AN: This isn't a storyline you're meant to like. I butchered the E and H relationship we know, so if you are not willing to keep an open mind, I suggest you turn around now. For those of you who do read, I hope you enjoy reading it.
It's guys like him, like Henry, that get away with it.
~MS~
The first time he notices is when they're all gathered in the conference room. It's the morning after a seventeen hour turbulence filled flight home from Mumbai. And though jet lag provides for some very irritating days, a Secretary of State too tired to blink, for once he was grateful for the different time zones— the extra nine and a half hours to his twenty four hour day allowed for a full seven hours of sleep.
His eyes squint as he laughs. A water pipe leak at Love of Learning daycare had forced Jay's hand in bringing Chloe in for the morning. He apologizes for delaying the schedule, but there isn't a single complaint from the staff.
Chloe's presence around the office always cheered up the Secretary, willing away the bureaucratic blues, and as Chloe handed out stickers, he'd thought she'd be the first in line.
She looks withdrawn, and the way she's sticking to the edges of the room worries him.
And as little hands land on his knee, he thinks she hadn't noticed Chloe at all.
His smile fades.
~MS~
The second time her behavior ends in a raised brow is as they're running through, at two times the normal speed, the usual get ready routine. They were behind schedule, had already missed cocktail hour and hors d'oeuvres, and he swears he and Nadine wouldn't hear the end of it from Russell because in four minutes a photo-op would be missed too.
He has his cell pressed against his ear, coordinating with Matt about the last minute revisions to her speech, when she steps out of her office. She'd gone with the blue gown. He looks her over, commenting about the flattering cut of the dress, but he couldn't help himself from asking why she hadn't chosen the ballgown they'd planned on, the one, two weeks ago, she'd looked forward to wearing.
He still has Matt whining in one ear, asking if he thinks she'll go off script when she mutters something about Henry not liking her in red.
Jay's snapping his fingers now, motioning them to the elevators, and he doesn't have a choice in rushing her to the door.
As they sit quietly in the backseat of the SUV he wonders when Henry had begun to have a stake in what his wife did and didn't wear.
~MS~
The third time prompts a call to Nadine.
His life consists of managing a woman who handles the situations that leave nations on the brink of war. Stress comes with the position, and panic attacks, even without the diagnosis of post-traumatic stress, were a given in the lives lived by people like them. Years ago, he'd held her hand through episodes of distressed cries and recounts of being pinned underneath the body of a man assigned to protect her. Once she'd agreed to therapy, finding her hidden away in the corner of her office, sometimes Nadine's, and once even the coatroom at the White House, distraught over the safety and wellbeing of Javani's son, and sometimes her own, became less frequent.
Though the bad days dwindled, being replaced by mostly good ones, the bad days still came.
She'd shrugged off sharing a celebratory glass of champagne in the breakroom, mentioning something about how although they may have just laid the foundation for peace in the Middle East, there would be loads of paperwork that followed.
An hour passes, and he decides she deserves a break. He steps into her office, a flute in one hand, and a draft version of tomorrow's front page of the Times in the other.
The last thing he expects is to find her crying at her desk because today was a good day.
Her head is in her hands, and she's babbling nonsense about how she needs to do more. He doesn't know if she's upset about the little time this week she'd been able to spend with the kids or the prospect of not accomplishing enough in this job, but he points out to her that she and Dalton just brokered a historic deal between Israel and the United Arab Emirates.
She's choking on her sobs now, telling him how Henry doesn't see it that way.
He drops the newspaper to her desk, setting down the glass as he goes, and places a hand on her shoulder. It sounds like she needs some outside reassurance, so they make a call to a friend on the West Coast.
~MS~
He loses track after that. He's trying to manage the emotions that have sprouted from the CIA agent captured by the Taliban. He doesn't know the half of her old job, but he thinks it hits a little too close to home. He'd heard she'd gone against him at the White House. Frankie had given him the rundown of the argument between husband and wife that had rather loudly ensued down the hall from the Oval.
He's held up at the office late that night, and the next, helping Jay review and weed out the dozens of applications sent in for his old position.
When he brings in a set of binders around ten, he catches her staring out the window.
He calls her name, and she ducks her chin into her shoulder, bringing a hand up to wipe under her eyes. His fingers dig into the plastic covers— twice in two weeks that he'd walked in on her crying.
He asks if everything's alright, though he doesn't expect an honest answer. This past month she'd been reluctant to share how she was emotionally, something he prided them in doing, a system almost that allowed him to check in and tally up the wounds that could be potential distractions throughout the day.
She says she's okay, but he presses further, offering his presence and a cup of tea.
She shakes her head, but he waits, watching as her fingers brush against the curtain causing the fabric to sway. And finally, she turns, but she's quiet as she eyes him.
He smooths down his tie as he steps up to her desk, explaining that he'd flagged Brian's report about the solar panels being transported to the site of the cholera outbreak. He reminds her that she needs to read through it sometime before her four o'clock meeting tomorrow.
With her hands shoved into her pockets, she rounds her desk slowly, watching as he sets the stack of binders in her tray.
He wishes she would initiate a conversation, he was more than willing to talk, but she just hovered instead. He excuses himself, repeating that he'd be at his desk, but now, she calls his name. He turns back to her, hopeful that she would share what was on her mind. Instead, she looks nervous as she asks for a hug.
It wasn't unusual for them to share an embrace from time to time, he remembered the early days of her term, traveling away from her family was hard, but she never outright asked for affection, especially not from him.
He pulls her in, wrapping one arm around her shoulders while his left hand presses flat against the middle of her back. She felt so small as she sinks into him. He can feel her fingers grabbing, almost desperately, onto the edges of his suit jacket, gripping as if she'll never let go. Her face is pressed into his shoulder when she shares that she hadn't had a hug in a while. The palm that had been moving in circles along her back stops as he wonders why Henry hadn't been embracing her as he commonly saw.
~MS~
She'd insisted on another blue gown for tonight, navy this time. A comment was made about Henry liking the way it brought out the color of her eyes. He'd replied by asking her what she thought of it. The dress was a thick fabric, he'd mentioned that she would be hot in the room of more than a hundred guests, and it lacked the pockets that she enjoyed having sewn in. Plenty of wives dressed for their husbands, he thought she was doing the same, but he caught the faked smile as she looked in the mirror. She was clearly uncomfortable with the lower cut of the bust.
She was tense under Henry's hand as he guides them between the tables. They appear engaged in conversation, so no one dares interrupt. He keeps a watchful eye, following behind as he usually did when Henry was absent.
They'd slipped him somewhere between a photo-op and the brief welcome to Prime Minister Sendoo, but he finds them again during pre-dinner mingling.
When he hands her a glass of red wine, she mutters a thank you and flashes him a genuine smile. As they find their table for dinner, she still hadn't taken a sip, not with the way Henry's fingers had been digging into her hip.
Their interactions through the night felt forced, and their touches through dinner were stiff. He glances up from his own plate to the couple sitting a table away, watching them as he tuned out Matt's comments about his chicken being too dry.
Every time she reached for her glass Henry's hand left his gin and tonic and covered hers.
Not a single drop of her favorite wine had touched her lips.
~MS~
She thins out over the next month and her weight worries him. Jay tries to convince him that she'd taken up running, maybe because she'dconvinced Jay, but he knows Elizabeth prefers jelly donuts to a light jog.
The dullness of her eyes and the paleness of her cheeks have him frazzled. The dizzy spells come a week later, and they leave him concerned. He recommends a doctor, but she bites back, recommending that he stay in his lane. She raises her voice, the most energy he'd seen her expend lately, and tells him that her health isn't of his business.
She wobbles in her heels, unbalanced, and the bouts of dizziness become so frequent that he calls home and asks Henry if she's eating. Husband says yes, but the tests from the lab say no.
Breakfast is waiting at her desk each morning. Lunch was a given even before— he only worries when Henry unexpectedly shows looking to take his wife out. Dinner was tricky. He goes as far as keeping her late at the office, sometimes even taking her back to his apartment. He sits with her during each meal, willing her to continue to bring her fork to her lips.
Though the weight comes back, the light behind her eyes fails to.
~MS~
Months ago, she'd complained of hot flashes, an ungodly unfair symptom of growing older, so her obsession with thick sweaters and the newfound habit of wearing her blazer outside meetings that require such dress wear is cause for concern.
~MS~
Her timidness is noticed by others now. Aids stop at his desk after leaving her office to ask if she's feeling unwell while the senior staff wonders whether something has caused her mannerisms she'd taken after Iran to resurface.
He doesn't have answers to give, and even if he did, he thinks he wouldn't give them.
Some days the temptation to call Will is enticing because he has suspicions of what's going on at home, but he's never been one to throw around accusations.
He knows this isn't the woman that used to stand toe to toe with dictators. Her confidence had not only gone but had seemed to be buried somewhere far away. She quivers in her shoes when faced with opposition, and she craves reassurance and validation from Russell and her staff when being pressed to make a decision.
~MS~
She refuses to let him help her before state dinners now.
While he used to powder her nose, lace up the occasional corset, and extend his hand for balance as she stepped into a gown, he's told to wait outside the door while she dresses.
She manages most of the time, but tonight they're alone on the seventh floor when his name is faintly called from the bathroom. She walks backward towards him, asking for help with the zipper that had somehow gotten stuck in the fabric. And it's when he lays a hand on her shoulder for leverage that he spots the first bruise.
~MS~
The phone calls from Henry, explaining that his wife had fallen ill, ill enough to miss a day of work, had become frequent enough to warrant a visit to Georgetown. He texts them both separately before venturing across the city— Elizabeth tells him not to come, and Henry tries to give him the brush, claiming that his wife is too tired for a visitor. He makes it a point to be persistent, and they eventually relent.
He feigns work as an excuse at the door, handing off documents that require her signature in the next week. He fibs telling Henry they're needed on Jay's desk by morning.
She sits on the sofa in the living room, wearing pajamas made for winter, while Henry hovers in the doorway. Two sets of eyes follow him closely as he lowers himself to sit by her side.
He asks how she's feeling, and she replies with a smile that doesn't reach her eyes. She says migraines can be a bitch, he nods, and tells her that they were— he'd experienced them a time or two. She had also, but it wasn't the reason she was out today. It was a slip of tongue, he knew.
She claimed migraine while earlier on the phone Henry had said stomach flu.
~MS~
He's sorting files for Jay, a favor to get him home to Chloe, when she finds him in Nadine's old office.
She's clutching the door handle with her left hand as the other grabs at the front of her blouse. Her chest heaves and he's already reaching out for her when the first tear falls from her eye. He hasn't seen her cry in months, and he hopes that maybe this means she was letting him back in.
As he settles her on the couch, he asks her straight out tonight if Henry was hurting her. She doesn't give an answer, only begs to be held.
A voice wakes him halfway through the night, and when he blinks his eyes open, he's only partly surprised to see Henry standing over his face. He mumbles something but his brain is too foggy to comprehend, though, he processes the anger he sees in his expression, and he realizes how they must look, squeezed together, spooned together on the sofa with her back pressed to his chest.
His arm falls away from her middle as he tells Henry that she'd been crying.
He doesn't seem to care as he bends down to collect her heels. He shakes her awake, and the moment she opens her eyes he's dragging her by the hand to the door. He follows them to the elevator, swallowing as she looks back at him, fear in her eyes.
She's late in the next morning, not making it to the State Department until almost lunch. He misses her at the elevator, but Jay tells him that she needs to see him in her office. She's stone-faced and her eyes are down casted towards the floor, refusing to meet his stare. She tears up as she tells him that she has to fire him, but she assures him she'll write a glowing letter of recommendation and put in a good word across the other departments.
He has questions, but he doesn't want to overwhelm her— this obviously isn't by choice.
He finds Jay after their talk, and he's hanging up the phone as he steps through his door. He asks if he's having an affair with Elizabeth, and his mind spins, refusing to believe that Henry could do this.
~MS~
Jay had found him another position, a policy aid, something he'd always held the aspiration to do, but he'd accepted with a heavy heart. He was still close to her, enough distance to appease Henry, but it wasn't close enough.
He watched on from a distance as she grew further withdrawn.
Nina didn't stand a chance.
~MS~
They're at a bar in Sao Paulo. Matt had disappeared twenty minutes ago, following a girl home. They didn't speak the same language, but with what they were doing that didn't matter.
As he sips his beer his mind wanders to Elizabeth who was alone back at the hotel. He hopes she was catching up on sleep because as of recently the dark circles under her eyes were unable to be covered even by the heaviest of make ups.
Jay says she doesn't talk much to Nina, and he worries over how isolated she's become. The loneliness of this job had been an issue throughout the years, but with today's circumstances, it was even more so concerning. Jay tells him he's noticed that she'd seemed a bit down and asks if he could talk to her.
She opens her door with a frown, and he can't help but think about how he couldn't remember the last time he'd seen her smile. When he asks if they could talk, she steps to the side, letting him in. The door clicks as he begins to ramble, only stopping when he faces her. She was wearing a nightgown tonight, the blue one he hadn't seen on her in ages, and without sleeves covering her skin bruises are visible.
He steps up to her and asks if Henry hits her. She breaks down, spilling out the truth.
He tries to convince her that they could leave right now, and never go back, but she doesn't listen. She doesn't want help.
"I love him," she says.
They fly home the next night, and in the dim light of the cabin, he makes her agree to call him when she arrives home.
~MS~
She'd made a habit of checking in with him each evening. He convinced himself it was for her safety, but now he's sure it had been for his own peace of mind.
It's three months after that trip to Sao Paulo, and it's half past eight when he realizes she hasn't texted. He swipes his keys from the kitchen counter and jogs down to his car.
The agents outside the McCord home are standing their posts as usual but staring up at the house something doesn't feel right.
He skips signing the timesheet and heads straight for the door.
There are hushed words that are a bit distant, and he thinks maybe that he'd overreacted, but as he moves further into the entryway, he spots her in a heap at the bottom of the staircase.
He falls to his knees in front of her, pulling her into his lap as he desperately calls her name. There's blood pooling on the hardwood from a gash above her right eye. And as he pushes the sleeve of his shirt against her skin, he hears feet on the stairs. He doesn't want to look up, she deserves his attention, not him, but his eyes lift, wanting to look at the man who dared raise a hand to a woman.
"It was an accident."
~MS~
It's guys like him, like Henry, that get away with it, but it was guys like him that let them.