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"Morning," said Sam cheerily, breezing into the office with an extra bounce in his step. "Or, should I say, M-O-R-N-I-N-G?"
Toby glanced up quickly and grunted his usual reply, then did a double-take and followed Sam dumbly to his office door.
"Sam."
"Mmhm?" Sam replied as he turned on his computer.
"What are you doing."
"Keeping busy," Sam replied, adding an unnecessary buzz to the latter word.
"No," sighed Toby impatiently, rubbing his forehead. "I mean, what are you wearing?!"
Sam looked down at the bright yellow bumblebee costume he was sporting, then looked back up, the black pom-poms at the ends of his antennae dancing merrily on the ends of their springs.
"It's Halloween, Toby!" he grinned. "Didn't you get the memo from POTUS to dress up for the White House trick-or-treaters? It said anyone who doesn't dress up today has to make it up by joining the President for Christmas caroling in Victorian costumes in December, by the way..."
"Yeah, well, some of us have at least a modicum of dignity to maintain," Toby retorted.
"Ouch." Sam faked a grimace. "That really... stings."
"Sam. Stop."
"S-T-O-P," Sam replied. "Did you pick up on the fact I'm a spelling bee?"
"I hate you," grumbled Toby as he stormed back off to his own office.
"Aw, come on, bee nice!" Sam called after him out the door, before turning to his computer.
"What do you mean, we don't have full-sized candy bars?!"
"We have the normal-sized ones, which will do just fine for the occasion," replied Abbey.
"Yeah, and every time the Speaker of the House makes a very similar argument about the federal minimum wage or Pell grants, I quote both Proverbs 11:24 and the General Welfare Clause at him," Jed insisted. "I refuse to be such a miserly hypocrite when it comes to Halloween candy. Do we have enough time to send someone out to get full-sized candy bars before the kids start arriving?"
"Look, I never signed up for this job, and I have actual life-saving work to do, so if you leave the minutiae of White House event planning to me, then you'd better be prepared to take what you get," the First Lady said tartly, as her husband trailed her through the hallways of the East Wing.
"Abbey," whined Jed, "we've reached the inevitable midterms slump, and the last thing I need for the party's polling numbers is for a bunch of irate parents to go ballistic over the next week because the White House was being too cheap to go all-out on candy expenditures! Surely we have a budget for this somewhere?"
"Of course we do," Abbey informed him. "But, as a doctor, I would be an absolute hypocrite to hand out full-sized candy bars, when this country is facing an unprecedented spike in childhood obesity!"
"You're such a killjoy," Jed grumbled as they wandered into the Blue Room, where Charlie was waiting to meet them. "Next year, I'm putting Charlie in charge of planning the White House trick-or-treating."
"Joke's on you, then, if you want full-sized candy bars," Abbey smirked.
"I suggested we hand out fruit slices," Charlie explained.
"You two are fired as my PR strategists," Jed groaned. "Okay, take me to these sad, minuscule excuses for M&M packets. We can lament the end of the Democrats' control of the Senate over the world's tiniest Snickers bars when this is all over."
"Yes, sir," said Charlie calmly at Jed slouched mournfully towards the West Wing. "I'll ask the Pentagon to send someone over to play Taps."
Josh was halfway through his customary morning caterwauling for Donna when she appeared in his office doorway, and Josh found himself momentarily speechless.
"What is this?!" he asked finally.
"Guess," Donna told him. She was wearing a headband with antlers attached, a fake moustache, and a green inner tube around her waist with a dollar sign written on it in black Sharpie.
"Uhhhhhhh." Josh screwed up his face in thought, blinked, and shook his head. "An... androgynous reindeer who can't swim?"
"I'm stagflation," Donna told him with an exasperated sigh. "Get it? Stag-flation."
"I literally never would have gotten that," Josh told her. "No one would ever get that."
"It's an economic theory pun," Donna insisted. "The Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers thought it was very clever, once I explained it to her."
"Why do you have a moustache?" Josh asked, nonplussed.
"So everyone knows I'm a stag, and not a doe," Donna said, as if this were perfectly obvious.
"Does don't have antlers," Josh replied.
"Josh?" said Donna airily. "You're not allowed to criticize my costume, if you didn't even try to make one yourself."
"I did," Josh insisted. "It's, uh..."
Donna waited patiently while Josh thought furiously for a plausible answer other than Disgruntled Executive Staffer. After a moment, she took pity on Josh and pulled from her purse a headband with cat ears on it. Josh watched, dumbfounded, as Donna momentarily caught her inner tube in the door frame, then squeezed through.
"Don't lose these," she warned Josh as she handed the headband over. "If you sing everything as terribly as you sing 'Happy Birthday,' you'd completely ruin Christmas caroling this year."
And she squeezed her way back out of the office again, Josh still staring after her.
Leo McGarry had seen a good many things in his life, but one thing he had never dreamt he would see was Debbie Fiderer dressed, inexplicably, as a Disney princess.
"He's over in the Executive Residence, picking up candy for the trick-or-treaters," Debbie explained as soon as Leo appeared.
"Yeah." Leo opened his mouth, then closed it, then opened it again. "Can I just ask...?"
"I'm not taking any chances," Debbie explained. "Last year, I wore a pirate hat with my normal clothes, and the President told me that that didn't count, and I really don't think any of you want to hear me sing Christmas carols."
"I can appreciate that," Leo conceded. "This is just... not what I would have expected."
"Well, I had it lying around," shrugged Debbie. "Not a bad excuse to wear it, actually."
"Okay," Leo said, increasingly bewildered.
"Yeah, some friends bought it for me years ago, as a joke."
"I'm afraid to ask."
"It was in connection with a fantasy about poisoning our horrible boss while dressed as Snow White."
"Uh huh," responded Leo, because that seemed like the most appropriate response. "Do I need to have your security clearance revoked?"
"Absolutely not," said Debbie drily. "I didn't actually poison my horrible boss. The only illegal thing that resulted from the whole matter was the incidental theft of a corpse—but we returned that as soon as we realized we’d made a mistake, so, no harm done."
"Did this come up in your interviews for this position?"
"Nope."
"Right." Sometimes, Leo really couldn't figure out Debbie's sense of humor. "Well, when he's back, tell him I'll debrief with him this afternoon, when I'm done with talking to the Republicans on Appropriations."
"Will do," confirmed Debbie, and Leo walked away, shaking his head.
"Since it's Halloween, I think we should play a little game," C.J. announced. "I'm going to ask you to announce when I call on you whether your question is a trick or a treat. Trick, obviously, means it's probably something I don't want to answer; treat means it's a nice softball for me. Okay? Great. Jennifer, trick or treat?"
The New York Times reporter bit her lip for a moment, as if torn, then said, "Trick, I guess. Can you comment on how the White House anticipates increasingly souring relations with Qumar impacting fuel prices for Americans as we head into the winter season?"
"Obviously, our embassy in Qumar is engaging in frequent dialogue with their counterparts in the country to mitigate any hard feelings over the recent round of sanctions, and between their efforts and our confidence in OPEC's ability to stabilize oil exports across the globe, we're optimistic that any impact on fuel prices will be short-lived and minimal," C.J. answered smoothly. "Rodney, trick or treat?"
The Newsweek columnist likewise gave C.J. a pensive look before he sighed and said, "I think I've also gotta go for a trick. The President's thoughts on his poll numbers, going into the midterms?"
"I'm sure he has many," C.J. replied, biting back the urge to make some comment about how no Halloween scare could be more frightening than the prospect of the Republicans taking back both the House and the Senate. "But regardless of the poll numbers, the White House looks forward to supporting the American public as it exercises its democratic right to vote in the coming weeks, including working with local law enforcement across the country to ensure that voting is kept free and open to all. Okay, really, no treats out there?"
"Yeah, I'll go for the treat everyone's been passing up," Danny said, raising his hand. "What's going on with your face?!"
C.J. froze for a moment like a deer in the headlights, clearly working through what exactly Danny meant, then let out an embarrassed laugh.
"Uh, this," she explained gesturing to her face, "is what happens when you're interrupted halfway through putting on makeup for the White House trick-or-treaters by a press conference that's unexpectedly been moved up by three hours, and forget to take it off before you rush over to the press room. And, on that note, I've got some candy to hand out, so, Happy Halloween, folks."
Danny, being incorrigible, intercepted C.J. as she tried to make her way from the podium out the door.
"Okay, but what's the costume?"
"Nope," C.J. replied.
"C'mon, please? Someone's gonna have to explain it once the C-SPAN watchers start spreading wild theories around the web."
"Oh, god," groaned C.J. "I was trying to do ancient Egyptian eyeliner. I have a headdress and everything!"
"Okay, so, you're a pharaoh or a mummy or something?"
"I'm a jackal," grumbled C.J. "Or technically Anubis the jackal god, whatever. How obvious is it?"
"Well, you could easily slip onto a stage with a emo rock band and only be noticeable for your height."
"Look," sighed C.J., "if The Post would consider clearing this whole mishap up for the American public, I would personally be very grateful."
"And?" Danny prompted after a moment.
"I can't make any promises on behalf of my boss," C.J. argued.
"I'm not asking about your boss," Danny countered. "Dinner sometime?"
"Fine," huffed C.J., and Danny finally let her past. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go give a bunch of kids a sugar rush that will make their parents curse me next time I appear on television."
"I'm exhausted," groaned Josh. "I'm exhausted, and I didn't even have to move while I was handing out candy."
"You could have just shut the door to your office," muttered Toby softly from where he sat across the Roosevelt Room, a still almost-full bowl of candy in front of him.
"True," agreed Sam, stealing a Hershey's bar from Toby's bowl, "but your attitude towards this whole thing is really just a-pollen."
C.J., sprawled a few seats away with her headdress askew, groaned and half-heartedly lobbed a Starburst at Sam's head, which Sam cheerfully caught with his free hand.
"Well, at least none of you made an absolute fool of yourself on national TV today," she argued. "Apparently someone on Fox News made a comment about how I looked less like a jackal than like a raccoon."
"It's Halloween," Donna said placatingly. "Everyone should understand."
"Speaking of not understanding," Leo chimed in, "what are you, Donna?"
Donna sighed impatiently.
"Really? None of you get it???"
At that moment, however, the President entered the Roosevelt Room, Charlie following closely behind in a Washington Wizards jersey, and everyone quickly rose to their feet.
"As always, thank you all for making today such a special one for all of the kids who visited," said Jed, who was dressed in a stovepipe top hat and an Abraham Lincoln beard. "And thank you to those of you who embraced the spirit of the occasion by dressing up! C.J., fabulous eye makeup; Sam, you're the bee's knees; Josh, the jury is still out as to whether that headband counts, it may come down to whether we need another tenor for caroling this year. And Donna..."
Donna bit her lip as Jed scrutinized her outfit for a long moment.
"Interpret it top to bottom?" she recommended.
"Something about bucks?" Jed ventured. "Bucks, inflatable..." A moment later, his face lit up. "Aha! Stagflation? That's very good!"
"Thank you, sir," Donna replied, smirking sidelong as Josh, who muttered something about economists.
"So, aside from allowing all of you to exercise your creativity, a brief word on why we do this every year." Jed seated himself at the head of the table, and everyone else sat as well. "As you all well know, enacting federal policy is like turning a battleship around. Agility is not the federal government's strength, and the ramifications of the decisions we make often aren't felt until months, if not years, down the line. It's tough to get the American people to understand that, let alone American kids. So the very least we can do is open up the White House on a few occasions per year, and let even kids too young to understand politics understand that this really is their White House, and we're working for them. Even if the candy we give them is, for reasons beyond my control, subpar by any true trick-or-treater's standards," he added.
"Actually, sir, I took an informal exit poll of the kids, and none of them had any complaints about the size of the candy bars," Charlie commented.
"Ah, good," said Jed pensively.
Because the thing was, the American public had the right to demand metaphorical full-sized candy bars from their government, even if the government could only provide normal-sized ones, whether due to compromise or budgeting constraints or sheer political disorganization. They had that right, and Jed wanted so badly to make sure his constituents—the citizens of these United States—received as much as they deserved. But, since even the President could only control so much, perhaps the moral of the story was to be glad that his intrepid staff had been able to provide a little bit of instantaneous joy to a few Americans today, even as the struggle to promote the general welfare as a whole ground on at glacial speed.
"Well, back to work," the President sighed finally. "Thank you once again, all. Oh, and Toby, Josh? Yeah, you, too, Leo, you had time to change before the Appropriations meeting this afternoon. The three of you be sure to see Debbie Fiderer at some point within the next few days to have your measurements taken for caroling outfits."