Well, the bathtub, to be specific.  The large, modernly-equipped-yet-artfully-old-fashioned ceramic bathtub. Sweet bliss.

She'd had money, of course.  She hadn't owned the house in Los Feliz -- that honor belonged to her bank -- but she'd paid enough on it that the sale gave her a nice cushion.  The upside was that upon her arrival in D.C., she'd had enough money to buy a townhouse in Georgetown.  The downside was that her new job left precious little time for house-hunting.

And so CJ had called Josh's realtor and given her a price range, basic instructions ("Nothing that's, I don't know, a primary color or ugly in any way") and one important requirement ("Find me a bathtub to die for").

At six feet even, CJ did not fit easily into your average tub.  Her knees stuck up out of the water, knobby and cold and covered in goose bumps.  That, or her entire torso was above water.  Neither situation being conducive to relaxation, CJ had turned up her nose at almost three dozen townhouses before she laid eyes on the opulence of this deep, sculpted, oversized tub.

She'd made an offer on the spot, which Toby called hasty and she preferred to think of as decisive.  After all, the small kitchen and guest room with too few windows were of little consequence to her; she couldn't remember the last time she'd cooked at home, and her next overnight guest had damn well better not be staying in the guest room.

But none of that mattered while she was engulfed in bubbles, tension seeping from her frame.  That tub kept her sane; in the midst of one particularly heinous day, she'd taken a long lunch (73 glorious minutes) and fit in a 20-minute soak.  (Though he didn't know it, Josh owed his continued existence to that emergency bubble bath.)

Over the years, CJ had perfected the art of the bubble bath.  First, a tip she'd picked up from Donna, the best bubble bath was, strange as it sounds, Johnson & Johnson's Lavendar & Chamomile for Sensitive Skin.  Second, a glass of wine.  Chardonnay, because the reds didn't help with her stress headaches.  Third, music.  Usually classical, sometimes jazz (Brubeck or maybe Parker).  Fourth, her cellphone.  She was, after all, the White House Press Secretary, though she sometimes fantasized during her bubble baths about being a glassblower up in Vermont.  Perhaps a needle-pointer (though she thought there was probably a better word for that occupation; no doubt Toby would know it, but she'd never ask him) in West Virginia somewhere.  It was never the same, but the one quality all of her bubble-jobs shared was a lack of stress.

Tonight, it was a violinist.  How hard could that be? she thought.  So what if she'd been unable to master the piano, despite her "perfect hands"?  The thing had 88 different keys!  A violin had only four strings.  CJ figured it'd be quite a relaxing life, toting that small case to various stages and playing beautiful music for hours.

She sank lower into the tub, noting with an absent sort of curiosity that her skin was flushed a deep pink from the heated water.  Of course, she thought, frowning, concert violinists had to wear formal wear.  Too binding, she decided, and three-inch heels were not at all stress-free.

CJ closed her eyes and allowed the water's warmth to seep into her skin.  Slowly, slowly, her shoulders began to relax, her muscles soften.  She ran two fingers lazily across her stomach, just enjoying the slide of wet skin.

Maybe that's why she enjoyed bubble baths so much; the pure sensuality of the heat and the water and the soft light and the scent of candles and the quiet sound of water moving, of bubbles bursting.  At some point, she was transformed from an overly analytical, walking thesaurus of spin into a full person, aware of her entire body, her entire mind.  Her stress, necessarily, melted slowly away.  At least until the phone rang.

And it always rang.

Tonight it was Toby.

"Toby, I'm busy."

He hesitated for just a moment.  "What are you doing?"  His tone was almost accusatory, like she'd somehow surprised him a little and he disapproved.

She considered "accidentally" dropping the phone into the tub, but figured that instead of shorting out, it would end up killing her.  "Press Secretary Dies Nude in Tub" was really not the headline she wanted for her obituary.

"If I'd wanted to share what I was doing, I would have said 'Toby, I'm busy crocheting.'"

"Crocheting?"

"I could crochet if I wanted to, Toby."

"Of that I have no doubt."

It caught her off guard sometimes, his strange compliments.  She didn't know how to talk to him like that, which usually meant she got irritated.  "Why are you calling me?"

"I wanted to make sure that--"  He stopped, started again, "that you weren't listening to NPR."

CJ frowned, shifting a little to ease the pressure on her shoulder blade.  "Is that reverse psychology of some kind?"

He chuckled, just a little.  "No."

"Okay," she answered, reaching for her wine glass.  She didn't feel like puzzling him out tonight.  She really wanted to lie there in her tub, overheated and floating and a little lightheaded from the wine and the sweet smell of scented candles.

"Good," Toby said too quickly.  "I have to go.  I have a -- thing."

CJ swallowed a fast, nearly choking on her wine.  "Hold on, there, Toby."  She thunked the glass down onto the lip of the tub.  "You can't just say something that odd and then hang up."

"Why not?"

Though he wasn't there to appreciate it, she gave him an exasperated look.  "Because.  It's rude."

"And since I am the soul of social grace--"

"Toby."

"CJ."

"You're ruining my relaxed evening."

He sighed.  "I was trying to keep Bob Edwards from doing that."

She smiled despite her irritation.  He could be quite unintentionally sweet sometimes.  "Are you going to tell me what Bob's up to?"

"Only if you stop calling him Bob."

"It's his name, Toby.  Which is besides the point.  Are you going to tell me?"

"I'd rather not."

"Toby--"

"Seriously, CJ, don't worry about it."

She drained the last bit of wine in her glass.  "You're impossible.  You called me in the middle of my bubble bath to tell me not to listen to--"

"Your what?" Toby interrupted.

CJ eased a lock of hair back into its binding and tried to come up with a way to convince him he'd heard wrong.  "Nothing."  Smooth way to extricate myself verbally from an undesirable conversation, she thought, good thing I don't do that for a living.

"You're taking a bubble bath right now?" Toby asked, his voice strangely hushed.

CJ sighed.  "Yes."

"Huh."

"Yes.  I take bubble baths, okay?  I love bubble baths.  I firmly believe that's why my half of the species is much less uptight than yours.  Bubble baths are relaxing, dammit!"

"Sounds it," he remarked.

Determined to prove him wrong, she slouched back down into the water, sending little shock waves careening into the ceramic sides of the tub.  "I was perfectly relaxed until you called with your big, cryptic secret."

He paused.  "Cryptic actually means secr--"

"Oh, shove it, Toby."

"Funny you should use that turn of phrase," he commented.

CJ's shoulders snapped to attention.  "Why do you say that?"

Toby sighed.  "Remember last week when you told me--"

"Hang on," CJ ordered, sitting upright to reach for the portable radio perched precariously on the counter.

"Don't bother.  The story's over."

"How did you know I was--"

"I can hear the--"  Toby cleared his throat.  "The water."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

It was strangely intimate, the fact that Toby could hear her bathwater as it swirled around her.  CJ was flushed again, whether from the heated water or the situation, she couldn't say.  "What story?"

"There's a protest."

"A protest?"

"Yes."

"About the arms deal with Qumar?"

"Yes."

CJ turned that over for a moment, savoring it like a piece of Swiss chocolate.  "Huh," she murmured.

"Yes," Toby said again.

Something in his voice, something muted, said that he wasn't telling her the whole story.

"Hey, Toby?"

He sighed, knowing what was coming.  "Yeah?"

"Did anything I said last week regarding the draconian treatment of women in Qumar lead you to believe that a group of sane, compassionate people protesting our indefensible sale of arms to Qumar would make me upset?"

"No."

"So there were counter-protestors," she guessed.

"A few."

"And Bob Edwards talked to them?"

"Yes."

CJ considered that.  "Were they pro-military or pro-Qumar?"

"Mostly the latter."

"Son of a bitch," CJ muttered.  "Toby, tell me--"

"Some were Qumari émigrés who--"

"Excuse me?" CJ interrupted, sitting up again.  She was so focused on the conversation that she didn't feel the tendrils of water slipping down her back.  "Male or female?"

"CJ--"

"Oh, you have got to be kidding me," CJ rubbed her suddenly throbbing temple with dripping fingers.  "Qumari women were protesting the protest?"

"Yes."

"On what grounds?" she demanded.

"They feel the sentiment of the protest was anti-Qumar."

CJ snorted indelicately.  "Ya think?"

"CJ--"

"Toby, anti-American protests in Palestine aren't about American citizens, not really.  They're about the objectionable foreign policies of the American government!"

"I know."

He did know.  She knew he knew, but she couldn't stop.  "And these Qumari women -- women who are over here enjoying the freedom to dress how they chose, to worship how they choose, to assemble, dammit, without male chaperones and protest the other -- Toby, how dare they--"

"CJ, it's not that simple."

"It is," she insisted.  The magic of the bubbles, the candle, the wine -- they fled, and she was an ineffectual woman sitting in a pool of rapidly cooling water.  She slumped back, hissing when her back met the cool ceramic.  "It should be."

Toby let the silence stand for a moment.  "I know."

"It used to be, Toby," she insisted, her voice quiet.

"It did."

"Ten years -- hell, three years ago, I would've been there, Toby.  At the protest."

"I know."

"The original one," she explained, unnecessarily.  "Not the--"

"CJ."

She sighed.  "Yeah."

"Listen--"

"I've got to go, Toby."

"CJ."

"I know, I just -- I've got to go."  She allowed herself a small, sad smile.  "The water's cooling off."

"Ah."  He was smiling too, she could tell from his voice.  "The perils of bubble bath-taking."

"Interesting grammar, there, Tobus."

"Go douse yourself in girly lotions or whatever it is you do, CJ," he answered, understanding the thanks in her words.

"Yeah."

They disconnected, and CJ stared balefully down at the water.  She popped the drain with her heel, grabbed the bottle of bubbles, and reached for the spigots.  She needed more wine, but it seemed like too much trouble.

As the hot water replenished the bubbles, CJ sat back, closed her eyes, and thought about her dream job.  Maybe a protestor.  A professional protestor.  She could help point out all the inconsistencies, all the inequality in the system.  She could nudge things in the right direction if she screamed loud and long enough.

It didn't sound like a stress free job, but she thought maybe she could get used to it.  In her next life, CJ decided, she'd be a professional protestor.

THE END

12.07.01