VI

MONDAY:

Wakefulness came gradually; the room was still dark, but something had stirred her from slumber. Not a noise, just a feeling of subtle wrongness.

Jed was awake. She could feel that in the vibe from his body, an alertness in the darkness. It was scarcely unusual for him to be unable to sleep, but usually he was restless, rolling from side to side, snatching the covers, and inevitably nudging her awake until she cuddled up to him and quieted him.

This strange stillness was troubling. Jed Bartlet was by his very nature dynamic; always in motion, frequently made clumsy by his body's inability to keep up with his frantic brain. When he sank into dull immobility, it was never a good sign.

"Hey babe," she murmured, not needing to turn toward him.

"Hey." The reply was automatic, and devoid of the rumbling warmth that normally filled it in the cosy closeness of their shared bed.

"You're awake."

"Yeah."

"Did you sleep?"

"Yeah." He didn't look at her, and she couldn't tell if he was lying.

That was probably the most unnerving thing of all.

"Hey, CJ."

"Hey, Sam." She looked up tiredly as he hovered in her doorway.

"You look awful," he noted.

"Thanks for that, Sparky," she said dryly. "I see you're your usual dapper and, dare I say, bearded self."

Sam touched his chin self-consciously. "I think it gives me an air of dignity, nay, maturity, that-"

"Sam." She smiled at him, exasperated but not unkind. "What did you want?"

He stepped inside, pulling the door to behind him, and took on a more serious air. "I spoke with a guy from the Shield of Innocence charity yesterday."

"Gareth Vance?" she supplied, shifting mental gears as she dredged up associations from months past. "About their advertising campaign?"

"No, uh... kind of." He shifted uncomfortably, and she set down the papers she'd been perusing and sat back, frowning.

"Go."

Sam hesitated. "He... He asked me to approach the president about-"

CJ was already shaking her head. "No way."

"I know, it's just that he-"

"No way, Sam," she repeatedly warningly.

He got it out in a quick blurt of information. "He thinks that if the president were to talk about his experiences, it would encourage a lot of children to come forward about abuse."

CJ digested that. "He thinks?"

"Yeah."

She eyed him intently. "You think?"

Sam sighed heavily, and sat down on the edge of her desk, looking at the ceiling. "I- I don't know, CJ." He got back to his feet and paced rapidly. "I see can both sides of this, and to be honest they're both pretty well driving me crazy."

"You can't put this on the president's desk," she warned.

"I know that-"

"I'm saying, he's not in any kind of position to make that kind of decision right now."

Sam halted his pacing, and nodded in acknowledgement. "No."

"Take it to Leo."

He winced. "He'll go ballistic."

"Probably. But... take it to him."

"Yeah," he agreed with a resigned sigh.

"And Sam?"

He paused on his way out, and looked back at her.

"I know it's pretty hard to see past a whole lot of kids in serious danger," she said, meeting his eyes soberly. "Just... remember the president's hurting too."

"Yeah." Sam nodded, and opened the door with a swift, angry twist of the handle. "Yeah."

He left.

Leo gratefully set aside his papers as the senior staff began to file in. It was tough to find patience for the picky minutiae of government with Jed's distress weighing on his mind, and he had more of it than usual to contemplate as he struggled to keep the load off his old friend's shoulders.

Everybody looked deathly tired, CJ especially. Her job had been hell over the past five days, as she wrestled with the slippery hydra that was a press corps with a story in their sights. His palms itched with every inappropriate question, and he couldn't imagine how she restrained herself from lashing out in fury at the things some of them asked.

Sam... Sam was hard to read right now. Presumably he liked his new beard - or had been too rushed off his feet to stop and think of it - but, either way, it remained. It darkened and reshaped the line of his jaw, making it harder to tell the difference between a pensive frown and a tired smile.

And Josh... well, Josh looked like he usually did, only more so. Events had spun him into one of his more manic phases, where he bounced between frenetic highs and maudlin lows with little chance to find any rest in between.

Unfortunately, when Josh was in that kind of mood he slid around the emotional spectrum too much to guarantee the success of any direct route in approaching him. Leo glanced at him from across the room. "Josh; what are you working on today?" An opened-ended question that he knew most of the answers to, but as good a way as any to gauge what was pressing most on his deputy's mind.

Josh rubbed his forehead vaguely. "I'm... meeting with Stuart Walters this afternoon about funding for the USFA."

CJ glanced sideways at him, and Leo grimaced. The last thing Josh needed right now was to fixate on something-

He might have spoken a few cautioning words, but then Toby arrived to complete the quintet, and the moment was lost.

Leo straightened up, and sighed. "Okay, guys, we've got a busy day ahead of us. There's a lot going on, and I don't want any of it landing on the president's desk. He's got a lot of weight on his shoulders right now, and he shouldn't have to carry it alone. That's what we're here for."

Sam lingered behind after the meeting. "Leo?"

"Sam." The Chief of Staff removed his glasses with a pinch of his fingers and looked up at the younger man expectantly.

"I had a meeting with Gareth Vance from the Shield of Innocence charity yesterday afternoon," Sam supplied.

"What did he want?"

"He feels that the president should-"

"No." He could have let it slide at that, but that damn conscience of his...

"Abused children need role models to help them understand that the things that happen to them are not normal and are not their fault. The benefit it would bring them to have as strong a public figure as the president speak out about his past-"

"-Does not, in this office, outweigh the pain it would cause the president to have to be pressured into doing so," Leo shut him down sharply.

Sam looked down, uncomfortable with the weight of the fierce protective instinct behind that glare.

"This doesn't reach the president," he continued warningly.

"No," he agreed solemnly.

"You bring this before him, he's going to think about doing it. He's going to seriously think about doing it, Sam, and whatever decision he has to make from that is going to haunt him for a very long time."

"I know," Sam admitted quietly.

Leo nodded, and turned back to his work, subject closed. Sam wandered slowly over to the doorway, and lingered long enough for the Chief of Staff to feel his continued presence and look up.

"It's just..." Sam met his eyes. "Which one of those kids is gonna grow up to be the next Josiah Bartlet?"

It was Leo's turn to look away.