"Man, it feels good to sit down!" Helen exclaims falling into a wingback chair and kicking off her heels.

I take the chair across from her, following suit. Another campaign rally, another night in a generic hotel room, another day away from Josh and Lulu. I'm pumped to be out here, in the thick of it. But when I stop and sit down, I'm exhausted. Why did I schedule Helen to do this event so quickly after all of our Easter activities at the White House?

We sit in silence for a moment before she sits up a little and looks at me long and hard for a full minute.

"How are you doing?"

"I'm fine." I respond breezily.

"Donna . . ." she drawls my name in a low warning. "How are you doing?"

I let out an exasperated sigh. The work day is over. We are technically off the clock. But Helen's tone makes it clear that even if she's asking as my friend, and not my boss, she's still not going to let me off the hook.

"You know. It's been quite a month."

"Yes, and you've kept a pretty tight lid on it, but it's time to let it go." She opens a bottle of wine and pours us each a glass. "So, one more time. . . How are you doing?"

"I'm hanging in there. But there are moments . . ." I trail off with a shrug taking a long drink. Helen's my friend, but she's also my boss. And we just finished an event, and we're still wearing our suits. This doesn't really feel like the time to get into my personal life.

"Donna, the day is over. We've slayed another dragon. Can't you just let go for a minute? I care about you."

It's the look on her face that finally gets me to open up. Concerned, hopeful. Maybe little hurt that I'm holding back. We've had a few late night conversations over the years, but it's mostly been her sharing with me. I don't want her to think it's a one way street and that I'm just pretending to be her friend because she's my boss and she needs one, but opening up is hard for me. I take another drink, then dive in.

"Easter with my parents was particularly awful this year. All the progress Josh has made with them over the last three years just went up in smoke. And watching him just take it from them. It makes me . . ." I feel my lip wobble a bit and my eyes are filling with tears, so I stop and take a deep breath to steady myself.

"They actually think he cheated on you?" Helen asks in confusion. "How is that even possible?"

Matt and Helen's steadfast support has been incredible. They've made it abundantly clear that there is not one single solitary doubt in their mind about Josh's faithfulness. The only problem is that it made going home and seeing the accusing glares from my family all the more painful.

At my little shrug, Helen rails on. "Don't they see how he looks at you? How completely devoted he is to you and Lulu?"

"No. Actually, they don't see it. We only see them about three times a year. We usually visit them at Easter and Christmas, and since Lulu was born they come here sometimes in the summer. Our visits tend to be really short. Just a couple days at a time. I think they just think Josh is being on his best behavior when they are around."

I pause for a moment, not sure I want to share what my mother said. It's so awful. But I guess that's what friends are for.

"You know my mom just assumed we eloped because I was pregnant, right? She figured the only way that Josh would marry me is if I trapped him. And even though Lulu was born a year after we got married, I guess that's the skuttlebut at her salon. That I tricked him into marriage and it's no wonder he's roaming elsewhere."

"That is the stupidest thing I've ever heard." Helen declares.

"Yeah, it really is." A short bark of a laugh escapes me. "I mean, Amy's older than I am. Whoever heard of a politician leaving his young, blonde wife for an older woman?"

"Donna . . ." Helen moves closer to me. "You aren't having doubts about Josh. Right?"

"NO!" I cry out. "God, no. I'm so sick of being asked that. Except at least you put it that way. My sister acts like I'm crazy for not assuming the worst. She came right out and asked me why I was so sure he wouldn't go back to Amy, given that he'd had such a long relationship with her. She kept pointing out that I'd had a huge crush on my boss all that time he was with Amy, and that our marriage had been so sudden, and that Josh was probably still in shock from the election and Leo's death. She said it was obviously an impulse decision. And it's not uncommon for people to regret impulse decisions."

"Oh honey," Helen coos, "she doesn't know Josh at all. The man loves you with his whole heart. He couldn't be any more happy about being married to you. He's like a completely different man now. I mean, granted, I didn't know him THAT well before, but the guy I met on the campaign- well, yeah, I probably would have assumed the worst about him. But the Josh Lyman I've come to know and love, there is no way he'd ever cheat on you. I'm almost more sure of that than I am of Matt!"

"Whoa! Hold on Helen. What are you saying?" Her comment pulls me out of my own troubles for a minute. This is an election year, we can't have Helen saying anything that would give people any room to question the President's family values.

"He was military. That's a lot of time apart. And then he was back and forth to DC for 6 years. There were rumors. We had to work things out." Helen admits, matter of factly.

"Mrs. Santos," I choose my words carefully, including using her title so she knows this is a work question, "Is there something we need to be aware of?"

Her eyes flash angrily. And I legitimately feel bad. I really do understand how painful it is to have someone accuse your husband. And she's probably also upset that I'm turning our girl talk into work talk. But it's the nature of the beast. I can't just turn off the fact that damage control is my job.

"No." She bites out. "Josh DID opposition research on Matt. If he'd had an affair, Josh would have known. They were just rumors."

"Sophia?" I ask gently, thinking of their sweet niece. I heard about that after the campaign.

"We managed to keep that one pretty quiet. Although in hindsight we got lucky to some extent. Local people knew that she was Jorge's so it got no traction in the Houston press. If Matt had run for Senate instead of Congress it might have been a bigger deal."

"I'm surprised Will didn't use it." I tell her honestly.

"Did he know?"

"I don't think so. I hate to say this but you were polling low enough, that it just wasn't a priority. They thought Matt was in the race just to shake things up a bit. Russell really thought that as the sitting VP he had a lock on it, and he was much happier spending his money on things with his name on them than on digging up dirt. Plus whenever Bingo Bob went negative it bit us in the ass, so we were trying to steer away from that."

"Vininck found out about it. Did you know that? Before you came on board, I think."

"Really?"

"Yeah, he found Matt's briefcase. There was a checkbook in it that Matt used to make child support payments to Anita."

"Oh my god! And Vinick let that go?"

"Matt told him the truth. He said that at first Arnie didn't believe him, but I guess he must have because he never brought it up."

"Arnie's a class act. He really would have made a good President."

Helen laughs. "Don't let our husbands hear you say that!"

"Just mine." I remind her. "Yours probably agrees. He put him in the cabinet!"

"Yeah, just between you and me, sometimes I think he wishes that he'd actually been able to convince him to take the VP slot. Baker gets on his nerves."

"No, State really is the perfect place for Arnie. They agree on foreign policy. He wouldn't have worked as a VP, that's too political. . . . Now, Carol Gelsey . . . "

"Don't let Amy hear you say her name." Helen suggests.

"No kidding." I mutter. Ugh. Thinking about Amy brings me right back to my current problem.

"Hey, I'm sorry I mentioned her name again." Helen offers apologetically.

"It's okay. It's not Amy that bothers me. Really. It's other people and the way they react. That's what bothers me. It's my family treating Josh differently. It's the added secret service. IT'S MARY FREAKING MARSH TRASHING US ON TV!"

My chest heaves as I shout at the First Lady. Oh my god. I just shouted at the First Lady. But Helen just smirks a little at me.

"There, now. Doesn't that feel better?"

A giant sigh escapes. "You know what? It does feel just a little better."

"Donna, you've been holding it together for everybody. And you're incredible. But it's just you and me and this bottle of wine. It really is okay to let it out. We're friends, right?"

"Yes, we are."

"The secret service is the worst, aren't they?" Helen suggests, slyly.

"You have no idea." I grumble, then when she laughs at me, I realize how stupid that was.

"Oh my god, I'm so stupid. You know exactly what it's like. And this is payback for all the times I've told you that you just have to live with it."

"It's not like you haven't been living with it before now too, Donna. What's different?" Helen asks, honestly curious.

"I don't know exactly. I mean, obviously there are just more of them. Instead of just leaving a car out front to secure the building while we are out they leave agents at the doors 24/7 now. They don't want us to drive ourselves at all anymore. We're back to exclusively online shopping. I hate to say it but I miss the Saturday morning grocery trip. And I don't know, there's just something demoralizing about watching your 2 year old followed by an armed guard at an Easter Egg Hunt!"

"I bet that went over really well with your family?"

"Yeah, no. We'd already had that little situation with Conor's friend at Christmas, and now this. Lulu's agent wanted to stay inside the house the whole time. He said he "needed eyes on the protectee" at all times. He's new. Luckily, Phil was with us and pulled rank on him because he wasn't really listening to me. Then the guy didn't just stand at the edge of the field, he literally followed her around as she picked up eggs. She just moved into the parent free zone. She was the only one with an adult chasing her around!"

"Did she get more eggs this year?" Helen teases, trying to lighten things up a bit.

"Not really. The other kids don't seem intimidated. But their parents all gave us the evil eye. Not that I blame them. Who wants men with guns in the middle of a kids' event?"

"Yeah, I hear you. So is this guy going to be part of her regular detail. Was he a local agent or DC based?"

"He's based here. Ron didn't want us to just use local people this time. We had four agents travel with us. Phil, Scott, Jackie, and this new guy, Chip. They handled the day time stuff, and the local people handled the nights. I didn't think he'd be a problem. He went with us to temple when Sylvia was here for Passover and it was fine."

"Was there anything specific Ron was worried about?"

"No. We're still getting those form emails suggesting we give Lulu up for adoption. But there haven't been any specific new threats. Annabeth said that if there is nothing new to spark more stories, it could die down in a month. She said the first week is the tabloid story itself. Then other tabloids run with it the next week. Then the mainstream press feels justified commenting on the reaction because that's newsworthy. Then it goes away."

"Yeah, that's what she told me when the Congressman Cassanova story broke. That was pretty short lived. Once we proved he was with me people lost interest really quick. My underwear lasted a lot longer. Mary Marsh had a field day with that one too. So hopefully her diatribe right before Easter about you and Josh was the end of it."

"Yeah, I hope so. Spending the weekend explaining to my family why she's NOT a credible source of information was exhausting. I swear everyone at their church thinks she's got a direct connection to God. I think they'd just finally gotten over Josh's tax indictment comment to her!"

"When did Josh talk to her?"

"That was 10 years ago! Bartlet's first term. Josh could be kind of a hothead sometimes."

"Campaign Josh."

"Exactly. But he's not like that nearly as often anymore."

"I know."

"And there were some people with cameras at the Easter Egg Hunt in Madison, so you'd think that they'd have gotten plenty of cute family photos right? But do they print those? No."

"I know, Donna, believe me, I know. I mean you don't want them to print anything about your family, really. But on the other hand, you'd like them to say, hey, it's all good. They are great. But that's not going to happen. You know that, right?"

"Yeah, I know."

"So how is Josh's Mom handling it?"

"She's pretty resilient. She came up early for Passover since it overlapped with Easter this year. Sylvia told me that a couple of the old biddies in the retirement community made some comments, but she set them straight. It's not that she didn't like Amy, but she said she always knew it wouldn't last. We used to talk about it, back when Josh was dating her."

"Really? You talked to Josh's Mom about his girlfriend back when he was your boss?"

"Well, yeah. I talked to her every week. She'd call to check up on Josh . . . and me. She never really pushed anything. But she always reminded me that I was the best thing in Josh's life and that she was so glad I was there. I once suggested that maybe she should call Amy and Sylvia just scoffed. She said "No, I'm sure Amy is a perfectly lovely woman, but she won't be around that long, and I'd much rather talk to you Donna."

"That's very sweet."

"She's a very nice lady She's been through a lot in life and she just handles it all with an inner strength and outward kindness. It's amazing."

"It must be great to have that support."

"Yes! So much better than my Mom who, get this, suggested in front of Lulu, that I'd better hurry up and have another baby to save my marriage."

"She didn't!"

"She did! I was so furious. I mean, first off, she's treating Josh like it's true, but then acts like it's somehow my fault or that a baby would be a good idea? It's just crazy. And Lulu is already practically obsessed with the idea of a little brother, and we don't even know if we can have more kids!"

"I'm sorry they're like that."

"Me too. I swear. Every time I think things are getting better something happens that reminds me why I wanted to get the hell out of there."

Helen giggles. "Yeah, I hear you on that one. Mothers can be something else. So, how'd Josh take all of it?"

"He and my Dad disappeared into his office for a while at one point. Later he told me that he'd plead his case to convince my Dad that it was all a lie. And after that Dad stopped giving him dirty looks. We all know that it's best to just let my mother wear herself out on something. But at dinner Dad finally said "Carlotta, that's enough." And that phrase and that tone still works on everyone in the family. After that she stopped saying things in front of my Dad and Josh. For his part, Josh was probably a little quieter than usual. He reverted back to the super politeness that he used on them when we first got married. It was just awkward. And it made me really sad, Josh was really feeling the part of my family, and all my siblings were back to looking at him like he was a stranger."

I pause to take a long drink from my wine goblet that Helen keeps refilling. "What really pisses me off is that we called them as soon as it happened. We told them it was all a lie. They said okay. But obviously, it's not all okay."

"No. It's going to take a while."

"Does it get better?"

"I don't know. My Mom & Matt have an odd relationship. I'm not sure whether or not she believes the rumors. But I decided I don't care. As long as she doesn't say anything bad about him in front of the kids, I just let it go."

"Yeah. I'm there. I just wish it didn't have to be like this."

"Yeah." Helen pauses to refill our glasses again. Then after we're both quiet for a while she asks, "so are you good, or do you need to vent some more?"

I give myself a little mental check and realize that I really do feel better after talking it out with a friend. "I'm good."

"Okay, well good, because, here we are, we've still got a lot of wine, and I bet you have more stories to tell me about the Bartlet Administration."

"Did I tell you about CJ and the curse of Bast?"