#ben and pedro are friends and i think about it everyday

[shanediomorrissey]

Din absolute losing it after experiencing severe head trauma and losing his home, creed, and family, but make it Jean-Ralphio’s technically I’m homeless monologue from Parks and Rec (yeah boba’s Ron Swanson and Cobb's tom in this scene but it was getting too long, so just pretend he's there)

@the-blind-assassin-12 gave me this idea :)))

Bonus:

[beatriceeagle]

How exactly do you think whatever happened between Ben and Bea the week after Heros birthday came about? It just seems random that all of a sudden they're working together

Some of this is answerable, I think, by looking to Much Ado About Nothing, where the immediate aftermath of Claudio’s big scene is actually shown. Benedick is the first to speak after they leave, and the first thing he asks is how Hero is doing. Then he helps to try to figure out how to fix the situation. Then he asks how Beatrice is, and assures her that he believes Hero. And then he tells her he loves her, and Beatrice breaks and says she loves him too.

Now imagine the NMTD version of that: Pedro and Claudio storm off one way, Bea leads Hero off the other way, and Ben goes after Bea and Hero. You can imagine the rest of the night. Bea comforts Hero; Hero says that she didn’t do anything; the people who’ve remained (Ben, probably Balthazar, probably Ursula) tell her they believe her; Ben futzes around getting tea; everyone goes home. And then the next day, Ben texts Bea with, “How’s Hero?” and “How can I help?” And Bea just doesn’t have the energy or the will to keep up the pretense that she hates him anymore.

The thing is, Bea’s really great at bullshitting herself. She spends years telling herself she hates Ben, she doesn’t want a relationship, she’s definitely 100% always right, because she doesn’t want to admit that she loves Ben, and Ben’s past immaturity hurt her, and it could hurt her again. And maybe if nothing had happened, Bea would have gradually let go of that, because that’s generally how people grow out of their self-deceptions: a little bit at a time.

But sometimes, things happen that just cut through the bullshit. You know the trope where, like, the star-crossed lovers are on the outs, and then Something Terrible Happens and one of them is afraid that the other’s dead, and after it’s over they make up because, “I just realized that if anything had happened to you…”? It’s super melodramatic, but there’s a grain of truth to it. Death, disaster, danger – they have a way of clarifying things, if only for a moment. When something truly bad goes down in the life of a friend you’re fighting with, you forget the fight for a little while. 

So everything blows up, and in that moment, Bea sees Ben, who’s just let go of his own bullshit, who she never really hated, reaching out to help and being there for her, and it’s just immediate clarity. Of course they’re friends. Of course she’ll accept his help. Of course she loves him.

But then – and I think this is incredibly important – the crisis ends, and everybody goes back to real, day-to-day life. The clarity fades; it always does. A crisis may briefly remind you of what you really care about, but if you can’t live with that decision in your everyday life, it doesn’t matter much. (To go back to our star-crossed lovers, when the sun comes up the next day, they’re still going to be star-crossed. Unless they’re willing to defy their families on a day when no one is dying, what does any of it really mean?) 

And as you’d expect, when the dust has settled, Bea and Ben fall back into old habits. But in the end, they still choose to set aside their bullshit and be together – because they’ve actually grown, enough that they don’t need a crisis to admit their feelings.