Josh didn't fall in love with Melanie, his red-haired dance partner in Kindy... not really. He just wanted the caramel fudge cookies her mother made and that Melanie shared with him as her 'boyfriend'. She was a very good dancer, though. He kept her lopsided, covered-in kisses, made of red cardboard Valentine's heart until the night his house burnt down.
Josh didn't fall in love with the student council leader he dated his sophomore year - but he was awed by her mind. She had the facility he would later encounter in Sam Seaborn of knowing a little - or a lot - about absolutely everything. She had braces, no bust and dressed like a forty-year-old librarian - but then he was the short nerdy guy with frizzy hair who kept getting thrown out of study hall. Oh yeah - and he was the guy who wouldn't go to the commencement bonfire. He didn't fall in love, but he sure fell in like when she followed him back to the car, sat on the hood with him and talked about the manifold shortfalls of Republican social policy until he could breath again... and never asked why.
Josh, despite what Sam likes to say, did not fall in love with the erm... hostess at the topless bar all the law students drank at in second year. Hopeless, mindless, pointless lust - oh yes! She, however, was about as interested in him as she was in her kids' hamsters... or maybe a little less. After all, she knew their names and worried if they were sick. On his part, he thought about her, dreamt about her and - please let Sam never find this out! - tried to write poetry about her. In the flesh, however, she scared him so much he could barely manage to mumble a drink order.
Josh did not fall in love with Mallory because who wants to have sex with someone who has peed on you, bitten you and watched you cry as their mom dug splinters out? How can you fall in love with someone you know eats pancakes with peanut butter, used to be madly in love with some hairy Scottish bloke from the Bay City Rollers and cuts her toenails in the kitchen? He knows Mallory is beautiful in the way he knows Sam is handsome, but he finds them equally unfanciable.
Josh never fell in love with Donna because who needs to fall in love with someone you just love? Almost from the day she started taking his phone calls and trying to make him eat something green - 'And sprinkles on doughnuts do not count, Joshua!' - it seemed like she belonged in his life. You fancy women you meet in bars, you sleep with other sharp-edged political operatives, and you marry - maybe - a girlfriend who puts up with you for more than six months. You just love Donna. You once told Donna (you blame the painkillers) that if you weren't Jewish and you believed in heaven you'd believe that Joanie was watching you from heaven and had sent her down as a guardian angel. How could you fall in love with a sister?
AN: Thanks to 96 Hubbles who pointed out one of my Australianisms. Writing American does not come naturally so if anyone sees anyhting else, please do point it out.