Disclaimer: I don't own the West Wing or its characters. No copyright infringement is intended.
A/N: Alright, so this will be a collection of short stories that I've tried to link up although they probably won't necessarily be posted in chronological order. They are a mixture of reinterpretations of scenes from the episodes as well as flashbacks to the pre-campaign days and flashforwards to a future that I've dreamed up for CJ/Jed post Presidency. Some are fluffy, some are angsty, some are serious.
The titles of each installment are prompts from another author on LiveJournal, 38gnihsurc, who has written some brilliant CJ/Jed fics. This is the link to the list of prompts that I've used.
http:/ 38gnihsurc. livejournal. com/ 16433. html# cutid1
Okay, I'm done. Enjoy!
(This was based on CJ calling Jed "Professor Incoherent" in the Season 5 episode, "Talking Points." A possible backstory to the nickname, hehe.)
88. School
She didn't know why she'd bothered going to his office hours. She prided herself on being able to hang in there during the driest of lectures and she'd been prepared to do exactly that when she learned that her professor was an East coast economist, probably an erudite snob with brown elbow patches sewn into his blazer. Suffice it to say that it was a pleasant surprise when she saw Professor Josiah Bartlet was actually one of those professors who could not only be personally engaging, but make his students feel a little if not the same enthusiasm that he had for his subject.
He was going to be teaching one semester of intermediate macroeconomic theory at Berkeley, at the invitation of a close friend and colleague in the economics department. He thought he'd hate being so far from Abbey and his daughters but secretly he enjoyed the weather in California and teaching was fun no matter where he was.
Not to mention, he thought as he stared at the young lady in front of him, he was meeting all sorts of interesting students. He knew he was smiling a bit stupidly. Strangely enough, he couldn't help it.
"Miss Cregg, you do realize you haven't actually asked me anything yet?" Bartlet asked, his amusement peeking through his sharp blue eyes from behind his glasses.
She actually blushed and sat up, a reaction he found indescribably endearing.
"Oh, sorry sir. I-uh…I was a little lost on the point you made in lecture about predatory lending to subprime borrowers—"
As he watched her speak, he detected a little bit of an Ohio accent. He noticed she would reach for her ear and tuck her hair behind it mid speech, even when it was already tucked in. She was a political science grad student but she was required to take a few economics courses. He'd met with her maybe only twice or thrice in the past two months but she stood out because of her insightful questions as well as her appearance.
She had wildly curling red hair that she kept short and she was very tall, a good head and then some taller than him. She must have been twenty four or twenty five.
When Bartlet returned to Dartmouth in New Hampshire, he'd sit in his office and occasionally when there was a knock at his door, he'd expect to see a gangly, fresh faced spitfire armed with acerbic wit and a wide smile. Whoever it actually was would always wonder why he was grinning like that before continuing with their main point of business. This process occurred enough times to earn Bartlet the less than flattering nickname amongst the undergraduates of "Professor Incoherent."