Title: Everything Will Be Wonderful Someday

Author: Jess Another Unofficial

Category: Jed/Abbey

Spoilers: Some References to 17 people and to be safe everything after that

Disclaimer: The Characters belong to the West Wing and it’s

creators. They belong to Warner Bros., Aaron Sorkin,

and other rich Hollywoold people. No copyright
infringement is intended. The title belongs to Everclear, 'wonderful'
Summary: Don’t want to give it away, you can read it. It is very good and
not that long. (So I think)
Rated: Serious discussions no foul language at all.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


May 2, 2001

Have you ever wondered which hurts the most; saying something and wishing
you had not, or saying nothing and wishing you had? They both tremendously
hurt. When Abbey came home today I was excited. I had ever reason to be. She
is my wife, she was away from me, away from me when I could’ve used her
support the most. She walked in the office and I asked her, ‘How was the
flight?’ It seemed like the most logical greeting at the time, but too my
wife it was the last thing she wanted to discuss. I shouldn’t have went into
the: ‘We are husband and wife......before we launch into a huge argument we
do, ‘how was the trip?’ ‘How was the flight?’’ lecture. That’s the
‘something’ that I wish I hadn’t said. The whole argument that followed was
about me, not telling her, about Zoey’s Georgetown papers. There it is, the:
‘said nothing and wishing I had,’ part. I guess the most important things are
the hardest things to say.

‘Don't be afraid to tell someone you love her. If you do, they might break
your heart... but if you don't, you might break theirs.’ I heard that before
some place. I’m not sure where at the moment, in fact I’m not sure about a
whole lot lately. These arguments I keep having with my wife. They changed
over the past few years from: ‘Why didn’t you take the garbage out?’ To,
‘Why didn’t you tell me I signed a form that is going to incriminate me in
this large plot of yours, to defraud the American public in order to win a
presidential election?’ I try to tell her I love her. I’ve tried so many
times I’m beginning to sound like a tape recorder. Every time I tell her she
ignores it, snubs it away with a pun or a comment on how mad she is at me. I
keep telling her though, I care for her to much to break her heart. I could
never, never tell her I don’t love her.

I always listen to my heart, it is my main counsel. Your heart decides whom
it likes and whom it doesn't. You can't tell your heart what to do. It does
it on its own....when you least suspect it, or even when you don't want it
to. People always ask me, ‘What should I do?’ I simply respond, ‘Listen to
your heart.’ My heart always finds its way to Abbey no matter how pissed I
am at her.

Have you ever wanted to love someone with everything you had? I don’t think
many people do. I don’t think it is entirely possible, but I damn well try.
I try everyday to show Abbey how much I love her. I follow the unwritten
commandment, ‘Everything that is yours is yours, everything that is mine is
yours.’ I give her everything. I try everything to show my appreciation, it
just seems like everytime I do I get slapped back down. Either my job
interferes, or I say some stupid-ass lame thing that I end up sleeping on
the couch for.

Have you ever denied your feelings for someone because your fear of
rejection was too hard to handle? I’m beginning too. Our conversations seem
to end or start with, ‘I love you Abbey,’ to which she responds ‘You
Jackass....’ and continues on about what she is pissed at, and usually it’s
me. I am beginning to feel rejected and it hurts. It unimaginably hurts,
that someone I love so much, can be so pissed at me.

She is pissed about our ‘deal,’ that I would not seek another term. It’s so
hard for me not too. I love this job, I love these people, I love doing
good, but I also love my wife and nothing means more to me than her. The
deal was to keep the MS a secret from everybody. We would basically lie.
What we didn’t know back then was that I would eventually become president
and this secret would come back and bite us in the ass. People are going to
ask, ‘Why did you lie?’ In fact they are already asking. The answer is
simple. Why does anybody lie? We tell lies when we are afraid.... afraid of
what we don't know, afraid of what others will think, afraid of what will be
found out. I was afraid of my MS. I thought if I just kept on living my life
like I was, that everything would turn out alright. That when the time came
and the MS began to take it’s toll I would quietly announce my ‘newly
discovered illness’ and slide out of the spotlight.

But every time you tell a lie.... the thing you fear grows stronger. Life is
all about risks and it requires you to jump. Don't be a person who has to
look back and wonder what they would have, or could have had. Think about
what you have and had. Then you decide what is best: Should I seek another
term? Resign? Disclose my MS before I resign? Should I tell them I had MS
for 8 years? or rather it is new? Should I finish my term and step out of
the lime-light? Disclose my MS and hope everything goes away? It is hard to
say when it is you. I feel like a TV character, one that has a dilemma and
the answer is so obvious that everyone is screaming it at you and you just
have to unscramble it. But the answer is simple, stop the lie and stop the
fear from growing.

I also have my family to think about. I have to think about Zoey, Ellie,
Liz, Annie and Abbey. I have to think about Leo, Toby, CJ, Josh, Sam, Donna,
Margaret, Joey, Mrs. Landingham, Charlie and others in my extend family that
I am dragging into this ‘conspiracy’. Like everyone else I have priorities
and those are first and foremost my wife and kids.

I can understand were my family and everyone is coming from, I mean think
about it. What would you do if every time you wanted someone they would
never be there? What would you do if your best friend died tomorrow and you
never got to tell them how you felt? What would you do if you watched your
husband, friend or father die knowing he doesn’t know who his, why he is
dying, or that he doesn’t know many, many people love him? But my biggest
fear is dying and not being able to tell my wife ‘I had an amazing life and
I love you.’ Think about it: What would you do if you never got the chance
to say ‘I am friends with all of my family and they know I love them’? But I
am President of The United States and I also have to worry about: Joe Brown
form Davenport who is mad at me because I spent his money on school books to
better educate his kids, instead of repairing his road. Stacey Miller from
Kansas who has ten kids, no husband, no money, no job and is still paying
taxes on her shack-of-a-house. Henry Killington from Detroit who is pissed
because he is making five hundred thousand dollars a year and he still has
to pay taxes so Stacey Miller’s all over can live. I also have to worry
about racists who are going to kill my daughter for dating a black man. I
have to worry about India blowing away Pakistan. Castro invading Miami.
POW’s still in Korea that no one knows about. Unlike every other schmuck, I
have to worry about two hundred and sixty million people, along with
refugees, immigrants, other countries, and the one in five children living
in the most gut-wrenching, back-breaking, poverty filled environments ever
imaginable and that they will never become educated, benefit from the health
care package I will sign, or the tax cut bill, or for that matter even live
old enough to shave.


I have this fearful dialogue always in the back of my mind I heard
somewhere: ‘Some people love, and some people die. But I want to tell you
that you are a friend. If something happened to me tomorrow, you would be in
my heart. Would I be in yours?’ Why does this lingers in the back of my
mind? I don’t know. It probably has something to do with being forgotten. I
worked my whole life to become, Bartlet the Inert. I don’t want to be
forgotten. I graduated High School, got a Ph.D. in economics becoming Dr.
Bartlet, received a Noble Prize in economics, I was Governor Bartlet,
Congressman Bartlet, I got elected to the House of Representatives and
finally became President Bartlet. In between there I managed to marry a
doctor, have three kids, watch them grow up, watch my granddaughter grow up,
provide money and a house for my family, watch my kids go to school, save a
friend from alcoholism, become a godfather, get shot at, watch as crazed men
shot at my daughter and her boyfriend, my staff, my friends, the public I’m
sworn to protect and myself, and finally get diagnosed with MS. I worked too
hard for 40 years of my life to have it shot to hell in one sentence,
‘Governor Bartlet, you have MS.’ I still remember it, I cried forever.

I guess once this is released I won’t have to worry about being forgotten.
It will actually be quite the opposite. I will be remembered as the
President who committed a massive act of fraud to win his election. But I
worked to hard to let everything be blown to hell. So have those who work
for me. I can’t let Josh, Sam, Toby, Charlie, CJ, Leo, Zoey, Abbey or anyone
pay for my decision. I don’t know what I would do if this affected my
family. I couldn’t take CJ or Toby hating me, I love them too much.

Then there is Abbey, if she ever stopped loving me I will have to die. There
is no point of me living without her. She is the one I need to get through
this, I just hope she is willing to be there for me. I need her so bad right
now and she seems to be pushing away from me. I’m hurting her and I can’t
stop it. All I know is I could’ve prevented it, but I didn’t and it is
eating me up inside. I watch her when she is around me, it is different than
it used to be. She seems distant and stubborn, I just want to slap her for
it but I wouldn’t dream of it. Does she realize how scared I am? Does she
realize how much I need her? How much I depend on her? And how much I hurt?
She didn’t even ask me how I was. When Toby didn’t, it was expected, but
Abbey is my wife and she understands the seriousness of this. I’m beginning
to think she doesn’t love me anymore, and that is eating me up inside more
than the MS ever could. That the whole, ‘in and sickness and in health...I
do,’ was a lie. I just hope she will understand me and we will back to
loving each other, before it is too late and I can’t say it.

Jed Bartlet

__________________

Abbey closed the book. Her whole body was wracked with tears. How could she
be such a cold-hearted bitch? She carefully rubbed her fingers over the book
to wipe away the tears and put it back on the corner of his private desk.
She sat on the floor to overwhelmed with emotions to walk to the couch. He
need her the most, and she kept turning him away. All he wanted was an I
love you back, nothing more than to know she cared.

"Abbey?........Abbey, Abbey honey what’s wrong?" Jed came in and sat down on
the floor across from his wife. "Abbey sweetheart tell me what’s wrong?"

She looked up at his pain-filled blue eyes. It caused her to cry more. Here
she was being a bitch to him and he is dying and he is being so nice to her
because she discovered how much of a bitch she was.

"Come on Abbey tell me what’s wrong?"

She pulled him into a tight embrace, "Oh, Honey I love you so much. I’m so,
so very sorry."