Author's Note:
When I wrote the first two installments of this story, I left it open-ended because I didn't know what to do. I wanted to write about one night, but it always felt unfinished. I've had some time and distance to think about an Olivia and Fitz future and to be honest, things were a little bleak. I have only watched episodes 3x01 and 308 – 310 live this season and to be completely honest, I enjoyed very little. The characters and the show have become unrecognizable to me. Creatively, Season 3 has been holding me back.
I've been reading a lot of fan fiction and there I have rediscovered my love for these characters. I see glimpses of the characters I fell in love with. I began thinking of this story again and where it could go. I will take liberties and in this world, certain things will not have happened (no house in Vermont for example, no rape of Mellie). I'm even going to go back to the Season 1 version of Mellie (if she ends up in the story because I'm still not sure), because the current iteration is a caricature.
This story is how I see Olitz moving forward. Any extraneous characters will be very limited and in small doses. Please consider Inauguration night as the Prologue.
Thank you for reading.
Chapter 1
For a few hours, they were just Olivia and Fitz. Two people in love. Two people. As one.
She let go of her Gladiators and her responsibility to them. Let go of the pain she caused him and in turn, caused herself. Let go of the feelings of inadequacy and just let herself be. Let herself be with him. Let herself love him and let herself, for once, be loved. She tries to commit every emotion, every movement of his body, every thrust and reaction, every word, to memory.
He let go of his wife, his role as President, his status of leader of the free world. Let go of the broken heart she caused by letting him go time and time again. Let go of the voice in the back of his head that is his father, reinforcing every negative feeling he's had about himself. Let himself love her because if he can point to the one thing he's gotten right, the one decision that's made the entire journey worth it, it's loving her. He knows when the sun peeks through the gap of her curtains, and he slips out of her bed, dresses and kisses her goodbye, he will leave in body but she will leave in spirit. She will run. He will chase. So, he tries to commit her to memory. She's changed her lotion again; he inhales her. He commits her taste to memory, though it's a little different because she has changed her grooming habits, deciding to go completely bald in the area he loves. He vows to remember her groans, her fingertips as they caress his scalp and pull the hair at the back of his head. He remembers the way she moans his name, "Fitz, Fitz," almost as though she's crying and she is, so he licks her tears away, hoping if he says he loves her enough, she will finally believe him.
He moves so slowly inside of her and she doesn't rush it either. They try to prolong the inevitable. Each kiss is long and lingering; tongues tasting, memorizing. It's two people not being able to get close enough to each other. If they could, they would try to literally become one. She can feel him getting closer, so she stops. His eyes open lazily and ask what he cannot speak, "What's wrong?"
She shakes her head and whispers, "Not yet," wiggling from beneath him. She positions him the way she wants, on his back, and moves down his body with her tongue. He tastes of salty sweat, his heat warming her tongue. Lower, she moves, licking his tip. Neither is sure who gets the most pleasure. She wraps her lips around him, sucks, but doesn't move. Slowly, almost painfully so, she takes more and more of him, until she can't, and even then she tries.
He looks down at her with tears in his eyes, taking one of her hands and bringing it to his lips. Kisses it. Takes her index finger and sucks it because he needs to feel some part of her in his mouth. He needs to be connected to her.
He can take no more of being away from her, so he pulls her hair and smiles, bringing her lips to his. The kisses this time aren't exploratory, they are needy and messy, without thought or technique. He slips inside of her and they move fast and hard together. She sits up because she knows that's what he likes and he touches her because he knows that's what she likes and he moves his index finger faster and faster as her movements become less controlled. This is his Livvie. And she screams his name as loud as she can, louder than ever before and he grabs her by her neck, pulling his face to his.
"I love you. I love you." He says it over and over, needing her to believe it.
They stay connected for the rest of the night. Caressing each other. Sleeping, then waking and enjoying each other again.
As the sun's rays make their first appearance, and the real world creeps in, they become Olivia Pope and President Fitzgerald Thomas Grant III, father, husband. He tries to move out of her embrace without waking her, but she's already awake. He sneaks into her bathroom and cleans himself up.
This is always the most painful, more painful than being apart for months at a time. Leaving her. If he could, he would stay wrapped in her arms and never leave, make love forever. More than that, more than the physical, he hates leaving his best friend.
He watches her from the doorway as he gives himself a few more moments to bask her the calm cocoon they've created for themselves. He walks over to her and gives her a final kiss, before turning away and leaving.
When she hears the door close, she turns on to her back and stares at the ceiling. This was never supposed to be her life. She was never supposed to be this woman, who slept with another's husband. These are things she has to tell herself to be able to disconnect because if she doesn't, she will wither and die.
His fingers run along the curves of the Resolute Desk. There are piles of folders, a national security brief, polling numbers, his schedule for the day. He ignores them.
Instead, he opens the filing cabinet under his desk and reaches for the unlabeled folder in the back. It is their plan for the first 100 days of his second term. Cyrus doesn't know about it. Neither does Mellie. No one in his inner circle at the White House has an inkling that this is something he planned with Olivia on the trail.
It was during one of their late nights together. They were lying in bed, but they hadn't made love that night. Like so many others, they just lay together, wrapped in each others' arms and talked about their shared vision for the country.
Olivia was the one who brought it up. She was always thinking about the long game. Not the first four years, the next, when he could pursue legislation that he wouldn't dare attempt during his first term. No, the first term is about making it to the next term; it is about survival.
They talked all night and it wasn't just about vision, it was hopes and dreams for the country, the world they wanted to leave for their children. Everyone talked about lowering the deficit and simplifying the tax code, but she challenged him to look beyond the traditional rhetoric of politicians.
So, they sketched out the country's future. And when they finished, she laughed at him. He was running as a Republican, but it was clear that he was progressive to his core. It was yet another way in which he was completely different from his father.
She made a copy of the document for herself, and gave him the original. So many times when he was weak and wanted to resign to be with her, she reminded him of that night. There was work to be done. There was legislation to pass in the first 100 days. A new Marshall Plan. A second chance for newly released prisoners. An education system that prepares students for the jobs of today, not those of yesterday. Immigration reform. He may not pass everything, but if he's able to make a dent, able to pass something and compromise, he could truly go down in history as great, something his father never thought he'd be.
There is work to do. He considers calling her and even picks up the phone, but he's interrupted by Lauren, his secretary, carrying a box. "Mr. President, this just arrived." She puts the box on his desk.
"Thank you. Oh, and can you tell Cyrus to stop by in ten minutes?"
"Yes, sir."
He waits until she closes the door to open it. He smells her perfume before he opens it and takes a couple of deep breaths. He removes the lid and sees a bottle of hundred year old scotch, the meaning not lost on him. It's her handwriting on the card, though it is unsigned.
The second first 100 is the most important. Be great.
Her words do something to him, as always. They light a fire and make him believe that he is good enough. And he knows that with her in his corner, even if it's from afar, he can do anything.
Olivia breezes into OPA as she does each day. No one would know she cried that morning. No one would know her heart has been broken again because she has the perfect gladiator amor.
She drops her belongings on the sofa in her office, turns on her televisions and gets to to work. "Where are we, people?" She struts out of her office and into the conference room, where her gladiators gather each morning.
Abby speaks up first, "We've got a slippery congressman whose been skimming money from his campaign donations and stepping out on his wife. Double sleaze."
"What else?"
"We've got a millionaire mogul who makes 70 times the average worker at his company and refuses to pay a living rage. He's getting skewered-"
"Rightfully so," interrupts Abby.
Harrison rolls his eyes and continues, "By the press. No judgment Abby. We've worked with worse."
"Quinn, what have you got?"
"Um, Supreme Court Justice with an illegitimate kid who's ready to go public."
"Who came to us? The kid or the Justice?"
"The kid."
"Which Justice?"
"The Chief Justice."
Heads snap toward Quinn. The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Michael Jeffries isn't even 60. He sold himself as a family man, dedicated to his wife and two children. He said he was a moderate during confirmation hearings, and without ideology, two things that were proven false within his first term. The opportunity for the Grant administration to fill another vacancy in the Court would be a game changer.
"Okay, Abby, Harrison, Quinn, I want written briefs in on all three cases in an hour and then we'll vote."
Everyone scatters, and Olivia retreats to her office. Closes the door. She needs more than a minute; she needs hours. She isn't supposed to be here; it wasn't the plan. She was going to stay the entire 8 years. They were going to be together, no matter what, but life happened. Life always happens to her.
They talked about it, after they created his plan for the second first 100. She was going to create a PR plan to sell his ideas directly to the American public, respectfully going around Congress. She boots up her laptop and waits for it to load, while glancing at the television screens. Every news channel is showing footage from the previous night's inaugural balls. If they only knew they weren't seeing her Fitz, the man who would change the world, they were seeing the master politician, playing them all.
With just a few clicks, she attaches her PR plan to an e-mail, and sends it to him. It's just the attachment, no text; he'll know exactly what it means. He will want more than just her plan. He will want her presence. He will want her leading. She will fight him and the compromise will be her selling the plan to Cyrus and guiding him from behind the scenes.
The e-mails start coming with background information on the three cases being considered. It may not be the most professional way of thinking, but the best case scenario for Fitz is remaking the Supreme Court. He talked about the impact the Court's very political makeup was having on the country, and with an inevitable vacancy and difficult Congress, his best chance of impacting issues such as Civil Rights, could be through the courts.
Before she knows it, an hour has passed and she has a rough list of candidates to share with Cyrus. This day, which started out with heartbreak, is looking up. She can't be with him, but she craves him. Needs to be a part of his world, to hear from him every now and then. That is the only way she can make it and it's past time to stop pretending. She needs him every bit as much as he needs her.
With that, she gets up, straightens her suit and her spine, and rejoins her staff in the conference room. OPA, she's decided, will be an extension of the White House, for the next 100 days.