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"So, we know these guys are up to something, but proving it..." Josh sighed. "Five votes from our side isn't going to kill the whole bill, but it could seriously damage our chances of getting it through with the sexuality segment intact. There've been rumblings on that part anyway; we'd be lucky to get half a dozen honest 'yea's from the Republican camp, and there are plenty Congressmen on our side who aren't in love with it."
Leo fixed him with a fierce gaze. "He wants the whole package, Josh."
"I know," he agreed quickly. Leo had been throwing his weight behind the president with a whole new force ever since the hate crimes initiative had been announced; even though he hadn't been there when the president had gone out in front of the nation to propose it. Josh wasn't sure if it was a combination of the frustrations from too many lost chances along the way, or just the sharp reminder of how much more work this country needed when they'd almost lost Charlie. Either way, where Leo had once been the voice of caution and moderation at the president's side, now he seemed determined to push through all his old friend's most sweeping changes or die trying.
Fiery determination was all well and good, and Josh relished being let off the leash as much as anybody - but he couldn't help feeling that it was taking its toll on his boss. He would have scoffed at the idea Leo could throw himself any deeper into his work, until he'd seen the old flashes of humour and playful exasperation begin to dry up and disappear.
He didn't like it, and never mind whether Leo was becoming a harder taskmaster or a less forgiving boss. Leo was burning himself up for fuel, focusing his whole being on the job and nothing but the job, and Josh had been on that side of it often enough to know that sooner or later, something would have to give.
But Leo was... Leo. And how was he supposed to begin to tackle any sort of conversation about it without getting summarily dismissed with the verbal equivalent of a cuff round the ear?
He rubbed his forehead. "We're meeting with the military guys again tomorrow. But seriously, I... I don't see that we're going to catch them out on this. I'm not sure... We're gonna need another line of attack, something to-"
"Make it happen," Leo ordered, with an air of finality.
Josh hesitated, caught between needing to speak and knowing it would get him nowhere. "Leo..."
Leo peered over his glasses to give him the 'are you still here?' look. He didn't follow it up with a snide comment, which only made it more disconcerting.
Josh fumbled for the right words. "Leo... are you okay?"
Leo just looked at him for a moment. "Get to work," he said peremptorily.
And somehow, Josh found that refusal to even accept the question even worse than an outright, blatantly untrue denial.
"Hey Charlie."
He smiled delightedly and pushed up out of his chair. "Hey, Zoey."
"Oh, no, don't get up." She leaned across his desk to give him a soft, lingering kiss. There was a loud, disapproving 'hmph' from the direction of the Oval Office. Zoey pulled away reluctantly from her fianc and grinned. "Hi, dad."
He pulled a face and narrowed his eyes at Charlie. "I'm watching you," he said, pointing a warning finger.
"I think you should be watching her," Charlie said dryly.
Zoey tilted her head to look at him. "Traitor," she said playfully.
They kissed again. Her father cleared his throat pointedly and waited for them to pull apart. "I haven't gone anywhere," he reminded them.
She nodded her head towards the Oval. "You got an office," she shrugged.
Her father looked disgruntled. "May I remind you that I run this country?"
"You'd better get used to it dad," she warned, smiling up at Charlie as she played with his fingers. "In two months' time we'll be married."
"Unless I ship one or both of you off to Zimbabwe," he threatened without missing a beat.
Zoey looked at Charlie. He looked back at her. She stood on tiptoes to kiss him again.
Her father beat a retreat into his office, grumbling all the way.
Toby was seated alone at his desk, eyes downwards in concentration. He registered her presence in the doorway through some unknown sense, and tilted his gaze up to meet her.
"Hey." CJ stepped inside and closed the door behind her. He straightened up in his seat and looked at her curiously. She tapped the edge of the manuscript against her cheek.
"I've been reading a book about... the president's childhood."
"Ah." There was world of expression in that 'ah', and she didn't like any of it. But he just looked at her, and she knew that this was something that she couldn't quite trust to the nuances of nonspoken conversation; no matter how much easier that would feel.
"Toby, there's... it's suggested that, uh, the president and his father..." God, how was she ever supposed to deal with this if it turned out to be true, if it turned out to be real? If she couldn't even make herself say it to Toby... "The author implies that... things weren't good. With the president and his father. Things weren't good."
No, things were definitely not good. Teachers who'd talked about bruises and a family doctor who'd made a note in the margin of a file... Things she couldn't begin to reconcile with the warm, boundlessly affectionate man who filled every room he stepped into. Except sometimes, wasn't there just an edge of a look in his eye; a guarded face, a defensive withdrawal, and... no.
Toby, tell me no.
But Toby just looked at her, and she looked back. And she could already read the answer in his eyes, but he seemed to understand that she needed it committed to words anyway.
"It's true."
CJ shook her head, even though Toby was Toby, and when it came to the important things, the things that existed under the skin, Toby was never wrong. "How do you know?"
"I see," he said simply. Toby always saw; every tiny gesture, every waver, every emotion that was buried down so deep that she knew damn well he shouldn't be able to read it in her face.
But that was... well, that was her and Toby, and the president was... not the same. Toby could be wrong. Toby had to be wrong.
"Dammit, Toby, this is- you're coming to me with 'I see'?" she demanded.
"Dr. Jekyll and Uncle Fluffy," he said softly.
"What?" He mumbled into his beard, but even after the words clicked into place it was a moment more before comprehension followed.
"I told you about Uncle Fluffy."
"Toby-" CJ shook her head slowly.
"He hides, CJ," he said emphatically, pushing out of his chair to stand up. "He hides, and you can see him do it."
"And from there you go to-? Toby, this is... This is not something you can, you can just pick out of the air because you-"
"CJ." They exchanged a long look.
Her voice, when it came, was tentative. She could see something there that... something that didn't quite fit on Toby, because for a moment there it almost looked like shame or guilt. "Toby...?"
He hesitated. "There was a time when I may have been... less than tactful-"
"Toby!" She stared at him in disbelief. There was a long pause, and he looked at the floor.
"We talked."
"You- you actually-? Toby!"
"I spoke to him about-"
"There are lines, Toby!"
"He shouldn't hide!" Toby burst out. "He shouldn't-" He broke off, and began to pace the office. "He can't be allowed to run away from himself."
"Because he's the president?" she asked sharply.
He came to a halt. "Because he's who he is!"
CJ shook her head sadly at him. "You can't try to make him perfect," she reminded him.
"I can make him as good as he can be," Toby said fiercely.
"Why?"
"Because..." He waved his hands emphatically. "Because mediocrity abhors brilliance. And the only defence against mediocrity is to be brilliant, and to stay brilliant, and hiding is not escape, it's surrender! And you cannot surrender to mediocrity, you cannot ever surrender to mediocrity, because... Because that's where it ends. If you let mediocrity break you down, then... that's where it... ends."
He wound down slowly, like a clockwork soldier. There was a long silence.
CJ gave him a slow, gently sympathetic smile. "Toby... what happened to you when you were at school?"
They exchanged a long look. "I got tougher," he said very softly. He gave her a melancholy smile, and walked past her out of his own office. She could have followed.
But she didn't.