Lessons

by: Allison

Character(s): Josh, Donna, CJ
Pairing(s): Josh/Donna
Category(s): Romance
Rating: YTEEN
Summary: A friendship provides a basis for dealing with other relationships as well.

"So," Josh says, leaning across our corner of the table in a rather alarming way, "how's life?"

I must be giving him a priceless look, because he laughs. "Right. Silly question."

"Josh, what exactly did you want to talk about?" I ask in total frustration. I'm nervous, terrified, curious, intrigued, and all this is going way too fast and agonizingly slow at the same time.

"Nothing," he says enigmatically. "Life. Work. Us."

Oh dear oh dear oh dear. Something better happen soon to distract him from life work us. Soon.

When I see the look on his face I realize I've been sitting in silence waiting for something to rescue me.

"Oh," I say intelligently. "Life, work, and us, huh?"

"Sure." He picks up his water glass and starts sloshing the liquid around it in circles. "Um - have you been seeing anyone lately?"

Apparently he thinks that question is just as abrupt as I do, because he immediately looks like he wants to take it back. I sigh. "Not since - well, that one date a couple weeks ago."

His face flushes and he looks vaguely embarrassed and maybe just a little bit - guilty? Well, good. He should. "Look, Donna," he says, "about that..."

My heart starts to pound. I realize that I don't really want him to talk about this, because if he was actually thinking those things that he said I don't think I can hear them again. I have to change the subject, and fast. "I said it wasn't your fault, Josh. It would have sucked even if I hadn't had to leave early. Really, it was no big deal." Please leave it at that.

"I wasn't talking about that," he says. Oh, hell.

Do I really have to - is he expecting me to ask - yes, he is. There's really no way out of this one. Either I ask, or he tells me anyway. "What were you talking about?" I ask with a weary sigh.

"I was talking about - what I said - about -"

No, I can't hear this. "It's really fine, Josh," I cut him off desperately.

"It's not fine!" he exclaims, startling the waiter who is leaning over our table to deliver the food. Josh waits discreetly until the waiter has left and then says again, more quietly, "It's not fine. I shouldn't have -"

I am bound and determined that he is not going to get this out. This evening has gone downhill real fast. I'm not quite sure at what point it got so out of control, but it's gone from a friendly dinner to a veritable battle of wills. I interrupt him again. "Josh, really -"

"No, Donna, I need to -"

"Josh!" This is getting bad. We're both cutting each other off at every turn and any second now he's just going to start talking over me until I'm forced to hear him out. I turn to the only method left at my disposal. Honesty. "Josh," I say, surprised to find myself fighting real tears - there's no way I'm going to cry over this, "I'm sorry, I really can't hear you talk about that again." Damn. I thought I was doing pretty good but my voice sounds shaky and I hate myself for being a drama queen.

He looks surprised and - I don't know, something else. Saddened, maybe? He reaches over and takes my hand, and I'm too out of it to pull away.

"You don't understand," he says very quickly, as if trying to squeeze the words in before I refuse to listen. "I need to apologize. I shouldn't have spoken to you that way, I was out of line."

"Do you think that mattered?" I ask before I can stop myself. "Do you really think that's what mattered?"

Oops. So, as if the near-crying hadn't been enough, I've just admitted that what he said mattered for one reason or another.

He gives me a look that I pray isn't pity and holds my hand a little tighter. "What did matter, then?"

I've gathered myself enough to pull my hand away. I know with complete certainty that what I'm about to say is going to lay it all on the table. It's going to bring this tentative new friendship that's been building between us to an absolute halt. And there's no way now that I can not say it. "What mattered wasn't the way you said it," I say, looking carefully at the table and not him and managing that way not to cry and to keep my voice steady. "What mattered was that you thought those things in the first place."

I'm not used to talking openly about my emotions. I can't help but feel that we're in a bad after-school special.

He sighs. "I didn't think those things, not the way I said them," he says. I can tell he's no more comfortable than I am. Wow, is he going to regret bringing up this topic. He looks down and plays nervously with his fork. "What I said - came out sounding like I thought you were weak, and I regret that because I don't see you that way at all. What I should have said, was that I didn't like to see you going out with losers because I was afraid of what might happen."

"You were afraid of what might happen?" I echo skeptically.

He pokes the fork rather viciously into the tablecloth. "When I see you with guys like that, I'm afraid that they're not good enough for you, I'm afraid you're going to get hurt, and I'm afraid that some guy is going to break your heart and that you might lose the confidence I've seen you gain." He stops and takes a deep breath. "I'm sorry, I sound like a Hallmark card."

I shake my head. "Are there Hallmark cards for 'sorry I called you a pushover?'"

"I didn't say..."

"Same thing," I insist. "You suggested in one breath that I'd go out with anyone just to be attached to something male, and that I would run off and sleep with the first loser who asked."

He blanches. Score one for Team Moss. "I shouldn't have said that."

"Which part?" I ask sarcastically.

"The sex part," he replies.

"Yeah, you shouldn't have." Actually, this is kind of fun. He's squirming like bait. And we may have gotten closer recently - in my head at least - but I can still punish him (thank you, CJ). "Why did you?"

He mutters something I don't quite catch that sounds like "I was a fairy knight." I'm pretty sure that wasn't really it.

"What?" I ask.

He clears his throat. "I was afraid you might."

Uh-huh. "So you didn't really think I would sleep with him, but you were afraid I might? Doesn't that kinda sound like the same thing?"

He's dying now. I'll let him off the hook eventually, because I can see that he is sorry, but I really need to know this.

"I don't think of you as someone who would sleep with the first guy you met, no," he says carefully. "But you said you had a vibe."

He sounds so positively helpless that I have to laugh. "That wasn't necessarily the have-sex-with-me-now vibe, Josh!" He looks up at me and sees that I'm laughing, and finally he smiles a little too. This is okay. He really doesn't think I'm easy. It's just that as a friend, he worries. He was just afraid -

Hang on.

Whoa there.

He was afraid? I'm pretty sure, from what little I've overheard, that he is not afraid of CJ getting involved with Danny. In fact he's doing just about all he can to encourage it. So why should me sleeping with Todd be something he should be afraid of?

No.

If I'm going to survive this, I really need to stop having those thoughts. Because they're ridiculous.

I need to stay calm and connected to reality. It's probably a little-sister protectiveness thing. After all, CJ's a big girl and he trusts Danny. It's not the same...

"Josh, do you think of me as young?" I blurt out without thinking.

He looks up, startled. He's obviously been lulled into a sense that things are going better. "What?" he asks like the articulate Ivy Leaguer he is.

"Do you think of me as young?"

Now he just looks confused. "Well, you are," he points out. "You're twenty-six."

Yeah, I know. Thanks for the update. "But, younger than you?"

Again with the confusion, only now some of his usual sarcasm is creeping in. "Again, you are." This is good. This is normal for us. This is something I can handle.

"You're not answering the question," I say, dangerously close to whining. That's fine too - that's what we do.

"I'm not sure I'm hearing the question." He's got the familiar teasing note in his voice, and I think we're going to be okay - depending on his answer to my question, that is.

I pause a second to frame it carefully. "Do you think of me as immature and flighty?"

He studies me for a harrowing moment. "How old is Margaret?" he finally asks.

Huh? "Thirty-six," I reply, baffled.

"How old is Carol?"

"Thirty-three."

"Bonnie and Ginger? Cathy?"

"Um - thirty-something, I guess." I sure hope he knows where he's going with this, because I haven't got a clue."

"You know how old Ainsley is?"

"No. Twenty-eight?"

"Thirty-two. She's the same age as Sam."

"That's fascinating, Josh. Where are you going with this?"

He leans back in his chair and stretches. "So you're working in the White House at the age of twenty-six, everyone else who has a similar job is over thirty, everyone on the senior staff for whom you do research is at least over thirty, and you think I could possibly see you as immature?"

You know, I never thought of it that way. I'm practically a prodigy.

He's not quite finished. "Who were the last few women you had a friendly conversation with?"

I'm confused again. "Well, um - Margaret, Carol, and CJ. And my old roommate. Why?"

He starts counting off on his fingers. "Thirty-six, thirty-three, thirty-eight, and thirty-two. Has it ever occurred to you that you feel immature just because all your friends are in their mid- to late thirties, and not because you actually are any less mature mentally than they are?"

Wow. "No, I have never thought of that," I admit.

"But I'm right?"

"It does sort of make sense." I meet his eyes across the table. "And that really scares me."

"Because you're too young to be this old?"

"Because you're starting to make sense to me," I retort. "Am I too young to be this old?"

He props his chin on his hand and looks me over for an uncomfortably long period of time. "No. You're perfect." I blush furiously and he adds, "You have much more energy - not just physically - than those of us who are pushing forty, but you're smart and in control and no, I don't think you're flighty."

I can't quite let go. "But before you said you were afraid I might lose my confidence. That doesn't sound like I'm in control."

"You are more in control than most people your age," he clarifies. "You're also sensitive. It's because of that that I worry about you getting hurt."

"Oh." I ponder that for a second while he steals a bite of my chicken. "Okay."

He looks up cautiously. "Really okay?"

I nod. "Really okay. Quit stealing my chicken."

"You want some shrimp?"

I hesitate for a ninth of a second. "Slide it over."

We both fight for a minute over two ends of the same piece of shrimp and wind up sawing it inelegantly apart with a fork. He's still laughing when he asks, "Why did you want to know?"

"Know what?" His teacup is dangerously close to the edge of the table and I move it back before he knocks it off.

"If I thought of you as young."

Oh. Suddenly I'm feeling very sober again. "I was just wondering if you thought of us as being really far apart in age," I say. Try to keep it casual.

"Why would that matter?"

Okay, casual isn't going to work. Let's go with unimportant. "I was wondering whether age affects our relationship, that's all."

He reaches over with his fork to help me struggle with a particularly large and vindictive piece of chicken. "I am your boss," he says teasingly.

"Not that relationship," I say before I think.

He freezes, fork in chicken. Then he returns to normal and says, "In view of the fact that you've taken care of my drunkenness, reorganized my office and my closet, changed my shirts, and just moved my tea so I didn't spill it, I think we can be friends without my thinking you're too young."

I pause. "Point taken. And move your tea again, it's migrating."

He moves his tea and smiles at me. And the look on his face completely floors me. It's the same look I caught him giving me when he suggested we put me on a stamp. I could be hopelessly misreading this, but he looks exactly like he wants to reach out and muss my hair and then kiss me.

But of course he doesn't.

By the time we hit his apartment we're both a little giddy - the other patrons in the restaurant were giving us funny looks for battling over food and we found that highly entertaining. It's also been a long week and we're both just a little punchy.

I know you're wondering. No, I haven't forgotten that I've fallen in love with him. But we're starting to be friends, real honest friends, and I'll take that for now. That's definitely a step in the right direction.

We settle on opposite ends of his couch to watch the movie. This feels most comfortable - maybe with CJ he'd be a little more used to lounging together (am I obsessing over CJ?), but aside from that time when I was asleep we haven't really been physically close. Not enough for it to be completely casual.

Which is why I'm kind of surprised when I shift positions halfway through the movie and he takes the opportunity to hold out his arm and say, "Come here."

Okay. I take a big huge breath, remind myself that this is platonic, and scoot over to his side. I rest my head against his shoulder and he wraps his arm securely around me. This is not so surprising, after all. Then he reaches up with his free hand, strokes my hair back from my face, turns to press a gentle kiss to my forehead, and then reaches over to take my hand in his. He settles both our hands in his lap as if it's nothing out of the ordinary.

Now that was surprising.

And what's even more surprising is the way we continue to watch the movie, discussing plot points, guessing what's happening next (most people hate when I do that) - all without feeling even a little bit weird. I feel enough at ease to nestle a bit closer, and he shifts to accommodate me without comment.

This is nice.

What have we learned this evening? My boss and I are friends. Hmm.

Chapters: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11

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