All in all, it had been a good day.

They had closed the gap entirely to Vinick, the Republican Senator had come down with a cold, the interruption to their campaign schedule so the candidate and Leo could meet with the President about the conflict in Asia had dampened his spirits only slightly, but everything just seemed to be going so well for them that Josh found himself enjoying the extra time sitting around and working with his staff. Oh yeah, and he had kissed Donna.

His head was still a little fuzzy, if he was honest. He probably couldn't even describe the events leading up to the kiss, or what immediately followed; all he knew was that he had spent all day feeling like, for various reasons, he was floating. And now it was night time, and he was starting to come back down.

And he was panicking.

He had missed out on going up to Donna's hotel room with her, through no fault of his own, he would add, and maybe that would have answered some questions, maybe it only would have let to more, but all Josh knew was that it was late, he was on his second drink, and he was way out of his depth.

"What are you still doing down here?"

Josh startled at the sound of Leo's voice as the other man sat down across from him.

"Could ask you the same thing," Josh replied, finishing off his drink and setting the glass down on the table. "You've got an early flight tomorrow."

"So do you," Leo countered. "Everyone else probably has right idea turning in early, you should go upstairs."

Josh waved him off and looked around the room, considerably less crowded than it was an hour ago, but still by no means empty. He contemplated ordering another drink but couldn't quite make eye contact with a waiter, so he turned back to Leo.

"Josh? Is everything alright?" Leo asked, clearly noticing his distraction.

"Hmm? Yeah, fine," Josh responded quickly. "It's just, you know, been a day."

"Don't I know it," Leo chuckled. "Never thought I'd still be galivanting across the country at this point in my life, yet here I am. I must have a death wish or something."

"Or something," Josh agreed absently, glancing around the room again, but this time for nothing in particular.

"Seriously, kid, what's going on?" Leo's tone turned serious, apparently catching on to his former deputy's frazzled thoughts.

"It's nothing," Josh brushed him off again. "It's…nothing. Sorry, just forget it."

"Josh," Leo warned.

"There was just a…thing," Josh said vaguely. "Its really not a big deal, Leo."

"A thing," Leo repeated.

"You probably don't wanna know," Josh shrugged. "Anyways, you should get to bed."

"Hey, now, would I have asked?"

"Leo…" Josh felt his resolve weakening. Thing is, Josh didn't do feelings well, never had. He didn't know how to talk about them, he just felt generally uncomfortable when the emotional stuff came up in conversation. It was probably why his relationships all seemed to fail. Good, bad, all of it; he tended to just shut down and hope everything went away on its own. But there was something different this time. For some reason, he needed to talk with somebody. Donna would seem like the obvious choice, given that hers were the other feelings involved, except that he had maybe missed that window and was too much of a coward to go up there now and risk waking her up, so that was ruled out.

The thought of having this conversation with Leo felt an awful lot like, well, having the talk with your parents, because, he supposed, that's what this was. But he wasn't in middle school, he was a grown man, and objectively he knew that he had nothing to be ashamed of. Plus, if he didn't say something there was a good chance he would end up drinking the entire minibar in his hotel room and that really didn't seem like a productive coping strategy.

"If you really don't want to talk, tell me to go upstairs and I'll go," Leo gave him an out. "But this isn't campaign stuff that's bothering you."

"No," Josh finally admitted. "It's not."

"Well?"

"There was a thing," Josh began.

"So you've mentioned."

"Just a moment really, this morning, when the Times released the poll. Donna came in to give me the numbers and I guess things just got a bit, well, out of hand," Josh explained. "She was excited, I was excited, and I guess basically I ended up kissing her."

"Huh," Leo said after a moment. "I guess I'd figured you'd have done that already."

Josh's head snapped up to meet his mentor's gaze. "What?"

"Oh come on, Josh, think about it," Leo rolled his eyes. "After all these years? You have to have known that people wondered about you two."

"Well, yeah, but…it was never like that," Josh protested.

"Josh," Leo prodded. "Are you really surprised?"

"No," Josh admitted. "I feel like I've been floating all day. It's a combination of everything, really, but I think it just freaked me out, because it didn't freak me out? I know that doesn't make any sense…"

"Sure it does," Leo argued.

"It does?"

"It's you and Donna," Leo explained as if that was an explanation. "It was bound to happen eventually."

That really made Josh start. "That's…exactly what she said."

"Well, Donna's a smart girl," Leo shrugged, casual as anything. Meanwhile Josh's head felt like it was spinning.

"Okay, yeah, but…now what?" he tried to wrap his head around, well everything. "Like…now what?"

"What do you mean?" Leo asked.

"I mean…now what?"

"Well what do you wanna do?"

"Leo, if I knew that do you think I'd be down here getting drunk when I have to be up in five hours?" Josh snapped, and immediately regretted it. "Sorry, I'm…my head's all over the place, that wasn't fair." He took a deep breath. "I never even allowed myself to think about this, you know? It just wasn't even an option, because it's Donna, so it never mattered what I wanted to do. But now…"

"It's always mattered, Josh," Leo countered. "At any moment, you could have made a choice. Choosing to ignore it was a choice. Probably not a great one, but a choice nonetheless. But now it is time for you to think about it. So, what do you want to do?"

"I like her a lot, Leo," Josh admitted. "Like, a lot. And today…it just felt like that's what we were supposed to be doing. It happened so naturally, then I spent the rest of the day freaking out about it, while she was being so calm, and then she might have asked me back to her hotel room—"

"She asked you back to her hotel room?" Leo interrupted. Josh hadn't actually intended to mention that, there were some things Leo probably didn't want to know.

"It didn't end up working out, obviously," Josh assured him, gesturing to their surroundings to remind him that Josh very obviously was not in Donn's hotel room. "I don't even know what to say to her now. How do I—how can I even begin to tell her what I want when I have absolutely no idea myself?"

Leo sighed, and Josh figured he had had enough of the conversation. He didn't blame him; Josh was about sick of himself too. But instead of getting up and leaving, Leo stood and circled to the other side of the table to take the seat next to Josh.

"Josh, you and Donna make sense in a way very few people do," Leo said.

"But we don't—"

Leo held up a hand before he could interrupt. "It's never been my place to say, but the rest of us aren't nearly as dumb as you might think we are. For years it's been obvious that she makes you happy, she keeps you sane, she keeps you from flying off the wall, and god knows how she's managed to put up with you for so long. You deserve someone like that, Josh. You don't have to push people away because you're afraid they'll leave anyways, or because you're worried about things changing. It's okay, Josh. Things are changing all around you, every day. Big changes. A lot of them are changes you yourself helped create. They're not always bad. It's all about taking the chance. You deserve to be happy, and Donna makes you happy, and nothing else really matters, right?"

"Right," Josh echoed, but the words felt like they were just bouncing around inside his head, unable to fully register. Because there was nothing about him and Donna that made sense; they had known each other for ten years. Surely it was too late now to go about making any big changes in their relationship, especially since they had just managed to rebuild their rapport.

"Josh, listen to me," Leo broke him from his trance, waiting until he had Josh's full attention. "You don't have to be afraid of this. You deserve to be happy. You deserve to have something for yourself. Donna's a good girl, she cares about you a lot. I have no doubt that whatever is supposed to happen with the two of you is going to happen naturally, just like this morning, okay?" Josh nodded absently. "You don't have to know exactly what you want Josh, you don't have to put it into words if you can't. But don't fight it. Just let it happen, whatever it is, and I promise you it'll be okay. You two always are. Do you trust me?"

"I—yeah. Yeah, okay," Josh nodded absently, a bit dizzy from the sheer volume of thoughts that had been tumbling around in his brain all day. Leo had only added about three hundred more, yet somehow he felt more at peace than he had since that morning. He couldn't help it really, it was ingrained into his DNA to trust Leo, the man had never let him down before.

"Good," Leo nodded, standing up and offering a hand to pull Josh up too. "Now, we both have about five hours before we need to be back down here to fly off to god knows where you've got us going, so I suggest we both go upstairs and get whatever sleep we can, while we can. Sound good?"

"Yeah," Josh agreed, pulling a few bills out of his wallet to leave as a tip before allowing Leo to tug him to his feet. The exhaustion hit him all at one, and suddenly he wanted nothing more than to get to his room upstairs. Well, he supposed he would rather get to Donna's room upstairs, but that would be a step for another night, with any luck, so a few hours rest would have to do for now.

The elevator arrived quickly, and they rode up in silence. Leo's floor came first, and the doors opened with a ding.

"Night, Josh," Leo nodded as he stepped off. "I mean it. Get some sleep. Your day is over."

"Yeah, g'night," Josh responded. "And Leo?"

Leo turned around, leaning into the door so it wouldn't close on them.

"Thanks," Josh finished. "For, y'know…thanks."

Leo smiled warmly, the way he did when he wasn't Leo McGarry, White House Chief of Staff or candidate for Vice President of the United States, but Leo, his father's best friend and the closest thing to family Josh had in Washington. Josh couldn't help but smile back. It felt like he had been smiling all day, really, but this one felt different. All day he'd been manic, soaring between peaks and higher peaks, entirely out of control. This, though, this was peace, comfort, and confidence. Something that settled over his entire being. Not artificial mania, but true happiness. Stability. Josh really did feel like he would be okay.

"Yeah," Leo nodded, as if reading his thoughts. "You're doing just fine, kid."

And if Leo said it, it must be true.

I realized that this was my first time ever actually writing Leo as a character, so hopefully I did okay? I have so many Josh/Leo headcanons like this because they're legit my fav friendship on the show, so I figured it was time to write at least one of them down. Let me know what you all think!