Title: Four Hours
Author: CGB (luberluber@yahoo.com.au)
Web: http://Appelsini.tripod.com/Christine/
Rating: R or something. Some adults doing the wild thing here kiddies - avert your eyes.
Feedback: Yes please
Archive: Same
Disclaimer: yadda yadda not mine yadda yadda actually I don’t know who owns them…
Summary: Four hours on Air Force One proves to be a little too hard to handle.
Some background: August suggested I write a story about the missing four hour flirtation on Air Force One mentioned in her story “Paper Replicates”. Because I needed an idea and because I loved that story I took her up on it. The theme of this story is inspired by a line from that story “You see, words are everything to me, CJ, they're all I have (Toby)”
This theme has been touched upon by August and Penelopody since so I guess that line had quite an impact. Always a good thing, right A.?
-------------------
Four Hours
When they discussed it, and
they never discussed it, when they exchanged breathless promises to themselves
and each other in heated moments, they insisted it would never be like this.
Not like this.
*
She’d been reading the tax reform report but she
couldn’t make sense of it. The words swam around the screen slipping into one
another. The political jargon was repetitive and complex. Josh had told her not
to attempt to read it on the plane but she couldn’t resist getting a head start
on it, even if it was just to know she’d seen the words before.
But she was easily distracted. Her thoughts roamed,
coming to rest of the notion of language and the mutation of language that
constituted political jargon. She mused
on the stages of evolution that took place from the moment the ‘rah rah’ became
known as the large creature with the imposing incisors to the appearance of
such wonders of poetics as words like ‘multi-tasking’ and ‘globalisation’,
although from what she understood that was just one theory on the development
of language in human beings. She liked it anyway.
She knew a great deal about language and linguistics
and about the origins of words and phrases. It was a prerequisite for the
job. Taking on the press room meant
knowing stupid things, like the development of the term ‘networking’ for
example or the meaning of ‘nescient’, which some ostentatiously clever person
had chosen to include in the report she was reading.
It was a useful word. The kind of word she’d expect to hear Toby use in a speech.
No, it was the kind of word Toby hurled up people
who really were nescient just because he’d know they wouldn’t know what he was
talking about. He loved that kind of
cruel irony.
And there it was.
She’d meandered and circled but, as was inevitable, her preoccupation
with words and language led her to thinking about Toby Zeigler.
She had resolved not to think about him after
finding herself executing somersaults in her head in an effort to determine the
exact nature of their relationship, it’s implications and potential
hazards. Normally an organized and disciplined
person, she had been confident of deriving a solution to the chaos that was
Toby and herself, but she wound up confused and frustrated and angry with
herself for starting something she had no idea how to finish.
She wisely told herself to find another subject to
dwell on but she hadn’t slept in forty hours and words like ‘nescient’ were
getting stuck in her head and bouncing around in there long enough to lose all
semblance of meaning.
She gave in and quickly risked a side long glance at
the figure across the cabin. He was sleeping. She decided she would punish him
severely for such an obviously display of callousness when she was only six
feet away from him. She thought perhaps
she could refuse his advances the next time they were offered but she couldn’t
really be sure there would be a next time.
The last time, a heady moment in her office late at
night that still made her cheeks flush thinking about it, they’d agreed that
the possibility of continuing their covert encounters was ludicrous.
“This has to be the last time,” she’ d said.
He nodded, “it won’t happen again.”
And they didn’t talk about what ‘it’ was or why it
wouldn’t happen again or why it shouldn’t happen again, but went home in
separate cars soaking up the smell of mixed sweat and semen still volatile on
their bodies.
But she knew the conviction behind the words could
not be trusted because they’d made similar vows before only to denounce them
days later.
They were just words. The language, well the
language was something else entirely.
*
He was pretending to be asleep. At one stage he was actually trying to sleep
but he gave up on that idea when he caught CJ leaning back against her seat
rubbing her neck with her eyes closed.
He knew now that any attempt to take that image into slumber was likely
to be met with resistance from other parts of his body.
So he feigned sleep because it was the next best
thing and because his position with his legs up on the table in front of him
afforded him the best vantage point in the cabin from which to observe CJ’s
private ministrations.
She was looking at her monitor only he’d noticed
that she hadn’t raised a finger to the keyboard in the last fifteen
minutes. She was wide awake so he had
to assume she was completely engrossed in something taking place somewhere
other than on her computer screen.
He was faced with a most intriguing question. What
was going on in CJ Gregg’s mind? He was arrogant enough to hope it had
something to do with him but not so arrogant that he would suspect her thoughts
of him to be encouraging.
Here was a woman who had set them both on the path
of sexual misdemeanors by saying, “Toby, take me home now because I’m about to
change my mind and I really think we should have sex,” and like a deer caught
in her headlights he’d responded, “OK.”
It wasn’t that she’d issued him an ultimatum, or
that he felt pressured into compliance, he knew as she did, that it was the
right time. It was the only time.
*
She closed the laptop and leaned back into her chair
taking in the man sleeping across from her. She was surprised when he opened
his eyes and stared right back.
They stared at each other blankly for a few moments
until Toby said, “I assume the reason you’re staring at me is not because I
have drool coming out the side of my mouth?”
She broke into a grin and he grinned back and they
grinned at each other like silly teenagers until they became suddenly conscious
of where they were and CJ did a quick scan of their surrounds to see if anyone
noticed.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this that much she was
sure of. It wasn’t supposed to be
anything at all but if it must be something then it probably shouldn’t be these
mindless moments where they flaunted an undeniable attraction for all to see.
She placed the laptop on the table in front of her.
“I have to go to the bathroom,” she said and he
nodded as she rose.
By some strange compulsion she found herself walking
past him close enough to brush her thigh against his shoulder, a light touch
but its effect was substantial. She clenched her hands into fists hoping to
exorcise some of her nervous energy. It wasn’t working. Perhaps it was sleep
deprivation. She felt like she was on the verge of exploding.
In the staff’s bathroom on Air Force One she ran her
hands under cold water and splashed her face.
She thought of the age old remedy of taking cold showers to quell a
sexual appetite and knew that on Air Force One she could consider it seriously.
She doubted the cure was as effective as mythology
made it out to be she really didn’t want to take a cold shower to prove a
point.
What she really wanted to do was go back to her
seat, sit down and treat the situation calmly and reasonably. They were on Air
Force One surrounded by their colleagues and the press not to mention the
President of the United States and she really should think about something
else, anything else, and oh god, she really couldn’t go back out there with her
pupils dilated and her hands struggling to find somewhere they could just sit
still.
She breathed deeply and willed her heartbeat to
slow, remembering that the last thing she wanted to do was give Toby Zeigler
the satisfaction of knowing she’d hyperventilated in the bathroom over him.
She opened the door and stepped out to face the
object of her distress.
“Toby, “ she said, taking a moment to compose
herself, “would you use the word ‘nescient’ in a sentence?”
He looked momentarily thrown and she was pleased
because she didn’t know what he expected and she doubted he did either, but it
wasn’t that.
“Right now?”
She raised her eyebrows.
“Spoken or written?”
“You say words you wouldn’t write or is it the other
way around?”
“It goes either way,” he looked down at her hand
resting one in the other in front of her.
He reached out to run a finger across her knuckles. “You’ll notice the
President doesn’t refer to a ‘thing’ he has with relatives in Delaware, but
you’ll also notice that I’d call Josh an idiot before I referred to him as
‘nescient’.”
“Mmhm,” she murmured, “what about ‘gloaming’?”
“Gloaming?”
“From Old English ‘glom’ meaning the evening
twilight. Have you ever referred to the evening as gloaming?”
His finger still caressed her knuckle. She looked
down at where the hands met and then up at his eyes. They were closer. She thought
they might kiss in what was no doubt going to be a clinical example of throwing
all caution to the wind. As they were their backs hid their touching hands but
anyone catching them standing this close was doubtlessly going to wonder what
the Press Secretary and the Communications Director had to say to each other
that required them to stand so their noses were almost clashing.
“I think,” he said, and now he had taken her hand
and was applying some pressure to her palm, “that Bartlet’s disease is contagious.”
And she thought that might be it, the end of it all,
as they got swept into an irretrievable moment, but Sam’s voice was heard
breaking the tension.
“Toby?”
They parted quickly, and she stumbled back to her
seat. She checked her watch. Two and half
hours to go before they touched down.
She didn’t consider herself a religious person but she was about to
implore whatever deities had put her in this situation to grant her the relief
of sleep for the remainder of the trip.
*
After attending to Sam, he went back to his seat and
saw that CJ was absent. He was
surprised to find himself slightly dejected by this. He began to reprimand
himself for his rather bold display minutes earlier outside the bathroom. He really didn’t know what he was doing. And
he was so used to knowing what he was doing.
This spontaneity in him was unrecognizable as the Toby Zeigler he knew
and appreciated.
And that was the strangest thing to say about
himself because he’d been in love, got married and done all the things
associated such as propose on buses and have sex in her parents’ kitchen. He’d
been wild and he’d been frivolous so when did he start thinking of himself as
an austere and serious presence?
But this was different, so very different. Aside
from the fact that they really hadn’t qualified this relationship and flinging
such words as ‘love’ into the arena was probably wildly inappropriate, if not
downright stupid, this was a relationship forged in the prime of their careers.
This was it. This was the height of their lives and it felt out of control,
dangerous, to be in each other’s company because the view from the pinnacle was
dazzling.
And yet none of it, nothing could erase the memory
he had of her when he had slipped her gown from her shoulders and kissed her
collarbone for the first time and she had moaned softly and looked at him like
she might have been ready to drown with him.
He had a dream that he remembered at the strangest
times. He was driving his car off an
exit ramp, when he realized there were cars coming towards him in the opposite
direction and he had no where to turn. It’s not that it was like that from time
to time. It was like that all the time.
*
“Toby?”
Charlie was standing before him in his now familiar
‘I’m sorry to have to do this to you but he’s the President’ pose.
“The President said that if you were awake you might
like to join them.”
“Them?”
“The President and CJ.”
He nodded and rose and thought, for the life of him
he really should have pretended to be asleep.
“Toby sit down,” Barlet was making wide gestures as
he often did when he was in a good mood.
The senior staff had made an art out of their
excuses to escape the President when he was in a good mood. Toby was, of
course, particularly artistic in that area only he wasn’t making excuses now
and he really did want to be sitting down listening to whatever wild tale the
President was telling if CJ was willing to do so as well.
“Toby, CJ was telling me that you were having an
very interesting discussion about the use of the words ‘nescient’ and
‘gloaming’?”
“Mr President, ‘interesting’ is a poorly chosen
adjective for the Press Secretary’s startling repartee” he deadpanned. CJ
raised an eyebrow and Bartlett looked skeptical. The President was astute
enough to know when the staff played games with one another but he generally
let them determine the outcome on their own.
“Is that so?” he said, and they were lectured at
length on the peculiarities of the English language only it didn’t matter
because every now and then Toby caught CJ pulling a lock of hair out of her
eyes or flicking lint from the top of her blouse just above her breast and he
relaxed comfortably into the pleasure of figuring, knowing this show was just
for him.
*
Air Force One touched down in the Capital at 3.30
am. The tired and disgruntled
passengers were herded into their respective vehicles and taxis. CJ had driven
and a dutiful Secret Service Agent had offered to accompany her to her car.
“It’s OK,” Toby had interjected not really knowing
whether it was or whether he had the right to say so but he hadn’t slept in
over forty hours and all reason and sensibility had vanished long ago.
She had raised eyebrows at him but said
nothing. They’d walked to her car in
silence. He with his hands in his pockets and bag slung over his shoulder, her
carrying hand luggage and trying not to look at him.
She’d stepped off the plane thinking practical
thoughts in her head like a mantra. They had to go home, to sleep, to prepare
for the morning that was only another four hours away, they had to change
clothes, read notes, check their answering machines, and she had to do all
these things. She really had to.
Finally she spoke. She had arrived at her car and
was leaning against the driver’s door, waiting for the end, the finale, the
round up for the four hours of mania they had just experienced.
“God, it’s 4 am. I’m have to be back at the white
House at eight thirty! Toby do I get paid enough for this?” she was nervous.
They weren’t moving. He had his hands in his pockets and he was only inches
away and they both needed sleep but they weren’t moving.
“If I told you ‘no’ would you still be there at 8.30
tomorrow?”
“Yes.”
“No.”
She fumbled in her purse for keys. She looked down
for a moment searching, and then back up again at his face. He was staring at
her, unflinching.
Her fingers tightened around her keys and she told
herself she needed to open her car door, get in and drive home, because she
needed the three hours of sleep she was still likely to get tonight.
Instead, she leaned forward, acting on an impulse, and kissed him. He returned
the kiss pushing her back against the car and pushing himself against her body
insistently.
She found herself unlocking the door and they
stumbled into the back seat. Toby was tugging at the front of her blouse. She
lost three buttons in his haste to undress her but she only noticed when she
tried to dress herself again later.
She noticed, however when his hands touched her
skin. When his mouth felt warm and wet on her collar bone and her neck as he
whispered to her that she was beautiful and that he had tried, god he’d tried,
to keep his hands off her but her couldn’t.
She was saying the same words back. Speaking the
language of two people who had a relationship, had something, not just an
attraction that was harboured and only taken out to sail when it could be kept
under control.
And she was
amazed that she had never learned, but spoke this language so well.
*
They were all hands and legs. All sighs and moans
and clothing half on and half off. He could feel the protruding bone of her
thigh as he ran his hand down her body, slipping his fingers between them,
desperate to see her face in ecstasy.
He thought he might have told her he loved her only
she’d not responded so maybe he’d said it to himself. Or had she ignored
it?
He lost sight of himself during these times. Forgot that he was the
Communications Director of the White House, a very important man and major
influence in the politics of the nation, forgot he had these duties, these
responsibilities and expectations. Forgot that he was this person who hears his
own words from the President’s mouth.
And he forgot that the woman underneath him was the
White House Press Secretary and had just as many obligations and expectations.
He’d lose himself in her and she’d grip his
shoulders and when they spoke neither one of them heard.
*
Eventually she came back down and realized that she
was half undressed in a parking lot near Air Force One. She had visions of the
Secret Service shining their torches into the car and the two of them, her
minus the buttons on her blouse, staring at their feet like naughty school
children and that was the last thing she wanted to happen.
No. The last thing she wanted to happen was to find
that it was not the Secret Service outside but some particularly tenacious
photographer who just knew where to find the picture to make his or her career.
“I should take you home,” she offered. He had tossed
his tie into his pocket and shoved his hand in there after it. He looked rumpled, as if he’d just woken up
and she was momentarily reminded that their prospects for much needed sleep
were now dwindling.
“It’s OK, I’ll sleep in the office.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah.”
She got back in her car and started the engine. He
leant in to kiss her and she smiled as he pulled away.
“Seeyou tomorrow,” he said softly.
“It already is tomorrow,” she said, equally soft.
*
She thought about it later, that there must have
been, must be some point in evolution where the language, the words, took
flight and left a trail of broken meanings and misunderstood concepts behind,
so that one could now speak without ever having to say anything.
She had spent the last five hours or so talking to
Toby without touching on the relevant or pertinent issues of their dalliance,
and yet somehow they both understood that the culmination of the dialogue would
be a completely reckless attempt to realize a teenage ideal by making out in
the back seat of a car.
She was tired. Words and meaning always assaulted
her when she was tired and words, well, thinking about words always ended with
Toby and she really needed to sleep right now.
End