Title: All I Want For Christmas
Pairing: CJ/Toby
Rating: A for angst
Completed: December 2002
For John, my sunrise and sunset, who passed away in his sleep on December 11th.
*~*~*~*
It wouldn’t have been so bad if it had been at least snowing, or foggy, or gloomy outside - the sort of day that bad things were meant to happen. But the sun was shining, the streets were full of people making the last minute shopping trip and everyone looked happy.
CJ sat in the window seat staring out at the street below. She wasn’t sure how long she had been sitting there, and she didn’t care. The phone call had come in the middle of the night. Andi’s voice had been quiet and composed, her words carefully chosen in the hope of lessening the burden.
“CJ, I don’t know how to tell you this but. . .”
She had known immediately that he was gone, that a large part of her life was going to be missing.
“Toby slipped away in his sleep.”
The fact that he hadn’t suffered, that there had been little pain, was little comfort then. Not when it was someone she had loved for almost forty years.
When Jed and Abbey had passed away within months of each other, CJ had been half expecting it. Jed’s illness had been prolonged and painful and Abbey had pined for him. With Toby, it was different. He had cancer, it was inevitable he would die, but not so soon, not without saying goodbye.
The tears had begun almost as soon as the phone dropped back into its cradle, tears which had fallen in earnest each time the phone had rung or she had remembered something happy.
Josh had been just as stunned and confused. He had sought answers, answers she didn’t have. Sam, dear sweet Sam, had been at a lost for words.
Toby had become a big part of their lives, their friend, brother and for CJ, so much more.
She wasn’t sure when exactly she had fallen in love with him, when his face became the first thing she saw each morning and the last thing each night. All that mattered some days was that he had been proud of her. Whether there was ever a time when Toby loved her, she’d never know now.
Their first kiss was when they worked together on his first campaign, a sweet good luck kiss for his maiden speech. In the minutes and hours afterwards she had wondered if she’d made a mistake, if he’d think her stupid. Their second kiss had been the following day, a long passionate embrace that had left her wanting more. For a few months they had danced around a relationship, neither sure whether it was what they wanted. Finally they had gone their separate ways.
It had never been easy to be Toby’s friend, but then Toby was not an easy person to know. He was stubborn, antagonistic, and at times just damn right annoying, but she couldn’t give up on him.
Three years on, he had married Andi and CJ had befriended the other woman. Toby’s happiness and obvious love had been hard to watch but CJ had, hoping that he’d never end up hurt.
CJ pulled the frayed robe around her and pressed her forehead against the window pane. Now she was the one hurting. Toby was dead and she hadn’t said goodbye. They had met for lunch less than a week ago and he had chatted about his plans for Christmas with the twins. Leo had joined them for coffee and it was like old times, sparring and sarcasm aplenty but little said of any substance. If she’d known, even if she’d had an inkling that that would be the last time she would see him, the last time she would hug him as he squirmed, their final kiss, she would have said so much more. There was so much running through her mind right then. His words scrawled across the all too familiar legal pad, his hands moving through the air as he talked, his wry smile when she said something that amused him and the place he held in her heart. It would have been so simple to tell him that she loved him, that she respected him, but the chance had been taken away.
CJ clenched her fists at her sides. She was angry, bitter even at Andi. It wasn’t her fault and in time she would learn to deal with it, but right then she hated Toby’s partner. Andi must have known Toby was dying and she hadn’t let anyone know. Surely his friends had the right to know, to prepare.
Then there was guilt. Guilt for not being there when he needed her. She should have been there. It wasn’t fair, but life so seldom was.
Something caught her attention and she turned. The tiny forlorn tree sat in the corner, the presents underneath taunting her. They were going to do the whole exchanging gifts thing on New Year’s Eve, her compromise to Josh and Toby for the holidays. Now they wouldn’t have the opportunity.
His voice had escaped her, she wasn’t sure now if he mumbled or growled. His face played in her mind, not the Toby she had known for a lifetime, but the Toby in the hospital after surgery, pale and in pain. It wasn’t really him, but the image wouldn’t go away.
Fresh tears spilled onto her cheeks as she struggled to her feet and crossed to the tree. Tomorrow would be Christmas. A frozen dinner awaited her in the freezer and a glass or two of wine. It would go uneaten and undrunk now. Her world had been pulled out from beneath her, like the proverbial rug.
They had never even made love, she’d never felt his hands caressing her skin, but she’d imagined it. Wondered if maybe he thought of her too, wondered, if not for the twins, whether maybe he and Andi would have finally parted company, wondered if he‘d ever turn to her.
All she wanted for Christmas, all she had wanted for nearly forty years, had been Toby’s love, all she had instead was overwhelming emptiness.
Shaking her head, CJ unplugged the Christmas tree lights. The holiday was over.
The End