And here we go, onto Season 2! I hope you enjoy. And though this doesn't really change anything there are twenty more chapters left of this story!
Disclaimer-Nothing but Jacob is mine.
And on a side note, I like so many other Fanfiction Authors no longer receive notifications via email about reviews/PMs etc. So if you do send any it might be a while, if ever before I get back to you. Please keep that in mind for it is not intentional-If anyone has a fix please let me know.
There will be a second part that follows this...eventually. Each series should cover about seven chapters some chapters several episodes. Flashbacks included when needed.
Also I do not do Private Messaging anymore, any questions stick them in a review and I will get back to you next chapter note.
Also please be aware of a bit of a time jump between these chapters.
Also after much thought and consideration I have decided not to include Mandy in this story. She's there for like one Season and misses half of the episode and while she was an okay character played by a very good actress her disappearance and everything that follows is just too hard to write. So no Mandy. Ever.
And a couple of the episodes are mixed around here but please keep that in mind.
There will be a lot of flashbacks in the Season 2 arc as well.
Perhaps Love
Chapter 9-Lies Mothers Tell
Jake remembers the day his Dad came to tell his Mom about a guy called Bartlett. Meanwhile senior staff return to the White House.
Jake was still sat in the waiting room shirt stiff with blood. The President was going to live. Josh was still fighting for his life. The country was in uproar and then someone touched his shoulder. He reared backwards to stare up at his Dad who smiled at him softly.
"I'm gonna go back to the White House" he said softly. "I want you to come with me. Ginger's gone to my apartment to grab you some clothes and Anna? Your parents are on their way down they just cleared through the gate security. Mrs Bartlett's been on the phone with them for an hour. I think she might be planning a joint paper with your Dad—"
"Sounds about right" Anna said with a forced grin getting to her feet. "Would it be alright if I just washed my face before we left?" she gestured at her face and Jake saw that the make up had been washed off but the blood was still there and he knew that she didn't want her father's to see her covered in blood that had happened when she had witnessed a shooting of the most important man in the world who was supposed to be surrounded by the best level of security in the world.
She smiled at him and then left and his Dad took her vacant seat.
"She seems nice"
"Yeah she is, somehow I don't think I'm gonna get a second date though"
"Why not?"
"Dad don't make jokes right now I'm too tired"
It came out a little testily but his Dad just grinned at him. It didn't meet his eyes and Jake didn't know what to say. Oddly enough he never had, had a problem communicating with his parents before now and now suddenly he couldn't speak. He wanted to sleep, wanted to curl up into a ball in his bed and wrap the covers around him and he wanted to let the gift of sleep take him away from the nightmare that was today but he couldn't. He knew that he couldn't.
"Where's Mom?"
"Back at the White House, she's gonna be surrounded by reporters. Even if this wasn't broadcast on national TV all of the White House Press Corps were there tonight and so she's gonna be getting it from all angles. My guess is you won't see her until later on. I've got to get over there too. You want to come with me or you want to go back home?"
"With you" Jake said, the thought of being without either one of his parents right now borderline obscene. He thought that he was going to start crying and he wiped his hands under his eyes even though they were dry. He stood up and his Dad slung one arm around his shoulder, he nodded towards Donna who had been silent and ashen faced and had stayed that way since she had learnt that Josh had been shot and then he all but steered Jake towards the exit. Anna was waiting by the door her face as clean as it was ever going to be. Sam was next to her and in a fit of chivalry no doubt he had let her wear his jacket. Anna was holding her bloody shirt in her hand with an expression that said it was going straight in the trash can. He noticed that while Sam's jacket covered her up you could see that her bra was a hot pink colour and he had no idea what to do with that information.
They got to the White House in silence and Jake watched as Anna got out of the car and stared up at the building almost glowing in the light of the darkness.
"Wow" she said softly. "I don't…you look at it but you never think about walking into it you know?"
"Believe me it never gets old" Jake's Dad said quietly.
"What happens now?" she asked as they walked through the doors. Jake noticed that the security which was always around was doubled and the guards who usually said hello to him didn't this time. Everyone was battening down the hatches and preparing for war. Jake had never seen anything like it and never wanted to again. His father on the other hand got them both into the communications bullpen and then to his office with very little fuss.
"Your Dads are on their way, security is taking a lot longer because of what's happened tonight but they should be coming through in a minute. I gotta say Anna" and here he sat down so that he and her were face to face.
"We don't know how much the press knows about what happened tonight—AP—"
"They were all there" Jake said quietly. His Dad nodded and when he next spoke his voice was impossibly gentle.
"Yes they were and they know who was there but Anna you were a late edition to the trip and CJ and I tend to keep Jake out of the press as much as we can. Had tonight gone smoothly this wouldn't be an issue—believe me no reporter tonight is going to face the wrath of CJ Cregg on her son but you…if they find out that you were there, with no connection to the White House you become a new source they can exploit. You might get phone calls from reporters asking what you saw and what you heard, what you did, what you saw Senior Staff doing and they might come to your apartment and if that happens I need you to understand that your first phone call isn't to CNN it's to CJ because she will get them off your back. I need—"
"Mr Zeigler I am not gonna sell the President out for a quick buck" Anna said quietly. "I am not that kind of person"
"The kind of cash they will offer will pay for the first two years of whatever Ivy League school you want to go to"
She gazed at him for a second clearly thrown and then…
"They care that much about what I might have seen tonight?"
"They really do care that much about what you might have seen tonight"
She blinked and then shook her head.
"You got CJ's number?"
His Dad stared at her for a second and then he smiled.
"Atta girl"
"You know, if it's a Fox guy I am I alright to tell him that nobody died because of gay marriage?"
"Sweetheart if it's a Fox guy you can hog tie him down and make him wear a rainbow flag and I will happily bail you out of prison"
Anna cracked a grin and then…
"You know shooting aside tonight was really good. I enjoyed listening to him. I always did kind of like him. Surprised nobody asked about Cuba though when he was talking about dictatorships"
For a second his Dad gazed at her and then…
"Did you speak to Mr Seaborn tonight by any chance?"
"He gave me ten bucks to try that one on you"
"Bastard"
She smiled and Jake smiled and then his Dad looking at the two of them decided to go and find out what was taking her Dad's so long. Weather or not he had picked up on Jake's desire to have five minutes alone with her or not but he left them alone nonetheless.
"Sorry about tonight" he said and she turned to look at him.
"Wasn't your fault some skinhead took a shot at the President" she said quietly. "And I wasn't lying before you know, I actually did enjoy myself. Until the shooting started"
He nodded and she reached out and took his hand and he blinked. She had not touched him all night but now she was touching his hand and he looked up at her and he noticed that her eyes were very brown and warm and that her dark redish brown hair was knotted at the nape of her neck.
"Next time" she said very quietly. "Why don't we just stay in the apartment and watch Golden Girls?"
He laughed at that and suddenly it felt amazing to laugh. He had not realised until he could laugh in this world, this brave new world that he had stepped into that was different from the one he had been in this morning until he could laugh. He wanted to laugh and laugh again and he knew that he could now and from the warm twinkle in her eye he knew that this shockingly easy revolution wasn't missed on her either.
"Sounds like a plan"
The door to his Dad's office burst open and two men came in, Jake reckoned these had to be Anna's Dads simply because of the way they all but flung themselves on their daughter. Jake thought she looked more like the one in scrubs than the one who was dressed like Maverick straight out of Top Gun (and looked damn good too—in a national crisis Jake saw that both Bonnie and Ginger had stopped to look and stare) and he gently extricated himself out of his Dad's office.
His Dad patted him on the shoulder hands lingering. Ginger with a smile passed him a bag and Jake pointed towards the gents and his Dad nodded. He shut the door and then bent over the sink retching.
Come with us while we work for Bartlett they said, it would be an adventure they said.
He could remember it like yesterday.
"Jake?"
"Dad?"
One day they were going to open the door and see each other and it not be a question Jake thought as his father grinning let his dripping wet mother into the house.
"Eh Mom, your all wet"
"Yes I am, towel Jacob now"
"Okay" he said reaching into the bathroom. It was California, it was delightfully warm and sunny even though it was seven fifteen and Jake was too hot to go back to bed. It was going to get warmer and sometimes he thought warmly of the people who woke up in the middle of the night because they were cold.
"Okay" he said passing his Mom a towel. "Mom you know you left your contacts when you left this morning—"
"WELL I KNOW THAT NOW, I FELL IN THE POOL"
His Dad started laughing again and Jake grinned. He was fourteen, everything was funny.
"Hey Dad did Mom tell you I was finally going out for debate?"
"You are? Oh fantastic buddy, what's your first topic?"
"Abortion, yay or nay"
"And which side are you on?"
"Please, woman's right to choose—"
"That's my boy" his Mom muttered, his Dad caught his eye and winked at him.
"So Dad how's life on the road?"
"Good…actually bud your Mom and I have something we want to run by you?"
Jake looked up from where he was powering up his computer and smiled.
"Oh?"
"You know I've been working for Bartlett?"
"That guy out of New Hampshire?"
"Yeah. He's err…his chief of staff is a man called Leo McGerry. He…he wants your Mom to join the campaign as press secretary when they announce their Presidential bid. If we win…and bare in mind we are a long way away from that but if we win then we will then your Mom and I would work in the government. In Washington"
Jake blinked.
"So your asking me if I would like to move to Washington?"
"Well…Jacob honey…you know if we do this we'd be on the road a lot—"
"So free reign of the house for eighteen months?" here Jake clapped his hands together in glee. "You know how great that sounds—"
"NO" his Dad said with a grin at the same time his mom said, "Not a chance in hell Jacob"
Well he had known that it was a long shot.
"Okay so what?"
"So if we went on the road would you come with us?"
Jake stared at them both for a second and then he laughed.
It took him a second to realise that they were not joking.
That was the start of many a conversation but when looking back, that was the moment that his life changed. And standing in the bathroom of the White House his vomit washing down the sink and his face splattered in blood he found that he was remembering that moment more than anything else.
Jake stared at himself in the mirror seeing but not seeing. The night was not over. The night was never going to be over. The night was going to go on and on and on until the massive third man hunt was over, until Josh got out of surgery, until his mother got out of the press room and even then the nightmare was not over, it was just beginning.
He thought to himself that his mother had once told him that it was all going to be alright, that everything was going to be fine.
That Jake thought grimly, was an abject lie.
But he was alright.
He was standing.
And he had to make that be enough.
Lies mothers tell to their sons, regardless.
And there we go.
Next Chapter-In the aftermath of the shooting Jake, CJ and Toby take a moment alone as they finally find out if Josh pulled through surgery. Meanwhile in the past CJ remembers when Toby asked her to work for the future President of the United States.