Analecta

by: N. Y. Smith

Disclaimer: Not Mine

Category: AU (very), Josh/Donna Romance, Josh POV, Angst,

Spoilers: Through Season Three

Rating: PG-13

Author's Note: Contains references to 9/11/2001. Amy-free universe.

Hope

I had just grasped her hand, tugging her to the car in the bright morning light when I caught the lens flare in the hazy edges of my vision. I jerked my head around and saw the photographer grin.

"What is it?"

"Nothin'," I lied, but Donna followed my line of sight and saw what I saw.

"Oh, God," she groaned, "you'd think they'd have more important things going on right now."

I pulled on the car door and gently lowered her inside, "You'd think."

At the White House we parted ways, she to our office and I directly to CJ Cregg's. CJ barely looked up when I propped myself against her door frame, hands stuffed in my pockets. "Good morning, Josh."

"There was a photographer outside my apartment this morning."

She regarded me over the frames of her glasses. "And did this hack photograph anything that's going to give me a headache?"

Just as a what was undoubtedly a stupid grin split my face I slowly pulled my hands from my pockets and crossed my arms in front of me, the right one on top. "Probably," I admitted.

CJ stood, blinking slowly for several seconds. "Oh, hell," she snatched the glasses from her face. "Tell me that's not what it looks like."

"What does it look like?"

She walked around her desk and planted herself four feet from me. "A wedding ring."

"Wrong hand."

"Engagement?"

"Betrothal."

She made a circling motion with her glasses. "Which is?"

"The time during which you're waiting for the law to catch up with your heart."

"And when will that be?"

"Mid-October."

"Any reason to rush?" she asked carefully.

"God, I hope so."

"Me, too," Donna sidled against me and grasped my upper arm with her right hand, ring gleaming, before returning my stupid grin.

The Press Secretary fixed us in a laser-beam glare for several minutes before scrubbing the back of her hand against wet cheeks. Then it happened. For the first time in days, weeks really, we are favored with a thousand-watt, gap-toothed, CJ Cregg smile. "It's about damn time."

"We certainly think so," I said quietly.

"I hope Leo shares your opinion," Donna sighed. "He wants to see us."

Leo did not share CJ's enthusiasm. He thundered, he threatened, but underneath the anger seemed to be a sense of relief. Of course, the fact that the First Lady approved may have had something to do with it. Few people bucked Abbey Bartlet-which explains how I came to be in my office, dressing with Sam Seaborn, on the Thursday before Columbus Day.

"When did you know?" Sam asked quietly, ends of his cravat grasped in trembling fingers. "That you loved her, I mean."

The corner of my lips curled upward as he smoothed his own necktie. "In the hospital. When I woke up and wished hers would have been the first face I saw rather than Leo and the President. Why?"

"You were only three years behind the rest of us," he gibed but the look on my face provoked a more thoughtful response as he smoothed his tie. "Mallory called."

"I'm hearing things," I shook my head, as if clearing it, before slipping on my black jacket. "I thought you just said Mallory called."

Sam nodded, putting on his own coat.

"What did she want?"

"She wants to get back together."

"And leave the hockey-stud?"

"That's over." He studied his shoes. "She said what he was doing-playing hockey-was trivial. It wasn't important enough."

"Sam..."

"So I told her I was quitting-leaving the White House. That I couldn't live like we've had to anymore."

My hands stopped working. "You're leaving?"

"We're the palace eunuchs, Josh. The President, Leo, even Toby has had his chance at a family. But not us. We've been so busy protecting our Way of Life that we've not even noticed Life passing us by. Has it been worth it? Can you honestly say it's been worth it?"

I shook my head. "But I'm changing that in about fifteen minutes." Nervously, I twisted the gold band that would soon be moving from my right to my left hand. "So she said good bye because you're leaving?"

"She said it didn't matter. She said that even if I were digging ditches that I'd find a way to make sure it counted."

"Sounds like she loves you."

"You think so?" he said, hope lifting the timbre of his voice.

A gentle chuff punctuated my response. "Do you? Love her, you know, still?"

Now he studied my shoes. "Yeah, dammit," he said ruefully. "What do you think? About Mallory and me, I mean?"

"I think I'll be wearing this suit again in the very near future." I looked at my watch. "And I think it's time to go downstairs."

Sam checked his watch then showed me. "It's fifteen minutes early, Josh."

"Ah, man. Donna must have reset it last night." I pulled on my suit coat with a mock grimace.

"Good for her; somebody needs to take care of you." Sam pulled on his own coat, adjusting the tie. "Are you taking care of her?"

A leering remark perched on my tongue but I swallowed it. "I hope so; I plan on spending the rest of my life trying."

<"Guys," Charlie leaned in my door, "it's time."

Finally, nearly one month after we'd exchanged our own private vows, we stood in the Residence beneath the chuppah my parents had used, the one they'd saved for my sister Joanie, and completed the public manifestation of the covenant into which we'd already entered: we signed the marriage contract. When my cellphone rang later, as we dozed in our own bed after the quiet reception, I knew what news would be interrupting my sleep.

"Who was that?" Donna murmured sleepily.

"Leo," I answered and she hummed. "I think you should go home to Wisconsin when your parents go."

"I thought I told you no already."

"I still think you should go."

She propped herself on an elbow, now completely awake. "What's happened?"

I stared at the tiny baseball glove she'd given me just hours earlier, after we'd returned home, the spread of its webbing measuring barely larger than the palm of my hand. 'To the Big Dude from the Little Dude-to-be,' the card had read. "I just think you'll be safer there. You and the Little Dude."

"Dudette," she corrected, then prodded gently, "Joshua?"

I rolled onto my back. "We're eliminating the enemy's technological infrastructure as we speak."

She scooted closer, still on her side, sliding her right leg over mine. "Meaning we're bombing the hell out of their military installations."

"Yeah." I took a deep breath. "Washington will be a certain target for retaliation, Donna."

"I know."

"You'll be safer in Wisconsin."

"Possibly."

"Then you'll go?"

"Not a chance."

"Why?"

"Are you going?"

"You know I can't, Donna."

"And neither can I."

"Donna..."

"Josh, we can't ask Americans to be brave if we're not prepared to do the same. I'm staying."

Defiance lit her eyes and determination flushed her skin crimson, even in the half-light. "Any kid would be lucky to have you for a mom," awe roughened my voice.

She pulled closer, her head on my shoulder, hand covering my hand that rested on my chest. "And you for a dad," she nuzzled my shoulder and we lay, still and silent, for several minutes before I splayed my hand across her still-flat belly.

"Can you feel him move yet?"

"It's too soon." She covered my hand with hers, pressing gently until I felt a hardened knot deep within her. "There she is."

"He," I corrected gently, then pulled her closer, savoring the feel of us. "This is what I lived for."

On the next Tuesday, Evelyn Saunders, who had worked in the Senate Mail Room for thirty-two years, called in with a chest cold-her first sick days in six years. By dark she was dead. The anthrax letters had begun.

Chapters - Prologue | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23

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