Summary: Mandy couldn’t believe her luck. Josh had hired a deaf pollster! She chuckled to herself, thinking Oh, there is a God!

Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Mandy / Joey
Spoilers: Twenty Hours in L.A.; Mandatory Minimums
Note: Written in response to a WingSwing challenge
Disclaimer: "The West Wing" and all the characters are owned by Aaron Sorkin, except for Eleanor Roosevelt and Lorena Hickok who belong to history. This is strictly for fun and no copyright infringement for profit is intended.

~for M, as always~

Joey loved to fly. But it hadn’t always been that way. Before she had the clout to demand that an interpreter accompany her on business trips, flying had been a nightmare. It always was for deafies. So much depended on audio announcements. Even when the airline had been informed that it had a “special needs” passenger on board, Joey had to hover near the desk close to boarding time, trying to figure out what the gate clerk was saying. It didn’t help that they always seemed to hold the microphones right up to their mouths when they made announcements, blocking Joey’s view of their lips. What she always dreaded most was the mad stampede other passengers made to the desk or to the bank of pay phones when a major announcement was made. It made her feel so powerless. At those times, Joey, who usually had the world by the tail, was suddenly rendered helpless, completely dependent on the kindness of strangers who all wanted to get her seat on the next available flight out.

But now she had Kenny with her, and she was on her way to Washington. To the White House, no less. She and Kenny had been there once before, when she was managing the O’Dwyer campaign. What a disaster that trip had been! What a disaster the whole campaign had been for that matter. The President had called O’Dwyer an empty shirt. He was right about that. Joey had known it from the beginning. But O’Dwyer had wanted her as his campaign manager. He wanted her, Joey Lucas. She couldn’t turn him down. There weren’t many high-level jobs open in politics to women period, and the field got even smaller when you factored in a disability.

Al Kiefer had wanted her, too. He had wanted her body and her mind. She couldn’t turn him down, either. She had given him her body, for a while, and a part of her mind. Not all of it. Only what he asked for, which wasn’t much. Kiefer was the kind of guy who wanted smart people to tell him he was right. Joey could have told him much more about his polling numbers if he had asked for her opinion. He hadn’t. So she hadn’t given it to him. He wouldn’t have wanted it anyway because it contradicted his own opinions. Joey kept quiet. She was good at that sometimes.

The White House had asked her opinion and she had given it to them. Josh Lyman, Sam Seaborn, Toby Ziegler, and CJ Cregg, when they had come to L.A. for a fund raiser, they had all listened to her. They were brilliant people who on their worst day could easily run circles around Al Kiefer on his best. She had wanted to look good to them, and she had. Very good. Toby Ziegler had even said so. “You’re looking very good to me,” he’d said.

She replayed the moment in her mind, again and again. Toby leaning in, his palms held together in his lap, like he was getting ready to open a book. Or pray. Joey had liked the expressive intensity of his eyes, how his face could change with the slightest movement of his eyebrows. The way he held his body. He was easy to read. Sam and Josh... the boys, Joey called them in her mind. Boy wonders, maybe, but boys nonetheless. Sam was always stiff, buttoned up. Hard to read. Josh was the opposite. Gangly. Fluid. Emotive. Joey knew he was attracted to her and she found that flattering. She led him on a bit, even though she knew it would never go anywhere. He wasn’t her type. CJ, on the other hand, she was magnificent. Such beautiful eyes. Such an incredible body. To say she was tall would be an understatement. She was an Amazon. You’d never lose her in a crowd. Joey got butterflies in her stomach, just thinking about seeing her again.

Now Kenny was touching her elbow, interpreting an announcement from the cockpit. There’d be a slight delay, he said. Ten to fifteen minutes. Then they’d be on their way. Joey knew they’d be serving drinks up in the business cabin, where Al Kiefer was sitting. She’d passed by him when she’d boarded. He’d been sipping on a gin and tonic, pretending to be immersed in the Wall Street Journal, ignoring her as she passed by. For all his liberal politics, he’d long-since come to view his privileges as rights. That didn’t bother Joey nearly as much as the fact that he reversed it in her case, viewing her rights as privileges. He’d made such a big deal about allowing Kenny to come along on this trip, all expenses paid. Allowing. It should go without saying. How the hell was she supposed to communicate without him? Keifer could be such a jerk. She could scarcely believe she’d ever slept with him.

The flight attendants started walking up and down the aisles, checking on seat belts and chair positions, and Joey knew they were not far from take-off. She leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes, enjoying the slight vibrations the attendants made as they moved through the cabin. She opened her eyes just in time to see the attendant at the front of the cabin beginning her explanatory dance. She held up an abbreviated seat belt and demonstrated how to use it. With arms outstretched, she used two fingers on each hand to point ahead of her, to her sides, and at the floor. She pointed as if she were shaking water off her fingers. Then came the grand finale, where she put an oxygen mask over her nose and mouth. It fascinated Joey that all the flight attendants on every airline all over the world seemed to have adopted the very same motions. Why did they all use two fingers on each hand when pointing, she wondered? Did it have some special significance? And did anyone traveling by plane really need the seat belt demonstration in the year 2000? The motions had become so universally ritualized that it had become a language everyone ignored. Everyone, that is, but Joey, who silently applauded the flight attendant’s flawless performance and then once again closed her eyes so she could enjoy the rush of the plane speeding down the runway, and anticipate the curling feeling she’d get in her stomach when the wheels lifted off the ground. She was on her way to the White House.

***

Mandy hated being on the outside. Ever since the Senior Staff had found out about the memo she’d written for Russell, outlining the President’s weaknesses, they’d cut her out of their meetings. Now they stopped talking when she came within earshot. They looked at her accusingly, too.

She’d gone over it and over it in her head, wondering how the memo had surfaced after all this time. Which of her enemies had fed it to someone on the outside? She would figure it out if it killed her, and then she would track him down and kill him. Or at least cause him pain. She was good at that.

Hell, she’d just been doing her job when she’d created the memo. Leo should understand that. She’d do the same for him, given the chance. But now she’d probably never have the opportunity. And the way news traveled through Washington, she was completely screwed. She’d been given a chance to play with the big boys and she’d fucked it up. Royally. She’d forgotten the Rosemary Woods Corollary to How to Succeed in Politics: destroy any evidence of the truth. Erase. Shred. Obfuscate. Or get out of town.

Now even Lloyd Russell wouldn’t return her calls. Fucking Lloyd. What a pansy he had turned out to be. Mandy was trying to remember what she’d ever seen in him. Political potential? Maybe. A stepping stone to power? More than likely. She had known all along he didn’t really have a chance in a run against Bartlet in the next election but if he could have gotten his name out there in the primary, he’d have been in a good position to be a real contender in the election after that. And she’d have been in a good position to manage his winning campaign. But now she had been exiled to No Man’s Land, reduced to wandering around the corridors of the West Wing, looking for a friendly face. And some info. The scoop. She had grown to need an insider’s knowledge of the West Wing inner workings like a junkie needed a fix.

Mandy plunked herself down at one of the empty desks in the bullpen outside of Josh’s office, lying in wait. Maybe Josh would let her in. He had loved her once and she was still pretty good at messing with his mind. She could still get under his skin and get him to say things he probably shouldn’t tell her, just by making him irritable. He was so transparent most of the time, like a little boy. An idiot savant, that’s how she thought of him. Mandy wondered what she had ever seen in him. She guessed it was pretty much the same thing she had seen in Lloyd.

She watched Donna fluttering around, clearing out a workspace in a corner of the bullpen.

“Hey, Donna,” she called out. “Who got fired?” It was pathetic. Here she was, reduced to office gossip for stimulation.

“No one,” Donna looked over at her, obviously puzzled. “Why? Did you hear something?”

“No,” said Mandy, getting up and walking toward Donna to sit on the edge of the desk she had just wiped down. “Whose desk is this? Or should I say, was this?”

“No one’s,” said Donna. “I mean, not regularly. We use it for interns, temporary help, that sort of thing. Right now I’m getting it ready for a pollster Josh has hired.”

“A pollster?” asked Mandy. “Josh has hired a pollster? What for?” Mandy was playing dumb to see if she could get Donna to tell her something she didn’t already know.

“Beats me,” said Donna with a shrug.

Great, thought Mandy. Now even Donna Moss is giving me the cold shoulder. Who’d have guessed I could sink this low. Mandy affected a hurt look, sighed heavily, and got up to walk back to the desk where she’d originally been sitting. Donna looked over at her guiltily. The ploy had worked.

“Well, if you must know, he’s bringing in a California expert.”

“California expert?” said Mandy. “Who? You mean Kiefer?”

“No, Joey Lucas,” Donna replied. She was placing pens, pencils, and pads of paper in the desk drawers.

“Joey Lucas?” Mandy let the name roll around in her mouth. “Never heard of him.”

“Her,” Donna said emphatically. “Joey’s a she.”

“Well, this should be interesting,” said Mandy. “Does Josh know?” Donna gave her a funny look. “I mean, you of all people must know that Josh has a problem with women who know more than he does. Which I guess would mean just about all women.”

“Yes, I would say that Josh definitely knows Joey’s a woman,” said Donna. There was a triumphant little twinkle in her eye. “If you catch my drift.”

“Ah, so they have a history!” said Mandy, smiling conspiratorially. “It just gets curiouser and curiouser.” Mandy watched as Donna continued to sort through a pile of folders she had placed on the pollster’s desk. Always protective of Josh, she wasn’t about to volunteer any more information. She needed prodding. “So is this pollster person in love with Josh or something?”

“Maybe a little,” Donna confided. She straightened up and smiled weakly at Mandy. “And maybe Josh is just a little bit in love with her.”

Mandy hooted. “Josh? In love?” she laughed. “With someone other than himself? Are you on crack?” Mandy leaned back in the desk chair and chortled with satisfaction as she watched Donna bristle. If she couldn’t needle Josh, she’d at least have some fun with his assistant. Maybe this wouldn’t be such a bad day after all.

****

They’d given her her own desk in the West Wing, a really nice old wooden desk with lots of drawers and a built in bookshelf on one side. The grain on the surface was worn smooth with history. Joey wondered about all the people who had worked on it in the past, in past administrations. What Presidents had they worked for? Carter? Nixon? LBJ? JFK? The desk was old. Maybe it even went back to FDR. Why did Presidents stop using initialized versions of their names, she wondered briefly. Did anyone even know Jed Bartlet’s middle initial?

Joey especially liked to imagine that Eleanor Roosevelt had brushed by this desk at some point. Maybe she had even used it. Joey imagined her sitting at this desk, writing one of her My Day columns. Or, better yet, hastily scribbling a note to Lorena Hickok. Hick, darling, I wish I could lie down beside you tonight & take you in my arms.

Josh had offered a strange welcome. This is a place where work is done and nothing else, he’d told her. She wondered if that was always true. Looking around at the hard-working people around her, it seemed to be. Still, Lorena Hickok must have definitely had her fun-filled moments.

But she was anxious to get to work. She’d already been briefed by Toby Ziegler who’d called her in California so she’d have a day to do some preliminary fact-gathering before she left for Washington. She glanced at the TDD transcript of their conversation noting with satisfaction that she’d already crossed several things off the To Do list she’d written for herself in the margins. She’d found plenty of background material about the disastrous effects of Proposition 227 in California, Ron Unz’s malicious legislative baby that had attempted to outlaw bilingual education in the state. She had a bit of information on the effects of English Only in the Workplace policies, although the effects were much more difficult to document statistically and were mostly anecdotal, based on court cases.

She had been working fifteen or twenty minutes when she all of a sudden was struck by the sensation that someone was watching her. She looked up quickly and saw that, sure enough, there was a woman in an expensive tailored business suit watching her from across the room. Joey flashed a smile at her and then turned to Kenny who was asking her a question.

“Since it’s pretty quiet around here now, I’m going to go get a soda,” he signed. “Do you want anything?”

“A cup of coffee wouldn’t kill me,” Joey responded. “But don’t be gone long. Josh is supposed to be coming back here soon to brief me.”

“Don’t you think Toby will tell him he’s already taken care of it?” asked Kenny.

“It’s possible. But Josh seems to need to do things in his own way. Let him have his moment. You better get going. But hurry back. He may be here at any moment. I don’t want to be stuck alone with him.”

Joey tried to get back to work after Kenny had gone but still she had the feeling of being watched. Again she looked up and saw the woman in the tailored suit watching her. This time, however, she looked away when Joey caught her eye. She didn’t think much of it. She was used to being stared at by hearing people who seemed to be fascinated with ASL. She returned to her work and didn’t look up again until Kenny returned with her coffee. By then the woman was gone.

****

Mandy couldn’t believe her luck. Josh had hired a deaf pollster! She chuckled to herself, thinking Oh, there is a God! She had spent part of the morning watching her. She had an interpreter with her and the two of them had chatted a bit, mostly small talk. But Mandy had been able to glean that she had been brought in to focus on English Only legislation. What in the world would have prompted that, Mandy wondered. She figured it must have something to do with expected Republican opposition to the FEC appointments. Surely that wasn’t the best the Republicans could come up with, thought Mandy derisively.

She watched Joey and the interpreter for a while longer, hoping to extract something more from their conversation. A couple of times, Joey looked over at her and caught her watching, but Mandy was pretty sure she didn’t suspect that she could understand their conversation. After all these years, growing up with a deaf brother had finally paid off, thought Mandy. She had spent most of her life resenting him, resenting the attention he had garnered from their parents. Mandy had always had to do things three times as well just to get noticed in her family. It was like that even now, years later. Mandy had a high-powered job, working with the White House staff and, sure, her parents were proud of her and bragged about it. But it was nothing compared to the fuss they made over David, a high school teacher.

Mandy’s interest perked when she saw that Joey was talking about Josh and she resisted the temptation to smile when Joey made reference to his need to be in charge. Well, she had his number, Mandy thought, and she did break a small smile when Joey asked the interpreter to hurry back so she wouldn’t be caught alone with Josh. She sat and watched Joey for a few moments longer, wondering if she should go over and talk to her now that her interpreter was gone but decided there were too many other people around. She didn’t want to tip her hand. No one here, not even Josh, knew about her brother David, and she planned to keep it that way. She left her post in the bullpen and went looking for Josh, to see if she could have some fun with him.

She found him alone in the corridor, having just come out of the Oval Office. “So, Josh,” she said with the old bravado creeping back into her voice. “I see you’re doing your part for affirmative action. Hiring the handicapped. Is that the only way you can assure yourself of finding a woman who won’t talk back to you?”

Josh stopped in his tracks and raised his eyebrows at her. “First of all, no. Joey does plenty of talking back to everyone, not just to me. And, second of all, handicapped is an antiquated term. People with disabilities is, I believe, the expression au courant. And thirdly, what are you doing hanging around here? Don’t you have work you could be doing?”

“As a matter of fact,” said Mandy. “No. I’m free as a bird, as you may recall. And, Josh? Your French sucks.”

“Mandy...” Exasperation was creeping into Josh’s voice. That’s what Mandy liked to hear. She loved to reduce Josh to the babbling idiot she knew him to be.

“Why did you never meet my family?” asked Mandy. She knew that she could completely throw Josh off by drastically changing the subject mid-argument.

“What?” Josh asked. He looked so perplexed that she almost felt sorry for him. Almost.

“We were together for 14 months and I’m just wondering how, in all that time, you managed to never meet my family.”

“You never asked me to.” said Josh, with a sudden intake of breath. He looked slightly nauseated.

“Are you sure about that?” asked Mandy. She paused for two beats, then turned to walk away. “Oh, and by the way. The flowers you sent to Joey Lucas? Nice touch.”

“That was... Leo,” Josh stammered. He looked deflated now.

“Figures,” said Mandy casually as she walked down the hall. She didn’t even bother to turn back. Her work here was done.

*****

Josh Lyman was such an odd duck, Joey was thinking as she washed her hands in the women’s room after lunch. Here he was, one of the most powerful men in America, and he acted like a nervous frat boy on a first date most of the time. At least around Joey. Still, there was something endearing about him, and Joey couldn’t help but be nice to him. He brought out the big sister in her, complete with the typical sibling teasing.

Joey felt the whoosh of air from the restroom door opening and turned just in time to see the woman in the expensive tailored suit walk in, the one who had been watching her so intently this morning.

“Hello,” Joey voiced, smiling. The woman touched her fingers to her forehead and waved her hand in a gesture that looked for all the world like the sign for hello. "You understand sign?" Joey asked. She was sure the woman had understood her but she had the feeling she had been caught off guard. "It’s okay. Your secret’s safe with me." An old self-deprecating joke.

And then she smiled. Now Joey knew for certain know that she understood her. Still the woman said nothing but Joey didn’t mind. She enjoyed looking at her beautiful smiling face, the little crinkles around the sides of her mouth, and those eyes! They were gorgeous, almost lavender, and they looked sad, even when she was smiling. "Are you deaf?" Joey asked.

"My brother is," she responded. "I’m Mandy Hampton."

"Joey Lucas. It’s nice to meet you." Joey knew she should be getting back to work but it was such a relief to talk directly to someone other than Kenny that she wanted to savor the moment. "Do you work here?"

"I'm the media director," she responded. "At least, for the time being."

"Meaning?"

"I’ve made myself unpopular. I think I may be on the way out." Mandy smiled again, that sad little smile. "I used to work for the opposition and I think it's finally catching up with me."

"Opposition?" asked Joey. "You mean Lillienfield?"

"No, Lloyd Russell."

Joey laughed. "Well, in that case, me, too. I worked for Bill O’Dwyer."

"So why are you here advising Josh on English Only?" Joey must have looked taken aback because Mandy added quickly: "Sorry, I couldn’t help overhearing." She flashed a wicked little smile, and Joey laughed at Mandy’s own self-deprecating humor. It was so nice to meet a hearie with a sense of humor.

"The Republicans are about to make an issue out of it," said Joey.

Mandy's face lit up momentarily, but she pulled it quickly back into a serious expression. "As punishment for the FEC appointments," she said.

"Yes." Joey suddenly wondered if she had perhaps said too much. But Mandy was the media director, after all. An insider. Even if she was on the way out, as she said, she hadn't been pushed out yet. She was still allowed to wander through the White House. And there was something about her that made Joey want to trust her. Maybe it was because she'd come right out and told Joey she understood ASL when she could very easily have kept it a secret, continuing to eavesdrop on Joey's conversations with Kenny. Maybe it was her eyes. They revealed so much about her: That she'd been hurt and rejected. That she wasn't nearly as brave as she pretended to be. Joey could identify with that.

"So? Where do we stand?" Mandy asked, breaking Joey's reverie. "This Administration, I mean."

"We're against it," Joey laughed. "Was there any doubt in your mind?"

"To be honest, Joey, some days I don't know what I'm supposed to think. And English Only is such a bogus issue that it pisses me off that we have to spend any time at all even thinking about it. There are much more important things we should be working on."

"I might be inclined to agree with you if I didn't come from a state where the movement has taken hold. It's been a disaster."

"And you're finding evidence to support that?"

"Yes," Joey replied. She reeled off some of the statistics she'd just been working with that morning. It was all fresh in her mind, and she'd always had excellent recall when it came to numbers. As she talked she felt herself being drawn into Mandy's gaze. She loved the way Mandy watched her hands so intently, then occasionally looked up into her eyes with the same intensity when Joey paused for a moment. Mandy was a skilled listener, she could tell. Most hearing people she met only ever wanted to talk to her or, more accurately, at her. She could usually sense their impatience when she was signing, even with simultaneous translation. Joey gradually slowed down, and then stopped talking altogether. Her eyes met Mandy's, and she saw such a hunger, such a passion in those eyes that, for a moment, she thought she was going to be kissed. She wanted it. She needed the touch of a woman again. It had been so long. But instead of kissing her, Mandy started talking, and Joey reluctantly had to pull her eyes away from Mandy's face and ask her to repeat herself.

"They don't get it, you know," said Mandy.

"Who?" Joey felt suddenly disoriented. "What?"

"The White House Senior Staff," she responded. "They don't get the irony."

"What irony?" Joey felt a bit dizzy. What was she talking about, Joey wondered. One minute, she was all caught up in a romantic moment, dreaming she was about to be kissed, and the next, Mandy was talking about irony, seemingly out of the blue.

"You," said Mandy. "They don't get the irony of having you here, working for them on English Only."

"I know," said Joey. She was smiling broadly, not because the White House didn't get the irony but because Mandy did.

"What are you smiling about?" asked Mandy.

"You," said Joey. She noticed that Mandy was looking quite flustered. And she was actually blushing a bit! It was time for Joey to press her luck. She was anxious to see what else Mandy might be able to do with her hands. "Could we have dinner together?"

"Tonight?" Mandy was clearly surprised by the invitation. "I guess so. I'm... you know... free as a bird."

"It would have to be late, like around 10:00." Mandy hesitated, so Joey quickly added, "Or we could have lunch, if you'd prefer." When Joey made the sign for lunch, she turned her hand slightly so that it actually was closer to the sign for lesbian, hoping Mandy was fluent enough in ASL that she would pick up on the subtlety of the visual pun.

Mandy's eyebrows shot up. "Excuse me?" said Mandy. "Did you say lunch?"

Joey raised her eyebrows flirtatiously in response. "Are you deaf or something?" She was pleased to see Mandy's whole face light up. For the first time since Joey had met her, she was smiling, really smiling, with none of the sadness in her eyes. Joey thought she was the most beautiful woman she had ever seen.

"That's the nicest compliment anyone's paid me in a long time," said Mandy.

"I'm glad you recognize it as such," said Joey. Now she was smiling broadly, too, feeling almost giddy with a sudden rush of infatuation and an uncurling lust. Joey looked at her watch quickly. "I've got to get back to work. I should be back at my hotel tonight by about 10:30, if you want to come by then. The Renaissance. Then we can decide what to do about dinner."

"Or lunch," said Mandy, twisting her hand down into the sign for lesbian. "I just have one favor to ask of you."

"What is it?"

"Don't tell anyone that we understand each other. On the White House staff, I mean. At least not yet."

"Why not?" asked Joey. It struck her as an odd request and she knew her eyes were flashing with anger. Mandy had seemed so perfect for her, too good to be true. Now here she was, backing away from her all of a sudden.

"I don't know. I can't really say. It's just a gut feeling." Mandy smiled again, and this time the sadness had crept back into her eyes. "You don't know these people like I do. You can't trust them. I've learned not to tip my hand around them." It was a warning that Joey didn't really understand. Mandy knew so much about the inner workings of the White House and Joey knew so very little. She wanted to trust Mandy. She wanted so much more from her. She wanted to know everything those eyes had seen. She wanted to feel her bare skin in the darkness.

"Okay," said Joey after giving it a moment's consideration. "I won't let on that I know about your special talent, as long as you continue to tip your hand around me." Joey made the sign for lunch and then lesbian again to accentuate her point. Mandy smiled and shook her head as Joey headed toward the restroom door. "Tonight? At around 10:30?"

"I'll be there," Mandy answered with a nod, and signed lunch/lesbian back at Joey.

Joey practically floated back to her desk, where she found Kenny waiting impatiently.

"Everything okay?" Kenny asked. "You were gone a long time."

"Everything's fine," Joey answered. "I was just taking a little walk, looking for White House ghosts."

"Find any?" Kenny joked.

"I'm not sure," said Joey. "I think maybe I found the spirit of Eleanor Roosevelt."

Kenny laughed. He thought Joey was kidding. But Joey was dead serious. She caught a movement out of the corner of her eye and turned to look. It was Mandy, walking down the corridor, past the bullpen. She barely caught Joey's eye as she walked by but her hands moved to grasp at the air in front of her. Trust me, she had said.

Joey turned back to her note pad, smiling. She would have to do that. Already she was imagining the note she would write to Mandy: Hamp, darling, I wish I could lie down beside you tonight & take you in my arms.

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