AUTHOR'S NOTE: Just a reminder that these stories contain some spoilers. The rest is my imagination. So, I won't tell you which is which and let John Wells surprise you when you watch on Wednesday nights.
This chapter is for Suze, who is a CJ freak, and Birdie, who is a light and encouragement.
PHOTOGRAPHS (12)
C.J. tried to concentrate on the briefing in her hand, but her mind kept wandering. She had yet to adjust fully to her 'new' office and the events of the last several days had her pondering things other than the stack of binders Margaret had left in front of her. Looking over at the fishbowl on her desk, she thought even Gail looked slightly disturbed this evening.
Taking off her glasses and rubbing her eyes, she chuckled hollowly.
"Whatcha reading?" Toby asked from the doorway where he had taken up his normal stance of holding up the doorjamb.
C.J. looked up, "A briefing on the pending labor strike of Los Angeles public transportation workers."
"And you find that funny? You have a decidedly sick sense of humor."
"Anything that would inconvenience any of my former clients amuses me, Tobus," she replied, putting the briefing down and laying her glasses on the desk, "But I wasn't really laughing about that."
"Oh, really?" he slowly walked across to the visitors chair and sat down across from her.
"Yeah, really. Anyway, what brings you up here?"
Toby looked around the office, noting that C.J. had stubbornly kept everything the same way it had been during Leo's tenure as Chief of Staff, right down to the sailing pictures on the walls and the heavy, masculine décor.
"I came to talk. We don't… talk much anymore."
Looking at him, C.J. slowly replied, "Well, you know, I kinda have this thing now…"
"Really? I hadn't noticed," came the sarcastic reply.
"Sorry," she knew that he was having a hard time settling for the fact that his former colleague and friend was now his boss, "You're right. We haven't talked recently. I'm sorry. How are Huck and Molly?"
"Good. Big."
"You should have Andi bring them by one afternoon. It would be nice to see them."
"Yeah."
They studied one another in silence for a few moments before Toby cleared his throat.
"C.J. What's going on that I don't know about?"
C.J. looked down at her desk and pondered how she was going to handle this. Did she avoid him and take the easy (at least in the immediate sense) way out or did she tell the most volatile man on her staff that the President of the United States wanted to buck tradition, rip the rug out from under the Vice President, and pick a dark horse candidate to take his place? Knowing Toby as long and as well as she did, she figured honestly would probably be the best policy.
"C.J.?"
She sighed, rubbed her eyes one more time and looked him in the eye, "Toby, what I tell you, you can't tell anyone else. Not Andi, not Charlie, no one."
Toby's eyes got wide and C.J. instantly knew that her approach had been wrong, "No! It's nothing to do with the President. At least not in the way you think, so you can take the panicked look off your face."
She could see him relax slightly, but he was still anticipating a hit… she could tell.
"The President and Leo have asked Josh to find a candidate." There, she said it.
Toby, for all of his political acumen looked slightly confused, "A candidate? For what?"
"Oh for Christ's sake, Toby, I don't know… homecoming queen?" Exasperated she looked at him as if he had grown a second nose that was now sprouting out of his forehead.
The two sat intently staring at one another until C.J. could see the realization of what she meant slowly creep across Toby's face.
"He's not backing Russell?" he said softly.
"He's not backing anyone at the moment," she replied, dropping her eyes.
"The Vice President, who, I might add, has a huge war chest and is the presumptive nominee is not going to receive the President's endorsement???? Jesus Christ, C.J.! Don't we have enough problems with the party as it is??" He was out of his chair now and gesticulating wildly. C.J. heard 'that tone' seeping into Toby's voice and she knew she had to get control of him before he made a spectacle of himself.
"Toby, listen… Bob Russell isn't the right guy to be sitting in that office," she pointed to the door that connected her office with the Oval Office. "The person taking that office will be taking over our legacy. Can you see him in there?"
He looked at her for a moment and then dropped his eyes, acknowledging the truth in what she had said,
"No," he huffed, "Russell is a stuffed shirt. And an uneducated one at that. He can barely use the English language without eighth graders laughing at the effort."
"Exactly."
"So who is he going to run?"
"What?"
"Who is Josh going to run?"
C.J. sighed, "He doesn't know if he's going to do it yet."
Toby smirked, "He'll do it. It's a fight. An uphill fight, I might add. When have you ever known Josh Lyman to back down from a fight?"
C.J. laughed. It was true. Josh was known around Capitol Hill as "Barlet's Pit Bull" – a name he had certainly earned in two terms of twisting arms and bulldozing through offices.
"So who is he going to run?" Toby was rubbing his head now and pacing back and forth. C.J. couldn't tell if he was talking to her, or talking to himself.
Suddenly he turned and looked at her, thinking for a moment, he quietly said, "Santos."
She smiled, "It would be good, wouldn't it? Almost like the old days."
"A catholic, Hispanic Congressman from Texas? It's almost impossible." He was truly anxious now, fingering his beard and rubbing his head in those totally quirky ways that C.J. found so endearing.
"And just the fight Josh Lyman could win," she noted, leaning back in the big executive chair and smiling like a Cheshire cat.
He sat down in the chair and crossed his legs. C.J. could see the wheels spinning in his brain as Toby contemplated the possibility. As she watched him, she thought back to that day by the pool, when she had asked him about the unknown Governor from New Hampshire he wanted her to come see.
Is Jed Bartlet a good man?
Yeah.
Toby?
Yeah. He's a good man.
"Toby… Santos is a good man," she said in a soft voice, "Josh says he's the real thing."
Toby gazed at her, remembering the first campaign when they all fought because of the ideals and not because that was what they were paid to do. When the dream of doing good hadn't been ruined by the necessity of just staying alive.
As he looked at her, he noticed a picture on the windowsill behind her. It was one of the few personal belongings that she had brought into this office. In the silver frame was a photograph taken during a campaign stop from the first Bartlet for America tour. They were all in the picture – Sam, Josh, Donna, Toby, C.J. and Mandy – their arms around each other, laughing, beers raised in triumph.
C.J. followed Toby's gaze to the photograph.
"Josh said something interesting the other day," she mused, studying the faces in the photograph. "He said that he had never contemplated the fact that we wouldn't all always be together. He said he never thought that far ahead."
She looked back at Toby, "Have you ever thought about it?"
He chewed on his lower lip, "Yeah."
"Really?"
"Yeah," he said wearily, shaking his head slightly as if to clear some fog, "I think about it every day. In every fight. I think about what it would be like if we weren't all here. If we all didn't fight to get here. If it was Russell, or Hoynes, or Lillienfeld, or Carrick in that office over there. And that's why I come in every morning. Because if we're here, it means they aren't. But, yeah, I think about it."
She looked at him, pondering the depths of devotion and idealism that kept him coming back day after day. He was the last one of the group who had kept the faith in what they were doing. He was the one who used his voice continuously to remind them that their work wasn't over yet.
"Yeah."
Toby stood and started for the door, "So when is Josh supposed to give an answer?"
"He asked for a couple of days. There's a lot that is going on with him right now…"
Toby stopped and studied a spot on the carpet, "He can't tell her."
"He knows," C.J. sighed, "he won't."
"You know…"
"Don't, Toby. I feel bad simply contemplating what they have asked him to do. After seven years… and now…"
Toby looked up and caught C.J.'s eyes, "Do you think that will keep him from…"
She shook her head, "No. He fights for the good guys. Just like you."
"Yeah. We've just asked him to sacrifice so much." C.J. saw the memory of the night Toby found Josh shot outside the Newseum reflected in his eyes. She knew he would carry that night with him forever, as would she.
"Toby, we've all sacrificed for this. Josh knows what it means."
"Yeah," he said sadly, staring again at the floor, thinking of all of the sacrifices that had been made in the past seven years by all of them.
"Anyway, I have to meet with the President," she said, standing up from the massive desk and straightening her skirt.
"Yeah. Well… thanks."
C.J. moved toward the heavy door, opposite the one in which Toby was standing. She stopped, turned around and smiled, "We need to talk more often."
Toby smiled and watched her open the door to the Oval Office. As it closed behind her, he heard her say, "Mr. President. Are you ready to kick my ass in chess yet again?"
Smiling, he walked out into the hallway.
(To be continued.)
