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Title: Sleep Dep
Author: Priya Deonarain
Rating: R, for language
SPOILERS: Manchester, Part 1 (it's a mid-ep); possibly M2, if they're 
going where I think they're going.
Characters: Leo, CJ
Archive: wherever you want to.
Disclaimer: No money being made, I don't own 'em, please don't sue.
Summary: Blame it on the sleep deprivation.

[-----]

"Relieved, CJ?"

"Leo, don't-"

"Relieved?? He's relieved that he-"

"Just shut up already-"

"Yeah, because the last thing we need to do is talk about how to fix 
this," he quipped, eyes cold. "CJ, what the hell happened in there?"

She leaned back in her chair, her elbows sliding off her desk in one 
fluid motion. "I fucked up. What do you *think* happened in there?"

"I think you fucked up," he replied coldly. "How the hell could you 
slip up like that?"

"I was tired, all right?" she sighed. "I was dead on my feet, and I 
snapped at him, and it came out all wrong."

"You were tired," he repeated, his voice quiet and his eyes narrowed. 
"You were tired."

"I was tired."

"We had a week to rest up before this fight," he stated.

"No," she chuckled. "*We* had a week. You, dear friend, had a year 
and a half."

"That's not fair," he said quietly. "I didn't know that it would 
happen like this-"

"Leo, how could you-" She stopped short and took a calming breath. 
"When he told you, that day, that he has multiple sclerosis, what 
was going through your head?"

"When you saw Abbey inject him with something in Manhattan, Kansas, 
what was going through *yours*?" he retorted coldly.

She stared at him for a moment, taken aback by the accusatory tone 
in his voice, wondering how he'd found out. "Leo . . . "

"CJ, I hired you because you can handle the press," he began, his 
voice menacing and rougher than normal. "I hired you because you're 
tough, not because you 'get tired'-"

"I'm human, Leo," she roared as she threw her hands in the air, 
exasperated. "Like most warm-blooded human beings out there, I get 
tired. I guess you wouldn't know the feeling though, now would you? 
You haven't had warm blood flow through you since--since-" She cut 
herself off, and put her hands palm-down on the desk. "Fuck it."

"Great witty comeback there, Claudia Jean." He took a step towards 
her desk and added, "I didn't hire you so you could be coddled when 
you get tired. I hired you because, unlike the men on this staff, you 
don't slip up. I hired you because you *tell* me things, when you 
think they're important, and you don't let things get past you."

She stared at him again, confounded by the simultaneous praise and 
smackdown that she was receiving. "I slip up, Leo. If you're surprised 
by that, it's your own damn fault for putting me up on a pedestal. 
And I really didn't think that what happened in Manhattan, Kansas, 
was all that important. Could've been allergy shots, for all I knew. 
You, on the other hand . . . the most powerful man in the most 
powerful country told you he has a disease that could conceivably 
take away his cognitive functions, and what? You say, 'Okay, Lone 
Ranger, I'll keep that factoid tucked away in my saddlebag.' I'm not 
the only one around here who slips up, you know." She sighed and 
picked up some paper on her desk, pretending to read it. "Now, 
if you'll excuse me, I have some work to do here."

"I never said you were."

She looked up from the paper she wasn't reading. "Pardon me?"

"I never said you were the only one to slip up," he stated. "Look, 
CJ. I'm sorry you're tired. But we don't have downtime here. We're 
gonna be tired on the job for the next two to four years, and you're 
gonna have to deal with it, just like the rest of us."

"That was an ambiguous statement," she muttered.

"What was?"

"I'm gonna have to deal with it, just like the rest of you," she 
replied. "Do you mean, I'm going to have to deal with being tired 
on the job, just like the rest of you do, or that I'll have to deal 
with being tired on the job, just like how I deal with the rest of 
you?"

"CJ-"

"I mean, I know that both this staff and sleep deprivation can be 
royal pains in the ass, so that statement could very well be what you 
meant-" 

"CJ, you're the press secretary. You deal with it. That's what you 
do," he explained softly.

"Gee, Leo, thanks for explaining that one to me, those last three 
years I'd been shootin' blind." She looked back at the paper and 
then dropped it on the desk in frustration. "Do you think I don't 
know that I made the biggest screw-up in the history of this 
administration? Do you think I'm ignorant of that?"

"CJ," Leo said, almost chidingly, almost frustratedly. "Of course I 
know that you know you fucked up. I'm not stupid, you know."

"Could've fooled me. Hid that one in your saddlebag too, huh, Tonto."

"That was uncalled for-"

"Well, so was keeping his illness a secret from his staff for a good 
year and a half," she bellowed. "God, Leo, what were you thinking?"

"If your best friend of forty years-"

"Dammit, Leo, he's not your best friend," she growled. "He's the 
goddamn President of the United States of America, with the strongest 
military in the world at his fingertips and more natural enemies than 
any other head of state, ever. He took that oath, and he stopped being 
your best friend and started being your boss and leader. Start 
thinking in *those* terms, and we'll talk."

"Stop turning this conversation into something it's not, and *then* 
we'll talk," he countered coldly, his voice rising with every word. 
"Do you have any idea what you just insinuated? Do you have any idea 
what you just said to me?"

"No, because I never have any idea what I say," she sneered. "Swear 
to God, maybe I should just resign."

He watched in stunned silence as the sarcasm in her eyes turned to 
serious thought, and he knew that the anger in his was turning to 
fear. "You were tired," he stated anxiously.

"Leo-"

"You were tired, CJ. This can be fixed in some other way."

She got up abruptly, grabbing some papers, and strode to the door. 
"I gotta go talk to-" She was out of her office, and Leo knew that 
she'd stopped talking. He did not follow her, but looked after her, 
his lips parted and his mouth cottony, and his gaze that of a man 
who'd just received the death penalty.

He swallowed, and then sat down.

-end-