I'm on your side

So, Reception Part II—The After Party, has been a rousing success. As nice as everything today has been—and it's been pretty awesome because I got to marry the love of my life who also happens to be one of my very best friends in the entire world—having his party has been so much fun. Everyone has completely cut loose, dancing nonstop, eating all the leftovers, and participating in general merriment. We even have one of our photographers here to capture the revelry. Dancing with my new wife on a rooftop in the middle of winter is the best way to celebrate our marriage. I still can't believe the restaurant owners were willing to let the space be rented for the night. Sure, Donna and I like this place, but I've never felt like we have a special bond with the owners, especially not enough for all this. I feel like that might change after tonight.

My mom finally begged off about an hour ago—dead on her feet but looking completely high on life. She told me repeatedly that today was one of the best days of her life, though not without also mentioning how she thought this day would never come. Donna's parents—my in-laws now—left not long after that, also looking tired but pleased. Donna's mom hugged me tight, telling me that she loves me and welcoming me to the family, but the biggest moment might have been Donna's dad. He refrained from threatening me and instead shook my hand, followed by a big clap on the back. It was the first time I felt truly accepted by the man.

I lean against the makeshift bar—because what's an after party without a bar?—and watch my wife as she's twirled endlessly around the floor. I still can't completely wrap my mind around that she's my wife. That's so huge. She's voluntarily spending the rest of her life with me. I'd love to monopolize every single moment of her time tonight, but I suppose I have a few decades to do that.

Wow. I don't know why it keeps hitting me like it's brand new information, but I really get to spend the rest of my life with Donna. It feels too good to be true. I'm still trying to figure out how I got her to agree to any of this. How in the hell did she look at me right before the election two years ago and decide she wanted me? Or that she wanted me again the day after? After all those years working together, after seeing me at my worst, after being a dick to her for no apparent reason, after sabotaging her personal life…after all of that, how did I get so lucky?

I'm never letting her go. I'm going to screw up along the way—it's a given—but I want to make sure she never regrets choosing me. I don't know how I'm going to manage that, but I guess all I can do is love her. And I do. I love her so much that sometimes I can't breathe.

I'm the luckiest man in the world.

A glass of scotch appears next to me, Sam not far behind. He leans against the bar next to me, holding out his own glass to me. We toast silently, my eyes hardly leaving Donna as I take a careful sip of the expensive liquor, letting it roll around in my mouth for a few moments. I've been very mindful of my alcohol intake for the evening, mostly because it doesn't take much for me to get extraordinarily drunk and the last thing I want to be is a slobbering mess on my wedding night. Just because it's for better or for worse doesn't mean Donna should have to deal with the "worse" aspect right off the bat.

"How you doing there?" Sam asks.

"I'm great," I answer, entirely distracted by my wife.

He just chuckles. "You look lovesick."

"I am."

"Marriage looks good on you."

I finally look over at him, lifting an eyebrow in question. He just shrugs. "It does. You look settled."

"I'm happy, man."

"That much is very obvious."

I take another sip of my scotch, watching the dance floor for a while. "Why did I wait so long to do this?"

"What? Get married or get married to Donna?"

I roll my eyes, giving him an exasperated look. "Get married to Donna, of course."

He just shrugs, taking a long sip of his own drink. "You got me. I could see this one coming a mile away."

"Then why didn't you tell me?" It's not an accusation—I'm genuinely curious about this. People always say they knew Donna and I were going to end up together, but with the exception of my mother, not one person—at least no one close to either of us—said anything of that ilk to me.

"I don't think there was anything I could have said that would have made this happen any faster. Actually, if I'd said anything to you at all, you probably would have done something stupid and pushed her away. I couldn't tell you that you were head over heels in love with her because you would have started dating any other woman you could find just to prove me wrong. Hell, you probably would have married Amy to show that you in fact were not interested in Donna." I can't help but shudder at the thought. Amy is really good at what she does on a professional level, and she's been with her lumberjack boyfriend for a few years now so I guess things have changed a bit, but being in a relationship with her bordered on toxic. We had some good moments, but not enough to outweigh the bad, and certainly not enough to make me look back on our time together fondly. I can't imagine being married to her. I'm positive we'd be divorced by now, if one of us didn't kill the other first. "I definitely couldn't tell you that Donna was crazy about you because I don't know that you had the emotional maturity to not tease her about it mercilessly until she quit." He's got me there. I was definitely terrible to her at times, more like that awful boy on the playground being mean to the girl he liked because he didn't know how to express himself properly.

"You're probably right. Still, I wish I could have had this with her years ago."

"Well, why you didn't go for her after the second inauguration is beyond me."

My mouth drops open, more in surprise than anything else. "You weren't even here for that! You don't know what—"

"You dragged a reporter and three members of the Bartlet staff to Donna's apartment to throw snowballs at her window. That sort of thing gets around. You should have made a move then."

"I've said as much to her."

"Well, congratulations on being Captain Obvious a few years too late."

"You know, this is just the kind of morale booster I need on my wedding day."

"You asked a question. This is the answer I have for you. You could have made a move years ago. You could have moved her into another office so you wouldn't have had a conflict of interest. But you didn't. You sat on your hands and tried to keep her around as your assistant because at least that meant she was in your life and then acted shocked when she didn't want to put up with it anymore." He pauses for a breath, taking another long sip of his drink.

"Been holding that in for a while, have you?" I ask, feeling entirely amused at his outburst.

"Do you have any idea how agonizing it was to watch you two? It was worse than a soap opera."

"I take it you've watched a lot of soap operas in your time."

"The point is, you two are so stubborn—you in particular—that saying anything at all would have been counterproductive, and that might have been the worst part. That, and watching the two of you suffer for so long. I wasn't fond of that. For the love of God, Josh, you sabotaged her dates. Who does that? You sabotaged her dates and pretended that it was the sort of thing people do for their assistants even though you never saw me or Toby or CJ or even Leo do that—"

"Breathe, Sam!" I exclaim, laughing. "It's okay; we're married now. We may be stubborn and blind but we got there eventually."

He breathes heavily for a few moments before his face turns a little pink and he turns away a little, looking a little embarrassed. "Sorry about that."

"It's all right. It's nice that you care that much, though. For whatever it's worth, I'm happy. Donna and I are very happy. It may have taken us far too long to get here but we're here." I pause, taking another sip of my drink. "I didn't realize we'd given you so much anxiety, though."

"I don't think I did, either," he answers with a laugh. He puts his glass down on the bar, pushing it away. "Maybe I've had enough." We're quiet for a while, watching our friends and family have fun. Naturally, I can't help but focus on Donna. Right now, she's being yanked around the dance floor by her oldest brother, Matteo—he's the only one of the four Moss children that not only likes but insists on being called by the Italian version of his name—and it may be the first time I've ever seen the man smile. Well, at least it's the first time I've seen him smile so broadly. He has the same ear-to-ear, face-splitting grin that Donna does; it's nice to finally be able to see that the two of them are actually related. It's also nice to see that he looks happy. I've always gotten the "I hate you" vibe from Donna's oldest brother, even after really making the effort to get to know all of her brothers. Ben I have no problems with; he's five years older than Donna but she says they've always been closer to each other than their other siblings. He and Donna both think it's because he liked being able to play with the "girly" toys that weren't around before his sister was born. According to Moss family legend, it wasn't too long after that they all knew Ben was gay. He doesn't seem offended by the story, so maybe he remembers the "ah-ha" moment, too. At any rate, they bonded from a very young age. He's almost as much of a wiseass as his sister, so I have some experience on how to handle that. Nick, the youngest, and I get along well enough, though I don't think there's ever going to be any sort of bond between us. He's nice, but not very interested in getting to know me, and honestly, I don't think he's terribly interested in getting to know his sister. Since they're only two years apart, I would have assumed they'd grow up being fairly close, but it was Matteo that clicked with Nick despite their ten year age gap. It doesn't seem to bother Donna—she says they love each other and that's what matters, even if they're not as close as she would like.

Matteo, however, has always been a little hostile toward me. I suppose part of it is because he's the big brother and that's somehow his job. In some ways, it's amusing to me because even though he's older than Donna by eight years, he's still four years younger than I am. I shouldn't actually be intimidated by him in anyway. None of that changes the fact that the longer I've been with Donna, the less he seems to like me, and the more he seems to want to threaten my life. It's made for a few less-than-stellar encounters. So, the fact that he looks like he's having a good time despite that it was me who married his sister today has to be a good sign. I'll take what I can get.

At the end of the day, however, all that really matters is what Donna thinks and feels about me. I'd love for her family to like me—and most of them do—but Donna's opinion is the only one that really matters. As long as she can still tolerate me, I'm good.

"For what it's worth," Sam says suddenly, "I'm happy you're happy. You deserve it. You both deserve it, and I'm happy you found happiness together. You're going to have a great life."

I look out across the roof at Donna again, somehow not surprised to find that she and CJ are now slow-dancing. We have some pretty great friends, something I knew before today. That they went through all this trouble, though, and planned a second reception for us is above and beyond anything I could have expected. Everyone here has high-pressure, demanding jobs and I know they're all exhausted, but everyone has put all that aside to celebrate with us. It's pretty amazing.

"Yeah," I finally answer. "Yeah, we are."

"And just think! Our kids are going to grow up together! How amazing is that?"

My head whips over to him, my eyebrows reaching for the sky. "Are you trying to tell me something?"

He grins at me from ear to ear but shakes his head. "Haley's not pregnant…yet. We're working on it, though."

"Good for you," I answer. "You'll be a great dad."

"You will, too," he answers, nodding sagely.

"Now are you trying to tell me something?"

He blinks at me a few times before he laughs. "That came out wrong. I have no idea if Donna's pregnant. I just mean at some point."

"You're not planning to move back to L.A.?"

"No current plans."

"Not after we leave office?"

"Well, with any luck, that's still a bunch of years off. We haven't discussed it yet, honestly. Even if we did, though, there's no reason our kids couldn't be in each other's lives, right?"

"Tricky, what with being on opposite coasts and all, but sure, our nonexistent children could find ways to spend time together."

"You and Donna could move to California," he suggests. "You could join my old firm."

I let out a chuckle and shake my head. "Donna and I have been married for almost eight hours; I don't think we're looking to relocate quite yet. Besides, by that point, Donna'll probably in charge of, I don't know, the world? I'll follow where she leads. She hasn't steered me wrong yet."

Sam laughs, too. "You've really been married to her for years, haven't you?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I think I have." I suppose, from a certain perspective, I've been behaving like a married man when it comes to Donna for a very long time. If nothing else, needing her voice to be the first thing I heard every day—to the point that I had her call me most mornings to be my own personal alarm clock—should have been a dead giveaway. I know there are a million other things I've done over the years that would lead just about anyone to think Donna has been my wife for some time. Hell, I used to check in with her before I went out to a bar for the evening to make sure it was okay and to confirm that we didn't have any sort of plans.

I'm just glad that it's now all official. I get to be whipped without it being strange. I get to say I'm going home to my wife. More than that, I actually have a wife to go home to. Not that I haven't been going home to and with Donna for the last couple of years, but it's different now. It's definitely better. As much as I sort of hate that it took us this long to get here, it was entirely worth the wait.

Sam starts tapping on his glass, breaking everyone out of their spells. "I want to make a toast!"

Donna grins at me and I hold my hand out to her, both of us walking to each other until we're within reach.

"Is he drunk?" she whispers through her teeth, the smile never leaving her face.

"Oh, definitely," I answer. I glance at her, not surprised to see her eyes twinkling. Drunk Sam is a very rare occurrence, and he's always super affectionate and nostalgic when he is. It's kind of nice that he brought it out for our wedding.

"God, I hope someone's filming this."

"I want to propose a toast to Josh and Donna, my best friends in the entire world. You both know I'm a man of many words, and though I've already written and delivered a toast for you tonight, I'm still having trouble expressing just how happy I am for the two of you." He pauses and looks down at his shoes for a few moments, and clears his throat.

"I think…is he crying?" I whisper in Donna's ear.

"Don't be mean," she answers, elbowing me in the ribs.

"I'm not! I'm just wondering."

He finally composes himself, smiling out at the rooftop full of people. "I know you both waited a long time for this—for all of this. It's been such a joy seeing you so happy the last couple of years, and I know that this next part is going to be even better for you. Now, I know that marriage isn't the be all and end all for everyone, and that's all right. I also know that marriage isn't the magic secret to endless happiness but I have no doubt—not one single, tiny shred of doubt—that being married is going to be so good for you. It's your next step. Whatever happens, whatever life throws at you, you'll get through it because you're going to be together forever. We may not be able to count on much in this world, but I know for a fact that Josh and Donna will be in it together until the end. They're meant to be. If anyone ever wants to know what it means to be happy, they need look no further than our friends." He pauses again, his eyes suspiciously bright, and lifts his glass into the air. "To Josh and Donna!"

There's applause and cheering and I'm not surprised to see that my wife's cheeks are wet. "Damn it. How was that better than his first toast?" she exclaims. I laugh and pull a packet of tissues out of my pocket, and she grabs one gratefully.

"He's something else," I admit, not surprised when Donna reaches up and dabs at my face. I've resembled a leaky faucet tonight and I have no shame about it. I got to marry the love of my life—it's an emotional experience.

Without warning, I reach out and wrap my arms around her, tilting her back. She laughs in surprise, her eyes shining, and I press my lips to hers, kissing her once again.