Work Text:
Put your lips close to mine
As long as they don't touch
Out of focus, eye to eye
'Til the gravity's too much
February 1998
“I’ve never been to Texas,” Donna admits, throwing her bag over her shoulder. “I don’t know why I thought it would look… different, somehow.”
“Yeah, well when you spend your nights in one of three chain motels you can find all across this great nation of ours, it’s not exactly easy to play a game of ‘spot the difference’,” Josh says. “Did CJ tell you where her room is?”
Donna nods as she reaches forward to press the button on the elevator. “She’s a couple of doors down from you and Sam, I think. Apparently, Leo’s going to get her an assistant too so we can room together.”
“Really?”
The elevator doors slide open and they step inside. Donna unconsciously slides her hand up and down the strap of her quilted duffel bag. “Yeah, something about you being much easier to deal with, hoping it would have the same effect on the others?” she quips.
Josh turns his head toward her as the doors close. “I’m easy to deal with!” Josh protests.
“You scared three interns this morning at the coffee pot,” Donna points out, “and that was just before seven A.M.”
“They didn’t know how to make coffee!” Josh says. “They were about to dump actual coffee beans where the filter goes. Coffee beans, Donna.”
“Maybe they were just nervous,” Donna says. “I’ve done some pretty stupid things when I was nervous before.”
The elevator comes to a stop and they step out onto their floor. Donna hands Josh his key card and he accepts it, sliding it out of its envelope. “You were nervous to come here, and on your second day you talked to the Governor about logical fallacies in small-town newspapers.”
“One could argue that was a pretty stupid thing,” Donna says, feeling her cheeks flush.
“Hardly,” Josh scoffs. “You endeared yourself to him right away.”
“He doesn’t remember my name,” Donna argues.
Josh steps toward his room, sliding his key card in the door. “He doesn’t remember my name, either.”
“Your first meeting is at seven-thirty tomorrow. I’ll be at your door at six-thirty. Have you changed your watch? We’re on Central time now. Although it wouldn’t kill you to be early to something for once, so maybe I shouldn’t have said anything.” Donna turns toward Josh to ensure that he heard her, but notices that he’s still struggling with the key card. She watches him for a moment as he gets increasingly frustrated with it, vigorously shaking the door handle and cursing under his breath. “Josh.”
“Yeah,” he barks, wincing as he hears the sharp tone of his response. “Sorry, yeah. Six-thirty. Central.”
Donna drops her bag and walks over to Josh, grabbing his hand and inserting the key card. The jolt of electricity she feels when she puts her hand over his is hard to ignore, and it catches her off guard. She clears her throat and slowly lets go of his hand as the door clicks, allowing Josh to open it.
“Thanks,” he says.
She gives him a small smile as he enters the hotel room, trying to ignore the fact that she can feel her heartbeat in her ears. It’s as though a kaleidoscope of colorful butterflies are flying around in her stomach, bouncing off its walls to announce their presence. Donna enters her own hotel room and digs through her bag for her pajamas, her heart successfully hijacking every train of thought with Josh. Josh’s dimples, Josh’s messy hair, Josh’s laugh.
The last time she’d been this consumed by thoughts of someone else was freshman year - Michael Bennett, a shy but charming junior trombone player in the high school marching band. They went on two dates and things fizzled when she realized he was kind of arrogant.
Donna rolls her eyes at herself as she starts the water for a shower. She’s got a type, doesn’t she? A little older, a little arrogant, incredibly charming. She’s just gotten out of a long relationship with a guy who was exactly her type. The last thing she needs is a crush on her boss.
But she can’t help who she has feelings for, can she?
She steps into the shower and lets out a sigh as the hot water starts to ease her aching muscles. It’s quite possible - probable, actually - that she’s overthinking this. She’s perfectly capable of managing a little crush. A crush that will probably fade in time when she gets to know him better, after she works with him for fourteen hours a day, when he starts to be less charming and more frustrating.
Until then, though… it’s a harmless crush.
And I'll do anything you say
If you say it with your hands
And I'd be smart to walk away
But you're quicksand
April 1998
Donna hangs up the phone and stretches toward Josh’s calendar, sighing heavily when she realizes that it’s just out of her reach. She slowly stands, careful to keep the weight off her bad ankle, and bends over Josh’s desk.
“Seriously?” she hears Josh’s voice say from the doorway.
Donna turns to look at him as she lowers herself back into the chair. “I need to move around, Josh.”
“Yeah, and you need to elevate that ankle, too.”
Since her return to the Bartlet for America campaign the day before, Josh has been acting… strange. Much to her surprise, he didn’t tease her once about her return, didn’t question her at all about why she’d come back. He simply caught her up on what she’d missed and shifted into Political Operative Josh Mode.
But today, he noticed her limp as soon as he walked into Campaign Headquarters. He’d set her up with an extra chair to rest her foot on in order to keep it elevated, and he’s prevented her from getting up and moving without some sort of assistance several times throughout the day. The campaign HQ is quiet now, Josh and Donna being the last two in the building, but he’s still hovering despite the lateness of the hour and the fact that she can’t exactly sneak past him with no one else there.
Donna makes a show of lifting her foot and placing it back in the chair. “There,” she says, motioning toward her foot. “Elevated.”
Josh sighs and shakes his head. “Your bandage is falling off.” He walks toward the empty chair and lifts her foot, then places it in his lap as he gently removes Donna’s shoe and starts to unwrap the ace bandage around her ankle. “For someone who helped her boyfriend through medical school, you’ve done a terrible job at wrapping this.”
“Well, for one, it’s a lot more difficult to wrap your own foot,” Donna says. “Not to mention the fact that I’m not the one who actually practiced medicine.”
He just laughs, starting the process of re-wrapping her ankle entirely from scratch. It’s the first time he’s touched her since she returned; it’s probably the excruciating awareness that they’re slowly getting back to normal, whatever normal means, that’s causing her to have a slow and steady spiral over how it feels to be touched by Josh.
Josh is tactile; she learned this about him early on. His hands are always warm. He has a perpetual papercut on the side of his right thumb. Sometimes, when they’re drunk after a long stretch of traveling, he’ll drape an arm around her shoulder and play with the ends of her hair. When he hugs her, he buries his face in her neck. Once, he put his hand on her knee, so deep in a story about his and Sam’s early days in D.C. that he didn’t even realize it was there.
She’ll never forget what it was like the first time he pressed a hand to the small of her back, guiding her through a busy hotel conference room in South Carolina. The way he extended his hand toward hers when she found him on the floor of a hotel room the morning after he returned from his dad’s funeral, allowing her to place their joined hands in her lap as she sat with him in silence.
But there’s something painfully intimate about this, the way he’s holding her foot in his hands as though it’s fragile, breakable, like the slightest touch could further injure her.
“Okay,” he declares. “That should be much better.”
Donna leans forward to look at Josh’s handiwork. He’s done a surprisingly good job at wrapping her ankle; the bandage isn’t too tight, but it’s not loose enough to come undone. She wiggles her toes and slowly moves her ankle from side to side, noticing that Josh’s hands are still resting gently on her foot. “Leaps and bounds. Well, I can’t move leaps or bounds on this ankle, but the sentiment stands.”
His thumb grazes against the ace bandage near her anklebone as he watches her open the calendar and jot a few notes down. It sends an involuntary shiver down her spine and she starts to talk, attempting to redirect his attention. “You’ve got a meeting with Joseph Wilson from the League of Women Voters tomorrow at eight.”
“Why is a guy in charge of the League of Women Voters?” Josh asks. “That seems… you know.”
“It does water down the strength of the message, so to speak,” Donna agrees. “Did you finish the thing?”
Josh nods. “Yeah. You ready to call it a night?”
Donna glances down at her ankle again. “You re-wrapped that, chided me about not having it elevated, and now you want to call it a night?”
He simply shrugs. “It needed to be wrapped. And you need to keep it elevated.” Josh places her shoe on her foot, then lowers it to the ground before he stands. “Let’s get out of here.”
She leans on him as they walk back to the hotel, the dull ache in her ankle overpowered by the ache that settles in her chest when they reach her room.
This slope is treacherous
This path is reckless
This slope is treacherous
And I, I, I like it
November 1998
The room erupts into cheers. A random intern nearly knocks her over with an exuberant display of his excitement. It doesn’t feel real; it’s like she’s watching it all happen around her in slow motion. She’s pulled into a hug by Toby, of all people, which is the thing to snap her out of her state of shock.
It’s not like she didn’t think they could win; she felt it in her bones like everyone else. This thing they were doing was special, it was important, it was going to help change the lives of millions of Americans. But presented with the reality of it, the idea that she had a hand in electing the President of the United States… she never thought she’d find herself here. Nine months ago, she sat on the couch at her Nonna’s house, listening to her rave about the Governor - President-Elect - and how she couldn’t wait to vote for him. Now, she’s standing ten feet away from him as he is congratulated by his family.
“Donnatella Moss!”
Her heart does a few somersaults when she hears her name from across the room - for all the cheering and yelling, it’s nearly impossible to hear herself think. But it’s like her ears are finely tuned to his voice because she turns around to find Josh pushing his way through the crowd to get to her.
He wraps her in his arms and presses a kiss on her cheek as the rest of the world seems to disappear around them. They stand there, holding each other for what could be minutes or hours or days before Josh pulls back just slightly, looking her in the eye.
“You just got a guy elected President,” Donna says, brushing some invisible lint off of Josh’s shoulder. “How’s it feel?”
He laughs. “Feels pretty good, actually.” His arms are still around her waist and her hands are still on his shoulders, and there’s an unrecognizable expression on his face as he looks at her. “What, are you going to make me say the Disney World line?”
She slides her hands down to his arms, resting them on his forearms just below the bend in his elbows. “No,” she answers, grinning, “but if you were going, I’d have to insist that you take me. I think I’ve earned it. You could also take me to Hawaii; I’m really not picky.”
Josh leans forward to talk directly into her ear. “How about I take you to D.C. instead?”
His offer combined with the feeling of his breath against her ear makes her feel like she’s floating. She knows it’s a job offer - one he can’t officially extend, but a job offer nonetheless. Suddenly, the feeling of floating gives way to a sudden and probably inevitable crash back to reality. If he’s her boss, then nothing can happen between them.
It’s not like either of them had made a move. Her crush had grown embarrassingly obvious, despite her best efforts to keep it under wraps, and he was either great at toying with her emotions or great at ignoring his own feelings because it felt like she was constantly shouting I love you into a void, echoing endlessly without a response.
She’d always thought the moment would be more magical than this. Something more poetic, a story to tell her grandchildren someday. But instead, her feet are aching and she’s wearing a charcoal pantsuit and a pink blouse, and it’s just before midnight in a noisy, overcrowded hotel room in New Hampshire that Donna Moss realizes she’s in love with Josh Lyman.
She doesn’t have time to think about that, because he’s still waiting for an answer. When he gives her that hopeful smile, his hands still resting on her hips, looking at her like she’s the most important person in the world, her decision is easy.
“Okay.”
I can't decide if it's a choice
Getting swept away
I hear the sound of my own voice
Asking you to stay
September 2000
Josh awakes with a start, coughing and sputtering as his heart races. He’s not sure if he’s grateful or frustrated that he can’t remember the nightmare he’s just had, but either way, it looks like he’s in for another sleepless night.
“Josh?” The door cracks open and Donna pokes her head in. She’s wearing a pair of purple and blue polka-dotted pajama shorts, his Harvard sweatshirt, and her glasses. She’s got a book in her right hand and her left is resting on the doorknob.
A wave of embarrassment washes over him in an instant. For Donna to be at his door, he’s clearly been making some sort of noise or drawing attention to himself somehow. She’s seen him in much worse shape than this, but the mortifying reality of Donna knowing that he’s still struggling is getting to be too much.
“I’m fine,” he assures her, attempting to sound confident.
She clicks her tongue and places the book down on Josh’s night table, turning on his bedside lamp. “Uh huh.” She walks over and places the back of her hand on his now sweaty forehead. “You don’t have a fever, that’s good.” She drops her hand to his shoulder and gives it a small squeeze. “I’m going to get you one of those sleeping pills,” she says, moving to stand up.
Josh instinctively grabs her hand. “No!”
Donna turns toward him. “Oh, don’t try to pull the ‘I don’t need the medication that was prescribed to me that I use as directed’ act,” she sighs.
“They make me feel weird when I wake up,” he whines. “It’s like a Benadryl hangover only ten times worse.”
“Well, would you rather feel weird when you wake up and get over it, or get no sleep and be miserable for the rest of the day tomorrow?” she counters.
He takes a moment to look down at their hands, still intertwined as he debates the internal pros and cons of taking a sleeping pill. Sometimes, Josh’s mind unhelpfully reminds him how easy this could be if he’d allow it. Reaching out for her hand took no conscious thought, but extracting it from hers was somehow a monumental task. “Fine,” he says, letting go so that Donna can open the pill bottle.
Donna hands him a pill and a glass of water and takes her spot next to him on the bed as he swallows it. She watches as he places the glass back on the table, her head tilted just slightly as she tries to read his expression. “You want to talk about it?” she asks, pressing her glasses up the bridge of her nose in a way that makes it hard to breathe in an entirely different way than he’s become accustomed to.
“Not much to say,” he answers. “Don’t really remember it.”
Donna studies him for a moment, seemingly deciding if she believes his answer. After a beat, she nods and stands, reaching for the book she left on the bedside table. “Okay,” she says. “That should kick in soon. Let me know if you need me.”
“Donna, can you… stay with me?”
The request tumbles out of his mouth before it reaches the filter between his brain and his lips. It seems to catch her off guard because there’s something in her expression that seems apprehensive, hesitant. But it disappears in a split second and she nods before she reaches for the lamp to turn it off. She walks around the other side of the bed and peels off his sweatshirt, exposing a strip of skin at her hip as her shirt catches slightly inside the crimson material.
“Scoot over,” she says, peeling her side of the covers back so that she can crawl inside.
“I mean, if you don’t want to, that’s… I don’t want to make you uncomfortable,” Josh says.
Donna throws her arm around him, pressing her body up against his as her hand travels up his chest toward his heart. “You won’t.”
She slips her toes between his feet and he lets out a yelp of surprise, which makes Donna laugh. “Your feet are cold!” he whines.
“What, are you going to kick me out of bed?” she teases.
He lets out a long exhale as he allows himself to notice what it feels like, being this intimate, this close. Josh isn’t sure if it’s the medication starting to kick in, or the fact that she’s here with him, but he feels anchored, safe.
“Nah,” he says, allowing his eyes to close as he drifts off to sleep.
And all we are is skin and bone
Trained to get along
Forever going with the flow
But you're friction
January 2002
After the success of the State of the Union, Josh takes a moment to step away from the celebration. He slips into his office, shuts the door behind him, and straightens his back against it as he closes his eyes and lets out an exhale. Between the laughter, the music, and the loud voices, Josh’s nerves are slowly becoming more frayed. It’s not like he’s on the verge of a Christmas carol-induced panic attack, but he could use a moment of silence.
“Are you okay?”
Josh jumps, startled, and opens an eye to find Donna sitting in his chair, her feet up on his desk. Her face is dimly lit by his desk lamp, her smile and her hair visible among the shadows. She brings her feet down to the ground, pushing the chair away from her as stands.
“I’m fine,” he insists.
“The fact that you’re standing with your back pressed against the door would indicate otherwise,” Donna points out.
Josh pinches the bridge of his nose and walks toward his desk, leaning on the edge of it. “I just needed a break. It was noisy.”
“Ah.”
“And… you know. Didn’t want to get smacked upside the head again.”
“A reasonable request,” Donna says. “I’m guessing your second date --”
“First date.”
“--didn’t go so well?”
“It…” he pauses for a moment. “No, it didn’t.”
She smiles at him, and for a split second, he wonders if it’s worth bothering with Amy. It’s a stupid thought, one that comes out of nowhere, with no basis in reality. He brushes it aside as she comes to stand beside him. She folds her arms and playfully bumps him with her shoulder. “Well, maybe the third date will be the winner this time.”
“Second date.” Josh turns his head toward her and she glances at the floor, breaking eye contact with him briefly before looking up at him once again.
“Can only go up from here,” she grins.
He’s never really understood if he’s hopeless with relationships because he’s so focused on work, or if he’s hopeless with relationships because he’s terrible at reading women. Of course, the likely answer is some combination of the two, but the uncertainty of where he stands is… strange, to say the least.
Donna goes on dates all the time. Josh always sabotages them. Josh goes on a date biennially, at best, and Donna doesn’t interfere. She’ll speak up, certainly, make the occasional joke, but she just… lets him go.
And he’s not sure why he doesn’t want her to.
“I don’t know if I have high hopes for that,” Josh admits.
Donna shrugs. “Well, if it doesn’t work out, there’s always your fallback plan.”
“Which is?”
“Mope around the office for three weeks and swear off dating until the next election cycle,” Donna shrugs.
“That’s not much of a plan,” Josh argues. “That would imply that I do this with some sort of calculated intent.”
“Oh, that’s not something you plan on saying every time things go sour?” she teases.
“Donna!”
She laughs. “I don’t know, maybe your mom will like Amy.”
“My mom doesn’t like any of the women I date.”
“Well, if you’re not just dating, then maybe she’ll learn to like her,” Donna points out.
“I can’t get past the second date, I’m not about to take Amy Gardner to the courthouse,” Josh insists.
“So you admit the second date is where it all goes down the drain,” Donna says.
Josh puts his hand at the small of her back. “Let’s go back to the party.”
“You sure you don’t want to hide from Amy some more?” Donna teases.
“Donna.”
“Okay, okay.”
This slope is treacherous
This path is reckless
This slope is treacherous
And I, I, I like it
September 2002
“Okay, forget what I said about a hot bath,” Donna says, pulling herself slowly up the stairs. “I’m going to collapse onto the bed. Probably dressed just like this. I may even show up to work tomorrow in these same clothes.”
Josh laughs. “You won’t.”
“You’re right,” Donna sighs. “I won’t. But what I will do is point out how the men in this administration could show up in the same clothes and no one would bat an eye.”
Part of Josh wants to argue with her, to point out that if he or Toby showed up in the same wrinkled clothes they would most certainly hear about it. But he’s already given her enough of a hard time over the last twenty-plus hours, so he keeps his mouth shut.
Donna starts to dig through her purse, searching for her keys. “If I lost my keys in Indiana, I just might also lose my mind,” she mutters. She tucks a strand of frizzy hair behind her ear and lets out an impatient sigh, unzipping a different pouch.
“Worse comes to worst, you can stay with me,” Josh offers. “I’m sure we could ask one of the kids from the…”
“Aha!” Donna cheers, finding her keyring and shaking the keys in the air for added effect. “My sanity is saved. Well. What’s left of it, anyway.”
He feels a pang of disappointment settle in his chest as he watches her unlock the door. It’s not like he wanted her to lose her keys, he’s not a heartless monster. He just… isn’t quite ready to leave her yet. It’s been a terrible day; they’ve bickered back and forth for the majority of it, they’ve had setback after setback, and all he wants to do is take a hot shower and crawl into bed.
But he’s realizing that he wants her there beside him when he does. Josh wants Donna there beside him on his worst days, his best days… all of his days.
“Thanks for seeing me to my door,” Donna says, pulling him out of his train of thought. “Get some sleep tonight, okay?”
It’s going to take effort, getting any rest when this is weighing so heavily on his mind. This is Donna, and he’s Josh, and they’ve been just… doing this thing for years. The most insignificant instance of feelings gets buried somewhere deep inside him along with everything else he’s been shoving aside for decades. And now, the door to the metaphorical closet of feelings and thoughts and emotions won’t close anymore, and here he is, standing outside of Donna Moss’s apartment, thinking that he could kiss her goodnight if he really wanted to.
And boy, does he want to.
Every slightly flirtatious she’s ever said to him, every lingering look, every small touch, feels different now. He can’t exactly pinpoint where it all began, but he knows it’s all come down to this moment, Donna in an Indiana State sweatshirt, her hair standing up in three places due to static, the exhaustion evident on her face.
“I’ll do my best,” he manages to answer as she opens the door to her apartment.
His brain is buzzing as he makes his way back to his place. He crawls into bed and manages to doze off for a little while, but he can’t shake the urge to get up and work. Even though he’s not exactly unaware of his feelings, he’s got a job to do.
When he sees her the next morning, he’s about to tell her all the work he’s done, all of the ideas he’s had, but every last coherent thought leaves his brain. It’s just her smile, the gentle way she asks if he slept okay, the way he knew she’d make up a band when he asked about the Rock the Vote event.
It’s amazing what he notices when he’s not trying to ignore it all.
Two headlights shine through the sleepless night
And I will get you, and get you alone
Your name has echoed through my mind
And I just think you should, think you should know
December 2002
“Josh,” Donna says. “What are you doing here?”
He’s holding a coffee in one hand and a wrapped Christmas gift in the other. Well, it’s a Christmas tree donut in a red and green striped bag they gave him at the donut shop, but it still counts as a gift, right? It’s probably irrational, borderline unhinged, that he feels the need to see her before they return to work after the New Year. But he’s recently come to terms with the fact that he misses her when she’s not around and… now he’s at her door.
He can’t exactly tell her that, so he does what he always does. “It’s a peace offering,” Josh explains. “I guess it’s supposed to be a season of joy and peace and… consumerism-slash-gluttony, apparently. So. I think I’m checking all the boxes.”
She gives him a smile and a playful roll of the eyes as she opens the apartment door wider for him. Josh can’t help but notice that her overnight bag is dropped in the middle of the living room floor, still full and zipped from her trip. Donna hasn’t even bothered to unpack. She’s wearing a long-sleeved Wisconsin Badgers t-shirt and gray sweatpants, blue and white snowman socks peeking out underneath the pant legs.
“I… hope I’m not intruding,” he says, his eyes fixed on the bag as though he could see through it, almost hoping he could discern how the trip went by looking at the outside of her duffel.
“No,” she assures him. “I just didn’t feel like unpacking when I got home last night.”
“I’m going to hold this over your head,” he teases, handing her the coffee and the donut.
“I figured as much,” Donna says, accepting the offering and taking a small sip of the drink. “Is this about the thing at work the other day?”
Josh takes a seat on the couch. “Sort of. I just… I really wasn’t trying to interfere with your… vacation, or whatever. I know you were looking forward to it.”
She takes a seat next to him on the couch. “It’s okay. I had a couple of opportunities to leave a little earlier, but I stuck around too.”
His heart constricts in his chest for a minute as he processes this. She could have left earlier, but she chose to stay. With him. As he obfuscated, deflected, danced around direct inquiries. It hits him like a punch to the gut: she was hoping he’d tell her exactly what he meant. No obfuscating, no deflecting, no dancing. She saw right through him, and she wanted him to tell her what he was feeling.
But he’s lost his chance to do that. She’s just returned from a trip with her boyfriend, and he’s just her boss intruding on what little free time she has from work.
“I was just… I don’t know, I was just thinking about you and I figured… you know, consider this my official apology for interrupting your romantic getaway with Commander Wonderful.”
She laughs, a forced and self-deprecating chuckle. “I’d hardly call it romantic when you slosh your way through ankle-deep snow for a half a mile because the cab you hailed couldn’t make it any further. My pants were soaked all the way up to my knees by the time I made it to the hotel.”
“Okay, so the first night sucked. I bet you had a good time once you got there though,” Josh says.
Donna looks down at the donut in her hands, then back up at Josh, giving him a small smile. It’s not her usual Donna Moss smile, the one that shows all of her teeth and reaches her eyes. It’s something different entirely, almost sad. Wistful. “It was… nice,” she finally answers.
“Good,” Josh says, attempting to sound like he means it. “I was hoping it was, you know… good.”
Donna raises an eyebrow. “You were?”
Josh shrugs. “I mean, you made me go try to convince the guy to ask you out, so for you to ask me to talk to him…”
Josh isn’t quite sure how to finish that sentence. He can’t take the idea of Donna being in love with Jack Reese. It’s probably a leap, considering they’ve just barely been together a month and as far as he was able to tell, this is the first sign of it being anywhere near serious. But the thought enters his mind and he can’t shake it.
It’s probably the most serious relationship she’s had since Dr. Freeride, he realizes, due in no small part to his meddling.
“Josh?”
“Yeah.”
“You kind of… short-circuited there.” Donna takes a bite of the donut and eyes him suspiciously.
He clears his throat. “I don’t… all I’m saying is that I just… you know, I wouldn’t… wish that you had a bad time or anything.”
Donna chews as she studies him, considering what he’s just said. She chases the bite with another sip of coffee, glancing down at the donut before she answers, looking him in the eye. “I get it.”
There’s a tension in the air, something unidentifiable but oppressive, and it’s getting to be a little too much to bear. Josh stands and motions toward the door. “I’m gonna head out. Stop interrupting your day off.”
“You don’t have to go,” Donna says quickly. “I mean, you’re not… bothering me or anything.”
Josh stuffs his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “I was probably going to head into the office for a little while anyway. Just figured I’d catch up on some stuff.”
“Do you need me to…”
“No,” Josh says quickly. “No, you enjoy the rest of your time off. We get it so rarely around here.”
“Yeah,” Donna agrees. “I’ll see you in a couple of days?”
He already misses her and he hasn’t even left yet. “Right. Yeah. See you in a couple of days.”
That nothing safe is worth the drive
And I would follow you, follow you home
I'll follow you, follow you home
May 2004
The plane isn’t moving fast enough.
Donna told him once that Air Force One has a top speed of about six hundred miles per hour. Nothing short of teleportation would be fast enough for him right now, and since NASA doesn’t seem to be making that a priority, he’s stuck on this flight for the next several hours.
He’s read her emails a hundred times already, searching for whatever subtext he can pick up on. The thought occurs to him that he can hear them in her voice - the way she talks just a little faster when she’s excited, the way her voice goes slightly higher when she’s unsure about something.
Josh feels a wave of nausea roll over him when he realizes that there’s a nonzero chance that at the end of this plane ride, he may never hear her voice again.
He pushes the thought away, doing his best to cling to what little hope he has. The last thing he wants is for her to be alone - if the worst he suffers is some discomfort and anxiety on the plane while he makes his way to Germany to be by her side, then he can live with that.
This hope is treacherous
This daydream is dangerous
This hope is treacherous
May 2004
Donna flips through the channels once more, cycling through the lineup as quickly as possible. She finally settles on an I Love Lucy rerun, dubbed in German, just to get her mind off of the fact that Josh was leaving.
Sure, she’d been the one to kick him out. It’s not like she took joy in it, but she knew that Leo and the President needed him much more than she did at the moment. It feels strange to even think that she needs him - she has no right to feel that way, not really. She’s well aware that he would argue with her, remind her what she did for him during his recovery after Rosslyn, point out how much he needed her despite the fact that he’d never admit it.
But this feels different.
For one, CJ’s words are playing on repeat in her mind, namely the assertion that she’s stuck around after all these years because of Josh, the encouragement to go for anyone and anything that wasn’t him. And it’s because of this that her mom and Colin are making awkward small talk yet again in the hospital cafeteria while Josh gets ready to head for the airport.
Josh flew to Germany for her. He hasn’t left her side. She wonders if he did it for the same reason she slept in the same hospital chair for three days, or the same reason she woke up at night to make sure he was still breathing.
He probably did. There’s no other explanation.
He emerges from the bathroom, freshly shaven, and takes a seat next to her on the bed. He watches the TV for a moment, furrowing his brow slightly as he takes in the scene. “Did they translate Vitametavegamin?”
“Different episode.”
“Ah.”
They sit in silence until the episode ends, and Donna reaches for the remote to mute the television. “All packed?” she asks, a forced cheer in her voice.
He shrugs. “Didn’t exactly have a lot to pack in the first place.”
“Right.”
He shifts slightly on the bed and turns to look at her. “Donna, I just…”
“The President needs you,” Donna insists. “I really… I can’t thank you enough for what you’ve done for me. But… he needs you. Leo needs you. Go.”
“But you need me too,” Josh insists. “I’ll stay as long as I need to. They haven’t asked me to come back, they…”
“I’m not going to put you in the position of having to choose, Josh,” Donna declares. “I’ll see you when I get back.”
There’s a hurt in his eyes, and Donna can’t help but feel guilty. What did she say? What could she possibly have done to make him feel this way?
“Donna, I… if it’s what you want, I’ll leave, but don’t feel like…”
“I don’t feel like anything, Josh.”
“You... Donna, you’re… you’re way more important than half this stuff.”
“More important than peace in the Middle East?”
He looks at her, concerned, then flashes her a smile. “You’re trying to trick me.”
“I just need to know where I stand, Joshua,” Donna teases.
“Donna, if I had a list of the most important things, or people, or… everything, in my life, you’d be at the top. I need you to know that.” The hurt in his expression has faded and there’s something else there, something she can’t recognize. “I don’t care what time it is. If you need me, call me. I’ll tell you stories about the week Sam and I thought we could be roommates. I’ll… tell you all the stupid trivia facts I know. I’ll go to the mall and tell you what the pigeons are doing like I’m a narrator in a nature documentary. Hell, I’ll get on a plane and fly back here, if I need to. Just say the word.”
“Josh.”
He stands up and starts to pace by her bedside. “I’m not kidding, Donna. If Heathcliff makes you upset, or your mom gets on your nerves…”
“Josh.”
“Or… I don’t know, some doctor waltzes in here acting like he knows what it’s like to get blown up…”
“Josh!” Donna interrupts, more forcefully this time. “Come here,” she says after a beat, her tone softer.
He snaps his mouth shut and does as he’s told. Donna reaches up and wraps her arms around his neck, allowing herself to hold him for a minute. Josh sits back down on the bed next to her, returning the embrace the best he can given her position and lack of mobility. She takes a deep breath in, trying to memorize everything about him - the way he smells, the beating of his heart, the way his hands feel, warm against the thin material of her hospital gown.
She waits for him to pull away, but he doesn’t, so she finally lets go of him, trying to hold back the tears pricking at the corners of her eyes. “Thank you,” she says, her voice shaky. “I just… I need you to know how much this means to me.”
“I know,” he says. He leans forward and gives her a gentle kiss on the forehead. “I’ll see you when you get back, okay?”
“Okay,” she agrees.
Two headlights shine through the sleepless night
And I will get you, and get you alone
Your name has echoed through my mind
And I just think you should, think you should know
November 2006
The cab pulls to a stop outside of Josh’s apartment and Donna checks her phone. It’s been an emotional day for everyone, so this plan is probably a terrible one. But she pays the cab driver and walks up to Josh’s door, standing outside it for a moment contemplating her next move. She’s pretty sure she’s arriving at the sweet spot between Josh’s return to his place and Josh finally shutting down due to exhaustion. There’s no way he’s ready for the talk he’s suggested they should have, but if she’s being honest with herself, she isn’t either.
She knocks on the door and takes a deep breath, trying to calm her nerves as she hears the door unlock. Josh opens the door, wearing just a t-shirt and his boxer shorts, and grins. “Hi.”
“Hi,” she says. “I, uh… I was thinking about you tonight. Didn’t want you to be alone.”
He steps aside and allows her to enter the apartment. “That’s… nice of you, thank you.”
She nods, hanging her coat next to his on the rack. “I didn’t want to be alone either, so.”
“You had CJ,” Josh points out.
Donna shrugs. “Wasn’t the same.” She takes a few steps forward, cupping his face in her hands as she leans forward for a kiss.
It’s not until later, when they’re holding each other, dancing in the space between sleep and consciousness, that Josh acknowledges her earlier statement. “I’m glad you… weren’t alone tonight,” he says, his hand tracing abstract patterns on the bare skin of her side.
“Me, too.”
That nothing safe is worth the drive
And I will follow you, follow you home
I'll follow you, follow you home
November 2006
Josh walks the perimeter of Donna’s temporary office, picking up a mug from the corner of her desk. It’s one he recognizes from all his years of working with her - the chip in the handle, the bright colors, her lipstick stain on the edge, the blocky font spelling out the word Hawaii in all caps.
She’s joked about it for years, walked through the halls of the West Wing with him telling him all the places he’d take her someday, all the things they’d do in Hawaii. It’s what a good boss does, she’d insisted, then later, she’d reminded him that best friends take their best friends on vacation.
“Dreaming of sandy beaches and hibiscus flowers?” Donna asks from the doorway, startling him out of his train of thought.
He puts the mug back in its place. “What if I was?”
She snorts, entering the office and shutting the door behind her. “Very funny.”
“Very serious,” he corrects her. “It was brought to my attention several times that… sometimes, people take other people to Hawaii.”
Donna looks at him, the realization of what he’s offering appearing on her face. “They do.”
“Come to Hawaii with me,” he says. “I know I’ve been… I know we’ve been… things haven’t been the same, and I’d like to try to fix that. I realize that it’s going to be a lot of work, but Donna, I just… I think that we can do it. And I’d like to start things off on the right foot. I can’t -- I don’t think there’s anything I can do that will really express how I feel about you, but Hawaii is the closest thing I can come up with.”
Donna just looks at him, her eyes wide.
“Come with me, Donna. I don’t… I don’t know what this is, with us, but I know what I’d like it to be, and I hope you’ll give me the chance - give us the chance, to figure it out.” He steps forward and takes her hands in his. “I should have done this a long time ago, really.”
“You should have,” she agrees. “But you’re doing it now.”
“So… is that a yes?”
“When are we leaving?” Donna asks.
“Tonight,” Josh says. “I know it’s short notice, but… I figured you could pack quickly.”
She leans forward and captures his lips in a quick kiss. “I don’t think I’ll ever pack this quickly again.”
This slope is treacherous
I, I, I like it
November 2006
The plane hits a spot of turbulence and jostles Donna awake. She’s hesitant to move, considering that she’d fallen asleep on Josh’s shoulder. She’s pretty certain that he’s awake, and her suspicions are confirmed when he reaches up and brushes a strand of hair out of her face.
“How you doin’?” he asks, his voice soft and sleepy.
“Good,” she says, stretching her arms before snuggling a little closer to him and closing her eyes again. “How much longer?”
She feels Josh shift beside her to check his watch. “Two hours, give or take.”
“Okay. Wake me in about an hour?”
“And risk life and limb?” he teases, dropping a kiss to the top of her head. “I think I’ll wait for the pre-landing announcements to do that for me.”
Donna playfully swats his chest. “I’m not that bad.”
“You are,” he insists. “But…” He trails off for a moment, letting out a breathy laugh, “I’m okay with that.”
“Good,” Donna says. “You’d better be.”