idea.”
Ben’s not sure he has any idea at this point either. Without thinking, he opens his email, pulling up the draft Chris wrote earlier and waving his other hand in its general direction. “I should probably read it, huh?”
“You should just tell Leslie,” says Andy. Absurdly, it sounds like practical advice. He must be drunker than he realized. “Just tell her how you feel.”
“Sure,” he agrees, laughing a little.
“Yeah. Practice on me,” Andy insists. “Pretend I’m Leslie.”
“Not possible,” Ben mutters. What had Chris said earlier? He made commonplace observations? Right now he can’t even come up with those. Dimly, he looks down at the email, the words going in and out of focus as he stares. Curiosity is getting the better of him, and mindlessly, he starts to read aloud, the words slurring together as he speaks. “’I know this might come as a surprise, but it’s important to be honest and tell people how you feel. You’ve become one of my dearest friends, and I can’t imagine my life without you. I know every day would be a little less special, filled with less humor, joy and beauty, if you weren’t there. So I can’t let another day pass without telling you the truth. I’m crazy about you. I know this could change everything between us, and I know that the timing probably isn’t perfect, but I had to tell you. Because I think if we just take a chance, this could be something great.’”
“Dude.” Andy holds out a hand, and belatedly, Ben gives him a weak high five. “That’s perfect. Say that.”
“I don’t think it’s that easy.”
“Yeah it is. You think too much. You need to be more like me and stop using your brain.”
Ben nods, more to appease Andy than anything, and tucks his phone back into his pocket. Across the bar, April is still glaring daggers at them, and Andy finally seems to notice. He stands, and immediately Ben takes advantage of the empty space to lie down, purposefully ignoring the way the seat is slick with sweat where his roommate was sitting. He lifts a hand to his forehead and shuts his eyes.
“Are you sure you’re okay?”
“Fine.”
“Okay. I’ll let you know if I find Leslie.”
Ben manages a thumbs up, mostly grateful when he hears Andy bound away. It’s the closest to quiet solitude that he’s going to get in a crowded, noisy nightclub, and right now it’s the one thing he wants more than anything. Even with his eyes shut, he still feels dizzy, and he already knows he’s going to regret this in the morning.
All of this, probably. Even the non-alcohol related parts of the night.
He loses track of time then. Everything seems to move around him at an interminable pace, but he’d wager that in reality almost no time passes. He keeps his eyes shut, listening to the people around him, ignoring the couple who collapse next to him on the couch to make out, tapping his foot in time to the music and imagining Leslie in a dance-off with Chris. He thinks he’d like to see that. And all the while, like a soundtrack to his thoughts, Chris’ email keeps flitting through his mind, oddly perfect words that he can’t say.
So really it’s impossible to say whether it’s a matter of minutes or hours that he lies there before Leslie finds him, her foot lightly tapping against his ankle as she greets him. “You came.”
Ben lifts his arm away from his face and squints at her. “Leslie?”
“Yeah.” She offers him her hand and he takes it, allowing her to help him back to a sitting position. Immediately, the room begins to spin. “I think I drank too much,” he observes.
Leslie grins. “Looks like it.” She still holding his hand, he notices, but when he looks up at her, there’s no indication that she realizes she’s doing it. “Come on,” she says. “It’s time to get off the couch.”
“No.”
“Yeah.” She tugs, hard, but he just sinks back, trying to melt into the seat. “Come on. You’ll feel better.”
“Or I’ll puke.”
Leslie wrinkles her nose, still pulling on his hand. This time, he’s distracted enough to come willingly, lifting his own hand to his nose and petting it thoughtfully. “I can’t feel my nose,” he says as Leslie wraps an arm around him. His own arm snakes around her shoulders, but he’d be lying if he said he didn’t need the support.
“That’s okay,” says Leslie. “You don’t need your nose to walk.”
“Where are we going?”
“Home.”
“No, no, no.” He stops, but Leslie’s arm remains around his waist, the pressure of her fingers in his side urging him to move. “You just got here.”
“I’ve been here for hours.”
“Yeah. But you just got here.” He tries to look down at her, but pressed against his side, he can only see her profile. Her hair is sloppily tied back, the gleam of sweat along her hairline just scarcely visible in the dim lighting, but it’s the patch of skin beneath her ear that catches his eye. He wonders if she’d like it if he kissed her there; what it would feel like to press his lips right against that spot; if she’d moan or hum or push him away because she’s ticklish there. Maybe, he thinks, she’d want him to linger. To lavish that spot with his tongue before he pressed his lips all along her neck, her collarbone, all the way down to the gap in her shirt that reveals the swell of her breasts. If he had the chance, he’d brush his tongue against her skin there, kiss her again and again, until finally he’d have to break away to pull her shirt over her head.
He bumps into someone and slowly drags his eyes away from her chest. When did they start walking again?
“Eyes on the road,” he mutters, laughing, but it’s okay because Leslie’s grip just tightens, holding him closer and steadying him at the same time. And it feels good-it feels natural-to be with her like this, even if she’s only helping him because he’s drunk and his legs don’t work right.
It’s cool once they get outside, an immediate respite from the hot, staid air in the club, and he becomes uncomfortably aware that Leslie feels like pure heat against him wherever they touch. Still, by the time they reach her car and she releases him, it feels more like a loss than relief.
“I was looking for you,” he says. His eyes can’t stay still, flitting over her form in a haphazard way so he can’t focus on more than a tiny piece of her at a time. “Tonight. I thought you’d left.”
“I did. I had to take Ann home, but then I came back. Good thing, too, or you’d be spending the night on that couch.”
“It was pretty comfy.”
“I bet.”
He smiles, ducking his head for a second and staring at her ankle. It feels dream-like, her sudden appearance, dragging him out of the bar instead of letting Chris take him home, and knowing it’s actually happening is reassuring. “I’m glad,” he says, eyes moving back up her body and settling on her lips. “I’m glad you came back.”
The words come out the way he feels, and not the way he intends, soft and wanting and too full of the things they aren’t acknowledging. He thinks she falters for a moment, hands a little shakier as they dig through her purse, but steadfast in her pretended ignorance. He wishes…
Well, he wishes a lot of things.
As he stands there, watching Leslie as she searches for her keys and ignores him, he can feel that thought, all of those unanswered wishes, spreading like poison through his veins. It moves throughout his body, extending out to the tips of his fingers and all the way down to his toes until even the parts of him dulled by alcohol or time feel suddenly alive and aware. And it’s not just Leslie, not just months of unfulfilled desire; it’s every feeling he’s ever suppressed and every dream he’s given up on and every time he’s said no when he wanted to say yes.
Chris is right, he thinks dumbly, a thought that feels foreign and not entirely welcome. He gets in the way of his own happiness; he stands back when he wants to push forward, and for what? For the rules? For Chris?
Chris said himself that he wanted him to be happy.
God, even Andy implied that he’s being an idiot.
“Leslie.” Her name is on his lips before he means for it to be, propelled by alcohol and the terrifying Andy-Chris hybrid in his mind, and, maybe more than anything, by his own needs. He can’t seem to focus on anything else right now but how he feels, a selfish, dangerous game that he shouldn’t be playing. “Les?”
“Hmm?” She glances up casually, but seeing him, the look on her face changes, her stubbornly set happiness fading to some indefinable combination of apprehension and anticipation. It’s the kind of look that reminds him that he could potentially be free-falling toward solid ground without a parachute. The kind of look that steals his breath and his thoughts. The kind of look that makes him want to do something stupid.
And suddenly he finds that the only words he has left are not his own.
“I’m crazy about you,” he blurts out, and the way her eyes widen make him think he misread her, that maybe she didn’t realize what he was going to say. But now that he’s started, he can’t stop. “I am,” he says, nodding. Chris’ words seem to jumble in his mind, coming out the moment he remembers them and feeling like his own. “I know this could change everything between us, and I know that the timing probably isn’t perfect, but I had to tell you. Because I can’t imagine my life without you anymore. And-And because I think if we just take a chance, this could be something great.”
Leslie’s face softens, the look in her eyes loosening the tight knot of fear in his stomach, and when she steps toward him, he can feel his hands shaking. But whatever he was expecting, the hope is immediately dashed as she simply reaches for the handle of the door and opens it. His stomach plummets, his vision swimming, and when Leslie takes his hand and squeezes it, he can’t breathe. “We can’t do this now,” she says quietly. The words hang between them, intimate in a way that hurts almost more than anything else. “You’re drunk.”
“That doesn’t make it less true.”
Leslie sighs, and for a brief moment, she leans into him and lets her forehead rest lightly against his chest. His heart stutters, but by the time he moves to embrace her, she’s already pulled away. “We need to talk about this. We do. But not right now. Not like this. Ben.” She sighs, her fingers toying with his, and gives him a weak smile. “This is too important.”
She steps back before he can respond, giving him space to climb into her car, but for a moment he wants to protest. To insist they do this now and finally put to rest the months of tension between them. To reassure her that this isn’t the alcohol talking or his frustration or even Chris.
It’s just the right thing to say in exactly the wrong moment.
But Leslie stands there, not breaking eye contact, smiling a little uncertainly and asking him to have faith in her, and despite how much he wants to, he can’t say no.
Instead he gets in the car, closing his eyes and blocking out the world.
Even her.
Part Four!
Pairings/Characters: Ben/Leslie; ensemble
Word Count: 3600
Rating: PG-13
Setting: Post-Jerry's Painting
Summary: Chris decides to interfere in Ben's love life. Shenanigans ensue.
A/n: A million thank yous to shornt and americnxidiot for reading through this for me and giving me feedback. I'm beyond grateful for your help and encouragement! And thank you to everyone who commented on the last part. One more to go after this!
Part One || Part Two
Are you still here?
It takes longer than it should to type four words, but Ben feels tipsier now than he did an hour ago. Something about the crowd here, the insistent pulsating beat of the music and the stale smell of sweat and alcohol makes his head swim. Chris is already bouncing along to the music, ready and willing to be swallowed by the crowd and swept away; Ben just wants to find Leslie. He looks at his message again, carefully checking its coherence, and then he hits send.
“Should we dance?” asks Chris, apparently not noticing that he’s already doing so. Ben blinks at him and shakes his head. “I don’t think-“ he starts, but Chris grabs his arm and drags him further into the crowd before he can finish his protest.
Chris dances like he’s having a seizure, not necessarily drawing people to him but rather around him. The moment he starts flailing his arms and legs and jerking his head, the crowd parts to give him a wide breadth. And still people can’t seem to help but stare and smile, mostly because it’s obvious that Chris is having fun. Even with six beers pulsing through his veins, Ben is not that uninhibited, but at least it makes it easier to melt back into the crowd and watch.
“Dancing literally makes you feel alive,” Chris shouts at him, spinning around in a circle and waving his arms. “Don’t you think?”
“I tend to feel alive even when I’m not dancing.”
Chris laughs, pointing at him and then moving his arms like he’s doing a backstroke. There’s a sudden wail of pain, and Ben catches sight of Tom holding his hand to his head and darting out of the way. “He hit me!” Tom yells, though Chris doesn’t seem to have noticed. In fact, he just steps forward and grabs Tom by the elbow, pulling him back in and twirling him around in a circle. When he lets go, Tom stumbles backward into Ben, who catches him awkwardly.
“Is he drunk?”
“No,” says Ben, rolling his eyes and righting Tom. The other man is still rubbing his head as though he’s actually been wounded. “He just feels alive.” For a second, he glances back at Chris, now doing what appears to be a demented version of the hokey pokey, and then turns to Tom. “Hey, have you seen Leslie?”
“Yeah, she was here.”
“Was?”
“Actually,” says Tom, ignoring his request for tense clarification, “I’ve been looking for you.”
“I just got here.”
“Yeah, well, I need your help.” Tom grabs him by the elbow and tugs him through the crowd on the dance floor toward the bar. It’s littered with shot glasses and various bottles labeled with numbers, but that’s not what grabs Ben’s attention. “Sit here.”
“Uh, Tom?” Ben continues to stare at the man who lies curled in a fetal position next to the barstool as Tom shoves him into the seat. “Is he okay?”
“Who?” Tom follows Ben’s line of sight and nods. “Oh, my boy Jean-Ralphio? Yeah, he’s fine.”
Ben raises an eyebrow, but Tom has already settled in the seat next to him, apparently unconcerned. “You don’t think we should help him?”
“Dude, I tried, but he’s not going anywhere right now. Don’t worry about it. He always gets like this when he drinks too much.”
From the floor, Jean-Ralphio whimpers. “Will someone cuddle me?”
“Uh…”
“Here. Drink this.”
Ben lifts his eyes from the grown man on the floor to the amber-colored liquid Tom has placed in front of him. It’s a toss-up between which of them he wants to ignore more right now. “What is this?”
“This is the next big thing. The only drink guaranteed to change your life.”
“Is this what he was drinking?”
“Look, I need someone to be my lab monkey and try this. I have to perfect it before we go live next week.”
“Okay.”
“So you’ll do it?”
“No.”
“Ple-e-e-e-ease. It’s just three shots.”
Ben looks down at Jean-Ralphio. “Three shots of what?”
“I can’t say. This is a blind taste test.” Then, as if just noticing that Ben’s still concerned, he adds, “Oh. Don’t worry. He had way more than that.”
In some wild hope that someone is going to intercede, Ben glances around the bar, but Chris has been swallowed by the crowd on the dance floor-many of whom now seem to be cheering for him-and Leslie is still nowhere in sight. Ben looks at his phone, but there aren’t any new messages.
Tom nudges the shot a little closer, and Ben sighs. What difference does it make at this point? “Yeah,” he concedes. “Okay. Just three.”
“Just three, I swear.”
Five shots later, Ben is ready to join Jean-Ralphio on the floor. Tom keeps scribbling notes in a notebook with a dragon on the cover, and then insistently pushes another shot toward Ben-“You can’t just say they all taste the same. Try this one again.”-at which point Ben completely understands why Jean-Ralphio crawled under the bar to get away.
“They’re good. All good,” he says, pushing the shot away and stumbling off of his barstool. He grabs Tom to regain his balance, but Tom just wrenches his arm away and jots something else in the notebook. For a moment, Ben stands there swaying, and then he remember his legs are there. “I am going over there now,” he says, pointing nowhere in particular.
“Fine. Thanks for being absolutely no help,” snaps Tom.
As Ben walks away, he can hear him begging Jean-Ralphio to get up, which is stupid because lying down is clearly the better option. In fact, Ben thinks he might do that himself. Just until he can feel his legs again. Or at least control the muscles in his face that won’t seem to stop smiling. He lifts his hands to his face and tries to pull his smile down to a more neutral expression, but it doesn’t seem to work.
“You think I won’t use a human shield?”
Two hands grab Ben’s arms tightly, jerking him around to face the way he just came. He stumbles over his own feet, nearly falling down, and catches a glimpse of Andy. Awkwardly, he cranes his neck back, and in the process, knocks his head against April’s. Her claw-like grip on his arms tightens.
“Hey,” he says, trying to blow some of April’s hair out of his face and mostly managing to spit on her. “What are you doing?”
“I think he’s drunk, babe.”
“So?”
Ben laughs, relaxing his body and leaning back into April’s arms. It’s not exactly comfortable, but it’s better than standing on his own. “What are you doing?” she hisses, moving her hands from his arms to his back. She shoves him and he lurches forward into Andy, who is, unsurprisingly, a more comfortable if sweatier pillow.
“Sorry about that,” says Andy. “April likes to use human shields when we play tag.”
“You’re playing tag?”
“Yeah. Well, I mean, I’m chasing her because she said if I catch her we can make out in public, so it’s like tag. It’s the hunt for foreplay. Or the hunt is foreplay. I can’t remember.”
“Oh god. This is going to end with you having sex on the couch again, isn’t it?”
“Man, that would be awesome! But April wasn’t so happy when you walked in on us the other day.”
“Neither was I.”
“Yeah,” Andy laughs. “You screamed so loud and turned all red. That was hilarious.”
“Right.” Ben leans into Andy a little more, still a bit concerned by the way his legs don’t seem to be working. “Can you help me find a couch?” he asks. “I think I need to lie down.”
“Sure.”
Andy half-carries, half-drags him across the club, Ben taking in the action around him like one watching life through a fishbowl. He sees Chris snapping a picture of himself with a couple who look half his age and Donna making out with a guy with a lot of muscles; April flits by, scowling at them, probably annoyed that her game was interrupted. Back at the bar, Tom has apparently coaxed Jean-Ralphio into a sitting position.
And there’s still no sign of Leslie.
“Here you go,” says Andy, dumping Ben onto the couch. He slouches down, resting his head against the back of the couch and splaying his legs out in front of him. “Dude, are you gonna be okay?”
“Maybe.” He blinks as Andy sits down next to him. “It’s been a weird night.”
“I know. Did you see those two guys get in a fight over Donna? That was awesome. They made that Jean-Ralphio guy cry.”
“Yeah, no. I missed it.”
“Too bad. It was hilarious.”
Ben nods, frowning as April walks past and makes a threatening gesture, but Andy just laughs.
“Oh hey, did you find Leslie?” he asks, as if suddenly remembering something he forgot. He gives April a small wave, apparently unconcerned that she obviously wants to continue their game, and she rolls her eyes and stalks toward the bar. “She was looking for you.”
“Is she still here?”
Andy shrugs. “Probably. How’s that going anyway?”
“Not great.” Reflexively, Ben reaches for his cell phone, but the only message is from April, telling him to go away. “Chris is trying to set us up without knowing he’s setting us up and I went along with it and it’ll probably end up blowing up in my face because everything always does, you know?”
“I have no idea.”
Ben’s not sure he has any idea at this point either. Without thinking, he opens his email, pulling up the draft Chris wrote earlier and waving his other hand in its general direction. “I should probably read it, huh?”
“You should just tell Leslie,” says Andy. Absurdly, it sounds like practical advice. He must be drunker than he realized. “Just tell her how you feel.”
“Sure,” he agrees, laughing a little.
“Yeah. Practice on me,” Andy insists. “Pretend I’m Leslie.”
“Not possible,” Ben mutters. What had Chris said earlier? He made commonplace observations? Right now he can’t even come up with those. Dimly, he looks down at the email, the words going in and out of focus as he stares. Curiosity is getting the better of him, and mindlessly, he starts to read aloud, the words slurring together as he speaks. “’I know this might come as a surprise, but it’s important to be honest and tell people how you feel. You’ve become one of my dearest friends, and I can’t imagine my life without you. I know every day would be a little less special, filled with less humor, joy and beauty, if you weren’t there. So I can’t let another day pass without telling you the truth. I’m crazy about you. I know this could change everything between us, and I know that the timing probably isn’t perfect, but I had to tell you. Because I think if we just take a chance, this could be something great.’”
“Dude.” Andy holds out a hand, and belatedly, Ben gives him a weak high five. “That’s perfect. Say that.”
“I don’t think it’s that easy.”
“Yeah it is. You think too much. You need to be more like me and stop using your brain.”
Ben nods, more to appease Andy than anything, and tucks his phone back into his pocket. Across the bar, April is still glaring daggers at them, and Andy finally seems to notice. He stands, and immediately Ben takes advantage of the empty space to lie down, purposefully ignoring the way the seat is slick with sweat where his roommate was sitting. He lifts a hand to his forehead and shuts his eyes.
“Are you sure you’re okay?”
“Fine.”
“Okay. I’ll let you know if I find Leslie.”
Ben manages a thumbs up, mostly grateful when he hears Andy bound away. It’s the closest to quiet solitude that he’s going to get in a crowded, noisy nightclub, and right now it’s the one thing he wants more than anything. Even with his eyes shut, he still feels dizzy, and he already knows he’s going to regret this in the morning.
All of this, probably. Even the non-alcohol related parts of the night.
He loses track of time then. Everything seems to move around him at an interminable pace, but he’d wager that in reality almost no time passes. He keeps his eyes shut, listening to the people around him, ignoring the couple who collapse next to him on the couch to make out, tapping his foot in time to the music and imagining Leslie in a dance-off with Chris. He thinks he’d like to see that. And all the while, like a soundtrack to his thoughts, Chris’ email keeps flitting through his mind, oddly perfect words that he can’t say.
So really it’s impossible to say whether it’s a matter of minutes or hours that he lies there before Leslie finds him, her foot lightly tapping against his ankle as she greets him. “You came.”
Ben lifts his arm away from his face and squints at her. “Leslie?”
“Yeah.” She offers him her hand and he takes it, allowing her to help him back to a sitting position. Immediately, the room begins to spin. “I think I drank too much,” he observes.
Leslie grins. “Looks like it.” She still holding his hand, he notices, but when he looks up at her, there’s no indication that she realizes she’s doing it. “Come on,” she says. “It’s time to get off the couch.”
“No.”
“Yeah.” She tugs, hard, but he just sinks back, trying to melt into the seat. “Come on. You’ll feel better.”
“Or I’ll puke.”
Leslie wrinkles her nose, still pulling on his hand. This time, he’s distracted enough to come willingly, lifting his own hand to his nose and petting it thoughtfully. “I can’t feel my nose,” he says as Leslie wraps an arm around him. His own arm snakes around her shoulders, but he’d be lying if he said he didn’t need the support.
“That’s okay,” says Leslie. “You don’t need your nose to walk.”
“Where are we going?”
“Home.”
“No, no, no.” He stops, but Leslie’s arm remains around his waist, the pressure of her fingers in his side urging him to move. “You just got here.”
“I’ve been here for hours.”
“Yeah. But you just got here.” He tries to look down at her, but pressed against his side, he can only see her profile. Her hair is sloppily tied back, the gleam of sweat along her hairline just scarcely visible in the dim lighting, but it’s the patch of skin beneath her ear that catches his eye. He wonders if she’d like it if he kissed her there; what it would feel like to press his lips right against that spot; if she’d moan or hum or push him away because she’s ticklish there. Maybe, he thinks, she’d want him to linger. To lavish that spot with his tongue before he pressed his lips all along her neck, her collarbone, all the way down to the gap in her shirt that reveals the swell of her breasts. If he had the chance, he’d brush his tongue against her skin there, kiss her again and again, until finally he’d have to break away to pull her shirt over her head.
He bumps into someone and slowly drags his eyes away from her chest. When did they start walking again?
“Eyes on the road,” he mutters, laughing, but it’s okay because Leslie’s grip just tightens, holding him closer and steadying him at the same time. And it feels good-it feels natural-to be with her like this, even if she’s only helping him because he’s drunk and his legs don’t work right.
It’s cool once they get outside, an immediate respite from the hot, staid air in the club, and he becomes uncomfortably aware that Leslie feels like pure heat against him wherever they touch. Still, by the time they reach her car and she releases him, it feels more like a loss than relief.
“I was looking for you,” he says. His eyes can’t stay still, flitting over her form in a haphazard way so he can’t focus on more than a tiny piece of her at a time. “Tonight. I thought you’d left.”
“I did. I had to take Ann home, but then I came back. Good thing, too, or you’d be spending the night on that couch.”
“It was pretty comfy.”
“I bet.”
He smiles, ducking his head for a second and staring at her ankle. It feels dream-like, her sudden appearance, dragging him out of the bar instead of letting Chris take him home, and knowing it’s actually happening is reassuring. “I’m glad,” he says, eyes moving back up her body and settling on her lips. “I’m glad you came back.”
The words come out the way he feels, and not the way he intends, soft and wanting and too full of the things they aren’t acknowledging. He thinks she falters for a moment, hands a little shakier as they dig through her purse, but steadfast in her pretended ignorance. He wishes…
Well, he wishes a lot of things.
As he stands there, watching Leslie as she searches for her keys and ignores him, he can feel that thought, all of those unanswered wishes, spreading like poison through his veins. It moves throughout his body, extending out to the tips of his fingers and all the way down to his toes until even the parts of him dulled by alcohol or time feel suddenly alive and aware. And it’s not just Leslie, not just months of unfulfilled desire; it’s every feeling he’s ever suppressed and every dream he’s given up on and every time he’s said no when he wanted to say yes.
Chris is right, he thinks dumbly, a thought that feels foreign and not entirely welcome. He gets in the way of his own happiness; he stands back when he wants to push forward, and for what? For the rules? For Chris?
Chris said himself that he wanted him to be happy.
God, even Andy implied that he’s being an idiot.
“Leslie.” Her name is on his lips before he means for it to be, propelled by alcohol and the terrifying Andy-Chris hybrid in his mind, and, maybe more than anything, by his own needs. He can’t seem to focus on anything else right now but how he feels, a selfish, dangerous game that he shouldn’t be playing. “Les?”
“Hmm?” She glances up casually, but seeing him, the look on her face changes, her stubbornly set happiness fading to some indefinable combination of apprehension and anticipation. It’s the kind of look that reminds him that he could potentially be free-falling toward solid ground without a parachute. The kind of look that steals his breath and his thoughts. The kind of look that makes him want to do something stupid.
And suddenly he finds that the only words he has left are not his own.
“I’m crazy about you,” he blurts out, and the way her eyes widen make him think he misread her, that maybe she didn’t realize what he was going to say. But now that he’s started, he can’t stop. “I am,” he says, nodding. Chris’ words seem to jumble in his mind, coming out the moment he remembers them and feeling like his own. “I know this could change everything between us, and I know that the timing probably isn’t perfect, but I had to tell you. Because I can’t imagine my life without you anymore. And-And because I think if we just take a chance, this could be something great.”
Leslie’s face softens, the look in her eyes loosening the tight knot of fear in his stomach, and when she steps toward him, he can feel his hands shaking. But whatever he was expecting, the hope is immediately dashed as she simply reaches for the handle of the door and opens it. His stomach plummets, his vision swimming, and when Leslie takes his hand and squeezes it, he can’t breathe. “We can’t do this now,” she says quietly. The words hang between them, intimate in a way that hurts almost more than anything else. “You’re drunk.”
“That doesn’t make it less true.”
Leslie sighs, and for a brief moment, she leans into him and lets her forehead rest lightly against his chest. His heart stutters, but by the time he moves to embrace her, she’s already pulled away. “We need to talk about this. We do. But not right now. Not like this. Ben.” She sighs, her fingers toying with his, and gives him a weak smile. “This is too important.”
She steps back before he can respond, giving him space to climb into her car, but for a moment he wants to protest. To insist they do this now and finally put to rest the months of tension between them. To reassure her that this isn’t the alcohol talking or his frustration or even Chris.
It’s just the right thing to say in exactly the wrong moment.
But Leslie stands there, not breaking eye contact, smiling a little uncertainly and asking him to have faith in her, and despite how much he wants to, he can’t say no.
Instead he gets in the car, closing his eyes and blocking out the world.
Even her.
Part Four!