Keep Going

By Blueowl

Description: Leo meets the Janitor, but he soon learns this is not the first time.
Characters: Jed, Abbey, Leo, the old janitor (Todd), and his wife.
Disclaimer: The only characters depicted in this story that belongs to me are Todd Racey and his wife, but the rest, of course, belong to NBC, WB, and Aaron Sorkin.
Special thanks to: Chipmunk and Kalia.

Abbey woke up to find herself alone in bed.

Where did Jed go? I don't see the bathroom light on...'

Just then the bedroom door slowly creaked open, and in snuck Jed, in his PJ's with a robe and slippers on.

"Jed, where were you?" Abbey asked, seeing Jed sneaking back into bed, the lights were out, and they could barely see each other.

"Uh...out..." he mumbled, lifting up the covers, trying not to look her in the eyes.

"Jed, it is nearly 3 am...what were you doing?" she pressed, wanting to know what had caused Jed to get up in the middle of the night, and not be found coming from the bathroom, but instead from outside the bedroom.

"Well, you remember when I told you about that man I met when you were gone for that women's rights thing?" he finally said, only after receiving Abbey's demanding expression.

"Yeah..." she leaned towards him, wanting him to continue.
"Todd Racey."
"Uh-huh..."
"He's a great guy..." he continued, avoiding her first direct question.

Then she got it.

"You went to talk with him?" she asked, now not as pressing.
"Yeah..."

"Why can't you be normal and invite him over for dinner or something? Staying up until he comes to work is not doing you any good, or him, you probably hinder him..."

"I don't stay up until 2, I wake up at that time...my wristwatch has an alarm..." he responded.
"Why didn't I hear it?" she asked, curious to why she never knew his watch had an alarm.
"I have it on vibrate, so it sort of softly hums on the side table..."
"And that wakes you up?"
"I'm awake aren't I?"

"Well that still doesn't excuse the fact that you probably slow him down..." she went on, just going to look over the fact that the normal alarm barely ever wakes him up, she could not understand how a vibrating sound would.

"Not really, I help him when we talk...and it's only for about thirty minutes," he replied, slightly quietly.

Why was she not surprised? Only her Jed, the President of the United States, would do that – wake up at 2 to keep a janitor company a n d help him do his job.

"You know I think you're right..." Jed spoke, after a long silence.
"About which part?" Abbey muttered, her eyelids begging for sleep.
"I will call him tomorrow, invite them to dinner..." he replied, looking over to see Abbey's eyes shut.
"That's great..." she whispered as she went to sleep.

- - -

Leo walked into the Oval office; Charlie following him, a slip of paper in his hand.

Jed was behind his desk.

"Ah, Charlie, got the number?" Jed asked, reaching up and taking the slip of paper that Charlie was handing to him.
"Who are you calling sir?" Leo asked.
"Oh, just going to invite some people to dinner Leo…you want to come?" Jed asked as he began dialing the number.

Before Leo could answer Jed's ear was on the phone as it began ringing on the other end.

'Hello?' A sweet old lady answered the phone.

"Hello...is this Mrs. Racey?" Jed asked.
'Yes, it is...who is this?' she asked, her voice reminding Jed of one of the past nuns he knew.

"Well ma'am, I don't want to make you think this is a joke…I was honestly thinking that Mr. Racey would answer…but this is Josiah Bartlet..." he answered, praying he didn't just cause this lady to have a stroke.

'The President?' she asked, uncertain.
"Yeah..."
'Oh...' her voice going high, Jed could tell she was getting excited.

"Well, I was calling to ask if you two would want to have dinner with Abbey and I, and maybe Leo McGarry, tonight, or sometime..." Jed continued.

'Sir?' she asked.
"You and your husband can call me Jed..." he replied.
'You're Jed?!' she asked, even more excitedly.
"Uh, yes..." he replied, slightly confused at her even more excited response.
'You're the man that visits my husband at the White House during his shifts?' she asked.
"Yeah..."

'Wow, I thought all this time the Jed' he was talking about was a security agent...the only time I thought he met you was that night he left me that message...' she replied.

"Uh, yeah, I suppose I have been making it a habit to visit him..." he replied, surprised himself that he was finding himself looking forward to spending time with this man who was, honestly, a relic, but who was also a man of honor and decency, and whose all aspects revealed him to be a man to which Jed wanted to model.

'He talks about you a lot, but never said once the Jed he was talking about was you, the President...so I just assumed you were a security agent...' she replied, speaking somewhat fast.

"Well, I was just wondering if you two would want to have dinner..." Jed redirected her as he heard a door open and close in the background on her end.

He then could make out a conversation, which wasn't hard, Mrs. Racey holding up the phone, and Todd not being far away.

'Who are you on the phone with, pumpkin?' was what Jed heard first, Todd's voice slightly deep and strong. Jed...' was her reply.

Jed could just picture Todd's expression.

'The Jed that talks with me at work?' he asked, not really knowing how much she knew.
'Yes, he was just asking if we would want to go to dinner with him and Abbey...'
'Where?' Todd asked, his tone displaying his face of curiosity, and surprise.
'The White House...'

Jed could tell she was playing with Todd; this woman was so much like Abbey...

Have you answered him yet?' Todd asked, seeing the phone, and so knowing Jed was probably hearing everything that they were saying.

'I was waiting to talk to you...'
'Here...' Todd walked closer and Deanne, his wife, gave him the phone.
'Hello?' Todd asked.
"Yeah?" Jed answered.

'When is dinner?' he asked, unable to hid his excitement, and already forgetting his wife's face, showing she was slightly annoyed at having not been informed that this Jed' was in fact the President of the United States.

"Oh, probably around 6...I'll have someone pick you two up if that's alright..." Jed replied, he himself becoming excited; he would soon meet this pumpkin' that Todd adored.

'That would be great Jed, thanks,' Todd said, ignoring his wife's surprise that he truly was on a first name basis with the president.

"We are looking forward to it...see you both tonight." And with that Jed and Todd hung up at the same time.

- - -

Jed looked up after he hung up the phone, looking at Leo.

"You want to join us Leo? I'm sure you will like Todd," Jed said.
"Who is he?" Leo asked, only hearing rumors about this janitor that the president visited.
"A janitor."
"I knew that much sir," Leo stated.
"Oh, Todd Racey, he's a veteran, and a very decent man..."
"Todd Racey...todd racey..." Leo repeated, as if he was trying to place the name. "I know that name..."

"Well he was given the Medal of Honor, among other awards..." Jed offered, wondering if Leo had heard about him during his time in the service.

"No, it's not from that...I could almost swear I should know him..."
"Well, come to dinner tonight and meet him, maybe it will jog your memory," Jed offered.
"Maybe I will..."

- - -

6 o'clock came, Todd and his wife were escorted to the dinning area, where Leo and Abbey were waiting, Jed having to finish up a call with the Prime Minister of some place.

The elderly couple came in, Abbey and Leo would have never guessed that these two were in their eighty's.

"Mrs. Bartlet...Mr. McGarry..." Todd said, shaking both of their hands, Deanne, his wife, doing so afterwards.
"Great to meet the famous Todd Racey..." Abbey said, giving them a sincere smile.
"Good to meet you both..." Leo spoke up, hiding his amazement at Todd's firm and strong hand shake.

"Thank you, my wife and I were surprised to have gotten a call from the President..." Todd replied as they walked closer to the table.

"The President will be coming soon, he had some business with the Prime Minister of Bolivia, Carlos Iturralde Ballivian..." Leo informed them, trying not to stare at Todd, he looked so familiar to him; he just couldn't put his finger on why.

"I hope you haven't been waiting for me for long..." Jed said as he entered the room.
"No sir," Leo replied.
"Leo, this is not a formal gathering, call me Jed," Jed replied, sitting down, the others following suit.

Todd was dressed in a nice dress shirt and a tan vest over it. His shoes were worn, but were shinned never the less. A silver watch was on his left wrist whose band was black aged leather that had shaped perfectly for his wrist.

His wife was in an old classic dark dress; her hair was tied in a bun, and around her neck was a diamond on a silver chain.

They got their food, a Caesar salad, chicken and ravioli, which would later be followed by cheese cake.

Leo tried to listen to what Abbey and Jed were talking about, but he just found himself trying to figure out where he knew this elderly man from.

Todd continually glanced at Leo, as he tried to listen to Abbey and Deanne talk to one another, something about how husbands could be such children, but he wasn't paying attention.

Jed noticed Todd's glances Leo's way, and Leo trying to cover up the fact he was in deep thought.

"Mr. McGarry..." Todd spoke, staring at him.
"Just Leo," Leo told him.

"Alright, Leo. I hope you don't think I'm senile, but you look familiar..." Leo was slightly surprised, and relieved... he wasn't imagining it.

"You know, I was thinking the same thing about you..." Leo replied.
"Were you in the military?" Todd asked.
"Yes, the Air Force, Vietnam...Rolling Thunder," Leo answered, and as he did he saw something dawning in Todd.

"The survival course..." Todd muttered.
"What?" Deanne asked.

"I gave a lesson to some pilots, things to do to survive if their plane was ever brought down...the pilots I were teaching were going to join Rolling Thunder."

"How do you know if he was at your lesson?" Deanne asked her husband.
"It was the first one I ever gave to Air Force Pilots..." Todd replied.

Leo's face was disbelief.

"Small world..." Jed whispered, in surprise himself.

Leo couldn't stop himself from thinking back to when he and his friend, Ken O'Neal, crashed into that bloody forsaken jungle. His throbbing leg, of being carried on the back of O'Neal...too many miles...too many close calls...nearly being caught.

He still remembers the smell of the jungle, the sound of the jungle, and the feeling of that tree trunk to which they hid behind as the enemy walked just beyond it; no doubt looking for the downed plane and perhaps survivors.

"Leo?" Abbey asked, seeing Leo was in a daze.

Leo came back, finding Todd staring at him.

"I do that sometimes too..." Todd muttered to him, Deanne now looking at her husband, unable to hid her concern for him.

"The smell, the smell of jungle...never leaves you does it?" Todd asked him. Everyone was quiet, just waiting.
"No, it doesn't..." Leo whispered back. "Or the sound of the enemy getting closer..."

Todd nodded.

"War can never be forgotten, it is a stain of humanity, sadly a reoccurring one..." Todd replied quietly. "One can never know the burden of taking another life, unless they have taken one... Yes, in war it is either kill or be killed, but pulling the trigger should still be no easy task..."

They all were listening to this man who was full of wisdom, but also of a man who had a weight on his shoulders…the weight of War.

"I still think about all of those missions I did, amazed that the Lord has blessed me with this many years, so many times I should have been dead..." Todd admitted, his wife's hand under the table, giving a loving squeeze on his knee.

"Navy?" Leo asked, vaguely remembering Jed's talk about Todd.

"Yes, Pearl Harbor... Phoenix, TWR 771...machine gun battery...I was a petty officer third class then. Then I was selected, well, more like volunteered, for the UDT, the Underwater Demolition Teams."

Leo's eyes were filled with respect and admiration for this man. This humble man, just giving the facts, no dramatic story telling.

"How many missions?" Leo asked, wanting to know more about this man.
"Seven during WW2, and then two more during Korea…the important ones anyway..." Todd answered.
"What were the two?" Leo asked.
"Operation CHROMITE, and Operation FISHNET..." Todd answered. "I suppose you have some stories, just as I do..." Todd's eyes met his, while the rest of him stayed still.

"Some..." Leo paused, knowing Todd was waiting for him. "We were hit, and landed in the jungle...

"The moment I was aware enough to know that we were alive, I knew my leg was messed up, and that we were in trouble...part of me was wishing we had died...I did not want to become a POW...

"Ken O'Neal, a pilot with me, appeared next to me and pulled my parachute off, having already gathered his, and hid it under some brush. Then he grabbed me and quickly dragged me deeper into the jungle, where there was more cover.

"We stopped several dozen yards from where we had landed...I don't know how he moved me so fast, but within what felt like a minute I could no longer see the smoke from our plane above the tree line, and I could honestly not remember where he had hid the chutes.

"O'Neal quickly began working on my leg..." Leo tried not to think back to the moment he looked down at that mangled mess that looked nothing like it should...

"We were quiet for a time, O'Neal getting up and getting out his compass. He bent down again beside me and was about to tell me something when we heard them."

Leo made himself not close his eyes...it would only make the memory of those voices stronger...

"Enemy soldiers, speaking Vietnamese. Luckily we were behind a large tree, O'Neal hunkered down beside me, silently lifting fallen limbs and putting them over my legs and both of our bodies..."

Abbey could not imagine what that must have felt like, but Leo's face gave her a pretty good idea.

"It felt like forever...I pressed my back against that tree trunk, hoping I would simply disappear into it.
"I didn't breathe, and neither did O'Neal. Finally, when we were sure that they were gone, did we breathe.
"We knew we needed to keep moving, but I knew I wouldn't be able to go on my own. And as much as I did not want to be a POW, I did not want anyone to become one because of me..."

Jed looked at his friend. He knew about his experience in Vietnam, but he had never heard Leo talk about it like this before.

"I told him to go." Leo paused and took a large swig of his drink, unable to read Mrs. Racey's expression, but he could read Todd's. It was not of pity or of shock, or of some other form of that, but was an expression of understanding.

"He didn't listen of course..." Leo stated, putting the glass down.

"He lifted me upon his shoulders and carried me for I don't even know for how many miles. We had to bear two nights there...and three days...

"We endured biting mosquitoes, slippery mud, and rain.
"We hid from the enemy…under fallen trees and in bushes...honestly, just out of sight...
"If it hadn't been for O'Neal we would not have made it...

"And if it hadn't been for that short lesson from you, O'Neal would not have done half of the things that he had, and I would have done none of what I had." Leo told Todd, Leo's eyes imbedded with honesty and gratitude.

"We used our supplies wisely, drinking when our bodies told us to Thankfully we found a stream on our second day, we filled our canteen to the brim and dropped the iodine tablets in. And we ate the MRE's that came in the survival bags sown into our chutes...
"I was so glad we both knew how to us a compass, without that thing we would have never made it out.

"I don't remember, nor wish to remember, how many times we came close to being found. A couple of times, if they had looked down, they would have found my boot sticking out, or a canteen, or nearly all of us..." He thought back to the time they hid against a dirt wall, above them their enemies looked on. Leo remembers looking up, finding that if they were to look down O'Neal and him would be discovered.

"We finally made it out...we were safe, but only after the sixty nine hours of hell..." Leo finished, just as the cook entered, and looked at the president, wanting to know if it was time to bring out the dessert.

Jed nodded yes.

They brought out the desserts; all were quiet for a time, just taking in the moment.

"I will never forget one of my companion's reply to me on one of our missions during WW2. It was a time in which I would consider hell...We had been cornered by the Nazis, however, they didn't know that they had, but at the time we didn't know that...well, anyways, I asked my friend this:

'Do you think we will get out of this Hell?'
'And then he replied strongly, If you're going through hell, keep going...'

"I later learned Winston Churchill had declared the same thing…but to me it will always be my friend who said it first."

The rest of dinner was quite normal, besides the fact that Abbey and Deanne went on to talk about the funny and embarrassing things their husbands do. Todd and Jed both tried to ignore it...Leo, however, tried his best not to appear he was enjoying it.

Dinner finished, they said their goodbyes and they began to go their separate ways.

Todd and his wife were already well on their way to the car when Leo decided to join them, jogging to catch up.

Todd saw him coming and so opened the door for his wife, whispering to her as she got in, "Just a moment alright..."

He turned to face Leo, Leo having stopped a few yards from him.

They just looked at one another, no words able to pass between them that which they wanted to share. They were both veterans, both had seen the merciless monster called War, and both had experienced its Hell.

Their eyes continued to look into each other, until, at once, they both decided to act.

At the same time, they both put their feet together, stood up straight, and Saluted each other. A simple gesture that was stronger than any words, and more meaningful than any other gesture within, and, perhaps, outside, the military.

They had both kept going, and both had made it out of the Hells of War.

Two men, separated by a generation, but, in many ways, the same.

- - -

THE END

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