Title: Stay Anyway 15/?

Author: Amber (Ambino1111@prodigy.net)

Disclaimers & other notes in Part 1

Previously, in Stay Anyway...

Sam sees his ex-fiancee Lisa as she takes a tour of the White House with her son Alexander. He talks with her and they decide to go to dinner the next night. A political snafu pops up before their dinner, and they end up eating with Josh and Donna in the White House. Lisa vows to hook up Josh and Donna, the latter becoming a new friend. Sam encourages Lisa to stay so they can talk about what happened between them, and as she is singing her son to sleep in Josh's office, Sam talks with Josh and Donna. He goes ballistic when Josh asks if he still loves Lisa. Sam and Lisa decide not to talk about what happened, although Lisa rhetorically asks "How did we get here?" Flashbacks: Lisa is a dentist and first meets Sam at an appointment. Fast forward to Sam and Lisa living together. A misunderstanding occurs when Sam's plans for a surprise party make Lisa suspicious. She tracks down the woman she thinks he's having an affair with, and discovers it was Josh, who had been helping Sam plan everything. At the party, she and Josh, realizing who they are, react strangely when introduced, which makes Sam wonder. He confronts Josh, who tells him the truth. Sam tells Lisa it was all just a misunderstanding and they drop it. Back to the present, where Lisa informs Sam that she and Alex are moving to DC He offers to let her stay at his apartment until hers is ready - she says she'll think about it. Instead, she accepts Donna's offer to live with her and refuses to call Sam and tell him. Sam and Josh have a heart-to-heart about women, and Josh learns about the office-wide pool betting on when he and Donna would admit their feelings. Meanwhile, at Donna's, Lisa comforts Donna, who admits that Josh treats her like a platonic wife. Josh shows up at her apartment, drunkenly informing her of his love, and Donna makes him leave. While waiting for the cab, Josh tells Lisa that Sam still loves her.

*****

"Everything becomes a little different as soon as it is spoken out loud."

- Hermann Hesse

*****

I don't know what possibly compelled me to drive over to Donna's in the middle of the night. Honestly, now that I'm standing in front of her door, dripping wet from the quiet thunderstorm, I can't find a single reason for my being here. I know what I want to ask her, and it honestly could've waited until morning. I could've called her, or waited until she showed up in the west wing for work in a few hours.

Hindsight's a great thing, isn't it? I'll just blame my knocking on Donna's door at three thirty eight in the morning on a lack of sleep and wavering sanity.

"Sam?" Donna's disheveled head pops out of the door. "What happened? What's wrong?"

She closes the door and I hear the chain slide off. The door swings open once again, wider this time.

"Sam, what's wrong? Is everything okay? Is it Josh? The President?" With each query, her voice sounds less and less sleepy.

"No, it's not Josh. Or the President. Everyone is fine."

She actually scratches her head, yawning. "Okay then. C'mon in," She walks away from the door, leaving it open. I walk in and close it behind me.

"Do you want some coffee?" She wants to know, heading into the kitchen.

"No, thanks," I answer, carefully hanging my dripping coat on the coat rack. "There isn't a deadly emergency or anything. I just... I needed to talk to you."

"Okay," Donna reappears in the living room, tightening her robe around her. She sinks into the couch with another yawn. "What did you need to talk about?"

I open my mouth and then realize what an idiot I am. Josh had come over here earlier to profess his love. It's entirely possible that he's still here.

"Is, uh... How'd things go with Josh?" As soon as I ask, I realize she had asked me if something happened to Josh. He must not be here anymore. Whoops.

Donna suddenly seems wide awake. "Horribly. I don't even want to talk about it," She pauses and scrutinizes me for a moment, narrowing her eyes. "That's not what you wanted to talk about, was it? Because I'm just not in the mood to-"

I shake my head, starting to pace around her living room. "No, that's not it. Don't worry, that's not - Listen, Donna. I know you've been talking to Lisa. I have no proof, but I just know. You - Donna, you have to tell me where she is. I need to talk to her. I can't - I can't even sleep! I've been thinking way too much, and I need to see her. Please tell me where she is."

There's a perfectly-timed noise in the hallway behind me. I pause in mid-step, not quite wanting to turn around but doing it anyway.

"Donna? Is that Josh? Is everything o-" Lisa stops talking as soon as she sees me.

An extraordinarily awkward moment comes and goes.

"She's right there," Donna pipes up from the couch, not meaning it to be funny or cute. Neither of us turns to look at her.

"You've been here all this time?" I ask, incredulous. How could they have pulled this off? How could Donna have lied to me? And to Josh? Wait. Josh had to have figured it out last night, if he didn't already know. Why didn't he call me? Why the hell am I out of the loop again?

Lisa crosses her arms across her chest, already on the defensive. "What do you want, Sam?"

"I want... I want- I want-" I'm fuming. Absolutely fuming. I wouldn't be surprised if smoke started shooting out of my ears. I have to stay angry, too, otherwise I might realize how painful this all is. "Why didn't you call me? Two weeks, Lisa. Why the hell didn't you call me like you said you would?"

"Hush, Sam. You'll wake everyone up."

"I DON'T CARE!" I yell. Deep breath, Sam. Deep breath. "Why did you lie to me?"

"To be fair, Sam - and please keep your voice down - I never said I'd call you. I said I'd think about it. And I did, and I realized it was the wrong thing to do."

"Oh, so you decided that concocting an elaborate scheme to lie to me and stay with Donna was a better idea?"

"Yes, Sam. That was exactly my thought process, because as you've known for years, everything in the world revolves around you."

"I know the world doesn't revolve around me, Lisa. Believe it or not, I learned that three years ago, when you were so kind as to remind me, back when MY world revolved around you, that I wasn't the center of the universe. I knew that, dammit, I knew that, but you'd think... God! We were engaged, Lisa, we were almost married, and your world didn't revolve around me, around us."

She's getting livid now, too. "Oh, so you're going to drag my parents into this, huh? You're going to blame the fact that my mother had a stroke and my father was diagnosed with Alzheimer's- that they lived in Pennsylvania and needed my help- you're going to blame me AGAIN for taking care of them?!?"

"Lisa, I never SAW you! We were barely speaking at that point! I was working overtime, you were working and traveling between Pennsylvania and Manhattan every weekend. Who was I supposed to blame?"

"Gee, I don't know. Nobody? Blame God that they got sick, if you want to. I didn't. Blame Josh, if you want, because he encouraged you to leave. He showed you the bone and asked you to chase it."

"What?!?"

"Oh, come on, Sam. Don't you remember? You were almost a partner! You were excited! And then Josh came along with his face and his hopes about Bartlet being the real thing and got you all confused. Do you even remember what we fought about, what we broke up over? You wanted to go traveling all over the country with the campaign. You wanted to move to Washington. You wanted to give up stability for a dream, and you didn't want any objections. You didn't care that DC was even farther from my parents than New York was. You didn't care that I was happy in my job, that you were happy in your job until Josh showed up. You felt like something - your youth, perhaps- was slipping down the drain, and you wanted to chase a pipe dream. You even called it that, Sam! You didn't think Bartlet had a chance in hell because he was too decent a guy. Remember? And we fought, and we fought, and I gave up. In the end, Sam, I was too goddamned tired from trying to take care of everyone, and I gave up. 'Go on, Sam. Go get a good man elected President.' That's what I told you, Sam. And I may have regretted it over the years, but I never blamed you for it, I never blamed Josh for it, and I tried to never blame myself for it. Some things happen for a reason."

I pinch the bridge of my nose. This is SO not how this trip was supposed to end up.

"What do you want me to say, Lisa? That I'm sorry? Because I am. I'M SORRY! I never meant to screw up your life so much."

Somewhere in the apartment Alex starts crying. Donna quietly excuses herself to go get him.

"I never said that, Sam. Dammit! Stop pulling me into your little pity-party! I said I never blamed you! My life has turned out a lot differently than I expected when we were engaged, but I don't feel sorry for myself. And you shouldn't feel sorry for me either. I've done just fine over the years, and I'm damn proud of Alex. I love him more than I thought I could love anyone, anything. So don't you go feeling sorry about the most important part of my life, and don't you DARE expect ME to feel sorry. I'm only sorry that you feel this immense guilt and this need to fix my life. I LIKE my life, Sam. It's not a bowl of cherries, but it's mine and I've worked hard for it."

"I've worked hard for my life, too, Lisa. Damn hard. And don't you go trivializing my feelings and my actions. So I feel guilty? So what? I can't help it if I have compassion! So I feel sorry for you. And Alex. What of it? I'm sorry I'm not the insensitive, inhuman monster your memory must have made me out to be."

Donna re-appears in the room. She's holding Alex, who's whimpering as he sucks on a bottle.

"Sam-"

"I'll stop feeling sorry for you right now. In fact, I already have. But Alex - I still feel sorry for him. I may have had a bastard for a father, but he was my dad when I was growing up. I never suspected he could be a jerk. But Alex? Your son doesn't even know who his dad is, much less what kind of person he is. I feel sorry for him, because in all likelihood he'll never know how much fun, how important a dad is, and he'll never even know what he's missing."

Now Lisa is speechless. I think she's crying, too, because she just swiped at her eyes. I may be being a jerk right now, but I can't stop myself.

"You know what? I've been doing a lot of thinking lately. And I thought that if I could only talk to you again, that everything would be all right. Well, I was so blatantly wrong. I'm sorry I came over here and woke you all up. Okay? Donna? I'm sorry I woke you up, and I'm sorry I made Alex cry."

"Why did you come over, Sam? Just to try to make me feel bad? You needn't have bothered to do it in person - you could have told Donna everything and she would've relayed it to me."

I feel guilty now, for there's a sorrow underneath her sarcasm, a sorrow I caused by showing up here.

"Yeah, just forget it ever happened, all right? Forget everything I said, forget everything I did, forget that I still love you."

I don't even realize what I've said at first. I stare at Lisa and Donna and Alex for a moment as it sinks in.

Now I don't know what to say, what to do. I snatch my soggy jacket from the coat rack and leave, slamming the door behind me.

What have I done?

TBC