Rating: PG
Archive: At my site, The Band Gazebo Anywhere else, just ask me
Disclaimer: If you know it from the show, it's not mine. If you've never heard of something, I probably made it up.
Spoilers: General season one and two to be safe, but we're well into AU here.
Summary:Ginger goes home when her brother's child is born.
Author's Notes: Another part of the Novembers Past universe, archived at my site above. A follow-up, more or less, to Moments of Transition but I don't think you'd have to have read that to follow this.
Toby storms through the bullpen, complaining about House Republicans, idiotic Congressmen, and the heat of a Washington summer and various other annoyances before he reaches his office and slams the door behind him. Bonnie and I give each other a look, not the first of its kind that's passed between us since we had the luck, and I use that word loosely, to be promoted to the lofty heights of Assistant to the Director of Communications. When he comes back to the office like this, we usually take it in turns to go to him with his messages. Or we toss a coin for it. If no coin is handy, we resort to Rock-Paper-Scissors.
Today, it's my turn, and for a reason. But suddenly, I'm not so sure I want to go in there. My look to Bonnie turns pleading, and the second she realises what I'm about to say, her face slams closed and she shakes her head. "No way Ginger," she tells me. "You've got to ask him."
"Do I?" I ask, knowing that she's right.
"Yep." Bonnie's voice is firm as she nods and hands me a handful of phone messages. "Go."
Marshalling my courage as best I can, I go to the door of his office and knock before slipping inside. "Messages," I tell him softly, looking at him as he flips through a stack of papers.
"Did Ted McGregor call?" he asks me.
"It's on top," I tell him, placing the messages on his desk, knowing how important that one was to him.
"Great. I might need for you to arrange his flights from California to D.C if this call goes our way, so keep that in mind, ok?"
"Sure." He's looking down at his papers again, a sure sign that I've been dismissed, but I remain where I am, looking down at him, twisting the skin on my wedding finger nervously, stopping when I realise what I'm doing. It's a bad habit that I've never been able to break.
Toby, realising that I’m standing there still, looks up at me, just in time to see me snatch my right hand away from my left and put it at my side. He smiles slightly, and his whole demeanour changes, his anger dissipating like mist. All of a sudden, he's the Toby that I saw in the garden on Election Night, and I feel my nerves lessen. "You ok Ginger?" he asks.
"I just… I need to take some time off."
He leans back in his chair, looking up at me, concern unmistakable in his eyes, his fingers tapping against his chin. "When?"
I grin nervously, shifting my weight from one foot to the other. "Today?" I tell him, expecting him to explode, holding back a sigh of relief when it doesn't happen. "Remember, I asked you about it when I first started working for you? My brother's wife is having a baby…"
"And you wanted to go home when it was born," he interrupts me.
"My mom called a couple of hours ago, to tell me that Rick had taken her to the hospital, but it's her first baby, so it probably won't even be today, but I was wondering…" I trail off, overcome by the need to breathe, and I'm relieved to see that he doesn't look angry.
"When do you want to go?"
"I rang the airport, and there's a flight out at nine tonight," I tell him. "If that's ok."
"Bonnie can cover your work?"
I nod, Bonnie having been the one who encouraged me to book the ticket before asking Toby. She told me that I could still cancel it if he really threw a fit, and besides, the fact that I had it booked might give me some leverage if I needed it.
"How long will you be gone for?"
"A week?" It shouldn't be a problem - I haven't taken any vacation time the past few months, knowing that this was coming up, not wanting to give him any reason to say no.
He nods again, scribbling something down on his notepad. "That's fine," he tells me.
"Really?" That was easier than I expected.
"Yeah," he tells me again, raising his eyebrows as he looks at me. "That all?"
"Yeah." I decide to take the gift, taking a couple of steps backwards, not able to believe my luck. "Thanks Toby."
He waves his hand in dismissal, but I swear I can see the tiniest smile peeking around behind that beard of his, and I can't hide the smile that spreads across my own face. No more than I can stop the deep sigh of relief that explodes out of me when I close the door behind me and lean against it momentarily.
"Well?" Both Bonnie and Cathy are eyeing me expectantly, Cathy having been briefed by Bonnie on the phone call from my mom. I beam at them in response, and they laugh delightedly, Bonnie shaking her head. "I told you Ginger. No problem."
"Did he make you grovel?" Cathy wants to know. She always asks that question. Sam once tried to make her grovel so that she could leave early, and she tore strips off him. Ever since then, he's been terrified of her, and she's been giving lessons to the rest of us on how to tame our bosses. Neither Bonnie nor I have had the nerve to try them out with Toby however.
"No," I tell her. "He was really nice about it."
"Toby?" She arches one eyebrow. "Nice?"
Bonnie shakes her head again, adding in the clucking tongue soundtrack. "I told you Cathy…he never makes Ginger beg for anything."
I blink a couple of times, running that statement through my head, because I'm sure I'm missing something. "What's that supposed to mean?" I finally ask.
"Oh, c'mon Ginger, you can't tell me you haven't noticed it," Bonnie continues and I shake my head, wondering if she's hit hers on something recently. "The rest of us try to get Toby to do something and all hell breaks loose. We put you on him, and he toes the line like a lamb."
I laugh out loud at that. She has to be kidding me. "You're kidding right?" I ask her, just to make sure.
"I'm really not."
"You know, she does have a point," Cathy tells me. "He doesn't seem to get on your case half as much as everyone else's."
"Remind me of that the next time he screams at me," I say dryly.
"Seriously Ginger, I think Toby might have a little bit of a soft spot for you," Bonnie teases, her eyes dancing, and I throw a paper clip at her before going back to my desk and studiously avoiding her gaze and ignoring any choice comments that she or Cathy throw my way.
But I can't help thinking of what they said, and while I don't for a moment believe that Toby has any kind of spot for me, soft or otherwise, I do know that I've seen a side to him that they haven't seen. They've seen the side that screams and shouts and rants and raves and terrifies most of the support staff around here. They've seen the driven taskmaster, the hard-nosed perfectionist, the man who works us hard, but doesn't expect anything from us that he wouldn't ask of himself.
I've seen that side too, and I find myself thinking of the first time that I ever saw Toby. And it wasn't in the campaign headquarters in Manchester like everyone thinks. It was an April night, late, on a rerun of a CNN Special, where they were doing profiles on the Presidential candidates, and I saw him and Leo McGarry, both identified as architects of the Bartlet for America campaign, being interviewed. And while there was something almost fatherly about Leo, when it came to Toby, I found him slightly scary. His intensity, the sheer force of his convictions reached right through the television screen, made me sit up and take notice of this Governor of New Hampshire who wanted to be President. That belief, that passion spoke to me because it was something that had been missing in my life ever since the night I walked arm in arm with my husband and began to cross the road.
And in part, his words were what inspired me to get up off that couch, get out of the house and do something with my life.
That's not to say that when I first saw him, barking orders and screaming at people in the campaign headquarters, that he didn't scare me. In point of fact, he terrified me, and I spent long hours wondering what the hell I was doing there. Why wasn't I back home in Jersey, with my family, with people who loved me, who would do anything to help me through this?
Slowly, little by little though, I made friends. I started to enjoy myself, enjoy my work. And when Leo asked me if I wanted to come work at the White House, I didn't have to think twice about my answer. I told my family, sold the house, and started to make a new life for myself in Washington.
And along the way, I saw the other side of Toby Ziegler. The side that saw a woman near tears in the garden of the campaign headquarters when everyone else was celebrating inside, and asked her what was wrong. Who was so kind, so sympathetic, that even though she was scared of him, even though she didn't really know him and hadn't told anyone about what brought her to work on the campaign, she found herself telling him her long sad story. And he gave her the last of his drink, encouraged her to come inside, to join the party. That was the first night that I'd felt alive in a year.
That's the same side of Toby Ziegler that I saw in his office today; the same side that I saw when I told him back on my first day as his assistant that I was going to need some time off around now. He didn't say anything about why, didn't ask any questions, just nodded and said that that would be ok. Just the same as he did today.
But to say that he has a soft spot for me is insane. He might feel sorry for me, might go a little easier on me because of what he knows. But that's all it is.
Thankfully, Bonnie and Cathy don't say anything more about it, leaving me alone with my work, and almost hourly phone calls home, letting Mom know my plans, the flight times, asking her if there are any updates about Dee. By the time I'm getting ready to leave, there's still no word, and Bonnie and Cathy both hug me and tell me to have a nice week, and not to do anything that they wouldn't do. Not that that leaves much. Before I leave, I give Toby the papers I've spent the day typing, including Ted McGregor's flight details.
"Any word on your sister-in-law?" he asks, and I blink in surprise that he would ask.
"Nothing yet," I tell him.
He nods, then holds up the slip of paper I gave him. "These are McGregor's details?"
I nod. "I confirmed them with him; he says they're fine."
"Good. Thanks Ginger." Again, I know when I’m being dismissed. "Have a good holiday."
I smile, backing out of the office saying a quick goodbye to the rest of the assistants before heading home and then to the airport. It's only when I’m on the plane that my stomach starts to churn. And it's nothing to do with fear of flying, nothing to do with turbulence. It's a great deal more to do with the fact that I haven't been home since Christmas, and that while that was fun, while I loved seeing my family, it was more than a little painful. I'd been feeling so good while I was on the campaign, so happy, getting on with my life, feeling closer to normal than I'd felt in months. And then I got home, and everyone was walking on eggshells around me, and I wasn't used to that anymore. Plus, it was Christmas and everyone was there, except for the one person who was missing. And I missed him, so, so much.
And when Rick took me aside, told me about Dee, all I could think was that could have been Alan and me. We could've been telling the family about our imminent arrival, with Alan going on and on about how he wanted a little girl who looked just like her mother - he always did love my red hair and freckles. And while I wouldn't have cared about the sex of the baby, having heard every joke and catcall going to do with red hair, I wanted our kids to look like their dad; dark hair and blue eyes. But either way, we would have loved them. We would have been so happy.
And despite the fact that Mrs Landingham told me that I'd love this baby when it was born, I've been so scared that I won't. That I'll look at it, and all I'll feel is pain, and hurt, and jealousy. I'd been either numb, or in pain, for so long and I was just starting to feel normal again. To feel like me again, or at least, something like me. I want to keep feeling like that, and it scares me that I could lose myself again.
I try to sleep on the flight, but I can't; all those thoughts keep going round and around in my head. I try to read, but the words blur in front of my eyes, so I just stare at the ceiling and wish that I was there already.
It's the longest flight that I've ever been on, and when I step off the plane and walk through the airport, I'm greeted by the sight of my dad waving to me. I couldn't miss him if I tried - he's tall, like all my brothers, and it's from him that I got my red hair. That all of us Clark children got our red hair. He pulls me into a big hug, lifting me clear off my feet, and I'm laughing when he sets me down. "I take it there's news?" I ask him, knowing my the grin on his face that there is.
"A little girl," he tells me. "Born just after you got in the air. We would have phoned you otherwise."
"How's Dee? And Rick?" I ask as we make our way out of the terminal.
"Dee's tired, obviously. Happy it's over your mom says. And Rick's walking on air. He wanted a little girl."
I have to swallow hard against the lump in my throat. "Yeah, he did." But Dad hears the tears simmering just below the surface, and he puts his arm around me, giving my shoulder a little squeeze.
"Mom's at home; she's got your room ready for you. We thought that it's be better to wait to go to the hospital tomorrow. Give them some time to themselves."
I find myself nodding. "Yeah. Good idea. I'm pretty tired myself." I didn't know I was until I said the words, but all of a sudden, I can't stop the yawn that escapes from me. By the time we get home, I'm all but asleep in the car, and it's all I can do to drink the hot chocolate that Mom foists on me and make small talk with her without falling asleep in my chair.
The next morning comes all too soon, and when I wake up, Dad's already gone to work, leaving Mom and me alone in the house. She's got a huge breakfast ready for me when I come down the stairs, all my favourite things to eat and quite a few things that I've never eaten in my life. When I protest about the amount of food that's there, she tells me that I'm far too thin and that I can't be eating properly. Which is something she told me a lot in the last year, and it's something that I can't deny. I did lose a lot of weight before I joined the campaign, and I'm still thinner than I was on my wedding day. But I am getting better, even if Mom doesn't think so.
Mom drives to the hospital and we ask at the reception for Deanna Clark's room, and make our way there, knocking on the door when we get there. When we go in, Rick all but leaps up from the bed beside Dee, ignoring Mom totally, and wrapping me in his arms, just like Dad did last night at the airport. He lifts me off my feet and kisses my cheek. "I'm so glad you came," he whispers in my ear.
"I wouldn't have missed it," I tell him, taking a step back to look in his eyes, and I'm surprised to find that I mean it; that I didn't even have to think about saying it.
I turn my gaze on Dee, who's looking at the two of us, a beaming smile on her face, a small bundle in her arms, being transferred as I look at her into the arms of her doting grandmother. I take advantage of the opportunity to go to her and hug her, whispering congratulations into her ear. "Thanks for coming," she tells me.
"Like I'd be anywhere else," I smile. Rick is the brother that's closest in age to me, and we've always been close, to the extent that he was one of Alan's groomsmen, and gave the eulogy at his funeral.
Mom is staring down at her latest grandchild with a smile on her face, and I know that she's going to spoil her rotten, just like she does all her other grandkids. "She's just beautiful," she says to no-one in particular.
We laugh at her intoxicated expression, and that snaps her back to reality. "How about you let me have a look at my niece?" I ask, holding out my arms, ignoring the surge of apprehension shooting around in my stomach.
When the child is put in my arms, when I look down at her, I realise just how wise a woman Mrs Landingham is, and resolve to call her when we get back to the house. Because all the fears, all the worries that I had dissolve in a wave of tenderness as she opens her eyes and looks right at me, clear blue orbs of innocence in a pale face that I just know is going to be covered in freckles one day, crowned by a mop of dark red hair. Tears come unbidden into my eyes, but they're not tears of pain, or sadness. Instead, they're tears of happiness. Mrs Landingham's words come back to me as I look into those eyes - "That's what a baby is Ginger…God's way of reminding us that life goes on."
When I lift my head, they're looking at me with expressions of happiness and worry mixed, and I smile genuinely at them through my tears. "She's perfect," I tell him, and I can see them relaxing from here.
Rick is sitting down on the bed beside Dee again, and their hands are joined. They look at one another, and there's no pang of jealousy from me, just pure happiness. Dee nods at Rick, and he clears his throat. "We were wondering," he begins, clearing his throat. "If you'd be able to get more time off, in about a month or so?"
"Why?"
Another look passes between them. "Because we were hoping that you'd be her godmother."
I have to swallow very hard, and still the lump in my throat doesn't go away. "I'd be honoured," I whisper, looking back down at the baby. Mom comes to my side and looks down at her too, pulling the blanket away from her face.
"What are you going to call her?" Mom asks, and when I look up, I see Dee squeezing Rick's hand, and I'm shocked to see the tears forming in his eyes.
"We're going to call her Alannah," Dee tells us, her voice strong, and I feel my heart stop beating for a second before it starts going again. "Alannah Joy."
I meet Rick's eyes, before looking down into the same blue eyes in my arms, the same blue that's in my own eyes. And I nod, smiling genuinely, knowing how much Alan would have loved all this. "It's perfect," I tell them both. "Just like her."