Pairing: CJ/OFC (Sydney Ludlow)

Disclaimer: CJ Cregg is, unfortunately, not mine. If she were, I wouldn’t owe what I owe, and I would also be living in LA, writing for the West Wing. So, no, I don’t make any money off of her or any of the other characters that were created by Aaron Sorkin (or later on, John Wells, et al.) Melissa, Lila, and Sydney Ludlow, however, are all mine. And so are any other original characters.

Author’s note: This is what happens when a plot bunny gets into your head and won’t let go.

Timeframe: Covers the whole series, but chapter two is the night of the Mendoza confirmation.

Toby never thought about it. If you asked him, he’d tell you he never thought about any of it. In moments like this he could swear that every blood test she’d had over the past ten years had been a false positive. To everyone else, she was the paragon of health – at least an hour a day at the gym (even if it meant getting up at four AM), a diet of salads interspersed with the occasional hamburger or piece of fried chicken, at least eight bottles of water a day. He never thought about it, expect at eight AM, two PM, and ten PM. He never thought about it except when she walked into a room, or smiled, or cried, or argued with him about how they needed to be focusing on the issues from the campaign. He never thought about it except when she danced around the room, lip-synching to The Jackal and charming everyone within viewing distance. He never thought about it, that’s what he’d tell you.

He watched her stumble over the words in the same place she always did. She did it for the comedic effect, and it worked, and he laughed and forced himself to keep from crying. He’d been watching The Jackal since day one, and no one understood why it was so sacred to him. This was CJ, his sister, his best friend and every time she did this, it meant she was living her life on her terms. He never thought about it, never. Except every moment of every day.

Leo chuckled and leaned back against the table, shaking his head at the antics of the press secretary. The first time he’d seen the Jackal, they’d all been crammed into the back of the campaign bus and they’d all needed a break and so CJ had popped in this old tape she had of different seventies soul tunes. For a while it was just music in the background, but when The Jackal came on, he’d looked up to see CJ mouthing the words and Toby bowing at her altar. He had loved watching her mess up the words (he’d later learned she did it on purpose) and he loved how she could move with the grace of a dancer even while taking a tumble over a row of seats as the song ended. He smiled as he watched her slip out of her jacket and toss it in Toby’s direction. The song was nearing its end and she did her little wave of her hand and made a small bow at the waist. Never in his life had he met someone so full of that spark of energy, and it seemed so fittingly ironic. Of course she would love every breath as much as she did – she never knew how many breaths she had left.

He had been privately wrestling with the knowledge of two different, yet so identical secrets, and he didn’t know which one was harder to deal with. Yes, Jed’s condition was terrible, but it wasn’t fatal. CJ could suddenly develop symptoms tomorrow and a poorly timed flu bug could send her right back into the hospital. He’d done his research and he now knew that the drugs she took involved side effects like kidney failure and heart palpitations and even lack of bowel control. He was angry with both of them for not telling him things he needed to know, but he also knew why they had made their respective decisions. Jed had wanted to be the president, and CJ the press secretary, and there was no way it would have happened if they’d told the whole truth.

He admitted to being uncomfortable with the idea of CJ’s sexuality. He loved Sydney, and he considered CJ a daughter, but in accepting them completely, it meant he had to be okay if Mallory came to him and told him that she was a lesbian. It bothered him that he knew that he wouldn’t take it well, not at first. He wanted life to be easy for his daughter, and he knew that life was far from easy for CJ and Sydney. He wondered how CJ’s father had taken it, that initial news – he didn’t know anything about that, and he’d never felt it was his place to ask.

Josh watched Toby and Leo watch CJ and frowned. It wasn’t like he felt left out, even though he did. But something, lately, had changed and suddenly Leo was a close member of CJ’s little circle. He never thought he’d see Toby and Leo laughing together, but there they were, blushing at something CJ had whispered to them and laughing and acting as friends and not peers.

He didn’t understand how CJ and Sydney could make it work. College for him had been a sea of confusion and three-week-girlfriends, but somewhere between CJ earning her doctorate from Berkeley and Sydney graduating Magna Cum Laude from Columbia Law and both of them taking advancing jobs in their chosen fields, they’d managed to not only be in love but stay together. Somewhere between occasionally living on opposite coasts, multiple campaign schedules, and bouncing around to different PR and law firms, they’d managed to build a life that most couples only dreamed of. He admitted to being jealous of what they had. While Leo and Toby hadn’t been able to keep their marriages going, Sydney only seemed to love CJ even more every time they looked at each other. He also didn’t think it was fair that two women as beautiful as CJ and Sydney were lesbians.

Carol leaned in the doorway to the press office and checked her watch for the millionth time. It wasn’t that she wanted to get home to Luke, it was, but she wanted her boss to go home. She’d had to pick up CJ’s refill today and it only served to remind her that CJ needed to get home at reasonable hours. Not like it ever happened. One AM was reasonable, and she knew that even after CJ had ordered her to go home, that she’d go back to her office and work to get ready for the morning and then be up again before 5 AM and be in the office by seven. It was inspirational, actually. Carol had lost three family members to the disease, and none of them had ever lived life with the same voracity that CJ did.

She laughed as Toby took CJ’s hands and spun her around the pressroom. Patti Labelle’s Lady Marmalade was on the stereo now – yes this was CJ’s seventies soul music medley. She shared Toby’s silent worries, and always answered any questions Sydney had when she called. It was her job to make sure everyone knew what was going on and that everyone would be in the right place at the right time – and that went so far as to be ready to get people in their places when the end came for CJ. She’d followed CJ from Trinton Day to Manchester and she was going to be there, still taking dictation, from CJ’s hospice room.

But, now, in this moment she was laughing at the press secretary and the communications director and she was still laughing when she turned her back on the party and headed toward her office – planning to get as much as possible off CJ’s desk and organized before they had to be back here in a few hours. It wasn’t the late nights or the early morning briefing after the lack of sleep that bothered Carol about her job, it was the eight AM medication that always made CJ cranky. By eight-thirty, CJ always needed a ginger ale and a couple of crackers. By noon she was hungry, but had no appetite for anything. By four she’d have been to the gym and finally found the elusive appetite only to have dinner chased away by the need to work. For years, it had been Carol’s job to keep more than coffee in her boss’ system and to keep the press off any stories that might only add to CJ’s stress level. She had learned a long time ago that worrying didn’t do any good – it was action that kept her going. But that didn’t stop her from keeping CJ’s door closed during the busiest hours of the day or making sure that no matter what, there was at least a salad and some crackers on her desk come six o’clock. Worry didn’t help, but she figured it couldn’t hurt either, and it was her job to take care of her boss. She never understood assistants who leaked stories to reporters or stabbed their boss’ in the back – it was the job of the assistant to take it all and say nothing. It was the job of the assistant to make life easier in the morning. It was the job of the assistant to worry so that their boss didn’t need to.

Sydney smiled as their eyes met across the bedroom. In moments like this, she could forget all of it. When she saw that look of joy in CJ’s eyes she could forget the research on side effects and the agonizing waiting for blood test results, and even that day when she’d walked into their bedroom with a letter from Berkeley County General. CJ had been dozing that day, home early from work and at the end of a long run of being constantly tired. Over the years each of their careers had taken their turns as being the more important than the relationship, but in the end they always seemed to find their way home. She worried, constantly, about the late hours and the hectic schedule, and the taking off to small, disease-ridden third world countries at a moment’s notice (was she wrong to include any of the deep south in that category?) and the constant exposure that CJ had to the world at large. But, if CJ had given in and huddled in the house for the rest of her life, Sydney was sure that she’d be dead by now. No, CJ loved to live and she planned to keep living and no little thing like HIV was going to get in the way of her doing just that. So, Sydney kept her fears to herself and when it got to be too much, she would call up Toby and they would lie to each other, saying that they weren’t worried and that they weren’t thanking God every day for the few more hours that he had granted them with CJ.

She purred as CJ slipped in under the soft cotton sheets and the purr became a growl as her hands touched CJ’s bare breasts. Foreplay was their favorite part of sex, the time when their skin could touch without dental dams or finger cots. She loved being able to suckle at CJ’s nipples, to kiss her way down CJ’s bare stomach, and there was no smell in the world she loved more than the heady scent of CJ’s arousal. For almost seventeen years, there had only been one person she’d made love to and every time it was as precious as the first night under the trees in the old redwood forest. She never thought about the end of it for the two of them. She never thought about living wills or life insurance or standing alone at the end of her own days. She never thought about pneumonia or KS or CMV. She never thought about wasting or side effects. She never held her breath whenever CJ sneezed and she never found herself on her knees praying each time CJ went in for a blood test. Never. CJ’s smile kept her going, kept her remembering that it was only about getting through each day and not looking at the future. CJ had a saying, “never let the fall be the thing to kill you” – so Sydney laughed and loved and cherished each minute she had next to this amazing woman. It was only when she was alone that she dared to fall – a fall she’d never let CJ see – it was only when she was alone that she let her mind run the gamut of scenarios, and when she hit her knees and prayed.

CJ gasped and reached back for the headboard while Sydney’s tongue drove her closer and closer to the brink. There were times when she missed the actual feel of Sydney’s lips over her clit and the touch of Sydney’s tongue deep inside her body. But times like this, when that thin piece of plastic between their bodies didn’t seem to matter, she just opened her legs even further and moved one hand to tangle in Sydney’s hair. Moments like this she felt more alive than any trip to the gym or winning any vote could do for her. She never thought about the end, never. She didn’t have the time or the patience to do more than update her living will every year or to make sure that she took her medication on time. She never thought about the end, about the rocks rushing up to meet her while the fall took more and more away from her. She never thought about the eventual lesions or the lack of organ support or how her mind could be eaten away. She didn’t bother to think about what CMV could do to her already shitty vision or the needles that came along with the treatments. She didn’t need to think about it, everyone else around her seemed to – so why should she add to the process.

Why did she need to think about it when she lived it?