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For the past couple weeks, Leslie and Ann have taken the habit of going on a walk in a park near City Hall after lunch. Every day, before going back to work, they take time to walk along the paths, admiring the bushes of flowers and feeling the sun warm their skin on these early afternoons of July. Today seems different, however—today, a Monday of all days—the park is crowded. While surprising, it fills Leslie with a sense of pride she can’t quite explain. Her work for the parks and recreation department isn’t always easy, but seeing the people of Pawnee enjoying the fruits of her labor has always been her main motivation. Her smile of satisfaction quickly turns into a frown, though.
“Why are all of these people on their phones?”
Ann shrugs. Surely there has to be a reason. She reaches for her own phone, then places it back in her pocket when she realizes no breaking story or other Indiana-related news has come up. She turns to Leslie, only to notice her best friend is growing more annoyed by the second.
“You’d think they’d want to enjoy the park without staring at their screen,” Leslie continues.
“At least they’re outside,” Ann tries—an attempt at comforting her that somewhat fails, prompting her to add, “In your park. The park you imagined and worked your ass off for.”
“Oh, Ann. You perfect and loving baby bird. I just wish they’d stop for a minute to take it in.” She pauses. “But you’re right. They’re here. It’s like all of Pawnee gathered in this park, for some reason.”
She doesn’t give it much more thought, and soon enough the two of them have finished their lap and are now heading towards City Hall.
It’s a quiet day at the parks department. Leslie is in the middle of typing an email when Tom runs in, holding out his phone.
“Guys, have you heard about this new game? Pokémon GO?”
“Pokémon what now?” Leslie answers without looking up from her screen.
Ron, looking more like he’s searching for excuses not to work than genuinely interested, appears at the door.
“Is that some kind of new government initiative?”
“No, it's this really cool game where you walk around and catch Pokémon—tiny creatures of sorts—in real life locations. It's super addictive!”
Leslie finally looks up, intrigued, while Ron’s expression indicates just how lost he is.
“Can I eat those Poké-man?” He asks.
“It’s all on your phone, so that would be a no,” Tom replies with a laugh.
“Then I do not care.”
Later, Ron will go on to tell the camera crew that while this sounds like hunting, it is lacking the satisfaction of killing something. After a pause, he will add, “I am not interested.”
Leslie, however, raises an eyebrow, as if waiting for more explanations. Tom is about to continue when Ben enters, eyes on the phone he is holding in his hand.
“Did you hear? They finally released Pokémon GO!”
Leslie is starting to piece it all together—a new game only available on mobile devices, everyone on their phones at the park…and she cannot help but shake her head at the thought. Ben, however, looks adorable when he’s excited, and what was annoyance in her eyes a few seconds ago turns into affection and a tender smile.
“So,” she starts, in an effort to bond with her husband and co-worker. “How do you play it?”
Ben takes a few steps until close enough that she can see the screen, and shows her how to throw the red and white ball at a Pokémon. The thrown Pokéball lands on the ground, and he invites his wife to try to catch it herself but, just as she tries to make her first throw, Donna storms into the office.
“Don’t move, don’t move!” She exclaims, looking at Leslie. “There’s a Pidgey on your head!”
Leslie looks around and up, looking for the creature before realizing she means it is on her head, in the game, and suddenly Tom and Ben are staring at their phones again, trying to catch the pocket monster on their own device.
If she’s being honest, she doesn’t really get it. But her friends seem into it, so she’s willing to give it a try. What really wears her down is Ben showing her the Ponyta he’s caught a few minutes before, telling her she could rename it after Li’l Sebastian. And so, she downloads the app, too.
The next day, Leslie and most of the Parks department decide to go to the park on their lunch break. There’s an even bigger crowd than the day before, every single person staring at their phones, and this time Leslie doesn’t seem to mind as much, her mind focused on trying to land a ball on a nearby Pikachu.
“This is so cool!” She exclaims as she proudly shows the electric Pokémon to her friends once she’s caught it.
Tom and Donna are walking ahead, often stopping, sometimes running to a different part of the park. Ann, Ben and Leslie are a little behind, watching them from afar as Ben tells his wife and her best friend about his favorite legendary Pokemons and catches the occasional pocket monster showing up on their screens.
Suddenly, though, Tom turns around and yells out, “Guys, there’s a rare Pokémon nearby. We have to go catch it!” He and Donna run to it before their friends have time to answer.
When the time comes, they return to City Hall, and Tom notices that the building is actually home of a nest of Zigzagoons in-game. He jokes about Pawnee’s infamous racoon infestation being accurate across universes and calls Ben a buzzkill when he argues that Zigzagoon is a common Pokemon.
That night, Leslie wakes up around 1AM. She turns around, extends her arm in a sleepy attempt to hug Ben, but finds herself wide awake when she realizes that her husband is not asleep next to her. She calls out his name, looks for him, and finds him dressed and ready to sneak out. She immediately assumes the worst, asks why he’s leaving her, tells him she can change, well no, she can’t, but begs him to stay, and Ben has to grab her by the elbows and insist he’s not running away from their marriage a few times to calm her frenzy. When she finally regains a hold of herself, she asks why he was leaving in the middle of the night, and Ben hesitates, but decides to come clean to ease her mind. He was about to drive to Eagleton to catch a Pokémon, and Leslie is so shocked at the confession she needs to sit down.
“I think I liked it better when I thought you were leaving me.”
Ben only has time to utter a faint “I’m sorry?” before his wife goes on a rant about how much Eagleton sucks, and that he should know better than to sneak out of their marital bed to go to the enemy. He patiently waits for her to be done, asks her if she is when she stops talking; she says no, then realizes she doesn’t have much to add. She lifts her chin, expecting an explanation from her husband, something to justify his betrayal.
“Eagleton has a lot of Pokéstops,” Ben sighs. “There’s one on about every street. Do you know how many Pawnee has?”
He pauses for her to answer, and when she shakes her head no, holds out five fingers.
“No way!”
“Yes way,” Ben confirms, and Leslie can feel her blood starting to boil.
“How do we add one?”
Ben walks her through the process, and they agree to talk about it more in the morning, but for now, both of them need sleep.
The next morning, Leslie has already sent Ann a dozen texts, and it’s not even 9AM yet. Eventually, though, Ann shows up at her office door, and Leslie almost runs to hug her.
“Ann, we got a code red.”
Ann nods, adds she’s seen her texts and came as soon as she could. Leslie explains the situation once more, with an emphasis on how unfair it is that Eagleton is once again privileged, and of course Pawnee gets nothing, and she’s about to spiral some more when Ann interrupts.
“I had an idea,” she simply says, and waits for Leslie to register her words and let her speak. When she does, she continues, “We’re going to request new Pokéstops from Niantic. And when they get approved, I thought maybe the Parks department could organize some sort of inaugural event, which would also happen to highlight the importance of going outside and having fun in nature.”
“Ann, you intelligent, Mew-like creature!” Leslie explains, and Ann laughs at her friend’s very first Pokémon-related compliment. “Let’s do it.”
A couple weeks later, they receive an email from Niantic—they’ve approved their Pokéstop request. One of their beautiful fountains will now be Pawnee’s newest stop, and Leslie couldn’t be more excited.
The day of the inauguration, Leslie is beaming. There’s nothing she loves more than seeing children running around the park, playing and laughing. Lots of teenagers have joined, too—though most of them are too distracted by the game to care about what’s going on around them. JJ has set up a stand to provide waffles for those needing a snack, and Leslie gives him a shout-out in her speech—speech that is a beautiful, heartfelt declaration of love for Pawnee, its citizens and their passion for the game, and, of course, for her friends and co-workers.
The entire Parks and Recreation department showed up, though Ron did more out of obligation due to his position, and as an attempt at humoring Diane’s daughters who’d begged him to take them. He somewhat regrets going to a place this crowded, though, and says he wishes he’d gone hunting instead, as that is the proper way to catch animals. Chris is doing laps around the park, claiming that, “this is literally the most fun he’s ever had while jogging.” Donna and Tom stay by the Pokéstop so they can spin it every five minutes and catch the monsters spawning there. They trade some, too, and when Tom receives a lucky Charmander, he decides to call it Lucky Lucky Charm Charm, which causes Ann to roll her eyes. April grabs Andy’s flip phone as he attempts to throw it at a squirrel, asking how many points that would grant him and, after a soft “Andy, no,” she takes his hand and announces that they will go use the game as an excuse to trespass now. Leslie, of course, tries to change her mind, but the young couple is running away as April screams, “the tiny monsters are making me do it!” Another scream comes from behind her and Leslie turns around, only to see Jean-Ralphio leading an excited group of teenagers to an in-game Snorlax—they’re so excited, in fact, that they even shove Jerry without realizing it, and the poor man falls to the ground.
Despite these tiny incidents, though, the inauguration is a success, and Leslie tells the Parks department to give themselves a big round of applause for their hard work. As always, she’s proud of and has Pokémon-inspired compliments for every single one of them, short of Jerry, who only gets a “thanks for showing up.”
Weeks later, Ann and Ben enter Leslie’s office to find a sleep deprived Leslie, and both of them let her know it’s gone too far. She has been seen skipping her lunch break to go catch the digital monsters, she’s made the children watch the anime with her. And the movies. And the anime again. She’s even been sleep-playing the game, and Pokémon is all she talks about. Ann extends her hand, an offer for Leslie to give her her phone so she can uninstall the game for her. Leslie, though, runs away with it, and, as she runs, a smile grows bigger on her lips.
“You can’t catch me until I catch ‘em all!”