Ginger stood back and admired the floral display on Sam's desk. She straightened the pile of cards that had arrived since it had become known in the West Wing he was returning and then turned the flowers around one more time. Toby entered the room quietly and stood behind her. "That's nice, what you've done there. He'll like that."

She nodded. "We've missed him."

"Yeah."

Ginger smiled before turning to Toby and kissing him lightly on the cheek. "I know you have," she said before leaving him alone. It was six o'clock, Sam was due at nine. Toby savoured the peace of the early morning bullpen and then went to look once more at the final draft of the State of the Union.

Josh was sitting on CJ's desk oblivious to the obvious relief she was feeling every time she looked at another front page of the pile of newspapers in front of her. "This is top of the range; it's not even in the stores yet. I know this guy who works for the com-" He looked at the top of CJ's head. "You're not even pretending to listen to me!"

She nodded in confirmation as another paper was tossed onto the pile on the floor. "I'm not even pretending to be pretending."

Josh frowned as he worked through her sentence then placed the watch on the paper she was browsing. "Well, listen up, Claudia-Jean, because I have reached 'return to work gift' heights never before reached."

She pulled her glasses down her nose and looked at the watch disdainfully before returning to her search through the papers. "I got Sam a pen that has a microphone it in so he can record notes and stuff he wants to remember without feeling it's too obvious."

"That's a really great present!"

"I know."

"It's considerate and really makes things easier for him."

"I know."

"My present sucks."

"Yup."

"Do you wanna swap?"

CJ threw Josh an 'as if' look. He walked to the door but stopped before opening it. "You're gonna know the story's out before you read it in the paper."

Her hand froze over the page she was turning. "I just wanted to…I don't know what I wanted to do."

"Stop it, you wanted to stop it, but you can't."

She pushed the papers away. "True, Joshua. What I can do is make you take me to the Mess and get me a coffee and a huge muffin."

"Will you have a proper look at the watch?"

"Yes I will, and I might even say something nice about it."

Leo had told Sam he would pick him up and take him into work and so Sam stood outside his apartment, tugging at his tie and wishing he'd bought a new suit.

He hurried down to Leo's car, there were no spaces and he knew if he didn't get in quick he'd have to wait for it to go around the block again. The rear door was pushed ajar and Sam jumped in. "Did you see that guy!" Leo said by way of greeting of the man who had squeezed his car in behind Leo's.

He finally finished his rant and glanced at Sam. "How ya feeling?"

"Good," Sam blurted out as if he'd been rehearsing the response all morning.

"Okay."

The rest of the journey was spent in silence as the driver navigated the building traffic. He made quick work of parking and Leo and Sam walked together to Leo's office. Once there, Sam was told to sit and offered a coffee. He spent half an hour there before Leo took him to CJ's office where he was offered more coffee. He was wondering if his day was going to be spent being ushered between offices, being given coffee, when CJ arrived. She wrapped him up in a hug and told him how great he looked. She took a seat beside him and he knew from her expression that he was about to hear something he wouldn't like. He listened as CJ told him about the story. He nodded when she assured him that she had done all she could to stop it, that they were going to come out fighting once it was out and that he didn't need to worry about it.

"What else? There's something you're not telling me."

CJ glanced at Leo before continuing. "There's a picture, a photo of you and Toby just before the accident."

Sam nodded slowly. The room was spinning a little and so he stopped nodding and looked up at Leo. "I should probably go to my office now. Unless you have something planned I mean. I should probably go and do some work."

CJ walked with him. He liked the flowers and the pile of cards and the welcoming hugs Ginger and Bonnie gave him. He went next door to Toby's office and sat down on the sofa. Toby closed the door. "How you feeling?"

"Good."

"I don't know what I should…do you want to get a coffee or something?"

"No!"

"Okay, so," Toby walked to his desk and picked up a file. He sat down next to Sam, the sofa dipping with his weight, "I thought you could start looking at some of these, start getting up to speed. There's a paper Leo wants you to write, it's an environment thing; he thought you'd enjoy getting into that. So you could do that."

"Or?"

"Or," Toby reached for a file from his desk, "Or, you could start looking at the State of the Union."

Sam smiled. "I thought you'd never ask."

"He's doing good," Josh told Leo after a staff meeting. Sam had been back for a week. He worked until two, later if he could manage it, and the general verdict was that he was doing okay. He couldn't hide how tired he felt and a lot of his time was spent hiding out or sleeping on CJ's couch. But, when he was in his office, he was functioning well or at least was appearing to do so. There was no writing happening. His work was mainly proofreading. Although his short-term memory remained poor he found he could remember speeches he had written years ago and quotes that he was surprised he even knew. It had only been a week though and Josh soon discovered his verdict on Sam's ability to cope was probably a little premature.

It was the Monday morning of Sam's second week back at work. Josh noticed he looked more tired than he had on Friday and wondered if he should have kept tabs on him over the weekend. Allegations of financial impropriety in the press had kept him busy and those same allegations were the subject of the discussion he was having with Sam and Toby. Josh was very much in favour of still attending a dinner funded by the company the allegations were against but hosted by a senior citizens group.

Sam listened to his reasons stood up and walked over to the window. He perched on the windowsill and waited until Josh had finished. "Really? You still think we should go?"

"I do," Josh confirmed. "I think if we back out now it will look like we're snubbing them."

"We are snubbing them, we're meeting here to work out how to snub them, this is a snub meeting," Sam pointed out.

Toby smiled, it flashed across his face and then disappeared. "They won't think that. They'll know exactly why we've cancelled. Let's invite them to the fireworks thing it will be over by then one way or another."

"Yes! Excellent. I'll write a short letter that will be suitably regretful and sincere." Sam folded his arms and looked down at his feet. "I might send them some flowers too."

"Sam!" Toby warned. "They're militant, opinionated, senior citizens they don't want flowers. They want increased Medicare and-"

"A bunch of flowers never offends, Toby, and I think it might just go a long way to making our snub a little easier to bear."

"I think flowers are a nice gesture." Josh agreed. "Never let it be said that this White House is above the sending of a simple bouquet to our friends that we have snubbed."

"Exactly!" Sam stood away from the window and put his hands in his pockets. "I might even pen a short verse for the card."

Toby picked up a file and shook his head. "If you two don't mind, I'm going to do some work that might actually make a difference now."

"I'm going to make a gesture which will be remembered-" Sam stopped mid-sentence and frowned, "remembered…fo…fo…"

"Forever?" Josh supplied helpfully.

Sam frowned and shook his head. "Remembered fo…fo…damn it!"

Toby's head sprung up at Sam's shouted curse.

"Hey," Josh advised, "they'll remember it that's the main thing."

"I c-can't think of the d-damn word." Sam held his head in his hands as if he could squeeze the word from it. "Fondly!" he exclaimed.

"There you go," Toby said but he shared a concerned look with Josh.

Sam was rubbing at his forehead. He looked at the sofa where Josh was sitting and then at Toby's desk. His attention turned to the Bullpen outside. It was as if he was cataloguing his surroundings. He ignored Josh who quietly called his name and walked into his office, pulling the door closed behind him.

Josh followed and knocked a couple of times before going in. Sam was sitting at his desk, a file open before him but clearly not being read.

"You okay?"

Sam looked up and for a horrifying moment Josh thought he didn't know who he was. He heard Sam say his name as if confirming to himself the identity of the person standing in front of him. Josh asked him again if he was okay although he was pretty sure he wasn't.

"I'm, yeah, I'm fine. I'm just looking at…I'm just reading this," he glanced at the file, "this report. I'm reading this report. Do you need something?"

"Yeah, I need to know you're okay."

"Well I am, so…"

Josh sat down. "What happened back there?"

Sam rubbed at his head then realised Josh was studying him and so stopped. "Nothing happened. I forget words sometimes you know that."

"No, after that. You looked a little, I don't know, spooked or something."

Sam shook his head and picked up the file. "I'm fine, Josh. I just need to work."

"You're not fine, you don't look fine and you're certainly not acting fine."

"Well, I'm sorry to disappoint, but you're the only one who thinks there's something wrong here."

"Sam, talk to me. If you need some time or something you can-"

"For fuck's sake, are you even listening to me? I'm fine, but I swear to God you won't be if you don't get the fuck out of my office right now!"

Josh stood quickly, holding his hands up before him, and slowly backed out of the room and straight into Toby who was standing outside the door. "What's going on?"

"He's fine," Josh deadpanned. "Let's leave him alone for a while, okay?"

Toby reluctantly agreed and they went to his office. Sam had already pulled the blinds on the adjoining window and so they were left with sitting in silence and trying to decipher what was happening next door by any noises they heard. There were none. Toby returned to his desk and went back to work. He handed a pile of papers to Josh who sat on the sofa and starting to browse through them. Still no noise came from next door. Josh finished the paragraph he was working on and put the papers down. "Maybe I should go back in there?"

"Maybe."

"It's very quiet."

"Yes."

"I should probably go in."

"Yes."

Before Josh could summon the nerve to face Sam's anger again, he heard the door to the office next door open and watched as Sam hurried through the Bullpen.

"I think I may have missed the boat there."

Toby looked up from his work. "Yes."

Sam stood at the door to CJ's office and put his hand up to knock. She was on the phone, nodding and scribbling notes as she listened to the caller. His hand wavered in mid-air and then he started to turn away. CJ caught sight of him and gestured at Carol to grab him. Carol guided him in and closed the door behind him. He sat on the sofa, hands resting between his knees as CJ finished the call. "That was what is commonly known in media parlance as a scoop." Sam showed no interest in the caller or the reason for the call and so CJ walked over to the sofa and sat beside him.

"You here for work or something else?" Sam didn't look at her and now, sitting close to him, she could see the paleness of his face, slight tremble of his hands and red-rimmed eyes. Instinctively she stood up and pushed him down gently so that he was lying on the sofa. She pulled the comforter from the back of the chair and placed it over him.

"I shouldn't be here."

She knelt down so her face was level with Sam's. "It's fine. You've got my sofa whenever you need it."

"No," Sam was falling asleep so CJ leaned closer to hear him, "shouldn't be here, at work. I keep forgetting and I'm useless. I'm useless now."

It was too late for comfort or reassurance, Sam was already asleep. She placed her hand on his head and whispered, "You're not useless, Sam." She stood and opened the door to her office and told Josh Sam was asleep. She led him away and back to his office where they sat in silence. After a while, Toby joined them but added nothing to the silence except his own worries and fears.