Author's Note: Today's story, the penultimate work in the fantastical Fic-A-Day-Til-The-Election, is in response to a prompt from Anonymous, who asked for an exploration of Donna's journey from Wisconsin to DC through the lens of her long friendship with Stephanie Gault (from Somebody's Going to Emergency, Somebody's Going to Jail). It's a great story prompt, and as soon as I started writing it I could tell that it was going to mushroom into something longer than I could write in one day. More chapters of this one will be forthcoming as long as people are interested. Hope you enjoy! =)
…...
Stephanie Danielle Gault was having a pretty good evening, if she did say so herself. Grad school was no picnic, but she finally had one major project under her belt already, and from the sound of her advisor conference this afternoon, she was well on her way to being published in a very minor journal of international relations. To celebrate, she had a glass of wine that tasted more expensive than it was, a bar of dark chocolate, and an evening full of laying on the couch and watching The Princess Bride for the twentieth time.
She'd already called her dad to tell him the good news, so hearing the phone ring again just as the opening credits began was a surprise. People didn't really call her, certainly not on rainy Tuesday nights when nothing was due in her TA classes. Setting aside her glass of wine, she rose and picked up the phone in her kitchen. "Hello?"
"Steph?" The voice was very familiar, but small and half-choked with tears. "It's me, Donna."
That was enough to get alarm bells clanging loudly in Stephanie's head. She'd been more than a little skeptical when Donna had come back to town three weeks ago, back with Rick and determined that this time it was going to work out, despite all historical evidence to the contrary. Ten days ago, she and Donna had met up for dinner, and Donna had been full of bubbly enthusiasm on the surface for Rick's many perceived behavioral changes, and full of miserable uncertainty inside that even a changed Rick was anybody she really wanted. "What's the matter, honey? Are you all right?"
"Not really," Donna admitted. "I mean, I'm okay. It wasn't a bad accident, I've got some bruises, whiplash, sprained ankle... but it's nothing, right?" Her laugh was high-pitched, edgy and bitter. "I need a ride."
"Whoa, back up a second, kiddo," Steph demanded, already turning off the television and dropping a coaster over her wine glass. Where were her shoes? "You were in a car accident? Where are you?"
"Yeah... the car got the worst of it, it's totaled. My dad's going to be really pissed." Donna's voice was even smaller suddenly. "I'm at UW, um... I think this is the emergency department lobby."
"Okay, you sit tight, Donna. I'm going to be there in fifteen minutes." Steph debated before even asking, but it seemed important. "Where's Rick?"
Again that laugh, raising the hairs on the back of Steph's neck. "I wouldn't get into a car with that fucker if he were the last man on earth," Donna swore.
"All right, that's a good call, you keep that up," Steph encouraged. "I'll be there in just a few minutes." Her sweatsuit-and-sneakers combination wouldn't win her any fashion prizes even in a crowd of grad students, but she hadn't been expecting to go out again, and she wasn't going to take the time to change. She drove carefully but quickly on the rain-slick roads, wending her way through campus and following the signs for Emergency through the enormous hospital complex. There was a covered parking spot available, a small miracle, and soon Steph found herself in the waiting room.
Donna was sitting on one of the vinyl-covered couches, holding herself stiffly with discomfort and clutching a nearly-full cup of coffee in one hand. Rick was, as expected, nowhere to be seen. She set aside the coffee when she noticed Steph, struggling to her feet with the help of a pair of metal crutches. "Thank you so much for coming, I know it was a huge imposition..."
Steph gave Donna her best quelling-the-undergraduates glare. "Donna, we established years ago that I am your first call when it comes to boyfriend problems. You damn well better have called me! Is that your stuff?" Donna nodded, and Steph picked up the purse and the small plastic bag off the seat. She looked inside. "You brought your groceries to the hospital? Didn't you come in an ambulance?"
Donna shrugged with a faint smile. "I honestly don't remember. I must've just had them in my hand the entire time and never put them down. But considering I totaled my dad's car over them, I might as well have them, I guess."
"Point." Steph took a look in the bag as they slowly made their way to the doors. "Mint Milanos, chocolate truffles, tiny little bottle of amaretto... your night wasn't going so well before the accident, was it." Donna just shook her head, her hair falling down around her face as she maneuvered the crutches. Steph let it go for the moment. She helped Donna get situated in the car, tossed the crutches in the backseat, and slid behind the wheel. "Okay, where to?"
Donna looked at Steph like she'd just been poleaxed. "I... I don't know," she admitted.
"Do you want to go to your folks' place?" Donna shook her head, and Steph didn't blame her. Donna's parents weren't bad people, but they had strong feelings on what their children's lives should look like. This would be just one more piece of evidence in the "someone needs to be taking care of Donnatella" argument, and no wonder she didn't have time or energy for that tonight. "Okay, my place it is. Hope you like wine and The Princess Bride, cause that's tonight's agenda."
"Sounds about perfect," Donna told her, and was silent for the rest of the ride. Steph just let her be.
The stairs at her apartment were a little tricky to navigate, but eventually they were both settled in on Steph's couch with cheap wine, cookies, and the movie. Steph waited until after the first Westley and Buttercup sequence to start talking. "So what happened with you and Rick?"
Donna stared into her wine. "He worked late again yesterday and we had a fight. Not because of the hours, but because his clothes smelled like perfume when he got home." She sighed and knuckled under one eye. "He swore he got puked on during his peds shift and that it was the only fabric softener he could find at the hospital, and maybe it was true. It could've been true. But then he started going on about how can we rebuild our relationship if I won't trust him, and it really made me start thinking. I don't trust him because he fucking cheated on me, and I don't know how I'm ever going to trust him again. When he finishes school he's still going to be working long hours and going out in the middle of the night, and am I going to spend every single night wondering who that page was actually from? And then tonight..."
She trailed off. "What happened tonight?" Steph nudged gently.
"I called him after the accident," Donna told her, her voice heavy. "We were still arguing this morning, but tonight I was upset and scared and I wanted my doctor boyfriend to tell me everything was okay. And he said he was going to come and get me, but I finished up in X-rays and got my crutches and got put back out in the waiting room and he wasn't even there. We live less than ten minutes from the hospital and it took him more than an hour to show up, and when he did there was beer on his breath." Donna hugged one of the couch pillows, even though doing so made her wince. "He'd been about to go out with his friends, and I wasn't important enough for him to change his plans. That's how much he actually cares about me."
"He's a complete asshole and not worth a minute of your time," Steph agreed, passing Donna a box of tissues. "I was honestly kind of surprised you came back at all," she admitted. "I thought you liked working for the Bartlet campaign."
"I did," Donna confessed miserably. "It was the best thing I've ever done in my life, and I was actually good at it. It felt so amazing to be good at something for once, instead of just scrambling to get by, or enduring something so tedious I could scream. Everyone there was amazing, and I was learning so much just by being around them. My boss, Josh, just the way his mind works is phenomenal, all the twists and turns, and the Governor is so nice and so smart and has these great policies-"
"Then why did you leave?" Steph broke in, sensing that Donna was on a roll.
Donna's face crumpled. "Lots of reasons, I guess. Rick kept sending me flowers and telling me how much he missed me, how we weren't complete without each other. He'd call me on the phone and sound so sad and lonely. And I'd talk to my mom and try to tell her about what we were doing in the campaign and how exciting it was, and all she said was it sounded to her like I was homeless, and at least they pay secretaries in Madison. Then Rick sent me a plane ticket and begged me to come home and promised everything was going to change. He was going to be the guy I always knew he could be. And..."
She trailed off, but Steph just leaned back, watching and waiting until Donna started talking again, in an even softer voice now. "And I thought that if I went back and we patched things up, it meant I wasn't stupid for being with him in the first place. It would mean that I didn't throw away my college career and three years of my life for nothing. But I guess I'm just double-stupid now." She started to cry again, big, slow tears and intermittent sobs, as though she were too worn down for anything energetic.
Stephanie scooted across the couch to wrap Donna in a hug, giving her another handful of tissues in the process. "You're completely not stupid," she maintained loyally. "He's the stupid one for having two chances with you and blowing them both so spectacularly. You would've been the best thing that ever happened to that pissant wanna-be surgeon." Steph and Donna had originally become friends back in college, when Steph as a junior and Donna as a freshman had fallen afoul of the same graduate student Lothario. Steph had plenty of experience coming up with epithets for terrible boyfriends. "Okay, I tell you what we're gonna do."
Donna looked up and wiped her face. "Please tell me it involves drinking the rest of the wine."
"It does indeed involve drinking the rest of the wine!" Steph assured her. "We're gonna drink the wine and we're gonna rewind the movie back because we missed the part where Westley and Inigo fight, and we're gonna watch that. We're going to eat chocolate until we're ready to throw up, and curse men, and possibly fall asleep right on this couch."
"That's a good plan," Donna agreed with a nod and a sip of her wine.
"And then in the morning," Steph continued unabated, "I'm going to call my dad and borrow his Camry and we're going to take you back to New Hampshire."
"What?" Donna asked, setting down her glass.
"You sold your car and totaled your folks' extra car, right?" Steph pointed out. "You're gonna need a ride. My car's a piece of crap, so we'll need something that's up for interstate travel."
"You can't- I can't go back to New Hampshire!" Donna sputtered.
"Why not?" Steph demanded. "Do you really want to stay here? Get another job on campus, knock around with the undergrads and try to pretend like Rick never existed?" She hitched both legs up onto the couch so she could face Donna fully. "You said you were happy there. You said you were good at it. You really want to let him take that away from you?"
"No," Donna admitted, "but I can't go back there. When I started with the campaign, I just walked in the door and started organizing the messiest office I saw, and it turned out to be Josh's. When he showed up and asked what I was doing, I told him I was his assistant, and that's what he let me be. He took a chance on me that no sane person should've taken, and I bailed on him to try and make it work with Rick. I can't show my face there again. What if he wouldn't take me back?"
"Does sound embarrassing," Steph agreed.
"Really embarrassing," Donna assured her.
"You'd have to be crazy to go back."
"Yeah." Now Donna just looked despondent.
"Only somebody who really believed in a candidate and who loved what they were doing would even try," Steph pressed.
Donna gave her a narrow-eyed look. "I sense you're going somewhere with this."
Steph grinned at her. "It would take somebody brave enough to chuck it all and drive halfway across the country to do volunteer work in the first place. Anyway, what's the worst that could happen? You and I take a four day road trip, stop in Chicago on the way back and go to the top of the Sears Tower."
That got a laugh from Donna. "I haven't done that since I was twelve. But even if I go, I can't ask you to drive all that way, or ask your dad for his car. You have classes."
"You're not asking, I'm offering," Steph pointed out. "I just finished my independent study project for this term, I was already planning on taking a week off to unclog my brain. Look, Hoynes is slime and Wiley's a lightweight, and god only knows who they're going to be putting up on the Republican side, right? You say Bartlet's the real deal, and that means it's like my civic duty to do something to help him get elected. So I'm gonna give him you."
"Now that's some grad school level political thinking," Donna snarked, but she was smiling again. "Do you think you can get the car?"
"Sure, my dad's a soft touch and he likes you. It's a done deal." Steph gave Donna another quick hug, then sat back with the remote control. "But there's an order to all of this. Movie and wine, then get the car, then we grab all your stuff while Asshole Rick's at work, then we hit the road. We'll be in New Hampshire by Friday morning. If you want to go back."
"I want to go back," Donna said, quietly but firmly as she picked up her wine. "Even if he- if they won't take me back, I want to try. You're a good friend, Steph."
"I'm the best," Steph agreed cheerfully, clinking her glass against Donna's. "To fresh starts." It was the toast they always used after a breakup or a bad grade or a terrible day at work or any other setback that required drinks. It was multifunctional.
"To fresh starts."