A good heart Part Three As they walked down the stairs, Leo asked: ‘Who called them?’ Standing at the foot of the staircase, Bartlet said: ‘I did.’ CJ and Toby were standing nervously in the sitting room. They both looked up as Dan and Leo walked in. Seeing their surprise, Dan said quickly: ‘Hi. I’m Dan, I’m a friend of Leo’s.’ Bartlet moved to stand with his arm around his wife. Leo looked expectantly at Dan. She looked from Bartlet to Leo. After a few seconds of silence, Dan said sharply: ‘I’ll go first, shall I? A couple of hours ago Josh and Sam were attacked. They were mugged, then beaten. Josh has broken ribs and severe bruising. Sam didn’t do so well. He was…’ Dan chose the word carefully. ‘…abused. He’s been cut with a knife of some description. He lost a lot of blood. And while Josh has the advantage of having been unconscious for at least some of the time, my feeling is that Sam remembers all of it.’ From their faces, she knew both the Press Secretary and Communications Director understood what she meant. Taking a deep breath, she went on: ‘We didn’t call an ambulance, we didn’t call the police. We came here. They’re both upstairs. Leo thinks you will need to say something about them being mugged or people are going to wonder where they are. That’s it.’ She sat down sipping slowly at her coffee while the two newcomers absorbed the horrific news. Grimacing at the cold liquid, Dan looked round. ‘I need some more coffee.’ Leo said grimly: ‘I need a drink.’ Dan looked at him. ‘Yes, Leo, because what we really need at this point, just to round things off nicely, is you drunk in the corner.’ Bartlet and Abbey looked at each other. Toby and CJ did the same. All four waited for Leo to explode at Dan’s sarcastic remark. But there was nothing. ************************* When Dan opened the door quietly, almost an hour later, Josh was lying on top of the bedclothes, his arms round Sam’s battered body. Both of them were finally sleeping. She turned as a hand rested on her shoulder. ‘I guess there’s a couple of things I should have told you. Just not…here…now.’ Dan laughed. ‘It can’t be that bad! I mean, in comparison to what’s happened here?’ ‘I guess not. But not here. Not now. Later.’ Dan looked at her watch. ‘Any later Leo, and it will be tomorrow.’ ‘Tomorrow then.’ ‘Promise?’ Leo nodded. ‘Yeah. Promise.’ """"""""""""""""""""""""""" Dan walked into the sitting room to collect her coat and bag. ‘I have to go. If I don’t get some sleep, I’ll never manage work tomorrow. Can someone call me a taxi please?’ ‘Dan, you can’t go.’ ‘Who is going to stop me, Sir?’ ‘I will. Well, Leo and I will.’ Bartlet waited for the anger. He didn’t have long to wait. ‘Sir, tonight we did so many things wrong, I don’t think I can even begin to count them. We didn’t report a serious crime. We destroyed evidence of that crime, and tomorrow CJ and Toby are going lie to the Press. Just exactly how far are you prepared to go?’ Bartlet was tired, and snapped: ‘For those two? All the way.’ Dan was no less tired. ‘I’m only here because I was having dinner with my boyfriend! I didn’t want this. You will not drag me into this. If we get found out…’ Leo said firmly: ‘We won’t.’ Dan scoffed. ‘Leo, I would have thought you at least would have understood that there is always someone willing to gossip for the right price.’ Trying to diffuse Dan’s anger, Bartlet said quickly: ‘Sam and Josh need you here. I need you here. Please stay.’ Bartlet looked at Abbey for support. If he was right, Dan was about to yell at him again. ‘You don’t have to go in tomorrow. I called Ed Winter.’ Abbey was right. Dan’s anger spilled into her voice. ‘You telephoned my boss and told him what exactly?’ ‘That you’re looking after me.’ Dan sighed. Shaking her head slowly, eventually, she looked around the room. Tired, Leo had left to stand outside the door until the shouting was over. ‘Well, how long do you think it will be before you’re feeling better, Sir?’ Bartlet smiled, relieved. ‘You’re the doctor. Any ideas?’ Dan pictured Josh and Sam. ‘At least a week Sir, maybe ten days.’ Bartlet nodded. ‘Yeah, I was thinking that.’ ‘I have to go home and collect a few things, Sir.’ ‘Sure. I’ll get someone to take you.’ Leo walked back in then. ‘You leaving?’ Dan looked at Bartlet. ‘I’m going to be staying here for a while. I need to go home and pick up some bits and pieces.’ Leo put his mug down on the table. ‘Okay, I’ll drive you.’ ‘Leo, it’s very late. You’ve had a long day.’ Leo nodded. ‘Yeah. So have you.’ Dan gave in then. She turned to Abbey. ‘Is it being in politics, or working here which makes these men so stubborn?’ Abbey smiled. ‘A bit of both, I think.’ Dan walked through the door Leo held open. Pausing, she turned. ‘When I’m gone, you can all talk about me. Just be nice. You haven’t caught me on a good day.’ Abbey waited only a few seconds after the door closed. ‘Where in the Hell did Leo meet her?’ ‘She did his last medical.’ Abbey looked at her husband. ‘And she agreed to go out with him?’ Bartlet looked surprised. ‘Yeah.’ ‘She seems nice.’ Bartlet smiled. ‘Yeah. She was gonna marry Marbury. She threw him over for Leo.’ ‘Why?’ Bartlet lost patience. ‘Oh I don’t know Abbey. You’ll have to ask her that.’ Realising how tired her husband looked, Abbey sighed. ‘What if she sells her story to the Post?’ Bartlet shrugged. ‘I guess she’d have done it if she was gonna.’ ‘Let’s go to bed.’ ‘Okay.’ As they walked upstairs, Bartlet put his arm around his wife. ‘Do you still have your white coat?’ ‘Yeah.’ Bartlet grinned. ‘Okay.’ ‘What?’ ‘Nothing.’ """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" ‘Sam, you need to have something to eat. It’s been two days.’ Dan was sitting on the edge of Sam’s bed, trying to work out why he hadn’t even touched the food on the plate on the table at his bedside. She resorted to picking up a little of the mashed potato and a carrot and pushing it towards Sam’s tightly closed lips. ‘Right, if you won’t eat, Sam, I’m going to have to put a tube into your stomach and feed you liquid mush.’ For most patients, Dan knew this was sufficient to get the to open their mouths. Sam’s expression didn’t even change. Sam moved his head away from the narrow tube. He had felt it in his nostril, and the sensation was sufficient to make him turn away as Dan tried a second time. After a few tries, Dan gave up. ‘Sam, you really have to eat. I can’t let you starve. Come on.’ But as Dan moved the end of the tube near him, Sam moved his head in the opposite direction. ‘Sam, this really will be easier if you help me.’ But Dan wasn’t able to hold his hands and head at the same time. ‘Sam, I’m going to have to get Leo and Toby to help me. If you could just eat something…’ ‘I need Mr McGarry and Mr Ziegler in here now.’ The Secret Service agent, following the President’s instructions that the doctor was to have whatever she wanted, nodded and walked quickly in the direction of the West Wing. ‘Toby, hold his legs. Leo, make sure he can’t move his arms.’ Dan was giving the two men instructions as to how to hold Sam while she inserted the naso-gastric tube. They were clearly uneasy, but she ignored their nervousness and walked across to Sam’s bed. As she leaned across, she heard Sam’s desperate whisper. ‘No, please…’ She looked up. ‘Wait downstairs for me please.’ The two men walked out and Dan waited until she was sure they were alone. It was only a few seconds before the silence was broken. ‘They held my mouth open…’ Dan forced a hardness into her voice. ‘Sam, you need to eat.’ Sam’s response bought tears to her eyes. ‘I don’t ever want anything in my mouth again. Ever.’ ‘Let me try.’ Dan looked round. ‘Are you sure you want to?’ Josh shook his head. ‘No.’ Dan handed Josh the tube. ‘Sam needs to eat something today. If he can’t or won’t eat, you need to put his in. If it doesn’t reach the green mark, it’s not in the right place. Don’t force it any further. And make sure you tape it in place.’ """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""" ‘We’re gonna try some ice cream.’ Josh’s voice made Dan jump. ‘I’ll get Leo to get some. What do you want?’ Josh smiled. ‘Chocolate.’ Dan looked at him. ‘How did you do it?’ Josh almost didn’t answer. Then he realised Dan knew about him and Sam. If no-one had told her, he was sure she would have worked it out. ‘I told him if he didn’t eat, I’d resign and he’d never see me again.’ ‘And that worked?’ Josh smiled. ‘Yeah. While he was trying to talk me out of it, I fed him carrots.’ Dan pulled her phone from her handbag. She dialled, then waited until it was answered. ‘Leo, we need chocolate ice cream. Get two tubs. I can eat the other one in front of you as a punishment for breaking your promise.’ Leo remembered what he had said two days earlier. He hadn’t found the right moment, and he had been glad Dan hadn’t reminded him of it. Until now. ‘Okay.’ While they waited, Josh said: ‘People think Sam’s weak, just cos he’s young. He’s not. He’s stronger than me.’ Dan waited, wondering what was coming next. ‘I took his hand. I didn’t know anyone was watching. It was my fault.’ Dan shook her head. ‘No, Josh! It wasn’t your fault. Or Sam’s. The only people who bear any responsibility for this are the people who did it.’ ‘You been seeing Leo long?’ Caught out by the sudden change of subject, Dan shook her head. ‘No. A couple of months.’ ‘He’s nice.’ ‘How would you know?’ Josh was concerned he had said the wrong thing. ‘Oh, I don’t. I mean, just cos he and the President, that’s just…he’s not…’ Josh stopped talking, and Dan managed to keep her face completely blank. Her mind was a different matter entirely. But she had to say something to fill the silence. ‘You got him dressed again, didn’t you?’ ‘How did you know?’ ‘Well I didn’t think the people who attacked you did it. And his clothes weren’t torn.’ ‘I didn’t want anyone to see him…’ Dan put a hand on Josh’s arm. ‘It was a nice thing to do.’ """""""""""""""""""""""""""""" Handing her the ice-cream, Leo glanced at Abbey who had taken time during the few minutes she had between meetings to come and check on Josh and Sam. And Leo had taken the opportunity to talk to her as they both walked into the Residence. She smiled encouragingly. ‘I’ll take this in to them. That way, I get to have some.’ Dan looked at Leo. ‘Where is mine?’ ‘Jed has it.’ Abbey groaned. ‘Get going. If you take too long, he’ll have eaten it.’ """""""""""""""""""""""" Dan followed Leo into the Oval Office. He looked round quickly, making sure all the doors were closed. They were. Bartlet had made sure of it. ‘Where is my ice-cream, Sir?’ Bartlet looked slightly guilty. ‘It’s…around somewhere.’ Dan suddenly frowned. ‘Leo, why does the President have to be here while you share your second secret with me? Are you afraid I’ll be so upset at the news that he will have to drag me off you when I try to break your neck with my bare hands?’ Both men smiled nervously. Dan leaned back against the President’s desk. ‘Well, one of you has to say something or it’s going to be really quiet in here.’ Bartlet cleared his throat. Leo fiddled with his shirt buttons. Neither spoke. ‘Now, if this secret has to do with the, um, shall we say, intimate relationship the two of you enjoy on occasion, it’s not a secret. If it’s anything else, you had better tell me in the next ten seconds or I’m going to find my ice-cream.’ Leo managed: ‘You know? Who told you?’ Dan shook her head. ‘No. I keep people’s secrets. It was quite a relief actually. After all this time and you hadn’t done more than kiss me goodnight, I was beginning to think you were gay, Leo. And the person who told me evidently assumed that you had told me a little more about yourself than you so far have. Am I going to be restricted to one fact per month, or will I only learn things about you in the aftermath of a major crisis?’ Leo’s expression changed from shock to relief to amazement. ‘You know. And you’re still here?’ Dan nodded. ‘Yes. I’m not leaving before I have my ice-cream. Now, exactly what did you do with it, Sir?’ The President of the United States stared at the floor. ‘Um, it was melting. It was gonna make a mess, so…’ Leo walked to the door. ‘You want me to go get you some more? Dan shook her head. ‘No, Leo. It’s almost one o’clock. You can take me to lunch. And there had better be ice-cream on the dessert menu. If I’m going to convince Mrs Cunningham to come here and look after Sam, I’m going to need ice cream.’ Both men had the same question. Leo got there first. ‘Who is Mrs Cunningham?’ ‘She is a nurse. She retired from GW a couple of weeks ago. If I can, I’m going to convince her to come here and look after Sam. It’s Sunday Leo. Tomorrow, you’ll all be back at work, and I’ll be here looking after Sam. And I’m not a nurse. Plus, I’m not at all sure that Sam is going to be at all happy having someone he knows looking after him. So, if I can convince Ellie Cunningham to nurse Sam, I’ll be happy. And you want me to be happy, don’t you Leo?’ Leo nodded. ‘Yeah. Okay, let’s go.’ Click here to go to Part Four Home Send me feedback on this fic Return to the X-Files Fic Index Return to the West Wing Fic Index Return to the other fic index