A/N - Warning, this is going to be a sad one. Sorry! This one shot is based on a song by Jamie Lawson called 'Wasn't Expecting That' and I really recommend that you listen to the song while reading this or even just once you've gotten to the end. I would like to thank 2queens1prince and her timeline she put together on tumblr for helping me to put this together. Still not one hundred per cent sure that I like this story - I could see it all in my head and did my best to write it down but I'm not sure this does justice to what I was seeing in my head. I hope you can all see where I was trying to go with this.
Please leave a review if you can, they're so helpful - again sorry if this is upsetting.
He sits at her bedside in silence, right arm outstretched and grasps her fingers in his grip. As he looks at her, though her face now much older and wrinkled, every line a visual representation of her journey up until this very moment, he smiles. Twenty years with the CIA, five years at state, eight years in the White House, three kids and five grandkids later and here she was. He gives her fingers a small squeeze in the hope of getting a response as his mind reflects over their lifetime together.
As he stares at her peaceful, resting face he sees the breathtakingly beautiful twenty year old college girl he first fell in love with - it was, as you would call it, love at first sight. His breath catches in his throat as he ponders over what his life would have been like had he not gone to investigate what that noise was, and he thanks God everyday for bringing them together.
He sees his girlfriend stood by his side as he marries the love of his life - it wasn't the wedding they'd truly wanted but it sufficed. All his life he'd dreamed of a church wedding and what he wouldn't have given to see her walk down the aisle to him dressed in white, but at that moment a courthouse wedding would have to do.
He recalls holding letters that she wrote to him while he was away at war close to him, in an effort to feel her nearby. He reads them thousands of times, his eyes looking over every single word she wrote again and again and he softly touches her name at the bottom of the letter softly with his fingers.
He sees his ever glowing and radiant pregnant wife carrying their first child, he remembers feeling so elated as he strokes her belly and talks to the baby inside of her. He calms her when she worries that she won't be able to do this, he reassures her that there will be no better mother on this planet for their child than her.
He sees the way she smiles at their newborn baby, holding her close in her arms a single tear of happiness rolled down her cheek. His heart went wild when she looked up at him - their eyes meeting over their shared love for the tiny human resting in her arms. The mother daughter bond that had been broken at fifteen years old for her, now restored by this miracle baby girl.
He sees an exhausted new mother sitting in the living room of their apartment playing with baby Stevie, and to him there's not a more beautiful sight than this.
He smiles as he remembers the way she cradled both Alison and Jason as newborns with a newfound confidence now that she had already done it once with Stevie. Not only was her existence a gift to him, she had given him the three most precious gifts anybody could have ever received - his two daughters and now finally a son.
He sees her sitting with Stevie at the dining room table, a hyperactive Jason sitting on her lap as she helps Stevie with her math homework while Alison runs around the table in circles.
He sees her growing both professionally and personally as each year passes by. He watches as she becomes the powerful force he always knew she would be. He is not surprised when she tells him she intends to run for president, he'd known all along that it would happen, he had just been waiting for her to realise it. He would always be behind her one hundred percent.
He remembers the day she found out about the basal cell carcinoma, holding her hand tightly in the doctors' office as they delivered the news. She was always so brave and had always taken everything on the chin, facing every challenge head on, and this was no different. At first she had been ashamed of the scars left behind from the surgery, but he had always thought it made her even more beautiful.
He can't help but laugh as he remembers the smug look on her face as she's arrested for criminal trespass in Arizona, that was his girl - forever fighting for what was right.
He sees the look of sheer delight on her beautiful face as she realises she's won the election, he remembers the way he leaned over in the back of the car and kissed her mouth, overwhelmed with pride. He always knew that she could do it.
He sees her standing with tears in her eyes as he walks Stevie down the aisle on her wedding day. As they got closer she heard the whispers 'You look beautiful' from mother to daughter and inside he is so thankful that his daughter and her husband are able to have the wedding that he and Elizabeth never got to have.
He watches as she struggles to hold in her delight upon finding out she's going to be a grandmother - it happens the same way every single time and she is overjoyed as her family grows into the next generation. She gives her grandchildren absolutely everything that she has, he knew she would be willing to walk through fire for them. Nothing can top the look on her face as she holds her first grandchild in her arms and for the first time in her life, she is at a loss for words.
He thinks once more how lucky he has been to find somebody like her, how that one circumstance that led to them meeting resulted in all of this, the perfect life, the perfect family. He breathes deeply and holds back tears as he thanks the universe for giving him Elizabeth Adams.
He matches his breathing to the repetitive beating of the heart monitor as he watches her sleeping, he'd give anything to have her back. As he watches her peaceful, resting face he doesn't see an old woman internally fighting a losing battle against recurrent cancer.
He sees his whole world, a beacon of light ever so slowly going out. When her heart stops beating, his world shatters into millions of little pieces. The tears come, slowly at first and then more and more until he struggles to see her face past the blur of his eyes. He leans forward and places a kiss on her forehead. He'd known it was coming, yet it still took him by surprise. He settled himself back into his chair, still holding her hand in his as he began to day dream of the day they would be reunited, knowing for sure that she would be there waiting to welcome him with her arms open wide.