Title: There In The End
Author: White Star 2 (hila-p@barak-online.net)
Spoilers: Uh... I haven't actually seen anything past Two Cathedrals.
But I've heard very few early S3 spoilers and I wrote them in, so
call it that.

Disclaimer: Aaron owns them and it's probably best that way. I
borrowed, I wrote, I'll give 'em back by tomorrow.

Summary: It was a good campaign, but it was doomed from the start.

Author's Notes: Many thanks go out on this one. Thanks to Rob for
keeping me up late so I can have the three o'clock spark of
inspiration. Thanks to Ayelet for having me over so I can write it on
the train on the way back. Thanks to Luna for the beta. Thanks to
Arkin for relentlessly annoying me until I actually got it posted.

* * *

There In The End


It was a good campaign, but it was doomed from the start. Much like
Roger Becker's movies and New Coke, she thought, the effort was
wasted, because the core was rotten, the product. The candidate. And
that's one problem even the best of advertisers, strategists, and PR
people couldn't put a good face on.

And so they lost. It wasn't her fault, she tried to tell herself,
none of them were to blame. Maybe the President, in the end, but no
one would say it to his face. After the year and a half they had been
through, no one would have thought about laying any of the blame on
him. And so she tried hard not to take it personally, and she failed
miserably.

She wasn't going to get to keep the job she'd grown to love and
Democrats weren't going to get to keep the White House. It was a
double loss for her, and it seemed like, at least in part, it was her
fault.

"CJ?" Josh knocked softly on her open office door. She looked up
slowly, her hands still deep inside the deep bottom drawer of her
desk, discovering treasures that had been lost for four years and
long since forgotten. Life Savers, pennies, Post-Its with names and
numbers she only partially recalled. Nothing of any value, so far.

"Listen," Josh said with the same hint of desperation that had been
in everyone's voices all month. The building was suffocated with it.
"We're all going out for a beer in a bit. Sam and Toby and Donna and
me. And maybe Ginger, too, if Sam manages to convince her by then."

"I'll pass," she said. She hated it - the sudden increased sense of
community between them, trying to gather up good memories as fast as
possible before they all go their separate ways.

"Are you sure?" Josh asked.

"Yeah," she said heavily. "I think I'll stay here."

"I'm going to miss this place," Josh thumped his fist against the
doorjamb as he left. CJ looked around what was once her office but
now was nothing but a disarray of half-packed cardboard boxes. It was
night already, and it was snowing. The windows were fogged up just a
little, failing to ward off the cold from without.

This was one of the better days. Since the election, she'd had worse.
She'd had days when she could barely stand coming to the office in
the morning. But now it was hardly an office anymore, and in six days
some Republican who thought he knew what the world really needed
would occupy it, the new voice of the new administration.

It wasn't as if her life was going to stop. She got job offers from
all over the map, both political and straight-up PR. None of their
lives were going to stop. Toby had accepted a job at Atlantic
Intermedia. "Sold out," he said with a smile so tiny no one else
would have noticed it. He was giving up on politics, leaving his
losing streak behind him. Because, he said, if Josiah Bartlet lost,
it was time to hang up his hat.

Sam was off to write speeches for some Governor from the Midwest that
might be running for president in three years. Josh was taking a job
with the Senate Majority Leader, set out to do exactly what Ann Stark
had failed to do - reduce the new president to Prime Minister. "I'm
going to make him regret ever running," Josh said, almost managing to
sound proud.

Donna was going with Josh, Charlie was off to law school, Leo was
moving back to Boston to consult. None of their lives were going to
stop. But she wished the world would, for just a second, so she could
catch her breath again.

Her time in the White House was out, and in six days she would have
to take her things and leave. No one talked about that part - about
having to clear out. They just silently packed their boxes, ready to
leave empty rooms for their predecessors.

* * *

"You know, I always figured we'd get another four years," Sam said,
as Toby played with his pink rubber ball. "I always figured that it's
meant to be, that he's a good president and they'll see that."

Toby threw the ball against the wall, and Sam was slightly startled.
It came back and Toby caught it, expressionless.

"We should do the farewell address," Sam said, hoping it would get
some kind of reaction out of Toby. It didn't. "It's five days from
now."

"It can wait another day," Toby said finally. Sam knew he was right.
In the glumness of the building, everyone was tempted to
procrastinate, even Toby. And Sam, willing as he might have been to
just get it done with, knew it was hopeless to try.

The whole building was foreign, suddenly, cold. Computers were
packed, files were moved, desks were bare. And Sam saw how it was the
little things that made a place home. Even Toby's office, which had
never seemed very decorated or homely to him before suddenly seemed
deserted, a shadow of what it had been.

They were working half-days, as if time had stood still and the
country wasn't there to be run anymore. It was someone else's concern
now. The staff was wandering aimlessly through the halls, some, like
Toby, like defeated giants, slumped and afraid to look up, others,
like CJ, like ghosts ready to haunt the place and maybe scare all the
Republicans out of it once they arrive.

They were going out almost every night, the whole gang, this bar or
another, once or twice a restaurant so that Leo could come along.
They talked about good times they'd had in the White House,
friendships they'd shared in the past, how shocked they were four
years earlier to wake up and find that they were working for the
President of the United States.

But none of them talked about plans for the future. He knew almost
everyone had them. But they were never discussed when they were there
as a group. The feeling of friendship was just too fragile to be
disturbed. One nudge in the wrong direction, and it would break. And
then that bitter taste would be all they'd have.

The closer their eviction deadline got, the more aware he was that he
didn't really know what he wanted to do. He'd accepted an offer to
write for Terry Windham in Ohio, but that was nothing more than a
first instinct of self preservation. He agreed to write - that was
what he did now, write speeches, great speeches, even.

But he didn't want to be doing that forever. He wanted out of
politics at some point. But he couldn't damn well go back to Gage-
Whitney, or any other firm in New York. He could move back to
California, to try to forget why he ran away from it in the first
place. Maybe Chicago. Or, like Josh had said with a smile that wasn't
cheerful but was a lot better than most he'd seen around since the
election, he could stay and accept his fate as a whore for the
Democratic Party.

It was an appealing thought some days. Maybe he'd even get to see the
inside of the White House again. But, starting five days from now,
they would be the opposition, the other guys. He wasn't used to that.

At least they got the Senate and the House, he thought. For the first
time in twelve years, the Democrats had some legislative power. "And
that," the President had said, "Is final proof that it's not
Democrats that the people have a problem with, it's me. The American
people are punishing me."

If he wasn't the President, if he wasn't smarter than all of them put
together, if he wasn't twenty years their senior, if he wasn't in so
much pain at that moment they couldn't bear it, one of them might
have said something tactless like, "You deserved it." But he was all
those things, and they knew better.

And so suddenly the West Wing developed a new set of unwritten rules
for what you can and can't discuss. No talk of the future or of MS.
No talk of why and how they lost. And suddenly he imagined Ann Stark
in Leo's office and it made him sick to his stomach.

"We should start on it tomorrow," he told Toby.

"Yeah," Toby said and threw his ball against the wall again. This
time he was just a little less expressionless.

* * *

As fast as Margaret was packing things from his office, Leo was
taking them back out. He needed to work. He loved this job and he
knew he only had four more days to do it. Not even four, he thought.
Three. In four days, Robert Ritchie would be sworn in, and his office
would be occupied by someone he'd probably loathe if he had the
chance to meet.

No one else had their head in the game anymore, they were too busy
packing and remembering old times and planning ahead. He was that
young once, he thought. They'd move on, do other great things.

He didn't worry about them. He worried about the man in the office
next door, the one with a wife, three kids, and MS. The man who just
lost a Presidential election under the most horrible of terms and
would probably never be remembered for any of the good he managed to
do while he was in office.

On any given day, there's no knowing what he'll choose to care about,
he told CJ once. More than ever, it showed now. There were days when
he dragged himself into the office late and grumpy, swearing he'd
take out his rage on anyone who dared mention a Republican. Other
days, he'd wake up with more energy than Leo had seen him with in
years.

Leo put away a memo from the Assistant Secretary of Transportation
and put his hand on the knob of the door that connected to the Oval
Office. He hesitated. Today was one of the worse days. When he
finally opened the door, the sight pinched his heart. Unlike the rest
of the building, which was being slowly packed into boxes, dissolving
into nothingness, the Oval Office didn't change.

The President noticed him standing there, half inside, and said,
"Leo, come on in." It startled him out of the thought and he stepped
in and closed the door behind him. The President was sitting on the
couch, the jacket of his suit draped on the chair next to it. He put
down the book he was reading. "This should be wonderful," he said in
a tone somewhere between lost and ironic. "For the first time in a
long time, I can sit down, I can read a book. No one expects anything
from me." Anger started seeping into his voice, though his face never
showed it. "Let me tell you, there's a certain advantage to being a
lame duck."

"Yes, sir," he was careful not to smile. If he knew anything about
Jed Bartlet, it was that right now he didn't want to joke around, he
was doing it out of habit. He didn't want to be left alone, either.

The President seemed to be the only one in the building with nothing
to do. Toby and Sam were working on the farewell speech, Josh and CJ
were overseeing the packing efforts. And only the man with the
hardest job in the building, had nothing to do but sit in his office
and read a book.

"Why don't you go up to the Residence?" Leo suggested, knowing it
probably wasn't the best of ideas, either. Like the rest of the
building, any part of the Residence that was customizable was being
placed into boxes and trunks and shipped to various locations.

"Nah," he replied. "Abbey's up there scaring the stewards. I don't
really want any part in that."

"Probably not."

"Hey, Leo," the President said after a moment of silence that wasn't
really awkward, just intolerable. "I'm supposed to do this farewell
address, right?"

"Toby and Sam are working on it."

"And then go out to the lawn and shake hands with Ritchie?" Leo
nodded. The President sighed. "I don't want to." And suddenly he was
the eighteen-year-old boy he'd only just met, wanting to stand up to
his father and knowing nothing would come of it.

"Jed," Leo started and trailed off. He had nothing to say that was
worth saying.

"We got beat," he said, simply, quietly.

"We got beat," Leo repeated.

* * *

Republicans were idiots.

They were idiots and their constituents were idiots. And Josh had
long since given up on trying to make them see that, and so his only
other option was to make them pay. And if that meant going back to
work for people he'd had to insult and take out for a ride all
through the Bartlet administration, then so be it.

It was weird to suddenly think of a Republican White House. It was
not the right order of things.

Republicans were idiots, and it was starting to get to him.

Twice in the past two elections a president was elected whose party
was in the minority. The first time it was the fault of the Electoral
College. The second, it was the fault of the American people.

But Bartlet acted like it didn't really matter that much, most days.
Josh knew him well enough by now to know that wasn't true, but he was
a private man, and Josh respected that.

As for himself, he was as devastated as anyone else in the building,
but what killed him was that he wasn't sure why. He'd been the one
that looked at the polling numbers first, he'd had late-night
conversations with Joey Lucas about the likelihood that they'd
change. He'd been preparing for defeat just a little longer than
everyone.

He'd known it was coming, and so by the time it had finally come,
what really bothered him was knowing he was going to lose all of his
friends. Sam was picking up for Ohio, Leo for Boston, the President
was going to retire to New Hampshire, CJ had just accepted a job for
some feminist lobby in San Francisco whose name he couldn't recall.
Even Toby was running away - leaving politics for good.

Only Donna was staying, coming with him in hopes Wiley would make a
good enough Senate Majority Leader to put him in the White House in
four years. "Even if just as vice president to your guy." Sam had
smiled back, nearly mirroring his smirk, and said, "We'll see."

And the days dragged on and on, and the body count in the White House
slowly dropped. First it was the interns who went on Christmas break
and never came back. After them, it was the congressional liaisons.
Then the associate counsels, and finally, these past few days, even
the assistants had slowly started dropping out.

Ginger took a job with some law firm in Baltimore. Bonnie was off to
the other coast with some boyfriend he never knew she had. Margaret
was still around, packing all of Leo's things - and her own - for the
move to Boston. Charlie had already left, in time to make it to the
start of Spring Semester at Yale Law. The President, for just that
one last week, was left in the capable hands of Nancy. She left
today. For two days, he would be alone.

They were all alone.

And in three days, they would all go their separate ways. He wondered
how often they would look back, how hard it would be. He wondered if
they would stay friends, any of them. His friendship with Sam had
survived through thick and thin, though politics and distances and
call girls. He like to think it would survive now, too. But he had no
idea if it really would. He had no idea about any of them, and that
devastated him more than anything.

"Josh," Donna said, grabbing his arm as he walked, almost
sleepwalking, past the empty desk that used to be hers. He told her
she didn't really need to come in anymore. She should worry more
about their things being moved to their new office on the Hill.

"Donna." He smiled. It's all he had the strength left for, anymore.
"You didn't have to come in today."

"I know," she said, more apologetic than he'd seen her, well, ever.
Something was up. "Listen..."

He motioned with a jerk of his head and they stepped into his office.
"What?" he asked.

"I talked to my parents yesterday. We talked for a very long time,
about the election, about everything. And we decided that it's best
if I go home for a while." And there it was.

"Donna..."

"I know I said I'd start at the new place with you, but I need some
time off, Josh. I really need this. I wouldn't do it otherwise."

"I know."

She wrapped her arms around him tightly. "Thank you for
understanding." He smiled, a little more wearily than last time.

They were all alone.

* * *

Masochists had always seemed stupid to him. He never understood what
kind of person could possibly experience pain and then come back for
more. And suddenly, he was one. This job had turned him into one.

He ran his bicycle into a tree, back in his first year. He came back
to work. He got his weaknesses published in the Post and the Times,
and he came back to work. He got shot, and he came back. He told the
world he had MS, and he came back.

But none of it ever prepared him for the biggest pain of all, losing
the election. In his entire life, he'd never lost an election until
this one, and even that, right now, seemed like too much. It was the
knockout, the killing blow, the one that would not be followed by any
more pain, the one after which he did not need to go back for more,
after which there was no way to come back.

Nothing in his life ever prepared him for how it felt. More than
anything, it felt lonely.

Sure, Abbey was there for him, but she was never really on his side
on this one. She was almost relieved when they lost, he knew she
wished for it, even if it was only unconsciously. He was forced to
live up to his promise that way, one term.

The staff were all handling defeat their own way. It was true, he
felt close to them, he thought of them as his own children. But that
kind of closeness, and with this job, only went so far. And so, now,
they all seemed distant.

Leo was the only one that seemed to notice. He surfaced from his
papers and phone calls every few hours to check up on him. Again and
again he'd come in, asking him how he's doing, afraid too much time
alone in the Oval Office with nothing to do might drive him mad. He
might have been right.

"Mr. President?" Leo appeared through the door again, quiet as a
prowler. He waited to be waved in before he entered, closing the door
behind him. And suddenly the thought surfaced - tomorrow he wouldn't
be Mr. President anymore.

Tomorrow he'd just be Jed.

"You know, it never changes," Leo said and he raised a questioning
eyebrow. "The Oval Office, from administration to administration. The
whole building changes, but this room stays exactly the same."

"I guess there's some measure of comfort in that," he said and Leo
nodded in agreement. "Or futility," he added and saw Leo search for a
response.

"I just got off the phone with Charlie," he said.

"Are you checking up on him?" Leo chuckled.

"Well, someone ought to," he said. "At least he's doing well."

"He likes Yale?"

"He hates it."

"Why?"

"Because it's three states away from Georgetown."

"He misses Zoey?"

"Wouldn't you?"

Leo smiled.

"This was my last job, you know," he said suddenly, surprised at his
own moment of darkness. The months since the election had been
flooded with them, but they caught him by surprise every time. "This
is it."

"Well, it was a good one, Mr. President," Leo said with that rare
smile of nostalgia and joy that he hadn't seen on him for months,
maybe years. "It was a good one."

"It was," he replied, "But it's gone."

"No," Leo said. "Not until tomorrow."

* * *

Toby moved slowly through the crowds on Pennsylvania Avenue. The
motorcade was coming through, and they were cheering senselessly.
Once in a while there was a strange look from someone who recognized
him, but they were all too happy to care. They'd put a man in the
White House. They drove the evil Democrats out.

These people, covered in scarves and coats and earmuffs, out cheering
for their new President in the freezing January cold, reminded him
too much of all those people who'd come out to see them four years
before. They looked almost the same. Somehow, he found that morbid.

It had been a frustrating campaign. He was trying to run an
intellectual from New England who'd been scandalized and branded a
liar. And if that wasn't hard enough, their opponent had campaigned
himself as "an honest man of the people". He suddenly wondered if he
was going to pull a Jimmy Carter and hop out of the car.

No, probably not. It was too cold, and Bob Ritchie was probably too
stupid to see the value of the gesture to the people the way Carter
had when he'd done it.

The first campaign, back when getting Jed Bartlet elected president
was improbable and only seemed impossible, was an intellectual
exercise. This campaign was impossible repressed and denied to the
point where it only seemed improbable. It was devastating, and more
than any of his other failed campaigns, because this time he knew
what it was like to win.

He felt almost like a small child, running away at his first failure.
But it wasn't his first. At minimum, it was his thirty-first, and
he'd had it. He was good, that was true, but there was only so much
disappointment he could take.

The crowd cheered Ritchie all the way from the car to the podium on
the steps of Capitol Hill and Toby clenched his jaw. It stung, more
than anything else. For that one minute, Ritchie's slow walk up the
stairs, all of his tragedies, his humiliating moments, seemed
inconsequential, miniscule. He wanted to scream.

Twice in two elections, the White House was occupied by the minority.
Somehow he felt like both were his fault. The first time, he managed
to get Bartlet elected. With only 48 percent of the votes, true, but
he put his man in the White House. The second time... some days he
wondered if he hadn't started sniffing around Hoynes and the oil
industry, if he hadn't gone to Leo, would any of it have happened.

Would it have been wrong? Yes. Would he have felt better about it?
Yes. And right now, listening to them cheer for a man he felt wasn't
worthy of holding any public office, much less the presidency, he
thought he might have been able to live with it.

He was tired of it. He knew it, but he never knew how much until
Bartlet asked him to write the note he was supposed to leave on his
desk for Ritchie. "I don't want to do it," he'd explained
apologetically, "But I already told CJ I would and she told the
press."

And so he sat down at his computer and wrote words of encouragement
he didn't mean and a few praises he had up his sleeves for the people
he really had nothing to say about. And he realized exactly how tired
of politics he had gotten.

He started thinking of things they'd planned for their second term.
There was so much they still wanted to do. "You have goals," CJ had
told him when he announced he was quitting. "And even though you
wouldn't like the rest of them to know, you have ideals, too. This is
what we do. This is how you make them happen."

And it occurred to him that tomorrow morning he wouldn't be going to
the office, he wouldn't be listening to her brief, he wouldn't be
annoyed by Josh and Sam. And he didn't know how long until he'd see
any of them again. Phone calls on special occasions, Christmas cards,
birthday e-mails. Maybe dinner or drinks if they were in each other's
new home. They were all going to go off and be rich or famous, and
the group was a shattered glass, its pieces strewn all over.

And then, as if only to kick him when he was already down, the
speakers rang out with the words he least wanted to hear. "I, Robert
Ritchie, do solemnly swear," the knot in Toby's stomach tightened.
Everything around him seemed surreal for just one second, then hard
reality struck him again, and it hurt. "That I will faithfully
execute the office of President of the United States," he continued
in a southern drawl, inconsiderate or unaware of how sharply each
word twisted the knife in Toby's gut.

He didn't expect it to feel this bad. He didn't remember what it was
like, maybe. Or maybe it was suddenly different. Perspective was
everything, truth was nothing. It had been his job to prove that
right. But perspective had changed, and the truth, inconsequential as
it should have been, was not on his side anymore.

And so he did the thing that defined his political career as a whole,
the thing he was best at. He turned around and walked away.