This piece began, in part, as something fuelled by my desire to ignore my finals and by excessive listening to Kath Bloom's album 'Thin, Thin Line'. I'm not sure why watching season six for the second time has suddenly struck me with such a strong urge to read and write CJ/Kate. There is just nothing about these two characters that I don't like. But I'm pretty sure there aren't many reading things like this anymore.

This is a non-linear collection of events that sort of form a cohesive story that is not in a strictly chronological order. For the most part, please take each new section as a snapshot or memory.

When It Is.

1.

"But a heart proceeds so sadly
when it is, when it is, when it is afraid to live." – Kath Bloom

After Bartlet, the Secret Service detail is, much to her relief, pulled from trailing CJ Cregg. She drops by Josh Lyman's place once in a while, and grins when she sees him rolling his eyes at the security procedures that dogged her throughout her time as Chief of Staff.

When Kate walks along the halls of CJ's apartment block, she's struck by the absence of those dark-suited figures by the front-door. It reminds her, with an almost sickening jolt, just how long it's been since they were together, and when she knocks on the door and CJ appears, she can see on her face that that same jolt ran through her too.

"Kate." she says, and maybe she sounds surprised, or maybe she still just sounds tired. "Come in."

Kate does, but only so CJ can close the front door. She won't go further than that; she steels herself, she keeps her resolve.

There are cardboard boxes scattered around the living area, most empty but some labelled in CJ's writing – "Kitchen misc.", "Electrical" – in that haphazardly ordered, impenetrable way of thinking Kate had almost forgotten in her.

"CJ…" Kate starts. She is not here to catch up.

"Sorry for all the chaos," CJ waves a hand around the room and the way she talks is so breezy, so flippant, it makes Kate shiver. "I probably won't even need half this stuff in Santa Monica, and it'll just stay in these boxes gathering dust. Moving, huh? I think that's probably the main reason I stayed in DC all these years. Not so much for the President, but because I just hate packing."

"CJ." Kate can't take listening to her talk aimlessly like she's talking to other people. CJ's head snaps up to her, guilty. Kate says, "I'm taking a position overseas."

They are not, they never were, just other people.

CJ says nothing for a while, just stares at her, as though waiting for more, as though she'd forgotten Kate never says more than she has to. And when CJ does speak, it's one of those rare moments where she stumbles on words – "What? I mean – overseas where?" As soon as she says it, sees that look on Kate's face, she knows she won't get a straight answer.

"Well, I'm still holding out for an ocean-view room in the Bahamas, so we'll see." Kate says, and CJ wonders if Kate picked up that smart-ass way of avoiding a question from her, or if she's always been this way.

CJ sighs. "How long for?"

"Indefinitely…"

"And Will?" CJ says.

Kate almost laughs. "We really haven't spoken in a long time, have we?"

There is a pause. CJ squeezes her eyes shut, pressing her fingers into her temples. When she opens them again to look at her, the next thing she says falls from her mouth like it's the first time she's realised it herself: "I'm marrying Danny."

Kate's jaw stiffens slightly. She jerks her chin up in a firm half-nod, and the sunlight slants over her high cheekbones, her fine features. For a brief moment, CJ's mind conjures the memory of that face on her pillow, remembers waking up to a crisp first light in the summertime, and stroking her fingertips lightly across that cheek. CJ's palms twinge at the memory of how they'd covered every inch of her body, but she snatches her hand into a fist, and Kate only says – "Yes. I heard."

CJ sighs another long sigh. "Look – I don't know how – "

"You know, I really just came by as a courtesy thing. I didn't want you to wonder if you couldn't get hold of me sometime." Kate breezes past the lost end of CJ's sentence. This wasn't what she came for – for answers or an argument. "Congratulations, CJ. Take care of yourself."

"Kate – "

She's already opening the front door. She's already stepping out. CJ grabs her arm without knowing what she could say to stop her. She feels Kate's muscles tense under her touch and, for a second, CJ thinks there were tears in her eyes. But when Kate looks back, she is resolute.

"CJ, you know this will be much easier for the both of us if we just pretend that there was never anything there at all."

The first time they meet, it is not fireworks, not a riveted, longing gaze across a crowded room. CJ thinks that they probably shook hands but even so, she cannot say for sure. Maybe they passed each other on the way out of the Oval Office. Maybe she'd been hastily introduced at some point in the busy hallways.

The first time Kate really caught CJ's attention was actually a time when Kate wasn't even there – when CJ had gone along to apologise to Donna and instead found Josh ranting in his office after being caught in a lockdown with some infuriating new Deputy NSA. CJ had marvelled at this woman's ability to rile Josh Lyman, knowing full well that what truly drove him up the wall was when he knew he was wrong but unable to admit it. He said her name – "Kate." – with hard edges, hurt pride, and CJ had resolved to meet her properly.

Kate had made CJ smile before they'd even spoken a sentence to one another and, later, when CJ says her name, in the months and years after watching Josh fume, it's softer. When she says it in that particular, low timbre – maybe in the semi-light, as a quiet groan in her ear, maybe accompanied by elegant hands plucking open her shirt– it's the single most arresting sound Kate's ever heard.