LAX is a huge airport. I always forget that. Granted, I haven't flown into it so many times that I can be blasé about it but I would think I wouldn't feel so overwhelmed. I just don't want to seem like a country bumpkin as I try to make my way to the luggage pickup area. If I can find that, I should be okay.

It takes me another twenty minutes to find my way to baggage claim and another twenty before bags and suitcases start to make their way down the carousel. I breathe an involuntary sigh of relief as mine come into view. I've spent too many years now traveling on private planes where finding my luggage hasn't been a concern, so I'm always paranoid about it when I fly commercial. Too many people lose too many—

"Donnatella!"

My head jerks up, a smile spreading across my face as I see CJ barreling at me. "Hey!" I exclaim as we hug, her arms so tight around me I almost can't breathe. I'm fairly certain I'm hugging her just as tightly. "I thought you were gonna wait outside so you didn't have to park."

"I couldn't do that to you," she answers, releasing me marginally. "Besides, I couldn't wait to see you." She looks around, her face falling a little. "No Josh?"

I shake my head ruefully, managing to grab my bags before they spin past me. "Not for a couple of days. He had an emergency come up late last night so I'm going to reschedule his flight later this week."

"But he'll be here—"

"In time for your wedding. I checked my messages after the plane landed and everything is mostly handled. He thinks he should be able to get out here by Wednesday afternoon at the latest. It's good, though—you know how quickly he gets bored and there's going to be so much wedding talk that we'd probably have to keep him on a leash so he wouldn't wander away."

She throws her head back and laughs, grabbing one of my bags as she steers me toward the exit. I blink in surprise at the bright California afternoon sunshine, fishing around in my purse for my sunglasses. Once I can see again, I can't help but be shocked by the sheer volume of cars in the parking lot. I'm positive I've flown into LA before and shouldn't be so surprised, but I'm also fairly certain the last time I was here was in a work capacity. Flying in this way is a bit different.

"You got here just in time for a little bit of gridlock. Makes rush hour in DC seem like small potatoes."

"Can't wait," I answer, tossing my stuff into the trunk of CJ's Mustang.

"We can take some of the back roads. We won't get there faster but we'll be stopped less, so that'll be nice."

I chuckle as we get situated in the car, and I pull my hair back into a ponytail before the convertible does its damage. "Whatever you say," I tell her as she tosses me a baseball cap—Yankees. Josh would lose his mind if he saw this. "You're the bride. I'm just here for moral support."

"You're my maid of honor!" she exclaims. "Moral support is the least of your duties."

"CJ, have you ever been in a wedding? When everything starts to implode you're going to need me to talk you off the ledge."

"There will be no ledges," she insists as we creep toward the exit, batting my hand away when I try to pay the parking fee. "No meltdowns, nothing to fall apart. The only reason we're not doing this at the courthouse is because we thought it'd be fun to have some friends over for a party, but since most of our friends are still on the east coast, we figured the only way we'd get any of you out here for a party would be to have an actual wedding."

"Sound logic," I tease. "So, you don't think something could go wrong?"

"Oh, I'm positive something could go wrong. As long as the day ends with me being married to Danny, I don't really care." The sentiment nearly chokes me up but before I can respond she shrugs, guiding the car out onto the road. "We've given ourselves zero time to plan all this so it's very likely things will go awry. Or, everything could be great because I won't have time to dwell on the minutia. I have my dress, your dress arrived safe and sound last week, you're here, Danny's best man is already local, our favorite vineyard happened to have a cancellation—"

"Oh, so that's why there's all this rush. Because when you called and said your wedding was in less than a month, I wondered if…"

CJ shoots me a death glare despite the speed at which she's driving. "Donna Moss, just what are you implying?"

"First of all, keep your eyes on the road. Second, I didn't know if you were expecting."

"If I was pregnant, I would have told you before now. And also, this is 2007—people don't have to get married because of a baby."

"I know that, and I wouldn't assume that's the reason you were getting married. I just wondered if you thought the wedding thing would be easier earlier in the pregnancy."

"Well, there are no buns in my oven, so I'm free to get completely trashed at my wedding."

"We know how to keep it classy, don't we?"

She glances my way again, this time grinning from ear to ear. "Always." She focuses back on navigating through the thick but manageable traffic and makes a slight face. "If I tell you something, do you promise not to tell Josh?"

"Depends on what it is."

"Donna!"

"CJ!" I mock.

"What about that whole sisters before misters thing? Chicks before dicks?"

"Did we make that pact at some point?"

"I'm serious!"

"As long as it's not, you know, a matter of national security, your secret is safe with me."

Without looking, she reaches over and smacks my arm, hard enough to make me wince. "You're terrible."

"Might I remind you that my dress has no sleeves? Do you want your bridesmaid with a big bruise on her arm?"

"Not bridesmaid—you're maid of honor and my only official witness to this whole affair. Besides…" she glances over at me as we hit a stop light, grinning cheekily. "I'm sure you and Josh have experience with covering up the odd, strategically placed bruise from time to time."

I can actually feel my face turn red, heat rushing to my cheeks so quickly I feel like I'm going to pass out. "CJ!" I squeak, burying my face in my hands. "Oh, my God!"

She lets out a laugh—a huge, deep belly laugh. "You're both consenting adults in a grownup relationship. You're allowed to have loud, raunchy, borderline painful sex. There's no shame."

"You're awful," I tell her, my voice muffled by my hands.

"Hey, I know a little something about repressed desire. I know it can manifest itself with enthusiasm."

"Since you're so keen on this subject," I tell her, composing myself enough to look up. "He likes to grab my ass and hips, so that's where most of the bruises show up."

"Good to know," she answers, though I swear her smile looks a little strained. Ahh—she can dish it out but can't take it in.

"My nipples, too. They tend to get a little bruised because he likes to—"

"Got it!" she exclaims, her cheeks actually turning pink. "Geez, Donna!"

"What? You don't want to hear about his incredible suction? Because the nipples aren't the only place where—"

"Ugh! All right! You win. I can't hear the details of Josh Lyman's mating habits."

"Are you sure? Because you brought it up."

"I'm sure!" she yelps, her forehead wrinkling in concentration as she maneuvers through the slow traffic. "I've been outplayed again. Well done."

"Don't start it if you can't finish it." This isn't even the first time we've had this sort of tiff. She likes to tease me about Josh but gets freaked out when I start to play along. Granted, we've not come close to talking about bruises and suction before this, and it probably won't even be the last time this week that we have this sort of standoff.

The car crawls to a stop, the afternoon LA gridlock going into full effect. CJ grins over at me, stretching out her arms for a hug. "God, I've missed you!"

"I've missed you, too," I answer as I return the hug, hoping her foot stays on the brake pedal. "Almost eight months is a long time."

"God, has it been that long?" She settles back into her seat, flipping on the blinker about half a second before yanking the car onto an exit. The car behind us honks their horn, but it sounds more like a habit than anything else.

"Since a couple of nights before the Inauguration," I answer with a shrug. "I didn't get to see you before you took off for the airport."

"In fairness, you were a little busy on Inauguration Day," she teases, guiding us through a series of turns in a nice, well-manicured neighborhood—the traffic is still slow, but at least it's not at a standstill. CJ's not wrong about being extremely busy on Inauguration Day, either, which makes me all the happier that we had a small get together a couple of nights before. CJ was there, and Sam, Charlie, Will, and Kate. CJ had offered to have everyone over to her place, but it was full of moving boxes, not to mention all the furniture was wrapped and propped up haphazardly. So everyone gathered at what was then Josh's apartment—even though I'd officially claimed to just be staying with him for a while, in hindsight it definitely looked like we were living together. I was definitely playing hostess that night, not to mention we'd moved in more than half of my stuff by that point. It didn't look like a bachelor pad, it looked like a cozy little nest. Now I can completely understand why CJ would give me that look or use that tone when I'd insist we weren't living together. At any rate, having a few people over to reminisce for a few hours, to unwind and prepare for the next step and catch up on each other's lives was wonderful, but it unfortunately marked the last time I saw a lot of those people. CJ and I certainly speak on the phone fairly often, and when we can't talk we email, but I haven't seen her since January.

"Eight months is definitely too long. We shouldn't let that happen again," CJ says resolutely.

"I don't know that we have much say in that, Ceej," I answer with a chuckle. "Unless one or both of us plans on quitting our jobs and relocating."

"I just don't want the next time I see you to be at your wedding, you know?"

I can't help but choke and sputter just a little. "I'm nowhere near marriage right now, so I would hope we'll see each other before then."

"'Nowhere near marriage'," she repeats dubiously. "You are still with Josh, right? That hasn't changed?"

"CJ, Josh and I have only been dating since November. We're not exactly—"

"You're not 'dating,' you're cohabitating. You want me to believe that your relationship is so tenuous that you don't think you're in it for the long haul?"

"Of course not! Josh and I are solid. We're just not thinking about getting married yet."

"Well, all the more reason that I don't want to wait for you two to get your act together before we visit again."

I sigh and shake my head; everyone is in a rush for me to marry Josh. It was less than two months ago we were visiting his mother in Florida and she wasted no time in hinting that she was up and ready for a ceremony if we were. My mom has been grilling me about it since Christmas when my parents came to stay with us. I would suspect Mrs. Lyman has been doing the same to her son. My brothers have even poked at me a few times, which struck me as odd considering they've had very little interest in my personal life in years. The people we work with keep trying to talk up marriage. It's not even unheard of for President Santos to extol the virtues of that particular institution as well as the grand affair a wedding between me and Josh could be. When it comes down to it, though, I don't think we're there yet. I love living with him and everything about our life together, but marriage feels like a rush at this point. It took us so long to get to where we are and I'm not interested in hurrying through it. Right now, everything is for us; it's all our decisions and on our terms. We're happy–not usually obnoxiously so—and we do have to work at our relationship, but everything is good right now.

"So, what's on the docket for the next few days?" I ask, hoping to get her mind off the idea of me and Josh and a wedding.

"I hope you've been carbo-loading because this is gonna be a marathon," CJ says, returning her attention to the traffic in front of us. "We have some downtime tonight. I took care of a lot of running around before your flight got in because I wanted to make sure we had time to actually just hang out a little."

"Not that I want to turn down hanging out with you, but if there's wedding stuff that needs to be done, don't put it off because I'm here. Put me to work."

"Oh, don't worry—I will. I just didn't want you to step off the plan to a to-do list. You know—'Welcome to California! Can you go to the florist for me?' Plus, I could really use an afternoon to unwind. No matter how small we tried to keep this thing—and it is pretty small, all things considered—there are still a million things to do and organize and dozens of calls to make, not to mention that I'm doing almost all of it remotely, so that's an added level of difficultly—"

"Wait—remotely? Have you been out of LA lately or something?"

"Did I not tell you where the wedding is going to be?" she asks, her forehead wrinkling in confusion as she brakes heavily just before yanking the car sideways into a clear space in the next lane.

I close my eyes for a few seconds, sure we're going to plow into the back of the car in front of us. "I don't think so. You told me back when you first called that you were looking at resorts and hotels and stuff but had already decided on the date so I thought…I don't know, that you'd gone with City Hall or something. You just told me about some vineyard becoming available…"

"Well, we were going to do the City Hall thing even though it didn't solve the problem of where to have a reception. We spent almost a week trying to find a venue but with our date being so close, our options were limited. We didn't want to give ourselves much more than a month between the engagement and the wedding because we figured a few months would turn into a year and everything would get really out of hand. But we got a call a couple of weeks ago from one of the places we'd looked into initially and they had a sudden cancellation for the day we wanted so we grabbed it. I'm sorry I didn't tell you but everything has been so insane the last few weeks it must have slipped my mind."

"Hey, I'm just along for the ride," I answer. "I'll stand where you need me to stand and smile for the camera and all that good stuff. Just let me know so I can adjust Josh's flight plans accordingly."

"Ah, damn it. I wasn't even thinking about that when you got in alone. I was planning for us to head there on Wednesday afternoon or evening so he might have to fly in there instead of here. Donna, I'm sorry. I really wasn't thinking at all that something might keep Josh from getting in with you and never accounted for that. This is such a mess—"

"CJ, it's not that big of a deal. Josh'll get over it. It's usually not an issue for him to switch flights at the last minute. His position offers him some flexibility with some airlines—it happens pretty often for him. I'll just need to know if he should land in a different airport or something." I look over at her and notice she still looks a little distraught so I reach over and pat her arm. "Seriously—don't stress about this part. This is an easy fix. Even if he has to fly into LAX and hop another plane, it'll be all right. The longer he's on a plane, the longer he'll be able to work and the more time he'll have to focus on the festivities." Not that I would ever mention this to her at this point—and she probably knows—but it's really a huge pain in the ass to make changes for the Chief of Staff. Last minute switcheroos really make his details' heads explode.

She lets out a little breath though not all the tension leaves her body. "Might I suggest, when the time comes, that you two elope? Don't even give it a month—get the ring and find a courthouse."

I chuckle a little, shaking my head—not because I don't believe her but because I'm fairly certain that, should I marry Josh, his mother would kill us if she wasn't invited. My family might be able to get over it, seeing as how my brothers have all had fairly large ceremonies, but I think Mrs. Lyman would never forgive us if we denied her some sort of celebration. "Okay, so where is the wedding going to be?"

She steers the car through a few more turns, grinning as we're suddenly on comparatively less crowded streets—we must be deeper into the residential areas. "Believe it or not, it's called Concannon Vineyard."

I can't help but snort. "Yeah right." She just nods her head in response. "Seriously? Did you two buy a vineyard or something?"

"Just an amazing coincidence, I swear. We found it months ago. Obviously, California has a lot of vineyards, and not just in Napa, and because our schedules are much less demanding now, we wanted to make a point of exploring as much of our surroundings as we could. Sort of make up for lost time, you know?" I nod because I do know. Josh and I are extraordinarily busy all the time but we force ourselves to stop whenever possible and try to take it all in, even if it's as simple as walking to work when the cherry blossoms are in bloom. "We started with exploring some of the stuff within an hour or so of here. Anyway, we were at some work function of mine and when I introduced Danny, someone asked if he had any connection to the vineyard. We looked into the place—not because we thought Danny was related but because it was fun—and went to visit and it's absolutely gorgeous. Everything there is so beautiful, the wine is fabulous, there are lots of places to explore, and we made it a point to go there several times. We've recommended people and it was actually the first place we looked into but they were booked. Obviously. Because normal people plan months or years ahead of time for days like this. But they called us out of the blue and told us they'd had a cancellation and it was ours if we wanted it. It meant a lot more work on our end because we've had to inform people that we were getting married at the last minute, then tell people who were planning to be in Santa Monica that that was off, we had to figure out how to take food and decorations and flowers and all this other crap that we'd been planning on doing here and get it there, but since we can't go back and forth every day, there's a lot that can't be done in person so it's going to have to be handled when we get there. And, I just found out, that I somehow managed to not tell my own damn bridesmaid that I'd changed wedding locations. I guess I was thinking that since you two were coming here I'd just drag you along—"

"Breathe, CJ!" I exclaim. "Like I said, I'll go wherever you need me to. But…just how far away is this place?"

She cringes then smiles sheepishly. "It's about an hour away from San Francisco."

I try to do the mental math, but I think I need to hear her say it out loud. "Which is how far from here exactly?"

"A little over five hours from here."

I blink a few times, shaking my head. "Oooookaaaaaay…"

"Yeah. I really dropped the ball on this one, didn't I? I'm so sorry—there has just been a million things going on and all I could focus on was you getting here so I never thought about anything…obviously."

Other than the surprise of suddenly going to San Francisco, it's not that big of a deal for me. For Josh, it might be another story. "All right, well…are we flying up there? You said Wednesday, right? I'll need to check with Josh and see if he can get here on Tuesday and drive up with us or if he'll have to fly into San Francisco. I'll have to get in touch with Josh's detail so they can make sure your venue is secure enough for them. Then I need to check and see if I can change our flights out on Sunday instead of driving back to LA and leaving from here. I'll have to—"

"Don't worry about finding a room," CJ interrupts quickly. "Danny and I reserved a few rooms at a hotel—one for us, one for you and Josh, and one for Danny's best man. That's on us. As long as the detail is good with it, and they should be. I had enough sense to do some preliminary checks on it—that's not a problem. We were planning to drive up there because we have stuff we need to bring and I don't want to trust an airplane with my dress or Danny's suit. So, yes, the goal is to leave on Wednesday and it'll depend on his schedule, but it might just be easier for him to fly into San Francisco then; either we can pick him up or he can rent a car." She looks over at me for a few seconds, her face suddenly lined with worry. "I really am sorry. I screwed the pooch on this one, didn't I?"

"I'm still trying to get my brain to catch up but it's okay, CJ. Don't stress yourself too much about this. I just wasn't expecting to go to San Francisco while I was here."

"Well, technically, we're not going to be in San Francisco. We don't even have to go near it, not unless we're picking up Josh, but I promise you it's a beautiful drive, at least once we get out of LA. We don't have to drive straight through, either. If we leave early enough on Wednesday, we'll have plenty of time for pit stops and sightseeing if anything strikes your fancy…I really didn't tell you any of this?"

I lift my eyebrow, even though she can't see it. "CJ, who are you talking to? My job in life used to be keeping Josh Lyman organized. I knew the names and schedule of every major and minor player DC. Do you really think I'd forget if you told me you'd moved your wedding from Santa Monica to Concannon Vineyard?"

She makes a face, smiling a moment later. "Damn. I guess I forgot just how compulsive you are." She pauses for a moment. "Do you think Josh is going to be mad?"

I wave my hand dismissively. "He'll be fine. He's not a big fan of LA anyway. And if he's irritated, well, I have ways of calming him down."

"Ew! Donna, ew! I don't want to know about your sex games!"

"Who mentioned sex? Did anyone here mention sex? You're the one with a filthy mind."

She has the good grace to look sheepish. "Oh. Sorry. I guess I just automatically assumed you meant something about your 'stress relief.'"

"Apology accepted." We're quiet for a few moments and I watch the well-manicured lawns and modest-though-undoubtedly expensive houses go by. "For the record, I was actually talking about sex."

"Oh, come on!" CJ groans. "I don't want to think about the two of you like that!"

I can't help but laugh. "Well, consider it payback for changing your wedding venue and not telling me. Now we're even."

She makes a face but says nothing as we pull up in front of an adorable bungalow. The pictures didn't do it justice. "It's lovely, CJ! Why didn't you two decide to get married here?"

"We talked about it," she answers as she parks the car, hopping out a moment later. "Then I realized I didn't want to have that many people stomping through where we live. We'd have to deal with caterers and their staff, not to mention all the people wandering in and out. Even if we did it out by the pool, well, it's a pool. Those don't usually mix well with alcohol."

"Oh, yeah! I forgot you had a pool. I know where I'm going to be for the next few days." I pull myself out of the car, too, tossing the ball cap into the backseat. I grab my luggage from the trunk and follow CJ inside. It strikes me as odd for a moment that I don't have to stop and wait for several members of a security detail to sweep the area before I go in. I guess it's been a while since I went somewhere without Josh, and security is always doing sweeps for him. We've been told that the detail will be able to ease off a little if and when the threat from Kazakhstan dies down, but for now, it's become part of our normal life.

"I don't think so, sister. This isn't a vacation. We don't have time for you to lounge by the pool while you fry yourself to a crisp."

I make a disgruntled noise, but it's only in jest—I knew without a doubt before ever setting foot on the plane today that this wasn't going to be a leisure trip. Not that I thought I wouldn't have fun, but CJ warned me that she'd need my help with some things and had plans to drag me with her wherever she went.

"Hey—you were going to tell me something earlier," I say, our conversation from the car ride coming back to me.

"I was?" she answers distractedly, finally unlocking her front door after punching in her alarm code.

"Wow," I breathe as we step inside. "Nice place."

"It's not much, but it's home."

That's a bit of an understatement. While it's much less pretentious than some of the houses we passed on the way in, it's really very beautiful and spacious. I knew CJ had done well for herself before she went into politics, but I'm guessing she was just being modest when she talked about her previous life.

She leads me upstairs, chatting a mile a minute. "We actually have some time tonight. I have to remake my lists and things like that, and I'm hoping you'll lend your hyper-organization to that for me because I'm going to be all over the place with the things I need to do and I'm going to forget stuff but you're really good at reading between the lines and I'm hoping you'll be able to at least sort of guess what I'm thinking and fill in some of the blanks. But I was thinking if we get a lot done this afternoon we could go out tonight. We'll wait until Danny gets home and see if he's feeling up to it, but I thought you might like to go to the Santa Monica Pier and see the sights. We can have a late dinner and a few drinks, ride the Ferris wheel if we're so inclined. I don't want you to miss out on the entire experience with all the wedding stuff and since we're going to busy busy busy up until go time on Saturday, we both deserve a little fun before then. If Danny's not into it, we'll force him to be our chauffer for the evening." She lets out a breath and flops down on what I presume to be my bed. "I'm probably babbling. I know. How does that sound?"

"Sounds good to me. I'm just along for the ride."

She sighs and blinks at me a few times. "What were you asking me before?"

It takes me a few moments to catch up. "Earlier in the car, you asked me if I could keep a secret or something from Josh."

"Oh, yes. I don't recall getting an answer on that, either."

"CJ." I sit down next to her. "You can trust me. Really. Unless it's something that's a threat to Josh or the President, but we've been friends a lot longer than I've been with Josh." She drops her chin and lifts her eyebrow, giving me a look of utter disbelief. "Whatever, you know what I mean. If there's something you want to tell me, you can."

"Well, it's probably been built up too much by now, but...Danny and I are sort of trying to get pregnant."

I gasp, actually covering my mouth. "Oh, my God, CJ, really? That's…that's…huge!"

"Well, we haven't started really trying yet but we've been talking about it. We've been doing a lot of talking and soul searching because…well…I'm not getting any younger. We don't have a huge window where this could work, at least not the old-fashioned way, and having a child is such a huge thing anyway but to make that choice at this point in life feels even bigger. I never really thought too much about having kids before but…I can see it with Danny. Since we're not drawing out the engagement, we thought we'd try working on it sooner rather than later. I'm not sure how aggressively we're going to try at first. Maybe we'll take a few more months to start; it's all sort of up in the air at the moment but—"

I can't help it—I launch myself at CJ and wrap her in a hug. "This is so exciting! I'm so happy for you two!"

She laughs, hugging me back. "Don't get too excited yet. This is all still in the early stages."

"It's still exciting."

"It is. It's scary, too. I've heard children are a lifelong commitment."

I chuckle, pulling back. "Usually."

"Anyway, we're going to give it a shot and see what happens. If it doesn't work, eventually we'll talk about other options. We've touched on those briefly and even if we do manage it, we might consider adopting a kid, too."

I feel my eyes grow wide, but my smile is even bigger. "Really?"

She shrugs, waving her hands helplessly. "It's all very hypothetical right now. We want to see if we can handle one first and go from there." She glances at me, one eyebrow up, and grins evilly. "You realize, of course, if Danny and I have one, you and Josh will be obligated to give it a cousin or potential life mate."

I choke a little. "No pressure on our genetic compatibility. Or, you know, Josh and his long-term commitment to me."

"Sure—Josh isn't long-term committed to you. All right."

I shake my head. "I'm not saying that. I'm not saying anything one way or another. We're not even talking about me and Josh; we're talking about your uterus and its abilities."

She laughs and nudges my shoulder. "Still. I'm expecting you to provide a playmate of some sort for my future child."

"Okay, fine, whatever," I answer, rolling my eyes. Truthfully, I haven't thought a whole lot about having kids period, never mind with Josh. I've had a vague idea of having a family throughout my life, and I'm certainly not immune to kids and how adorable they can be and what they have the ability to do to my biological clock. I haven't made it a priority, though being with Josh for almost nine months has stirred a few more things within me than at any other point in my life. But…that's not where we are right now. We're not talking about marriage and family or any of that other stuff yet. "Point me in the direction of wedding stuff—we'll get started on lists."

I've been working on this story for what feels like forever. It started with a very vague concept for just one moment (a moment that will be very poorly executed at some point later on) and evolved into a monster. It was all hand-written initially and then I typed it up so badly that a lot of it was gibberish so I've had to work on essentially translating it. At any rate, I hope you enjoy. There's more to come. Also, did any of you get to the West Wing Weekly podcast finale? It was awesome, wasn't it?