Summary: Sequel to "Bathing on Rooftops"...Josh tries to make amends for screwing up after Donna's bath...
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Special thanks to Christine for being a wonderful beta and making me smile with all of her funny comments!
LAYING SIEGE TO TINTAGEL
***When the King saw her there among the other women, he was immediately filled with desire for her, with the result that he took no notice of anything else, but devoted all his attention to her. To her and to no one else he kept ordering plates of food to be passed and to her, too, he kept sending his own personal attendants with golden goblets of wine. He kept smiling at her and engaging her in sprightly conversation…When Ygerna’s husband saw what was happening, he was so annoyed that he withdrew from the court without taking leave…
Without more ado, while the bad blood remained between the two of them, the King collected a huge army together and hurried off to the Duchy of Cornwall…As Gorlois was more worried about his wife than he was about himself, he left her in the Castle of Tintagel, on the sea-coast, which he thought was the safest place under his control…***
~ Geoffrey of Monmouth
History of the Kings of Britain
There was no easy around it.
I was in hell.
And when I say hell, I mean that all-pervading, hands-reaching-out-to-grab-you-and-drag-you-under, entirely tortuous existence that comes from me putting my foot in my mouth to the nth degree.
While naked. In bed. With Donna.
See what I mean? Hell.
I could have given Dante lessons on how to rearrange the topography of his Inferno to match the layout of my apartment.
What? Shocked by my rich metaphors? Like I said before, I took English classes at Harvard. I know my way around a work of fiction. I am a man full of surprises—in more ways than one, I guess. I was an idiot.
My bedroom? That’s the hell for thwarted lovers like Francesca and Paolo, with banshee winds whipping about the place, creating havoc and screaming maelstroms. Everything tainted with jealousy and anger and regret.
My bathroom? The mire for the gluttonous. That’s what it had been when I had walked in on her in the bath. I had been totally transfixed for what felt like an age and then I had just wanted to feast for the rest of my life on that silken radiant skin, the subtle pink of her nipples, those big blue eyes staring at me, urging me to do things I’d scarcely ever even dreamed about doing – they had seemed so forbidden.
And then there’s where I had fled to: lying on my couch in the darkness of my living room. This was the lowest level, the frozen wasteland for traitors and deceivers. Me and Judas and Brutus and Cassius and Mordred. That’s a fair amount of politicians, come to think of it.
I was one of the frozen outcasts. Donna had kicked me out of the bedroom as soon as I confessed about telling Heathcliff Colin to fuck off back to Gaza.
She didn’t understand. I didn’t understand myself.
All I knew was that I was in hell. And I loved her more than anything else in the world.
********
A loud knock at the door woke him.
Slowly coming to, he staggered towards the door, vaguely registering that he only had boxers on. The pale light of dawn was creeping in through the blinds. The clock on the VCR read 6:08AM.
“A bit early for visitors, isn’t it?” he grumbled to himself. His voice sounded rough and sandpapery.
“Josh?”
He thought he recognised the voice coming through the door. But why would—
“Margaret?” he croaked, opening the latch and peering out. “It’s not even light outside yet. Well, hardly.”
Margaret and Carol stood on the threshold of his apartment, both dressed for work and looking fiercely sombre.
“We’re here to get Donna,” Margaret announced.
Suddenly, Josh felt completely awake. “Excuse me?”
Carol snorted, half-flipping her dark hair over one shoulder. “Come on, Josh. Don’t make this any harder than it already is.”
He blocked their way into the apartment, holding the door close to his shoulder. His grip on the wooden frame was so intense, his knuckles were turning white. “What’s going on?”
Margaret sighed. “Donna called us an hour ago.”
He shook his head. Denial wasn’t just a river in Egypt. “No, she didn’t.”
“Yes, I did!”
He spun around, loosening his death-grip on the door. It fell open as he took in the sight before him. Donna stood a few feet away, leaning heavily on her crutches. She looked winded and completely out of sorts. Her hair was mussed from sleep – he remembered playing with it while she had lain against him, their bare skin touching from shoulder to thigh.
Somehow she had managed to put on a pair of his old boxers and a threadbare Harvard t-shirt. Josh bit his tongue, knowing instinctively that now was not the time to comment on her charming new wardrobe.
He had liked the towel ensemble a lot more.
“I called from the bedroom,” she continued. “Hi, guys.”
Carol immediately took charge of the awkward situation and charged past Josh. “We’ll have you out of here in five minutes, Donna.” She cast a look back at Josh. “Maybe less.”
All of a sudden he realised that he was bare from the waist up. But just as quickly he decided it didn’t matter. So what if Carol and Margaret saw his scars – that was the least of his problems.
“All of my stuff is in the bedroom,” Donna said softly.
Those words were a red flag to a very frustrated bull.
“You’re not going anywhere!” he bellowed.
“Just watch me.”
Donna’s eyes blazed as she and Josh stared each other down. She spoke calmly to Carol and Margaret without ever breaking eye contact with him. “Go on and gather my stuff, please. I need to explain things to my boss.” The coolness in her voice was terrifying.
There was a swift clattering of heels as they made their way down the hall to Josh’s bedroom. It had almost become *their* bedroom, he thought angrily.
“Donna—”
She held up a hand, effectively silencing him, and then leaned awkwardly against the back of a plush chair. “I don’t know why you did what you did, Josh, but I can’t stay here anymore.”
“Wait. Are you talking about the thing last night or the thing with Heathcliff?”
“Stop it!” Her eyes flashed dangerously. “Don’t you get it? You lied to me!”
He couldn’t help the smirk that automatically took over his face. After all, he was still Josh Lyman, despite having a life-altering epiphany since sunset.
“Technically, I didn’t lie. I omitted certain conversations, that’s all. If you had asked me straight out if I told Colin to fuck off recently, I would have said…um, ‘define recently’. But none of that matters anymore now that we’re…that you and I are…you know…you know!”
“Don’t talk about last night, Josh,” she snapped. “It never happened.”
“Excuse me?”
“It. Never. Happened!” she hissed through clenched teeth.
His hand crashed into the wall with a loud bang, but he was long past caring about the pain. “It most certainly did so happen!” he yelled.
She shook her head so that her hair fell into her eyes. “Not for me. Not anymore. You betrayed me. I don’t feel safe here anymore.”
Every urge and impulse within him told him to grab her and make her see sense; but there was something so heartbreakingly sad and pitiful about her tone of voice as she spoke, that he became rooted to the floor. Taking a deep breath, he tried to think logically and talk to her at the same time.
“Donna. You’re being ridiculous. You need to sit down and listen—”
“Stop ordering me around! I don’t want to hear any of it! Just leave me alone! Get it?”
He didn’t say anything; he just stared at her. Weird mental telepathy had always worked for them in the past. If he could just—
“Ahem.”
Margaret cleared her throat. They both turned to see the two West Wing assistants standing in the hallway. Donna’s two suitcases looked very small next to them. Surely she’d brought more than that with her when she’d moved in? She had taken up every space in his apartment – and now it came down to two little bags?
“Donna? We’re ready.”
Josh continued to stare at the luggage. “Where are you taking her?”
Carol looked at him balefully. “My apartment. Don’t bother calling or stopping by to harass her. You won’t be able to get in.”
Margaret got Donna’s coat out of the closet and helped her into it. Very slowly, the three women made their way towards the door.
Josh refused to move out of the way; he wasn’t going to make this any easier, not after – after everything that had happened. Just when Donna was about to hobble past him, he raised his hand as if to touch her shoulder.
“Donna.”
It was a whisper – it was a prayer.
Her cold eyes slammed into his, stopping him a hairsbreadth away from making contact.
“I can’t believe you,” she said. “I really can’t.”
Carol ignored him outright as she helped her friend out into the hallway. Margaret reached back to pull the door closed and looked sadly at Josh.
“See you at work,” she muttered. Then she caught his eye and shook her head. “Yeah – maybe not so much.”
********
Carol was right when she said there was no point trying to get in touch with Donna. The phone line was constantly busy – after a while I figured out that they must have unplugged it. I would have unplugged it too, I guess.
I left my apartment that next day about half a dozen times, determined to drive over to Carol’s, barge past the dragons in the doorway, and *make* Donna listen to me; but I never made it farther than getting into my car.
I just couldn’t do it.
Donna already thought I was the scum of the earth: someone who had lied and betrayed her. I didn’t need to add obsessive psychopath to that lovely description.
What I needed was a chance to sit her down and force her to listen to me, to see that what I had done wasn’t as bad as she thought. I never got a chance to explain my side, you see. One second we were in bed, laughing, playing with each other; the next, the world had blown up in my face. I’m not denying that it was my fault. It was. But there’s more to the story than a pissing contest with Harlequin Heathcliff in that German hospital. I didn’t get a chance to even begin to tell her about any of it.
It wasn’t fair.
And when things aren’t fair, two things happen: I get angry, and then I get creative.
********
CJ came to see me just after lunch. I was polishing off the last few fries on my plate, which my temp, Anna, had so nicely brought to me when I had said I was hungry about an hour before.
If Donna wanted nothing to do with me, then I wanted nothing to do with her stupid rules about what was good or bad for me to eat.
“Josh?”
I looked up to see the White House Press Secretary taking a seat in front of my desk. “CJ. What’s up?”
“More crap about Republican challengers to Bingo Bob next fall. Don’t even go there right now. I don’t want to think about it.”
I stretched in my chair. “Ah-kay. Just leave their names with my temp out there and I’ll destroy them tomorrow morning.”
“Cute.”
Then she got this look in her eye. I didn’t like it. It had been three days since Donna had bolted at dawn; I had expected CJ to come asking questions quite a while ago. Still, that didn’t mean I was going to particularly *enjoy* the conversation.
It seemed that Carol couldn’t keep her trap shut about anything and had told CJ her own personal version about what had happened between me and Donna. She was totally winning the pool on which West Wing assistant hated my guts the most.
CJ spoke slowly, gauging my reaction with every word. “There’s been some questions coming in about Donna and they’re being sent to me – I guess because I’m the Press Secretary.”
“That would make a small amount of sense.”
She shook her head. “I think it’s odd. It’s like the guy asking for information knows not to go through your office.”
Like I said before, I didn’t like where this was headed. I didn’t want to think about Donna – I thought about her enough the other twenty-three hours of the day. I’d been up all the night before trying to figure out a way to get her to talk to me and I hadn’t gotten anywhere. It was pissing me off and I wanted a break.
Time for good ol’ misdirection.
“Oh,” I said, very cool about the whole thing. “Really?”
“Does the name Colin Ayres mean anything to you?”
Shit.
“Colin…Colin Ayres?”
CJ snorted. “Yes, Josh. He’s a photojournalist who’s been working out of Gaza for the past few years. Maybe he met Donna while she was there – you know, before the…before the accident?”
“Could be.”
She gave me a look. Obviously, she wasn’t enjoying my stonewall treatment.
“Josh…?” Her voice went up at the end of that, leading me somewhere I didn’t want to go. Time to end this now.
“Colin Ayres. Yeah, don’t worry about it.”
“Wasn’t he the guy who went to Germany to visit Donna in the hospital?”
I feigned shock. “Was he?”
“Josh!” Okay, now I was just pissing her off. Never a good thing with CJ. I mean, she can get really scary at times…
“Thanks, CJ. I’ll get on it.”
She glared at me. “You mean you’ll tell Donna.”
I sighed, deciding it might be best to get this all over with at once. Why prolong the torture? After all, it really was only a matter of time before CJ figured out everything – including the bath scene and me going down on Donna in my bedroom – and came after me with a wicked-looking pair of gelding shears.
Steepling my fingers along the bridge of my nose, I closed my eyes and waited for the axe to fall – in a totally manly way, of course.
“You better go and get Carol to do that instead.”
“What? Why?”
I looked up and stared at her; I just hoped my poker face was holding up tolerably well. “Donna moved out. Three days ago. Stuff happened and she went psycho and now she’s gone. She’s at Carol’s for the foreseeable future. And I *don’t* want to talk about it.”
CJ’s eyes narrowed.
Oh yeah, I was a dead man.
“I should go and talk to Carol,” she said slowly.
“She won’t want to talk about it either.”
CJ had stood up while I spoke; now she whipped around, giving me just a glimpse of the fury barely contained beneath her professional mask. “Does it look like I care? I don’t want you to talk. I want you to fix it. *Now*, Monkey Boy.”
I rolled my eyes and leaned across the desk. “I think you’re oversimplifying things, there, CJ.”
“NOW, Josh!”
The door slammed shut behind her.
Well, that went rather well.
Except that, three hours later, I was summoned to her office. Did I mention that CJ can be a bit of a fascist at times? Yeah. Hell.
********
She closed the door and waited until I sat down before moving back around her desk. The chairs in CJ’s office are deceptively comfortable. You sink down and begin to relax and then she pounces on you – not literally, though that might be kind of interesting under a different set of circumstances.
CJ is a tiger when she smells a scandal, and I had just become a fresh piece of meat.
She leaned back in her chair, seemingly calm and collected. I smelled trouble.
“Carol’s filled me in on a few things,” she said.
“How nice. What did she say?”
The chair snapped forward and she practically lunged for my throat. Tyger, Tyger, burning bright…
“That you were a jackass and tried to sabotage yet another of your assistant’s relationships and she found out. Carol thinks there’s even more to it, but Donna is protecting your ass. Why, I can’t imagine.”
“Because it’s a nice ass?” I smirked.
“*Enough* with the flippancy, Josh. I also found out more about Colin Ayres. Not only is he a British journalist assigned to the Middle-East, but he *definitely* went to Germany to be with Donna. What the hell did you say to him over there?”
“What do you mean?” I asked. “And further more, what does it matter?”
“I think it matters a lot to Donna!”
“You don’t know that.”
I knew I was getting angry, so I just tried to clam up and breathe slowly. CJ wasn’t making things any easier for me, though.
“Did you know that he’s in town?”
“What? Here in DC? Since when?”
“About a week or so. Those calls coming in asking about Donna were from a local hotel.”
My jaw hit the floor. “He’s come all the way here just to see her…again?”
“He’s here as a liaison for the BBC while they sort out their Israeli bureau, but he certainly isn’t wasting any time trying to get in touch with her.”
This was horrible. Not only was Donna shutting me out and forgetting everything that had happened between us that night, but now Mr. Bodice Ripper Incarnate was here to woo her? It was more than I could swallow in one sitting.
“Isn’t there any way we could send him away by Presidential decree?” I asked plaintively. “Back to Gaza or Darkest Africa or the far side of the moon?”
CJ looked at me and perched on the side of her desk. “Um, let me think about that…No! Of course not! Why would you—” Then a light came into her eyes and she hurried to the door and bolted it. Towering over me, she crossed her arms and glared ferociously. “Spill. Now.”
I jumped to my feet and started to pace around the room. “I screwed up, all right? He came to see her in Germany because there had been something going on between them in Gaza. He just waltzed in one day with his flowers and his posh accent and his ‘come hither’ bedroom eyes and romanced her right in front of me! I kind of lost it so, when Donna was in surgery, I…yeah…”
“You—you *what*, Josh?”
“I told him to get lost and shove off back to Gaza and that Donna wasn’t comfortable with him there anymore.”
“Josh!”
“I said that Donna and I had this…thing…going on between us and then I might have maybe said that, well…that she wanted me instead. As, you know, a…lover.”
I thought she was going to kill me right then and there. Her face paled and then flushed. I think she was more than a little bit angry.
“Josh!” she yelled. “You said that to a REPORTER??”
“That part of the whole thing kind of slipped my mind at the time. And, in my defence, he’s a photojournalist, not a reporter. It’s not like he was taking photos of me with Donna while I told him to fuck off.”
I’d never seen CJ like this before; she was not only livid, she was almost speechless. If I hadn’t been feeling so damn uncomfortable and cornered, I would have found it all highly amusing. Kind of like Sam’s phrasing about how he ‘accidentally’ slept with the call-girl. That was classic.
CJ got right up in my face with the screaming this time. “You complete moron! You’re beyond being an idiot! No wonder this guy’s questions about Donna seemed so personal…” She trailed off, thinking quickly.
“I—”
“CAN IT, LYMAN!” she bellowed, waving a finger at me. “Don’t even think about speaking right now. Speaking. Bad. Now!”
So I sat down again, rolling my eyes and staring at the fishbowl on her desk, while CJ paced up and down, muttering incoherently. She’d changed the fishbowl décor again – this time there were the ruins of a castle inside, perched on what looked like two cliffs, so that Gail could swim around the fallen towers.
At last, she deigned to speak to me.
“How much does Donna know about this?”
“A little. Not much. Enough to move out and say she doesn’t want to be anywhere near me.”
She tapped her foot. “You have to tell her the rest.”
“Back off, CJ,” I warned. “You don’t know what you’re getting into.”
“You have to tell her, Josh! You’re just being childish.”
“No, I’m not. It’s not that easy.”
“Yes, it is!”
“No.”
“Yes!”
“NO, CJ!”
“Why the hell not?” she yelled back at me. “Unless – was there more to it than you messing up another one of her love affairs? What did you do, Josh? Why did Donna *really* move out?”
This was enough. More than enough.
“You know what, CJ? I’ll tell you some stuff about my personal life to make your job easier, but there are other things that even you can go without knowing. Back. Off.”
“I don’t think so, Lover Boy,” she scoffed.
“I do.” I stood up, done with talking. “I am the White House Deputy Chief of Staff. This meeting is over.”
Her mouth fell open. “What? I don’t think I heard you right.”
“Yes, you did.”
I walked out of her office, straight back to my end of the bullpen, and never looked back.
Enough was enough.
********
Leo sat in his chair and sighed. It had not been a good couple of weeks.
He was still dealing with the fallout from the explosion that had killed Fitz and the congressmen, Kate was really getting on his nerves, and now Josh was annoying everyone in the West Wing, including Margaret, which was something he had until now thought impossible.
“Margaret!” he bellowed.
The door opened and a red head of hair appeared. “Yes?”
“Send him in.”
“Are you sure that’s wise? He’s in a mood today.”
“He’s been in a mood for days, Margaret. That’s why I’m seeing him.”
“Sure. Whatever. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
“Get away from me.”
Josh plodded through the open doorway. It was worse than Leo had thought. Josh looked like a man who wasn’t just lost in a hole – he had turned into a shadow of his former self.
“You wanted to see me?”
Leo nodded and placed his elbows on the desk. “You look like hell.”
“Wow, Leo. You really know how to sugar-coat things, don’t you?”
“What’s going on, Josh?”
The younger man crossed his arms. There was an edge to the set of his jaw that radiated exhausted tension. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I think you do. You haven’t been yourself for the better part of a week. And now I hear that you and CJ aren’t speaking. I don’t need this kind of crap. This is the White House, not Georgetown Junior High.”
“I know that,” Josh snapped. “It’ll pass, Leo. I just need to…you know…figure some stuff out.”
“And I need your head here, Josh, not somewhere else. So I’ve brought in a guy.”
Josh rolled his eyes and shook his head. “This isn’t an ATVA thing, Leo. If you’re telling me that Stanley is about to walk through that door, I’m not going to like it.”
“I don’t care if you like it or not! But no, it’s not Stanley. I made a call and brought in some reinforcements.”
Like clockwork, there was a knock on the door.
“Come in!” Leo hollered. Josh turned as the door opened and his mouth fell open.
“What the hell…”
Sam smiled broadly and closed the door behind him. “Who were you expecting – the Spanish Inquisition?”
Leo began shaking his head. “No, no Monty Python jokes in my office. Nice to see you, Sam.” He looked back at his deputy. “You’re going to sit down with Sam and let him help you figure out what the hell is going on – and if you two can’t fix it, then you’re going to have to seriously think about taking a leave of absence, Josh. Get your head in the game, okay?”
“Ah-kay,” Josh concurred. Leo thought there was almost a hint of a smile there on his face.
“Now get out of here. I have *real* work to do.”
Sam opened the door again. “Shall we?”
Josh nodded, feeling good for the first time in days. “After you…buddy.”
********
***Finally, after a week had gone by, the King’s passion for Ygerna became more than he could bear. He called to him Ulfin of Ridcaradoch, one of his soldiers and a familiar friend, and told him what was on his mind. “I am desperately in love with Ygerna,” said Uther, “and if I cannot have her I am convinced that I shall suffer a physical breakdown. You must tell me how I can satisfy my desire for her, for otherwise I shall die of the passion which is consuming me.”
“Who can possibly give you useful advice,” answered Ulfin, “when no power on earth can enable us to come to her where she is inside the fortress of Tintagel? The castle is built high above the sea, which surrounds it on all sides, and there is no other way in except that offered by a narrow isthmus of rock. Three armed soldiers could hold it against you, even if you stood there with the whole kingdom of Britain at your side”…***
“So, how are we doing?”
I looked up from behind my desk and rolled my eyes. Sam was perched on the visitor’s chair in my office, all smiles and perfect teeth. I had told Anna The Temp to make sure that he and I weren’t disturbed for a good hour or so, as if this man to man chat was some kind of political manoeuvring session.
Maybe it was.
“*We* are in hell,” I snarked back.
“Donna?”
“Yup. Got it in one.”
He leaned back in his chair, making it creak slightly. “How bad of a screw up are we talking here?”
“Epic proportions,” I admitted, burying my head in my hands.
I could hear him breathe out heavily through his nostrils and I knew just what kind of a look would be on his face if I were to look up at him. It would be the patented ‘Josh, you’re an idiot, but I’m here to save your ass, so we’re gonna be fine’ countenance, last seen during his pep talks to me about not dumping Amy when we had first started seeing each other.
“What did you do?”
“A lot.”
“Okay, I’m going to need more to work with than that.”
I tilted my head back and nodded. “Right. Well, the short-short version is that Donna moved in with me after she got out of the hospital.”
“To help speed her recovery, right?” he interjected.
“Totally. It worked really well for about a month or so. We got…you know…close.”
He totally saw through that statement.
Leaning in, he forced me to look at him. “How close is close, Josh?”
“Close close. Good close. Very close. And then one night I walked in on her taking a bath.”
I don’t know if he meant to smile at that, but he suddenly broke into a goofy grin. “Really?”
I just stared at him until he returned to passive-lawyer mode. “I mean, what?” he said, readjusting his tie.
“It was amazing, Sam. She…I…yeah…”
“And that’s what freaked her out? You seeing her naked?”
“No. No, surprisingly, things went *very* well after that. Actually, not surprisingly – I mean, we’re talking about me here – more like, happily. Yeah. Happily, she didn’t throw a shampoo bottle at my head. In fact, she did the complete opposite.”
“She washed your hair?”
“No, Sam!” God, he could be so naïve sometimes. “She and I…ya know…”
He looked confused at first, trying to work it out. Come on, Sam, I thought. Don’t make me get out the flow charts and diagrams.
“But,” he said haltingly, “I thought – isn’t she in a cast? How did you…?” He trailed off and I rolled my eyes again.
“We didn’t! But…you know…” I started doing weird circle hand gestures to cover the ‘everything but’ scenario. After about five seconds, it dawned on him.
“Oh. You mean…” Then he started doing his own weird finger movements, except these all seemed to point at his crotch.
Subtlety, thy name is Seaborn.
“Gotcha,” he said, grinning again.
I breathed a weak sigh of relief and continued telling the story.
“It was going along great there, and then, in the middle of the night, we started talking and I accidentally mentioned telling this—guy—from Gaza to fuck off when he came to see her in Germany.”
“A guy?”
“What else do you want me to call him? They’d obviously been sleeping together while she was doing the CODEL thing.”
“Oh. Okay. And he left after you told him off?”
I winced, remembering how CJ had handled this bit of information. “I did a bit more than that. I kind of mentioned that Donna was mine and he should beat it. *That’s* what made her move out. She yelled for a bit and then kicked me out of my own bedroom and then called Carol and Margaret to come get her.”
Sam nodded, understanding at last. “And now she won’t talk to you or see you anymore?”
“Exactly. And she doesn’t know the whole story, she just knows I told Colin to go back to Gaza and play hide-and-go fuck himself. She doesn’t know *why* I said it or how I’m absolutely besotted with her. She just cut me off completely before I could explain anything. It’s like she’s locked herself away, but I’m the one in jail!”
We stopped talking for a bit. I felt so tired. It was like I was wading through thick mud up to my waist when what I really needed to do was to run off to where I was needed most. This whole thing was SO FRUSTRATING!
“Do you ever think about letting your hair grow out again?”
“Excuse me?” I looked up at Sam, wondering when he had turned into a woman. “What are you talking about?”
“Maybe Donna would agree to see you if you – you know – looked like *you* again.”
“What?”
“I mean, really, Josh. What did you do? Let some barber take a weed-whacker to your head?”
“Sam. Can we not talk about my hair? That’s not the angle I’m going for here.”
“Fine,” he sighed. “But it’s a disaster, just so you know.”
“NOT HELPING!” I banged my hand on the desk for emphasis. Maybe Leo wasn’t so brilliant after all, if *this* was who he brought in to help me…
Sam stood up and walked a bit around the room. Finally, he went back to the chair, but this time he leaned against it, his hands firmly planted on its back. “How serious are you about this whole thing?” he asked point blank.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, you and Donna have had this…this unresolved *thing* between you for years. Are you sure you want to change it now?”
“Sam, I swear to God, if I don’t see her soon, I’m going to lose her. I can’t – I can’t cope with that. I’m crazy about her, Sam. She makes me crazy. I’m useless around here or at home or anywhere else I go, because I know that she’s off in that apartment, hating me.”
I tilted back in my chair and stared at the ceiling. For some reason, I thought of that time, all those years ago, when a big chunk of it had fallen down right between me and Donna onto the desk. It had scared both of us.
Now I was beyond scared. I was frantic.
“If I can’t be with her,” I said hotly, “I’m going to lose it. I need her, Sam. I’ve never wanted anyone so badly before in my life.”
“Wait,” he said, holding up a hand. “This is more than just sex, right? Leo didn’t call me away from my beach-side bungalow where I was happily writing the Great American Novel just because you want to get laid, did he? I’d do anything for you and Donna, but I’m drawing the line at helping you be a chauvinist man bastard.”
“‘Chauvinist man bastard’? Impressive phrasing there, Sam.” I ran my hands through my hair. “Of *course* it’s more than that! Me having a case of blue balls because of Donna isn’t exactly a new phenomenon. No, this is…I dunno…*deeper* than that somehow. When I say I want her, I want all of her…everything…mind, body, soul. The works. But if I don’t have her soon…” I broke off, not even wanting to think about the possibility of having her loathe me forever. “If I don’t have her soon, I just don’t know what’s going to happen to me.”
Sam looked at me for a second and then shook his head. “Wow,” he muttered. “I’ve never heard you talk about her that way before.”
“I hadn’t ruined things this badly before.”
“Point taken.”
Suddenly I sat up, remembering something. “Oh! And to top everything off, her Belfast boyfriend is now here in DC!”
Sam pulled a face. “Shit. Has he seen her yet?”
“I dunno. Maybe. I certainly wouldn’t put it past him to just waltz right up and knock on the door to Carol’s place. He’s done stuff like that before.”
Sam came around to the desk and leaned towards me. “Josh. You’ve got to find out.”
“How? No one will tell me anything!” I ran my hands through my hair again, messing it up a little this time, dizzy with aggravation. “Carol and Margaret heard some twisted version of what happened between her and me that night and now want to see my head on a stick, like ‘Lord of the Flies’ or something. CJ thinks I’m a childish jerk hiding some sordid sex scandal that could sink the entire administration, so she’s rather pissed at me. Leo is threatening me with time off if I can’t pull myself together. Work is all I’ve got going for me now, Sam, so I’m freaking about that now, too.”
He nodded, not saying anything.
“I’ve tried calling her,” I continued, “but she won’t pick up the phone. My emails bounce back to me. I know if I actually go there physically, Carol will call the cops. Donna wants nothing to do with me and I’m just some love-sick chump who’s starting to go severely mental! I’m dying here, buddy. You’ve got to help me out, but I don’t even know where to begin.”
“I’ll do my best, Josh,” he said, smiling sadly. “But I can already tell that this won’t be easy.”
“Great.”
Sam backed away towards the door. “How long has it been since that night?”
“What?”
“That night that you walked in and…?” He did the crazy finger gesture again.
“Oh. Almost a week. Why?”
He reached over to the coat-stand and swung his jacket back on. “I’m going to go for a walk and see what I can find out…over there.” He pointed through the door in the direction of CJ’s office.
I nodded, impressed with his secret plan to get information. “Be careful,” I warned. “Carol’s m.o. in life these days is to dismember me. Plus, I think CJ is on her side. It’s not a safe place for men right now.”
Now Sam really began to smile. “I can take them,” he scoffed. “Didn’t you know that Carol’s always had a bit of a thing for me?”
“Really?”
He shrugged. “Well, I’m hoping.”
********
The TV blared in the background. It seemed annoyingly loud, even though the volume was set extremely low. Maybe her ears were getting defective along with the rest of her failing body.
Donna Moss was not a fan of puking. Really, who in their right mind was? The flu bug had hit her like a bolt of lightning from a clear sky.
Now she lay on the couch in Carol’s living room, watching game shows and melodramatic soap operas. Occasionally, she would flail around and grab the Lysol pail lying on the floor nearby.
Ew.
She couldn’t decide if it was more degrading to puke in a bedpan in the hospital with Josh holding her hair back, or to barf in a friend’s old cleaning bucket while under self-imposed house arrest.
The jury was still out on that one.
Being ill like this really had been the last thing she expected.
What she *had* expected was for Josh to come grovelling in person to Carol’s apartment days ago. She had agreed with Carol’s idea about unplugging the phone when she was alone in the apartment—it was an easy way to avoid being bothered by Josh when she wasn’t ready.
Truth be told, she was still furious with him. It wasn’t quite the information that he had sent Colin away that had triggered her fury – there had been inklings he might have done something along those lines that she had picked up on weeks ago after leaving the hospital.
What was unforgivable was the fact that he had upped the ante between them without coming clean first about his macho tactics in Germany, and then tried to weasel his way out of the truth. While they were in bed. Together. Naked.
It was a trust thing. He hadn’t trusted her to understand or think for herself about which man she wanted. It was the ‘secret plan to fight inflation’ all over again, but this time with more serious and devastating consequences…like ruining their relationship.
He had been so wonderful the night before: unbelievably sexy and seductive, walking in on her like that in the bath, and then daring to reach out and touch what he had wanted – what they had both wanted…
So why wasn’t he trying to reach for her again, now? It was like he stopped caring somewhere along the way in the past week, and hadn’t bothered to fill her in.
When she had left his apartment, she had just assumed he would move heaven and earth to win her back, once she had had a day to cool off. Obviously, she had read too many romance novels in her life, because it wasn’t happening.
And now she had the flu.
She was tempted to ask if things could get any more miserable, but she knew better than to risk the wrath of Murphy’s Law.
He wasn’t coming.
It was over.
It was over before it had even begun, really. The whole thing sucked.
But she wasn’t about to do anything to change things. Screw the proverbs about pride coming before a fall – her pride was all she had left.
Sighing, she rolled her eyes and began to flip through the channels again.
********
***…When Merlin saw the torment which the King was suffering because of this woman, he was amazed at the strength of his passion. “I know how to give you the precise appearance of Gorlois, so that you will resemble him in every respect…In this way you will be able to go safely to Ygerna in her castle and be admitted.”***
Sam strode into Josh’s office late in the afternoon and shut the door behind him.
“Well, she’s got the flu,” he announced, taking a seat in front of the desk.
Josh looked up from the mound of paperwork in front of him and peered at his friend. “What?”
“Donna. She’s had a bug for the past few days. Sick as a dog at the beginning, Carol said.”
Sitting up a bit, Josh paused, taking in the information. “Oh. Okay. What does that mean, exactly?”
Sam crossed one ankle over his knee. “Physically? That she’s miserable. Mentally? That she’s miserable and watching bad television. Emotionally? I wouldn’t dare to guess. And socially? Definitely not up to visitors.”
“So, you mean…”
“That this Belfast guy hasn’t been near her,” he smiled. “Not yet, at least.”
Josh grinned. His dimples grooved deeply into his cheeks. “I never thought I’d be so happy to hear that Donna was ralphing in a bucket, but I am. Fabulous news.”
Sam had the grace to wince slightly. “I wouldn’t say it to her like that.”
“Thanks. I’ll keep that in mind.”
Stretching back in his chair, he marvelled at Sam’s espionage techniques. “You found this all out from Carol? She actually talked to you?”
“Never underestimate the smoothness of a Seaborn seduction. You’re not the only lady-killer in the building.”
Josh cocked an eyebrow at that. “Oh, lord. You didn’t…”
“No!” Sam cut in, scandalised. “I’m a gentleman!”
“Riiiiight. So now what?”
Taking a deep breath, Sam stood up and moved towards the door. “Now you have another visitor.”
“What?”
“I’ve talked to her and she’s willing to give you another chance, though she was rather hurt, you know.”
Josh’s eyes lit up for the first time in days. Was Sam suddenly Superman? Had he managed to get Donna down here despite the puking?
“Sam. Did you – is she here? Really?”
Opening the door, Sam stood to one side and waited as the female presence came into the room and sat down gracefully in the chair directly in front of him.
“CJ?”
The White House Press Secretary stared the Deputy Chief of Staff in the eye and began to speak very quickly. “You’re a jackass, but I hear you’re in love with her, so I’m here to help. But I swear to God, you do any of that pulling rank crap again and I’ll slap you into next Tuesday.”
“Ah-kay,” Josh nodded.
Exhaling loudly through her nostrils, she gave him a look, as though it was possible to see right into his thoughts.
“Is this for real?” she asked.
Sam piped up, “Definitely. And we need your help. I’m just about out of ideas.”
Nodding, CJ looked at Josh. “Right. This is a bit late for a first phone call, but we’ll see what we can do.” Leaning back, she motioned for Sam to close the door. “Okay, LemonLyman. Tell me what I need to know.”
********
About an hour later the proverbial light bulb went off over CJ’s head.
“Okay,” she said, “I’ve figured it out. You know what you have to do?”
“What?” I asked. Honestly, I was getting really tired of talking about…well…ME for so long. We had rehashed everything about me and Donna and me and Colin and Donna and Colin. I had no idea that all this emotional crap could be so damn exhausting.
“Take the high road,” she said simply.
“Oh, no. Nope, I don’t like that one. Next idea, please?”
“Josh, I’m serious. You need to go and see this Colin guy. Today.”
I winced and screwed my eyes shut. “God. Why?”
“Because I said so.”
Women. Honestly. Don’t get me wrong, I was grateful for CJ’s help, but I was going to need more than her being stubborn to get me to go and see Harlequin Heathcliff. He wasn’t exactly my favourite person these days, if you know what I mean.
Then Sam jumped in too.
“Wait, Josh,” he said. “CJ may have a point.”
She became all smiles and self-righteousness. “Thank you, Spanky. Don’t you get it, Josh? It’ll be a sign.”
“Of what?” I squeaked. “Total insanity?”
“No, you idiot! That you trust Donna to make up her own mind about you.”
“That’s the craziest thing you’ve ever said in your life, Claudia Jean,” I said, looking her straight in the eye. “I mean it. It’s even nuttier than the whole ‘bweifing’ thing.”
She crossed her arms and sniffed. I hate it when women sniff at me.
“Fine. Don’t listen. But this whole thing is about trust. You didn’t trust her and that’s why she hates your living breathing guts.”
“Trust her? *Trust* her?” My voice rose very badly every time I said it. “Aw, hell.”
It was at that point that I started banging my head against the desk.
“Sam?” I asked between bangs.
“I’m with CJ,” he said.
Traitor.
CJ leaned towards me and grabbed my hair so that I’d stop hitting the wood with my forehead. “You’re pathetic,” she said. “You’re lucky I love you, otherwise you’d be so screwed right now.”
I looked up at her, totally dejected and feeling about five years old.
“Do I really have to?”
She leaned back in the chair. “It’s up to you. But it’s a start.”
“And then what?”
She paused, her mouth kind of hanging open. She had nothing. I glared.
“I’m thinking, okay!” she snapped defensively.
“THINK FASTER!”
Her eyes narrowed into little slits. “Josh? Shut up.”
I rolled my eyes again and held up my hands in apology for bellowing. “Right. Right, sorry.”
The three of us sat in my office for a few more seconds in complete silence as the bad news settled in.
I looked up at them and sighed. “Colin? Really? God. I don’t believe this.”
I still didn’t believe it when I was at his hotel two hours later.
I was doomed.
********
Walking down the hall of the fourteenth floor at the JW Marriot, I wondered what I had done to deserve such misery. Then I remembered. Donna. Right, maybe I did deserve to be in this mess.
There was a smell to hotels that I always loved and hated. It was that smell that said you could relax for a night but be sure to get the hell out by morning kind of thing. If you were with a group of friends it was the ‘let’s have an amazing weekend of drunken partying’ smell; if you were with a beautiful woman, it was the scent of ‘I’m gonna get me some and you’re about to have a fabulous time too’.
From now on, however, I was going to associate the smell of this particular hallway with the ‘I must go and humble myself before the man that’s trying to steal my woman out from under me’ scheme that I had been talked into.
This so wasn’t going to work.
CJ had gone through the messages Colin had left at her office and found his room number at the Marriott. I had it written down on a piece of paper which I was now crushing between my fingers. Here we were: room 1407.
Donna. This was for Donna. This was the ultimate wooing – though I think someone still needed to run by me again the exact logic of how I could woo the woman I loved by giving another guy the green light to be with her. Still, this was supposed to help me in the long run, right?
Hell.
Thinking of Donna, I stopped dawdling and knocked on the door, hoping that no one would answer and I could get back to lurking in my office, where I belonged.
No such luck.
The door swung open and there he stood: Mr. Bodice Ripper.
And he certainly looked like he’d just come from the cover of one of those porn romance novels. I must have caught him fresh out of the shower. His hair was wet and so was a lot of the rest of him. He stood there, barefoot, with a towel around his waist and held at his hip with one hand.
This was so embarrassing. I hoped like hell I wasn’t blushing.
Then I remembered that this paragon of manliness standing before me had slept with MY DONNA. He’d seen her naked. So had I, but he’d gotten the chance to do more. Bastard.
If I’d had the balls to sucker-punch him, I would have. But I was supposed to be here to take the high road, damn it.
God, this sucked.
I did my best not to wince as I took in his wet hair and bare chest. Why did he have to be naked? I didn’t want to see any of that! CJ and her stupid plans. She was going to be dead once I recovered my self-respect and beat it the hell out of this place. Why couldn’t we have sent Sam to do this? He never got fazed by anything, including male nudity.
Really, did I need to see Heathcliff in a towel? No, I didn’t think so.
Funnily enough, his towel was kind of peach coloured, just like the towel that Donna had been wearing – and then not wearing – the night of my trespassing incident. She had looked so damn hot, all naked and purring while I tasted her and then rubbed her with the towel and then tasted her some more.
Oh, hell.
Great, so now I was getting a hard on from thinking about Donna while staring at the towel around Colin’s very masculine hips. Hello? Humiliation? Table for one?
“Josh?”
Ugh, that *accent*. Kill me now.
“Uh…hi. How ya doing?”
“Well, I was just getting out of the shower…”
“Right.” I paused, thinking if he was so damn smart, he’d just know what I came here to talk about. That led to several awkward seconds of me staring at a guy in a towel in the middle of a hotel hallway.
Obviously, he wasn’t as smart as I had thought.
“I heard you were in DC,” I muttered, staring at the wallpaper beyond in his room.
“Ah.”
More silence. This was just plain awful.
“Shouldn’t you be working at the BBC right now or shopping for a big, glamorous house in London? Isn’t that what all you English journalists do when you come back to civilization?”
Well, that sounded horribly unimpressive and stupid. Thank God Donna wasn’t around to hear me right now.
“Actually, I’m Irish,” he said, correcting me. “We’ve talked about this before. I grew up in Belfast? Went to school in Dublin?”
“Oh. Big difference, then?”
“Rather.”
“My mistake.”
He shook his head, almost smiling. God, I must look like such an idiot. “You really don’t know what you’re talking about, do you?” he asked.
Damn, that accent was so stupidly distracting. I just stared at him, trying to make out what he had just said.
“What are you doing here, Josh?”
Blinking furiously, I tried to regain a small measure of impressiveness. “Donna. I’ve come about Donna.”
“Ah. Grand. What about her?”
“What do you mean, ‘what about her’? We’re talking about Donna here! The woman you flew to Germany to see in the hospital!”
He nodded coolly. “Yes. And then when she flew back here she didn’t return any of my calls. Or, rather, your office wouldn’t put them through. No one would tell me where to find her. I can take a hint.”
I closed my eyes and prayed for strength.
“It wasn’t her hint.”
“Excuse me?”
I opened my eyes and tried not to scowl. “She had nothing to do with that. I…she had moved in…you see, I wanted to help – things there were so – and then…” I broke off, totally frustrated.
Before I could change my mind I held out the crumpled piece of paper I’d had balled in my fist. On one side was his hotel information, but on the other side were directions to Carol’s house and her private phone number.
“Look,” I said forcefully, “here’s where she is now. Just go and see her while you’re in town, okay?”
He looked taken aback. “She knows I’m here?”
“She will when you call her.”
“Ah. I see.”
I scoffed. “Do you?”
Now his eyes met mine and peered at me. For the first time since I had met him in that damn hospital in Germany, I saw a bit of why Donna had liked him so much. He had those hawk-like eyes that really looked at you when you let them.
“I think I might,” he said in a soft lilt. “Should I ring her first, do you think, or just head over?”
I sighed and pinched the bridge of my nose. “I don’t know. I wouldn’t know anything.”
He was looking at me again. Okay, time’s up. I needed to get out of there – now.
“Josh?”
Staring right back at him, I jammed my hands into my pockets and glared. “Forget it,” I snapped. “See her – don’t see her. Do whatever you like. It’s not like I give a good goddamn.”
I strode off down the hall, leaving him and his towel to do whatever the hell they wanted. It just hurt too much to stay there any longer, giving him an all-access pass to Donna when I would have killed for the same.
I had made a huge mistake in not telling Donna about Colin.
Now I just hoped I hadn’t made another huge one by telling him about her.
********
I sat down at my desk and waited for the vultures to descend. It didn’t take long for CJ and Sam to emerge from her office and come barrelling across the abandoned bullpen into mine.
CJ closed the door, despite the late hour and the fact that no one was around, and waited for me to say something. “Well?”
“I just gave a nearly naked man Donna’s phone number. I want to die.”
She shook her head, totally dismissing my pain. “This is good, Josh. You did the right thing.”
“No, I didn’t. I hated doing it, I hated being there, and I hate any and all of your ideas. It was horrible.”
She came around behind me and started to rub my shoulders. It felt nice, but I knew she was doing it just to keep me from banging my head against my desk again – which, let’s face it, was only a few seconds away from happening.
Sam smirked at me, crossing his arms against his white dress shirt and leaning against the door. “It can’t have been that bad.”
“It was. Did I mention he was naked?”
“Totally naked?”
“He was wearing a towel. A peach towel. The image is now burned into my brain.”
“Oh, right. Well.” He grimaced slightly. That was good, because if I’d caught him smiling, I would have decked him. I was rather upset by the whole thing.
“So, now what?” I asked.
CJ’s hands gripped my shoulders. “We’ve had another idea.”
I stood up and backed away from her. “No. No more ideas, CJ. I’d rather be miserable.”
“No, you wouldn’t.”
“No, I wouldn’t,” I admitted.
“You’re going to like this one.”
“Why?” I think I squeaked. “Why in God’s name would I ever do anything you said ever again?”
“Because I know what I’m doing,” she quipped, looking down her nose at me. I’d never noticed it before, but CJ could be a total school marm when she wanted to be.
“You know what you’re doing? Because you had nothing planned when I left!”
“I do now.”
I looked warily at her. I didn’t want to place myself in the hands of her womanly schemes, but what other choice did I have? Working on this by myself had gotten me absolutely nowhere.
“This had better work, CJ,” I said, relenting at last.
“Believe me, it will. But you have to give it time. Go home and get some sleep. You’ve done enough for tonight.”
“But I hate waiting!” Okay, I had officially crossed into whining. But I didn’t care. “I suck at waiting!”
“Don’t we all know it,” Sam shot back.
“Nice. You’re supposed to be here to help me.”
“Then listen to what we’re saying!”
I reached down and swung my backpack onto my shoulder. “So I should just go home?”
“Yes,” CJ nodded. “Sam’s going with you. I’ll explain phase two first thing in the morning.”
Sighing, I gave in completely. “I’ll do whatever you say, CJ, if it’ll get me Donna back.”
“That is the plan, mi amor.”
Sam and I were just about to go out the door when I thought of something. “This isn’t like my secret plan to fight inflation, right? It’s not that kind of a plan? Because that really didn’t work.”
“Of course, Josh. That’s exactly what it is!” she deadpanned. “Jackass.”
“Okay. Just checking.”
Sam draped an arm around my shoulders and steered me into the bull pen. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s get out of here. You can start again with the wooing in the morning.”
When we got back to my place, I went to bed immediately. Falling asleep, however, was an entirely different matter. Finally, I couldn’t take it any longer and walked out to where Sam was asleep on my couch. I poked him hard to wake him up.
“Sam? Do you think I’d look good in a towel? Should I maybe go over there just wearing a towel and try to make it up to her that way? Impress her with my bodice ripping qualities?”
He just looked at me. Slowly, he shook his head and tried to focus on me with sleep-blurred eyes.
“This is why we’re not letting you do this on your own, Josh – and now I’m going to be trying to get rid of the image of you in a towel outside Carol’s building, so thanks for that.”
“Right. Sorry. So that’s a no to the towel thing?”
“That’s a definite no. Go back to bed.”
“Ah-kay.”
It was going to be a long night.
********
The nights were the hardest part of the days.
Before, she had briefly flirted with the illusion of control; now, away from Josh, he ruled her subconscious.
Last night’s dream was particularly vivid.
Carol had come home, muttering about Sam and smooth moves, and then put on the extended version of “The Two Towers”. Donna had gone to bed on the pull-out, fully expecting to dream naughty things about Viggo Mortensen.
But scruffy Aragorn had morphed into clean-shaven Joshua early on, and things had stayed that way until dawn.
She dreamt that Josh was some famous celebrity, trying to lay low in Madison, Wisconsin, of all places. They had been at the same restaurant and she had spent an age trying to simultaneously catch his eye and tamp down the butterflies fluttering about in her stomach.
Then, suddenly, they had been introduced, but she thought she was being much too forward with him. At one point, she had actually sauntered over to his table and leaned her elbows onto the shoulders of his white dress shirt, as though they were old and intimate friends. He reluctantly gave her his illegible email on a card and she – ever the gauche one – had given him every possible address and phone number ever associated with her.
When he had walked out, his arm around some slim, smart brunette, a small piece of her soul had died.
She woke up, struggling against tears and the overwhelming sense of loss flooding through her.
When she fell back asleep, she dreamed – no *relived* -- every moment of their lone night together, beginning with him seeing her naked in the bath, and moving on from there, back to the dark, intimate confines of his bedroom.
His mouth was everywhere: lapping at her core, tickling the back of her bare knee, tasting the rising crowns of her breasts, nuzzling the soft skin of her navel, flicking and teasing her clit to the point of absolute dizziness. His tongue stabbed into her opening, making her rock her hips up into his face with reckless abandon.
But this time, she was able to return his amorous overtures as much as she liked. She beckoned him into the cradle of her hips; she licked every inch of his skin, biting down on his dark nipples and sucking them into her mouth; she traced his hard, hot length with her fingers, then her lips, and then the wet darkness of her mouth.
When they couldn’t stand it anymore, she made him drive into her, stretching her like no man ever before, filling every inch of her slick, tight passage.
It was as it should have been.
Then she woke up, hearing the early morning rain pelting against the outsides of the windows. Silently, she admitted to herself that she missed him.
She missed Josh Lyman.
But she was sick of being the one who chased him – and she sincerely doubted that he was operating a covert stake out downstairs, madly bent on seducing her when the opportunity arose.
It was too late.
Time to move on, pick up the pieces, and admit that men didn’t go about making epic grand gestures anymore.
At least, not that man.
********
To continue reading, please go to PART TWO