Have any of you ever been to Well, if you've been there and taken a look around, there are some "articles" on there, and one includes Josh's mother, and they said her name was Patricia. Since I absolutely hate naming people (especially Josh's mom – I should probably take a census of what her name has been in other stories, and then name her) I have decided to call her Patricia. Because I'm unoriginal like that.

Also, her characterization is VERY generic. Sue me.

Oh, and the way I handled Toby was mediocre and lazy. Again, sue me.

Actually, I take that back. If you have problems with those two decisions, do tell me. I'd like to know.

I was in an absolutely ('scuse the language) bitchy mood writing this, and tried to just move things along. It would have been far too painstaking to go through all the motions in real time, so instead I'm going to do what I did in this chapter. I actually am writing this note while in the middle of writing the chapter, so I can't tell you exactly what I did, because I don't even know yet. Ha! Talk about organization. (And clear sentence structure. I don't think I understand what I wrote.)

Thank you to everyone who takes the time to read this story. I appreciate it so much. It may sound silly, but it makes me feel so loved, even though sometime the writing itself sucks. It's a nice little pick-me-up to see that someone cares when I get a review or whatever, and I love you all for it. So much.

Sorry to get all sappy and long winded on you guys. :(

Honestly: this was the first time he had woken up any time later than 9:00 in quite some time. The campaign did that to a person. Also, the fact that A. he hadn't even set his alarm, and B. he was being awoken by a phone call was pretty damn weird, too. But, then again, it wasn't as if things had been going on too normally lately anyway. Josh rolled over to grab his cell phone.

"Hello?" he sleepily spoke into the phone.

"Hi, honey."

"Oh, hey, mom," Josh replied, sitting up in the bed. "How are you doing?"

"Fine."

"I'm really sorry I haven't been able to call you more often. As you can probably assume, things have been pretty crazy around here." Josh felt guilty. As soon as it was publicly announced, the first person on his call list had been his mother. Knowing Leo for the number of years she did, it seemed wrong for Patricia Lyman to be left to find out the news of the death on her own accord. It surprised Josh enough that when the report of the vehicle crashing showed up on TV that his mom didn't call. That was of course all explained when it turned out she had been out with her lady friends. Josh laughed whenever he thought of his mom and all the other ladies in the retirement home; Betty, Marcella, Eileen, and Theresa were quite the wild 65+ bunch.

"Really, the world of professional politics, crazy?" she quipped. She cleared her throat and then continued, realizing that humor probably wasn't the total best in this situation. "But, no, honestly, everyone's doing okay? Donna? You? Donna?"

Josh smiled. His mom loved Donna. Absolutely adored her. Of course, who didn't love Donna? As he had said to Joe Quincy during the Republican's interview a few years back, how could anyone hate Donna? She's from Wisconsin, for crying out loud!

But, his mom loved Donna in a different way. It was sort of in the same way that Josh had loved Leo, or rather, Leo loved Josh. There was somewhat of a parent-child relationship at hand – surrogacy parenthood. Of course, Donna didn't need another mother – her mom was having fun with Donna's nieces and nephews in Madison – but, Patricia was always willing to treat Donna like the newest member of the Lyman family, and Donna allowed herself to be treated that way. Josh knew that his mother could also clearly see on her radar that there was something more than boss-assistant feelings between her son and his subordinate. Josh knew that she saw it. Josh knew that he felt it, but he hadn't wanted to admit it years ago, and he didn't want to admit it right now. It made him feel sick. It was better off to push the feelings of – well, love, despite his reservations admitting it – off to the side for the time being. At least until the boat became righted once more in this surprise storm. If the power plant disaster had been the Perfect Storm to the Vinick campaign, Leo's death was that to the Santos. Damn what life had to offer sometimes.

Josh left his thoughts and returned to his mother's question. "She's fine, mom. Doing very well. Same with me."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah. We're fine."

"All right then. The Congressman dealing with it well?"

"As well as he can. We finally decided yesterday that we were going to wait until after the election to nominate a vice presidential candidate. We're announcing it today."

Patricia smiled. She was happy the campaign had come to that conclusion. "Good. It seems fitting."

"Yeah. I took on the job of getting Matthew Santos the Presidency and Leo McGarry the number two spot, and I'm going to continue it. Plus it shows the voters we're not afraid of Congress. We trust the citizens' judgment, and therefore their representatives should be able to appoint a worthy candidate."

"Donna going to be saying those exact words to the press?"

"Well, I'm sure Lou will change them up a little bit, but that's the jist."

"It works."

"Thanks."

Josh's mother sighed. Now it was time to get into the questions that had been really plaguing her for the past few days. "Did Sam arrive from California yet?"

"Yesterday. I haven't seen him yet. C.J. did, and Toby did too."

Toby. That's what had been worrying her. "Oh. And what about Toby? Is he going to – will he be able to show his face at the service?"

"No."

"No?" Patricia was shocked.

"No. He can't legally be there. He's not pissed, but more depressed than anything. Sam said that Toby's been working on some remarks to be read at the funeral in his absence. Toby acts okay over the phone, but I'm sure this has all taken a bigger toll on him than he wants to admit."

"There's no way that he can show up for the funeral? The President can't give out an Executive Order or anything like that?"

Josh laughed. "E.O. 28274873: Toby Ziegler, though incarcerated for leaking state secrets, may attend the funeral of Leo McGarry. Nah, I don't see it happening."

"The President couldn't pardon him?"

"He could."

"But he isn't."

"Yeah."

"Why not?"

"I don't know," Josh sighed. The problem of what to do about Toby had been weighing on him for days. It was just an impossible situation.

"That's too bad."

"It's not what Leo would have wanted," he blurted out.

His mother frowned. "No, it's not. But, Leo would understand the way these things work. He understands why Toby won't be there. And I'm sure that if Toby's working on something, it's going to be good. State of the Unions, Inaugural Addresses… he's a very talented young man. Same with Sam. Leo had two good kids working for him years back."

Josh chuckled. "Oh, wow. Thanks mom."

"Oh, darn," she replied sarcastically. "Did I forget to mention some bright young man working for Leo? Silly me. I'm getting so forgetful in my old age." The smile on her face was evident in the sound of her voice. She loved giving her son a hard time. Though, usually it was about Donna.

Her son sighed. "You sure you don't want me to get you into the funeral? I am sure I can fit you in on the guest list. It's tight, but you knew Leo, so—"

"No. All I want is Mallory's address. I figure it'd be nice to send her a card. I'd send one to Jenny, but she's remarried and – it just seems inappropriate. Mallory seems like the default person for a card, even though I really don't know her very well."

"You'd love her."

"I met her once a while back. Your father and Leo met up and we got to say a little hello to the young McGarry girl. Very pretty. The apple of her father's eye, it seemed." Patricia frowned. "You know her. How is she taking all this?"

"Badly. Well, not badly, but – he died. She's not a happy person." Josh realized his words were callous. "Sorry to be blunt."

"Don't worry about it. Just find out Mallory's address and give me it when you get a chance. And, take care of yourself, do you hear me? Don't make me worry. I'll be calling Donna and having her reinforcing her old 'rules' if I suspect anything's up. And, I've infiltrated your campaign. You cannot hide your actions from me, even when I'm in Florida. The proverbial eyes in the back of my head are making sure you're being good, okay?"

"Yes, mom."

"I love you. Get Leo elected, will 'ya?"

"I'm trying," Josh replied with a small smile. "You better do your part though – we need those electoral votes in Florida."

"I'll do my best, Joshua. Good-bye."

"Love you."

And with that, Josh flipped his cell phone closed. He pushed his head back and closed his eyes. Another day had begun, though he would have given anything to go back three days earlier. He should have stopped the crash.