Title: Does Heaven Have Enough Angels Yet?
Author: (fauquita@hotmail.com)
Disclaimer: I bow down before the greatness that is Aaron Sorkin, and admit that these are his characters, not mine...although I usually have more fun with them than he does!
Summary: I've gone hard and I've gone cold. I can't make the pieces of this cracked life fit. Please forgive me for wanting to know, does Heaven have enough angels yet?
Thanks: To my partners in crime, Sidalicious and Lizisita.
Note: Yes, illness is involved, and again I'm attempting to portray it with the sensitivity it deserves. Be forewarned however that if these kinds of things upset you, you're gonna wanna skip this one. In addition, this is a sequel to 'Silence', so you might want to read that one first. Oh, and this is entirely AU...I mean, I'll pick and choose what I want to include from third season.
Rating: a strong PG-13 for language.
The day has passed in measured sun-lit color and changes in the wind before she walks through the doors of the West Wing again, clutching her sensible black purse to her side as a talisman. A talisman against what I don't know. But her eyes hold this wild look, and she doesn't acknowledge my presence as she walks into her office.
For months I've noticed the almost subtle changes in her appearance. At first I attributed the dark circles under her eyes to the long hours spent trying to spin the President's MS. The weight loss was easy to ignore because we were all eating less, and if her collarbone was a little more pronounced, we didn't say anything. But she walks with a painful gait now, the grace and elegance absent from her posture. Time and his brother, Care, have set some marks across her brow, and worry lines have spread in a ripple-like effect around the corners of her mouth. But she is no less beautiful to me.
When she finally notices me on the couch, she sighs and leans back in her chair. "I don't want to hear it, Toby."
"Ok."
She shoots a deadly look my way before closing her eyes briefly and rolling her neck. "I told Leo I was going to be late," she says suddenly.
"Yes."
"I mean, I didn't know I'd be gone so long, but I told him."
"Why did you turn your cell phone off?"
I try to keep my tone level, and my face blank because I don't want to put her on the defensive, but she's going to have to answer these questions sooner or later, and it's better me than Leo.
She shrugs carelessly. "I didn't want to be disturbed."
"You didn't want to be disturbed?" I ask incredulously. "You're going to have to do a little better than that."
She holds my gaze for a moment and smiles softly. "I just got in my car and started driving. I ended up halfway to Virginia Beach before I turned around."
I look down at my hands clasped together over my crossed legs and sigh. "Do you have any idea how incredibly stupid that was?"
"I needed some time to think."
"Think about what? You work in the White House, CJ, you can't go gallivanting across the state whenever you get a wild hair. You have responsibilities. Leo's pissed."
"Sounds like you are too, Pokey."
"I'm not. I'm just concerned."
Her gaze is locked to the far wall, and there is a look of infinite sadness etched across her features. I wonder if it has always been there, and I just haven't noticed before. It's possible, believe me. When she turns back to me, her face is blank again.
"So, why were you trying to call me?"
"What?"
"You asked me why I'd turned off the cell phone, so I assume you tried calling."
"Repeatedly."
"Yeah, so, why?"
I shift uncomfortably because I'm the one who's supposed to be asking the questions here. She notices my discomfort and pinches the bridge of her nose. With one twitch of her mouth she exudes weariness, but her eyes remain challenging, and she looks like the old CJ.
"There's this thing."
She looks at me expectantly when I trail off and leans forward. "Yeah Toby, my psychic wasn't able to fit me in today, so if you could, you know, tell me what this 'thing' is, I'd be much obliged."
I wonder for a moment if maybe Josh should be the sitting here right now. He's the one who shares her mornings and late nights. He's the one who leaves the toilet seat up in her apartment, and the hallway light on when she's running late. He's the one who fights with her over the paper and the last cup of coffee.
But he's also the one who stormed out of here two hours ago because he didn't trust himself to be in the same room with her. And so here I sit.
"Barbara Shallick is filing for divorce, and she's selling her story to the Enquirer," I say in a rush of breath that I hope is intelligible. But her face is still passive, and so I think maybe she didn't hear me. "Barbara Shallick is filing for divorce," I reiterate.
"Yeah, I got that the first time, Tobas. How is this a thing?"
I sigh in frustration because she isn't making this easy. But she has never been one to make things easy, and so I forgive her this transgression. "She knows about the affair."
She nods her head thoughtfully and takes a deep breath before speaking. "So, I guess we'd better start damage control then. If Leo can find it in his heart to forgive me, we should call a staff meeting and go over what we're going to say. Did Simon get questions about this today?"
Her reaction is not the one I was expecting, and so it takes me a few moments to gather my thoughts. I look deeply into her eyes, searching in vain for any deception. She is too calm. She is emotionally detached, and this is not the CJ Cregg I know.
"CJ, why didn't..." I trail off and rub one hand down my face, scratching thoughtfully at my beard.
"Why didn't I tell you?" At my nod, she continues. "I didn't think it was important."
"You didn't think it was important? What the hell?"
"I don't expect you to understand-"
"Well help me understand then."
She sighs in frustration and pushes away from her desk, and when she speaks, she does so grudgingly. "It's possible that I didn't trust you...any of you," she admits.
"What reason have we given you not to trust us? You're the one-" I stop abruptly because I realize how accusatory my words are.
She arches and eyebrow. "I'm the one who keeps secrets...that's what you were going to say, right?"
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean it."
"Yes you did." She closes her eyes, but the tone of her voice isn't angry, just tired. "It's not like I thought you'd run out and tell the papers, or that you'd think less of me. Ok, well, maybe a little insecurity about how you'd view me played a factor." She opens her eyes again, and now she's looking straight at me. "I thought you might use it as ammunition...to strong-arm Shallick, or some other senators."
"CJ...God, we don't do that!" I nearly shout as I stand. I begin pacing in front of her desk. "You know we would never use something like-"
"I'm not saying it was rational, Toby. I'm just saying that I thought there was a chance that I might be used against him. And I didn't want that, so-"
"So instead, you let us get ambushed by it?" I don't care anymore how my words sound. I'm angry and all I can think about is that, once again, CJ didn't trust us. "This is becoming a habit with you. Are you single-handedly trying to ruin a second term for President Bartlet?"
She flinches, and I take some pride in the fact that my words have wounded her. Later I might be ashamed at the way her eyes clouded with hurt, but for now I feel powerful. I stalk to the door and grip the knob.
"Leo wants to see you."
Her hand is at her throat now, unconsciously rubbing at the phantom scratch the way she does when she's nervous or mentally exhausted. She nods her head, and I walk into the hallway, leaving bitterness and anger flowing behind me like a bridal train.
When someone you love dies, and you're not expecting it, you don't lose him all at once; you lose him in pieces over a long period of time-the way the mail stops coming and his scent fades from pillows, and even the clothes in his closet and drawers. Gradually, you accumulate the parts of him that are gone. Just when the day comes-when a particular missing part overwhelms you with the feeling that he is gone forever-there comes another day, and another missing part.
The evening after my father's funeral, I felt he was gone when it came time for my mother to decide whether to stay with my Aunt Hannah, or go home to the empty house. I realized that my mother had choices-she could return home alone, or I could offer to go with her; or she could stay with my father's widowed sister, and even sleep in the other twin bed she had in the room. But as soon as I realized what my mother's choices were, I also knew they were-each of them-imperfect in their own way. I realized that the choices available to her, regarding where she would sleep would be imperfect, forever, and that, forever, there would be something unsatisfying about thinking of her alone.
With Joanie it was easier, because I was so young, and there were no empty rooms and abandoned records to contemplate. Her presence didn't gradually fade from the house because it too, was gone. I'm not saying I didn't miss her, that I don't still miss her. Whenever I see the right shade of blue (a mixture between periwinkle and sky if you're curious), or hear a piece of music I remember her listening to, I picture the tall, awkward girl she was. And sometimes I see the accomplished woman she would have been.
The thing is, Joanie was gone irrevocably. And I knew it from the moment I watched the house collapse upon itself in a smoldering uproar of flames and smoke. But there were moments, visiting my mother, when I fully expected to hear my father yelling at the Mets on TV, or smell the tobacco from his pipe. It has gotten better now that my mother sold the house and moved down to Florida. I don't expect him to pick up the other phone when I call because I know he would never voluntarily relocate to the beach. My mother was trying to escape his memory because in the tall maple trees and snow of Connecticut she saw him everywhere.
I think I miss him the most when a bill we've fought hard for passes, a bill I know he would've been proud of. My mother is always happy, but she doesn't fully appreciate the enormity of having done something important and beneficial amidst so much opposition. She's never had a head for politics. But I know my father secretly enjoyed this because he loved to explain things, and she was always a willing listener.
I don't even know why I'm thinking of my father now. Maybe it's the crisp chill in the air. He used to love playing football in the winter; I think the almost painful feeling of cold air in his chest invigorated him. He said he never felt more alive. Or maybe it was the elderly man who passed me a few minutes ago, wearing the same cologne my father wore for as long as I can remember.
I shake my head as if this will clear my thoughts. Truth be told, I'm nearly frozen sitting here on this bench because I forgot my coat in my haste to leave the building, and I'm too stubborn to go back in. I shiver as a cold breeze rustles the remaining leaves of a tree overhead.
She warned me. I have to give her this much. She warned me about the baggage she came with, back in her father's kitchen last spring. But I didn't care; at least I thought I didn't care. But I think it's time for reevaluation of that particular sentiment.
Because I do care, a great deal actually. She has this power to hurt me that no one else has ever been able to possess. And I find myself resenting her easy laughter with other people when we're fighting. Which isn't often mind you, but I hate that she can still walk through the day, as if nothing is wrong, while I'm lost.
I knew it wouldn't be easy, but I never imagined it would be this hard.
There are moments with him when I think that the world is perfect. I don't care about neo-Nazis or depletion of the rain forest. Toby and his latest issue doesn't register, and Leo's casual dismissal of my ideas don't hurt. Not when he looks at me with that gentle light in his eyes.
But then there are moments with him when I think that our relationship is a mistake. When I hurt him with something I did or didn't do. When he tries hard to make me happy, and I can only find fault in his actions or words. When he avoids me after an argument.
I've always valued his friendship, the way we can blow up at each other one minute, and buy drinks in apology the next. The way he reassures me when I've made a gaffe and they way he supports my suggestions when no one else listens to me.
I depend on him; I think I have from the moment we met. Sex hasn't changed this. But it has changed everything else. I weigh his words and actions so much more carefully than I ever did before, and I wonder what, exactly, I'm afraid of.
"Where have you been?"
I look up to find the object of my thoughts standing in the doorway, his eyes an unmistakable shade of anger. I don't have the energy to engage in another battle, but I know from the tension in his stance that he's not going to let this go until we've had it out.
"Where have you been?" I return.
"I asked you first."
"Why don't you come in and shut the door so we can yell at each other like normal people."
"Don't be glib. This is serious," he says coolly as he slams the door behind him.
"This is serious because you say so?"
"Me, Leo, Toby, the President," he ticks off on his fingers. "And I think every reporter in your press room is going to bear me out on this."
"In the grand scheme of things-"
"This is politics, CJ. The grand scheme doesn't matter. Here and now does. And here and now you're an adulteress working for an administration that's already plagued with scandals."
The veins in the side of his neck are popping out, and I can't imagine what his heart rate must be, but I must admit that right now, I don't give a damn. "An adulteress, Josh? You don't think that's being a bit melodramatic?"
"No, I don't."
"You're being a child. You're not mad about how this affects the administration, you're mad because I didn't tell you."
"Because you didn't tell me, we weren't prepared for this."
"Oh, and if you had known that I was involved with him five years ago, how would you have handled it? I mean, let me know how the great Joshua Lyman would have prevented this from becoming public."
"I'm not saying I would have prevented it. I just think this is another instance of your deception screwing us over."
"Fuck you, and get out of my office."
His eyes widen in shock at the vehemence of my words, and he takes a step back. He shoves his hands into his pockets and walks towards the door. When he regains the power of speech, he turns to throw a parting shot. "Go to hell, CJ."
"So I guess the movie's off for tonight, then?" I call after him because I don't want him to know how upset I am.
I throw my pencil across the room, wishing it were something heavier. Something that could do some damage to the window, or door. Just one satisfying shatter or thud. I stand up because the office has suddenly become suffocating, and grab my purse.
I don't care that Leo and the rest of the staff are waiting for me in the Oval Office. I don't care that every newspaper from here to Sacramento is going to print this story. I don't care about the re-election campaign, the briefing notes on my desk, or the insistent ringing of my phone. I don't care about anything right now.
There used to be a framed picture on the corner of the desk. Three men and one woman smiling brazenly at the invisible photographer with their arms thrown casually around each other in obvious euphoria. If you look closely enough, you can see the circles under their eyes from late nights and too-little sleep. But their faces glow with some unnamed joy, and even if they had to throw away partnerships at prestigious law firms and $550,000 a year, surely it was worth it.
I don't know what she's done with it. I only know it's been missing from her desk for three months now. Maybe it was too painful to look at. We were so impossibly innocent, and naïve about things to come. We thought we knew what we were doing. We thought we were invincible.
Or maybe it's not the four figures in the photograph itself that makes her cringe. Maybe it's the unseen man behind the camera. The man we all believed in, the man we followed across the country, the man we helped get elected to office. The man who lied to us.
I don't know how to talk to her anymore. I don't know how to speak without unleashing the bitter words that spark her own resentment. I don't know how to ask her if she's sleeping, and eating without arguing about trade embargoes. I don't know how to tell her that I'm angry too without correcting her grammar, and that sometimes betrayal lies heavy in my chest until I can barely breathe.
The wind is biting, and it has blown dark clouds across the sky. I smell rain in the air, and remember only then that my umbrella is hanging behind my office door. I turn up the collar of my coat when I feel the first droplets, and run towards the nearest open building, which at this hour turns out to be a bar.
It's not particularly classy, and the neon lights in the window are garish and out of place. But it's quiet, and the occupants barely look up from their drinks as I make my way through the dim room. And then I see the almost glowing halo of hair I've spent the last three hours searching for in every church and café across town.
She doesn't notice my presence until I slide across from her in the booth. Her eyes widen in surprise, and she makes a move to flee. But the alcohol has dulled her reflexes and motor abilities, and so she merely slumps in the seat and covers her eyes in a sign of frustration.
"Sam, I really want to be alone right now. Whatever it is can wait."
Only in the harsh lighting of the overhead lamp do I notice the hollowness of her cheeks, and the pallid shade of her skin. Her eyes are dull and ringed by dark shadows underneath. Her shine is gone and it breaks my heart.
"I...what's wrong, CJ?" I'm surprised at how awkward the words are, because it never used to be like this.
"I gotta tell you...that has got to be, by far, the stupidest question I've ever heard." But her heart isn't in the words, and so I don't take offense.
"I mean, what's wrong with you?"
"The same thing that's wrong with everyone else," she replies as she drains the rest of the contents, whiskey if my guess is correct, in one long gulp. "I'm underpaid and overworked."
"Look, I want to-"
"Tomorrow, Sam. Tomorrow."
"What?"
"I just want to sit here, by myself for the next few hours. I promise that you will have the opportunity tomorrow to lecture me, cast me out, and whatever else you all have planned. Right now, I'd just like..."
When she trails off, I lean forward. "I just came here to tell you that I support you."
"How did you know I'd be here?"
"Luck. I've been to every Starbucks in the city. And then it started to rain and-"
"And you left your umbrella in the office again," she finishes with a smile.
"Yeah," I say sheepishly.
"And you support me."
Her tone is somewhere between a statement and a question, and I say simply, "Yes."
"Why?"
"Why what?"
"Why are you suddenly lending me all this support? You've been arguing with me about everything from educational spending to Josh's favorite color for three months now."
"Let me tell you a story, CJ." She looks at me in askance, but makes no protest. "There once was a dashing, suave Presidential advisor-"
"You forgot refined, cultured and debonair," she interrupts sarcastically.
"Have you heard this one before?" She smiles softly and I continue. "Anyway, this exceedingly charming Presidential advisor got himself into a little trouble with a call girl, who he didn't know was a call girl when he had sex with her, which erases, I think, all culpability of-"
"Sam! I don't have all night."
"Right. Ok, well, like I said he didn't know she was a call girl, and when he found out, he told two of his friends. But he didn't tell the person he should have, and when she found out, she was very angry."
"Is there a point buried somewhere in this story?"
"But despite her anger, she supported him," I say over her interruption. "She was a friend to him. She was always a friend to him. And he misses that."
CJ reaches across the table and pats the side of my face. "Well, she misses him too."
"I don't know why we've been so angry with each other, CJ. I just-"
"I know." And as I look into her eyes, I see that she does.
She only pulls away when the waitress approaches our table. She declines another drink, but I order a beer. She waits until I'm nursing it before speaking again.
"I guess everyone's really pissed, huh?"
"Yeah."
"Won't be the first time," she says tiredly. "And Josh..."
"He didn't say much in the meeting."
She buries her face in her hand and groans. "I didn't want it to end like this, you know?"
I pull her hands away from her face. "What are you talking about? This is a little fight...it'll blow over."
"I can't continue...I mean, I thought he was...Jesus, Sam. If this is how he handles Shallick, how is he going to handle-" she stops abruptly and looks away, "something bigger?"
An icy hand grips my heart. "Is there something bigger, CJ?"
"No...I was talking in what-ifs."
"You can't live your life in what-ifs. You know that better than anyone." She nods her head half-heartedly and I study her quietly for a moment. "What's going on?"
"Nothing." But her hands are shaking, and she can't meet my gaze.
"CJ?"
"What?" she asks softly.
"Look at me." When she complies with my quiet order, I freeze at the fear in her eyes. "I can't help you if you don't tell me what's wrong."
"It's not your responsibility to help me, Sam. And I owe it to him to tell him first."
"Josh?"
"Yes."
"He's...now's not a good time to talk to him. He's angry."
"I know."
"So you're just going to wait?"
"Is there any other choice?"
"You can tell me."
She sighs and looks deeply into my eyes, almost as if she's searching for something. Whatever it is, she must find it because she leans forward and lowers her voice. "What I'm about to tell you, can go no further than the two of us. In fact, after this conversation, I don't want you to mention it. At least not until Josh knows. That's the price."
"Anything."
"You should think about this, Sam. Keeping secrets is hard work."
"I know," I say with just a touch of bitterness.
"Yeah, I guess you do," she admits. When she speaks again, her voice is trembling, but I pretend not to notice. "Well, the long and short of it is...well, Sam." She stops and chuckles in self-deprecation. "I didn't think this would be so hard."
"It's ok," I assure her. "Take your time."
"I have cancer," she blurts out after a long silence.
It all makes sense now. The weight loss, the dark circles and fatigue. The way she flinched when Toby grabbed her shoulders in a staff meeting once, the way she sent her food away, barely touched, at two State Dinners and one luncheon, and the way she walked into the office one day as if every step caused unremitting pain.
"Are you sure?" It seems the only safe thing to ask.
She must recognize the disbelief in my eyes because she grips my hand and squeezes. "Yeah."
"But, I mean...God...Breast Cancer?"
"Leukemia."
I swallow painfully. "What...what type?"
I was twenty years old, in my junior year at Princeton, when my maternal grandfather was diagnosed with Acute Myelogenous Leukemia. My brothers and I were never close to my mother's side of the family, but that didn't stop me from spending late nights at the library trying to read as much as I could about the disease. Even after he'd succumbed to infection three months later.
"Blood tests don't reveal that. I have to make an appointment with an oncologist."
"Bone marrow aspiration?"
"Yeah."
"You haven't done it yet?"
"No, I just found out today. I need time to think."
"Think about what, CJ? This is your life we're talking about. If-"
"Don't talk to me like that, Sam. Don't talk to me like I don't understand what I'm dealing with. I've read these damn pamphlets three times," she says angrily as she pulls her hand away and throws the glossy packets on the table.
I bow my head. "Of course...I'm sorry. I didn't mean...what do you need to think about?"
She sighs and runs a hand through her hair. "To be quite honest, I wanted to tell Josh, and the rest of you, first. Well, that was my motivation earlier. Now I have that little matter with Shallick."
"None of that is important. You need to have this procedure done as soon as possible. And then we'll go from there."
She opens her mouth to protest, but thinks better of it and rubs her temples wearily. "I know."
"You're scared," I say in wonder as it finally dawns on me that her reluctance has nothing to do with her schedule.
"Wouldn't you be?"
"Yeah. But you're not alone in this."
"It feels like it, Sam," she admits tearfully as she finally allows her sorrow to show. "I've been thinking about it all day, and I decided that I was going to be strong, you know? I wasn't going to cry, or think about death, but I'm so scared. And just, you can't understand that."
"No, I can't," I whisper. "But I can listen to your fears."
"No, it's too much. You're a good friend, but I can't do that to you. I have to deal with this on my own." Her voice, even though it's still thick with unshed tears, is firm with a resolve that raises the hairs on the back of my neck.
And just like that she's gone. A handful of bills thrown on the table and an empty glass rimmed with lipstick the only signs she was ever there.
TBC...
Author: (fauquita@hotmail.com)
Disclaimer: I bow down before the greatness that is Aaron Sorkin, and admit that these are his characters, not mine...although I usually have more fun with them than he does!
Summary: I've gone hard and I've gone cold. I can't make the pieces of this cracked life fit. Please forgive me for wanting to know, does Heaven have enough angels yet?
Thanks: To my partners in crime, Sidalicious and Lizisita.
Note: Yes, illness is involved, and again I'm attempting to portray it with the sensitivity it deserves. Be forewarned however that if these kinds of things upset you, you're gonna wanna skip this one. In addition, this is a sequel to 'Silence', so you might want to read that one first. Oh, and this is entirely AU...I mean, I'll pick and choose what I want to include from third season.
Rating: a strong PG-13 for language.
The day has passed in measured sun-lit color and changes in the wind before she walks through the doors of the West Wing again, clutching her sensible black purse to her side as a talisman. A talisman against what I don't know. But her eyes hold this wild look, and she doesn't acknowledge my presence as she walks into her office.
For months I've noticed the almost subtle changes in her appearance. At first I attributed the dark circles under her eyes to the long hours spent trying to spin the President's MS. The weight loss was easy to ignore because we were all eating less, and if her collarbone was a little more pronounced, we didn't say anything. But she walks with a painful gait now, the grace and elegance absent from her posture. Time and his brother, Care, have set some marks across her brow, and worry lines have spread in a ripple-like effect around the corners of her mouth. But she is no less beautiful to me.
When she finally notices me on the couch, she sighs and leans back in her chair. "I don't want to hear it, Toby."
"Ok."
She shoots a deadly look my way before closing her eyes briefly and rolling her neck. "I told Leo I was going to be late," she says suddenly.
"Yes."
"I mean, I didn't know I'd be gone so long, but I told him."
"Why did you turn your cell phone off?"
I try to keep my tone level, and my face blank because I don't want to put her on the defensive, but she's going to have to answer these questions sooner or later, and it's better me than Leo.
She shrugs carelessly. "I didn't want to be disturbed."
"You didn't want to be disturbed?" I ask incredulously. "You're going to have to do a little better than that."
She holds my gaze for a moment and smiles softly. "I just got in my car and started driving. I ended up halfway to Virginia Beach before I turned around."
I look down at my hands clasped together over my crossed legs and sigh. "Do you have any idea how incredibly stupid that was?"
"I needed some time to think."
"Think about what? You work in the White House, CJ, you can't go gallivanting across the state whenever you get a wild hair. You have responsibilities. Leo's pissed."
"Sounds like you are too, Pokey."
"I'm not. I'm just concerned."
Her gaze is locked to the far wall, and there is a look of infinite sadness etched across her features. I wonder if it has always been there, and I just haven't noticed before. It's possible, believe me. When she turns back to me, her face is blank again.
"So, why were you trying to call me?"
"What?"
"You asked me why I'd turned off the cell phone, so I assume you tried calling."
"Repeatedly."
"Yeah, so, why?"
I shift uncomfortably because I'm the one who's supposed to be asking the questions here. She notices my discomfort and pinches the bridge of her nose. With one twitch of her mouth she exudes weariness, but her eyes remain challenging, and she looks like the old CJ.
"There's this thing."
She looks at me expectantly when I trail off and leans forward. "Yeah Toby, my psychic wasn't able to fit me in today, so if you could, you know, tell me what this 'thing' is, I'd be much obliged."
I wonder for a moment if maybe Josh should be the sitting here right now. He's the one who shares her mornings and late nights. He's the one who leaves the toilet seat up in her apartment, and the hallway light on when she's running late. He's the one who fights with her over the paper and the last cup of coffee.
But he's also the one who stormed out of here two hours ago because he didn't trust himself to be in the same room with her. And so here I sit.
"Barbara Shallick is filing for divorce, and she's selling her story to the Enquirer," I say in a rush of breath that I hope is intelligible. But her face is still passive, and so I think maybe she didn't hear me. "Barbara Shallick is filing for divorce," I reiterate.
"Yeah, I got that the first time, Tobas. How is this a thing?"
I sigh in frustration because she isn't making this easy. But she has never been one to make things easy, and so I forgive her this transgression. "She knows about the affair."
She nods her head thoughtfully and takes a deep breath before speaking. "So, I guess we'd better start damage control then. If Leo can find it in his heart to forgive me, we should call a staff meeting and go over what we're going to say. Did Simon get questions about this today?"
Her reaction is not the one I was expecting, and so it takes me a few moments to gather my thoughts. I look deeply into her eyes, searching in vain for any deception. She is too calm. She is emotionally detached, and this is not the CJ Cregg I know.
"CJ, why didn't..." I trail off and rub one hand down my face, scratching thoughtfully at my beard.
"Why didn't I tell you?" At my nod, she continues. "I didn't think it was important."
"You didn't think it was important? What the hell?"
"I don't expect you to understand-"
"Well help me understand then."
She sighs in frustration and pushes away from her desk, and when she speaks, she does so grudgingly. "It's possible that I didn't trust you...any of you," she admits.
"What reason have we given you not to trust us? You're the one-" I stop abruptly because I realize how accusatory my words are.
She arches and eyebrow. "I'm the one who keeps secrets...that's what you were going to say, right?"
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean it."
"Yes you did." She closes her eyes, but the tone of her voice isn't angry, just tired. "It's not like I thought you'd run out and tell the papers, or that you'd think less of me. Ok, well, maybe a little insecurity about how you'd view me played a factor." She opens her eyes again, and now she's looking straight at me. "I thought you might use it as ammunition...to strong-arm Shallick, or some other senators."
"CJ...God, we don't do that!" I nearly shout as I stand. I begin pacing in front of her desk. "You know we would never use something like-"
"I'm not saying it was rational, Toby. I'm just saying that I thought there was a chance that I might be used against him. And I didn't want that, so-"
"So instead, you let us get ambushed by it?" I don't care anymore how my words sound. I'm angry and all I can think about is that, once again, CJ didn't trust us. "This is becoming a habit with you. Are you single-handedly trying to ruin a second term for President Bartlet?"
She flinches, and I take some pride in the fact that my words have wounded her. Later I might be ashamed at the way her eyes clouded with hurt, but for now I feel powerful. I stalk to the door and grip the knob.
"Leo wants to see you."
Her hand is at her throat now, unconsciously rubbing at the phantom scratch the way she does when she's nervous or mentally exhausted. She nods her head, and I walk into the hallway, leaving bitterness and anger flowing behind me like a bridal train.
When someone you love dies, and you're not expecting it, you don't lose him all at once; you lose him in pieces over a long period of time-the way the mail stops coming and his scent fades from pillows, and even the clothes in his closet and drawers. Gradually, you accumulate the parts of him that are gone. Just when the day comes-when a particular missing part overwhelms you with the feeling that he is gone forever-there comes another day, and another missing part.
The evening after my father's funeral, I felt he was gone when it came time for my mother to decide whether to stay with my Aunt Hannah, or go home to the empty house. I realized that my mother had choices-she could return home alone, or I could offer to go with her; or she could stay with my father's widowed sister, and even sleep in the other twin bed she had in the room. But as soon as I realized what my mother's choices were, I also knew they were-each of them-imperfect in their own way. I realized that the choices available to her, regarding where she would sleep would be imperfect, forever, and that, forever, there would be something unsatisfying about thinking of her alone.
With Joanie it was easier, because I was so young, and there were no empty rooms and abandoned records to contemplate. Her presence didn't gradually fade from the house because it too, was gone. I'm not saying I didn't miss her, that I don't still miss her. Whenever I see the right shade of blue (a mixture between periwinkle and sky if you're curious), or hear a piece of music I remember her listening to, I picture the tall, awkward girl she was. And sometimes I see the accomplished woman she would have been.
The thing is, Joanie was gone irrevocably. And I knew it from the moment I watched the house collapse upon itself in a smoldering uproar of flames and smoke. But there were moments, visiting my mother, when I fully expected to hear my father yelling at the Mets on TV, or smell the tobacco from his pipe. It has gotten better now that my mother sold the house and moved down to Florida. I don't expect him to pick up the other phone when I call because I know he would never voluntarily relocate to the beach. My mother was trying to escape his memory because in the tall maple trees and snow of Connecticut she saw him everywhere.
I think I miss him the most when a bill we've fought hard for passes, a bill I know he would've been proud of. My mother is always happy, but she doesn't fully appreciate the enormity of having done something important and beneficial amidst so much opposition. She's never had a head for politics. But I know my father secretly enjoyed this because he loved to explain things, and she was always a willing listener.
I don't even know why I'm thinking of my father now. Maybe it's the crisp chill in the air. He used to love playing football in the winter; I think the almost painful feeling of cold air in his chest invigorated him. He said he never felt more alive. Or maybe it was the elderly man who passed me a few minutes ago, wearing the same cologne my father wore for as long as I can remember.
I shake my head as if this will clear my thoughts. Truth be told, I'm nearly frozen sitting here on this bench because I forgot my coat in my haste to leave the building, and I'm too stubborn to go back in. I shiver as a cold breeze rustles the remaining leaves of a tree overhead.
She warned me. I have to give her this much. She warned me about the baggage she came with, back in her father's kitchen last spring. But I didn't care; at least I thought I didn't care. But I think it's time for reevaluation of that particular sentiment.
Because I do care, a great deal actually. She has this power to hurt me that no one else has ever been able to possess. And I find myself resenting her easy laughter with other people when we're fighting. Which isn't often mind you, but I hate that she can still walk through the day, as if nothing is wrong, while I'm lost.
I knew it wouldn't be easy, but I never imagined it would be this hard.
There are moments with him when I think that the world is perfect. I don't care about neo-Nazis or depletion of the rain forest. Toby and his latest issue doesn't register, and Leo's casual dismissal of my ideas don't hurt. Not when he looks at me with that gentle light in his eyes.
But then there are moments with him when I think that our relationship is a mistake. When I hurt him with something I did or didn't do. When he tries hard to make me happy, and I can only find fault in his actions or words. When he avoids me after an argument.
I've always valued his friendship, the way we can blow up at each other one minute, and buy drinks in apology the next. The way he reassures me when I've made a gaffe and they way he supports my suggestions when no one else listens to me.
I depend on him; I think I have from the moment we met. Sex hasn't changed this. But it has changed everything else. I weigh his words and actions so much more carefully than I ever did before, and I wonder what, exactly, I'm afraid of.
"Where have you been?"
I look up to find the object of my thoughts standing in the doorway, his eyes an unmistakable shade of anger. I don't have the energy to engage in another battle, but I know from the tension in his stance that he's not going to let this go until we've had it out.
"Where have you been?" I return.
"I asked you first."
"Why don't you come in and shut the door so we can yell at each other like normal people."
"Don't be glib. This is serious," he says coolly as he slams the door behind him.
"This is serious because you say so?"
"Me, Leo, Toby, the President," he ticks off on his fingers. "And I think every reporter in your press room is going to bear me out on this."
"In the grand scheme of things-"
"This is politics, CJ. The grand scheme doesn't matter. Here and now does. And here and now you're an adulteress working for an administration that's already plagued with scandals."
The veins in the side of his neck are popping out, and I can't imagine what his heart rate must be, but I must admit that right now, I don't give a damn. "An adulteress, Josh? You don't think that's being a bit melodramatic?"
"No, I don't."
"You're being a child. You're not mad about how this affects the administration, you're mad because I didn't tell you."
"Because you didn't tell me, we weren't prepared for this."
"Oh, and if you had known that I was involved with him five years ago, how would you have handled it? I mean, let me know how the great Joshua Lyman would have prevented this from becoming public."
"I'm not saying I would have prevented it. I just think this is another instance of your deception screwing us over."
"Fuck you, and get out of my office."
His eyes widen in shock at the vehemence of my words, and he takes a step back. He shoves his hands into his pockets and walks towards the door. When he regains the power of speech, he turns to throw a parting shot. "Go to hell, CJ."
"So I guess the movie's off for tonight, then?" I call after him because I don't want him to know how upset I am.
I throw my pencil across the room, wishing it were something heavier. Something that could do some damage to the window, or door. Just one satisfying shatter or thud. I stand up because the office has suddenly become suffocating, and grab my purse.
I don't care that Leo and the rest of the staff are waiting for me in the Oval Office. I don't care that every newspaper from here to Sacramento is going to print this story. I don't care about the re-election campaign, the briefing notes on my desk, or the insistent ringing of my phone. I don't care about anything right now.
There used to be a framed picture on the corner of the desk. Three men and one woman smiling brazenly at the invisible photographer with their arms thrown casually around each other in obvious euphoria. If you look closely enough, you can see the circles under their eyes from late nights and too-little sleep. But their faces glow with some unnamed joy, and even if they had to throw away partnerships at prestigious law firms and $550,000 a year, surely it was worth it.
I don't know what she's done with it. I only know it's been missing from her desk for three months now. Maybe it was too painful to look at. We were so impossibly innocent, and naïve about things to come. We thought we knew what we were doing. We thought we were invincible.
Or maybe it's not the four figures in the photograph itself that makes her cringe. Maybe it's the unseen man behind the camera. The man we all believed in, the man we followed across the country, the man we helped get elected to office. The man who lied to us.
I don't know how to talk to her anymore. I don't know how to speak without unleashing the bitter words that spark her own resentment. I don't know how to ask her if she's sleeping, and eating without arguing about trade embargoes. I don't know how to tell her that I'm angry too without correcting her grammar, and that sometimes betrayal lies heavy in my chest until I can barely breathe.
The wind is biting, and it has blown dark clouds across the sky. I smell rain in the air, and remember only then that my umbrella is hanging behind my office door. I turn up the collar of my coat when I feel the first droplets, and run towards the nearest open building, which at this hour turns out to be a bar.
It's not particularly classy, and the neon lights in the window are garish and out of place. But it's quiet, and the occupants barely look up from their drinks as I make my way through the dim room. And then I see the almost glowing halo of hair I've spent the last three hours searching for in every church and café across town.
She doesn't notice my presence until I slide across from her in the booth. Her eyes widen in surprise, and she makes a move to flee. But the alcohol has dulled her reflexes and motor abilities, and so she merely slumps in the seat and covers her eyes in a sign of frustration.
"Sam, I really want to be alone right now. Whatever it is can wait."
Only in the harsh lighting of the overhead lamp do I notice the hollowness of her cheeks, and the pallid shade of her skin. Her eyes are dull and ringed by dark shadows underneath. Her shine is gone and it breaks my heart.
"I...what's wrong, CJ?" I'm surprised at how awkward the words are, because it never used to be like this.
"I gotta tell you...that has got to be, by far, the stupidest question I've ever heard." But her heart isn't in the words, and so I don't take offense.
"I mean, what's wrong with you?"
"The same thing that's wrong with everyone else," she replies as she drains the rest of the contents, whiskey if my guess is correct, in one long gulp. "I'm underpaid and overworked."
"Look, I want to-"
"Tomorrow, Sam. Tomorrow."
"What?"
"I just want to sit here, by myself for the next few hours. I promise that you will have the opportunity tomorrow to lecture me, cast me out, and whatever else you all have planned. Right now, I'd just like..."
When she trails off, I lean forward. "I just came here to tell you that I support you."
"How did you know I'd be here?"
"Luck. I've been to every Starbucks in the city. And then it started to rain and-"
"And you left your umbrella in the office again," she finishes with a smile.
"Yeah," I say sheepishly.
"And you support me."
Her tone is somewhere between a statement and a question, and I say simply, "Yes."
"Why?"
"Why what?"
"Why are you suddenly lending me all this support? You've been arguing with me about everything from educational spending to Josh's favorite color for three months now."
"Let me tell you a story, CJ." She looks at me in askance, but makes no protest. "There once was a dashing, suave Presidential advisor-"
"You forgot refined, cultured and debonair," she interrupts sarcastically.
"Have you heard this one before?" She smiles softly and I continue. "Anyway, this exceedingly charming Presidential advisor got himself into a little trouble with a call girl, who he didn't know was a call girl when he had sex with her, which erases, I think, all culpability of-"
"Sam! I don't have all night."
"Right. Ok, well, like I said he didn't know she was a call girl, and when he found out, he told two of his friends. But he didn't tell the person he should have, and when she found out, she was very angry."
"Is there a point buried somewhere in this story?"
"But despite her anger, she supported him," I say over her interruption. "She was a friend to him. She was always a friend to him. And he misses that."
CJ reaches across the table and pats the side of my face. "Well, she misses him too."
"I don't know why we've been so angry with each other, CJ. I just-"
"I know." And as I look into her eyes, I see that she does.
She only pulls away when the waitress approaches our table. She declines another drink, but I order a beer. She waits until I'm nursing it before speaking again.
"I guess everyone's really pissed, huh?"
"Yeah."
"Won't be the first time," she says tiredly. "And Josh..."
"He didn't say much in the meeting."
She buries her face in her hand and groans. "I didn't want it to end like this, you know?"
I pull her hands away from her face. "What are you talking about? This is a little fight...it'll blow over."
"I can't continue...I mean, I thought he was...Jesus, Sam. If this is how he handles Shallick, how is he going to handle-" she stops abruptly and looks away, "something bigger?"
An icy hand grips my heart. "Is there something bigger, CJ?"
"No...I was talking in what-ifs."
"You can't live your life in what-ifs. You know that better than anyone." She nods her head half-heartedly and I study her quietly for a moment. "What's going on?"
"Nothing." But her hands are shaking, and she can't meet my gaze.
"CJ?"
"What?" she asks softly.
"Look at me." When she complies with my quiet order, I freeze at the fear in her eyes. "I can't help you if you don't tell me what's wrong."
"It's not your responsibility to help me, Sam. And I owe it to him to tell him first."
"Josh?"
"Yes."
"He's...now's not a good time to talk to him. He's angry."
"I know."
"So you're just going to wait?"
"Is there any other choice?"
"You can tell me."
She sighs and looks deeply into my eyes, almost as if she's searching for something. Whatever it is, she must find it because she leans forward and lowers her voice. "What I'm about to tell you, can go no further than the two of us. In fact, after this conversation, I don't want you to mention it. At least not until Josh knows. That's the price."
"Anything."
"You should think about this, Sam. Keeping secrets is hard work."
"I know," I say with just a touch of bitterness.
"Yeah, I guess you do," she admits. When she speaks again, her voice is trembling, but I pretend not to notice. "Well, the long and short of it is...well, Sam." She stops and chuckles in self-deprecation. "I didn't think this would be so hard."
"It's ok," I assure her. "Take your time."
"I have cancer," she blurts out after a long silence.
It all makes sense now. The weight loss, the dark circles and fatigue. The way she flinched when Toby grabbed her shoulders in a staff meeting once, the way she sent her food away, barely touched, at two State Dinners and one luncheon, and the way she walked into the office one day as if every step caused unremitting pain.
"Are you sure?" It seems the only safe thing to ask.
She must recognize the disbelief in my eyes because she grips my hand and squeezes. "Yeah."
"But, I mean...God...Breast Cancer?"
"Leukemia."
I swallow painfully. "What...what type?"
I was twenty years old, in my junior year at Princeton, when my maternal grandfather was diagnosed with Acute Myelogenous Leukemia. My brothers and I were never close to my mother's side of the family, but that didn't stop me from spending late nights at the library trying to read as much as I could about the disease. Even after he'd succumbed to infection three months later.
"Blood tests don't reveal that. I have to make an appointment with an oncologist."
"Bone marrow aspiration?"
"Yeah."
"You haven't done it yet?"
"No, I just found out today. I need time to think."
"Think about what, CJ? This is your life we're talking about. If-"
"Don't talk to me like that, Sam. Don't talk to me like I don't understand what I'm dealing with. I've read these damn pamphlets three times," she says angrily as she pulls her hand away and throws the glossy packets on the table.
I bow my head. "Of course...I'm sorry. I didn't mean...what do you need to think about?"
She sighs and runs a hand through her hair. "To be quite honest, I wanted to tell Josh, and the rest of you, first. Well, that was my motivation earlier. Now I have that little matter with Shallick."
"None of that is important. You need to have this procedure done as soon as possible. And then we'll go from there."
She opens her mouth to protest, but thinks better of it and rubs her temples wearily. "I know."
"You're scared," I say in wonder as it finally dawns on me that her reluctance has nothing to do with her schedule.
"Wouldn't you be?"
"Yeah. But you're not alone in this."
"It feels like it, Sam," she admits tearfully as she finally allows her sorrow to show. "I've been thinking about it all day, and I decided that I was going to be strong, you know? I wasn't going to cry, or think about death, but I'm so scared. And just, you can't understand that."
"No, I can't," I whisper. "But I can listen to your fears."
"No, it's too much. You're a good friend, but I can't do that to you. I have to deal with this on my own." Her voice, even though it's still thick with unshed tears, is firm with a resolve that raises the hairs on the back of my neck.
And just like that she's gone. A handful of bills thrown on the table and an empty glass rimmed with lipstick the only signs she was ever there.
TBC...