Warning: Spoilers for "Road Trip" and a few for "The Fight"
When some rare things happen, people tend to overreact and call it a sign of the apocalypse. But there were some cases in which it was probably warranted.
Leslie Knope being quiet for more than an hour was certainly one of them.
Then again, it's not like it wasn't exactly rare anymore. This was the first time she was quiet in the office, but she was mastering it- just like she had mastered being quiet on two long drives lately. But in those two drives, she had to close her mouth so she wouldn't….do other things with it.
In this case, she was dead quiet after she had done something else with her mouth today, and the silence felt 10 times worse. She even almost wished that Chris was in the background and dancing to banjo music again. At least that would give her something else to focus on.
But all she was left with was the memories of a kiss- three kisses- with Ben, instead of the grinning jerk who kept those kisses from happening for so long. Yet even though it had finally happened, all she could do was say "Uh oh" have another awkward goodbye with Ben after he had nothing to say, and then clam up with her confused, out of control thoughts and memories.
She did everything to prevent this from happening in Indianapolis, even though Chris was the only thing that stopped her at the very last second. But she had just told the camera people that it was for the best, and then she had to go and let Ben kiss her before she kissed back. Who says one thing to a camera and then has the exact opposite happen a minute later? Why did she and this have to be the exception now?
Leslie needed some air, so she went out into the courtyard, even though Ann wouldn't arrive for their lunch in 10 minutes. But at this point, she didn't even feel like talking about it with her, since she'd be so happy and giddy about Leslie killing her career like this. Leslie knew she should have written another letter to herself for if she actually kissed Ben, but with her luck, Ann wouldn't have even brought it over.
Yet Leslie backed off from there, since last week was the last time she ever wanted to get angry at Ann. She certainly didn't need to do that while sober this time- especially not today.
What she needed was a plan, or another boring soundtrack to get her back to normal. Or another look at the section of her dream journal about her future office, and how she was throwing it all away now. Or some kind of pill that stops you from remembering how lips feel. Or-
Actually, one of Harry Potter's invisibility cloaks would do just fine right about now.
But since Ben already saw her and was coming to sit with her, she decided she would trade that for a Hippogriff, or one of Harry's faster brooms. Yet when he finally sat down, and she was still sitting in place, she had no choice but to cancel her mental order from Hogwarts. In fact, she'd gladly cancel remembering who Harry Potter was, and those talks that she had with Ben about his books- and a few of his better movies- altogether.
"So…." Ben started, in the first noise that Leslie could clearly hear in an hour. "We kind of…..clamed up a bit after our….last meeting." This didn't stop Leslie from clamming up at the beginning of this meeting either. "Is there….anything we should go over, now that we've had time to think about our….findings?"
Leslie knew she'd have to speak up, yet she had to rehearse in her mind how she'd use "findings" as their next code word. Yet Ben kept giving examples anyway. "Because those findings were among the most…..revealing I've seen in a meeting in a while. I mean, they got pretty up close and personal….and defied all kinds of expectations I had about them…..and then they….they….."
Leslie should have been worried when Ben started trailing off, just like in his interviews and when she first tried to ask him out.
But in all those times where he forgot how to speak, he never recovered by taking a deep breath, closing his eyes, and then opening them with that exact same fire she saw in their…..meeting.
"You know, this is more ridiculous than usual. I kissed you, Leslie. And it'll take me quite a long time to forget that you kissed me too. So why are we still letting ourselves dance around what's really going on? I did enough of that in Indianapolis, and I was finally ready to stop until Chris ruined everything. Now we kissed, and he's not here right now, and we're still keeping everything bottled up! I broke that bottle and kissed you so that didn't have to happen anymore!"
And yet after all that, Leslie was still speechless- but now it was more because of shock than fear and nervousness. She'd already seen Ben put himself on the line to her in Indianapolis, but not this openly before. But he still kept going on to top himself.
"Leslie, you're the most open and honest person I've ever met, and that's why I've remembered how to be like that in the last year. But now we have to hide what we're feeling in everything we do and say, even when we're in a car together, or at dinner by ourselves. That's not how we became friends or started to care about each other this much. I said back at dinner that we should really talk about this, and I really want to just once, with no more metaphors or codes or secrecy or anything! And I want to do it with the old, fearless Leslie Knope….even if I understand all too well why she's had to take a break."
Part of Leslie wanted to argue about why fearless Leslie had disappeared, and what kind of hell it put all the Leslies through. But all that the rest of her could do was look on at fearless Ben, who had even surpassed the fearless, semi-cryptic Ben she saw in Indianapolis. Yet as Ben waited for any kind of answer or response, Leslie saw a glimmer of uncertain, nervous Ben in her eyes- which made it all the more remarkable that fearless Ben was still around anyway.
With that, Leslie made her first real sound in a good long while. "How do you do it?"
"Do what?" Ben gasped out, almost in shock that she was finally talking.
"All this, being all clear and honest and everything. I did everything to make sure I didn't do that on the trip, but you kept coming. You plucked my eyelash and raved about 'Pawnee' to the committee, and then kept doing it at dinner. You knew the risks just like I did, and you still tried to ignore them, and you almost made me do it too. And you did it even more today….so how in the hell did you get so brave?"
Leslie pictured a lot of different, romantic answers to that question, in just a split second. Yet she didn't think of the one where he was laughing.
"Leslie, brave isn't how I'd put it. It's more like being schizophrenic, really." Well, this was a hell of a time to finally disclose mental problems. "Wait, so the Ben from an hour ago wasn't you? That almost explains a lot…."
"No, no, that's not what I mean. You know that I can be all calm and collected most of the time, and go nuts under pressure the other times…..like with interviews, Ice Town, and you lately. Maybe I'm getting better at hiding that other side of myself to the outside world. But that other side was so anxious and dying to do more on the road, it took pretty much everything I had to keep him down. I had to do small things like pluck eyelashes and talk about 'Pawnee' just to hold him back- and he still almost said 'Leslie' during those speeches more times than I could count."
"Well, if he was that powerful, why didn't he come out sooner before Chris showed up?"
"He wanted to….or rather, I wanted to for him. The only thing that stopped me was the thought of you getting fired for it, and I was still ready to ignore that before Chris arrived. At the condo, I was ready to lock Chris in his bathroom more than once, and to try and get to you before he got out. But I knew that wouldn't end well for you, and I had to try and be selfless…..just like you've been. I know you've kept yourself under control just to save my job, so I figured it was the best possible example to follow."
She was the best example of selflessness? Leslie had heard Ben say that in various ways a lot already, so it wasn't that new.
But when she remembered all the things she said to Ann about why she couldn't give in- even during their drunken fight- it made Ben's praise ring much more false.
"No….no it wasn't. I kept on and on about how I was trying to protect my job, not yours. I even wrote stuff down about my job in my letter to myself. That's why I tried so hard to ignore everything on the trip…..including your own job, all those things you said about me, how you were feeling when I didn't say anything, and everything you were putting yourself through not to say more….."
For the second time in the span of a week, Leslie felt a crushing guilt. But going through it while sober wasn't that much easier than going through it on a Snakejuice hangover. And going through it because of accidentally torturing Ben wasn't easier than going through it because of fighting with Ann. Not even close.
It was so hard hitting that she didn't even have the energy to hold up her head, as she just let it slump down against the concrete table. Leslie let out a now muffled little groan, but that had little to do with her head's landing.
"Ugh, Ben, I'm so sorry….I…." No. This was something that shouldn't be said face down on a table. Yet it was still taking an effort to lift her head up. "Come on Knope, you can do this! Up and at 'em, Knope!" She then slapped the back of her own head to jolt it back up, which brought about one of Ben's more typical, befuddled looks. Yet there was a bit of relief as well, at seeing that sign of the old Leslie.
Once she rubbed the back of her head and her forehead for a few seconds, she took a deep breath and put on the old Leslie's game face, turning it right back to Ben.
"Now then, I was saying that I'm sorry, Ben, and I am. You went through and said and did all that for me, and I was too caught up in my own paranoia to help you. I could have given you some relief and said I wasn't allergic to fingers, and that I knew who you were talking about to the committee, and that you said the greatest, most wonderful things I've ever heard. But I was so worried about controlling myself that I didn't make things any easier for you…..God, you must have thought you were such a failure when I ran off to the bathroom and didn't kiss you!"
"Well….keep in mind, after you 'went to the bathroom' I was resisting the urge to strangle Chris until his teeth popped out of his mouth. So I guess you got off the hook on a technicality."
Although this really wasn't the ideal situation to laugh, Leslie let out a slow building giggle at that image. After a second, Ben's laugh built up as well. The joke itself wasn't that extremely funny- especially since they had far more creative fantasies against Chris from the last 24 hours. But the actual reason for their long laughter didn't matter, because it just mattered that they were laughing.
They had technically laughed and joked as much as usual in the last several weeks. Yet every time they did, they had to remind themselves not to laugh too much, or get too carried away with how funny the other was, or not to look too much at the other's mouth as it laughed. The need for secrecy, and to hide how they really felt, had made real, genuine, unbridled joy at each other's company that much harder to feel. Ben had missed that, and Leslie now saw first-hand how much she missed it too.
That made it a little harder for them to stop laughing, but they couldn't fake it for too much longer without it sounding creepy.
"Ah…..yeah, his teeth are too perfect. Heart crushing monsters are supposed to be too poor to afford toothpaste, anyway," Leslie quipped.
"Yeah, their union really has to be crushed soon, or at least stripped of its dental. Of course, as The Simpsons proved in 'Last Exit To Springfield,' fighting a union war over a dental plan can be funnier than it sounds."
"More like nerdier than it sounds, cause you just took the last exit to Nerdfield." There it was. Nothing said normal for these two more like a nerd joke from Leslie, which is why she found herself downright cackling now. As recently as yesterday, she would have tuned it down significantly, for fear that she would then attack Ben with her tongue, in front of Chris or someone that Chris regularly jogged with.
But now that he and Ben were back on each other's wavelength, and had let some of their tension out, that fear didn't seem so important anymore- even if she didn't know that Chris wouldn't barge in for once. Once the two finally stopped laughing, Ben kept them from drifting back apart again.
"Listen, Leslie, you don't ever have to apologize for wanting to keep your job. Pawnee needs you here, and so do I, and I'm sorry if I pushed you too hard to forget that. That's why we still need to keep this a secret, but we can do that and not have to be nervous around each other. Look what we've put ourselves through by not being clear and open, like we usually are. We're so much better when we're on the same page, talking together and working together. Otherwise we wouldn't want to be together so badly."
"Well, it's clear we're pretty nuts when we go it alone. You want to strangle someone's teeth out, and I put ear-splitting banjo music on unsexy CD's, so we're even." This made them both chuckle, with much more normal laugher than before. "And together we save budgets and put on festivals, so the math alone is undeniable."
"Unfortunately, Chris isn't the numbers guy around here," Ben lamented.
"Numbers are complicated and boring, you should know that by now. Of course, words are pretty screwy too. Like, say….I, Leslie Knope, want to be with you, Benjamin Wyatt, in a way that transcends friendship, but I still want us to be great friends again until then. Sure, stuff like that is a bit wordy, but take away all the words and metaphors and stupid, stupid panic, and they're a lot easier to remember than fractions."
"You never saw how my 10'th grade teacher made us memorize fractions." It was coming so easy to them again- the give and take between every kind of topic, no matter how nerdy or sweet or uniquely them. But Ben remembered his own advice about being clear and honest, instead of using metaphors and allegories. "Yet there is a case to be made about simple things. Like how I, Benjamin Wyatt, want to be together with Leslie Knope, but can't find a way to do it without torturing my boss. So maybe you have a few ideas on how to do it without breaking laws, other than Chris's law."
"Unfortunately, I've been too busy trying to follow Chris's law, so I don't have a way around it yet. But with some new help from my partner-in-crime, I'm sure we can brainstorm something. Heck, with our combined brain power, we can have this policy defeated by this time next week!"
"Good, because if we have to keep fighting it into the summer, I will tear my hair out before September," Ben half-way joked. "Still, finding the amount of time we need to brainstorm could be difficult."
"Wait, Chris'll give it to us!" It was encouraging that Leslie was her old brainstorming self, but it sounded to Ben like she was still off her game- until she spoke. "We're his Dynamic Duo, and we just brought the Little League series to Pawnee! So it'd be irresponsible of him not to expense some work dinners for us, so we can think of our next dynamic projects- or so he'd be dumb enough to think!"
"Yeah…..with our track record, he would be quite reckless not to let us, wouldn't he?" Ben remarked in his typical Leslie awe.
"He already let us go on one trip and dinner, so I say we milk him for a few more and get them right. After all, he still has no reason to think that I want to have anything more than work dinners, with my best work friend."
"Wait, shouldn't that honor go to Ann, since she works with us now?" Ben was turning this into a more playful talk, but Leslie was still in working mode- which, as always, wasn't a completely bad thing. "Wait, Ann! She does work with us now! We can take her out to work dinner with us and say we need to help her adjust to her new job! But she'll actually help us think of ways to beat Chris, since she already loves us together and wanted us to make out to Al Green!"
"Well, it has been clear that she doesn't hate the idea of us together," Ben stated while remembering her hung over, but incredibly beautiful words about Leslie liking him. Beautiful Ann, indeed. "You sure she'd have more juicy ideas up her sleeve?"
"She's Ann, why wouldn't she? Besides, I have to start balancing my time between my best overall friend and secret boyfriend sometime." Every word of that sentence, save for an obvious one, sounded like music to the secret couple. "Oh wait, Ann's coming in a minute, we can start pitching ideas here right now!"
"No, I think we've exhausted our brains enough for a while. You go bring your second best work friend up to date, and we'll figure out a 'work dinner' schedule later on. I think we've accomplished all that we needed to here."
With that, Leslie once more felt a pang about Ben leaving soon. But somehow, it was a pang that she could better live with now. The days of her dreading their next meeting, and trying not to enjoy herself around him anymore- days like today, until 10 minutes ago- suddenly seemed far away.
"Thank you, Ben. I mean, just…..the beginning and end of our trip were terrible, and the beginning was my fault. But the middle was the best part of a trip I've ever been on, and I wish I'd actually told you before the end was ruined. But thank you for the even better stuff today, for everything else you've done, for putting up with me period…..just, just thank you."
"You're quite quite welcome, then." Ben stood up right in sync with Leslie, although she was the only one to look around a bit, before holding out her hand.
"Well then, I'll see you later on. I look forward to finally working together with you again." Although Leslie was once again putting on a professional face when saying goodbye to Ben, it came with much fewer butterflies in her stomach, and much less indigestion.
And when Ben went to shake her hand, she decided to add one more extra bonus as well.
As much as she feared looking back on it until now, Leslie knew she wouldn't forget the exact nature, exact technique, and exact movements of their first kisses. That's how she knew to pull Ben in, and recreate his maneuvers to the letter, only with her leading the way. Somehow, Ben was able to catch up near the end, like Leslie was an hour ago. But in both cases, they knew who was really in control and were in no way willing to object.
Leslie always liked being the leader in everything, yet when she broke away from Ben, she was still split on whether it was better to lead in their kisses. But there'd be time to make a more informed decision later- and at least as the leader this time, she could have much more confident last words.
"You'd better not say uh oh right now, or you're only getting pizza at our work dinners, okay?"
But Ben stayed perfectly quiet altogether, as Leslie finally made her way out of the courtyard and back into the building. She got as far as halfway to her office before Ann found her and headed over to her. "Leslie? What happened?"
By the time Leslie got to Ann, her growing smile was already glowing, now that it finally sank in that she had kissed Ben Wyatt- in two sessions. It was more than enough for Ann to have a knowing glow as well, and lead them to a more private part of the office where they could celebrate in secret.
But whether in secret or not, Leslie Knope was excitable again, making all right in the world.
The silence was filled by Ben, who could manage nothing more than nods, grunts, and the occasional "mm-hm" for anyone the rest of the day. Yet unlike Leslie, he wasn't quiet because he wanted to block out any secret kisses from his mind.