The Night Would Give You Up, Toby/Andy, PG
Title: The Night Would Give You Up
Pairing: Andy/Toby
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Set post-ep for 4x11 'Holy Night'
Disclaimer: Not mine! Just playing! Sorkin, Wells, NBC yadda yadda yadda. Making no profit! The title comes from a U2 song and it's testament to Amy's loveliness that I would go searching through their song catalogue for exactly that ;)
Prompt: From amy_119: Any West Wing, how about Merlot and fairy lights?
Dedication: For my lovely Amy, who was kind enough to let me right Toby/Andy in a West Wing prompt. May your Colorado Christmas be snowy and lovely and exactly as nice as you are. I hope you enjoy this little offering <3
It takes almost five minutes of knocking on the door (well, he’s pretty much just thumping it with his fist by now) before she answers.
“Is my apartment on fire?” Andy snaps, not even slightly pleased to see him. Toby hesitates for a moment, noting the lopsided bathrobe with a sloppy knot tied around the waist, and the wet strands of hair falling against her neck from where she’s pinned it up. Definitely interrupting, then.
“Well, can I come in?” He asks, and no matter how hard he tries to play nice, it still sounds punchy and indignant.
It’s clear that she really wants to say no, from the way she squares her shoulders to the sudden tension in her jaw, but Andy relents at the last second and waves him inside with a heartfelt sigh.
“This had better be good,” she warns him, and Toby wishes that is was something important, something big and life-changing instead of painful and petty. But she’s always been the one person who understands him being painful and petty, and so here he is.
“For a given definition of ‘good’, yeah,” Toby says as she ushers him into the cosy sitting room. Andy hasn’t gotten any tidier for living alone - open books face down on every conceivable surface, plus the inevitable stacks of paper and folders defying gravity at an angle not often seen outside of Pisa, and Toby thinks that even through a sudden bout of amnesia, he would know the occupant of this room.
“Sit,” she instructs, but she doesn’t join him. Toby plucks a discarded blazer and a briefing memo from the armchair and settles into it, feeling out of place in this home he’s never lived in.
“So, my dad spent the day in my office,” he begins, because if ever the band-aid needed to be ripped off.
“Seriously?” She looks stunned at the news, eyebrows arched and mouth hanging open just a little. “Wow,” Andy says, exhaling loudly. “This is gonna need wine.”
“Thank you,” Toby says, and he’s surprised by how much he means it.
She returns with a filled glass and a re-corked bottle under her arm. Toby accepts it and takes a long sip; it’s not Scotch, but it’ll do. Andy moves some books around to clear space for herself, and sits down opposite him. The only light in the room comes from the fairy lights on the Christmas tree, and the muted glare of streetlamps reflected up off the snow that’s still falling.
“Toby?” She breaks the silence, still reaching out to him after all this time. “Where’s your dad now?”
“He’s at my place,” Toby sighs. “We couldn’t get a hotel room, and the tracks are frozen in Trenton.”
“Plus, they closed the airports,” Andy adds.
“Right. Exactly that,” Toby agrees. “I should go, sorry.”
“No, stay,” she offers, and as she leans back against the sofa cushions, it brings the curve of her stomach into sharp relief. Toby swallows, hard, and tries to find words for this collision course of past and future that he’s not sure he’s equipped to deal with.
“Also, I was deposed this morning,” he reminds her, but Andy just smiles, as unapologetic as ever. “That was--and you may have already guessed this--a complete delight. I can’t wait to pick that up again after the holidays.”
“Aw, Pokey. Were you defending my honor?”
“You say that like you have any left to defend,” he sasses back, tired of the argument already and somehow, sometimes still living for it. In these endless, pointless debates he’s still alive and not burdened down by the tarnished promise of a second term. He sees this same confusion in Josh’s face, in CJ’s when she lets her guard down a little, late at night in her office. They’re supposed to be invigorated, buoyed by triumph and a mandate to do new and wonderful things. Except they’re still working out how to pay for all the new and wonderful promises they made the first time around, and even if the rock is shifting by increments, they’re still rolling it uphill.
“It was Claypool again, right?” Andy asks, sipping water from a bottle she pulls out of a purse on the floor.
“Yeah,” Toby confirms, pulling his tie loose and leaning back. “He seemed very insistent that I share my medical expertise. Have you been telling people that I’m an OB-GYN in my spare time?”
“Like anyone who knows you would believe you have any spare time,” she points out, and that’s hard to argue with.
“Anyway,” he says, and he drains the last of the wine in his glass. It’s not bad, for wine. “I hope you have a lovely time getting sued.”
“I intend to,” she replies, that unmistakable sparkle in her eyes. Toby remembers that particular gleam all too well--from election nights, from their wedding day (and a very pleasant interlude between signing the register and joining the reception)--and too many kinds of trouble to list. When he calls this woman a pistol, he really isn’t kidding as much as he might have hoped.
“I really should go,” he says, bracing himself to stand. “You can get back to your bath. Although I thought that was--”
“Only in the first trimester,” she cuts him off, and a shadow flickers across her face that drags him back to nights of holding her on the bathroom floor, of the constant arguments over new treatments and another hoop to jump through. It’s stupid--insensitive, even--to think that she would do anything that three different doctors hadn’t signed off on. “I let the water drain, anyway. So stay. Talk about your father.”
“I’d rather not,” Toby protests, but he can already feel his weight shifting back until he’s sitting again, seemingly unable to flee.
“He sent me a card, a couple of weeks back,” Andy confesses, and he can see her holding her breath in the dim light. She has that pregnant woman glow that Toby had assumed was another myth pushed by people with an unhealthy interest in procreation, but even that can’t hide her apprehension. He wonders: would she ever have told him about this card, had it not been for his unannounced visit?
“He asked me about you,” Toby concedes, because the fight is not worth picking. He’s not Andy’s postman, and he doesn’t get to control who talks to her. “He asked if you were healthy, in between telling me to forgive him, and that I should know my homicidal history.”
“Sounds like fun,” she says lightly. “And I am healthy, at least.”
“The very picture of health, in fact,” he flirts almost out of habit, because she’s beautiful and she’s carrying his children and maybe he’s starting to get sentimental at Christmas. “December is treating you well, it would seem.”
“You want to see the card?” It’s unlike her to offer--Andrea who hoards her possessions like a magpie with an overflowing nest. Sharing doesn’t come easily to her, despite the two sisters, either side of her in age. “It’s the nicest thing I’ve had at the office since we’ve been out of session. Lots of letters calling me a sinner and a whore, not so many from proud grandparents.”
“No, thank you,” Toby shoots her down fast. “More wine? That I’ll take.”
She shrugs, leaning forward to uncork the bottle and pour him another generous glass. Toby can’t help his eyes straying towards the very accommodating neckline of her robe, and when she catches him in the act he gets an eye roll for his trouble.
“Down, boy,” she mutters, but her smile suggests she’s not entirely opposed to the idea. They’ve been doing this, in fits and starts, since that night of heavy arguments about Islam when he brought her an ice cream cone and some mumbled apologies. That’s the night these twins were conceived, unless she’s really got a surprise to spring on him, and having that spark back (and permission to do something about it) is doing wonders for his distraction levels.
He thinks, sometimes, that everything would be so much more bearable if he had more moments like this to break up everything else. He hasn’t been kidding all this time, with the proposing. Honestly, he misses this--misses her--in a way that becomes more palpable with every doctor’s appointment and newspaper item about his impending fatherhood. Toby was always going to do this better, going to be better, and he knows it’s possible when he looks at the kids his brother and sisters are raising. There’s still time, he has plans and vague notions to make it all come to pass. Just another item not crossed off on the world’s longest to-do list, and he’s getting better at living with that as the years roll on.
“This is good wine,” he offers, letting the tension in the air dissipate if she wants to let it.
“Merlot,” she supplies. “A gift from a constituent, who perhaps needs to read up on Fetal Alcohol Syndrome.”
“I hear that’s a real page turner,” he smirks. “Though I am happy to benefit from their stupidity.”
The clock in the hall chimes, startling them both.
“Merry Christmas, Toby,” she says as the clock strikes twelve.
“Well, you forgot to wish me Happy Birthday, so I’ll take it,” he says, sipping his wine.
“So I did,” she says, with a slow smile. “I feel just terrible about that. After all you’ve given me,” she waves a hand vaguely over her abdomen, her smirk deepening by the second. “How about I make that up to you?”
“Yeah?” He raises an eyebrow in question, deploying a weapon from her own arsenal. It’s nothing more than a shot across the bows, and she deflects it easily.
“Oh yeah,” she confirms with a nod, standing in a fluid motion that exposes more of her legs as she steps closer to him. Toby doesn’t dare blink once he sees a hint of thigh, since these legs of hers are the kind he could write poetry about (by the book, should he ever have the time or inclination). Andy offers her hand, and he grasps it gratefully.
And just like that, he’s back on his feet, and kissing her with something between reverence and relief. This, he wants; this, he needs. The rest will be worked out between depositions and saving the world and whatever the hell else they get up to between now and that faint, terrifying day when they bring new people into the world.
“Merry Christmas to you, too,” he whispers as she leads him along the hall towards her bedroom.
Pairing: Andy/Toby
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Set post-ep for 4x11 'Holy Night'
Disclaimer: Not mine! Just playing! Sorkin, Wells, NBC yadda yadda yadda. Making no profit! The title comes from a U2 song and it's testament to Amy's loveliness that I would go searching through their song catalogue for exactly that ;)
Prompt: From amy_119: Any West Wing, how about Merlot and fairy lights?
Dedication: For my lovely Amy, who was kind enough to let me right Toby/Andy in a West Wing prompt. May your Colorado Christmas be snowy and lovely and exactly as nice as you are. I hope you enjoy this little offering <3
It takes almost five minutes of knocking on the door (well, he’s pretty much just thumping it with his fist by now) before she answers.
“Is my apartment on fire?” Andy snaps, not even slightly pleased to see him. Toby hesitates for a moment, noting the lopsided bathrobe with a sloppy knot tied around the waist, and the wet strands of hair falling against her neck from where she’s pinned it up. Definitely interrupting, then.
“Well, can I come in?” He asks, and no matter how hard he tries to play nice, it still sounds punchy and indignant.
It’s clear that she really wants to say no, from the way she squares her shoulders to the sudden tension in her jaw, but Andy relents at the last second and waves him inside with a heartfelt sigh.
“This had better be good,” she warns him, and Toby wishes that is was something important, something big and life-changing instead of painful and petty. But she’s always been the one person who understands him being painful and petty, and so here he is.
“For a given definition of ‘good’, yeah,” Toby says as she ushers him into the cosy sitting room. Andy hasn’t gotten any tidier for living alone - open books face down on every conceivable surface, plus the inevitable stacks of paper and folders defying gravity at an angle not often seen outside of Pisa, and Toby thinks that even through a sudden bout of amnesia, he would know the occupant of this room.
“Sit,” she instructs, but she doesn’t join him. Toby plucks a discarded blazer and a briefing memo from the armchair and settles into it, feeling out of place in this home he’s never lived in.
“So, my dad spent the day in my office,” he begins, because if ever the band-aid needed to be ripped off.
“Seriously?” She looks stunned at the news, eyebrows arched and mouth hanging open just a little. “Wow,” Andy says, exhaling loudly. “This is gonna need wine.”
“Thank you,” Toby says, and he’s surprised by how much he means it.
She returns with a filled glass and a re-corked bottle under her arm. Toby accepts it and takes a long sip; it’s not Scotch, but it’ll do. Andy moves some books around to clear space for herself, and sits down opposite him. The only light in the room comes from the fairy lights on the Christmas tree, and the muted glare of streetlamps reflected up off the snow that’s still falling.
“Toby?” She breaks the silence, still reaching out to him after all this time. “Where’s your dad now?”
“He’s at my place,” Toby sighs. “We couldn’t get a hotel room, and the tracks are frozen in Trenton.”
“Plus, they closed the airports,” Andy adds.
“Right. Exactly that,” Toby agrees. “I should go, sorry.”
“No, stay,” she offers, and as she leans back against the sofa cushions, it brings the curve of her stomach into sharp relief. Toby swallows, hard, and tries to find words for this collision course of past and future that he’s not sure he’s equipped to deal with.
“Also, I was deposed this morning,” he reminds her, but Andy just smiles, as unapologetic as ever. “That was--and you may have already guessed this--a complete delight. I can’t wait to pick that up again after the holidays.”
“Aw, Pokey. Were you defending my honor?”
“You say that like you have any left to defend,” he sasses back, tired of the argument already and somehow, sometimes still living for it. In these endless, pointless debates he’s still alive and not burdened down by the tarnished promise of a second term. He sees this same confusion in Josh’s face, in CJ’s when she lets her guard down a little, late at night in her office. They’re supposed to be invigorated, buoyed by triumph and a mandate to do new and wonderful things. Except they’re still working out how to pay for all the new and wonderful promises they made the first time around, and even if the rock is shifting by increments, they’re still rolling it uphill.
“It was Claypool again, right?” Andy asks, sipping water from a bottle she pulls out of a purse on the floor.
“Yeah,” Toby confirms, pulling his tie loose and leaning back. “He seemed very insistent that I share my medical expertise. Have you been telling people that I’m an OB-GYN in my spare time?”
“Like anyone who knows you would believe you have any spare time,” she points out, and that’s hard to argue with.
“Anyway,” he says, and he drains the last of the wine in his glass. It’s not bad, for wine. “I hope you have a lovely time getting sued.”
“I intend to,” she replies, that unmistakable sparkle in her eyes. Toby remembers that particular gleam all too well--from election nights, from their wedding day (and a very pleasant interlude between signing the register and joining the reception)--and too many kinds of trouble to list. When he calls this woman a pistol, he really isn’t kidding as much as he might have hoped.
“I really should go,” he says, bracing himself to stand. “You can get back to your bath. Although I thought that was--”
“Only in the first trimester,” she cuts him off, and a shadow flickers across her face that drags him back to nights of holding her on the bathroom floor, of the constant arguments over new treatments and another hoop to jump through. It’s stupid--insensitive, even--to think that she would do anything that three different doctors hadn’t signed off on. “I let the water drain, anyway. So stay. Talk about your father.”
“I’d rather not,” Toby protests, but he can already feel his weight shifting back until he’s sitting again, seemingly unable to flee.
“He sent me a card, a couple of weeks back,” Andy confesses, and he can see her holding her breath in the dim light. She has that pregnant woman glow that Toby had assumed was another myth pushed by people with an unhealthy interest in procreation, but even that can’t hide her apprehension. He wonders: would she ever have told him about this card, had it not been for his unannounced visit?
“He asked me about you,” Toby concedes, because the fight is not worth picking. He’s not Andy’s postman, and he doesn’t get to control who talks to her. “He asked if you were healthy, in between telling me to forgive him, and that I should know my homicidal history.”
“Sounds like fun,” she says lightly. “And I am healthy, at least.”
“The very picture of health, in fact,” he flirts almost out of habit, because she’s beautiful and she’s carrying his children and maybe he’s starting to get sentimental at Christmas. “December is treating you well, it would seem.”
“You want to see the card?” It’s unlike her to offer--Andrea who hoards her possessions like a magpie with an overflowing nest. Sharing doesn’t come easily to her, despite the two sisters, either side of her in age. “It’s the nicest thing I’ve had at the office since we’ve been out of session. Lots of letters calling me a sinner and a whore, not so many from proud grandparents.”
“No, thank you,” Toby shoots her down fast. “More wine? That I’ll take.”
She shrugs, leaning forward to uncork the bottle and pour him another generous glass. Toby can’t help his eyes straying towards the very accommodating neckline of her robe, and when she catches him in the act he gets an eye roll for his trouble.
“Down, boy,” she mutters, but her smile suggests she’s not entirely opposed to the idea. They’ve been doing this, in fits and starts, since that night of heavy arguments about Islam when he brought her an ice cream cone and some mumbled apologies. That’s the night these twins were conceived, unless she’s really got a surprise to spring on him, and having that spark back (and permission to do something about it) is doing wonders for his distraction levels.
He thinks, sometimes, that everything would be so much more bearable if he had more moments like this to break up everything else. He hasn’t been kidding all this time, with the proposing. Honestly, he misses this--misses her--in a way that becomes more palpable with every doctor’s appointment and newspaper item about his impending fatherhood. Toby was always going to do this better, going to be better, and he knows it’s possible when he looks at the kids his brother and sisters are raising. There’s still time, he has plans and vague notions to make it all come to pass. Just another item not crossed off on the world’s longest to-do list, and he’s getting better at living with that as the years roll on.
“This is good wine,” he offers, letting the tension in the air dissipate if she wants to let it.
“Merlot,” she supplies. “A gift from a constituent, who perhaps needs to read up on Fetal Alcohol Syndrome.”
“I hear that’s a real page turner,” he smirks. “Though I am happy to benefit from their stupidity.”
The clock in the hall chimes, startling them both.
“Merry Christmas, Toby,” she says as the clock strikes twelve.
“Well, you forgot to wish me Happy Birthday, so I’ll take it,” he says, sipping his wine.
“So I did,” she says, with a slow smile. “I feel just terrible about that. After all you’ve given me,” she waves a hand vaguely over her abdomen, her smirk deepening by the second. “How about I make that up to you?”
“Yeah?” He raises an eyebrow in question, deploying a weapon from her own arsenal. It’s nothing more than a shot across the bows, and she deflects it easily.
“Oh yeah,” she confirms with a nod, standing in a fluid motion that exposes more of her legs as she steps closer to him. Toby doesn’t dare blink once he sees a hint of thigh, since these legs of hers are the kind he could write poetry about (by the book, should he ever have the time or inclination). Andy offers her hand, and he grasps it gratefully.
And just like that, he’s back on his feet, and kissing her with something between reverence and relief. This, he wants; this, he needs. The rest will be worked out between depositions and saving the world and whatever the hell else they get up to between now and that faint, terrifying day when they bring new people into the world.
“Merry Christmas to you, too,” he whispers as she leads him along the hall towards her bedroom.