Disclaimer: Shondaland/ABC owns these characters. But I've taken the Gladiator oath as a writer: #OLITZ4LIFE #JAMMMMmmmm

No Mellie or Joke: Public Service Announcement for any accidental non-Olitz readers

"You want the White House to go Web 2.0," Cyrus repeated looking from Olivia to Fitz. "What is that – some kind of Spiderman lingo for putting solar panels on the roof? Eating more greens? Adopt an Arachnid Day? What?"

"The White House needs to enter the 21st century. We need to embrace social media in all its platforms. We need to hire a tech team and we need to do it now," Fitz explained.

Cyrus got to his feet and walked over to the Resolute Desk and pick up the half-filled glass and sniffed. "What is this - Vodka?"

"It's water, Cyrus," Fitz smiled wryly. "Besides this is Olivia's idea." He smiled at her, sitting beside him on the couch.

"Right," Cyrus walked back to Olivia, placing a hand on her forehead. "Hmm. no detectable temperature to indicate delirium…"

"I'm not delirious."

Cyrus dropped his hand and glared at her. "Are you crazy?! Right now we're in the middle of Fitz declaring war on the gun lobby, Wall Street and Christian fundamentalism. We have North Korea threatening a nuclear attack and we have your wedding. Now you want to start some kind of technological revolution? Do you realise this is only January!"

Fitz tickled Teddy's chin making the toddler gurgle happily. "Cy, you know the nuclear threat is just a scare tactic - North Korea is trying to prevent us from pushing through an extension of UN sanctions. And I'm not attacking Christian fundamentalism, that's Sally creating a mountain when there wasn't even a molehill."

"See, these messages aren't getting through to the people. That's why we need to get started as soon as possible. And we need James to help us," Olivia said.

"James? My husband James – who's already going through one mid-life crisis as a wedding planner? Now you want him to have another trying to be Steve Jobs or Bill Gates?"

"More like Mark Zuckerberg or David Karp." When Cryus looked at Olivia blankly, she shrugged, "James is a reporter. We need someone qualified to report on what's going on. He can submit content, and our job will be to find the people who can set up the platform."

"And you're okay with this?" Cyrus turned on Fitz who had been watching Olivia through the whole exchange with a faint smile on his lips, while Teddy chewed on his tie.

"It sounds like a genius plan. I'm happy for Olivia to run with it."

"Before we even tippy-toe towards this spider web, I think Olivia and I need to discuss a few issues," Cyrus stretched out an arm towards the door. "If you don't mind, sir," He told Fitz.

"I'm getting kicked out of my own office?"

"Yes, sir."

"Okay," Fitz sighed, looking at Teddy. "Looks like playtime is over, Teds."

He leaned over so he and Teddy could kiss Olivia, then whispered for Cyrus to hear, "Call me if you need to be rescued. We'll be in the Library." He grinned at an apoplectic Cyrus on his way out.

The door had barely closed before Cyrus exploded, "Have you lost your mind?! James?! James! Have you forgotten that he found out about Defiance and told David Rosen about it?! That he was going to spill his guts to a Federal Grand Jury?"

"I haven't forgotten, Cy, that's why I think he should be involved. He would be good at counteracting the attacks in the media with substantive facts, not spin."

"Facts! We don't want people knowing facts! We live by spin! We like spin! It's our job to spin! Someone who can lie about facts is what we need!"

"Don't be so hard on James. He used his better judgement at the Grand Jury; he didn't reveal what he knew. I'm sure he'll exercise that same judgement when he's working on our side."

Cyrus sat down, running his hands over his thinning hair. "I feel like I've entered a parallel universe where people use words I understand, without making any sense!"

"What isn't making sense? You know the media has been attacking Fitz since his State of the Union address; they've been changing his narrative to look like he's attacking our Constitutional rights. We need to give Fitz a platform, so his message reaches people in a way he can control. We need to do this, Cy. Actually we need to have done this yesterday."

"Olivia, I know you've been out there in the real world doing your own thing – calling the shots, getting things fixed – all in real-time. But this is the White House, we operate at a far more moderate pace. You may have forgotten that as you were barely here for more than a few months, from Inauguration to the first State of the Union address, but I can tell you this is going to take a lot of work, and it's going to take a lot of time."

"Cy, we need to step up our game and work faster. We can do it, Cy. I'm confident."

"Sir, we have a problem."

Fitz paused as one of his homeland security advisors stopped him in the passageway. "Another one? What is it this time?"

"The TMG Party is gathering momentum."

"The what party?"

"Sir, they are the pro-Republican Intenet bloggers who've been critical of your SOTU address on gun control. Now they've banded together to drum up support against you and your re-election campaign. They are calling themselves the Too Much Grant Party."

"Wow, I'm honoured."

"And they've added your stance on same-sex marriages to their list of grievances."

"My stance on same-marriage...? I've never expressed my opinions in public on that topic."

"The rumour is that your wedding will greenlight marriage equality for gays and lesbians, eventually leading to a repeal of section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act."

"I'm marrying Olivia in a civil ceremony. How did we get from there to DOMA? Who's feeding them this nonsense?"

"Unofficial White House sources.

"Wait, let me guess unofficial sources connected to the Office of the Vice President."

"We can't say for sure, Sir."

"Dammit, I only spoke to that woman this morning!"

"Social Media is a tinderbox, sir, one spark can start a wildfire in a matter of seconds."

Fitz gritted his teeth, then forced a smile as Teddy touched his jaw with a look of concern.

Then the advisor added, with a worried frown. "What's of concern to us, is that the LGBT groups are jumping in to support you, and there's a potential that the tinderbox situation could hit the streets."

Once Cyrus had left the Oval Office, unhappily accepting that Olivia wasn't going to budge on the James issue; she packed up Teddy's toddler bag and headed for the Library. Only to see that Fitz and Teddy had been waylaid by a new staffer who had brought his family for a White House visit.

She was debating whether to join them, when Fitz called her over.

Pasting on a smile, Olivia approached, taking his outstretched hand and leaning in closer as Fitz introduced his 'fiancee'. Then on receiving genuine smiles from the group that included the staffer's parents, his wife and his children – she instinctively moved to give each of them a hug in greeting.

"It's so lovely to be back here again," the mother told Olivia, holding onto her hand. "I came here in May 1952 soon after it re-opened to the public after renovations. It was a pivotal moment in my life to be here in the house of the President and his family. And you are such a lovely family, you should open it to the public again."

"Actually, Fitz has been thinking of resuming the public tours..." Olivia's intended glance became fixed on him, once she caught the way he was smiling at her, his gaze soft.

"Yes," Fitz said huskily, never taking his eyes off Olivia. "We've had feedback that the public want the White House tours back and they are happy to go through extra security checks we've put in place after the shooting. So it's in the works. We haven't decided on a firm date yet."

Then one of the teenaged kids asked, "Can we take a group picture?"

"Of course," Fitz grinned, looking away; allowing Olivia take a breath.

There was good-natured laughter as they all took various group shots with different phones. Then Teddy grabbed hold of Olivia's ponytail, and started chewing on a strand of hair. When Fitz tried to swap her hair for his tie, Teddy puckered up and started to cry. Instantly, everyone gathered around to comfort him, which promptly made him bawl.

"Hey, little man, I'm sorry," Fitz groaned, wiping Teddy's tears. "Don't cry."

"It's okay. I've got him. We should get going anyway," Olivia took Teddy from Fitz. "Teddy has a playdate with Ella and we don't want to be late."

Then after hasty good-byes, she hurried away hoping the movement of walking would soothe Teddy, but he continued to bawl until Olivia dug out his truck from the toddler bag and gave it to him. Instantly the tears stopped as he grabbed the toy.

"Good thinking, Ninety-nine!" She heard Fitz call out and turned to see him grinning with relief. Then she laughed as Teddy shouted, "Dah!" and shook his truck, chortling merrily.

"You want me to do Public Relations for the White House?" James curled his lip as if he had just caught a whiff of rotting fish.

They were in the living room, with Ella and James in a play yard on the rug, throwing stuffed toys at each other.

"It's not PR."

At the sceptical lift of his brow, Olivia added, "Well, it's a little PR but if you're against it, then I'm sure we can find someone else to do that. You can do factual exposes on government policies."

"By government policies, you mean the ones spear-headed by Fitz?"

"Yes, that would be my preferred bias but you can be objective up to a point."

"To the point that I can expose the inaccuracy of any claims made by the government?"

"James, you know every employee should have the protection of his or her employer's whistle-blower policy."

"The White House doesn't have a whistle-blower policy. In fact it has legislation and policies to prevent whistle-blowing of any kind."

"Yes. I am aware of that," Olivia smiled at James, who gave her wry look.

Then he said thoughtfully, "You know what the best thing is about all this?"

"You will be working with your husband?"

"No! That's likely to turn me off the whole idea."

"You can take Ella to work and Teddy will have a playmate?"

"That's lovely, but that's not it."

"The White House staff benefits?"

"No, what's lovely about all this is that, I came and told you that I was having a career crisis and here you are trying to fix it. You know I think I might actually like you."

Olivia laughed, feeling her cheeks heat. She picked a few stray cookie crumbs off her jeans and placed them on her plate. "So you'll take the job?"

James nodded. "Because I know Cyrus will be dead against it."

That made her laugh. "I can't wait to see you two work together."

"Just make sure you're wearing a flak jacket and the kids are in the bunker. Now…" He patted her knee. "Let's talk about the plans you've avoiding – for your wedding."

"I haven't been avoiding talking about my wedding."

"Olivia, please – I am familiar with the symptoms of cold feet. Cyrus had a severe case of it leading up to, during and after our wedding."

"I love Fitz."

"I know you do. I can see that you do."

"I just don't love the idea of being First Lady."

"Didn't you factor that in when you said yes to the bling?" James indicated her engagement ring.

"Yes, but I didn't foresee that it would all happen so quickly."

There was another long moment of silence, then James said gently, "Do you want to postpone the wedding?"

"I couldn't. I wouldn't. It would break his heart."

James looked at her. "So we're doing this?"

"We're doing this."

"Good," He patted her hand again. "Then we haven't wasted time putting this together." He went off to collect a thick binder of clippings, fabric swatches, photographs and business cards.

"Wow, you've done a lot of work."

"I had help."

"You're paying people to help you?"

"No, they're volunteers."

"Wow. That's amazing."

"Yes, it's been a bundle of joy so far."

"What he did is the trending topic this morning. According to Senior White House officials, the President yesterday expressed his support for marriage equality, a marked shift from entrenched Republican views on LGBT rights. This has concerned several key Republican supporters, including a group of social media bloggers, calling themselves the TMG Party - Too Much Grant Party. You guessed it they don't want President Grant in office for a second term..."

"Not a good day at the White House yesterday. First Mr President goes and sinks his re-election boat. That's right, the guy doesn't just rock the boat, he goes and ploughs a great big hole in the hull, with a proposal to repeal DOMA. And if that wasn't enough, the Fiancee, the lovely Ms Pope, makes America's baby, little Theodore Wallace Grant, cry. Don't believe me – here's the picture worth a thousand words – tells its own story, doesn't it? Ms Pope grabbing the little kiddie making him bawl his eyes out. I call it a disgrace! Has anyone called the Child Abuse Hotline?!..."

"Heaven forbid that another disenfranchised group gets even a hope of equality. Yes, there are some folk in this country who aren't sleeping nights worrying about minorities having the same rights they enjoy. Gotta love it – living here in the Land of the Free. Oh, and then there's the First Fiancee, here's the picture that's doing the rounds on other news sites. But here's the photo they aren't showing you –the little boy chewing happily on his truck, laughing in Olivia Pope's arms. Just remember that one picture doesn't always tell the whole story..."

Fitz switched the TV off and looked down at Olivia who was fixing his tie. "I'm beginning to see merit in your idea of having a White House media platform."

She paused her hands on the knot, frowning. "Beginning?"

He flushed. "Wrong choice of word."

"No, right choice of word. You are beginning to see the merit now, because you were humouring me before."

"I didn't say that."

"So I'm right," she muttered, dropping her hands and pushing him away, but he caught her by the waist.

"Livvie, I know it's been tough, the idea of giving up your independence, taking a step back from your career. I just wanted you to have a project to be in charge, to distract you from your doubts."

She slid her hands up around his shoulders. "So you were humouring with good intentions - that's your defence?"

"If I say 'yes', do I get off with a slap on the wrist?"

"Hm..." Let me think about it."

Just then the door was thrust open and Jerry barged in.

"Jer, what did I tell you about knocking?" Fitz admonished.

Jerry paused, rolled his eyes and walked out, shutting the door after him. "Knock, knock," he called out.

"Who's there?" Fitz and Olivia answered.

Jerry cracked the door open. "Very funny, you two. Can I come in?"

"Yeah, come in," Fitz said with exaggerated resignation.

"Hey, Dad. I'm here to help you. Well, Mom actually. You know those pictures they have of Teddy crying. The kid who took the pictures has sent the entire lot to me. I'm just letting you know that I'm posting them on my Facebook and Tumblr pages, and put a Twitter link so they can read what happened."

Olivia arched a brow at Fitz. "See?"

"I told you I've seen the light."

"The Light on what?" Jerry frowned at Fitz.

"Your Dad is realising the value of social media."

"For real? Dad? Wow."

"Hey, I can be cool." When his audience didn't respond, Fitz chuckled. "Come on, be nice."

"Yeah, well you know if you need help with the transition from the Obelisk to Online communication, let me know."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. I can set up a Twitter account for you, Dad. It's only 140 characters max a post, so you should be able to manage that."

"Do that," Olivia grinned. "Fitz Grant, with the intro 'for the people'"

"I like that. Makes me sound really cool!"

"There has been a sharp spike in incidents against LGBT members, Sir."

Fitz took in the worried faces of his security advisors, and sighed. "Have the perpetrators been arrested?"

"A few.

"Those that have been caught."

"We are concerned that what's happening in Russia and Nigeria will manifest in the United States."

"This government will not be passing any anti-gay laws," Fitz refuted firmly.

"It's not the laws so much as the community attitude that gay-bashing is okay."

"Especially since the group that's been advocating anti-gay legislation around the world is based in the United States."

There was a sudden pin-dropping silence. Then Fitz said, "Go on."

The advisor who had spoken, cleared his throat and continued, "Sir, it's an organisation calling itself the Global Unity for Families. They've been lobbying governments to pass anti-gay legislation here and overseas. So far they've had more success overseas at a Federal level. They even lobbied against countries signing the 2008 United Nations Statement de-criminalising homosexuality worldwide. Now it looks like they're coordinating hate groups here, using the prospect of a repeal of DOMA as the catalyst."

Fitz groaned, rubbing his fingers across his forehead. "Why haven't I heard of this group?"

"Sir, the founder was a Reagan appointee, and he has a lot of supporters in the Republican Party."

"If only there was a way I could get them declared as a Terrorist group."

"So you can stop their fund-raising activities under United Nations resolution 1373? Kill the source that feeds the beast?"

"Yes," Fitz smiled at Olivia, as they walked arm in arm under the trees on the South Lawn.

"You'll have to expand the definition of terrorism to lobby groups who incite hatred through national and international legislation."

"You don't think I should?"

"Fitz, I think people will see this as another attack on their freedoms under the United States Constitution."

"Right now we have a conflict between the 1st and 14th Amendments – people's right to religious freedom and free speech versus their right to equal protection under the law within State jurisdiction. And we have States arguing that the 14th Amendment right of equal protection is limited to gender and race, not behaviour, in order to overturn Federal rulings that gay-marriage bans are unconstitutional. People's rights are under attack, Livvie, and it's not coming from me. "

"I know historians say that the 14th Amendment was included in the Constitution specifically to protect slaves in the Southern States from violence, but that didn't prevent the horrors from occurring. The laws are only as good as our ability to make sure justice is done. Putting this group on a Federal watch list that only a few people know about isn't going to be effective."

"So what do we do?"

"You have two options, Fitz – you can play it safe until the election. Then after you win a second term—"

"If I win a second term."

"When you win a second term, you can push through all the radical reforms you want. But in the meantime, since you already have a lot on your plate. Bite off what you can chew. You've been accused of trying to repeal Section 3 of DOMA, canvass support for it. And in the short-term call out this anti-gay group. They are operating under the radar – bring them out, find ways to leak their donors, use shame as a tool."

Fitz stopped, grinning.

"What?"

"You are perfect."

Olivia smiled, "And just for that, I'll even propose a division of labour – you handle DOMA, and I'll handle the anti-gay group, find a way to publicise their activities."

"Livvie, I don't want the leaks traced back to Olivia Pope and Associates."

"Don't worry, they won't."

He bent low to kiss her, caressing her lips with his mouth. "You are perfect and very sexy."

She laughed, dragging on his arm to make him start walking again. "We are not going to do anything about that right now."

"Livvie…"

"No."

"Behind this tree trunk, no one can see."

Just then there were sounds of running feet, making them both turn swiftly. "Sir, you're wanted in the Situation Room," An agent said calmly, as an aide bent over trying to catch his breath.

"The Situation Room?"

"Yes, sir," The White House aide puffed. "North Korea has declared war on us, in response to a message sent from your Twitter account."

A/N: Helloooo, sorry I'm late! Actually, I think lateness is required with this story! My struggle is, yes, that I don't have protagonist – but I still don't regret killing Mellie. What I do regret is not being sufficiently prepared to write this story.

I've been reading this book called 'Becoming a Writer' by Dorothea Brande and she has noted (under the heading - Recapturing Innocence of The Eye) : '…Don't plan to use the material at once, for you may get only the brittle, factual little items of the journalist if you do not wait for the unconscious mind to work its miracles of assimilation and accretion on them." (BTW the meaning of 'accretion' from the Free Diction – yes, I had to look it up – 'growth or increase by the gradual accumulation of additional layers or matter'.)

When I started A Presidential Divorce – I had hated Mellie for a long time, so my subconscious had apparently germinated plots that I wasn't even aware of until I started writing – either that or Mellie had pissed off even my writing muses/angels/spirits and they too wanted her gone!

Anyway, existentialist spiritualism aside, I started writing this story without fully letting my subconscious absorb, collect and grow layers (like fungus!) of plot, so now I need to take time while writing to write (if that makes sense). I say this because, after I've posted the last 3 chapters, I realised there were things I wanted to change (to the point, I wanted to pull this whole story out and start over- BUT I've talked myself off that ledge!).

So now, I'm going to ruminate (like a cow chewing cud, yes) with each chapter. So THANK YOU again to the lovely readers who aren't completely turned off by this story but I think I'm turning the corner from despair to some kind of direction. AAAAnd THANK YOUUUU for GIVING me direction: specially the hint about the 14th Amendment and Loving vs Virginia – pure gold for this chapter!

Other bits of reality (my take at least) that I've tried to incorporate into this pickle of a story: Web 2.0 is what President Obama used in his social media initiatives - you can read more about it on About dot com - web trends How Barack Obama Is Using Web 2.0 to Run for President byDaniel Nations; The TMG party is loosely based on the Tea (Taxed Enough Already) party - info from Wikipedia. The idea of Global Unity for Families came from the America blog article written by Becca Morn- Homophobia Inc. and America's newest export: Hate (Part 1 of 3), published 10/11/2013.

Oh yes, and I'm pretending that section 3 of DOMA hasn't been repealed. DOMA - the Defense of Marriage Act was passed into legislation by Bill Clinton in 1996 and section 3 was declared unconstitutional in 2013 (under President Obama). You can read more on that in Wikipedia and the Glaad website Frequently Asked Questions: Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).