It was going to be one of those days. I knew it the moment I woke up. Or at least I strongly suspected it when I woke up to the sound of Donna retching into the toilet for the 4th morning in a row. I know what you're thinking and yes, now I'm thinking it, too.

I pause a moment to look at her from the doorway. Even hunched over the toilet she looks beautiful to me. She relaxes back from the toilet for a minute and I take that opportunity to hold out the sleeve of saltine crackers I had retrieved from the kitchen before joining her in the bathroom. She takes one with a small smile and starts gingerly to take a few bites.

Of course, I have a reputation to uphold so I sit next to her on the bathroom floor even though I'm not good with vomit. Don't get me wrong, I have vomited plenty and for all the normal reasons-tequila, vodka, beer, even champagne once. I have also vomited for some more unusual reasons-anxiety (mostly as a child-death will do that to you), pain, weaning myself off prescription painkillers for the aforementioned pain. Who knew one little bullet could hurt so goddamn much? Which brings me back to why I am not very good with vomit. It's the sound, and especially the smell, it reminds me of bad memories. But when I look at Donna now, hunched over the toilet on my bathroom floor, I suddenly don't seem to be bothered about the fact that there is vomit going on. She looks so pathetic, so sick and mostly, so scared. Plus, it's also possible this is at least partly my fault.

"Donna, when, uh, oh god this is hard. When was your last period?"

Donna grips the toilet bowl, chewing her cracker slowly and shakes her head.

"You don't know or you haven't had it?"

She nods, then shakes her head, then nods again. She can tell I am confused, but all the head shaking makes her nausea come back, so she white knuckles the toilet and dry heaves a few more times. Then with one hand on the toilet just to make sure she can get back to it quickly, she reaches into the bathroom cabinet where she momentarily searches around blindly before producing a white box. I already know where this is going, remember, I knew it was going to be one of those days when

I woke up, but actually seeing the words Pregnancy Test on the box makes my mouth go dry and the color drain from my face.
So that is how I found myself, after a meeting with Andy in legislative affairs and before a meeting with Senator Stackhouse, perched nervously on the edge of my desk, while my assistant uses my phone to call her lady doctor. Yes, I know, I am immature, but I don't have those parts and the stories I have heard, ok, they were gruesome. So yes, I am ok asking her about her period, but I get the shivers at the word gynecologist.

I can't imagine watching some doctor man handle my favorite part of Donna. Ok, second favorite part. Stop it, I meant her brain, ok, she's really smart, though it seems neither of us have been so smart here recently.

Donna looks up at me from her phone conversation with the receptionist. "She wants to know when we, uh, conceived."

"How the hell should I know," I shrug. I'm not trying to be a jerk, I really don't know - there has been a lot of sex, I mean a lot - and I feel like the doctor should be able to help with that question, it's her job, isn't it?

Donna rolls her eyes and returns to the phone receiver. "My last period? Hold on, I used to keep that in my planner."
She shuffles through the papers on my desk and finds my schedule, yes MY schedule, this isn't like her diary, or her day planner, it's my work schedule. When she finds it, I can feel my anxiety building with every page she flips backward in time. Hers is, too, because she starts stammering. "I must have forgotten to write one down."

For the next few minutes I just see Donna nod and say ok, jot down a note on the schedule in front of her and then she thanks the receptionist and hangs up.

"I have an appointment on Thursday at 11. I will take a long lunch. You have a lunch meeting at that time with Chris Carrick, so you won't miss me," she says while thrusting the schedule for the week at me. I don't take it from her or even look at it. Not only do I trust her implicitly with my schedule, I can't read her handwriting on a good day, much less a day like today where both of us are practically shaking.

I feel myself nod at her and she moves toward my office door. She can't look at me. Her hand is on the doorknob when the most inappropriate thing comes flying out of my mouth before I can stop it.

"You were keeping track of your period in my official schedule?!" I try not to yell, but it does kind of sound like yelling. Ok, it wasn't the most inappropriate thing I could have said, but I am not ready to deal with that yet, so it was the most inappropriate thing I was capable of saying at that moment.

"Josh, don't shout!" She sighs and quickly walks back to me, "I did it in code, no one would ever know." She's thrusting the schedule at me open to the date of her last menstrual cycle. I can't help but look down to see and note that she's right. She has a series of checks and dashes, circles and some one letter codes that in her handwriting simply look like squiggles. And that's when I realize she's been keeping track of more than just her period.

"What the hell does all this mean, it looks like the code of Hammurabi. Were you keeping track of everything?"

She blushes. "Well not everything." She draws the last word out.

Something is drawing me to keep looking at the scribbles made on the month she'd randomly opened to almost a year ago. There's something that my mind is grasping at understanding, but I am coming up short. "Donna these dates. Did you keep track of...?"

Donna looks sheepish and shrugs.

My eyebrows are now in my hair. "You kept track of when we had sex," I hiss. "In my work schedule?!"

Ok, now that was yelling, but right now, I am just imagining what the vein in Leo's forehead would be doing as he's paging through my schedule to see every time I had unprofessional relations with my assistant. I suspect there would be numerous and sundry threats on how to castrate me, likely with an audience. I wouldn't put him past employing a pack of wild dogs either. Later I will realize that the schedule isn't the only way Leo is going to find out about what we've been doing outside of work, but right now it's all I can think about.

"Well just the first couple times and on momentous occasions. After that I kinda lost track. It was a lot." Donna responds quickly.

"Oh my God. Donna. Your diary. This is stuff for your diary." And I know she has one. She got drunk one night and told me about what was in it. It's at least partly responsible for the mess we're in right now.

"I would have, but I didn't have time to keep track in my diary. You know, because of all the sex." She looks up at me with big, innocent eyes.

All I can do is look at her incredulously, mouth hanging open.

"It was a lot of sex, Josh." She says earnestly. "I always remove any of this before I file your old schedules she says pointing to her little codes, and," she starts to sound indignant, "I keep track of a lot more than just when we have sex, including when you work too much, have an episode or take your medicine late."

She is mad, now, I can see it in her eyes. I am upset too, but her last comment softened me and she knows that.
Then just as suddenly as she raised her voice I see her face change and she's sobbing. I had always heard pregnancy hormones made women crazy, and here is my proof-standing at my office door with her hand on the doorknob sobbing. And, of course, that's when CJ would walk in.

As I said, it's one of those days.

Donna knows I can't stand to see her crying. It is the most helpless feeling in the world. All I want to do is gather her into my arms and tell her it will be ok, which of course is a lie, but it's the lie we both need very dearly to believe right now. Add this to the fact that I am trying to calculate just how long CJ was near my door before she opened it and just how soundproof my office door is and the look on my face is something much deeper than annoyance.

Donna takes one look at CJ, shudders out a sob, quietly says "I'm sorry," though I am not sure to who and then slides past CJ out the door with only a muttered excuse me. As she's sprinting out the door I have an immediate and visceral reaction. I lunge forward with both arms as though I want to catch Donna's hands and pull her into my arms, but I stop myself mid-stride and let my hands fall helplessly to my sides. Fortunately, CJ is too busy watching Donna leave to notice my movements.

"What do you need CJ?" My voice is hard.

"I was just coming to talk with you about the Cochran thing before you go meet with Stackhouse, but it looks like you have other concerns." She says, still looking out my open door in the direction Donna had gone. "What is wrong Donna?"

"Nothing, I think she's just being a little sensitive today."

"Well considering how much you yell at her I think your perception of sensitive may be off base."

I wince. Could she hear what I was yelling about? Suddenly I imagine CJ's face in the front row as wild dogs tear at my testicles. I shudder at the thought and CJ eyes me strangely.

"Listen, she's not ok, but she will be. She's just, I'm just, we're both just having a day." I say as I pull my hand through my hair for the 25th time today. I always heard children will make you lose your hair, I think I'm going to prove that to be true.