A/N: Anonymously prompted as a what-if based on a certain line in "Christmas Scandal."

Breaking schedule because last day of shooting feels :(

She had never expected them to reach this point, if April had to be honest with herself. Not that she didn't actually love him or that she disbelieved him when he said it to her, but it felt like a dream to her. April wouldn't admit that she had a soft spot for fairytales about Princes Charming and knights with shining armor because she had a gruff exterior to maintain. It was easier that way, to keep the possibility of hurt away, but it let that inner desire melt away a little bit.

The child that had grown up believing that she'd find someone that was so cool she'd marry them without a second thought became the twenty-something convinced that it wasn't worth trying. Trying always led to failure, or at least a lot of wasted effort for very little benefit, so why bother when you could just not care at all? The problem was that she did care, and that she desperately wanted to tell herself to stop giving any time at all to those thoughts - those stray, niggling doubts and internal screams. Like fraying strands, that self-doubt ate at her until it became way too hard to deal with the reality in front of her.

But there she was, nuzzling Andy's shoulder on the Ferris wheel. What was their love supposed to be? Was it going to change their lives? She really didn't think so. It wasn't like simply saying the words to each other was going to make any difference at all, but to April it kind of did. In a strange way, everything was different and in an awesome way.

"Hey," Andy whispered to her, his voice all tender and weird.

"Yeah?" she looked at him, April feeling that weird fluttering movement of wings in her chest that she chose to call love.

"I love you," he said softly, masking his seriousness with that goofy grin she adored, "and I'm sorry, I guess."

"For what?" she asked with a curious bunching of her eyebrows.

She didn't want to go back to the time when they didn't say they loved each other, April realized just then. That was when they weren't really open, when April felt like she had to hide from him even a little bit, and he was afraid of something as stupid as how old she was. But, April still hadn't been honest with him. Despite that, he never pushed her. He never questioned her awful excuses and bubbling nervousness, and that's what made it so easy to let him know she loved him.

He cared, and it was obvious, but April had that dwelling fear that he was bored. There was only so much she could offer him before she got scared, told him she had to leave, and left him when just moments before she was sliding her shirt off. She didn't owe him anything, April wasn't that stupid, but she wanted it and yet hated that she couldn't let Andy closer to her. After all, she still had that malevolent exterior to polish and keep up.

"That you thought I didn't love you," he chuckled and rubbed her shoulders slowly, "because I super do. I totally love the crap out of you."

"I love you too," was all April could say.

She did love him. That was easy enough to say, but she wanted to show him. April wanted him to be able to wake up with her, and she wanted to roll over to his ruffled hair and smile, but it all felt too real. Too much like some dumb fantasy she was going to wake up from, and the possibility made her retract.

"After we find Li'l Sebastian, d'you wanna make out by the churro stand?" Andy asked her suddenly, his eyes getting that gleam that left April a little braver.

"Sure," she shrugged, pretending that she wasn't thinking about any of this at that moment.

April couldn't be bothered to think about how many times they'd sit on a bench in a park, take peanut butter sandwiches, and make fun of pedestrians only to end up with April on his lap. It was innocuous enough, and it was sweet the way he played with her hair sometimes though April wouldn't admit to enjoying that either. Maybe to Andy, but no one else. Then they'd kiss and it'd be pleasant and taste like peanut butter and dirt, little sweet pecks that devolved into something more, until April flushed and backed away from him.

How many times had she done that? At least one more, considering the sugary bread they shared and the incredibly saccharine taste in Andy's mouth when they fulfilled their promise, Andy leaning back up on the stand and April pulling him up to stand and hold her a little closer.

"Hey," she said in that minute distance between their lips, their breath mingling.

"Hey," he echoed, smiling and looking down at her like she was the only person in the entire universe. "What's up?"

"It's super late, d'you wanna, like, head back-?"

"I can drop you off at your place," Andy suggested.

"Don't worry about that, let's just crash at your house," she said more shakily than she'd have liked.

"You're right, Burly's couch is super comfortable. You can sleep on that," he nodded, taking her hand and walking before she could explain.

At Andy's, but really his guitarist Burly's, house she felt even stranger about how this was going. Why couldn't she just tell him?

"So, here you go," he patted down a pillow on the couch. "Bed, or not really. But, you'll be fine."

"Andy," she started, playing with the dangling string on her jacket.

"Right, you're right!" he half-shouted, looking like he was embarrassed. "Sorry, April... you should totally have my bed. I'll sleep on the couch."

"No," she chuckled. "Why don't you just... y'know, I can sleep in there."

"Yeah, that's what I said-"

She didn't let him keep talking, instead leaning up and kissing him to shut him up. Andy had a heart of gold, most of the time, but he had a hard time grasping some things.

"I love you Andy, like a lot," April pushed him backwards through the house, towards the bedroom. "We're dating, so it's not weird at all to sleep together."

"Oh, you mean like sex," he nodded, understanding. "Oh, you mean like sex!"

He had a mixture of astonishment and giddiness on his face. April didn't know which one was more concerning, or why her hands were kind of shaking on Andy. Either way, she had already gone this far and going back would be cruel to both of them, something that April had vowed never to do again after what she'd put herself through. Eventually they were sitting on the bed and April was unsure why she couldn't just go ahead and move her hands already at the hem of her shirt.

"Andy," her voice wavered.

"Yeah?" he asked, adoration all over his face.

"Do you... you want to do this, right?" April offered, her grip tightening on her shirt.

"Totally!" he crossed the distance between them and kissed her again, harder and his hands finding hers on the shirt before he broke off. "You do, right? Oh God, I didn't mean to-"

"Andy, I'm the one who started all this," she laughed, but didn't move the shirt an inch.

"You're being weird. I know you pretty well, April," he nodded knowingly, backing up. "You're being weird. What's up?"

It was one of those things chained in social stigma and other stupid norms that made April loathe it even more. So why couldn't she just tell him? April had let Andy know so much, get so near and close, that there wasn't any reason to hold back now. She loved him, after all.

"I'm kinda scared," she admitted.

"About what?" he asked obliviously, leaning back in the bed and resting on his hands.

"This. All of this, like loving you and you loving me and us right here, right now," she patted the sheets, continuing. "I mean, I don't know what to do here."

"Well... we were gonna do it, I think. So, we... uh, do that?" he suggested, smiling.

But she hadn't, and the terrifying possibility of Andy hating her and hating it was all too much. But that wasn't even one ounce of the real chance that she could just wake up afterwards, tired and alone in her bed at home and everything would be a terribly amazing dream. Andy wouldn't even have said a word to her and life would be Pawnee, 2009 instead of Pawnee, Now. She'd be alone again, and he wouldn't be the same person she'd imagined he was.

That was the fear bringing her down, shackling her to the doubt and worry over what had originally been nothing. Even when Andy was afraid of her because of the age difference she was impossibly shaken by the reality that she had a chance for something that could happen, only to have it taken away over and over.

"Yeah, that's what I mean," she couldn't look at him for a moment and when she looked back up he had a quizzical expression. "Andy, I'm a virgin."

"What? Woah, really?" he just sat there with a blank understanding, mouth half-open. "Didn't you have, like, three boyfriends at least before I met you?"

"Derek's gay, and we never did anything really," she shrugged, "and Eduardo was literally just to make you jealous."

As long as she was admitting things and being open, why not go all the way? April kind of liked the feeling anyways, like she could let Andy know that she wasn't actually trying to forget him. If he knew that she was testing him, trying to find exactly how far he'd go, then maybe both of their past transgressions would be forever discarded. They could start over, in a way, and be just them. But first they had this speed bump to get over.

"Are you, like, afraid of sex with, like, anyone or just... y'know, me?" he asked, the stupidly poignant question the last thing she needed to think about.

"I mean, with anyone I guess but especially you," she grimaced a little, but moved over to him and held his hand with a faint smile. "Not like that, Andy. I love you, dude. I just mean, you're so new and I'm feeling things I've never felt before... like, for you."

"Me too, April," Andy mumbled, their stare unbreaking. "I mean, I liked Ann a lot and stuff but this... you're seriously the best and I don't know what I'd do without you."

"That's why, because I'm afraid... not that you won't like it or that I won't like it, but everything's so different and so fast," April shrugged, throwing her hands up briefly before shaking her head and going back to hold his hand, "I thought that, maybe, I was just living in a fairytale. That you were like my stupid Prince Charming or something and I'd just wake up from a dream."

"Do you want to wake up?" Andy proffered, his eyebrows raised.

"Not at all, but... fairytales aren't real, y'know," she laughed at how childish she sounded before rubbing her eyes and continuing. "I dunno, I just thought you'd be a fantasy."

"I mean, I'm pretty real. That's cool, right?" Andy moved to his knees, taking her hand in his. "I can be like a real Prince Charming, but cooler."

He sat like that, smiling, and April wondered why it took them so long. In reality it wasn't actually that long, but it could have been so much more. Then again, they were here now and things couldn't be better. Maybe they were meant to go through their troubles to get to where they were, and to be stronger for it. Maybe that was their storybook ending. Instead of answering him, April moved forward and took his hand, shifting it to her back until he naturally curled around her hair. Kissing him felt like the most obvious answer in the world, and so she did.

Thinking like that, reverting back to the April that had hope and didn't think she'd be alone forever, felt great. It was amazing. Even if Andy was many of her firsts, she wanted to know what it would be like to have him as a few of those lasts. There weren't many things that could break through her inability to disconnect herself from failure, from anxiety and doubt, but Andy always did. He always knew how to say one word or give her one look that told her things would be okay. Life would all right, maybe, if they bothered to try for each other.