The Truth About Her Life (Flickering Firebrand Remix) (1/1)
Title: The Truth About Her Life (Flickering Firebrand Remix)
Fandom: West Wing
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: ~3500
Characters: CJ Cregg, Toby Ziegler, Andrea Wyatt, Sam Seaborn, Josh Lyman, OFC
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Source material: Based on The Truth About Her Life by andchimeras.
Summary: Six Qumari women are in need of an intervention. CJ knows that she has compromised, but she has only bent and never broken.
Warning: Deals with the subject of violence against women. Contains passing non-explicit references to sexual assault and a passing, more explicit reference to female genital mutilation (FGM).
Author's note: Written for remix_redux. In episode 3.8 "Women of Qumar", the viewer is left in no doubt that CJ has moderately feminist sensibilities when it comes to violence against women. The original text by andchimeras does a beautiful job of telling a story of CJ's early political engagement, contrasted against the immigration struggles of a group of Qumari women. (For those who don't know, this is a fictional West Wing state, presumably so the show could highlight the shocking human rights abuses thereof, without causing an international incident.) I kept the basic structure, and delved a little more into the idea of CJ's awakening as a feminist, which is then compromised by things within her control, and things outwith it. Fact fans may wish to know that I titled this remix after the article on Catherine Mackinnon, and not the book by Christopher Hitchins.
11.15 pm, today: Washington DC
She looked at herself in the mirror in her bedroom.
At her carefully tailored suit with the silk shell underneath it. At the expensive Scottish wool stockings that emerged from the skirt, drawing a line between its hem and her Italian leather shoes. She shook her head, watching her hair swing in front of her face. She stopped and it hung beautifully, the cut worth every cent of those five hundred dollars.
The light in her bedroom was diffuse; shadows pooled in the corners of the room. For a moment, in the mirror, her clothes looked as strange and foreign as a suit of armour.
1980: UC Berkeley
It was jeans all the time at Berkeley.
It was CJ, too, instead of soft, gentle Claudia Jean.
She was supposed to be in the library, writing her dissertation on race and the Condorcet paradox, but instead she was at the Women’s Center with the rest of her women’s group. They were sitting in a circle on the floor and talking about pornography and sex, and making placards for the Take Back the Night march that was taking place later in the week. There was a smudge of red on the denim stretched across her knee.
She had read too much. She didn’t remember ever not being a feminist, ever not knowing that women and men were treated differently and that it wasn’t fair. That past year, though, she had read so many books, and mimeographed papers and ‘zines that she could feel the anger at injustice bubbling in her stomach. The political science course she came to Berkeley for was engaging, and the seminars were full of smart people exchanging brilliant thoughts, but she couldn’t help but notice that it was the men who took up the majority of the time, and the women who were compressed into the remaining space.
In class she was just another woman clinging to the edge, but in that space, with those women, she felt like her fullest self. The training sessions were the only place in her life where truth was spoken, and it was as heady as it was sobering. She’d never been raped, never been hit, and she was tall and self-assured, but now she had language to describe the nameless dread and now she couldn’t go back. Couldn’t unsee what she’d seen.
She smoothed paint across the poster board, and listened to the voices of the women. Her sisters.
6.30 am, today: Washington DC
CJ picked at the edge of her Danish, pulling a thin strip of pastry away between her fingers.
"Do you remember, CJ? Do you remember printing off petitions, counting names? Do you remember making signs? Do you remember yelling into a crowd that was yelling back?” Alice’s eyes were dark above the rim of her coffee cup.
She did. She remembered the rush through her entire body that had happened on that first march. Of something that tickled like fear but turned out to be resolve, and then righteousness, and then power. She remembered standing and listening as woman after woman told their stories of violence, of humiliation, of pain. The thought that they were bearing witness, all of them, to truth instead of lies, had made her skin tingle.
Alice sipped her coffee. "I appreciate the heads-up, but come on. Can't you give us more than that? This is your fight too."
CJ met her gaze. “You know that I’m the Press Secretary, Alice? And not, say, the Secretary of State?”
"These women, CJ," Alice started in a low, urgent voice, as the barista made the coffee machine hiss behind her.
"I don't advise on foreign policy.”
"This isn't foreign policy. This is the brutal implementation of a bullshit bill signed by your boss. They'll die, CJ. Those women will be stoned to death because we’ve established a system to make sure of it."
CJ wet her lips with her tongue. “Alice, I’ve given you all the information I have.”
"The Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act is an unconstitutional, cowardly piece of pandering and you know it."
“An argument that I trust you will be able to make to the Board of Immigration Appeals.”
Alice snorted, inelegantly. “We’ve finished our appeal to the Attorney General, and we’re just putting the finishing touches to our Cert Petition. I hope you’re prepared to get on the Sundays and shill this bullshit position.”
CJ watched her gather her briefcase and stalk out of the coffee shop.
1983: Los Angeles
She had admired Alice at Berkeley, but there had been a thin, impermeable wall between Alice and the world even then.
They met when Alice was at law school, and then again when, as a lawyer in a feminist co-operative, she came to the Berkeley Women’s Center to explain how rape was prosecuted.
They usually went for a drink after her sessions, CJ and some of the others, and that night they discussed what a rape statute might look like if it was drawn by feminists, about a presumption of non-consent. Sitting at the long dark table in the bar, looking at the collection of women around the table discussing, arguing, and laughing, CJ felt her heart sing.
She could hear Alice, above the hum of noise, describing her PhD thesis, the next steps in her career. Her eyes were bright and her hands in constant motion, and CJ felt a pang of envy because she was so clear about what she wanted to do, had sight of the open road between her and her goals, and was barreling down it. CJ knew that she wanted to do something important, something good, but she didn’t know what. Then Alice had called her a couple of months later to let her know that the Women’s Emancipation Network was looking for a Head of Media Engagement and CJ found herself with a tiny office, a battered filing cabinet, and a purpose.
She stood in her office on her first day, carton of books and papers in her hands ready to fill the chipped bookshelves, and thought about how surprised she had been that Alice had called her about the job. She respected Alice’s intensity, but it scared her in equal measure. She cared, oh God she cared, but the fact that she couldn’t sustain the same unwavering zeal as Alice sometimes made her feel like an imposter.
The WEN had a large and sprawling remit, courtesy of a Director who found it hard to say no. CJ found herself working late nights to try and cram enough information into her brain so that she could brief the press, to develop a media strategy.
“So, explain the Perez-Nunez thing to me again?” She dug her chopsticks into a carton of kung-pao chicken.
Alice looked up from her papers. “Perez-Funez’s lawyers are seeking review on due process grounds, pertaining to the Fifth Amendment, of the way in which the INS implements its voluntary departure procedure concerning unaccompanied minor aliens. His lawyers are seeking certification of a class, which would be all minor aliens that will ever be dealt with under the process.”
CJ frowned. “So what does this have to do with women?”
Alice raised her eyebrows. “You don’t think that women are more likely to respond to some dude in a uniform telling them that they can come with him, in handcuffs, or go free without prejudice by getting the hell out of dodge?”
CJ’s frowned more. “But surely if they’ve been raped, or are running from violence then they qualify for refugee status.”
Alice reached across the table and picked up a thick book, then opened it and pushed it towards CJ. “This is the text of the UN Convention on the Status of Refugees. Want to tell me where you see the word ‘woman’ or ‘gender’? Which clause provides for protection for women who would otherwise experience systematic rape, torture, detention, abuse or murder on the grounds of their sex?”
CJ scanned the text. She shook her head. “There’s nothing there.”
Alice thinned her lips. “Yeah.”
5 pm, today: Washington DC
Someone from State was there to brief them on the case, and they sat in a row while he delivered his presentation. She heard Josh suck in his breath at the description of female genital mutilation and felt, rather than saw, his whole body stiffen next to hers when the State official put up a couple of photographs.
After the man from State scooted away, his laptop under his arm, Toby gave CJ a pained look, lips pressed together, and followed Sam out of the door to work on a speech to the Chamber of Commerce.
Josh was standing. “That was-“ He ran one hand through his hair. “Did you know about that stuff?”
CJ nodded, and felt a familiar pinprick of anger, because the luxury of not knowing what happens to women was something that she couldn’t even imagine having.
“I don’t-“ His eyes were dark. “Women are beautiful. Why would anyone want to-?” He trailed off.
“Cut them open on their wedding night?” CJ slid her folder to her hip, and then rolled it around so it was shielding the front of her body. “Josh, they don’t think we’re people. We’re not human to them.”
He looked at her, eyes searching her face. “But-“
She shrugged. “You don’t ask a stallion if it wants to be a gelding. In Qumar, you don’t ask little girls if they want to have any sexual pleasure, ever. Or if they want to give birth without that extra little bit of agonizing pain.”
She didn’t remember seeing him still like this, even on the campaign. “I didn’t have the votes to stop the veto over-ride.”
She nodded. “I know.”
“The President couldn’t afford to veto it. They even liked the bill in California.”
“I know. We went around this at the time.” Although they’d been talking about economics, and the Hispanic vote, and she didn’t think anyone had brought up women. Not even her.
1985: Los Angeles
It was a slow news week, and CJ had managed to arrange an interview between the LA Times and the director of WEN to talk about the declining number of rapes, because the Uniform Crime Report had just come out.
The Times had sent some cub reporter, fresh from Columbia, wearing crumpled khakis and a Yankees cap. From the chat on the phone they had had, CJ had surmised that he was yearning for a byline in the business section.
The interview had started badly, and, five minutes in, Susan was frowning and the cub reporter - John - was staring at his notebook.
“So, within patriarchy-“
“I think,” CJ interrupted, smoothly, “that John might be interested in some of the ways that rape harms the local economy.”
He looked up from his notepad, and clicked his pen. “The economy?”
CJ smiled, and ignored the flicker of doubt under her breastbone. “Sure. Tourist dollars, time off work, the strain on the healthcare system, and property prices. There are lots of really good economic reasons why we should be making sure that the LAPD is encouraging women to come forward to report rape.”
After John had shoved his notebook back in his messenger bag and left the WEN offices, Susan looked at CJ oddly. CJ fought down the sense that she had missed something important and closed the door of her office behind her.
The piece, calling for better investigation of reported crime and measures to make it easier for women to report, was on page three of the metro section. Two days later, Toby had called her to see if the candidate he was doing advance planning for could use the WEN for a campaign stop.
11.45 pm, today: Washington DC
She stood in the shower, feeling the warm water pulse over her head. The scent of her shampoo hung in the steamy air, and her throat ached but the tears wouldn’t come.
She dried herself, more deliberately than she ever managed in the morning, feeling the clean roughness of the towel against her skin. She dug in her drawers, towel wrapped tightly around her body, until she found her Berkeley sweatshirt and a pair of battered jeans with a smudge of red on one knee.
She made herself a cup of green tea, and took the mug and teabag into her sitting room. She switched on the news and watched herself tap-dance around the fact that the US was trying to deport six Qumari women to face almost certain death.
8pm, today: Washington DC
The Chamber of Commerce speech had finally been put to bed, and they sat around the gleaming table in the centre of the Roosevelt Room.
“So,” Josh said. “Where are we on this?”
Toby shrugged. “We are where we are.”
Josh tapped his pen against his legal pad. “And that’s where, Toby? I think we need to have the discussion.”
CJ bit her lip. Toby looked at her, and she wondered if she was imagining the unhappiness she thought she could see clouding his eyes.
Sam pushed his glasses up his nose. “Congress created IIRIRA, and the White House has directed the INS to ensure that all of its officers are behaving appropriately.”
CJ snorted.
Sam turned to her. “You think we should be doing more?”
CJ took her glasses off. “I think that a catalogue of what we’re not doing would fill a library, Sam.”
“Congress-“
“You really don’t need to explain to me about Congress, Sam.” She felt heat burning her cheeks. “What I would like us to do is stop pretending that we’ve ever had a discussion on women and human rights, much less developed some kind of strategy that Congress is thwarting.”
“The UN Convention on Refugees-“
“Is perfectly clear on its framers not giving a good goddamn if girls have their clitorises scraped off with a rusty razor. Or if we’re thrown in rape camps. Or if we’re penned up in a school to burn to death because we’re not wearing a black sack over our heads.” She steadied her voice. “I don’t think it’s a good look on us to hide behind the skirts of some 1950s misogyny.”
“What do you want me to do, CJ?” Sam’s voice was tight and hard.
“I want you to do what you can, Sam. I want you to use your brilliant brain to wring whatever concessions we can from Congress. I want to repeal IIRIRA.” She smoothed her skirt. “I want to ratify CEDAW. I want us to be a party to the International Criminal Court. I want us to be a leader on women’s rights instead of a follower. I want us to care less about bases in Qumar and more about women in Qumar. But whatever we do - whatever I get up on TV and sell as hard as I can - I want us not to pretend that it’s all there is.”
Josh cleared his throat. “CJ-“
She stood up. “I’ll be in my office. When you’ve decided what you want me to say, let me know.”
1988: New York
CJ grinned at Toby, grinned at Andrea, grinned at Alice and Bobby and Charlotte.
It was the night before the mayoral election. They were sequestered in a motel not far from campaign headquarters. Toby had already given it over as a loss.
"You can't run against an incumbent with a drunken, divorced Methodist," he said, morosely.
"You can't run against anybody with a drunken, divorced Methodist," Charlotte replied, levering the top off her Sam Adams with a house key.
"Except maybe a drunken, divorced Baptist." Alice smiled against the neck of her own bottle.
Andrea jerked her head, and CJ followed her into the kitchenette. The others didn’t notice them go. Toby had launched into a familiar diatribe on the failures of the Democratic Party’s messaging and Alice was arguing with him.
Andrea picked up a plastic champagne bucket that had seen better days.
CJ smiled. “We’re probably not going to need that.”
Andrea’s smile slipped. “CJ, that thing I told you yesterday-“
CJ looked at her. “Yeah.”
“I don’t want Toby to know.” Andrea looked at the floor.
CJ hesitated. “No problem. Your secret is safe with me.”
Toby stood up from his seat on the floor, and walked to the end of the counter, watching Andrea twist the champagne bucket in her hands.
“Everything okay?”
CJ smiled and shook her hair. “Everything’s fine. Just a little girl talk.”
And if Andrea didn’t want Toby to know about her crush, her attraction to CJ’s dark, sad friend, then CJ certainly wasn’t going to tell him.
Alice lit another cigarette and cracked a filthy joke about the incumbent, and Toby smiled, although his eyes were fixed on Andrea.
CJ smiled at them all. These people, her friends.
11.50 pm, today: Washington DC
She sat on her sofa, and sipped her green tea, and thought of the week after that first election, when she’d returned to LA with Andrea and Alice.
It wasn’t until they were back in LA that they had realized how little women’s issues had featured in the campaign. Andrea and Alice had gone at it in the apartment that the three of them shared, voices bouncing off the walls as they had pleaded, and articulated, and challenged. Alice blamed Toby. Andrea said he had done the best he could. That first night it had felt like they were hammering out a new politics over their wine and pasta, but by the third night the arguments seemed stale and ill-humoured.
CJ remembered the queasiness in her stomach as she put her key in the lock that fourth night.
Alice had been reading at the kitchen table, and did a double-take when CJ came in. “Is Andy not with you?”
CJ had shaken her head. “I had a late dinner with women from my Local.”
They had found Andrea where he - Graham - had left her. On the floor of the WEN conference room with a knife in her chest, and blood pooling next to her on the cheap carpeting. Her face had been so pale and sweaty that CJ had thought she would die. She’d clung to Andrea’s hand in the hospital, behind those ugly green curtains, and she had been so grateful that Andrea was still alive that it took her a moment to register that the nurse bustling around behind her was prepping for a rape kit.
She sat on her sofa in Georgetown, and a tear slid from under CJ’s closed lids and across her cheek. It was cold against her cheek and she felt a rush of gratitude that the fire of injustice hadn’t burned her from the inside out.
9 pm, today: Washington DC
It was Toby who came to her office, and she realized that she had expected Josh.
“We’re going to go for a repeal,” he said, and she knew that meant that the Attorney General wasn’t going to intervene.
“Yeah,” she said, and she was so tired that she wanted to lie down on the sofa in her office and sleep for a week.
“Congresswoman Wyatt came in today.” It was such a non-sequitur that she ccould feel her face doing something stupid.
“Oh.”
He sat down, across from her. His mouth was open, groping for words. “She was in the West Wing to lobby Sam.”
CJ raised her eyebrows. “Sam? On Qumar?”
“Josh was saying that she knows where the real power lies.” He smiled, and it was the smile he smiled when there was nothing funny at all in the world.
CJ was silent.
“She can’t talk about it to me. She can’t talk about six women who were mutilated. In case-” He stopped, and his mouth worked against the air.
“This isn’t about what happened to Andy, Toby.” CJ shook her hair. “It’s about human rights. She’s lobbying the White House on human rights. Sam’s the one doing the speech to the UN.”
“I don’t know how you do it.” He looked at her and there was something so soft in his gaze it made her recoil. “Separate the political and the personal.”
Somewhere he knew that was an insult, and CJ felt a familiar spasm of defensiveness. “I was keeping it all together until you dragged me into your murky world of political mendacity.”
It was a lie, and he must have known that, too.
“Yeah.” He looked as tired as she felt. “Goodnight, CJ.”
She didn’t watch him walk away.