Chapter Text
“Good morning, Sondasies,” Sonny smiled brightly into a microphone, leaning back casually in his chair.
“No we talked about this, you need to stop calling the listeners Sondasies, it's narcissistic enough that you named our podcast after yourself,” Amanda butted in, throwing a displeased glance across the table.
“We, Amanda. We named the podcast after me because nothing sounds good with Amanda,” Sonny laughed, “anyway, welcome to The Son-Day Report. We’ve got some really interesting conversation coming up with a incredible guest.”
“But first,” Amanda swiveled in her chair, leaning into her mic as she glanced across the table at their guest, waiting patiently for the interview to start, “we have to thank our sponsors.”
“Because they pay us so we don’t have to have real jobs-”
“Because we’re grateful and appreciative,” Amanda rolled her eyes, though it was more playful than anything.
Sonny reached up, flicking the switch to mute his mic while Amanda prattled off their advertisements, and he let his desk chair roll closer to their guest, seated comfortably in front of her own microphone. “You ready?” He asked with a bright smile, motioning for her to turn her own mic on. He rolled his chair rather ungracefully back to his mic and shot Amanda a cheesy thumbs up as he unmuted his mic.
“...And today we have with us New York State Representative Olivia Benson, welcome to the show, Congresswoman Benson, we really appreciate you joining us,” Amanda finished up her speech.
“Thank you so much for having me,” Olivia crossed her legs, adjusting in her chair. “Before we get started I wanted to say I really appreciate and value what you both do here. It is so important to make these difficult issues digestible and informative, and you have done a really great job at that, so thank you.”
“Aw shucks, well, thank you so much, Congresswoman-” Sonny started.
“Please, call me Olivia,” she interjected quickly.
“Olivia,” he corrected with a thoughtful smile, “we’re so glad you think so highly of us. I mean, really we were just scrambling to figure out what the hell to do with our lives after this presidential election.”
“Not much job security in presidential speech writing,” Amanda remarked dryly, earning a soft chuckle from Olivia.
“I think you probably lucked out all things considered, not sure how much you would have thrived under the new administration,” Olivia added.
“True, true,” Sonny nodded, “and I’m not sure I’d be able to handle my words coming out of his mouth,” he added with a laugh.
“To be fair they probably wouldn’t come out anything like you wrote them,” Amanda broke out into a grin. “But moving on, because we all know we could bitch about this for the whole hour, I want to jump right into talking about this Domestic Violence against Women bill you’ve been championing in the House.”
“Oh absolutely, so let me start by saying it’s actually two separate bills that we’ve introduced. I firmly believe they go hand in hand because they touch on the same underlying concerns.”
Sonny shifted in his seat, crossing his legs in his chair and Amanda shot him a dirty look across the table. “So what are these two bills and why are they so important?” He asked to prod the conversation forward as he looked around for his headset mic instead.
“So the first is a bill to limit the sale of firearms to people who have court orders of protection or restraining orders against them, as well as limiting the sale of firearms to people with misdemeanor stalking convictions,” Olivia explained, watching with piqued curiosity as Sonny switched to his headset, standing up to stretch his knees. “One in three women will experience rape, physical violence or stalking by an intimate partner. And every day on average, three women are killed by current or former partners. We’re not doing enough to protect these women, but one option we have is disarming the people who pose a serious threat to their safety.”
“So we crunched the numbers before you got here.”
“Just to impress you,” Sonny cut her off with grin.
“And that means that approximately 7,000,000 women are raped or physically assaulted by a current or former intimate partner each year. That’s an incredibly overwhelming number of women,” Amanda continued, turning in her chair to watch Sonny pace around the room.
Olivia’s eyes followed him as well, “exactly. The second bill is called the Fair Housing for Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Survivors Act. Nearly fifty percent of homeless women report that domestic violence was the cause of their homelessness. Once homeless, women are further vulnerable to sexual victimization and exploitation,” she paused for a moment.
“Our research, with the New York Attorney General suggests that over half of domestic assault victims reported that discrimination by landlords was a significant obstacle to obtaining housing. Research also shows that victims are often denied housing if their previous residence was a domestic shelter, if they ever secured a restraining order, or if there was any evidence of domestic violence incidents. Often times victims are evicted based on a single domestic violence incident, which essentially only further punishes a vulnerable person in need of help.”
“That’s horrifying, I had no idea that housing and domestic violence were so entwined,” Sonny remarked. “So how does the bill help to solve that problem?”
“Well obviously it’s not a hundred percent fix,” Olivia started.
“But then nothing really is,” Amanda interjected.
Olivia nodded before continuing, “the purpose of this bill is to add these specifications to the Fair Housing Act, so that landlords cannot discriminate against sexual assault or domestic violence survivors. It provides them a remedy under law.”
“So Congresswoman,” Sonny dropped back down into his chair unceremoniously. “Olivia,” he corrected, “I understand that nothing is a perfect fix, but it seems to me that if someone is having that much trouble finding housing, or is already living on the street, they wouldn’t really have much opportunity to pursue a lawsuit. So how does this help?”
Olivia’s lips pulled into a bit of a knowing smile, “yes unfortunately that is one of the problems with our legal system. In order to exercise rights guaranteed by law, you often have to have the capital to bring them to court. That said, like we saw with other non-discrimination acts, the law itself will hopefully have a deterrent effect, to prevent some of this discrimination in the first place, and certainly some people will be able to exercise this right. But really we’re just thinking of it as a first step.”
Amanda nodded along, eyes trained on the impressive woman across the table from her, “that makes a lot of sense. So these bills have been introduced into the House. Not all of our listeners are poli sci majors, so could you explain a little bit about what happens next, and how they can support these Bills?”
“Of course, so I, along with several fellow representatives introduced this earlier in the year. It was then referred to a committee. The committee requests opinions from relevant government agencies, holds hearings, and then votes on whether it should move on. After that the majority leader, William Dodds, decides when the bill will reach the floor. There are debates, and then its brought for a vote.”
Olivia shifted, crossing her legs, “if the bill passes, then it also has to be passed through the Senate and signed by the President. Our bills are still being considered by the committees at this point, so the most important thing is to contact your local representatives and make sure that you voice your support and encourage them to vote in favor.” Sonny and Amanda both listened intently as she spoke, her tone even but resonating with a certain gravitas that Sonny knew was what separated the politicians and the speech writers.
“So if these bills make it through the House, how much support are you expecting in the Senate? I know the legend goes that the Senate is where dreams go to die-” Amanda laughed lightly.
“Well they’ve been pretty well received so far. I’d like to think that protecting victims of sexual assault and domestic violence is a pretty bipartisan issue, but I’ve been working closely with several Senators on drafting this legislation, as well as gathering support.”
Sonny’s eyes brightened, perking up in his chair, “so, as a representative for New York State, have you been working on this with Senators Novak and Barba?” he asked unable to keep the smile from playing across his lips.
Amanda groaned, “don’t answer that, then he won’t shut up about Senator Barba.”
“I just think he’s impressive,” Sonny shot back quickly.
Olivia let out a short laugh, “Senator Barba and I are good friends actually,” she nodded and Sonny shot daggers across the table at Amanda with his eyes. “He’s been instrumental in garnering support in the Senate.”
“See, Amanda, impressive,” Sonny added.
“Yeah it's got nothing to do with, how did you put it a few weeks ago, that his eyes look like literal emeralds?” She shot back teasingly, “anyway, we’re about out of time.” Sonny glared again, miffed that he didn’t have the opportunity to defend himself as she continued, “thank you so much for coming on the show, Congresswoman. I’d offer to call my representative but, you’re already here,” she joked.
“Yeah thank you so much for telling us more about this legislation,” Sonny added.
“Thank you both, I hope you’ll have me back soon.”
“Absolutely.”
Sonny swiveled around in his chair to stop the recording as he tugged the headset off his ears. “That was great, we just have to record the outro now but don’t want to waste your time,” he announced as he stood up again.
Amanda and Olivia stood up as well, circling the table towards the door of the tiny recording studio that they called home. Sonny offered his hand first, and Olivia leaned in just a little with a grin on her face, “don’t worry, I won’t tell Rafael about your crush.”
A light flush spread across Sonny’s cheeks as Amanda practically cackled over his shoulder. “It’s not…” he started to say, but Olivia had already turned, heading out of the studio, throwing a sly smirk over her shoulder before closing the door behind her.
“Oh I like her,” Amanda laughed, dropping back into her chair with an unceremonious huff. Sonny just rolled his eyes, pulling his headset back on. “You ready?” Amanda looked up, hand hovering over the record button so they could finish up the show.
Sonny nodded, watching Amanda count down on her fingers, “Again that was New York State Representative Olivia Benson. Make sure all of you listeners reach out to your local representatives to voice your support for the Domestic Violence Bills currently in the House.”
“And we’re about out of time, thank you guys so much for listening.”
“See you next Sunday, Sondaisies.”
Amanda rolled her eyes, “we’re not using that term.” She cut the recording before Sonny had a chance to bite back and laughed at the indignant look on his face.
“I don’t see what’s so bad about the term.”
“It’s awful,” Amanda laughed, standing up to grab her jacket off the side table, sliding one arm in, and then the other. She raised her arm to check her watch, “it always throws me off that we record these on Saturday evenings and post them on Sunday mornings,” she remarked, “I’ve gotta go relieve the babysitter, do you want to come over for dinner?”
Sonny shook his head as he pulled a blood red scarf around his neck, shrugging into his coat. “I can’t, I’ve got plans,” a flash of a nervous smile played across his lips, not lost on Amanda, who’s smile curled into a feral grin.
“A date?” She asked with the crook of an eyebrow.
Sonny just rolled his eyes and collected his bag off the chair, “let’s go.”
* * *
Sonny shifted in his chair, flashing a bright smile at the waitress as she set two entrees down in front of them, “thank you,” he nodded before turning back to the woman sitting across from him. She was beautiful of course, soft brown eyes, a sweet smile, but her nose wrinkled up for a moment as she glanced at the plate in front of him, branzino alla griglia. She hadn’t mentioned she was vegan until after the waitress had walked away from taking their order.
“This smells good,” she added with a smile, and Sonny relaxed a little and let himself dig into his meal with restrained enthusiasm. The night had gone alright so far, easy enough conversation, she worked as a journalist and had quite a few interesting stories to relay.
“So how incredible was it to work in the White House?” Ariel looked at him with doe-eyed awe. Sonny shied away from the look, eyes trained on the rich merlot colored table cloth, the cool touch of silver under his fingertips.
“It was incomparable,” he shrugged almost shyly, “I can’t think of anything more incredible than sitting in the audience listening to the president of the United States speaking your words,” Sonny answered truthfully. “That said, I’m really enjoying this podcast thing I’ve been working on. It’s sort of nice to be able to be acknowledged for work instead of having everything credited to someone else.”
Ariel nodded, setting down her knife and fork, a thoughtful expression playing across her soft features, “when do you think you’ll go back?” She asked curiously. Sonny just cocked his head. “To speech writing I mean,” she clarified.
“Oh…” Sonny trailed off. He hadn’t given the idea much thought, all things considered. What with the state of politics at the moment, he knew he didn’t have any hope of working for a cabinet member, much less the president, and everything else would feel like a giant step back in his career, after spending the last eight years working with his hero. “I don’t know, I’m really like what I’m doing now, honestly. I haven’t put much thought into anything else since the podcast’s popularity exploded.”
Ariel furrowed her brow for a moment, looking up at him, “oh, I didn’t realize you were planning on doing that long term,” but her face broke into a smile.
“It is named after me after all, and Amanda might have trouble nailing the witty rapport without a co-host,” he joked lightly, but Ariel just tilted her head slightly, wide doe eyes batting at him. Sonny paused for a moment.
Before he could think of something to add, their waitress flitted back over to the table, “would you two like to see a dessert menu?” she asked with a pointed smile. Sonny gestured to Ariel, offering the decision to her.
“No thank you, I think we’re set, just the check please.”
It was a brisk night, but not overwhelmly cold, and Ariel decided to decline the cab Sonny had offered, instead choosing to take his arm as they walked back to her apartment. He glanced down, watching his shoes tap a steady rhythm on the concrete. He’d had a good time, the food had been as incredible as always, and he savored the feeling of her small hand gripping at his arm, pressed into his side for warmth.
“This is me,” Ariel announced lightly as they came to a halt in front of a charming brick rowhouse.
“It’s cold, so I won’t keep you,” Sonny smiled gently, “but I had a good time, I hope you’ll let me take you out again.”
Her face softened into a grin, “I’d like that.”
Sonny leaned in, dropping a chaste kiss on her pink and windburned cheek before they parted ways. He smiled the whole way home, biting back the pang of doubt. She wasn’t a senator, wasn’t a champion for justice, but she also wasn’t an impossibility, and that’s what he needed.