Josh hung up the phone and turned to the four pairs of anxious waiting eyes the surrounded him.
"Well, this night keeps getting better and better," he announced. "I just interrupted the First Couple engaging in a little recreational activities to tell them they have a nephew they never knew about. Now more than ever, I gotta say, I love this job."
"Well, that's awkward," Will commented.
"Just a little."
"What did the President say?" Toby questioned.
"They'll be down in ten minutes."
"We should get Leo in on this," CJ suggested.
"Yeah, let's move this little shindig to Leo's office. They'll have more privacy out that way anyhow," Josh agreed. "I'll go get Max."
"Okay," Will said. "Elsie, you get the chow mein."
"Hey!"
Leo McGarry's office was empty save for the man himself when they walked in. Will, Elsie, Toby, and CJ took a seat somewhere around the room while Josh stood beside Max. Leo stared at them with slight irritation, waiting for one of them to show initiative and explain to him exactly what was transpiring before his very eyes.
"Well?"
"Leo, this is Max Bennett."
"Yeah."
"He's the President's nephew."
Leo grimaced.
"What?"
"Yeah. His father is…"
"Michael," Leo whispered.
"You knew my father?" Max questioned, surprised.
"Oh, yeah." Leo stood up and approached the young man. "I was one of few, granted, but yeah, I knew him. You're the spitting image, too."
Max smiled.
"No one's ever said that to me before. I guess because I've never met anyone, besides my mom, who actually knew my father. I didn't. I was only a year old when he killed himself."
Leo nodded desolately.
"Who's your mother?"
"Patti Curtis."
"Okay. For a minute there, I was worried you were gonna say the Surgeon General," Leo said.
"I beg your pardon?" Max said.
"What!" CJ exclaimed.
"The Surgeon General…?" Toby raised an eyebrow.
"Yeah." Leo laughed. "Didn't you know? The Surgeon General used to date the First Lady's brother. Small world, isn't it?"
"And getting smaller," Josh mumbled.
"I assume one of you has called the President."
"Josh did," CJ answered. "He's on his way down with Mrs. Bartlet."
"All right. Somebody fix the First Lady a drink. She's gonna need one when she gets here. The rest of you, sit tight. It's gonna be one helluva night."
May, 1973
When Alexandra Bennett died, she left behind a legacy that was greater than her life. In the faces and aspirations of her husband and four children, her spirit remained. In every word they uttered, movement they dared to make, and every emotion they expertly conveyed, Alexandra was present. Her untimely death at the age of forty-two was largely considered to be one of the foremost tragedies to plague the small but industrious town of Andover, Massachusetts in quite some time. A formidable and beloved figure in the area, her limitless capacity to mold, inspire, motivate and love was constantly measured and tested until what little doubt there was of its existence evaporated completely. A little over a year prior to her demise, Alexandra was diagnosed with a severe case of ovarian cancer. The cancer, as most cancers do, traveled rapidly and soon had conquered every bone, every organ, and every cell. The impact of her death on those who knew her was nothing less than astounding. For, as the phrase had come to be, one funeral often leads to another.
The Holy Cross Cathedral in Boston was one of the most beautiful, yet modest, structures in the historical city. It was not overly ostentatious, nor exceedingly unadorned. It seemed, to local Catholics, an ideal place to practice their cherished faith. Often the church was filled with manmade illumination and strewn with smiles and hallelujahs. On the all too frequent occasion, however, the cathedral boasted only an aura of despair and remorse. May 11th, 1973 was one of those desolate occasions.
There were not quite as many people present as had been initially anticipated. Instead, the gathering was intimate, a fitting tribute to a life lost in less than heroic circumstances.The tears were expelled in abundance by those brave souls who managed,courageously, to attend. Those whose valor never threatened to exceed their dorment curiosity wept in isolation and, more than likely, in silence. There were only two ways to mourn the life of Michael Bennett, with pride and with shame, much in the same way he had oscillated through his final years.
Borne from the hallowed union of Andover's cherished darling and most accomplished, charismatic attorney, Michael Bennett had never envisioned his death would occur so inauspiciously. The many times he had visualized his death, the scenarios had jumped from taking a bullet for the innocent and losing a battle with a force greater than himself. The latter circumstance had proved to be just short of accurate. It was indeed a battle he had lost, but it was no insurmountable force that had defeated him. Michael Bennett, son of titleless royalty, had been crushed in the age-old battle against his own conscience. His mother would have been mortified.
The ceremony that officially extinguished Michael's inner fire in the eyes of the church was executed with little fanfare and moderate elegance.The priest who presided over the service had been hesitant in consenting his participation. The Catholic church, he insisted,did not condone such a death. The apprehensive priest was persuaded by the bishop to remove all qualms and thus, an exception was made. Nothing less would suffice for the deceased child of such upstanding citizens.The cause of bereavement was undisclosed during the ceremony. Words were not neccesary; there was not a mourner present who did not sadly acknowledge the true reason for Michael Bennett's passing.
An appropriately moving eulogy was given by one of Michael's three sisters.This particular sister was a rare and exquisite soul; she possessed all the virtues their parents exhibited and added a few of her own as well.Younger than he was by three agonizingly long years, this sister had loved him the best, the most, and the easiest. She denied that he was difficult to love, only that he was skeptical of receiving it. When the other two sisters tended to raise a white flag in favor of combating his heart, this sister treaded forward, never even entertaining a thought of retreating. She was the reason he had held on for as long as he did.
Her name, though it had changed once in the last six years, was Abigail Bartlet, née Bennett. Standing in front of the congregated mourners, she had been poised and not a little broken as she repeated, as if from memory, that words scribbled on the paper on the podium. Her delicate, striking features became more and more distinct with each tear that wandered down her porcelain cheek. Her flawless complexion was emphasized by the moist mascara that had gathered underneath her eyes. Mystifying as it certainly was, the general consensus was that her beauty was enhanced, if that was possible, by the appearance of grief. More mystifying was the origin of her exterior. She failed to resemble her mother, nor did she bear any perceptible likeness to her father. She seemed to be an impossible combination of both, a product of two intertwined souls, so much so that any trace of either parent was barely decipherable. This was the root of her fierce individuality; all eccentricities were developed as a result of this patent originality.
The heartfelt authenticity of the emotions elicited by the eulogy was felt by all who listened. This was a girl, a woman of hardly twenty-seven, who had lost her mother and her brother in two very different battles. In both cases, she had blamed herself, as any intense victim of such anguish would. She stepped down from the podium, her movements short and cautious so as not to let her agony guide her footsteps. She returned to the pew in the front and reclaimed her seat beside her devoted husband of six years, Jed Bartlet, and their daughter Elizabeth, who was just shy of her second birthday. The child had no way of knowing it then, but in years to come, the death of her godfather would prove to be devastating to her, despite the lack of time spent with him.
At the cemetary, the three remaining Bennett children clung to each other with a desperate yearning that brought stinging tears to their father's melancholy orbs.The oldest of his children was also the tallest, towering over the other two. Her name was Julia and, in her thirty-two years of freely roaming the earth, she had never married. Though her face lacked the startling beauty of Abigail's, she was attractive nonetheless. Whereas the latter was argumentative, impossible, and altogether beguiling, Julia was just argumentative and impossible. She did without the charm and magnetism bestowed upon her fellow siblings and, as a result, was left with a bitter and frigid imperviousness that could not be penetrated, not even by the tragic death of her younger brother. The youngest child of Nick and Alexandra Bennett was five years younger than the sibling closest to her in age. Michelle Bennett, although she was twenty-two, possessed the spirited innocence of a twelve-year-old. It was as if her growing twelve-year-old maturity had halted the moment her mother died and had not seized the opportunity to continue development since. The absence of hereditary female influence, instilled at such a young age, had caused a disillusionment that she either did not recognize or did not acknowledge. From her actions, it was unclear whether or not she was aware of her behavior on most occasions.Unlike Julia, Michelle wept copiously for her brother. She wept for his unfinished life and also for her unfinished attempt to fully understand and appreciate him.
For all the admiration and stature that surrounded him, the patriarch of the Bennett family was more grounded than the average lawyer, and the average man. Nicholas Bennett was brilliant, witty, passionate, and exorbitantly enigmatic. As executive assistant district attorney, he was also widely respected and envied. His tactics in the courtroom were often a little unconventional, but his track record put to rest any suspicions that his methods were ineffective or grossly unethical. In general, Nick was a jovial character and the sweetest, most considerate of men. As a father, he met all requirements and then some. His son, although he inherited, as all the children did, Nick's brilliance, was not even remotely similar in terms of behavior or beliefs.While this puzzled Nick greatly, it did not diminish his love for Michael in any sense of the phrase. In fact,observing his son's mannerisms had always fascinated him. Michael moved and spoke like no one he had ever met. Nick was ensorcelled by him.
The Bennetts stood alongside the grave site as the coffin was slowly lowered into the soil. Michelle closed her eyes and buried her face in Abbey's shoulder while Julia folded her arms across her chest and averted her eyes from the scene. Meanwhile, Nick could not remove his gaze from the coffin. He had watched the ground devour his wife, and now it was swallowing his son whole. As a father, this was his worst nightmare realized. When Michael was born, Nick had been in Germany fighting in the war. He had always felt a deep sense of guilt. At least he was able to put his son to rest.
Yes, one funeral often leads to another. The second to fall is unpredictable and often surprising. The second often falls harder and more brutally than the first. The path that leads to death is a long one.It's not the twists, the turns, the forks, or the blockades that enliven the journey. It's the people who blindly follow alongside the path, begging you to turn the other way.