TITLE: 'Here Comes the Raine Again (2/3)
RATING: A
CHARACTERS: Toby, Sam, Josh, Leo, Donna, and CJ
NEW CHARACTERS: Lori and Raine, King and Queen of Scotland and situated family members
SUMMARY: Toby's little sister comes to town and Josh meets a girl
DISCLAIMER: The characters used from the West Wing do not belong to me; they are the property of Aaron Sorkin.
**Toby's office**
"GINGER!"
Poking her head into his office Ginger replied, "You bellowed?"
Toby looked up from his paperwork that was piled onto his desk at his aide, one of the two women he sometimes took for granted. "I need the laws of Scotland, and I need them yesterday."
"What kind of laws Toby?" Ginger asked.
"I don't know, how many different laws can there be?"
"Are you serious Toby?"
Toby took a few minutes to ponder over what it was he had just asked. He bowed his head and hit it on the desk twice before lifting it back up to reveal a small red mark on his forehead. "Ginger, I am so not prepared for what I have to do in like five minutes so bare with me here. I need the laws regarding marriage and custody but not just for the people of Scotland. I need it for royalty, and then I don't know, ex royalty."
"Ex royalty?"
"I don't know what they become Ginger. Commoner's removed by marriage? Maybe we should call Fergie and ask her what her proper title is now, would that help?"
"Someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed today." Ginger made the appropriate assumption where Toby was concerned.
"No, for your information someone woke up on the floor. AGAIN! And so help me God if Meadow doesn't stop kicking me I am going to dock her Titanic sized feet permanently."
Toby put covered his face with his hands and realized that he had already said too much, and to the wrong person. Ginger would no doubt be on the phone in seconds with another member of the bullpen club and before you could bat an eyelash, the President knows your bedroom secrets with his daughter. With the left hand still covering the left eye Toby took a quick peak to see if Ginger was perhaps gone.
She was still standing in front of his desk waiting for further instructions from her boss. "Ginger, sometimes a person can say the wrong thing and not really have meant what it was that they were saying. Can you understand where I am going with this?"
"Not really Toby, but if you are asking me to keep my mouth shut, you got it." Ginger swung around happy that she had Toby in a tight spot, and then without turning back to Toby she said, "And I'll get on your marriage vows-I mean marriage laws."
**Josh's office**
"Are you really going to phone her Josh?" Sam asked his friend while biting into an apple.
"I don't know, I mean I should just as a good American citizen."
Nodding his head and with a mouth full of apple Sam agreed with Josh saying, "Yeah, yeah. Only most good American citizens don't do it with the hopes of catching themselves a date."
"Well I can't help if she should find me irresistible and want to go out on a date with me." Josh said putting his feet on his desk and stretching back.
"Why would anyone find you irresistible Josh?" his secretary Donna asked from the doorway.
"Don't you knock?" Josh asked her.
"I did knock, only with your ego you couldn't hear me. Why would anyone find you irresistible?"
Surprised that one could question him on this Josh answered, "Because I am."
"No you're not!" Came the response from both Donna and Sam.
Shocked Josh swiveled his chair around to Sam and said, "You can't argue this because you're a man. You are automatically against me therefore you can't rule against me and you," turning his attention back to Donna and raising a pen at chin level towards her, "Once said that I was too good to be true. That I was the most charming man you have ever come across in ages." With a smile Josh went back to stretching, satisfied that he had won his case.
Donna dropped a pile of file folders on his desk and said, "That was you Josh. You said that about yourself you big dope." Smiling she left the office and headed back to the bullpen.
Smirking in the corner was Sam who was also still tearing into his apple. Not giving Sam a chance to sarcastically insult Josh, Josh immediately said, "Don't even!"
The phone rang and Josh tapped the button that would allow him to talk using the speaker phone. "Josh Lyman."
"Josh this is Margaret, Leo would like to see both you and Sam in his office within the next five minutes."
"Both of us?" Sam gulped.
Josh shrugged his shoulders not sure why they were being requested. "Margaret, what does Leo need with us, we just got back and we are still trying to thaw out."
"Don't worry Josh. With the fire I have prepared for both you and Sam, you won't need to worry about thawing anymore. Now get your feet off the table and get over here!" Leo's voice came through the phone loud and raspy.
Josh threw his feet off the table and Sam trying to look around him and eat an apple at the same time lost his balance and fell to the floor bringing Josh's bookshelf tumbling to the floor.
"And Josh?" Leo cooed.
"Yes Leo?"
"Don't forget to bring klutzy boy with you." There was a click and then the dial tone could be heard. Josh ran his fingers through his hair and went to speak to Sam when he realized that Sam was on the ground.
"Sam, are you alright?" A slight moan and then a pause. "Sam?" More moaning and then Josh thought he heard sobbing coming from the mounds of books that lay in a heap on Sam. Josh ran over to Sam and when he started throwing the books off of him he was finally able to see Sam, he was laying on his stomach and his hands underneath him at waist level.
"Oh God Sam, now is not a good time for that. Ah man that is sick." Josh got up and with a look of unease he backed towards his desk. Sam lie on the ground and moved around a bit before finally getting up onto his feet. Holding up his apple, Sam said, "I landed on my apple you moron."
Josh started to chuckle. "Well that's good. You know for a minute there I thought that you-"
"Yeah I know what you thought I was doing. You're a sick man Josh Lyman, sick sick sick." Sam was jabbing his finger in Josh's face and as he left Josh's office he threw the apple towards the wastebasket and missed. Whispering a slight "shit" he was on his way.1
***Toby's office***
"Is this everything you could find?"
"Yes Toby, I checked all over and on short notice this is it. Oh and by the way, Mrs. Duncan is here to see you." Ginger answered.
Looking at his watch Toby told Ginger to send her in. He was looking through what documents Ginger had given him when Mrs. Duncan entered his office. She seemed nervous and timid and Toby knew right away that this wasn't going to be easy. He stood up and went over to where she stood and offered her his hand which she shyly accepted.
"Good morning Mrs. Duncan, my name is Toby Ziegler and I am the Director of Communications. Please would you have a seat."
She took the first chair that was directly in front of his desk. "Can I get you any coffee Mrs. Duncan?"
"No, I am fine thank you. And please call me Jewely Mr. Ziegler."
"Okay, and you can call me Toby. To be honest with you Jewely, I wasn't sure how to address you. I know that Princess Diana was addressed as Her Royal Majesty and I guess I assumed you were to be as well." Toby was sitting down as he spoke to her.
Jewely quickly began shaking her head, "Oh no, I am in no comparison to Princess Diana. She was a real princess."
Confused Toby asked her, "And are you a fake?" He was trying to relax her.
She smiled and crossed her legs. "There were times when I actually believed I was Toby."
"I can't possibly imagine the life that you lead, I can bet that it is impressive and yet overwhelming all in the same day."
"You have no idea Mr. Ziegler. Growing up you believe in the fairy tale and you dream for it to happen to you so bad, and then one day-poof. You are a princess and you have so many demands placed on you that you begin to doubt the idea of a 'happily ever after' life. Atleast I did." Jewely spoke with some hesitation.
Toby sat and listened to what this woman had to say and was surprised to learn that he was taken by her. Not in an unprofessional manner, he was after all happily married himself and the father of a little boy. A step father however, but the best father he could be to a little boy whom he adored. With his hands covering his lips Toby began to talk.
"Jewely, what happened to your fairy tale, if you don't mind my asking?"
Jewely didn't keep her eyes focused on Toby, they began to scan the room surrounding her. Toby gave her a few minutes to reflect on his question. Then she spoke,
"Mr. Ziegler I grew up a very unhappy little girl. I was the seventh child born and I was a disappointment from the start. Instead of being my father's first born son, I was his last child and I was a girl. My parents didn't coddle me like one does with their children now, because they had so many others to tend to. And being the youngest of a female population is no picnic. If you have sisters you can understand what I am referring to."
Toby began to shift around in his seat, uncomfortability setting in when it came to remembering his own childhood and being pushed around by sisters. "I do, I have 2 older sisters and I also have a younger one, but she didn't come till much later."
"I felt left out and when I was old enough I ran away to Europe. That was where I met Mike and I fell so in love with him so fast that I didn't even consider the consequences, I just went ahead and married him. I'm sorry I don't mean to whine, it's just that I wanted you to know what would drive a young girl to another country and marry a prince." She had relaxed a bit and was laughing at her own words.
"Please don't think that I am judging you, because that isn't why I am here. I am here to see if I can help you."
"Can you help me?" Jewely pleaded.
"I don't know yet Jewely, but I give you my word that I will do everything in my power to do so. But you have to trust me and you have to be honest with me. Okay?"
"Yes, oh Mr. Ziegler I will do anything if you can help me."
"How about we start at the beginning and we will see where that takes us?" She nodded in agreement. Again Toby asked her why her fairy tale didn't turn out right.
"My love and affection for my husband was genuine, and his was in return. We were young but we knew how to make one another happy. We had our daughter a year after we were married and life couldn't have been any better. Our son followed two years later and it was in that same year that things began to change. Slowly at first, Michael's elder brother Alistair was killed in a plane crash that also took the lives of his wife and son.
Of course the King and Queen were devastated and they began to replace Alistair with Michael. He was always doing a duty for them, or going on some trip to represent them. Michael was never one for attention, and he never wanted to have the throne, or atleast he said he never did. That wasn't the kind of life Michael wanted, he just wanted to spend his time with me and the children."
"Did they see you as a threat? Someone who would hold Michael back from his duties as the next heir to the throne?" Toby asked, sincerely curious.
"I don't know if I was thought of as a threat, I can't see why. And Michael wasn't next in line for the throne, his brother Faegan was. Of course he also had an older sister Brighid and a younger one as well Peigin but they would never be considered for the throne as long as there were male's in the family."
"So you have two children, a lost heir and a husband being treated as a puppet. That couldn't have been healthy for your marriage."
"It was rough for awhile and then Michael just sort of came back to me. That was when we conceived Cairrean. For a year it was just like in the beginning. And then they started in on him again, forcing him to go on tour after tour, and before we knew it he was sick. He was diagnosed with brain cancer less than a year ago and it took him from us just a few months now."
Toby couldn't fathom the possibility of losing his family. He knew it would destroy him, and here was a woman who was facing that risk for the second time within a year. To lose your partner, your very best friend and then on top of that have people try to take your children away from you as well. He would rather die.
"Do the Queen and-I'm sorry what are their first names again?"
"King Tomas and Queen Mairghead."
"Mairghead? That is one I have never heard."
"She is probably one that you would never like to meet as well."
Toby laughed, warming to his young woman who sat across from him placing all of her hopes into his hands. Toby allowed himself to get caught in the moment leaving him without a clue as to what question he was preparing to ask her. This wasn't something Toby did often.
"Who has custody of your children right now?"
"I suppose I do. There have been no legalities regarding the custody of my children."
"And you know for a fact that they will not allow you to leave Scotland with the children? Is this correct?" Jewely nodded her head and began weeping.
"When I spoke of my wish to leave Scotland to Michael's sister Peigin she immediately told her parents. They were furious at such a thought and the King himself warned me that I could not leave with his heirs."
Toby wasn't sure what to say to her, this was way out of his league and unfortunately he didn't know anyone that could help her. He pretty much knew that there was nothing that could be done, but he didn't have the heart to tell her that yet. With his pen in his left hand he began uncapping the lid and then recapping it. A sign that he was disturbed and that was never good for Toby.
***Leo's office***
Josh and Sam both stood in the doorway, both not wanting to be the first to enter Leo's office . Leo took notice of the two men blocking his doorway and removed his glasses before speaking.
"Are we waiting on an invitation?"
Sam swallowed and looked at Josh who was deep in thought about the woman he had met earlier, and wanted nothing more than to go and call her.
"For Christ's sakes you two get your butts in here." Leo yelled. The men complied, each taking a seat in front of Leo's cluttered desk. Leo looked from Sam to Josh and back to Sam who was beginning to get nervous. He figured he would start with him.
"So Sam, what can you tell me regarding this morning?" Leo asked.
Sam was taken back by being approached first and this left him a little confused with the question. What did Leo mean by this morning? Did he mean the date-book, does he know that Josh stole a date-book. Beginning to get a little paranoid Sam flashed Josh his mean look.
"What?" Josh asked defensively. Sam Seaborn trying to intimidate him by snarling wasn't what he needed right now.
"Is there a problem Sam?" Leo inquired.
Sam spun his head towards Leo and flashed him his pearly whites. "Problem, there's no problem. Why would you think there was a problem? Why? What have you heard?"
"Good cover there Sam, you should get into undercover work," Josh said leaning over to his friend.
"How about we start with this you two. You met with Helen Larson this morning, how did that turn out?"
"I hope you weren't expecting a miracle Leo?" Josh said more of a statement than a question.
Leo shrugged his shoulders, "Not a miracle but I was hoping for something good to come out of it."
Biting his fingernails Sam stopped to notice that Leo was studying him. "The meeting started out well Leo, but then they wouldn't actually give us anything in order to help them better." Sam said.
"Such as?"
"Well for starters Leo, they want more money, less work, less hours and less students. They pretty much want a vacation and they want to be paid for it too." Josh answered.
"You were supposed to reason with her Sam, that's why I wanted you specifically."
"Hell-ooo," Josh waved his hands in the air. "I am in the room still you know."
"We did try to reason with them Leo, only it didn't turn out so well." Sam replied.
"How did it turn out?" Leo asked not really wanting to know.
"Turned out they were a bunch of whiny, greedy, spoiled brats, and it's a good thing too because that was exactly what I called them." Josh answered with a smile on his face.2***Toby's office***
"GINGER!", Toby screamed from within his office.
A few seconds later Ginger appeared at his office door looking none too happy. "You know Toby, I do have an intercom that links your office to my desk. This constant yelling of my name is not necessary."
Ignoring what Ginger had said Toby spit out, "I need some time with Leo."
Ginger didn't move she just kept looking at Toby, who after a few seconds of pushing papers around took notice.
"Is there a reason why you are still standing there blocking my doorway?" He asked her.
"Did it ever occur to you Toby to maybe use the word please and thank you once in awhile. What were you raised in a barn?"
Toby blinked his eyes, not sure if he was truly witnessing his secretary second guessing the way he did business. "Oh, I see. Well I am sorry. How is this then? Thank you for deciding what pay raise you should qualify for, and please remove your ass from my doorway." Toby went back to reading his notes, not paying any attention to what Ginger may have been doing.
After a few minutes of pretending to look busy Toby sneaked a glance at his doorway and was relieved to find that Ginger had indeed left. He took a quick peek at his watch and wondered how long he had until he would be able to see Leo.
"LEO CAN SEE YOU NOW." Was shouted from within the bullpen and Toby didn't need to guess as to who was doing the shouting. He stood up and straightened his tie and made his way to the bullpen. Sitting at her desk with a grin from ear to ear was Ginger.
"Was that necessary?" Toby asked her.
"You tell me Toby, I mean it must be fun for you when you do so I thought I would give it a try."
"Well congratulations your try is complete. If I hear you screaming like that once more I will have you escorted from the building permanently. Do I make myself clear?"
Ginger didn't quite know how to respond so she slowly nodded her head to let Toby know she did indeed understand him. As he was about to walk away she mumbled softly under her breath, "Someone's in a mood?" Toby's back was to the bullpen but nobody mistook his comment, "I am not in a mood!"
***Josh's office***
"Do you still have a job Josh?" Donna asked Josh as she brought in reports for him to sign.
"Why? What have you heard?" Josh joked.
"I heard that the meeting didn't go to well with Helen. Did you seriously call them whiny and spoiled?" Donna questioned.
Josh looked up at his assistant and putting his pen down said, "You know, you girls communicate way too much."
Donna pretended to take offense to this, knowing all to well that his comment was true. The power of email was a glorious thing for Donna, Margaret, Bonnie, Cathy, Carol, and Ginger. "You're just mad because Leo didn't appreciate yours sense of humour."
"Leo never appreciates my sense of humour. And I happen to have a great sense of humour." Josh defended his humour.
"You're still the only one that believes that Josh and-what's that?" Donna asked questioning a book that Josh was leafing through.
Not looking at Donna to see what she was talking about Josh simply asked, "What's what?"
"That thing you are reading, Josh what is it and who does it belong to?"
"Who are you my mother?" Josh asked Donna.
"Would you like me to be?" Donna teased.
Josh did a double take at Donna and seriously considered her questioning. "If I wasn't infatuated right now I would be taking that offer up, you do realize that right?"
"Infatuated, you? Who is he?" Donna joked.
"Ha ha very funny Donna. For your information I met the most beautiful woman today." Josh let himself get lost in the memory of Raine for a few moments. Donna meanwhile was trying not to laugh at the goofy expression on his face all the while he was dreaming.
"So is that hers then?"
Coming back to reality Josh gave a quick shake of his head and answered yes.
"You stole it?" Donna gasped out in surprise.
"NO! Why would you automatically assume I stole it?" Josh asked his assistant.
"Did she give it to you then?"
"Not exactly, I sort of found it."
"You found it, and you haven't returned it yet. That is the same as stealing Josh." Donna stated to him.
"I don't recall asking for your opinion in this matter Donna. Now if you don't mind I have some reading to do."
"You are a nasty person Josh, reading someone's diary. That is really low."
"It isn't a diary Donna, it is her daybook and I plan to return it to her. I just can't seem to find her phone number in here."
Donna came along side Josh and looked down at the daybook. "Why don't you try the front, that is usually a good place Josh. Most people don't put their phone numbers in the middle of the month of December."
Josh gave Donna a dirty look and flipped to the front of the book where the phone number was listed. Trying to be surprised Josh said, "Oh, you're right. I thought I looked here already."
"Nice try Josh, you're still low." Donna said before leaving his office.
"I am not low, I just wanted to make sure her day wasn't full so that when I called, she would be available." Josh said to himself since Donna had already departed.
Josh picked up the phone and dialed the number that was listed. He was connected to a lawyer's firm in Boston. A few minutes later a woman came on the line to inform Josh that a Ms. Hudson was out of town but could be reached on her cell phone. Josh immediately grabbed a pen and jotted down the number that was read out to him.
"So, MS. Hudson, we are not a Mrs. That's a very good start." Josh said to himself.
He picked the phone up again and dialed the new number that was given. After three rings a woman answered with a soft voice, and Josh immediately grew nervous. He made it through the call and when he hung up he screamed out, "YES!"
Donna poked her head into the door to see what was going on. Josh noticed her right away and from mid-air where he had jumped during his YES cheer, he sat back down. "What can you possibly want now Donna?" Josh asked trying to busy himself with documents and papers.
"I heard a noise."
"Maybe it was Toby?"
"Toby doesn't make happy sounds. I heard it from here."
She had him there regarding Toby making happy sounds, but he wasn't going to admit to this one, even though he was completely guilty. "Well it sounded like Toby."
"Toby is in a mood today Josh, it wasn't Toby. Now why were you shouting?"
Josh kept his stare with Donna and was defeated when he finally had to blink. "Donna, it wasn't me, now go away."
Turning to leave Donna said, "It was you Josh."
Josh grumbled out, "It wasn't me."
A beep came through on his intercom, surprising him since Donna was just outside his office less than three seconds ago. He pushed the button down that would connect him to Donna and heard, "It was you Shaggy," and then she clicked off. Josh began cursing silently under his breath.
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