Laughter-Silvered Wings
From merely examining the administration and its immediate aftermath, very few differences between the Bartlet administration and previous administrations can be seen. Following the precedent set by previous presidents, the President retired to his Manchester home to spend some time with his family before going on a speaking tour. Some of his staff moved on to other things. Some of them stayed in politics.
But it is not the immediate aftermath that is impressive. It's more so the later achievements of those closest to the administration, most of them long after the coattails of President Bartlet had been shed.
"Democratic presidential hopeful Roger Merrell's campaign director Jack McCosham is the latest in a string of notable names to arrive at former President Bartlet's Manchester farm in the past eight hours," the anchor remarked. "He joins California governor-elect Sam Seaborn, Senator Donna Moss-Lyman, Pulitzer Prize winner CJ Cregg, New Hampshire attorney general Charles Young, Junior Counsel to President Nicholson Mark Goldstein, and the extended Bartlet family along with other notable figures from the former administration."
"Turn it off," Josh demanded. Someone hurried to turn off CNN, the almost constant companion of everyone in the room.
"Josh Lyman demanding that CNN be turned off?" Donna joked half-heartedly, trying to relieve some of the tension. The three former students had only just arrived and Jack had been hurriedly ushered into Jed's room.
The attempt to tease fell flat. "Has anyone heard from Alex?" Sarah asked anxiously.
"They're circling the airport and waiting for the weather to clear so that they can land. They're looking at re-routing," Margaret supplied. The girl had been beside herself when she phoned, desperate for some more information than the sketchy message she had received.
"What about her dissertation?" Donna inquired nervously.
"They were just waiting for the results when she got your message," Margaret reassured her. Donna breathed a sigh of relief. "I guess that she wanted to leave as soon as they told her. It took everyone there to convince her to stay until the evaluators got back."
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"I hope that she gets here soon."
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jack shivered, pulling his thin coat closer around himself and watched the snow swirling around the light. "I hope so too," he said, clearing some of the snow off the hanging swing. "You should go in and get something to eat."
Sarah nodded, turning to go inside. "You eaten already?"
"Yeah," he answered, "I just finished." She nodded again, brushing the gathered snow off her shoulders and stepping into the warm house.
Jack wiped off the rest of the snow and sank down onto the swing, the chains groaning beneath his weight. He leaned his head back against the hard edge of wood and idly pushed himself back and forth, the only sound the creaking of the chains and the whistling of the wind.
The door opened and Donna stepped out, a warm afghan wrapped around her shoulders. "Is there room for one more?" she asked, crossing the wide porch.
Jack brushed off the rest of the snow so that Donna could sit. "It's all yours," he answered.
She sank down wordlessly, clutching her blanket a little closer. "How're you holding up?" she asked blandly.
He shrugged. "I feel like an interloper, that I shouldn't be intruding on this thing. I mean, this should be a family thing."
"Half of the people in there wouldn't be counted as family by normal standards," Donna replied with a sigh.
"Maybe not family by blood," Jack reassured her, "but family nonetheless. You guys all went through hell together during the administration, and then came back through the other way. I'd say that you're family by fire."
"Family by fire," Donna repeated softly, shivering a little in the chill air.
"Family by fire," Jack maintained. "I'm just trespassing."
"You are not just trespassing," she asserted, some of her usual vigour returning to her voice. "He called you here, just like he called the rest of us. If that doesn't say something, I don't know what else you need to hear." It was good to have something else to focus her attention on for the moment, even something as trivial as this. It occupied her mind.
Jack sighed. "If you say so."
"If she says what?" Leo asked, joining them outside.
"He doesn't think that he's family," Donna explained when Jack remained silent.
"Josh was wondering where you went," Leo said, inclining his head back towards the door. "I think that he wants to give Noah and Joan a call."
Donna stood, hurrying inside. Leo drifted over to lean on the railing not far from the swing, staring out through the swirling snow over the white expanse of the yard. He stood there for a moment, unmoving. Jack rose to go, but Leo heard the squeak of the swing and turned around.
"Come here," he directed. Jack stepped over, his footsteps crunching on the snow. He leaned against the railing, unconsciously imitating Leo's stance.
"I thought that he was crazy when he wanted to go back to teaching," Leo began. "The Secret Service just about threw a fit; it was a nightmare, security-wise. Abbey wouldn't talk to him for a week. She knew that with his MS he might not have a lot of time left."
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"None of us knew what he was looking for."
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"So, finally someone asked him," Sarah said, a watery smile creasing her face. "He told us, 'I'm looking for the eraser. I just realized that I've been giving you the wrong lecture.' The thing was, we had all been sitting there for half an hour and hadn't realized it."
"You remember the time that he 'came to a sudden arboreal stop'?" Sam asked. "CJ had a hell of a time trying to spin that one to the press. How many other people can say that they tried to spin the President of the United States running into a tree with his bicycle?"
"It wasn't his bike," Toby pointed out. "It was Leo's and even though I'm sure that Leo had only ridden it like once before, Leo was pretty mad at him."
"So, then Leo calls him a klutz, in the Oval Office, in front of Mrs. Landingham," Charlie reminisced.
"That's bad on so many levels," Sam reflected.
"How do you know that? You weren't even working there yet?" CJ asked Charlie.
"It came up," Charlie answered. "I heard a lot of things. I just sort of tended to blend into the background. It was my job not to stick out."
"And just think, this kid could have had a bike helmet on his head," Toby pointed out.
"With all due respect," Charlie retorted, "I hear that they're really nice bike helmets."
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"I'll have to take your word on that one."
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Now don't you argue with me, Josiah Bartlet," Abbey said firmly, pulling the quilt up over him.
"Why would I do something like that?" he answered flippantly. He sounded so much like his old self that it almost hurt to look at him and see what he had become, a mere shell of himself.
"Don't play cute with me," she answered, trying to keep the crack from her voice as she concentrated on smoothing down the blanket.
"Abbey," he said, his voice suddenly serious and weighted.
"Don't do this, Jed," she replied brokenly.
"Abbey, I don't know how much…"
"Jed," she cut him off. A silence hung between them for a moment and he reached up to take her hand; the simple gesture cost him so much.
"I want to see them all one more time." She didn't have the strength to argue with him, to tell him that he would have time in the morning, to tell him that he was too tired and had to rest.