fic: falling slowly, leslie/ben, pg13
title: Falling Slowly
pairing: Leslie/Ben
rating: PG13?
words: ~8400
notes: College AU based on the movie/musical Once. Basically I saw it on Broadway a month ago and then watched the movie and then listened to the music so much that an AU formed in my head. I've been writing this for a month now and it's definitely the hardest I think I've worked on a fic, and I think it's finally ready. I'd suggest maybe putting on the soundtrack or a Swell Season album for mood setting~ Thanks to the constant hand holding and encouragement from americnxidiot and ashisfriendly.
Ben Wyatt is down on his luck.
No, correction, former mayor but recently impeached Ben Wyatt is down on his luck, only ten times more dramatic than that.
Eighteen year old Ben Wyatt is in his room, grounded, and everyone in his town hates him, and the girl he liked all through high school-- the one who finally looked at him this year-- has dumped his ass and run off to college in some other state.
What else is new in Partridge these days?
So, to say real life smacked him in the face after high school is an exaggeration. It’s been more than a few days, now, of avoiding human contact and wearing the same pair of patched jeans, day in and day out. He’s pretty sure this particular flannel has it’s own stench by now, but as long as his parents are still cohorting in this punishment (and it’s the only thing they’ve even agreed on in years), he’s gonna keep sitting in this room, throwing his Doc Martens at the wall while hitting the replay button on “Creep” until his sister screams at him again.
This isn’t what he had in mind when his ambitions took him to City Hall.
Also, he might be going a little insane.
Downstairs, he can hear his mom yelling in the phone, accusations about broken marriages and how Steve never sees the kids and “is this new one even big enough to go on roller coasters?” Stephanie’s practicing violin on the other side of the hall and the repetitive beats of Super Mario are loudly blasting out of Henry’s room, and he pounds his fist against the wall in exasperation.
Screw politics. Fuck government, and helping people, and falling in love, and trying to do fucking anything.
At eighteen, Ben Wyatt is done with life, and the decision feels like a good one.
---
It’s Stephanie who gets his parents to finally budge, complaining about his “pathetic sad-boy music” and the fact that people in the neighborhood have taken to egging her brand new car just because it’s in front of their house.
And what the hell -- it’s spring but still cool in Minnesota, and he’s got nothing better to do than hide from it all, so he calls up his best friend George in hopes that someone who’s moved out of state might not hate him yet.
It’s then that he finds himself sleeping on a futon on the outskirts of the Indiana University campus, wondering why the hell George went to a school somewhere just as mundane as Minnesota when Chicago is right there.
Chicago, where Cindy fled to when everyone realized she’d been dating the Ice Clown.
On second thought, screw Chicago.
George turns out to not hate him, but also doesn’t care very much. It’s been a whole year; Ben deferred college for holding office but George became an amateur alcoholic. Every night he returns to the dorm where Ben lays half asleep on the futon. He plops down random cans of Miller Lite for Ben, and retreats to his room to talk on the phone with his new girlfriend.
Even without the discipline of his parents, it’s like being grounded all over again.
---
After a week, George finally says more than three words to Ben and invites him out to the campus bar that doesn’t card. And Ben’s unsure of entering the real world until he remembers that no one knows him here, not unless college kids are perusing the last few articles in the back of last February’s People magazine.
Being a nobody again might be kind of nice.
Once they reach the bar, George high fives a bunch of beefy looking slackers in skullcaps and oversize hoodies, and tells Ben to hold on while digging in his pocket.
To Ben’s surprise, he reveals an American History textbook.
“Finals are coming. You don’t mind, right, dude?”
Of-fucking-course.
---
Halfway through George’s essay on the Civil War, Ben realizes he’s being watched by someone just beyond the dim parking lot lighting.
“Um, hello.”
The mysterious person whom he hopes to god isn’t a murderer steps into the light, and it’s not a criminal at all but a girl. Short, blonde, wearing a letterman jacket from a high school he doesn’t recognize.
“McMullan?” she asks, voice upbeat and full of innocent curiosity. He feels like he should be squinting at her.
“What?”
“American history.” She points at the textbook in his lap. “Do you have McMullan? I just finished my final paper today, it was on women’s suffrage. What about yours?”
“Oh, I’m not a student,” he responds dumbly, offering no further explanation. Her brow wrinkles in confusion and he kind of feels like an idiot, so he turns his attention away from her wide, searching eyes and back to the paper in front of him.
“Do you like history?”
“I like it fine.” He scribbles out something barely legible about Ulysses S. Grant, and realizes the girl’s not leaving. With a sigh, he looks back up at her. “I’m staying with a friend. This was his idea of a night out. He’s there.” Ben waves his arm back at the bar, which is now bustling with activity and loudly blasting jock jams. “And I’m here.”
“Writing about history is more fun than underage drinking anyway.”
He hopes that’s it so he can get back to this shitty chicken scratch of an argument, but she seems to find his silence an open invitation and plops herself down next to him on the curb.
“I’m majoring in history, but it was a hard choice between that, women’s studies, and political science. Do you like politics?”
He laughs bitterly to himself.
“You don’t have to be an ass about it.”
He can’t help but laugh again, less sarcastic and more amused. Who is this girl? He turns his head and finally, really looks at her. She’s pretty, with bright eyes and soft curls. While she’s been cheerful and inquisitive this whole time, she actually looks ticked off now. It’s kind of cute.
He’s in the middle of Nowheresville, Indiana, with a random stranger he’ll probably never see again, who actually seems interested in what he has to say.
For the first time since the impeachment, he tests the waters.
“Have you ever heard of a town called Partridge, Minnesota?”
Her eyebrows immediately raise, and he sees the light go off in her head as she studies his face. All of a sudden, she grins.
“You’re Benji Wyatt.”
He expected to feel horrible the first time someone recognized him. He’s still not entirely sure why he brought it up at all; it’s not well lit and she likely wouldn’t have noticed. But he took a chance and she’s smiling like he’s something to be excited over, and he feels a little itch that lifts the corner of his mouth, just the small beginnings of a smile.
“I am.”
“Wow.” She looks impressed, speechless even. “I read about you and was so jealous! It’s my dream to be a mayor. Well, it’s a stepping stone to my dream, but an important one. Holding political office before college? God, what is it like?”
“Well--”
“No!” she interrupts, looking even more charged, if possible. “This is it! This is my extra credit! McMullan offered extra points to anyone who can interview someone in government! What are you doing tomorrow?”
“Uh...”
“Great, I’ll see you tomorrow and have prepared questions written down. Where will you be, do you think?”
He looks down lamely at the school work in his lap, too speechless to correct this.
“The library, maybe?”
Her nose scrunches in disgust and it’s all he can do to not chuckle.
“Well, if I have to, I can find you there.” She checks her watch and her eyebrows raise. “I should really get going, it’s late. I’m Leslie, by the way. Leslie Knope. I’ll see you tomorrow!”
With a wave, she’s gone quicker than she appeared.
And tomorrow she expects an interview with Partridge’s overhyped teenage mayor.
He’s already screwed this up.
---
He doesn’t ever actually enter the library, deciding that George doesn’t deserve a researched essay (and Ben knows what he’s writing about anyway). But he does get himself to leave the confines of George’s dorm room during the day. There was something nice about fresh air and human interaction with someone who doesn’t look at him with any level of disdain or disappointment, and while he’s not exactly going to seek her out, it’s nice to know she’s out there, smiling at people and being interested in their lives.
He wishes he was still that excited about anything.
But it’s not like he can wallow for too long, because on his third circle of the quad, she finds him anyway.
“You didn’t go to the library,” she calls out, hurrying from behind him once he’s been spotted. But she doesn’t sound upset.
“Yeah, I’m not really in a library kind of mood.”
“Is anyone ever?”
She falls into step beside him, gripping a large textbook against her chest.
“So, can I ask you some questions?” He looks over and she looks so much younger in broad daylight, though they must be about the same age. Her eyes are big and blue, her lips a pale pink. Her hair’s pulled back in a messy ponytail and he likes the way a few curls fall onto her neck.
“You’re not gonna leave me alone, are you?” Not that he really minds. In fact, he’s secretly grateful for the company.
“Nope.” She grins.
“Alright, this might take a while.”
---
He’s not sure what makes him do it, but somehow he’s invited her to lunch and everything comes spilling out. She’s uncharacteristically quiet (or so he assumes, from how little he knows her at this point) as he stares at his hands and tell the tragic tale of an ice rink gone wrong and a stupid kid who had no idea how to be a leader.
“Wow. So you just left town?”
“What else was I supposed to do? Everyone hates me, they were even taunting my family and my girlfriend ran out of town, and--” He sighs heavily, giving up. This is the first he’s spoken to someone about this, someone who wasn’t there and doesn’t already know what a joke his life’s become. “Ex-girlfriend, I guess.”
“You were just trying to do something nice for your town. I know the feeling.”
For the first time she looks a little shy, and he smiles. There’s a lot more to Leslie Knope than he thought, and he wants to find out more.
“You want to run for office one day, don’t you?”
She looks up in surprise.
“How’d you know?”
He doesn’t want to spend more time on him; now he just wants to know who this girl is, where her passion comes from and what she wants to do with it. He bypasses her question with another of his own.
“Have you always liked politics this much?”
“My father was a history teacher,” she says dreamily, a small smile playing on her lips. “He died in a car crash when I was ten, but he played me a lot of Schoolhouse Rock before he left.”
“The Preamble?”
“We the people...” she starts singing, before trailing off in a giggle. She pauses in thought for a moment. “My mom too, she works for the school board in my town. My dad would teach me about powerful women in the past and then point to my mom. I’ve always wanted to be like her.”
Ben grins. He likes this. He might like her, too.
“So if you really hate the library so much, where do you do your studying?”
---
She leads him on a walk across campus, until they reach the outskirts of school grounds and the library is nowhere in sight. He follows as she barrels down a residential street; the sun has started gently setting and he pulls his coat around him as the air cools down.
They end up at a park. It’s nothing significant: a small playground for children, some big old trees just starting to bloom, a bronze statue of someone he doesn’t recognize. Still, her eyes light up like she’s entered Disneyland and has it all to herself.
He can’t stop looking at her.
“Over here’s my favorite tree.” She waves her hand toward a particularly large oak tree, with just the slightest hint of green at it’s branch tips. Once she reaches it’s roots, she moves to sit down, and he juts forward.
“Oh, you shouldn’t--” he flails at his coat buttons suddenly. “Here, you can sit on--”
“It’s okay,” she giggles, and lowers herself down to the ground. “It’s March in Indiana. You’ll need your coat once the sun is down.”
She rests against the trunk and he awkwardly stands, hands in his pockets, berating himself. Offering his coat to sit on, really? Smooth...
Her whole face wrinkles as she looks up at him, the setting sun making her squint. She smiles and pats the ground next to her, and yeah, it would probably make more sense if he was sitting there.
“This place reminds me of a park back at home, Ramsett Park. That was always where I went to think, so I found this place here.”
“Where are you from?” he asks, wondering what sort of distance he should keep, if his shoulder brushing hers is weird or not.
“Pawnee. It’s not too far from here, just two hours’ drive. I miss it. Do you miss Partridge?”
“Um, they don’t really want me there, so...”
“Did you apply to college?” she asks, breaking the silence.
“I did. I mean, my mom made me. I kind of half-assed the applications.” He shrugs, feeling a little bit of shame.
She appears to be thinking this over, her mouth quirked to the ride.
They sit in silence, watching the sky change color. Ben starts thinking about his hometown, if he’ll ever be welcome there again. Will his father always look at him in disappointment? Is Stephanie going to avoid him forever?
“I can’t imagine not having a hometown to go back to.” He’s startled by the sound of her voice. “I miss Pawnee so much when I’m not there.”
“I’ll find somewhere else, maybe, some day.” Truthfully, he’s not even sure he believes that, but it sounds like the right thing to say. He’s quiet and she lets him be, which he’s grateful for.
“Do you mind if I write some of this stuff down?”
He’s startled by the sound of her voice.
“Hm?”
“For the extra credit. I mean, it’s not necessary, and I don’t want to if you’re not comfortable with it. But...” She shrugs, and he wonders if she ever stops smiling for more than a few minutes at a time.
“But what?”
“Someone should tell your story, y’know?”
---
When they start walking back toward campus, just before the sun slips below the horizon, he invites her over.
“Just to hang out, or whatever. Uh. George should be out, it’s ‘Thirsty Thursday.’ You can ask more interview questions?”
“Sure.”
She doesn’t ask him too much once they’re back, just jotting a few facts down in her notepad. He just wants to look at her, really, this strangely optimistic girl who’s suddenly curled in the corner of his couch and looking at him like what he has to say matters.
He hasn’t felt this important in a long, long time.
When she runs out of things to ask, he’s desperate to keep feeling like this, to keep her in his grasp. It’s just so much better than being alone, than thinking about how much he hates himself and how fucked he is.
“I should probably get going,” she announces, and starts to pull her coat back on. He frantically shoots his hand out toward her arm, fingers brushing against her skin. She’s warm and soft and he feels a little crazy.
“Stay,” he pleads gently, fingers reaching more when she draws away. “Stay over.”
“What do you mean?” she asks, confused. It’s charming, how much it’s not connecting for her, how innocent and befuddled her eyes are. He wants to brush the stray curls off her forehead so he scoots closer and reaches, but thinks better and his hand falls to his thigh with a loud slap.
“Stay,” he whispers again, inching a little closer. It’s been a long time since he kissed someone, but he wants to feel it, wants to feel wanted and liked and if she’d only understand and close the gap, if he could only touch her, it’s been so long since he’s been with anyone, and she smells so nice and smiled at him so much today... “Spend the night.”
Her face changes as she realizes, her brow furrowing and lips parting. But he fails to realize it’s in anger and not agreement until it’s a second too late. Her hand pushes at his chest and she gathers herself up and off the couch.
“You’re a jerk,” she spits at him. In a flurry of movement, she turns on her heel and slams the door behind her.
And once he realizes how badly he misread this, what a selfish fucking prick he is, he can’t blame her for storming out. Or for throwing her pen at his head.
“You idiot,” he groans to himself, his face in his hands.
Typical Ben Wyatt. Something good happens, someone sweet and caring who actually wants to get to know him, and he goes and fucks it up.
And now he’ll probably never see her again, not that he even deserves to.
Fuck.
---
The next afternoon, he wanders around aimlessly, hands stuffed into the pockets of his hoodie while he thinks about how pathetic he is.
He wants to apologize, he really does, because she deserves so much better. Why was she even wasting her time on a fuck-up like him?
And when he passes the library, he stops and stares up. It makes him smile, thinking about the weird twitch she got whenever this place was mentioned. Why would Leslie Knope hate a building full of books? He’ll probably never know, now.
He’s about to continue his walk when, suddenly, Leslie bursts out the front doors at a light jog, nearly toppling him over.
“Oh, sorry, I--” She stops when she sees it’s him, and her eyes narrow.
“Leslie,” he stammers. God, part of him wants to crawl into the nearest hole. He really didn’t think he’d have to face her again, and he knows he deserves a lot worse than her scowl, but this is really awful. “Oh god, I’m so--”
“Sorry?”
“Yeah, that.”
“Hmm.”
She clutches the strap of her bag to her chest, her eyes calculating him. He can feel the sweat in his palms, and there’s a frantic need to do something, anything more, anything to fix this.
“I didn’t mean to-- god, I’m an idiot.” He scratches the back of his head and looks down at his scuffed-up chucks. It makes him smile a little to see her wearing her own pair, albeit a bit cleaner than his. “That wasn’t fair. To you. Not at all, and that’s not all I thought this--I mean, that’s not what I meant. I wasn’t thinking. I shouldn’t have. I was just lonely, and, y’know... God, I just, I’m, I mean if I just--”
He chances another glance at her face, and he’s startled. She’s biting her lip in an attempt to not smile. When his eyes meet hers, she raises her eyebrows.
“That all?”
“Um, yeah. I think I’m done.”
“Well then.”
She starts to walk away and his stomach bottoms out. Fuck, he didn’t even know how shitty this could feel, that this mattered so much, but goddamnit--
Once she’s a few steps ahead, she turns around expectantly.
“You coming?”
His stomach leaps like it’s Christmas morning. The grin on his face probably makes him look like an even bigger moron.
“Really?”
She shyly nods her head toward the sidewalk and keeps walking, and he nearly trips over his own feet in an effort to keep up with her. By some miracle, he might not have fucked this up yet.
“I really am. Sorry, you know.”
“You better be.” Smiling or not, he knows to take her seriously.
“You may be getting me extra credit, but I still think you’re an ass.”
To her credit, she’s been trying so, so hard to keep a straight face. It’s just working so badly that he bursts out laughing, and the warm cackle of her laugh joins him like she’s relieved he broke first.
“Can’t believe you just came out of the library,” he teases, bumping her shoulder.
“I had a study group in there,” she explains hurriedly, not meeting his eye.
“Mmhmm.”
Their walk past rows of old buildings and just-blooming trees is then quiet, but comfortable. He realizes that even though he’s a full head taller than her, she walks so briskly that he’s hurrying to keep up, winding in and out of other students as she plows right on down the path.
How he hasn’t massively ruined this, he isn’t sure. And he can tell she’s still mad a little, still not entirely over it, but she somehow doesn’t hate him, which is more than his entire hometown can say. So he’s happy to follow her quick gait as best as he can, wherever she ends up leading him.
But he sure didn’t expect to be led to her dorm building.
“Ah, so I guess I’ll leave...”
She pauses with one hand on the door handle, like she forgot he was there, or forgot that it was maybe a little strange for him to follow her into her dorm.
“I have more questions,” she says slowly, like she’s figuring out a reason as she goes along. “My roommate should be at calculus, and we only seem to bump into each other at random, so.”
Once they’re inside the building and have walked down a few winding hallways and up a staircase, he feels the shaking in his hands subside a bit. It’s just, she makes him feel kind of jumpy sometimes, and he’s so scared of disappointing her again.
With her key in the lock of her door, they pause.
“Just promise not to get weird again,” she asserts.
“Swear on my life.” He raises his hands in the air, then drops them pathetically.
“Alright.”
He shuts the door behind him and instantly slips on a stray sock before realizing the room’s practically a war zone. She’s flopped down on the only clean corner of her bed, but there’s piles of books covering her desk, magazine cut-outs and newspaper articles littering the walls, three pictures of Hillary Clinton crowding the bookshelf, and crumpled up notebook paper all over the floor.
A sneak peak over to the other side of the room gives way to a much clearer view, even if Leslie’s junk seems to be overflowing into her roommate’s half.
“I, uh, didn’t clean beforehand,” she tells him, apology in her tone. She motions at a desk chair covered in sweatshirts. “Feel free to move that stuff.”
He carefully sets the sweatshirts on the floor and sits at the edge of the chair. Leslie’s begun rifling through her bag, making an additional pile of books on her bed that must be homework. He sees a Nancy Reagan biography peeking out between math textbooks.
“Oh, I haven’t read that one yet,” he notes, pointing out at it. “Any good?”
Leslie pauses and looks at him with scrutinizing eyes. But after a moment her face softens, and she smiles a little at him.
“Definitely interesting, she was a powerful woman. The politics, though...” She wrinkles her nose. “Well, anyway. You read political biographies?”
“I mean... I did.”
He shrugs lamely and lets her continue shuffling her books around the bed. Even though her room is a disaster zone, he likes it. It screams Leslie Knope and he feels like he learns more about her with just a look around her bookshelf or over her desk. The corner of a familiar magazine is poking through from under a binder, and he cautiously pulls it out to take a look.
And fucking Janet Reno is looking back at him.
“You have this?”
He slowly starts flipping through it as her face goes beet red, and she scrambles for an answer.
“I mean, I had to buy a magazine with Janet on the front, I didn’t even--”
His article, that stupid profile of his spectacular rise in politics, is dog-earred.
“It didn’t click entirely until you mentioned Partridge, but I was so jealous of you.”
He feels a little heat in his own face. She moves on her bed, and her planner falls off the stack and lands open, and a quick glance shows him “PAWNEE!!!!!” in red ink over this weekend, circled with a few smiley faces.
“Oh, you’re going home this weekend?”
“I was going to, but I can’t afford the bus ticket.”
She snatches up her planner and starts scribbling in it ferociously, and Ben might not know her super well yet, but he knows her enough to see that her firmly set jaw is hiding something. Her eyes are glassy and she’s deliberately not looking at him, studying the swipe of her pen against the paper.
He kind of wants to give her the world.
“I have a car,” he offers. Her head immediately snaps up.
“Really?”
“Sure. That’s how I got down here.”
“I couldn’t--”
“I don’t have anywhere to go, Leslie. Want to go to Pawnee?” He can feel his mouth curling up, and he bites on his lip to keep from grinning. What’s he’s not prepared for is Leslie to throw herself at him, the chair nearly rolling from underneath him as she wraps her arms around his neck in a fierce hug.
He rubs her back and realizes how nicely she fits in his arms.
She doesn’t linger, instead pulling herself from him and immediately beginning to pack a weekend bag, happily chirping about all the wonderful parts of Pawnee she can’t wait to share with him. And it’s a foreign feeling, deep in his stomach: anticipation. He’s actually excited about something.
He gives a shit and it feels so nice.
---
He runs back to George’s dorm to start packing a bag for the weekend, and sees a coffee-stained post-it stuck to the phone.
Your mom called. - G
With a heavy sigh, he picks up the phone and dials in the Minnesota area code, hoping George’s dorm has long distance. It’s a grainy connection but finally someone picks up.
“Stephanie? Is mom home?”
“Oh good, it’s you. Don’t worry, good news.” He hears some clanking as Stephanie places the phone on their kitchen counter. “Mom, Ben’s on the phone!”
“Benji!” he hears in his mother’s sing-song voice, sounding happier than she has while speaking to him in ages. “I’ve been trying to reach you all day.”
“It’s good to hear from you,” he says, and he means it. Really. While his father never was a warm and loving parent to begin with, he missed the love in his mom’s voice from before the impeachment.
“When are you coming back? You’ve received some responses from colleges. Do you want me to open them?”
His heart stops.
He got into Northwestern. And Purdue. And one or two others. Waitlisted at Notre Dame, but it’s already more than he could have ever imagined.
Maybe disgraced mayor Ben Wyatt has a future after all.
“I’m so proud of you,” his mother says, and he hears the emotional edge to her voice.
“Wow. Thanks, mom.”
---
He picks her up in his banged up Saturn the next morning, and she fills his backseat with an oversized duffel bag and a bulging tote full of snacks and mix tapes. As she finally settles into the passenger seat and fastens her seatbelt, he grips the wheel and looks over with a grin he can’t contain.
“I have some news.”
“Oh yeah?”
He looks over and sees her genuine excitement, and feels like he could walk on air.
“I was accepted into some schools. I think I’m gonna enroll this fall.”
Before he can blink, she’s unclicked her seatbelt and leaned over for a mildly uncomfortable, but no less wonderful, hug.
“Ben! That’s so great! I knew you’d bounce back.”
She pulls away and redoes her seatbelt, flashing him a smug smile. Without another word he puts his foot to the pedal and they’re off.
Somehow, he misses her smile falter a bit as she stares out the window, watching Bloomington pass them by.
---
“I spy, with my bionic eye, something . . . brown.”
“Hay bales?”
He looks pointedly at the dozens of hay bales littering the fields on the highway before looking back at Leslie.
“Aw come on, I don’t have much to work with.”
He chuckles.
---
It’s not a particularly long drive, but Leslie wants all the usual fun of a summer road trip, and she bugs him to pull over at a rest stop for ten miles before he finally does.
“You have all the food anyone could need in the back seat,” he teases, nudging her arm.
“It’s tradition!” she says, for the millionth time, and somehow he’s still not tired of hearing it.
The rest stop is on the outskirts of a small town called Snerling. He pulls into a parking spot and lets Leslie run inside to use the bathroom and check out the vending machine options. Deciding fresh air wouldn’t hurt, he leaves the car and stretches his legs, pacing around the parking lot.
And right across the street, partially hidden behind some big oaks, is a fucking ice rink.
Of course.
Ben’s wildest, dumbest political dream was a fucking ice rink in the coldest state full of ten-thousand lakes that all freeze on their own every damn year. What the hell is he even going to bother with in college?
He hears her All Stars against the pavement before seeing her walk up, and she stands next to him and joins his gaze. He stuffs his hands into the pockets of his hoodie as a breeze goes by.
“How long are you going to punish yourself, exactly?”
“What?”
“Look,” she begins, turning to face him. Her arm tugs at his until he’s looking at her instead of the rink. “Ice Town was a disaster, and it seems like it was probably your fault.”
His stomach drops.
“Wow, why even say that--”
“But you’re only nineteen, Ben. And you got into schools - good schools. And you have all the time in the world to pick your life back up.”
She’s squinting up at him, the sun in her eyes, her hair glowing, and his chest feels funny. He has to touch her, has to. Thankfully she doesn’t even flinch as he reaches out and takes her hand.
“Thank you,” he says, feeling like he’s never meant those words more. She squeezes his hand before dropping the grip, leading the way back to the car.
---
Once they pass the “PAWNEE: HOME OF THE WORLD FAMOUS JULIA ROBERTS LAWSUIT” sign, Leslie appears so happy she might burst at any moment.
“I tried so hard to make it home for Easter, but we only got one day off and I had a huge test on Monday. I miss it so much! We should go to JJ’s Diner for some waffles, and I’ll show you Ramsett Park, and the Snow Globe Museum is incredibly fun, and maybe we can swing by the zoo to see the baby rhino, and you have to see City Hall, it’s the best building in the entire world--”
As she chatters on about her favorite Pawnee spots, it hits him.
Leslie’s glued to Indiana, to Pawnee. He can see the light in her eyes shine when she tells him about the new Wamapoke memorial they just put up in one of their parks, or when she points out the grounds they used to have a harvest festival on when she was a kid.
It hadn’t even hit him...
Leslie isn’t his. And in a few days, he’s going to have to say goodbye.
He grips the steering wheel on her and speeds through a yellow light.
---
“Are you sure your mom won’t mind me being here?” he asks just as they pull into her driveway. “It’s kind of weird, right?”
“I mean, it’s not like we don’t have the room,” she tells him, and starts rummaging in her purse for keys. “But she’s probably going to ask a million questions and make you feel very uncomfortable. Just don’t let her win the conversation!”
“Um...”
---
Marlene greets Leslie with a warm hug, but doesn’t seem to want to hear the explanation behind Ben.
“He’s a friend from school, mom, he drove me--”
“Are you dating my daughter?” she asks starkly, looking him up and down with cold eyes.
“No, ma’am,” he stutters, clenching his suddenly sweaty hands.
“Why? You think something’s wrong with her?”
“Mom,” Leslie groans, but he doesn’t miss her small giggle.
Within five minutes, Ben’s holding his shoes in his hand and stammering at a barrage of questions about his past, present, and future. At some point Leslie left and came back with a bowl of ice cream with whipped cream piled on top, and she smiles apologetically at him from behind a spoon.
“So you’re not in college?” Marlene asks him, sounding annoyed. “What are you doing in Indiana?”
“I got into a few schools for the fall. I’m just visiting a friend from high school at IU. Please don’t hurt me.”
“I’m not going to hurt you,” she scoffs, rolling her eyes. “You’ll sleep on the living room couch and there only, and Leslie’s to call me the second you return her to campus. Understood?”
He nods frantically.
“This one’s jumpy,” Marlene tells Leslie, before leaving the room to order everyone take-out.
“You should see her lead a board meeting,” Leslie tells Ben, and she reaches out to rub his arm soothingly. “You did fine, it’s okay.”
“Thanks... Why am I holding my shoes?”
---
Leslie takes him to JJ’s Diner for lunch, and talks it up as if they’re going to a five star establishment. It’s no surprise that Leslie’s greeted warmly by the staff, and Ben smiles when JJ himself visits their table.
“You know, business just isn’t the same without you bringing your friends, Leslie.”
“Aw, sorry JJ, I’ll try to visit more!”
It’s a quiet but nice meal, and Leslie quickly devours her waffle with extra whipped cream, leaving Ben to work on his turkey sandwich while she watches. He sees her eying the deli pickle on his plate.
“You can have that, if you want.”
“Thanks.”
She munches on the pickle and they smile at each other. That’s what this meal’s been; a lot of smiling and not saying much, but it’s good. He likes it.
"I love being home," she says, breaking the silence. "I miss it so much when I'm not here. College is great, but . . ."
She trails off, strain just past his shoulder at nothing, eyes dreamy. But just as quickly, she snaps back into focus, eying him intensely.
"Do you miss Partridge?"
It shouldn't have thrown him for a loop, knowing Leslie. But somehow it does.
"Uh. Getting egged and refused service at every restaurant and shunned by my friends?"
"You should go back," she asserts. He looks down at the table and notices their hands, close together on the surface, and he itches to twine their fingers. But he doesn't. "You never know. They might forgive you."
"They won't."
"They might." He hears a note of anger in her voice.
"Leslie, you don't know, you don't--"
"It’s your home," she nearly shouts, and he's stunned. "You can't turn your back on home, no matter what."
Her eyes are misty when she's done, and without thinking, his hand covers hers.
"Leslie, what's going on?"
His heart skips a beat when she turns her hand, palm against his. Her fingers gently hold on.
"I didn't get the internship I wanted. With City Hall. None of the departments had openings, or something."
"I'm sorry, Les."
"It shouldn't be a big deal," she tries to say strongly, but he hears the crack in her voice. "I have three more years for internships, and I can just do volunteer work. I’ve just wanted to do this for a long time. Work for the government. I love Pawnee..."
"I know you do."
"It’s just hard right now."
They smile sadly at each other, and she squeezes his hand.
"Promise me you'll go back to Partridge?"
He knows then that he'll never be able to deny her anything.
"It’s my sister’s birthday this weekend. God, I’m such a selfish asshole, I can’t believe--”
Her thumb begins tracing patterns on his skin.
“You’re right. I’ll go.”
---
When their meals are finished, he lets her get behind the wheel for a tour of the town. She drives him past her high school, the soccer field where she sprained her ankle in first grade, the bookstore she finds political biographies at. It’s fascinating, to hear the story of Leslie Knope told on the canvas of Pawnee. And even though it’s her tour, they trade questions about each other’s lives, hungry to learn more in what time they have left.
“Jimmy Quinn lived in that house. We went to the Sadie Hawkins dance together, and then his mom called my mom to say he didn’t want to date me.”
His heart beats a little quicker at the mention.
“That’s awful.”
“It’s okay, he was kind of weird.”
“Are you dating anyone now?”
Leslie looks over from the driver’s seat like he’s a moron, and duh, he would know by now. He wipes off his sweaty palms on his jeans and tries to play it off.
“Right, right.”
“And you? Any secret girlfriends I should know about?”
He likes the way that sounds, the jealous tinge to her voice.
“Just an ex who doesn’t have time for disgraced ex-mayors while she’s at college.”
“Screw her,” Leslie says, and the bluntness makes him jump a bit. But he sees Leslie’s brow crease at her own words. “Or I mean, hmm. She could be nice, right? Or maybe not to you. But I shouldn’t judge her, I don’t know her. Female solidarity. Were you a good boyfriend to her?”
“Um. Maybe? I was busy sometimes...”
“Hmm.”
He catches her eye and they both grin.
“Well, her loss.”
---
As dusk approaches, she drives them over to Ramsett Park. The sun’s beginning to inch below the treetops, and she mentions that the park is technically closed once night falls, but she has a good in with the rangers.
“They don’t mess with me; in highschool, I was the reason they never had to pick up trash.”
He imagines a younger Leslie, bright-eyed with a trash bag in her hand, happily volunteering her weekends to the upkeep of Pawnee parks.
As they walk a slow lap around the grounds, she turns the tables on him, asking a million questions about Partridge, and Stephanie, and also about Henry. When she gets to his parents, he halts.
“I don’t like to talk about my dad, much. Or my mom. The parents in general.”
“You don’t get along?”
“They grounded me when I was impeached.” He pauses shaking his head. “They’re also divorced and still pretty damn bitter about it. Makes family decisions really fun. Grounding me was probably the first thing they agreed on in years.”
He feels her palm on his shoulder, a comforting squeeze before she lets go.
“I can see why you wouldn’t want to go home. But you can’t run away forever.”
“Leslie, you and Pawnee... it’s different. You love Pawnee, right?”
She stares into his eyes and seems to be thinking it over, but he barrels forward.
“Imagine loving your town and letting them down. Or, don’t imagine it, because it sucks. But I really wanted to make things better, you know? And now no one there wants me around. I didn’t just lose an internship -- I lost thousands of dollars. Their dollars.”
“It won’t last your whole life, Ben.”
“I know.”
And he does, even though he never has before. Because of her.
“Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.” She bumps his shoulder with hers and smiles.
---
When the sky turns a deep navy and the sun’s almost gone, Leslie insists they return to her home for dinner.
“I haven’t seen my mom for a few weeks. I’d like to.”
“Of course.”
The meal isn’t some home-cooked feast baked with love like he always imagined Leslie having in a home with a white picket fence. Marlene orders pizza to be delivered, but by Leslie’s smile, Ben can tell that it means just as much to her. He doesn’t say much, especially when a comment on liking calzones is met with identical bemused stares, but it’s nice to see them like this. Mother and daughter. Marlene asks about school and Leslie asks about work, and he’s content just to watch them play catch up.
“Oh, and City Hall called while you two were out and about.”
Everyone immediately perks up, and Ben finds himself gripping his plate tightly.
“A senior dropped out, and they have an internship position open, with the community development coordinator.”
Leslie squeals in delight and hugs Marlene, and Ben knows then; Leslie’s tied to Pawnee. Any wish of her being his was just a fool’s wish.
She hugs him too, and over her shoulder he sees Marlene watching him, interested. He’s surprised to see a subtle smile on her face.
He pats Leslie’s back and lets go.
---
Leslie wants to get back to campus tomorrow, to finish up her schoolwork that’s due on Monday.
It’s the beginning of the end, and he knows it, so he asks her if she’d like to go out for a drive. She lets him aimlessly take them around town, until he finds an empty parking lot at the edge of the Pawnee Campgrounds and parks.
“My dad used to take me camping here when I was young.”
She smiles wistfully.
Ben turns on the car radio and they sit on the hood, backs against the windshield, shoulder to shoulder. They listen to the crickets and look at the stars and every few minutes Ben reaches out his hand, only to pull it back.
He can’t do that. Not if he’s leaving.
God, in a day or two, he might never see her again. What reason would he have to come back to Indiana? Minnesota isn’t exactly a short drive, and none of the schools he’s been accepted to are in the state, and he’s only known her a few days and...
He takes a leap.
"What if you came to Partridge with me?"
Leslie blinks, and her eyebrows raise.
He knows how crazy it is to ask, how little he and his problems fit in her life, but he can feel her slipping from his grasp every second and he's desperate to hold on.
"Just for the summer. You could meet my sister, I'd take you to Minneapolis--"
"I could see where you were inaugurated," she adds with a smile.
"And impeached." For the first time, he laughs about it. She joins him in an uplifting giggle that he knows he'll miss like crazy.
"My mom could want to come as a chaperone."
They both laugh harder, deliriously giddy in what's sure to be the home stretch of... them. Ben's not stupid; he knows he can't take her with him. He can't be selfish with her; it’s the last thing Leslie deserves.
As their laughter ebbs, Leslie leans into him for support. He hears the aluminum creak with their weight, knows he'll look at the dent later and feel an emptiness in his heart. And yet he still dares to put an arm around her, to pull her closer and feel her against him.
"I’ll miss you," she says sadly, and hides her face in his sweatshirt.
"I know," he whispers back.
With a heavy sigh, he lets his cheek rest against her head.
---
They drive back to Leslie’s home in silence and he lets her busy herself upstairs while he lays down on the creaky couch, an old homemade afghan his only protection from the nighttime chill.
He can’t sleep because he can’t stop thinking about her and how much she believes in him and how little he deserved these past few days.
He hasn’t even kissed her, and soon he’ll have to say goodbye.
---
He drifts into a light, fitful sleep, and wakes sometime early in the morning. As his eyes adjust, he sees her, curled into a ball in the armchair across the room, a notebook in her lap. A pale blonde curl hangs in her face and she looks so peaceful, wrapped in a big IU sweatshirt and plaid pajama bottoms.
He aches to hold her, for real, just once.
It’s not long before she stirs, and her face turns red when she notices him watching her.
“Sorry. I was just--”
“It’s okay.” He won’t make her spiral off into excuses; he gets it. Their time is limited.
She seems to take this as a cue to start her day and disappears into the kitchen. When she returns, she has coffee in hand.
“I didn’t know what you like in it, so it’s just black. There’s cream and sugar in the kitchen.”
“That’s fine.”
He smiles when he sees her own mug, piled high with whipped cream and rainbow sprinkles.
---
They’re back in the car before 10, and Leslie keeps trying to chat like nothing’s changed.
“So what are you going to study in college?”
Ben thinks about it, looking out the window as he drives.
“I applied for accounting.” He looks over at her, and laughs at her nose wrinkled in disgust. “You know, that’s where I messed up. I want to look responsible so maybe someday I can run for office again.”
“Okay. Not bad. Boring, but not bad.”
He wishes this could just be them; visiting her hometown on the weekends, driving back to campus together. But it’s more complicated and he’s still not even sure where he’ll end up in the fall, and they both already know this wouldn’t work out right now. If only he could have met her earlier, or later, or...
“I spy with my bionic eye, something... green.”
He grins.
---
He pulls up in front of her dorm building a few hours later, and they sit in silence, reluctant to let the weekend end.
“So when will you go to Partridge?”
“Tomorrow. I’m going to call my mom after this and let her know I’m driving back.”
“Good, good. She’ll be glad.”
“I hope so.”
They sit again.
“You should come over tonight. You know, just to hang out a last time.”
“What, for a little hanky panky?” she asks, her eyebrows waggling. He laughs.
“No one calls it that.” They both giggle, a little, but Ben can feel the tension. He kind of wants to be the one to break it, if she won’t. But he won’t push it. “Whatever you want. We could just talk, even. Please?”
“I don’t know, I have to write up the paper, and...”
He reaches over to her lap, taking her hand.
“Please?” he asks again, in a whisper.
It’s a few seconds before she squeezes his fingers.
“I’ll try to be there.”
---
Back at George’s, he begins packing up his shit, stuffing dirty shirts and crap into his old duffel bag.
He’s coming up with a ton of ideas, things he’ll do once she’s over. They don’t have to lose touch now, and they’re so young with so much time... he’ll get her home number to talk to her over the summer, and maybe her address to write her letters. Maybe if he gets a job while he’s at school he can afford a cell phone, and if he isn’t far from Indiana they can spend weekends together sometimes. And most importantly, he’s going to kiss her. He has to. He can’t imagine another moment with her passing where he doesn’t.
But he doesn’t get the chance; Leslie never shows up.
---
When he packs up his car to leave Bloomington, he notices a paper stuck in his windshield wipers.
Benji Wyatt: Teen Mayor.
And scribbled up in the corner: I was up all night finishing it. I’m sorry. But I think it’s an A.
He folds it up really small and puts it in his wallet.
---
When he graduates college and finds himself working for the Indiana state government, he pulls the yellowed paper out, and thinks about looking for her. He thinks about visiting Pawnee.
But his time with her feels like a moment; just a happy, warm moment in his past. It’s easy to convince himself, as he and Chris seem to drive in circles around Pawnee, that it might have meant more to him than it did to her.
And anyway, he’s the bad guy that slashes the numbers. She wouldn’t want to see him. She’s probably out there, helping her community and running for office and putting together projects and making change.
Hell, he’s half convinced he dreamed her.
But Pawnee’s incompetent government brings him back anyway.
---
When he follows Chris into the parks department, he sees her blonde hair first, and his heart stops.