NOTE: R (Yeah this section got somewhat R. Um, I'm sorry? No but really if this is problem for you pm me and I'll try to write you a sanitized version)
Leslie knows she's probably ready to go back to Pawnee when she stops wanting to sleep with Ben and instead finds herself wanting to sleep with him.
It hits her at the oddest, most ordinary moment.
Not on Wednesday night when they drive back to her father's house late in evening and she lays awake on the sofa-bed with Ben less than a foot away because while there is actually a bed in the spare-room it's still under a monstrous amount of junk and neither one of them has the energy to tackle it. Even in the darkness when she can't see any of her dad's stuff, there's something about the way the place smells—like aged paper and earl-grey tea and dust—like her father, like forgotten memories, and suddenly the floor of the Indiana State House feels very far away. So when she winds up talking about the last time she slept over in this house eight years ago, and Ben reaches across the space between them to take her hand, it's gentle and comforting and supportive, but it doesn't make her pulse race.
It doesn't happen on Thursday either. Thursday when she wakes up prepared to go through the motions of her dad's Thanksgiving like a private memorial service, and instead winds up in a celebration of all the laughter and joy and sometimes utter ridiculousness of his life.
They drag her dad's old Christmas tree out of the crawl space, and struggle for forty-five minutes to make it stand straight, finally resigning themselves to the perpetually sideways lean that only gets worse as they proceed to hang every single stupid teacher ornament her father ever got on its branches. When they're done they sit back on the couch and look over their handiwork. Ben pronounces the whole effect to be 'horrifying', but he does it with smiling eyes and a perfect deadpan that she knows would have made her dad laugh, so when she hits him with a couch pillow it's not very hard.
There's a moment as Ben puts the first set of pancakes and bacon in the pan while she's in the other room, and the whole house suddenly smells like the holidays, that she forgets that it's not her father at the stove. And when she remembers a split second later, the loss is sharp and new all over again, reaches in and grabs her by the throat, stealing her breath. But the pain is acute rather than chronic and by the time they bring their over-laden plates out to sit in front of the tv and watch Ralphie get told he'll shoot his eye out she's able to laugh in all the right places.
Okay, when she stretches out on the couch after dinner and Ben pulls her legs into his lap and they make sure George Bailey really does save the Old Building and Loan from Mr. Potter one more time, she might tear up a little bit but really you'd have to be a robot not to. (Ben does not tear up, but he does hush her during the run on the bank, and his hand tightens a little on her calf, like if they don't give the moment their full attention it might not happen the way he remembers. And that is possibly the most endearing thing she's ever seen. But it doesn't make her want to jump him.)
The return of her Ben related sexual urges definitely does not happen on Friday, which proves to be the toughest day of the whole weekend when she finally gets up the courage to start clearing out her father's bedroom closet and boxing his clothes, only to stall out when she stumbles upon two shoeboxes labeled 'Leslie' tucked high on the shelf. And Ben comes in to find her cross-legged in the middle of her father's bed surrounded by birthday cards and school essays and newspaper clippings from the Pawnee Journal for everything up to and including a profile they did for her State-Assembly run. (And the incongruity of access doesn't strike her until she pulls out an envelope with her mother's handwriting on it and she realizes whatever their problems her parents never stopped talking entirely, at least not about her.)
It doesn't even happen on Saturday when they load both cars to the gills and drive over to the Goodwill and with every box she hands off, every piece she gives away and doesn't second guess, she feels a little lighter, a little less burdened. And though there's a moment that evening as she stands in the middle of the increasingly empty house, surrounded by packed boxes and neatly organized papers and knows things are starting to draw to a close, knows this strangely chaste thing they've been doing will end with it, she forcibly shoves the thought aside, not quite ready to deal with all the implications of that. So when Ben lets her tug him down on the sofa bed, her only real desire is to curl up next to him and never have to leave.
No, instead it comes, of all times, on Sunday morning when she comes back from a walk to find Ben sitting at the kitchen table he's converted to a makeshift desk, surrounded by two neat stacks of well-labeled file folders, reviewing a spreadsheet of creditors and account balances on his laptop. And he's deep into whatever line of thought he's been chasing, so he doesn't look-up when she comes to stand in the kitchen doorway, maybe doesn't even realize she's there and for some reason the sight of him like that hits her like a lightning bolt.
It's no one thing really, instead it's a hundred little details. It's the intent expression on his face that means some problem has his entire focus. The slightly mussed quality of his hair that says he's run his hand through it one too many times. It's the olive-green sweater over the purple plaid flannel and the fact his color combinations still always skirt this side of awful. It's the sleeves he's pushed up so that she can see that slight line of muscle on his forearm. It's having his detergent on every piece of clothing she's wearing, and knowing exactly what his hair would smell like right now, because she's been using his shampoo ever since hers ran out. It's knowing that his body is still just the right side of skinny and his hips still slot perfectly between her thighs.
It's even the glasses.
Actually, bizarrely, it's really the glasses. Not that she likes them. Because she's still not certain she does, but that she's grown used to them, to expect them. That she's realizing now that when she closes her eyes and pictures Ben working like this, when she has a fantasy about surprising him in his office, disrupting his train of thought, (and let's be honest here she's been having these fantasies for months now so she's got a stockpile), while the location might change, the circumstances, the situation, his reaction, they might all vary. Those glasses are there, somewhere. He's taken them off, he's put them on, she's dropped them in the trash can, whatever. What happens to them isn't important. The point is they're there. The point is he needs them.
The point is she stopped wanting any version of Ben but the one sitting in front of her, a long time ago.
And god does she want him right now.
Ben removes his glasses to rub tiredly at his eyes and she has the overwhelming impulse to go over there and put them back on him. To pick them up off the table, climb into his lap, slip them back on his face, and tell him to look at her, to watch her. To have him know without a single doubt that she knows exactly which him she's with.
"Leslie?"
She blinks, comes back to the moment to find Ben looking at her, the twitch of a smile at the corner of his mouth telling her this is not the first time he's said her name.
"Sorry. Yeah?"
"You went off for a moment. Everything okay?"
Moving to the table, she picks up the glasses that have been occupying her thoughts and turns them over in her hands. "When did you start wearing these?"
"Um," Ben smiles in that way that says 'this is a weird question, but I'll play along,' "I don't know. Let's see, maybe two years ago. Why?"
She shrugs, "Just wondering."
"Well okay then," he reaches out to take them back, but she lifts her hands up out of reach without thinking. Ben huffs a laugh that's almost a sigh. Putting up with the crazy woman because she amuses him, but he's not entirely sure why. "Leslie, I kind of need them to read the screen."
"I know." And before she's even completely formed the intention, she's holding them up over her head and walking slowly backwards away from him with a taunting smile. "You should definitely come get them then."
"You can't be serious-" But he's standing up even as he's saying it, and her back hits the doorframe, and she spins away with a laugh and takes off. And he follows (he always follows) and it's a magnificent game of keep away.
They go round-about and back and through the main part of the house three times, Leslie laughing and Ben threatening her with dire consequences if they're broken. Circling round the coffee table, climbing over the couch. There's a moment where he almost has her in the kitchen, but she holds her hands up in surrender and he relaxes his guard, and she takes off again, unwilling to stop, trying to extend the moment for as long as possible. It feels like forever since she felt this untroubled, this free, since she just got to be in her own body, to enjoy being in her own body like this.
So when she finally gets caught against the door of the hall bathroom, Ben trapping her, arms on either side, she's already keyed up, aware, so aware of her heart-beat, the flex of her muscles, the rise and fall of her chest.
And she can feel that he's aware of her too.
Briefly, almost unconsciously, Ben's eyes flick down her body, and then back up to meet hers. "Hand them over."
He doesn't really think she's going to give in that easily, does he? Impulsively she raises her arms above her head in blatant invitation. "Make me."
And there's just a split second when it strikes her that they've been here before, done this before, and it didn't end well. And she's about to take it all back, to forfeit the game and grant him the victory as long as she gets to keep his smile when Ben throws a change-up.
He kisses her.
Really kisses her.
Kisses her in a way that for once isn't a beginning or an end, but a middle. Isn't a question or an apology. Isn't a prelude or a goodbye. Isn't anything other than what it is. It's just a kiss. Simple and basic and wonderful. The kind of kiss any newly-minted couple might exchange, the kind they've never had before.
She could have this. He's told her she could have this, as much as she wants, as often as she wants. And all she has to give him is her, all of her, forever.
At the moment it feels like a bargain.
Leslie melts into it with a sigh even as she can feel Ben's hand coming up to tangle with hers above her head and rescue his glasses.
"No fair," she whines against his mouth, "Cheating."
"I like to think of it as using all resources at my disposal," Ben retorts. But even though victory is now his, he doesn't seem to be in any hurry to pull away. Just shifts his attention to that spot behind her ear she didn't even know existed before he found it, the hand that isn't holding his glasses slipping up under her oversized flannel to slide along the thin fabric of her tank.
He's got her well and thoroughly pinned against the door now, a full body-press—his hand on the small of her back, his knee between her legs, mouth working its way down the side of her neck in a way that's not so much an overture as it is the main act. There's no urgency to it, no build. It's lazy and unhurried and content. And clearly not intended to be anything more.
Except it's been so long. So long since any man has touched her like this, and even longer since it's been Ben. And now that he is, she feels like she's alwayswanted it to be him, can't help the clutch of her hands on his shoulders trying to urge him on, or the instinctive roll of her hips as she starts moving towards something more. She shifts against him and can't stop the shuddering gasp against the curve of his neck as she hits just the right spot.
Ben lifts his head at the sound to look at her, and for a second she's afraid she's inadvertently shifted them into the wrong gear, tried to go too far too fast.
All her fears seem to be realized when he moves his hand off her waist, and Leslie lets out a little mewl of protest. But then he's turning the handle on the bathroom door, and backing her inside. And she's about to object to his choice of location when she remembers where she is.
As if reading her thoughts, Ben shuts the door behind them, blocking everything else out, closing her off in this space that's been completely taken over by them—their toiletries on the counter, the scent of his soap in the air, her toothbrush by the sink. Just them, only them.
Pressing her back against the door, he places a soft kiss to her temple. "Stay with me. Okay?"
She nods. Finds her voice. "Okay."
This time when he kisses her, the tempo is the same, (it's still languid and unrushed, like they have all the time in the world), but the tone has changed, turned sensual, savoring. No longer like he has nowhere to be, but simply that he wants to take his time getting there, see all the sights in between.
His free hand sweeps down her neck and along her collarbone, comes to a brief pause at the vee of her flannel, giving her a chance to stop him (like she could, like she wants to). Then one by one, he undoes the row of buttons, pausing repeatedly to run his knuckles along the line of her breast-bone in an almost soothing gesture that only seems to make her want him to touch more of her.
In an effort to coax him into more decisive action, she drops her hands to his hips and tugs a little at his belt loops, trying to pull him closer, but Ben stays stubbornly unmoving.
Still trying to urge him on, she shifts to reach for the button on his pants, but Ben stops her. Closing both hands over hers gently but firmly, he pulls her hands away and places his glasses in her palm with a quiet, "Hold on to these for me." And even though he places a soft kiss to the inside of each wrist to lessen the sting as he drapes her arms over his shoulders, the message is clear.
This is about her. Only her. He'll give, but she can't take.
And the thought that he still needs to hold something of himself back like this makes her sad, almost makes her say stop. But then he's slipping a hand under the fabric of her tank, to stroke the line of her hip-bone in a way that's somehow generous and needy all at once, and brushing a quiet, "Let me take care of you," against her ear and the word 'no' disappears from her vocabulary.
God, what is it about him that turns her selfish, makes her grasping and greedy? She just wants him so badly, wants to keep him, hoard him, tuck pieces of him away in her pockets and carry him around. Wants anything he'll give her and then only seems to want more.
Still she feels like she's already taken so much, and given almost nothing in return. Like the least she can do is offer him the chance to change his mind.
"You don't-"
Ben swallows her protest with a kiss so infinitely tender it feels more like an act of grace, than passion. Cupping her face in both hands, thumbs stroking the lines of her cheekbones, he presses another to her forehead and whispers, "I want to." Drops a kiss on each eyelid and adds, "Let me do this for you, please?"
And even as he's saying it, his right hand has moved back to her hip, and he drags his fingers along her waistband, teasing the sensitive skin just beneath it like he's trying to tempt her (like she's the one who would be granting the favor). Until he reaches the button of her jeans and stops. Just stops.
"Leslie?"
Because 'yes' is too inadequate a response to this, and she wants to tell him how much she loves him, but she feels like she'd need the entire dictionary to even start and can't seem to form complex syllables anyways, she does the only thing she can.
She kisses him. Tries to pour everything into it, everything she feels, everything he's given her, all the joy and the strength and the love. All her want and her need and even her fear. Kisses him and says 'Thank you for coming back to me when I gave you every reason not to.' Kisses him and says 'Here I am—too independent, too scared, too ambitious—imperfect in every respect except in my desire to love you the way you deserve.'
Kisses him and says 'I've already asked for more than I have a right to, but give me just a little more time and I'll get there. I promise'
And she doesn't even realize she's crying until his thumb starts to brush the tears away, and for a moment she's afraid she's ruined the mood, but then she can feel his other hand work the button on her jeans free and the zipper down and she's reaching to help him push both her pants and underwear off her legs without breaking the kiss and they can't quite get the logistics, and they're both laughing against each other's mouths even as she can still feel the saltwater drying on her skin.
She finally manages the task and kicks them free, and Ben starts to drag his hand up the inside of her thigh with a tantalizing slowness that seems designed to pull her focus. Force it to coalesce on nothing more than the feel of his fingers inching towards her core. Breaking the kiss he lowers his gaze to watch the progress with a fascination she finds slightly unnerving, until he whispers, "Do you know how often I've imagined doing this?"
Like he's timed it, he reaches his destination as he finishes the question, punctuating it with a twist of his wrist that makes her see stars, and Leslie drops her back against the door with a groan, just barely manages to gasp out a response. "When we worked together?"
"At least once a day."
"Even at the beginning when I fought you?"
"Especially then."
And she wants to ask him more, but he's stroking her and teasing her, driving her higher and higher, and then backing off, prolonging the moment and she's starting to lose coherence.
As loathe as she is to admit it, there'd been a part of her that was half-afraid she'd built the physical part of their relationship up in her head. After all it had only been that one night and the emotion had been so incredibly heightened, and it isn't as though her prior frame of reference had set the bar that high. And she'd tried to prepare herself for the possibility that the reality wouldn't live up to the memory. Because honestly the sex with Brent had been very good. Verygood. Particularly towards the end when he could play her body with the practiced ease of a maestro, had memorized every chord and note and rhythm that went into the symphony of her climax.
And it would be a disservice to Brent to say Ben exceeds him in technical ability, but god the potential is there. Because what he lacks in familiarity he makes up for in feeling. She can feel him watching her, sight-reading the nuances of her reactions with a deftness that tells her, given time, and the opportunity to practice, he could certainly match if not surpass any previous lover.
Her legs start to tremble beneath her, and she fumbles a little at the back of his neck, trying to hold on, stay upright. In response, Ben breaks off his ministrations and pulls her away from the door, walking her the two steps back to the bathroom counter, so he can lift her onto to it.
The move raises her up, so that she's now looking down at him, and for a second they just stare at each other. Then with a small embarrassed smile she gives in to the thought that had started this whole incredible sequence of events, unfolds the glasses she'd been entrusted with and slips them on his face with a quiet, "Hi."
"Hi." Ben responds, giving her a shy bemused look, not quite sure what's going on, and maybe just a little afraid he's being teased.
She runs her fingers through his hair in reassurance, holding his gaze. "I love you."
And she wants to keep repeating it over and over, until he gets it, understands what she's trying to say, that she knows which version of him she has, which one she's with, that there aren't any ghosts here. But she knows it still makes him uncomfortable to hear it when he won't reciprocate, so instead she kisses him swift and sweet and just a little bit dirty, pulls his hand back up her thigh, urging him to continue with the main event.
But shift in position has brought her breasts to near eye level, and Ben seems suddenly intent on making up for his previous neglect, runs his lips along the neckline of her tank and then mouths them a little through the fabric, even as he's pushing her flannel down her arms. And then he's pulling her tank over her head, and her fingers are scrabbling at the clasp of her bra, and suddenly she's completely nude save her multi-colored, knee-high wool socks, which have somehow remained on throughout this entire process, and the absurdity of that strikes her as incredibly funny.
"Want to let me in on the joke?"
She sticks her legs straight out on either side of him and waggles her feet. "Did your imagination ever include socks?"
He looks over his shoulder at the object of her amusement, then back at her and grins. "It will now."
That makes her laugh, and she bends over to shove them off, but Ben stops her with a hand on her ankle. "Leave them on."
"They're silly."
"I know. That's why I like them." And then he's bending her right leg so she can draw her knee up to her chest, like he wants to keep her rainbow socks in his sight-line. Sure enough when he's got her posed he runs his hand up the line of her calf, and drops a kiss on the top of her knee with a smile. "Perfect."
Leslie leans forward to rest her chin on her bent knee and wrinkles her nose at him, because honestly she can't imagine a less sexy picture than this. "You're insane."
And this should not be the moment that Ben chooses to level her world with a completely debauched kiss that makes her feel like some intoxicating courtesan rather than a middle-aged public-servant. But that's exactly what he does. Slides his fingers into her, curling them up in a way that makes her arch back a little, and tears his mouth away to whisper low and enticing against her ear, "Maybe that's because you drive me crazy."
Anytime, at any other moment it would sound completely ridiculous coming from his mouth, but he's working her body now with a focused intensity that makes her feel like he's trying to push her to the brink of madness with him, and just . . . god, she's so not laughing.
Ben keeps talking, pressing the words against the curve of her neck like he can't help himself, but doesn't really want her to hear. "You're still beautiful, you know. Still so completely breathtaking. God when I saw you talking to Diane-"
That makes her turn her head and capture his mouth before anything else can spill out, trying to let him keep his secrets. But he's still coaxing her higher, dragging her inexorably closer to the edge, and she can't make her body entirely obey her commands, so it's sloppy and unfocused, and then she's babbling things back, exchanging confession for confession.
"I love watching you work. I've had fantasies about interrupting you at your desk for months."
"Just months?"
"I didn't know what your office looked like before May."
The revelation that she's talking about his current workspace seems to make him lose his rhythm for a second, and the power of that makes her bold. Because maybe he won't let her touch him, but that doesn't mean she can't reachhim, can't at least try to give him something in exchange for what he's giving her.
Leaning back a little she arches up into his hand, aware she's putting her entire body on display in a brightly lit bathroom in a way she's never been comfortable with before. But Ben's seen her at her lowest as well as her best and still calls her beautiful. He thinks her rainbow-colored socks are perfect, and tells her she's breathtaking like it terrifies him. And she wants him to know he's not the only one defenseless here.
So she opens her mouth and says things. Things she'd never say to anyone else, probably wouldn't even say to him if she thought he'd let her give him anything different. But he can't, and she knows why, knows it would make him too vulnerable, too needy, and she wants him to know that he's not, that in so many ways she's the needy one. And the only way to tell him is by actually telling him, so she swallows her inhibitions, opens her mouth and says things.
"You could have had me anytime you wanted, you know. From that first night in the hotel bar, you could have just taken me up to your room. I would have gone. All you ever had to do was lean over and kiss me. Slide your hand up my thigh. Say 'I want you'. Anything really, I would have been so easy."
And she doesn't mean to, but she can feel herself about to crash over the edge, and she's unconsciously spreading her legs even wider as she's talking, urging him on. And the next thing she knows her left leg which is still draped off the edge of counter-top is coming into contact with his hips, and whether it's the touch or her words or just the fact that he's stretched his control to the breaking-point, but suddenly Ben utters a guttural curse against her collarbone and presses himself against the flesh of her left thigh and she can feel him hard and wanting and desperate for her.
And she shatters.
When she comes back down it's to find Ben watching her, and even though she can feel how hard he still is against the side of her thigh, the look on his face is nothing short of reverent.
Slowly she becomes aware of the fact he's running his hand up and down her sock-clad calf like he's calming a skittish animal, and scowls a little. "You are way too fascinated by those."
"I like them. They're very you. Besides, if I remember right-" he brushes his thumb along the exposed back of her knee and then up her thigh, gives her an impishly satisfied smile when she immediately dissolves into nearly hysterical laughter, "Yup, still ridiculously ticklish afterwards. At least this way I can touch you."
And of course because he really is just a little bit evil, he then proceeds to touch her anyway, sweeps the fingers of his left hand down the line of her spine and laughs when she starts to giggle and squirm and curse him simultaneously.
"Stop it!"
"Nope. Sorry. Too much fun."
Okay, she was going to be good, but if he's playing dirty, she is too, and she really only has one weapon in her arsenal right now.
Grabbing him by the collar she pulls his mouth back to hers, hooks her leg around his hips and presses the entire length of her torso against his chest in blatant invitation. It seems to startle him into momentary inaction and for a second she almost forgets it's a tactic, but then he's moaning against her mouth, and his hands are flexing on her hips like he's fighting for control and she doesn't want to break him, just warn him.
She pulls back, gives him a little separation, and whispers, "Truce?"
Ben steps away even further, like he doesn't entirely trust her, and braces his hands on the counter. Shaking his head, he half-laughs, half-groans. "God, you're evil."
"You're one to talk." She retorts, then lets out a groan of her own as she sits up and feels a muscle in her back give a small twinge of protest. Automatically Ben's hand comes up and begins to massage the spot where her finger are, and she drops her forehead to his shoulder with a sigh, "I think I'm getting too old to be having sex anywhere other than a bed."
"Oh no, don't give up on me now, I have plans for you."
That makes her turn her head to look up at him. "You have plans?"
Ben looks over at her and smiles, suddenly a little guarded once again, but somehow still hopeful. "Let's say I have fantasies I'd like the opportunity to turn into plans."
Leslie closes her eyes, "Ben, I-"
"Shhh." He brings his hand up and runs it through her hair. "Don't- Don't second guess it. I'm not. Just let it be what it was."
The problem is she doesn't know precisely what it was. Just knows what she wants it to be, and that it isn't quite that. But she also knows it wasn't nothing, at least not for her, and suddenly she needs to hear him say it meant something to him, too. So she presses.
"What was it exactly?"
Ben grins, genuine and happy. Kisses her briefly before answering with one word:
"Wonderful."
[]
Ben draws her a bath and leaves her to relax and clean up (because it's only nine-thirty in the morning and she went for her walk before taking a shower, and she really doesn't want to think about what she smells like right now). She thinks it's also to give himself the opportunity for a little space, because he makes a self-deprecating comment about going outside to stand in the cold and think about baseball stats and there's a thread of truth behind the joke that makes her heart ache.
Leslie reaches for his soap instead of her body wash and lathers it up in her hands, trying to make her skin smell like him the way it usually would after sex, but of course it doesn't work. There are complexities missing, intangible base-notes of sweat and release, light top notes like the coffee he drinks and the herbs he cooks with that always seem to linger on the tips of his fingers (it had taken her months to identify that one, and maybe it's a little obsessive that she worked so long to find it, but she likes knowing).
She wishes he didn't feel the need to hold those last few piece of himself back like that. It's not that she doesn't understand, because she does. Without either one of them wanting it, they've somehow replicated almost the same situation as before. He's put himself out there, given her the power, the choice and all he can do is wait. But last time he gave everything, exposed the soft-underbelly of his feelings and stupidly trusted she wouldn't hurt him.
And she turned around and gutted him, slit him open and left him bleeding.
And it doesn't matter that she cried as she did it; you remain skittish of the thing that hurt you long after you've healed.
So if he needs to maintain this separation, to hold on to this one point of control, this one choice he has left to keep himself from being that vulnerable again, she can't begrudge it, not if it might keep him safe. Because more than anything, maybe even more than she wants Ben to love her, she wants to protect him, stop him from being hurt. She just hates that it still has to be from her.
And of course none of that stops the selfish parts of her from wishing she could touch him anyway. She almost aches with how much she wants to touch him, wants to fit her fingers along his ribcage, run her mouth down the line of his spine. It's a desire that is simultaneously blisteringly sexual and not sexual at all. In some ways it's oddly chaste. She wants to stretch him out on her bed and line up their bodies point by point (fingertips, elbows, chests, hipbones, knees) and show him just how perfectly they fit, wants to curl up around him like a shield and press her lips to the nape of his neck and listen to his breathing as he falls asleep in her arms rather than the other way around. She wants him to be safe with her.
It strikes her that she's been imagining him in her bed at home in Pawnee, complete with its sunshine yellow sheets and Amish quilts, and half read reports she sometimes leaves on the foot of the left side because if she put them on the floor they'll just fade into all the other unread reports never to be heard from again. And she supposes that makes sense because she still doesn't know what his bedroom looks like, couldn't conjure the color of his sheets or the angle of sunlight. But it's more than that she thinks, in some ways Leslie thinks she just likes the idea of him in her bed.
Which is actually a little odd for her. Because she's never been a huge fan of bringing lovers home. Mostly because she used to worry about cleaning up for them, but even later in life as she's adopted an attitude that goes something like 'screw it, it's my house,' there's always that initial moment when she can feel them reassessing their opinion of her.
Even with Brent who spent more than his share of weekends there it had never been a truly comfortable thing. Brent liked clean lines and big open spaces and muted colors, and there was always that feeling when he sat at her kitchen table and drank his coffee out of a chipped souvenir mug from the Snow Globe museum rather than one from his set of hand-thrown stoneware, that he was a stranger in a strange land, observing the local customs because it was the polite thing to do but anxious to get back to the familiarity of his native home.
And it's not as though she's met a kindred pack-rat in Ben. Because god knows she hasn't. If anything, his home (other than his kitchen) is almost spare, like he lived so long on the road he forgets that he can keep things now. But there's something about it, something in the way the furniture doesn't quite match, and the chairs at his dining room table have been acquired piecemeal and then painted the same color to try to create the illusion of unity. Something in the way the photographs on his walls are all full color rather than the black and white that's so popular and there's an old C-3PO action figure sitting on the corner of the desk in the spare bedroom. It's a little haphazard, a little uncoordinated, and she thinks while all his coffee mugs might match (they do, she's checked), it's more likely a product of expediency then aesthetic choice.
Leslie tries to remember if Ben had a moment on Election Day when he stood in her foyer and stared at the clutter, but can't. And she's not entirely sure that means there wasn't one (because god knows there was enough going on to keep her distracted), but if it happened it didn't linger long.
And then she realizes what she's doing, unconsciously assessing the compatibility of their everyday lives, how they'd fit each other on a regular basis, and nearly has a panic attack. Sits straight up in the rapidly cooling water, goosebumps crawling up her skin, and hugs her knees to her chest, suddenly feeling strangely vulnerable and exposed.
God what is she doing? This is crazy. She's never lived with someone. Okay yes, there were obviously roommates in college and a truly disastrous apartment situation for the first two years of her professional career, but the moment she could afford to have her own place, she did and never looked back. And however you parse it, a lover is not a roommate. Living with someone like that is intimate, exposing; you twine your stuff, your habits, your lives together until they become nearly impossible to separate. Until no matter what happens, when it ends, if it ends (she's got to learn to stop thinking of relationships as intrinsically finite things), what you're left with in the after is fundamentally different from what you had before.
She thinks about her mother's handwriting on that envelope of clippings, and her father sitting at their kitchen table the night of her graduation. Thinks about the passage in Robert Knopes' will leaving Marlene his copies of Shakespeare and a small lump sum for "the trip to London I never gave you" and realizes sometimes you twine your lives together so tightly they simply can't be entirely separated ever again.
The idea of knotting herself up with Ben like that is simultaneously the most terrifying and wonderful thing in the world. Because for the past week she's had a taste, a sampling, and she loves it. Loves the feel of him beside her at night and the sight of his toiletries perfectly lined up on the other side of the sink away from her chaos. Loves coming back from her morning walk to the sight of him dressed and freshly showered, and the random things you laugh about that would never be funny in the retelling, but are hysterical when experienced together.
But she also knows it's artificial because this isn't her house or his and they're both in a strange way still acting like guests on their best behavior. And she doesn't even have a point of reference to know where the pitfalls and problems and spots of friction would be.
She needs more practice, more training, needs a trial run. She's a novice at this, an amateur. You don't do things this way. Really who does things this way? This is no way to conduct a life, just wake up one morning and realize you're desperately in love with someone and from here on out at least a portion of your self-worth might hinge on being able to make them happy and say 'it's okay, I have absolutely no discernable skills in this area, I'll just pick it up as I go.'
If this was a job and Ben was reading her resume for it, he'd never even give her the interview (and it doesn't matter that Leslie herself would probably argue for passion and commitment over experience, it's Ben's happiness at issue here). And yet he's already offered her the position, and he talks about 'two-years from now' like he's ready to put her under contract, and she can't help feeling like she's tricked him somehow.
Because what if she gets it wrong? Messes it up. What if she says yes and commits and throws herself into it, but can't get the details right? What if she repeats her mother's mistakes or makes new ones or decides three years from now they weren't mistakes at all? What if for all her passion and enthusiasm her execution is sloppy?
She wishes she had a blueprint or an instruction manual. Wishes this was something she could read up on, could outline and color-code and organize, because she knows how to do that. She's good at that.
But how do you even start making a checklist on the right way to love someone?
[]
Ben isn't surprised or upset when she starts talking about going back to Pawnee over a late breakfast of pastries he ran down to the local coffee shop for (the walk in thirty-five degree weather was apparently his version of a cold shower). Just nods in agreement like he thinks it's a good idea, and tells her he's put copies of the financial spreadsheets on a thumb drive for her in a way that says this was entirely expected.
Which when she thinks about it, it probably was. She's already pushing the boundaries of how long she can disconnect from her other obligations without things starting to slip through the cracks. Madison's been calling her more and more frequently with each passing day, and Ben told her from the beginning that he needed to be in Indy for meetings this coming week, and she supposes there was a kind of tacit understanding in the fact they took both cars back to Terra-Haute that she wouldn't be returning with him tonight.
That makes her pause, and briefly she wonders if he would have kissed her like he did if she'd stolen his glasses on Saturday instead, if he hadn't known they'd be going their separate ways at the end of the day. When he leans over her to walk her briefly through her father's financial picture and the steps she'll have to take to start transferring assets, there's a frission of something electric between them that hasn't been there since the night of her election, and Ben seems a little apologetic for it (like it's inappropriate for him to want her right now), and she thinks 'no' he probably wouldn't have kissed her on Saturday after all.
Still when he helps her pack her car with a few boxes of her father's things, and lock up the house (she'll have to come back in the next few weeks to have it appraised), he does it with a smile. Kisses her on the forehead before she gets in the car and tells her to drive safely.
"The weather sites say there might be snow tonight. Call me when you get in, okay?"
She nods. Smiling a little at this ritual they've developed, the way it says 'I have a right to know you're safe,' and if she thinks about it, she wonders if that's when this thing between them really started again. With his watch on her wrist, and his tired midnight phone call to her cell. Tiny tacit acceptances of the other's claim.
That night she calls him from her house when she gets in, and chats about nothing as she cleans out spoiled milk and moldy takeout from her refrigerator. Mentions she's going to have to go out and pick something up from JJ's because there's no food in her kitchen, and Ben tells her to get eggs instead of waffles so she's at least had some protein today.
"Yes, because with all that cholesterol it's a much healthier option."
"Did you have anything for lunch?" he asks in a way that says he already knows the answer to this question.
She looks down at the counter top, like it's going to save her. "No."
"Well I happen to know you had two blueberry muffins and a hot chocolate this morning and nothing else. An all carbohydrate diet is not a viable option, you'll crash. If I thought you were actually worried about cholesterol, I'd tell you to get an egg-white omelet but honestly they're awful. At least this way there's a fifty-fifty chance you might actually do it."
"I wouldn't get your hopes up."
Ben just laughs, signs off with, "Get the eggs. And some fruit."
"Now you're definitely pushing your luck."
"Can't blame a guy for trying."
She can and she will.
Leslie still gets the waffles. But she winds up feeling really guilty about it, and after five minutes of not being able to enjoy them the way she normally would, she orders a plate of scrambled eggs and a cup of fruit. Curses Ben the entire time.
And she wonders if this is what being with someone in the long-term entails, letting them have a right to you in a hundred little ways, letting them mess up your life and your habits with their opinions, and loving them for caring even as you wish they would shut up.
She pops a section of apple in her mouth, savoring the crisp bite that tells her she's gotten one from the late harvest (she always forgets how good fresh fruit tastes when it's in season), and thinks maybe she could learn to live with fewer waffles and more fruit.
It's not much, but it feels like a step in the right direction.
[]
It is of course not as simple as waffles versus fruit (if it was she'd be on his doorstep tomorrow), and being back in Pawnee reminds her of that in a way that's almost visceral.
This place is her home.
It's always been her home.
Even now when she's packing up her office, and exchanging emails with Diane about potential sublets up in Indy (between students and visiting professors her resources for temporary housing are amazing), there's something comforting about knowing she'll still list the same address on her tax forms and return frequently for town-hall meetings. To know that when the Assembly is out of session she's going to come back to this house, and put food in her bird-feeders, and do program development for five different summer camps and three professional retreats from her kitchen table to help make ends meet (One of these days her state is going to realize it can't keep paying its representatives like they're all still part-time officials with family farms and single person law practices and expect good government, but it hasn't yet).
She's made her life here, become the person she is here. She walks down the streets and knows people's names, knows their stories, can map her own history in everything from the field where she broke her arm playing field hockey, to the classroom at the Rec Center where she learned to French kiss, to the site where the Harvest Festival still goes up every fall.
She can even stand in the stairwell where she fell in love with Ben if she wants to. It's only a fifteen minute drive and the hotel manager knows her by sight.
In some ways she feels like she is Pawnee. Like she's seeped into its corners and its cracks and had a hand in making it what it is, and maybe that's a little self-aggrandizing, except Pawnee seeped right back, twined itself around her heart and leaked into her veins, until she thinks if you cut her she'd bleed corn-syrup and chaos.
And it's not that she thinks Ben would demand she move. It's that she knows sooner or later somewhere down the road, one of them will have to in order to have the relationship they want, and she can remember the look in his eyes when she pointed out he wasn't asking her to come to South Bend with him, that certainty that if he made her choose between Pawnee and him, he'd lose. Remembers hating herself for the fact he was right.
And she's still not sure what a "Loving Ben Wyatt" checklist should look like, but she thinks step one is probably being ready to put her life on the table.
For the first time she can remember, Leslie wishes she didn't love Pawnee quite so much.
[]
The first week and a half she's back everyone is careful with her, almost too careful, like they're afraid of breaking her.
She hates it. It makes her feel oddly guilty for not being weaker, more fragile, for feeling like she's ready to get her hands dirty when everyone else seems to keep expecting her to burst into tears. Like somehow she isn't doing this right, isn't sad enough or hurt enough or broken enough. Like she's dishonoring her father's memory by being determined not to let his loss cripple her.
Even Ann, wonderful Ann, seems to be getting on her nerves, bringing her breakfast every morning and pointedly not asking about Ben (when they both know she desperately wants to ask about Ben), until Leslie's almost maintaining radio-silence on the issue out of sheer childish-stubbornness. Like a pout or a sulk, not saying anything because 'she started it'. Like they're ten and giving each other the silent treatment on the playground. Except that's a horrible analogy because Ann is patient and forgiving and not giving her the silent treatment at all. And somehow, pettily, Leslie manages to find that irritating, too, because any other time of her life Ann would have called her on her bullshit by now.
She calls Ben up to complain about it on Friday afternoon when Madison backs down for the third time in as many days on something they both know she should have fought.
Ben answers the phone with a clipped 'I can't talk now. I'll call you back.' and hangs up on her.
It's the rudest someone's been to her all week, and she kind of loves him for it.
When he calls her back an hour later and starts to apologize for being so abrupt, she cuts him off.
"No, it's okay. You were working. Honestly it was kind of nice."
"Being hung up on?"
"Being treated like a rational adult."
"Ah."
And that's all she needs for the whole thing to come spilling out in a disconnected jumble of frustration and anger and tears because 'I do miss him. I do. But I hate crying like this. I want to get through one damn day without crying like this. Why can't I do that? What's wrong with that? You were okay with me being okay. Why can't they be?'
Ben's quiet for a moment when she finishes, then softly says, "They want you to be okay, Leslie."
He doesn't mean it as a chastisement, but she's suddenly contrite, because of course he's right, and it's horrible of her to think any other way. She sighs, swipes at her tears (god, when this is over she's going to investigate having her tear ducts surgically removed). "I know. I just- I wish they wouldn't treat me like I was broken. It makes me feel like I should be. Like there's something wrong with me because I'm not. Why is it you're the only one who can treat me like I'm okay?"
"Because you weren't for awhile and I was the only one who was there while you got better."
That makes her sit down on the bottom of the steps. "Oh."
"Yeah. I'd love to tell you that I just know you that well, and I'd treat you this way no matter what, but honestly, if the positions were reversed I'd probably be following you around with a box of tissues and getting you pissed at me. So, you know, cut them some slack for caring."
"How much slack?"
"A lot of slack. Cut them a lot of slack."
She groans. "I don't know how long I can take this."
"Have you talked about it?"
"Not really."
"Can I ask why?"
"I'm tired of thinking about it so much. It feels like it's all I think about sometimes. I just want to do normal things, talk about happy things. Did you know Abigail said my name the other day? Well kind of, it was more like Leffie, but I'm counting it."
Ben does not take the bait. "I think you should talk about it with Ann. Ask her to come up with you when you go to sign the probate paperwork next Wednesday. I think it will help if she can be a part of it with you and see firsthand how you're handling it."
Leslie turns the idea over in her mind and realizes he's probably right. Realizes even moreso that she'd really like Ann to be there. Wants to show her best friend the house she spent parts of her teenage summers in, and tell her about finding the college t-shirts her dad's graduating seniors gave him as gifts. Nods silently in agreement, not thinking about the fact Ben can't see her.
"Got any suggestions for Madison?"
He laughs. "You could always pick a fight."
[]
She actually winds up doing both.
On Monday she purposely gets into a twelve round battle with Madison about whether or not her legislative agenda is ambitious enough, and somewhere around round five she can see the other woman get riled enough to forget to be careful, and somewhere around round eight, she can see it sink in with Madison that she's not fracturing under the pressure (The remaining four rounds are just because half-way through Leslie convinces herself there's some merit to her position that they aren't being bold enough, even though she hadn't meant it when she started.)
Ann takes a little more convincing of her emotional stability (probably because she was there at Leslie's least stable).
On Wednesday they make the three hour drive back to Terra-Haute together, after Ann leaves Abigail with Ron and Tambarlee. (Ann is not sure about this at all, but it was either them or Andy and April who still barely manage to take care of themselves. And it's only until Greg's school lets out and Tamberlee promises to lock Ron out of the house if he tries to teach Abigail to drink or whittle. And she'd do it too, so everything is fine. Probably. Maybe. Leslie really really hopes so. Ann just calls to check in a lot.) And on the drive up even though Leslie keeps determinedly talking about her father in cheerful positive tones, and Ann makes all the appropriate responses, she can feel her friend watching her like she's a bomb about to go off.
Which is really unfair, because Leslie thinks she's handling everything perfectly. Signs all the probate paperwork with a steady hand and makes rational inquiries about the expected timeline for the courts to put it through given the simplicity of her father's bequests. And greets the real-estate agent who's come to appraise the house with a warm handshake and a welcoming smile.
And then kicks her out fifteen minutes later when the woman calls the dark wood paneling in the den 'dated,' and the wall of built-in bookshelves 'problematic' and starts to talk about replacing the linoleum in the kitchen if they have a hope of selling it for a reasonable price.
For some reason this is the thing that makes Ann decide she's a real person again, and when Leslie turns back from almost forcibly shoving the woman out the door it's to find her best-friend staring up at her from the couch with wide 'can you believe that just happened' eyes.
"Ugh, Bitch."
Leslie exhales in relief. "Oh thank god. I thought it was just me."
"No. Definite bitch."
Coming over she flops down on the couch next to Ann, and looks over at the wall of empty bookshelves, "I like the built-ins."
"I think the paneling makes it feel cozy."
"And the linoleum is-" Leslie can't think of a word other than 'worn-out' and 'tragic', just shakes her head instead.
"Like I said, bitch."
"Definitely."
After a long, comfortable silence, where Leslie just slouches against Ann the way they used [to] after all night brainstorming sessions about Lot 48, she announces without really knowing why. "I don't think I'm going to sell the house. It doesn't make any sense. There's no demand right now, and the neighborhood is starting to go downhill and no one who buys it will love it enough."
She is aware that these are not really legitimate reasons for holding on to her father's house when there's still five years on the mortgage and she has no reason to ever need to live in Terra-Haute. But Ann nods like she's just made an extremely compelling argument. "I think that's a good idea. In fact I think it's such a good idea we should celebrate."
Leslie lifts her head hopefully, "Like with cake?"
"Like with alcohol."
Yeah okay, her way is better.
They drive over to the grocery store and get several pints of ice-cream and three bottles of wine (they don't drink it all but they do seem to feel the need to sample all three for quality control). And there was probably a time when this wouldn't result in both them getting blitzed, but between pregnancy and breast-feeding Ann hasn't had anything more to drink than a few sips of beer in over a year, and Leslie has been exceedingly careful with her public intake ever since the primaries and has never been a private drinker.
Long story short. They get pretty trashed.
Ann has to call Greg to tell him she can't come home tonight because 'the real-estate agent was a bitch,' which is kind of true, but the fact she can't actually pronounce 'real-estate agent' and winds up calling her 'house-lady' probably clues her husband in on the finer nuances of the situation. Luckily Greg isn't one of those dads who freaks out about the prospect of being left alone with his child for an extended period of time, so Ann seems to get away with it once she's promised to make it up to him with 'dirty things' (she actually talks about the dirty things for awhile but Leslie covers her ears and sings 'Camp WamaPawnee We Love You' at the top of her lungs because she just doesn't need to know some things about the father of her god-daughter.)
Once Ann gets off the phone Leslie realizes she needs to call Ben. Because this is their thing, right? She needs to let him know she's still in Terra-Haute so he doesn't worry. Cause he would worry. He'd be cute and worry a lot and there would probably be little frown lines right between his eyes from worrying, and he'd make phone calls to the neighbors and the police about her, and maybe he'd drive down in the middle of the night to check she was okay. And that would actually be really hot, except she'd be in Terra-Haute and wouldn't get to enjoy the hotness, and yeah, okay she needs to call him.
Ann watches her fumble with the numbers on her phone with suspicious drunk eyes, "Why are you calling Ben?"
"I have to tell him where I am."
"Whhhhhhyyyyyyyyyy?"
"Cause I love him."
This seems to satisfy Ann for the moment.
Finally she gets the phone to start ringing, and then Ben picks up with a cheerful, "Hey, how'd it go?"
Leslie bends over and yells at her phone where it sits on the coffee table, so she's sure he'll hear her. "I'm in Terra-Haute with Ann. And we're really drunk because the house-lady was a bitch, so I can't drive back to Pawnee. Ann's making it up to Greg with dirty things. I want to make it up to you with dirty things but you won't let me. When are you going to let me?"
Ben doesn't get a chance to respond because Ann covers her phone with a pillow and sits on it.
She looks up, "Why did you do that? He's going to worry."
Ann just stares at her for a second and then pokes her in the breast. Leslie feels like this violates some kind of rule of female solidarity, but she can't actually remember any of the rules of female solidarity right now. But she does know it hurts. A lot.
"Ow! What was that for?"
"You're not telling me things! You-" Ann waggles her finger, loses her train of thought and then comes back to it, "You promised to tell me things! AllBen related things. Calling to tell him where you are and that you want to do dirty things to him are definitely Ben related things."
"You forgot that I love him." Leslie adds automatically, because that should probably be at the top of the list of anything Ben related, before remembering the list is what stopped her from finding out when Ben is going to let her do dirty things to him, so really the list sucks.
Ann goes to poke her again but her coordination is off so this time it's on Leslie's arm. It's still pretty annoying.
"Stop doing that!"
"Stop not telling me stuff!"
"I'm telling you stuff. I told you I love him."
For some reason that makes Ann flail so much she almost loses her balance. "You can't say that!"
"Why not?"
That question stymies Ann for the moment.
This is of course the point when Leslie's phone rings. It's Ben's ringtone, and for a second they just stare at each other. Then the phone goes off again, and like it's a starter pistol they move simultaneously to grab it off the coffee table, except Ann's cheating by being closer and still sitting on it, so she gets there first, holds it up and stumbles drunkenly to the middle of the room as she hits the answer key.
Immediately Ben's voice comes back over the speaker. "Is everything all-right over there?"
"Ann stole my phone," Leslie yells out, trying to do her best to warn him.
But she doesn't know if he actually hears, because Ann is already putting the phone to her ear and demanding, "What did you do to Leslie?"
She can't hear Ben's response, but Ann is obviously less than pleased with it, because she's shaking her head violently. "No. No. No. You did something. I can tell because she had speeches. Big speeches about you just wanting to be friends and how she was happy and wanted to kiss you and stuff. And now she's all 'I love him,' and- and glowy. What did you do? Did you sex her?" This would of course be the moment she chooses to look over at Leslie's face, and whatever's there makes her suck in an indignant breath. "Oh! You sexedher, didn't you?"
After a moment she lowers the phone from her ear and looks down at it in puzzlement. "He hung up. Rude."
"You're rude." Leslie shoots back, crossing her arms in a pout.
"Nuh uh." Ann shakes her head, "I'm the best-friend, he's just the guy who sexed you. Doesn't count."
It's really hard to argue with the logic of that.
Stumbling back over to the couch Ann flops down on the other end and nudges at Leslie with her toes, mouth curving in a little girl grin. "Was it good sex?"
Leslie can feel herself starting to flush hot at the memory, takes a healthy swig of her wine and nods.
"Does he have a nice penis?"
She almost chokes. "Ann Perkins! You're a mom!"
"I'm a drunk mom." Ann corrects her, like this excuses everything, nudges her again. "So does he?"
"I don't know. I mean he did."
Ann sits up straight, wide-eyed and alarmed, "Did something happen to it?"
It takes Leslie a moment to catch up. "Wha-? Oh God! No! Ew, no."
"Then why don't you know?"
"Because he didn't- um, you know-" Leslie trails off, makes vague gestures. Of what she's not entirely sure, but Ann seems to get the message, tilts her head in puzzlement and skepticism.
"I thought you said he sexed you good?"
That makes her sit up, a little indignant on Ben's behalf, determined to defend his prowess on this point. "He did. He sexed me very well. Really well." She points over the back of the couch, "In that bathroom. With his hands. He has nice hands."
Ann eyes go wide and she gets up on her knees to look at the door of the bathroom like she's never seen it before. Then because this apparently does not provide enough information, she stands and walks over to it.
Leslie follows. Don't ask her why.
When they're both standing inside and Leslie is pointedly looking anywhere but the bathroom counter, Ann asks. "He didn't do it on the toilet, did he?"
"Counter."
"Oh good. I have to pee."
Leslie goes back outside and closes the door.
Strangely this also closes out the Ben portion of their conversation for the evening. Looking back, Leslie's not entirely sure why, but it makes sense to both of them at the time.
They trip through a lot of half-thoughts after that. Including an incredible diatribe about Greg's inability to change diapers correctly, with an ode to his tongue close on its heels (god Leslie is not going to be able to look him in the eye for weeks).
Somewhere around midnight, the conversation slows, and without either of them noticing it slips its way into that quiet place where aided with the clarity of inebriation, you're able to hold painful truths up to the light and look at them for awhile.
Leslie drops her head back against the arm of the couch, glances around the den and sighs, "The paneling really is awful isn't it?"
Ann looks up at her from her spot on the floor and grimaces. "It makes the room feel dark and small."
"It isdark and small."
"It makes it worse."
"Yeah."
She sits with that for a little while, then adds, "I'm going to have to sell the house, aren't I?"
Ann nods. "Eventually."
"But not right now, right?"
"Nope."
"Good."
Later, Leslie curls up on her side and glares at the kitchen floor illuminated in the single strip of moonlight. "I hate that linoleum."
"How old is it?"
"I think it's older than me. I also think it might be a health code violation."
"Greg'll come up for a weekend and help you put in something inexpensive from the hardware store."
"He'd do that?"
Ann snorts. "If he wants sex ever again he will."
. . . .
"Ann?"
"Yeah?"
"The house-lady was still a bitch, right?"
"Definitely. Uber-bitch."
[]