Title: Breathing in Silence
Author: juxtaposed
Rating: G
Category: Romance/Angst
Pairing: Toby/CJ,
Spoilers: Season 4
Disclaimer: All characters are property of Aaron Sorkin, NBC and The West Wing, and are used without permission, without intent to profit. The lyrics are from the Lisa Loeb song “How”
Archiving: Yes, just let me know. You can find this and my other works online at www.geocities.com/juxtaposed666
Feedback: Appreciated at [email protected]. I’ve greatly appreciated all the wonderful feedback received for “Ghost” and “Escape Velocity.” I planned “Ghost” as a stand-alone, but it was feedback that convinced me to make a series of out it.
Notes: This is fourth in a series I am now calling “Sex and Carefully Guarded Secrets.” The first three must be read before this will make any sense.
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Breathing in Silence
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why did you come here?
you weren't invited.
and you're on the outside - stay on the outside.
and now you want to ask me "why?"
it's like - how does your heart beat, and why do you breathe?
how does your heart beat, and why do you breathe?
-lisa loeb, "how"
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She tries to take a breath, and no air enters her lungs and her heart trips in rapid, frantic beats. She is suddenly trapped in a vacuum, and she knows the cause has entered her office without knocking, knowing if he did, she would fold herself into a desk drawer to avoid him.
She holds her breath and keeps her eyes on her briefing book, her feet up on the desk, and refuses to acknowledge him. He refuses to allow her to hide. “She doesn’t want to marry me, CJ.”
She tries to ignore him, feels him standing over her and she wishes for oxygen and silence. She doesn’t want to talk about Andie, doesn’t want to counsel Toby on romancing his ex-wife. But she is his best friend, and she gave up her right to the ring he is now saving for Andie, and she must do her duty to “Team Toby” and to the Administration.
She swings her legs down and drops the briefing book on the desktop and refuses to meet his eyes. If she doesn’t look at him, she can breathe a little, can speak. “Why not? Talk to her. Woo her. Women like to be wooed.” But her head is becoming light and her chest heavy from lack of air, and she only wants him to leave her to her silence and her work, as they are all she has left.
She feels him move away and it becomes still easier to breathe, and then his soft voice. “It’s hard to ‘woo her’ when she knows I don’t want to marry her.”
Her heartbeat becomes deep and painful and she can’t breathe again, like he has put his mouth over hers and is sucking the air from her lungs, and she remembers kissing him in her kitchen, her back pressed against the counter and his fingers on her neck. She gives up and looks up from the book and sees him closing the door. He leans back against it and his eyes are hard and they never leave her.
“Why would she think that? Of course you do. You just have the wooing ability of rock.” Her voice is getting higher, and she can feel panic rising and her breath coming in short gasps as she struggles against the vacuum that is Toby. She doesn’t want to discuss this here, but he has trapped her, still standing in front of the door with his eyes inscrutable.
“CJ…”
She stands, and her movement stops him. She wants to intimidate him with her height, but she feels shrunken and tiny and right now, slumped against her door with his eyes watching her, he is infinitely more intimidating than she has the energy to be. “I don’t really want to talk about this here.”
She still can’t read his eyes, but at her words he seems to grow larger, to tower over her, to dominate her from across the room without a touch, and something in his eyes that she can feel like fingers on her skin is examining her. Measuring her will, her resistance, poking for clues and symptoms and anomalies, and suddenly she feels stripped bare before him, and only his eyes are touching her.
She is standing naked in her office under Toby’s gaze, and she can’t move and she is terrified because even when they had sex she was never naked, and now he knows everything, her insecurities, her fears, every emotion and memory and wish she’s ever had spills out of her to pile on the floor for Toby to examine and judge, and she is too exhausted and frightened to cover herself. In that split second she lets him look, lets him search for whatever he wants. She’ll let him do anything if it means he’ll turn around and walk away and leave her with her work and her silence.
And after a minute or an hour or a year, he turns and opens the door and walks away, and she hears the rush, feels the room fill with air and a layer of silence that covers her gasps for breath and the pounding of her heart.
-FIN-
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