So you know those chapters that start off in one place and then end up 300 miles away by the time you're done? That's what this chapter was. I would also like to not that the vast majority of this was written between 2 and 5:30 this morning because I am a disaster of a human, so if anything in this chapter doesn't make sense, that's why. So, yknow...hope y'all enjoy it.

2009

"Josh, can I talk to you a minute?"

Josh glanced up from his computer to where Sam was standing in the doorway to his office. He gestured for him to enter, but to wait a minute. Sam sat down across from him as Josh finished typing an email to the DNC chair. It was crazy just how quickly four years—he supposed it was still only three years at this point, but still—had flown by. It seemed like just yesterday he had been sleeping four hours a night in run-down motel rooms with Congressman Matt Santos, and already it was time to start talking campaign again.

"What's up man?" Josh addressed his friend as he hit send.

"I think…I think I could be doing more."

"More as in…?"

"Mitchell's Senate seat," Sam got straight to the point.

"You want to challenge a sitting Senator from your own party?" Josh asked in disbelief.

"He's not running," Sam responded. "He hasn't announced yet, but he will soon, and he said I should try to run for it. I know there's no shortage of good Democratic candidates in California, and the odds of me even getting the nomination aren't exactly great, but I think I should at least try, you know? And if it turns out to be a bust, I drop out and come back, no big deal."

"And you'll actually come back this time? This isn't just a clever ruse to go back to the private sector without actually leaving for the private sector?" Josh teased, but only partially teasing. Even years later, he still remembered the phone call, only a few days after Sam had lost in the 47th, where Sam had told him that he wasn't coming back. That he had decided when he left that it would be for good.

"Josh, no!" Sam exclaimed. "God, no. This is different, I promise. I'm in too deep, this is my life now, and I'm done pretending otherwise. I swear: I lose in California, I come straight back. But only if you and the President agree. You know I'd never do something like this without your blessing."

"Sounds like you've been thinking about this," Josh observed.

"I have. Even before Mitchell called I knew I wanted to do something like this someday, and this just seemed like the perfect opening. So, what do you think?"

"I think," Josh said slowly. "That California would be seriously lucky to have you representing them."

"Is that a yes?" Sam asked hopefully, and Josh had to smile at his earnestness.

"That's absolutely a yes," Josh replied. "This is an awesome opportunity for you Sam, you gotta do what you gotta do. I can talk to the President if you want, or if you want to tell him, I can be there when you do?"

"I'll ask him," Sam responded.

"He won't try to stop you," Josh assured him. "I'm serious, he'll love the idea. Will probably end up spending half his own campaign in California just so he can campaign for you."

"Oh, I wouldn't ask him to do that," Sam argued.

"Sam, seriously," Josh stopped him. "I can't think of anyone I'd rather have sitting in that seat. We're here for you every step of the way."

"Thanks," Sam said, suddenly serious. "I mean it Josh. Thank you for everything. I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for you, and I definitely wouldn't be any good at this if it wasn't for you."

"Nah," Josh waved him off. "You're a natural politician. You could only deny your inherent gift for so long, I just, I dunno, gave you the push, or whatever. Go talk to Ronna, I think the President should have a free minute soon."

"Thanks Josh," Sam stood up to leave.

"Sam?" Josh stopped him at the door.

"Yeah?"

"I'm proud of you."

Sam gave him a smile which Josh returned, as the other man closed the door behind him.

2017

The last week had been crazy in a way Josh hadn't experienced in almost seven years.

He and Sam had driven up to New Hampshire first thing the next morning, and had paid another surprise visit to the Bartlets on the way back just because they could, and because Josh thought Sam could benefit from some last-minute words of advice from their mentor before embarking on this herculean mission, and because honestly he'd rather let Abbey feed him than stop at McDonalds or something.

They went straight to the airport when they got back to Connecticut to fly out to California for Sam's official announcement, then back to the east coast to scout their initial home base in Manchester, then down to DC because Sam still had a day job and Josh needed to start putting together a staff.

Donna was back in DC, too, and Josh had been worried at first about getting someone to watch the kids, but apparently talking to his friends behind his back was his wife's new favorite activity, because apparently Zoey had come up from DC the other day to babysit. Josh had protested that it wasn't fair to ask Zoey to drop everything to take care of their kids for them, but Donna had brushed him off.

"You've committed to this now, so we're going to make it work whether you like it or not. Sam would kill me if I let you back out over something as silly as a babysitter."

Josh had to admit she had a point, as she usually does. The kids loved Zoey and she loved them, so he didn't imagine it would be a real hardship for any of them to spend some time together. Besides, he had known when he agreed to go to New Hampshire with Sam exactly what he was committing to. This was hardly his first campaign, and he was prepared to spend much of the next year or so away from home. Granted, last time he hadn't had much of a home to go back to even if he had wanted to. Just another way in which his life had changed drastically in the last ten years.

It was almost overwhelming, all the things to think about, that he was unused to thinking about. Sam had given him a list of suggested people to reach out to to supplement his existing staff in DC. Most were names that Josh recognized from various points in his twelve years in the White House, which didn't surprise him all that much. Sam valued loyalty, so of course he would have stayed in touch with everyone he had ever worked with. There must have been almost a hundred names on the list, and while Josh couldn't imagine needing anywhere close to that many people during the primaries, he knew without even looking at the list what his first order of business would be.

"Hello?"

"Hey man, you at your office?"

"Yeah. I heard you were in town, come on by."

Charlie had surprised everyone when he went into the private sector after graduating law school. He claimed he had always planned to go back into politics someday, but there was more money in consulting at the moment, and Charlie really wanted to know what it felt like to live comfortably for once. With the Democratic Party floundering, no one could blame him for wanting to stay away for a while.

Josh checked in at the front desk where he was given a visitor's pass for the day. Charlie had apparently already called down to let them know he was coming; either the kid worked fast, or he could add Charlie to the list of co-conspirators on Donna and Sam's mission to get him out of the house. Yes, he was aware he was probably being paranoid, but he felt he had a right. It didn't matter that he was now willing to go along with their plan.

"Josh!" Charlie greeted, once Josh had located his office on the north side of the building.

"Look at you, big man with a fancy office," Josh motioned to their surroundings as the two men shook hands.

"It's no Oval Office, but it's not bad," Charlie acknowledged.

"Speaking of…" Josh began.

"You're gonna ask me to quit, aren't you?" Charlie interrupted.

"No!" Josh lied.

"Josh, I know why you're here, my wife is in Connecticut right now babysitting your kids, you think we don't talk before she leaves the state?"

"Alright, you got me," Josh caved. "I'm gonna need some serious help, if I'm going to do this, which apparently I am. I know it's a lot to ask, and I understand if you can't do it, but I could really use you. Any position you want, just please at least think about it?"

"Josh, relax," Charlie stopped him. "I sent in my two weeks' notice as soon as Donna called Zoey. Sam's been talking about this forever. No way was I going to sit this one out."

Josh was caught off guard by Charlie's response, but now wasn't the time to dwell on the apparent extent of this conspiracy from which he had been kept in the dark for an unidentifiable length of time—and rest assured, he would dwell on it at some point—because his entire framework for this conversation now had to be reworked on the fly to account for Charlie's unanticipated enthusiasm.

"You…really?" was the intelligent response Josh finally formed.

"What? Did you expect me to be a tough sell?"

"I mean, kind of, yeah," Josh admitted.

"Josh, unlike you, I haven't spent the last ten years pretending that this isn't what I do for a living. I was just biding my time," Charlie said with a smile. "And any position I want? That offer still good?"

"Um, yeah, yeah, sure, whatever you want," Josh stuttered.

"Deputy."

"Deputy?"

"To you," Charlie clarified. "I want to learn from you the way you learned from Leo."

"You want…Charlie, you're a lawyer."

"So? You are too, technically."

"Charlie—"

"If you need me on legal—"

"It's not that, Charlie. Don't you want to be on legal? Or, actually, run legal? You're more than qualified, you'd be good at it, and what's more you wouldn't have to be away from home nearly as often," Josh listed.

"All excellent points," Charlie conceded. "Except that I don't want to run legal, and I don't want to stay home. I know I'm a bit out of practice at all this, which is why I want to work under you. I want to learn from the best, and anyone in the city you ask would say that's you."

"Okay, first of all, no one in this city right now would say I'm the best in the business given that I'm, you know, not really in the business," Josh countered. "But that's an argument for another day. Charlie, are you sure? Because I'd love to have you as my second, but you gotta know that if you're in this, you're in. Long days on the road, long days working, twenty hour days…"

"Josh, I worked in the White House for eight years," Charlie reminded him.

"And I've been told I'm not the most pleasant person to work for," Josh added. "I'm not like Leo, much as I wish I was. I don't keep my cool, I get tunnel-visioned and I take it out on my staff, and most of the time that'll be you. You're going to be away from home, from Zoey, for most of the next year."

"Just like you're going to be away from Donna."

"Which is why I'm not going to be an easy person to be around. It's—I just want you to know what you're committing to before you give up your entire life for what might end up being career suicide."

"It's not going to be career suicide," Charlie said firmly. "For any of us. And I know exactly what I'm committing to, that's why I'm committing to it. Josh, you're going to need someone to keep your head on straight. Donna's gonna be in DC, Sam's gonna have his own problems, and anyone who doesn't know you is gonna be too scared of you to tell you when you're being ridiculous. Which, I gotta tell you, a lot of this conversation falls close to that line. Answer me this: everything else aside, do you want me as your deputy?"

"Yes," Josh didn't even need to think about it.

"Then I'm your guy," Charlie responded. "We'll figure out the rest as we go."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," Charlie confirmed. "And with any luck, I'll be able to take some stuff off your plate, like you did for Leo all those years."

"Don't compare me to Leo, Charlie," Josh found himself pleading. "I'm not him, I'll never be him, and to indicate anything else is disrespectful to his legacy. So stop that. I'm not him."

"No, you're not," Charlie acknowledged. "But you're damn good at what you do and you need to realize that. You haven't been around in a while, you don't know what people around here are saying."

"Charlie—"

"No, Josh," Charlie interrupted. "Sam didn't ask you for nostalgia's sake. Donna doesn't think you should do it just because she loves you. And I don't want to work for you for fun. It's because you're the best, and everyone knows it. Russell wanted you, even asked Donna if she could talk you into coming out of retirement."

"Okay, does my wife talk to, like, everyone but me?"

"And if I'm not mistaken, Congressman Tyler wanted to contact you too, after what you did for the last junior Congressman running for President," Charlie continued as if Josh hadn't spoken. "So stop with the whole 'I'm a political has-been' attitude, because it's just not true, and you are the only person in the country who believes it. Now we're going to go out there, and we're going to take back the White House, and yeah, people are probably going to keep comparing you to Leo, because you're the only person in this party in the same league as him. Now," Charlie stood up and Josh did the same. "Consider this your first lecture of the campaign. You'll be getting many of them, as per Donna's orders."

"I really wish she'd stop doing that," Josh grumbled.

"Yeah, well, you'll get over it," Charlie shrugged. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a lunch. Let me know when you need me, boss." And with that, Charlie left Josh to find his own way out of the office, and Josh couldn't help but feel pride at how far the kid had come. This Charlie was a far cry from the one Josh had met almost twenty years ago now, who had been too nervous to call anyone on the staff by their first name for his first month on the job.

Josh had no doubt that Charlie would make an excellent deputy, if for no other reason than he wouldn't hesitate to, as he had put it, let Josh know when he was being ridiculous.

He made his way back to the street level and turned his badge in at the building's reception before stepping outside. He glanced at his phone to see if he had any messages, or, any messages he wanted to respond to. He unlocked it using his four-digit passcode (hell would freeze over before he registered his thumbprint into his iPhone…Donna accused him of being unreasonable but he wasn't entirely convinced that these phones weren't going to stage some sort of revolution on mankind, and until he was sure he wasn't giving them access to any more information than strictly necessary. Donna would be sorry when he was the only one who survived the technology-led apocalypse) and hit the most recent number on his call list.

"Hey stranger."

"Very funny," Josh rolled his eyes. "Where are you?"

"Waiting on the front steps with two sandwiches," came his wife's reply. "I take it you talked to Charlie?"

"Yes, and just so you know, we will be discussing this whole 'conspiring against me' thing at length at some point in the future," Josh told her as seriously as he could as he headed back in the direction of the Capitol.

"If you say so," Josh could practically hear her rolling her eyes.

"Donna," Josh whined.

"Josh," she mocked back.

"You know what, I'm hanging up on you until I get there," Josh huffed. "Because you're being mean, and I don't have to put up with it."

"Good for you" Donna patronized, and Josh really should be more annoyed than he was. Unfortunately, he found himself more endeared by his wife's antics than anything. Damn her.

"I'm actually like two blocks away right now so if you can bear to part with me for the next five minutes I actually am going to hang up the phone."

"I'm not the needy one in this relationship," she reminded him, though he knew she was only teasing.

"See you in a minute," he signed off before locking his phone again and picking up his pace. Sure they talked on the phone multiple times a day, but that was nothing like getting to see her in person, which was something he hadn't had the pleasure of for almost four days now. Hardly the longest they had been apart, but still. Given the choice, Josh would always rather see her in person.

Finally, Josh turned a corner and the Capitol building came into view, and just a minute later he had his wife in his arms. They usually weren't big on PDA, especially in DC, but Donna usually stayed with Andy while she was down here and Josh was staying with Sam for the week, so it wasn't like they had anywhere else to go.

"Hey," she whispered softly, tightening her arms around his neck, the bag with their lunch almost forgotten at their feet.

"Hey yourself," Josh responded, closing his eyes and breathing her in. "I missed you."

"I missed you too," Donna echoed.

"I miss my babies," Josh added quietly.

"Oh, honey, they miss you too," Donna said, stepping back and resting her hands on the tops of his arms. "But they were very excited when Zoey got in last night, so I'm sure they'll be fine this week."

"It's not this week I'm worried about," Josh reminded her. "Are you sure this is a good idea?"

"So you talked to Charlie?" Donna changed the subject, bending down to pick up the paper bag that contained the sandwiches.

Josh sighed. "I did."

"And?"

"And I think you know exactly how the conversation went, because apparently this whole this is some premeditated conspiracy that I'm the last to be let in on."

"Want to go eat in my office?" Donna suggested.

"Yeah."

Donna took his hand and led him back in the direction of her building.

"There was no conspiracy, Josh," she said as they walked. "We all live in the same city, we're not total strangers, and of course your name comes up. Everyone adores you."

"Not true," Josh argued, though he didn't expect her to respond to his contradiction.

"You're right, this has been something Sam's been kicking around for a while, and no, I wasn't the only one he told," she continued. "Charlie and Zoey, Annabeth, really anyone who will listen. And everyone has always said the same thing: that he needed to get you to run his campaign."

"You didn't tell me that Russell talked to you," Josh said, though it came out more like an accusation than he had intended.

"A lot of people talk to me," Donna responded cautiously.

"Donna," Josh warned. "Bob Russell isn't 'a lot of people'."

"You're right."

"Donna."

"What do you want me to say, Josh?" Donna asked. She led them past her secretary's desk and closed the door behind them. "Bob Russell stopped by a few months ago. He said he wanted to make one more run. I told him I already had a job, he asked about you, I said you weren't interested, and that was that. Were you interested?"

"Of course not!"

"Then I'm not sure what part of that exchange bothers you," she said simply, pulling the sandwiches out of the bag and setting them on her desk, along with more paper napkins than any two people would ever need, before carefully folding the bag and adding it to her growing pile of paper bags. She claimed they came in handy if she ever needed to take stuff to Andy's, but Josh wondered if his wife wasn't becoming a hoarder—not that he would ever suggest such a thing to her.

"Just—it was—" Josh struggled. "I don't know Donna, but you should have told me anyways. Just because I'm not here doesn't mean I don't have a right to know what people are saying about me."

"You could always google yourself," Donna suggested with a smirk.

"Or my wife could stop getting this strange satisfaction from controlling my life and tell me when politicians talk about me," Josh responded.

"Honey, if I told you every time your name came up in a conversation with a politician, we'd never talk about anything else."

That gave Josh pause as he sat down next to her on the couch. "Wait, really?"

"Mhm," Donna responded absently, unwrapping her sandwich and taking a bite.

"Seriously?"

"Josh," Donna huffed.

"I'm not being unreasonable here, Donna," Josh defended.

"People talk about you a lot down here, okay?" Donna said. "You're a bit of a legend, but not in the way you think. They all still talk about your victory with Santos as some kind of miracle—which it was, by the way, you're allowed to be proud of that regardless of what happened in 2010—and the talk of the town for the past year or so has been who you were going to pick to run in 2018. No one thought you would sit out as long as you did; every election cycle, inevitably it'll come back to 'who's gonna be the guy to bring Josh Lyman out of retirement'. You can ask Sam, he gets the questions too, probably just as much as I do. When you guys announced over the weekend, no on was surprised. In fact, I think people would have been more surprised if Sam had announced without you by his side. You're not some political has-been, honey. You're still one of the greatest minds in the party."

"Which isn't saying much lately, I've gathered," Josh laughed mirthlessly. "You know, that's almost exactly what Charlie said."

"Well, Charlie's right," Donna responded. "I'm not just blowing smoke up your ass when I tell you that you can do this, and neither is Sam. You may not know all the players right now, but you know the game better than anyone."

"It's a stupid game," Josh mumbled.

"You're a stupid game," Donna teased back.

"Very mature," Josh huffed.

"Hey," Donna took his hand and waited for him to look her in the eye. "It's just me here," she reminded him. "You can't tell me you're not at least a little excited for this?"

"Of course I am," Josh admitted. "Hell, I've probably been dreaming of this day longer than anyone. This…it's in my blood. It makes me crazy, and sometimes I hate the person I turn into when I let it take over me, but—"

"It's what you were born to do," Donna finished for him softly.

"Yeah," he sighed. "It's like…I have no control over it. And I hate that. I loved being at home, you know? It was so much more…"

"Safe," Donna said. "It was safe. And you weren't used to that. You latched onto that. But you're not wired for safe, not forever. This city, this job, it's as much a part of you as it's a part of me. It's a part of us, you know? We wouldn't be here if either of us was the kind of person to seek safety."

"Safety isn't a bad thing," Josh reminded her.

"No, but that doesn't mean its always the best thing."

"We have two kids at home!" Josh protested. "I wanted…I don't know, I wanted to give them stability. Leo got divorced after he went to work for Bartlet. Liz and Ellie and Zoey, they grew up around this stuff and you saw how it affected them."

"They turned out alright."

"It wasn't easy though," Josh warned.

"So we're not going to be a typical family," Donna shrugged. "There's nothing wring with that, is there? We love our kids, right? That's what matters. They might not get to grown up with a white picket fence and a mother who cooks dinner every night and a father who reads the paper on Saturday mornings. They might have to change schools, they might have to move around, they might not get to see us every day, but Josh, when they see you standing up there next to Uncle Sammy while he's taking the oath of office, they're going to understand everything. And they're going to be so proud. Liz and Ellie and Zoey turned out fine, and our kids will too. We'll make sure of it, won't we?"

"Of course we will," Josh answered.

"You have nothing to worry about," Donna assured him. "You're an amazing father, and no matter how much time you need to spend away from home this next year, they know you love them. You have nothing to worry about."

"I hope you're right."

"I'm always right," Donna reminded him as they finished their sandwiches, and Josh couldn't quite disagree with her on that. The woman was really very freakish sometimes.

"Yes dear," he placated, as Donna balled up their trash and checked the time on her phone.

"Shut up," she smiled fondly at him, and it was such a wonderful sight that Josh had no choice but to kiss her. "You know I love you, right?" she asked, suddenly serious.

"Of course," Josh responded. "What are you—"

"I feel like I don't say it enough sometimes," Donna admitted. "But I love you, and I'm so proud of you for everything you've done in your life, up to and including raising our kids for the first six years of their lives. And I know you're nervous about going back into politics, but I just want you to know that no matter what happens, I am on your side every step of the way, okay? It's always gonna be you and me."

"Damn straight it is," Josh smiled down at her, leaning in to kiss her again. "How long until you have somewhere to be?"

"About ten minutes," Donna answered. "Want to just sit here for a bit? I miss being close to you."

"That sounds like absolute heaven, baby," Josh agreed. Donna rested her head on his shoulder and wrapped an arm across his torso. Josh tightened his arm around her shoulders while his other hand stroked a smooth path up and down her side. It was the most at-peace Josh could remember feeling in ages.

He never wanted that moment to end, just the two of them sitting together in her office. In here, they weren't a congresswoman and campaign manager, they were Chiefs of Staff to the President and First Lady, they weren't the parents of two overly-rambunctious first graders; they were just Josh and Donna. Moments like this, Josh thought, made everything worth it, because at the end of the day, Donna was right: politics were a part of who they were, both individually and as a couple; it was stitched into the fabric of their relationship, and it was inevitable that they would end up back here someday. But as long as they ended up here together, Josh couldn't see it ending badly.

He knew he had a long way to go, but just that morning the staff of Seaborn for President (he would let a communications expert deal with the campaign slogan) had doubled from one person to two, and that was a start. And tomorrow maybe it would grow to four, maybe it would grow to ten. In his relaxed state, the wheels in his brain began to churn, outlining an agenda for the next forty-eight hours, cutting down Sam's list of people to the bare necessity, distributing their early funds to each of the three current offices, and Josh realized that he was doing it again. Right there, sitting on the couch in his wife's office on Capitol Hill, he was turning back into a campaign manager.

Just like riding a bike, he thought with a smile.

There was a point where I thought this chapter would be like 1500 words max...I really should know better by now. Let me know what you thought of all this by leaving a review or dropping me a PM! As always, suggestions as well as feedback are much appreciated! And with that, I'm going to go to sleep because it's almost 5:30am and I don't even know what I'm talking about anymore.