We Share the Laugh

 315.

We establish a rotating system of work stations to accomplish the aggressive objective. Upon completion of one's debrief, there us a shift at the communications station, and then what can only be described as office maintenance, logging the hours of media into our unique system, dealing with the near-constant demands for information from the White House, and, especially important in my case, following up on the string of criminals we had placed behind bars, hid into protective custody or simply put on probationary warning.

Most of the debriefs were running about six hours in duration. Considering all that we had done, this in itself was light. Given a more perfect environment under normal circumstances, each testimony might take two days. But if there was one thing that we had all learned, some the hard way, the perfect time, the convenient place and the ideal circumstance, rarely - if ever - offered itself as ready and willing. I considered tasking Mina with another poster job: DO YOUR BEST WITH WHAT YOU HAVE AND WHERE YOU ARE.

There was another matter that I had been subconsciously avoiding, promising my fragile ego to tend to its dark business once we were granted leave in the form of R&R. The matter of my damaged parts. Had they slowed me down or put others at risk? Was I doing everything possible to continue the positive trending - something Mustang called 'miraculous'? And perhaps most importantly, as I face the reality of nearing my seventieth year, could it be time to 'at least' consider the prospect of an official retirement? God it hurt to even think about it. The super-ego that once claimed that a half of me was worth two whole others, no longer carried the plausibility it once did. The image of rolling from Bartowski's barrage of handgun fire is dramatically inserted here as Exibit A. Maybe I'm just lucky, protected somehow by the cosmic forces that want us to win, to triumph over evil and balance the scales of universal justice. Or, more likely, am I trying every trick in the deniability playbook, fooling no one but myself?

Finally, I go from the on-deck cubicle, smothering small fires in the State Department, to my at-bat with Julie. We decide to first take a brisk walk around the block and enjoy a plate of Mina's amuse-bouche with a glass of sparking water. Out and on the street I try my best to keep the hectic pace she has established but immediately fall behind. She notices my struggle and slows her pace to accommodate.

"I heard a good one yesterday," she begins.

Hoping to engage her into the talkative mode to spare myself double-duty, I offer an open ended, "Tell me."

"The Vice-Chair and I were talking about you and TOM, about the similarities in your styles and methodologies. He mentioned that some of them, the most flamboyant - are now considered to be - no matter their effectiveness - decidedly old-school."

I remain silent egging her onward, but take a few mental notes to properly extract revenge on the appropriate offenders.

"I commented that together you two have shaped and protected this experiment in Democracy for almost eighty years, obviously spanning what might, what should, be considered passing the test of time."

There is a pause as I try to find a comfortable cadence. Perhaps she is hoping for me to set up the punch line for her, but my efforts are elsewhere, and I fail as straight-man.

"He said you knew dirt when it was young."

We stop. We inspect the color of each other's eyes. We allow the unfathomable to surface. We pine. We hear the wind whistle.

And we share the laugh.