Fed Up
Lee anxiously paced the length of his section chief’s office, waiting for his wife to arrive. After what had seemed like ages, Billy had finally received a decision on the matter that had plagued Lee for months.
One week ago to the day, Lee had approached Billy regarding an important issue regarding Amanda. Though it hadn’t seemed quite as urgent to the section chief, he had convinced Billy that the matter needed to be taken care of immediately, in order for him to regain his sanity.
The problem had to do with what people called Amanda around the Agency. Six months ago they had come clean, announcing their marriage publicly to everyone at home and at the Agency. The effort of keeping their marriage a secret had been a huge strain, not only on their personal relationship, but on their partnership as well. However, even though everyone now knew that Amanda was the mighty Scarecrow’s wife, many of the agents still insisted on referring to her as Mrs. King.
Lee realized that many of them did this because they had known Amanda from that first day, when she’d come in after that whole Pilgrim’s Peach Puff affair; and others had met her during those first years when she was very green around the edges, and more a nuisance to him than anything. Still others had only met her after she’d been well established at the Agency, as Scarecrow’s unofficial, and then official partner. During those times, she had always been referred to as Mrs. King, or even Amanda King.
Now, however, that everyone knew she was no longer Amanda King, but Amanda Stetson, hearing Mrs. King spoken in the hallways was like a slap in the face. It wasn’t that Lee disliked Joe, and while he wouldn’t call him a friend, they got along fairly well; mostly for the sake of Phillip and Jamie, and to avoid causing Amanda any stress.
It wasn’t that Lee had anything against the name King either; after all it was his stepsons’ surname. However, the moment they had announced their marriage to everyone, she had publically declared that she was now Amanda Stetson, and hearing his colleagues call her King was a constant reminder that he wasn’t her first, nor her only husband. He didn’t begrudge her past, especially since his had been spread out over four little black books, but he didn’t need to be reminded of it at work. Work was their common ground, and Joe King should not intrude on it, unless it was a matter of national security.
The final straw had come when a new recruit had called her Mrs. King. Lee had a sneaking suspicion that the poor kid had probably only been following Beaman’s orders, but still it had rankled him and he had decided right then and there that it was high time Amanda be given a code name; something that would provide her with her own identity apart from him, and effectively distance her from her first marriage.
Lee glanced at his watch and then looked out the window into the bustling Bullpen. What was keeping her? Billy had called her almost fifteen minutes ago. It wasn’t like her to take this long to respond to a summons from their section chief.
“Scarecrow, please sit down.” Billy closed his eyes and rubbed his temple. “Your pacing is starting to get on my nerves. Amanda said she’d be here as soon as she could, but she needed to run down to Research first.”
Lee turned to look at his friend and boss, took a deep breath and then walked over to the couch and grudgingly sat down. “Sorry, Billy. It’s just that I can’t wait much longer. The minute you tell Amanda then you can make the official announcement, and I can go back to giving my full attention to my job.”
“Amen to that.” Billy nodded in agreement. “And you can stop giving the new recruits a reason to run from you every time they see you in the hallway.”
Lee shrugged somewhat apologetically. “Okay so maybe I have been a little hard on some of the freshman agents.”
“A little hard? Scarecrow, you’ve been an absolute monster. I always thought that if you got married you’d settle a little.” Billy stared across the room at his best agent and shook his head slightly. “But I didn’t realize it was going to make you even more unbearable to be around than before. And after you almost put James through a wall, some of the senior agents started to avoid you.”
“Okay, you’ve made your point.” Lee raised his hands in surrender. “I’ll make a point to visit one of Beaman’s classes and apologize.”
Billy’s eyebrows raised in disbelief. “The great Scarecrow, publically apologizing. Now that’s a first.”
“Well, while I still blame the incident with James entirely on Beaman.” Lee ran a hand through his hair. “I swear he did it on purpose,” he muttered more to himself than to Billy, then in a normal voice he concluded, “I realize I shouldn’t take it out on the rookies.”
“I spoke to Beaman and it wasn’t personal, Scarecrow.” Billy saw the look of skepticism that crossed his agent’s face. “He apologized; not only didn’t he realize how much it would upset you, but he just wasn’t thinking and used her name out of habit. It’s bound to happen, Scarecrow, especially she’s been known around here a lot longer as Amanda King, than as Amanda Stetson.”
“I know. I know.” Lee sighed again. “But I’m really hoping this will help.” He waved the certificate he was holding towards Billy.
Billy’s face brightened as he saw the object of their discussion enter the bullpen. “Well your wait is almost over, Scarecrow.”
Lee rose from his seat just as he heard the sound of his wife’s familiar knock on the office door and Billy waved Amanda in.
“I’m sorry it took me so long sir,” Amanda stated as she entered the office and smiling brightly at her husband, she shut the door and walked towards Billy’s desk.
“Don’t worry about it. I know how things go down in Research.” Billy motioned to a seat and nodded in Lee’s direction as Amanda sat down. “As I’m sure you’re aware, Lee and I have been working on securing a code name for you.” The brunette nodded, and he continued, “Well after a lot of brainstorming and research, a decision has finally been made.”
Amanda sat on the edge of her seat. While she knew that Lee was responsible for the code name, and she also knew the real reason behind it, the fact that she was getting a code name made her feel like she was finally going to be seen as a real agent. Not that her training hadn’t done that, but after the incident in California, and having to prove herself all over again to everyone, including her husband, a code name would mean her own identity in the intelligence community; something that was hers, and hers alone. She glanced expectantly towards her husband than back to the section chief, the words ‘so what is it?’ hanging on the tip of her tongue.
Lee started to hand the certificate to their boss, but when Billy shook his head and nodded towards Amanda, he realized that he was going to be the one to break the news to his wife. “Amanda, your code name is Nefertiti.”
The End
Author’s End Note: Nefertiti is known from Ancient Egyptian history as the prominent wife of Pharoah Akhenaten. At some time during his rule, she was elevated to co-regent, having been given equal status to that of her husband. Her name is meant to translates to “the beautiful (or perfect) one has arrived”. I see it as the perfect name for Amanda, as she was the perfect one to come along and be the Scarecrow’s partner.
Author's Chapter Notes:
Disclaimers: Scarecrow and Mrs. King is copyrighted to Warner Brothers and Shoot the Moon Production Company. I have borrowed the characters without the permission of WB & Shoot the Moon. This story is for entertainment purposes ONLY, and I do not wish to use this story to profit off of the borrowed characters. This story, however, is copyrighted to the mentioned author.
Author’s note: This was written for the Friday Challenge issued on 4/25/08; the prompt line was “Amanda, your code name is now ______” (fill in the blank). Many thanks to Jan G for beta’ing this for me.
Author’s note: This was written for the Friday Challenge issued on 4/25/08; the prompt line was “Amanda, your code name is now ______” (fill in the blank). Many thanks to Jan G for beta’ing this for me.