A Frightened Peace
By Anne Callanan and Kathleen E. Lehew
Part 11/12
Abbey barely registered the soft click of the door as it closed behind her. Tightly clenching the clipboard in white knuckled hands, her attention was fully focused on the man lying quiet and still on the bed. His eyes were closed. The beeping of the monitor, insistently registering his heartbeat, broke the silence. Clinically, she found herself counting them. The rhythm was even and steady, a hypnotic cadence reflecting the continuing life and well being of Josiah Bartlet, President of the United States.
Abigail Bartlet's husband. Right now, everyone else could go screw themselves.
Glancing around, she noted that no one else was in the room. She was grateful for that. She didn't have the energy, let alone the will, left to send someone else packing, be they nurses or secret service. Right now she didn't want an audience, sympathetic or otherwise.
Slipping her glasses on, a wave of apprehension coursed through her as she began to leaf through the charts on the clipboard. Carlyle had said his injuries were minor, that it was a miracle. It was a confidence she would have to see to believe.
Her mouth tightened as she read, a tensing of her jaw that those who knew her would have understood indicated deep frustrated annoyance and relief. An unusual combination of emotions usually reserved for and applied to only one man and his antics. Somehow, saying yes when he'd asked her to marry him all those years ago had not included a lifetime of hauling him out from in front of onrushing trains. Half the time, she didn't know whether to cry or box his ears. Flipping through the pages, Abbey chalked up Jed's latest score. Reading, she found a small measure of her serenity restored.
He had been lucky. The whole thing read like a bad EMT report after a particularly vicious football game. Concussion, blood loss, bruises and contusions. Unconsciously, her brow furrowed as she read further. Somehow, he'd managed to do a real number on his right leg, twenty-seven stitches but minimal muscle damage. He was going to have one hell of a scar. Given half a chance, he'd be able to walk out of the hospital in a few days.
Not at all amused by that thought and knowing he'd do just that if given half a chance, she flipped the last page back and found herself staring at him again, taking the moment and simply rejoicing in the fact that once again, through no action of his own, he'd managed to dodge another bullet. He attracted trouble like a magnet.
Luck? Somehow, she knew luck had very little to do with his latest escape. More shaken than she cared to admit or show, even to herself, she searched half-heartedly for some meaning behind it all. Danger until Rossyln had been an abstract, something that existed only in the history books, threatened other presidents. Now this.
She couldn't help the sad smile that pulled gently at the corners of her lips. Her beloved klutz had somehow managed to stumble once again into those dry historical passages.
Josiah Bartlet: Crashed Marine One, insurance report pending.
"Jackass," she muttered, shaking her head sadly. A familiar surge of nearly overwhelming affection drove everything else from her mind. The feeling always thrilled and frightened her.
"I heard that."
Smiling, she wasn't surprised that he had. His eyes remained closed as she approached the bed. Saying nothing, she reached out and brushed a lock of hair from his forehead, noting the stitched wound just above the hairline. How many stitches? She remembered. Four. Another injury.
Another scar.
Abbey's smile, along with her relief, faltered. When he opened his eyes to look at her, it was nearly her undoing. He could be economical with the truth and his actions, but not when he looked at her like that. Clear blue and full of life, sorrow and a passionate intensity that took her breath away, she had never been able to deny him or those eyes anything. At least, not for long.
Her lips trembled with the sudden need to smile, to give him a small measure of absolution. But she wasn't about to give him that. Not yet.
Still, Bartlet sensed her yielding the high ground. Tired amusement had replaced the worry and anger in her eyes. That was always a good indication, a sure sign he no longer needed to find excuses or a place to hide. Why? He'd never been able to figure that one out; wasn't sure he really wanted to. Escaping, the doghouse door slammed shut behind him.
Safely away and almost able to hear it slam, he managed a weak, protesting grin. "This wasn't my fault."
Abbey sighed. "It never is."
"Meaning?"
"Meaning," Abbey dropped the clip board on the nightstand and took his hand, lacing her fingers through his and squeezing gently, "This is one hell of a way to try and get out of dancing with me at my birthday party."
"I like to dance."
"Not in front of an audience you don't."
He couldn't argue with that. He did like to dance, but only with her. Being schlepped off from one head of state's wife to another in an endless round of ridiculously polite niceties never improved his mood or his skills on the dance floor. More than one toe had meet with an unhappy end under his irritated feet. It was a sentimental bias he had absolutely no intention of changing.
And then there was that whole audience thing. The problem was that dancing with Abbey inevitably led to other things best left to the privacy provided by a locked door, a cordon of heavily armed secret service agents and a gloriously missing weekend. Something neither of them had had time for lately.
Come to think of it, they could skip the dancing altogether. It wasn't completely out of the question. Grimacing, he shifted on the bed as best he could, finding it impossible to settle in any comfortable position. He hated hospitals. He hated the drugs. He hated feeling goofy. Then again, goofy had its uses.
His mischievous gaze returned to hers. "You know, they managed to do it again."
Recognizing the devil that had popped up and immediately suspicious, Abbey asked carefully, "What do you mean?"
"They got my pants off before you could."
Abbey stared at him for a moment, openly incredulous and at a complete loss for words. Then her sense of humor took over and she burst out laughing. She could hear a touch of hysteria in the sound, but then she was entitled. Bad jokes or not, he always managed to make her laugh.
Feeling his fingers tighten around hers she leaned over and, voice shakier than she would have liked, murmured, "A wasted effort."
"Hmm." The response was distant and fading. "Am I going to be punished?"
Abbey could have provided more than a few answers to that question, but his tone, the quiet yet somehow forced desperation left her wondering if he was baiting her, teasing. It would be just like him.
She couldn't help the sad smile as she asked, "For what?" As if he didn't already know. But that was for later.
"Crashing Marine One," came the drowsy response.
"Were you driving?"
Considering his past track record, it was a fair question. One corner of Bartlet's mouth twisted wryly. "No."
"Then that's the Navy's problem, not mine."
"And your problem would be?"
This time Abbey did hear it, the worried question and underlying fear. He was watching her intently, fighting the drugs threatening to drag him under and waiting for an answer he dreaded. Falling back on her earlier equation, she decided boxing his ears for even thinking of the possibility wouldn't be fair. She was better at fights than he was. Her feelings for him had very little to do with sound reasoning and everything to do with what was simply good and right.
Besides, she never could resist the little boy lost look he could get on his face. It got her every time. That she had long ago concluded was a truly unfair advantage. It didn't help that he had absolutely no idea he was doing it and what it did to her.
What was Abigail Bartlet's problem? The list was truly endless, but only one person occupied the top slot.
"You are," she answered softly, and not regretting one moment.
Abbey leaned forward and pressed her lips to his, feather light and caressing rather than demanding. His response was slow, almost shocked and without the passionate hunger she'd long ago learned to expect from him. He was surprised.
Pulling away, Abbey smiled and realized it was nice to know she could still take the wind out of his sails every now and then. Whatever the future may hold, they always had that at least.
For now, it was enough.
Frowning, she noticed that his eyes had closed. Not exactly the best response to one of her kisses, but she allowed that he'd had a pretty rough day. Finding her smile again, she admitted candidly that they both had. And it wasn't over yet. Resolutions were never that easy.
Abbey could see a muscle twitching in his jaw as he clenched his teeth. She reached out to brush her thumb gently across the darkening bruise on his cheek. Poor comfort. It broke her heart to see the pain etched in merciless lines across his face.
This shouldn't have happened. They deserved better.
He deserved better.
In her mind's eye, Abbey returned to another hospital room, another bitter event that had torn out the supports of their lives. Too many hospitals. Too many questions without answers, leaving the future a blank, terrifying slate with no hint of what may yet come. Fate had already conspired to take him away from her.
Now this.
Her vision blurred, reliving the grief and pain of that older scene and adding it to the present. It was senselessly and sickeningly familiar. One hot tear trailed down her cheek. For the moment, it was all she would allow.
It was all she would show him. He didn't need her tears, not now. Neither did he need her anger. Later perhaps, but not now.
Trailing her fingers along his jaw, Abbey could sense he was close to slipping beneath the last layer of consciousness. Drugs, exhaustion, it didn't matter. Doctor Bartlet knew sleep was the best medicine for him now. Abigail, wife and mother of his children, was unwilling to let him go quite so soon.
Just a few more minutes were all she wanted.
"Hey!"
Drawn back from the brink, he blinked up at her. "It's okay."
"You sure?"
"Sure?" Bartlet managed a short laugh, which trailed off into a drawn out hiss of pain. He felt Abbey lay a worried hand on his chest. "Nah, but I think I'm getting used to it."
"One hell of a desk job?" It was a bad joke, but all she could manage. She never could play the game as well as he could.
"I think…" he paused, trying to keep his thoughts centered. It was becoming increasingly difficult. "…I'm going to have to reread the manual."
"We both will." She could see he could barely keep his eyes open. Abbey knew it was time to let him go, to sleep and recover. Reluctantly, she let go his hand and gently laid it on the bed. "Get some sleep."
"Abbey…"
"Not now." She knew what he wanted say, what he wanted to finish and silently cursed his timing. He always had been lousy at choosing battlefields. "Later."
His eyes drifted shut, giving in to the exhaustion. "Really?"
"Yeah."
"Okay." The last was a barely audible mumble.
Abbey stood there and listened to his breathing as it settled into the slow rhythms of sleep. She wondered briefly if she should feel some guilt over the relief she felt, that the whole ugly mess was being postponed once more. And this time it was her decision, not his.
How long could they wait? How long could she? The questions hammered at her. She wasn't really sure what she wanted of him anymore. Apology? Admittance? The horrible thought occurred to her that maybe, just maybe, she'd left him no alternatives. She'd backed him into a corner of her own choosing.
A cynical inner voice sliced through her wandering thoughts. Her own words returned to haunt her.
'Not now. Later.'
Perhaps they were both guilty.
It was something to think about.
To be concluded…
