A/N: Requested anonymously on tumblr as a role reversal of ch20.
Throughout the day, Andy watches April call people and ignore him. She refuses to say anything to him, flitting in and out of the house for hours at a time and for a lot of that time he's worried. Andy's never seen her like this - all worked up about pretty much anything, apparently willingly calling other people to actually talk to them about something important, and generally constantly agitated. Well, that's untrue because he's seen her agitated at him all the time.
Usually they worked through that, but this time she's nearly sprinting out of the house and driving around Pawnee apparently. When he goes out to try and grab something to eat he has to order in because the car's gone. April hated driving, especially when she could pass it off on Andy, so it was especially strange.
In the hour where the Chinese food comes and April's fried rice goes untouched, Andy can't help but worry more. She's a grown woman with her own life, he knows that on some level, but not being party at all to what she's up to just makes him uncomfortable. He has to slap himself out of that mentality because it sounds like April's not allowed to do anything without consulting him first, and Andy thinks that sounds stupid. If she finds a dog in a park and rolls around without him, that's his fault not her problem.
And now Andy can't stop thinking about rolling around with April and a dog in a park and it's awesome. Then he can't stop thinking about rolling around with just April and he really wishes she was there. But she doesn't come home for another hour and he's getting bored, and tired, so Andy just goes to sleep confused. He sends out a text asking her if she's okay and watches his phone until he drifts off.
"Andy," April shakes him quickly, and he only realizes what's happening when she's dragging him out of bed. "Andy, c'mon. We gotta go."
"Why? Wh... where you been, babe?" Andy's head is full of questions he wants to ask but can't voice them. He can't even remember what time it is. "What time is it? Where're we going?"
"Babe," she turns and grabs his face, "this is important and I'll explain it to you. You trust me, right?"
Andy nods and she smiles wide in response. That's all he really needed to see but she nods and takes his hand, running out to the car. Andy's in his sweatpants and a thin shirt but he generates so much heat for himself that he doesn't even register how frigid it is outside. April's driving them down a street not long after that and he can hear her calling someone, but Andy's drifting off again.
In sleep he can half make out what she's saying, but mostly all he can tell is that April sounds scared. That jolts him awake and he feels like he's never been tired in his life at that small tremble in her voice, turning to look at her on the phone. They're stopped at the side of the road somewhere and April's head is in her hand while she speaks.
"I know, mom," she says slowly and blinks way too fast for comfort. "I just... I thought maybe we'd find him, okay? I'll call you later."
She hangs up and bumps her head on the steering wheel twice before sitting straight up again.
"What's up?" Andy asks cautiously, in a soft voice.
April turns and gives him a brief look past her masquerade before her face is completely even again. "Nothing," she says.
"Obviously not," he gives a small laugh but April doesn't return it. "Hey, babe, you can tell me anything. You know that right?"
Instead of saying a word, April lunges over to him and wraps Andy in a close hug. From their positions in the car it has to be uncomfortable for her, but April keeps her arms around him and Andy can only return it without asking anything. If that's what she needed that's cool, and if she needed to just be away from him for a little bit that's cool too. He knew that if April wanted to come back she would, and he didn't think it was anything that serious.
That still didn't explain who they were supposed to be finding, like April said to her mom. Andy looked down at her and asked about it, confused. When April just sighed he tilted his head like he wasn't going to be taking that for an answer, or the shrug she gives him afterwards.
"Orin likes to take walks," she starts with a small voice until she's saying things so fast that she's running out of breath, "and it's not weird for him to be gone for, like, a week but his parents haven't seen him in a month. He doesn't text me back or anything and he's been going for this walk since then, and he's my friend and no one's seen him, and I-"
"So we're looking for Orin?" Andy interrupts seriously.
"Yeah," she finishes, out of breath from her previous constant barrage.
"Why didn't you ask me to help you before?" and it's the dumbest thing to him that she ignored him for a while.
"Didn't think you'd want to help me find a guy," she laughs, "and that sounds really stupid all of a sudden."
Andy laughs along with her. "Yeah, it does sound real stupid babe," he finishes.
"It sounded better in my head," she shrugs and moves back to the driver's seat. "I mean, he's my friend Andy. I didn't have too many of those for a long time. Yeah, he's creepy and weird but he's my creepy and weird friend."
"Sure," Andy nods, like he knows he's supposed to because telling her she doesn't need to say this isn't the right thing. He thinks. Andy isn't sure, so he goes with his gut.
"He was kind of my only friend for a long time," she grips the wheel and shakes her head, "and I just wanna make sure he's okay. He's probably just in the woods, finding a fitting cave dwelling or something."
"So are we gonna go look for him?" Andy asks her, giving April's hand a squeeze and smiling. She returns it and nods.
The car starts up and they drive around the outskirts of Pawnee for a few hours before they both get tired. Nothing noteworthy or any clues show up, like they anticipated a trail of blood to lead them to his hideout or something. In the morning, they agree, they'll scour the woods where April thinks he could possibly be. She thanks him before they go to sleep in the car, moving over to the passenger side with him and sleeping in his lap.
They search the woods, through the trees that April says he always hides in. She tells Andy about a treefort they made when they were thirteen, and how April never heard him speak the first year she knew him, and showed him where the carpet they threw on a flat branch used to be. He listens as she goes on and on, looking behind every bush and in every crevice that looks remotely like a cave. Each bit of the forest seems to spark a memory for her and Andy likes knowing these things about her.
Maybe one day, Andy thinks, he'll take her to his mom's house and show her all the places he used to get stuck. Like the stairwell's rails where he got his head stuck, or the tree where he got his ankle caught on a branch and hung like that for an hour, and all of that stuff. It dawns on Andy that they might not find Orin today but he doesn't say anything to April, not wanting to destroy her reminiscence.
When they don't find him for another day, April stops talking.
When they get back to the car she breaks down, and Andy's never seen her cry before in his whole life. It's really uncomfortable because he doesn't have any idea what to do for her - for April it could be anything under the sun and he'd still probably get it wrong. A small side of him wonders if she did this when he first deflected her advances and that makes him scoot her over onto his lap and put his arms around her in a hug.
"We'll try tomorrow," he says to her after she's stopped crying and April's just staring at him silently.
"Yeah?" her voice is hoarse and tired, and it hurts to hear.
"Yeah, tomorrow and we'll put out all those bulletins and get everyone in the whole friggin' country to look for him," Andy waves his hands around him before calming down.
"This is why I love you," she says quietly, without looking away.
"Yeah, you too," he pulls her back into a hug and they sit like that for a while, unspeaking, until April falls asleep and Andy tries his best to get comfortable in the car.