TITLE: "How I've Been Alone"
AUTHOR: S.N. Kastle
FANDOM/PAIRING: The West Wing, Josh/Sam
SUMMARY:
Post-episode, "The Portland Trip." If the flight was supposed
to land
at midnight "local time," Josh didn't go home until after 3
a.m. A
little late-night phone action seemed in order.
RATING: PG-13. It's not really that kind of action.
SPOILERS:
"The Portland Trip," obviously; otherwise clean. Could fit
within the
universe of my "Something In Between" but
is actually meant
to be a stand-alone story.
DISCLAIMER:
Not mine. Aaron Sorkin rules! Lyrics from "Wait" by John
Lennon
and Paul McCartney. Yes, we're back to Rubber Soul.
INDULGENCES:
I entertained myself with a private screening of this ep
because I'll be
occupied with real life when it's rerun this week, and
look what happened.
This conversation would not fit into my in-progress
behemoth of a story (see
teasers), but nothing
else
would progress until it had been exorcised.
DISTRIBUTION:
List archives OK; all others please send me URL of
archived location.
Originally posted 19 March 2001.
THANKS:
I'm motivated to thank director Paris Barclay and actor Charley
Lang (Matt
Skinner), whose own commitments to intelligent gay repartee
on the show clearly
shaped this episode for the better. And gracias a las
Amber and Nomi
for a close read; and to Jae, for the bigger picture. The
next plot
is all you, girl.
FEEDBACK:
You better. Send all constructive criticism and compliments
to snk@wearemany.net.
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"How
I've Been Alone"
by S.N. Kastle <snk@wearemany.net>
It's been a long time
Now I'm coming back home
I've been away now
Oh,
how I've been alone
-- The Beatles
JOSH
DUG HIS cell out of his coat pocket, even though he was sitting on
the couch,
six feet away from where the real phone rested. It was four
in the
morning, and six feet was just too far to walk if it wasn't going
to end
up with him in bed. Even when he managed that, he'd still be
alone.
He dialed information for Portland and had the call rung right
through to
the hotel.
"Uhhhnn..." Sam answered the phone with a sound that was somewhere
between a grunt and a moan. Josh wondered if having phone sex would
immediately bring Murphy's Law into effect and ensure that a transcript
of
the conversation would be on the Drudge Report by Monday.
"Hey," he said, still deliberating.
"Hey." He heard rustling, imagined Sam sitting up in bed. "What's
going on?"
"I just wanted to say hi. Because we didn't talk on the plane."
"Yeah," Sam said, clearing his throat. "It's such a long flight."
"Yeah, that's why he likes it."
"I know," Sam said. "Where are you?"
"Home, finally. At your place, I mean. Um, house-sitting. I,
like, watered a plant." Josh wondered if Sam was wearing anything.
Sometimes he slept naked. But it was probably cold in Oregon this time
of year, and the heat in hotels was never reliable, even when the
president
was staying there. "I am *so* not going in tomorrow," he
said, shrugging
out of the coat.
"No, you should take the day off." He left the coat on the floor.
He
liked littering Sam's apartment with his stuff. It felt
intermingled.
"What time is the speech?"
"Ug. Uh, 10, I think. We should be back by seven, I think, if you
still want to have dinner."
"Definitely," Josh said, letting his hand wander down around his
belt buckle
before pulling it up to rest of the sofa's back. "Did you
guys -- did
you change something?"
"Well..."
"Cause Toby started to ask me something, and then he wouldn't tell
me what
it was about. 'Off the top of your head,' he said, which always
means
he wants to change something."
"We're going to do a pilot program," Sam said. "Tuition incentives
for future teachers."
"That's a good idea."
"It would have been better for 100,000 new teachers."
"How many did you get?"
"A hundred."
"It's better, Sam." Josh kicked off his shoes, leaned back into
the
plush cushions. Sam's couch was so much nicer than his own.
"Yeah, I guess," Sam said. "I forgot to ask, is he going to sign
the
Marriage Recognition Act?"
"We're gonna pocket it."
"We'll just have to go through it again in January."
"I know. And we'll lose then. But you should have heard him, Sam,
yelling about it. He called it 'legislative gay-bashing.' He
was
pissed."
"I'm pissed," Sam said, sounding it.
"Yeah, I know. It sucks. Still, you should have heard him. I
just wish people knew that's how it really was. You know, before all
the politics fucked everything up."
"Yeah."
"Tell me about the speech."
Sam sighed, sounding frustrated. "I really choked, Josh."
"I'm sure it wasn't that bad." Sam was never as bad as he thought,
not writing, and not in anything else, either.
"No, it was worse. It was horrible. It was embarrassing."
"Is it better now?" Josh considered whether twiddling his thumbs
would
magically relieve sexual frustration.
"It's just... It's hard to be inspiring when there are all these
boundaries,
you know, about what we'd ever actually do. Why can't we
come up with
the great ideas and then convince people into believing
they can happen?"
"Because when it doesn't work we look like idiots."
"Why can't we make it work, Josh?"
"I don't know."
"It worked for Mao."
"Um, I'm not sure we really want to use his tactics in that area."
Josh had
seen The Little Red Book on the nightstand last week and had
wondered when
it was going to wind up in a speech.
"You should have been there," Sam said again.
"Yeah, well, you know how much I love flying. Plus, who would
water
your plants?"
"Yeah, because cacti really can't go 36 hours without being
watered," Sam
said, and Josh could tell he was smiling. "No, really, he
was great.
He said this great thing about how being freed from the
constraints of the
earth allows us be poets."
"He said that?"
"Yeah. Well, I said the poets part. But I was just rephrasing."
"You are, you know."
"Not tonight."
"No, really. When I went to get us a speechwriter, I had no idea
you
were such a poet." And he was. Even Sam's memos were inspiring.
And the other notes -- the ones that were buried in the back of Josh's
linen
closet, rubber-banded together in a plastic shoe-box his mother
had sent
him -- well, they were the work of a man with an ability to
wind words into
declarations of dependence the likes of which no lover
could resist.
"Well, a lot of good that does," Sam said. "I couldn't put two
words
together for the past three days, Josh. I made CJ get the draft
back
from the press so they couldn't see how bad it was."
"Sam, it happens to everyone."
"No, it doesn't happen to me. Danny told Toby to tell me I'd get
my
swing back. Danny Concanon, who on a good day gets enough
off-the-record
sources to string together five declarative sentences and
sell a paper.
Do you have any idea how humiliating that was? I just
wish you had
been there."
"So I could, what, hold your hand? You're impossible when you're
being
so hard on yourself." It was true. Sam was a nightmare when he
was on a perfectionist streak. Which was most of the time, but
especially
when he was waist-deep in a stream of thought.
"I know," Sam admitted. "But when I write --" He dropped off the
end
of the sentence. Josh couldn't tell if it was the cell or if Sam
didn't
want to finish.
"What?"
"Nothing. Never mind." He heard Sam click on the television and
the strains of the Cheers theme song in the background.
"Sam." He was whining, and he didn't care how silly it made him
sound.
"What?"
"You're going to laugh."
"Sam, I promise you, I'm so tired that I don't even think I
remember *how*
to laugh."
"When I write, I hear you, in my head. I can hear what you like.
What
makes you laugh. When you applaud."
"I applaud a lot, I bet." A studio audience laughed thinly through
the wires.
"I'm serious."
One day, Josh thought, he'd understand just how men could be so bad
at taking
compliments while being so sure they deserved them. "I wish
you'd been
here tonight," he said instead, "when I was talking to Matt."
"You met with the good congressman?"
"Yeah," Josh said. "It still feels weird to call him that."
"Did he flirt with you?"
"Sam, he does not flirt with me."
"He doesn't know, does he?"
"He never did. I think he thinks I'm sleeping with Donna,
actually."
Sometimes, Josh thought, maybe he encouraged Matt to think
that, but he wasn't
going to admit it to Sam.
"So?"
"I just wish you'd been there to argue with him, instead of me."
"I'm sure you did a fine job, Josh." Sam was old-school about
words
like 'fine,' Josh tried to remember. 'Fine' was superlative, not
ambivalent.
"Yeah," Josh said. "I don't know. He actually started to make
sense."
"What did he say?"
"Before or after the fourth drink?"
"Wait, you were drinking with him?" Sam was pretending to sound
jealous,
Josh thought. Or at least he hoped Sam was just pretending.
"Uh, yeah. We were just sitting in the mess, talking."
"Okay." Sam didn't sound like he believed Josh. "So what did he
say after you got him drunk?"
"That his whole life didn't have to be about being gay."
"Who said it did?"
"I don't know. I think maybe *we* did."
"Well, we're Democrats, Josh. We believe in identity politics."
"Yeah, I guess."
"It's not such a bad idea."
"Yeah, I guess," Josh said again. "But is it a good one? Now, I
mean? Still?" There had been a moment there, when Matt had started
making sense, when Josh had almost told him all of it. Because he'd
started to wonder whether maybe his whole life didn't have to be about
being in the White House, either. Whether, if he could recommend shitty
anti-gay policy to the president because it was the right move to make
politically, and still come home the same night to Sam's apartment, he
should
be allowed to stop feeling like they were sneaking around.
"I don't know," Sam said.
Josh sighed. "Me either."
"You should go to bed, Josh. It's morning there."
"It's not the same, you know. Alone."
Sam chuckled a little, almost under his breath. "Yeah. I wish I
was there."
"Me too."
"Look, I'm on my cell," Josh said, hating it. Hating the rules
they'd
made even though everyone who mattered already knew.
"Yeah, I can hear the difference. Why didn't you use my phone?"
Sam was always joking that he was lazy, and Josh hated to prove him
right.
But he was too tired to even think of a clever answer, which
left him with
the truth. "It was too far away."
He could hear Sam smirk. "Are you going to sleep on the couch?"
"No," Josh said. "Your sheets smell too good."
"Josh, you're on the cell."
"Yup. I know." He stood up and started walking to the bedroom.
"I'm going now, before I say something really inappropriate."
"I'm not wearing anything, you know."
"Sam!" He stopped short in the hallway.
"I just thought you should know."
"I'll see you tomorrow," Josh said, dropping his suit jacket on the
floor
next to the bed. "I hate being alone."
"I'm coming back today."
"That's even better."
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end. feedback to snk@wearemany.net.
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