Author's note: I do not own Bleach or its characters. This is AU and draws inspiration from The West Wing.

Giving Thanks

Thanksgiving was not a particularly easy holiday in the White House. It never went smoothly, and this year was no exception. Nanao took a deep breath and struggled to regain her calm. It was a very good thing she did not have plans for this evening; she would have never made them. Things were a little crazy right now. Of course, that meant something a little different when you worked in the White House. None of the senior staff would be going anywhere this year.

It had started with the usual turkey pardoning debacle. Rangiku as press secretary had ended up with all three of the turkeys to choose from in her office. She wasn't exactly pleased about that. She was even less pleased when the Deputy Communications Director and the Deputy Chief of Staff managed to accidentally let two of the turkeys out of their cages. Rangiku had blamed Gin. He might be the Deputy Communications Director, her childhood friend, and most likely her lover, but that didn't mean she didn't know what sort of chaos he could cause.

Nanao personally blamed her own boss. Shunsui Kyoraku might be the Deputy Chief of Staff for the White House and a world class political mind, but he was also an idiot who had the tendency to get into to trouble if she left him alone for more than two minutes. While technically Nanao might be his assistant, part of her job was to keep him on task and out of trouble. She hadn't known what she was getting herself into when she hired herself during the campaign.

So there were two turkeys of the non-human variety running loose in the White House and a party made up of Shunsui, Gin, Toshiro (the White House's Communications Director) were hunting them. Oh, and they hadn't bothered to let Rangiku know what was going on. Rangiku was, as she often reminded everyone, their first call whenever they were into something. So there was that. And then Jyuushiro Ukitake, the President's Chief of Staff, stumbled upon a minor plot to add a rider to one of the current bills that would basically undone most of the work they had put into that specific bill.

That meant a last minute scramble to get things fixed. Of course, it didn't help that his typical go to people were currently chasing a turkey. To say it had been a disaster would have been an understatement. It had taken hours to get everything sorted out and taken care. Nanao wasn't sure if Rangiku was going speak to Gin again any time this century. By the time anyone could actually go eat something, it was nearly eight o'clock at nigh. As it was, the idiot boys had been ordered to join Ukitake at the Presidential Residence for Thanksgiving. It wouldn't sound like a punishment to most people.

President Kisuke Urahara was a good man and a great president. He also had a vast store on useless trivia that he liked to share with people. And as he was the leader of the free world, it wasn't easy to escape once he got started. Nanao herself had once been treated to the entire history of the yam. Thanksgiving was one of his favorite subjects to expound on. He knew all sorts of meaningless facts about the holiday, and she doubted that that the Thanksgiving dinner would prove to be anything save for providing the president with a captive audience.

And that was the reason why she was currently trapped in a secure records storage room with her boss. The idiot man had tried to escape by grabbing her and ducking into the nearest empty room. Of course, he had forgotten that this room couldn't be exited without a key card. He didn't have his wallet on him, and Nanao lanyard with all of her ids and cards was currently on her desk thanks to the damn turkeys chewing through the thing. It was also cold in here, and she couldn't get cell phone reception.

"Nanao-chan, you're shivering."

That was all the warning she had before her boss wrapped himself around her. Normally, she would have just elbowed him, but she was cold, and he was a source of heat. Shunsui sighed into her hair.

"Have I thanked you yet today, Nanao-chan? We're supposed to say what we're thankful for after all, and I'm thankful for having this wonderful, amazing woman as much assistant."

Nanao sighed but hid a smile. Perhaps this wasn't too bad for now. Someone had better let them out by morning though, or she was going to be very upset.