Author's Note: This story is based on a prompt to write a fic in which one character, who cannot be Lee, is unhappy with a particular holiday and another character tries to change their perspective. This is also the fourth entry in my "King" series. It can stand by itself, but does make reference to the prior three, "King's Ransom," "Fit For a King," and "King of Hearts," so if you have not read those, I recommend them first. As for this one specifically, it is set during season three just after the episode "Fast Food For Thought."

December 20, 1985

"Amanda, you already know Christmas is my least favorite holiday," Joe groused from his stool at the kitchen island as he stuck himself for what must be the twentieth time with the needle in his hand as he tried to thread popcorn and cranberries. He let out a sigh as he watched his ex-wife bustling around the house hanging garland while singing "Deck the Halls" off-key wishing he could share in her enthusiasm.

"Shh!" she hissed at him. "Not in front of the boys!"

"Oh, please," he scoffed with a nod to his sons who were in the middle of having a tinsel fight. "They're making so much noise it's not as if they'd hear me anyway."

"Still, I want them to have a good time on their Christmas vacation and I don't want any negativity bringing them down." She sighed as she climbed the stepladder to hang the next bit of garland. "And what do you mean, I should already know? When did you start hating Christmas all of a sudden?"

"Oh, gee, I don't know…maybe since I spent last Christmas being shot at in Malta?" he suggested sarcastically. He didn't want to admit it, but he also wasn't any too happy about the fact that the man who'd rescued him from that situation had also captured his ex-wife's heart. He felt a sharp pang of guilt at that thought because he knew very well that Lee had most likely save his life a year ago and he'd saved his skin again just a couple of weeks ago, not to mention saving Jamie from Prescott. He was grateful to him for all of that and had told him so, but he still couldn't help feeling down about another man doing the things he should be able to do for himself and for his family.

"Now, Joe, come on," she scolded him without turning around. "You know that just isn't true. You were here with us last Christmas and you had a fine time getting caught up with the boys."

"Okay, so it was Christmas Eve, but still, close enough and I wouldn't say that I had a fine time last year."

"What do you mean?" She looked around to make sure her children were still occupied and in a hushed tone added, "I mean, I know from first-hand experience that it's no fun to be shot at during the holiday season, but-"

"What?" he interrupted a startled look on his face. "When were you shot at?"

She waved off his concern with a nonchalant, "More times than I can count, but if you mean at Christmas time, it was the first year I worked with Lee, but-"

"Let me guess," he cut her off again. "That's one of those things you can't tell me about because of the nature of your work."

"We-ell, yes," she answered, "BUT that's not what I was going to say. What I WAS going to say before you so rudely interrupted me, not once, but twice, is that no matter how scary that situation was, that was still no reason not to embrace the holiday spirit and try to make the best of a bad situation. That's what Lee and I did and that was with him nursing a bullet wound."

"Of course he was," Joe replied flippantly. "He's your knight in shining armor, right?"

"Is that what this is about? Don't tell me you're still jealous of the time I spend with him. He is someone I work with, you know. It's not as if I have any real choice about who my coworkers are."

"No, but you have a choice about how much time you spend with him outside of work," he pointed out. "Like last weekend, for instance, when you suddenly had to go out of town with him for 'work' when we had already made plans to do all this…" He gestured to her once again shifting the stepladder to put up more garland. "…stuff then?"

"Look, I told you I can't help it when I have to work with no notice just like you can't help it when EAO sends you someplace new on a whim-"

"I go where I'm needed," he chimed in.

"Exactly! And so do I," she countered as she tacked up the final piece of garland and climbed down for the last time. "I can't help it when things come up."

"Oh, I'm sure things came up all right!" he retorted bitterly.

With Joe's last comment, she slammed her stepladder closed and flung it against the wall, her irritation getting the better of her. "I hope you're not implying what I think you are," she responded hands on hips as she narrowed her eyes at him.

"Oh, come on, Amanda, I'm not stupid. You admitted yourself that he invited you to stay with him last year after you went to that party with him and that you wanted to," he reminded her. "You also admitted that you lied to your mother about the nature of that party because you didn't want her hounding you about your love life."

"Okay, yes, that's true…all of it, but I did tell you the truth, didn't I?"

"Only after I made an ass of myself thinking you were still a free agent," he answered with a hint of embarrassment in his tone.

"That's because you didn't bother to ask me. You based your conclusions on talking to my mother, not me, but that's not the point. The point is that I DID tell you the truth, so what makes you think I would lie to you now?"

"You're right," he admitted. "But still, I didn't like it that you made plans with me and cancelled at the last minute."

"Okay, first of all, I didn't make plans with you. The plan was for you to come help me AND the boys with the Christmas decorating and there was not a thing stopping you and the boys from doing it without me. They're plenty old enough to do things like that unsupervised."

"Really?" He nodded to Phillip chasing his brother with a can of spray-on snow.

"Oh, they're just having fun," she laughed and when Joe shot her a scolding look, she added, "Okay, maybe they still need a 'little' supervision, but you know, if might've been nice to get that from their dad. At some point, you're going to have to get used to spending time with them without me around. As you so bluntly pointed out, I have my own life now and as much as I love the boys and love being a mom, it doesn't always include them."

"You coulda' fooled me last year," he grumbled, "Which brings us right back to where we started that I didn't have as fine a time as you think I did."

"You certainly seemed to be enjoying yourself or maybe that was just the little something extra, Aunt Lillian added to the eggnog." She teased.

"Okay, listen, I did have a good time…for the most part, but it was more like I was watching one of those old Christmas movies on TV rather than being an actual part of it myself."

"What? You were a part of it."

"No." He shook his head. "You and the boys…you were all 'We Three Kings' presenting gifts to each other while I was the little drummer boy all by myself with nothing to give but my presence."

"Oh, now, Joe, you know very well that the boys would much rather have you here for Christmas than any gifts you could bring them."

"I know that, but that's not all," he continued. "It's like the three of you…you're a family without me…well, and your mother too, of course, but you guys don't need me anymore."

"Joe, don't be silly, you're their father. Of course they need you," she exclaimed in an encouraging tone.

"I notice you didn't include yourself in that," he observed.

"Well, Joe, that time has long passed and I think you know that. You do remember why we got divorced, remember? You were never there when I needed you."

"Let's be honest, Amanda. You never needed me."

"What? How can you say that?"

"Because it's the truth. You loved me, yes, and for a time, you wanted me, but you're so damned independent, you never actually needed me. You proved that when I started this job. You did just as well without me here as you did with me, better maybe."

"Hmm…I guess I never thought of it like that. I was really just doing the best I could while you were gone, but maybe you're right. Maybe I was never cut out to be the kind of wife like my mother was; the kind that needed her husband to do everything for her. But maybe that's because I saw how lost she was when we lost Daddy; she didn't know how to do anything on her own."

"I remember," he said sadly.

"But look at her now," Amanda smiled at how far her mother had come. "Just like me, she has her own life, her own circle of friends…and more than a few boyfriend."

"You have more than a few boyfriends?" he joked.

"No, I meant her. I don't even have one boyfriend."

"I think we both know that's not true."

"Lee is not my boyfriend. I've already told you that," she huffed.

"Maybe, maybe not, but he wants to be and I think you want him to be, but you're both too chicken to try."

She nodded. "You're right about the chicken part," she laughed at herself. "But you're wrong about me never needing you. I did…for awhile, but maybe…maybe I didn't make you feel like I did because I never wanted to admit that I couldn't do anything I set my mind to. Maybe that's why you felt so compelled to take the job you did…maybe you needed to go where you felt needed."

"Maybe," he sighed. "But that's all over now."

"What? Why?"

"Amanda, you were there! Two of the top-ranking officials at EAO were caught with their hands in the till, so to speak. Do you really think the organization can survive that?"

"Why can't it? You seem to forget that another of their long-time employees caught them red-handed. That's why they started the whole frame-up in the first place that sent you running back here. I'd say you're just the person to deal with that negative publicity and do something to turn it around."

He shook his head. "I'm not an administrator."

"You could be. You've got the education and the skill. How else could you have caught those discrepancies?"

"See? That's what's bugging me the most; the fact that there were those discrepancies in the first place. EAO is supposed to be helping people instead of hurting them and this happening right before Christmas makes it even worse. Some of those people, not just in Estoccia, but all over the world, those Christmas donations when people are feeling more generous, that's the best they ever get and Prescott and Foster took it away from them."

"And you gave it back to them," she reminded him.

"Not really," he shrugged indifferently. "I mean, they've frozen all of their bank accounts until this whole thing is resolved, but you know how the court system works as well as I do. It could be years before any restitution is made, if it even happens at all."

"So, do something about it. Isn't that one of the things you're supposed to be so good at in your job; drumming up donations and making sure they get where they're needed the most?"

"But what's the point now? This whole thing has made me take a long, hard look at my life and I don't like what I see. I pretty much threw away my family for this job and for what? For the organization I believed in to steal from the people they were supposed to be helping?"

"Joe, is that really how you see it? That you threw your family away?"

"Don't you?"

"No, I don't. I mean, you've been gone a lot. Neither of us can deny that, but I understand why you did what you did. It's funny to me that we're having this conversation now when we should have had it then. Maybe a real, honest talk like this could've saved our marriage. I mean, I always felt like you were the one who didn't need me. Or maybe that you needed the job more than you needed me…or something."

"I never really did try to understand your perspective," he confessed.

"And I never really tried to understand yours. Listen, you said earlier that you felt left out last year or unneeded or whatever you felt and it's obvious you're lacking holiday spirit this year between that and the stuff that just happened with your job, but here's what I think is the cure for you to get that spirit back. I think you need to move forward with the company, push to keep it going, maybe even see if you can recommend a good replacement for Prescott…someone who'll make sure this kind of thing never happens again."

"But what about Foster?"

"Oh, I think you should replace him," she stated matter-of-factly.

"What? I couldn't," he scoffed.

"You can," she replied. "I believe in you and even though, as you said, I may not personally need you, those starving people do just as much, if not more, than they did when you started this job as an idealistic young man fresh out of law school. Forget being shot at and the thefts…or maybe don't forget them, but use them as your motivation to keep going. Do what it takes to get those missing funds replaced, even if you have to fight the federal courts to do it. You are a lawyer, after all. If anyone can confuse them to death with legalese or bury them in paperwork, it's you."

He laughed for a moment, but then asked doubtfully, "Do you really think I can?"

"I already said you can. The D.C office of EAO needs a leader now and I believe that leader is you. Besides, maybe if you're here in the area, you won't feel like the little drummer boy next year. And maybe if things go the way I'd like with Lee, you and the boys will be 'We Three Kings.'"

He couldn't help laughing. "Yeah, maybe, but if that does happen, just do me a favor and don't go mentioning to the boys that I had to have him rescue me in Malta."

"Keeping secrets is the nature of my job." She nodded to the bowls still on the counter. "So, how's that popcorn garland coming?" When he looked down at his half-strung creation sheepishly, she offered, "Let me finish it and maybe you can go rein in the boys and see if you can get them to actually decorate the tree instead of each other."

"Yeah," he nodded in agreement as he rose from his seat. He stopped before leaving the kitchen and turned back to face her. "And thanks. Maybe Christmas this year won't be so bad."

"No bullets this year," she replied with a grin as she dug into the popcorn bowl. "That's a good start…for both of us."