Chapter 5
He woke up angrier than he had ever been today, Kendra had left before he woke up, leaving a note on the coffee table. He crumbled it in his hands and threw it away. It hit the wall and fell on the ground softly. He walks in the bathroom and looks at himself on the mirror, he looks tired and older. Sometimes, days like this one he wishes he was in the capitol that night it got blown up. Yes Alex would be devastated and his kids would miss him but they would be safe, all three of them, safe from the pain, the exposure, the dangers that come from being the 'first family of the United States'. Ignoring the hollowed eyes man in the mirror he quickly gets ready for the day ahead, he looked at the razor in front of him, he knew that he should shave but decided against it. The world wouldn't end if he went unshaved for one day in the office. He was scared that the more he kept looking into the mirror he was almost tempting fate and the shadow would appear once more to berate him again.
He gets dressed, and sneaks out of the residence, his mother and kids still asleep, he feels a stab of guilt in his gut, he left again without seeing them, but he couldn't face them, how could he face their faces, see the pain in their eyes, it would be as if he was admitting he failed them, failed her.
Which he did, but he still wasn't able to admit it.
He opens the door to his private office, Mike is standing outside, he freezes there, there's another agent next to him, he doesn't have an earphone and he is handing his gun to Mike. His face is familiar though. Too familiar.
"Mike!" he calls his agent's name and walks inside the office, dropping his old and weathered briefcase on the floor. The leather hits the wooden floor with a thud, he doesn't care. Mike enters the room, he can see the gun the other agent gave him still in his hands, he tries to hide it by placing his arm behind his back.
"Good morning sir" he says, his voice the same as always, as warm and friendly as it was before Christmas, as if he didn't see him sob on the floor of a hospital corridor, as if he didn't have to almost carry him to the car, as if he didn't have to hold him back to not rip the casket open just to see her face another time.
"I want the agents in Alex's detailed fired!" He stops behind his desk, straightens up a bit more with each word. He sees Mike's face, a flash of disappointment flashes through his eyes. It's brief, not longer than a second, yet it sparks more anger in Tom. He knows that look on Mike. It's the look he always has when he has to tell him he can't do something.
"I can't do that sir, I can assure you," Tom raises his hand cutting him off, he didn't need to hear his assurances, they meant nothing to him anymore.
"I don't need your assurance Mike, it means nothing to me, you assured me that Alex was safe every time she was leaving the white house and look where that got us. I need them fired, and if you can't do that, you're fired too!" the last part shocked him, he never thought he would say those words to anyone much less Mike, but apparently he changed enough to be able to utter those words without flinching, Mike did though. His anger prevents him from seeing the guilt and the pain in Mike's eyes, had he seen them, really seen them then he might have stopped himself, he might have apologized, but the rage was blinding him.
"You can't fire secret service agents sir, I assure you those agents will not work in protective detail ever again, and the head of the first lady's detail is suspended till further notice." this time Mike's voice is cold, different from what he uses when talking to Tom, as if he's talking to a stranger, to a man he doesn't know. He has to, this man in front of him might carry his friend's face but he isn't, this man is cold and broken, he is hurt and feels like he has to hurt others to feel better or even feel anything at all. He needs to be as cold and distant as possible, but the pain in his eyes breaks him a bit and the next part falls from his lips without much thought. "Sir I know you are hurt but firing those agents is not gonna bring her back, you know that right?" Tom lowers his head; he catches a couple tears that escaped his eyes before they roll down his cheeks.
"It's not your business Mike!" his voice is breaking with every word and he stops taking a couple breaths. "I know it's not gonna bring her back!" his voice is rising and Mike sees his hands curling into tight fists. "IT'S THE SECRET SERVICE'S FAULT SHE'S NOT HERE!" his explosion takes him by surprise, Mike takes a couple steps back, this man is a brewing volcano under all the stoic exterior he has carefully build. He wonders why he didn't notice earlier, Tom Kirkman can't lie to save his life,
Tom feels all the adrenaline draining from his body at once and falls back on his chair; he closes his eyes and buries his face in his hands.
"Just, leave, just go." Mike nodes although the man can't see him and leaves him alone in the room.
XXXX
Hannah got out of her car, looking at the building in front of her she can't remember the last time she could forget its existence. Taking the bouquet from the seat next to hers she locks her car and starts walking to the entrance, she feels weird not having visited yesterday but with everything happening she didn't had the time, she got home well after midnight and just collapsed on the bed exhausted, she was close she could sense it. Damian would make his next move soon.
She got to his room avoiding all interactions with others, he was lying on the bed, a tube down his throat helping him breathe, millions of other wires and smaller tubes visible under the thin blanket that covers him. He looks peaceful, the doctors don't know why he isn't waking up, he should be but instead he has fallen into a coma. He stubbornly refuses to open his eyes. There was one, a neurosurgeon, that told her it's probably because of the trauma, but those were all the answers he had. She shakes her head, for now he is here and so is she, she puts the flowers she brought in the vase at his bedside throwing away the old ones that started to wither and pulled the chair from the side of the room close to his bed. She sat down and took his hand, it was warm and soft.
"Hey Chuck, I couldn't come to visit yesterday, it was a long day, but I'm here today." "I brought you new flowers too, lilies that you like. They smell nice; I now know why you always kept a vase of them in your apartment." She looks outside, the sun is bright although does nothing to break the cold. The snow at least has melted. "The weather is getting better." She says, this was so weird for her, she always had the right words with him and now she finds herself unable to figure out what to tell him. The truth rises in her throat, almost suffocating her, it burns her tongue her lips, everything.
"I lied to you, I told you that you know who killed her" she blurred out, she takes a couple deep breaths trying to calm her raging heart beat down, the image in her head of Alex's broken body on the back of the car will haunt her forever. Everyone knows that she died in the ambulance on her way to the hospital, and that's what they will know for now, in reality it was her in the ambulance, with a friend from home, Callie, who helped her fake the death certificate, they ushered her into a private room under a different name, the bruises on her face and the gausses wrapping her head concealing her blonde hair were easy to deceive the few, next to none, who were around until, just a short week after, she was moved in Alaska. The body of a homeless prostitute buried in the grave with the first lady's name. She smiles at that a bit. This woman made her living based on her good looks, ones creeping similar to Alex Kirkman's, and now she was buried in her grave. One quick dyeing of her light brown hair to blonde and she was set to go. A closed casket funeral followed and no one had the opportunity to pick apart the small differences between the two women, like how this woman's nose had been repeatedly been broken, or how she had a large scar on the top of her forehead, one she covered with her bangs, or how this woman was almost four months pregnant when she died. Small things that would have blown their cover away in a week, but didn't, the president listened to the Callie who told him her face was too mangled for him to see her much less the entire world, or their kids and agreed to a closed casket. She was still impressed that he didn't barge in the morgue to see the body thought, she was sure that he would. And maybe the man he is today would but that man three days after Christmas was catatonic, unable to even walk alone without Cornelius Moss and Mike Ritter holding him upright.
"She's alive though, he, he failed, but I need you to help me keep her safe, I need you to help me find him and," she bites her lip, looking around her the room was empty and so was the corridor but she still lowered her head, leaning closer to this ear, softly whispering to keep it away from any possibly preying ears. "And bring her back to her family, I can't do it alone." She softly kisses his temple she doesn't know what came over her but she does. Leaning back on her chair she feels a small blush for the first time in years spreading down her neck.
"And I'm scared Chuck our boss is unraveling, I don't know who he's gonna fire next, I'm afraid it will be me and then he wins," Tom Kirkman was losing control of his anger day by day, the fight he had with the senior staff yesterday and his response to even the smallest things were enough to scare her. He suspended people without a second thought those days and even fired a few. "I thought about telling John, you know telling him the truth," she chuckles, "What I did, but I can't.|" few months ago she wouldn't have thought about it, John would have been her first call, but after the revelations that he used the Icarus investigation to forward his own political capitol was enough to shatter her trust to him. And she wonders how the hell could this happen? They fought side by side to bring down Pax Americana, they worked with the president for so long, formed personal relationships with this man and his staff and even family in John's case since he was around them more often that her "I don't think I can trust him, I did and he started a whole investigation that led to this,"» she takes a deep breath, this thing how to call it? "This mess"
She stays silent, there are so many things she has to say, so many things to ask but she can't all of them together are overwhelming her, and it's not as if she'll get answers in the end.
"I wish you could answer me," her hand rubs circles on the top of his palm. It's mindless, but it helps her focus. "I have so many questions and so few answers. You used to provide them for me and I don't think I remember how to get them on my own anymore." One tear followed the next and before long she found herself unable to stop, her sobs echoed around the empty room. It took her a while to gather herself together, almost an hour but she felt like a new person after, it was as if those tears brought some form of catharsis to her.
"It's getting late; I better get back to work now. I miss you Chuck." With one last squeeze to his limp hand she turns around and leaves the room. She walks to her car and drives off not noticing the figure of a man who was following her the entire time.
XXXX
Kendra walked in the family gym in the second floor; the president was punching a bag, his hands wrapped in gausses but no gloves. Noticing his technique she can't help but roll her eyes, his whole body is too stiff and his balance was off, she could throw him to the ground in a heartbeat.
"Punching your anger away?" she asks, her voice starlets him and he loses a step, she can see that his knuckles were slightly cut, the blood staining the gausses.
"What the hell do you want here?" he asks her, he turns his attention back to the bag but doesn't move, he's flexing his right hand slowly as if he's trying to get the feeling back to his fingers.
"I was looking for the president is he around?" she asks, he turns around starts to take off the gausses and walks towards a small fridge on the other side of the room, taking a bottle of water.
"Yeah, go ahead." He throws her a bottle as well which she catches with ease and watches him use his to soothe the pain in his bruised knuckles.
"We have a problem, John Forstell wants a meeting."
"That's Emily's job, we did you came to tell me?"
"Because you frightened your entire stuff and I'm the only one left that still stands your freaking face! That's why!"he blinks a couple times, he didn't expect this response from Kendra, it was as if she had two versions these days, the soothing calming one which made appearances mostly around the office, with her stoic un-expressing face and steady voice, and the other one that peaked through when she was with him, the one that was a brewing volcano, ready to tear his head off if he did something she disagreed with.
"That's not something you can say to the president" he warns her although he knows she'll ignore it.
"The president wasn't the one who blew up on Mike; the president wasn't the one calling his National Security Council stupid, the president wasn't the one yelling at his senior staff this morning about how useless they are. That wasn't the president, or at least god I hope it wasn't, because if that's the president, the president is mentally unstable and the president needs to be impeached!" an uncomfortable silence fell between them, Tom lost a couple steps and sat down on the bench studding her standing in front of him.
"You're punching wrong." She says again, Tom looks up, there's a slight sign of amusement on his face.
"How the hell would you know?" he asks her.
"I took kickboxing for six years, twenty years of martial arts in general, you're punching wrong you'll harm your hand before you harm your opponent."
XXXX
"Leo" Tom looks up from a bill he was trying to read and saw his son standing by the door of the oval office.
"Hey." His son's voice was cold, distant; he felt a sting of guilt at it. He knows that him keeping his distance is what amplified Leo's hostility towards him but he couldn't stop seeing Alex in both Leo and Penny so much that he, sometimes could barely look at them.
"Is everything ok, is Penny alright."
"Now you care?" Tom was taken aback by his tone; it was so similar to Alex's that took his breath away.
"Excuse me?"
"You haven't seen her in almost four weeks, a month, and now you care if she's alright? She not!" Tom looked at his son stunned, he knew that he was angry at him, another thing that added to his guilt but he wasn't sure Leo would ever raise his voice so much to him.
"I was busy." He tried to explain himself but he knew that it was pointless, "She was asleep when I came back upstairs," another lie, he knows, being asleep never stopped him in the past. He would always kiss them goodnight, even if they were already asleep.
"Excuses, I remember you waking us up, secretly from mom, when we first moved here, so could tell us goodnight." Tom looks away, Leo's look was filled with resentment and anger and it burned him anywhere it would land "You would do it even if mom was upset with you afterwards. And now that she's not here, you barely come by." He knows the question that follows, of course he does, he would ask the same question too, he does, only he doesn't have the answers. "What gives?"
"She's gone." He whispers.
"Yeah because of you." Tom bites his lip, he tries so hard to hide the sobs building up in his chest, it's such a struggle to hide from everyone, to stay strong, he blames himself all the time too, but actually hearing it from his son was the last straw.
"You could have protected her, fired Forstell,"
"I couldn't, John Forstell was doing his job!" Tom breaks, Alex had asked him the same thing right before the accident, she asked him again and again to do something, he doesn't know why but in all this that was the one thing he didn't regret. With all his faults John Forstell was doing his job.
"No he wasn't, there was no crime, there was nothing and an opening statement from mom showed that! He was trying to build a political profile! But you chose to protect your presidency rather than her."
"How dare you tell me that? I… if I wanted that I would have asked your mother for a divorce, I would have filed for a separation, cut her lose. I would have threw your grandmother under the bus." He takes a deep breath; he felt his blood pressure rising rabidly. "I would have let your mother plea for a crime I knew she was innocent. Any of that would be me protecting my presidency over her, but I didn't." An uncomfortable silence fell between father and son, both not sure what to say or do.
"And she still died," Leo broke the silence first with a soft whisper. "She wouldn't if you weren't president." This statement so small and yet so true, it fell heavily on Tom's heart, he knew that, he knew that if he wasn't president none of this would have happened, no one would have any reason to dig any of those things up.
"I know."
"I wish that bullet had killed you." His son's voice was cold. Tom felt his blood freezing in his veins, his breath caught in his lungs, Leo's back as he left the room was all he saw and no matter how many times he called his son's name he wouldn't turn around.
"Leo!" he called and called again but the young man was already long gone.
XXXX
"Eva, I'm so glad you came!" Penelope Kirkman stepped aside letting Eva come in the living room, she was nervous the two of them while on friendly terms after her son was inaugurated didn't have the easiest relationship till then.
"Of course." Eva sat down on one of the armchairs waiting for Penelope to sit down on the sofa too. She reaches for the coffee in the middle of the table but Eva weaves her away. "You told me on the phone that there was something wrong with Tom?" Penelope smiles sadly, the tears in her eyes visible to the other woman.
"My son is not the same anymore. He's," a sad chuckle left her lips, she looks down trying to find the right words to explain, what exactly to say explaining the condition her son was in. "He's different."
"We all are."
"Not like that," Eve looks at her questioning; Penelope felt the breath caught in her throat, only now realizing how much Alex looked like her mother. "He is my son and I love him to death, I'd die if I could ease his pain but I can't none of us can," she feels the sob chocking her, she didn't know how she could admit what she was about to admit to anyone else other than herself. "He's not well mentally right now."
"He is the president."
"And he does that well, he runs the country but he also has a whole staff to help him. The problem is here, with the kids," she stops talking, taking a sip from her cup of coffee trying to calm her breathe. "He can't even look at them."
"You mean he's been ignoring them since December?"
"Not exactly, more like since late January, it's more and more recently. Leo is ignoring him too, he doesn't want to see him, but Penny, Penny's been asking for him," Eva leans forward; there's something unreadable in her face. "She's been asking for him for weeks and she hasn't even seen him at all for over three weeks, I don't think she ever went this long not seeing Tom, even when they moved to Camp David." Eva leaned back on her chair. Her arms crossed on her lap, studding the other woman for a few moments before responding.
"He sees my daughter in them." She simply states.
"He does. We all do but I think for him it's harder."
"What do you suggest?"
XXXX
Tom took off his tie throwing it mindlessly somewhere in the back of the room, he had forbidden the butlers to enter the master bedroom, wanting to keep one last sense of Alex's influence in his day to day life with her insistence that at least in the residence, their bedrooms are their responsibility. They were supposed to set the good example to Penny and Leo by tiding up their room without the help of butlers and then they would do too. He doesn't know what example exactly he sets right now, hiding away in his office, avoiding all people he has no authority over.
He feels her presence in the room, it still brings chills down his spine no matter how hard he might try to ignore her. He closes his eyes taking a deep breath, he can't deal with her tonight.
"Please leave," he tells her, he's surprised his voice isn't begging anymore, he's tired, exhausted and he just wants her gone for tonight. "Not tonight."
"Why not Tom, do you have a date?" he rolls his eyes, she starts sounding like a nagging wife and that was so far away from who Alex was. "Am I bothering you, like your kids?" he can feel her breath on the back of his neck, she's standing close to him.
"Don't talk about them." He turns around and comes face to face with her. "Do not talk about them!" his tone threatening his hands curled in fists.
"Why not? You don't even talk to them."
"What I do is none of your business."
"You're turning into your father, I can see." She turns around walking to the bed and sitting down. He doesn't notice the way her clothes stain the bed this time, his anger is growing, bringing up his father was the last blow for him, he swore when Alex got pregnant with Leo he will never turn into him, he wasn't going to abandon Alex or his kids ever, so when he realizes that he is indeed turning into his father it's terrifying him.
"I am not him!"
"Yes you are, like father like son." Tom feels his throat closing, this was true, as much as he wanted to deny it the truth was powerful, he couldn't ignore it any longer, he might not have left like his father but he wasn't there either. "Don't worry, I'll take them away before you can turn Leo like you," he looks up there's a sick smile on her face, her eyes light up as she sees him breaking down. "Before Penny starts hating you, that's gonna be my only mercy."
"Don't touch them! Don't you dare!" He walks fast to the bed standing in front of her, his first need was to push her eyes, his first thought was that he had to make her shut up somehow.
"Or what?" She stands up, defiantly looking at him with cold blue eyes.
"Or I'll…" he stops realizing although late that there was nothing he could do to her after all. She was nothing but a shadow, a fragment of his imagination which held an unnatural amount of power over him. There's nothing he is willing to do to get rid of her.
"Exactly, you can do nothing to rid of me." She got up from the bed and ran her hand over his cheek, he felt the cold on his skin and closed his eyes trying to remember the warmth he felt earlier today when his Alex touched his skin. It seemed like a lifetime ago as well. "You'll die a lonely hatred man."
XXXX
Tom was trying to calm his breathing, this time it wasn't fear that paralyzed him, it was mostly anger. He was furious that she would dare claim that he was like his father, he was there for Penny and Leo, and although he needed some time right now he would be there for her after all this too.
He heard a soft knock on the door followed by his mother's familiar voice.
"Tom darling? Are you in there?" he walks to the door opening it slightly trying to shut the view from her, she didn't need to know exactly how low he had fallen.
"Mom!" he looks to his left and to his surprise realizes that his mother wasn't alone. "Eva?"
"Hello Tom." Her voice is even, almost cold. For a moment Tom thinks that of course she blames him for Alex's… for what happened to Alex, but he brushes it away fast. "You weren't sleeping were you?"
"No, no, let's move to the living room." He tries to push them away from the door, slid out and close the door.
"No, honey, it's better not," his mother starts, he follows her eyes, they fall inside the room and she sees the empty whiskey bottles on the bedside table and the clothes on the floor. "Maybe your office?"
"Yeah." He slides out of the door and closes it tightly behind him, turning the key on the door to lock it. He walks to the office letting the two women walk in first, this room was completely different than the bedroom, clean and tidy exactly how Alex would have liked it. The second desk he had asked to be put in there for her significantly cleaner than his which still was covered by different briefings he had and would have to read in the near future. He sits on his desk, forcing himself to stop looking at Alex's desk and look at the women in front of him.
"What's wrong?" he asks them after growing restless waiting for either of them to start talking.
"I would ask the same thing." Eva said, her voice once again betraying her frustration with him, he hadn't heard this tone in years almost ten now and it took him by surprise.
"Excuse me?" he asks her in shock.
"I would ask the same thing Tom. What's wrong? Why aren't you there for your kids, Leo's trying to figure out what college he wants to go to, do you even know which are the final 8 he settled on? Penny asks for you, they need you!" her voice is rising; it's making him uncomfortable again, just like it did in the past. His mother sits next to even her hands crossed on her lap; her eyes avoiding his for the first time in his 50 years on this earth. It's unsettling his mother never looked away from him for any reason. "So what's wrong?"
"What are you talking about?" he looks at his mother, she's biting her lip, this was confusing him further, why would she not look at him? "Mom?"
"She's right, I love you, you are my son, but you are not well enough to take care of them, you don't take care of them." He feels as if her words punched all the air out of his lungs, he thought he was covering it well enough, but his mother had noticed and she did enough to make her worried to call Eva for back up.
"You can't take them away from me!" he clenched his fists, felt his breaths pick up, this was getting out of his control and he wasn't feeling well. "They are my kids!" his voice was raising, but the two women didn't flinch, "They are mine!" he hits his fists on the desk, he looks like a child throwing a tantrum right now but he doesn't care that much, he is dizzy and feels like he's gonna be sick.
"Show us you are the man my daughter married and you can have them back, but until then they will be moving with me and your mother." Eva stands up and looks at him in the eyes, her blue eyes, Alex's eyes, are cold, it makes him lose his step and he falls back on his chair.
"Please don't do that" a sob is building on his throat, he remembers the threat the shadow told him, that he was going to die alone, if they took his kids away then he would be alone, what reason his mother would have to come around, or Eva, or anyone for the matter. "I'll have no one." He is unable to stop the tears from leaving his eyes, no matter how hard he bites his lip, "Please…" his mother breaks first, she gets up and walks to his side, taking his hands in hers. They are warm and soft, trying to pull him back from the ledge he was ready to jump off of.
"Honey, no, you'll always have them, and us, but right now you need time alone, to think, to process, your job is hard enough as it is."
"We're not taking them away forever." Eva says, he looks up from his mother and his hands and looks at the other woman sitting there, her face had softened, it looks more like the Eva he knows from the last few years.
"Can I ask something?" His voice is soft; he doesn't have the strength in him to fight anymore, Eva nodes. "Can you at least use Camp David? I'll be much calmer if I know that they are safe." His mother looks back to Eva, their eyes lock for a moment and they both nod.
"Ok." She tells him.
A/N: I am sure my friend MeredithBrody will hate me after that, I love you dear. Please let me know what you think guys!
Sneak Peek:
Hannah feels like she's being watched the entire day, she can't wait to get to her apartment, lock the door and pour herself a glass of wine…