We Interrupt This Mets Game Chapter III

NSF Thurmont (Camp David)

Monday, June 7, 2004

10:14 am

Josh absent-mindedly tapped his pen against the table and pretended to listen to Chairman Farad's meaningless attempts at condolences. Too little, too late, he thought bitterly. Your damn apology's not gonna bring Donna back to the way she was before.

He was getting frequent updates from Mrs. Moss and Colonel Leahy, but it wasn't enough. He wanted to be there with her. He wanted to see for himself. As Deputy Chief of Staff to the President of the United States, Joshua Lyman forced himself to pay attention to the peace talks. Why are we wasting our time? He wanted to ask. Let's just bomb the hell out of them and be done with it. His better judgment told him to keep that idea to himself.

Josh listened and allowed the other occupants of the West Wing to guide the talks. When they finally broke for lunch, he walked into the woods to make a long-distance phone call. He saw Toby standing outside the cabin.

"Hey, Toby," he acknowledged the Communications Director.

Toby Ziegler nodded a curt greeting and walked the other way.

He dialed the number and asked to be connected to the ICU. Finally, he was patched through to Sabrina Moss.

"How is she?" he asked Donna's mother.

"She had some juice earlier," Mrs. Moss said. "And she knocked over a cup of pears."

"Yeah, Donna hates pears." She's off the intravenous feeding. Good. "Did the doctors say anything new?"

"We're flying her home on Sunday," she told him. "Dr. Leahy says I should put her in a rehab center."

"In Wisconsin?"

"I'm looking for one in Washington. Don't be so shocked," she added, after hearing Josh's sharp intake of breath. "She has – had – her life there. The doctors say the less change the better. I know I'm overstepping my bounds here, but – could you help me find a decent place near you?"

"Sure," Josh said. "Are you going to stay in D.C.?" Sabrina Moss's silence gave him all the answer he needed. "I have to go," he said hurriedly. "The president needs to see me." It's a lie, but it works as well as any.

After hanging up with Donna's mother, he walked to the cafeteria and grabbed a seat next to CJ and across from Will, Toby, and Kate.

"They're not going to agree," Will was saying. "There are too many years of animosity."

"If the peace plan works ---" Kate started.

Josh mixed up the mashed potatoes on his plate. "It's not going to," he grumbled. "Let them just kill each other, for all I care."

"Joshua," CJ warned. Her voice was full of the no-nonsense Press Secretary. Her eyes, however, were filled with pity. Josh Lyman did not want anybody's pity.

"How's Donna?" Will asked.

"Have you heard anything new?" CJ inquired.

"She and her mom are flying back to Washington on Sunday," Josh told them. "She doesn't need a feeding tube," he added.

"She can swallow on her own." Kate stated the obvious.

Josh nodded and concentrated on getting through the meal. He wasn't sure he could handle talking about Donna at the moment without breaking down. Thankfully, CJ started sharing hilarious anecdotes from the pressroom.

"Welcome home, Josh."

He realized who had addressed him and immediately stood up, as protocol dictated.

President Bartlet motioned everyone to have a seat. Josh happily obliged.

"Take a walk with me," President Bartlet ordered his Deputy Chief of Staff.

"I understand you would rather be with Donna right now," the president said once the two men were alone. "But we couldn't have the peace talks without you."

"Yes, sir," Josh responded.

"If there's anything you need, you let me know," President Bartlet assured him. "I've said the same to Donna's parents."

"Thank you, sir."

He returned to the table in the midst of conversations about the (in his mind non-existent) peace plans and Kate Harper's bad date the week before. As Josh forced himself to swallow a piece of apple pie, he was mentally alerted to the fact that since he approached the table, Toby Ziegler had not said one word to him.


Donna squinted at the flashcard the nice man with the curly hair held in front of her. "M'ow?" she guessed.

"No, Donna, not what sound it makes. Tell me its name."

"Ja."

The nice man with the curly hair smirked. "No, that's my name. Cat. Can you say cat, Donna?"

"Kuh." She didn't want to say what Josh said. The bird outside the window was much cooler. The man in the white coat made her look at pictures, too. She stared at it until someone turned her chair around; then she shrieked.

Josh was looking right in her eyes. "C – ah – t." She laughed; he looked so funny.

"Kuh."

Her friend pointed to the picture. "Ca-ah-t," he repeated.

"K't."

"That's good. Wanna try again?"

"K't."

He placed the card on the table and picked up another one. "What's this?" he asked.

She remembered riding one when she was a kid. Could picture her favorite one, even. The name of the animal was there, but she couldn't reach for it. "A neh."

"Horse. Say horse."

"Neh!" She yelled. She didn't want to play this game anymore. Why was the nice man with curly hair making her play this game? He was not being a very nice man right now.


Tristen Baldridge Rehabilitation Center

Room 683 – Donnatella Moss

Monday, July 19, 2004

4:51 pm

Josh snapped his cell phone shut and walked through the courtyard behind the Tristen Baldridge Rehabilitation Center. Every day for the past month-and-a-half, the hours of 4 to 6 pm were blocked out on his schedule. Instead of wrestling with wayward members of Congress and pulling votes out of thin air, he was supporting Sabrina Moss as they learned how to feed, dress, bathe, and change the diapers of a thirty-year-old woman. His visits only served to maximize the Joshua Lyman guilt complex. He had sent his assistant to a war zone to shut her up, and it had worked - the woman who'd been his lifeline for the past six years now had the mental functioning of a three-year-old child. The person in room 683 was Donna at first glance. She had Donna's long blond hair, alabaster skin, beautiful smile, and the ability to wrap the cocky DCOS around her finger. But that's where the similarities ended.

Mrs. Moss was in Wisconsin, so today, CJ had accompanied him. She was keeping Donna company while he tracked down a wishy-washy senator. He hated leaving Donna – whenever he left the room, she became hysterical. They said she had no concept of time, couldn't keep track of something as important as a schedule. But she knew Josh always visited her after she saw the speech therapist. On the one afternoon he found himself stuck in a meeting, he later learned she had acted very ornery until he showed up. Unfortunately, Senator Davis was going on a two-week vacation; the White House needed her vote, and they couldn't wait for her to return to Washington.

He heard her voice before he even entered the hallway. Donna was sitting in her wheelchair, arms gesticulating wildly. "Onju!" She screamed. "Onju!"

"Donna, I don't know what 'onju' is," CJ said.

"Ahwan onju!"

Josh rested against the threshold of the doorway for a minute before making his presence known. "She wants orange juice," he explained to the White House Press Secretary. "'Onju' is Donna-speak for orange juice."

"You want orange juice?" CJ asked the other woman. She smacked the side of her head. "So that's what you want?"

Donna didn't respond. By now, her focus was on the man who had just entered the room. "Ja!" she squealed. "Ja!"

Josh brushed her hair off her face and kissed her on the forehead. "Were you good for CJ?" She shrugged, the impish Donna-grin tugging on the corners of her mouth. He turned to his other friend. "Was she ok?"

"We practiced our colors and I fed her some applesauce," CJ informed him. "She's been carrying on about 'onju' for the past ten minutes. Were you able to reach Davis?"

"Said she'll 'think about it,'" he replied over guttural sounds coming from his assistant. "I offered her the President's support on a grazing tax."

"And she still didn't accept?"

"I'm not gonna grovel. She wants us to grovel – Lymans do not grovel to anyone." The noises had stopped. He turned towards Donna and noticed her eyes were rolled toward the back of her head, which was lolled to one side. He grabbed a towel and wiped drool off her chin. "Go get a nurse!"

"What's happening?" She inquired.

"She's gonna have a seizure."

CJ did as Josh instructed and grabbed a nurse from the hall. Sure enough, Donna was having convulsions. As soon as the nurse injected something into her arm, the convulsions stopped. Josh ran his fingers through her hair and whispered soothing words of comfort.

"She'll be unconscious for awhile," the nurse explained.

"How often does that happen?" CJ asked.

Josh pulled a blanket from the bed and covered the sleeping woman in the wheelchair. "Without the medication? Could have twenty in one day. Now, it's maybe nine. Six or seven if we're lucky."

CJ shook her head in half-amazement, half-horror. "I don't know how you do it," she whispered, obviously thinking of her inability to take care of her Alzheimer's-inflicted father.

Josh sighed and attempted a smile. "I guess that makes two of us then."