Disclaimers et al. in part 1
Previously…
What happened between last May and now to make my life so content?
Chapter 2
***
May 2002.
***
I'm sitting here in my office trying to remember back to the point where I lost my game. This year has just been… I don't even know how to describe it.
CJ.
I have no idea how to reach her. Right now she needs her time alone. There's something in that relationship that was more than protector and protectee. By the look of things, Donna knew what, but she won't tell me. For some reason this has affected her too, but she won't let on how or why. I can take a guess, but I've been trying to avoid thinking about this whole situation, not because I'm a heartless bastard, but because I couldn't handle it right now.
Today has just been full of… The welfare screw up took a lot of promises to fix, which led me to screwing over Amy; I wish she hadn't made me do that. I gave her an out and she didn't take it.
I got her fired. Crap. Amy.
What the hell am I supposed to do about that? It should be clear, but it isn't. 'We should be able to talk about this'… 'Yeah'… We should, so why can't we? I just… ughhh, I'm frustrated. I want this to work. I actually really want this to work, Amy's smart, she's gorgeous, she's…
My thoughts are interrupted by a knock on my door.
"Josh? Hey." He looks worse than I do.
"What are you still doing here, Sam?"
"I could ask you the same thing."
"Yeah," I answer absently. "Have you spoken to CJ?"
"No, she just wants to be left alone for a while. I actually came here to talk about something else." He comes in and sits in the visitor's chair before continuing. "I heard what the President said," he pauses for a second and then with a sigh continues, "And look, I'm sorry, he shouldn't have blamed you for my mistake."
"Look Sam… he was right." We haven't really talked for a while, so this just seems long overdue.
"He was?" Sam asks with an incredulous look.
"He's right; it's my job to know how the opposition works and to stop us from falling into their traps. I knew about what could happen with the tape, but still, I was pre-occupied and so I didn't warn you. And for that I'm sorry. I may not be entirely to blame, but it is partly my fault." Both Sam and I sit here, quietly allowing the words that were just spoken to sink in. I hadn't really been thinking about this but it made sense.
Oh wait, Sam's talking, I should really be listening to this.
"…Yeah, but you'd think I've been here long enough to know how this world works."
"Yeah." I finally really look at Sam, and I notice he has that look he gets when he's up to something. I know about the press thing with Ritchie, but something else is up. His body language radiates 'I have a secret'. I should find out what. "So what are you gonna do?"
I'm thinking I could have phrased that better.
Playing the innocent, Sam answers, "What do you mean?"
Ok, Sam, this is me, Josh.
"K Sam, this is me, Josh, you know, the guy who you've known forever. We kick ass together, we're friends and above all, kicking ass is so much better when you share the victory. So spill," I say with a tired grin.
"Ok, so what are you gonna do about Amy?"
"How the hell did Amy come into this conservation?"
Sam just gives me this knowing look that roughly translates into a cross between, 'You are most definitely the biggest idiot there is,' and 'You've got to be kidding me, right?'
See we're friends, good friends, we see these things, hence my knowing he's keeping a secret. Sam's trying his hand at misdirection, and it just worked.
Ok, not really, since, I know that he's trying to misdirect me.
Still, I ignore the warning bells in my head and answer, "Ok, so Amy." Letting out a frustrated sigh, I then continue to say, "You know what, I have no idea. 'Us,' is taking too much effort, I know relationships need work, but not this much right?" That was rhetorical, in case you didn't guess. "I was stupid. I should have known her reaction. Hell, I would have done the same thing, it's just that… I don't know."
And the strange thing is, I really don't.
Or maybe I do, and I just don't want to deal with the truth?
"You care."
"Yeah." There is that.
Almost as if he's uncomfortable, Sam hesitates a little before finally asking, "Why are you with her?"
Honestly? I have no idea anymore, but he doesn't know that so…
"I'm sorry, what?"
"Since when do you not understand English?"
Great, he's not going to let this go.
"No seriously, what?"
"And seriously, why are you with her, because last time I looked - or rather, listened - you were not jealous of Donna's dates but still sabotaged them."
NO, no, noooooooooo, no, no, no! We are not going there. No.
"Donna has nothing to do with this."
"I didn't say she did, but something happened between you guys and again, why are you with Amy?" he asks with genuine curiosity.
"I do not have, and have not had, feelings for Donna. And as for Amy, I like being with her. She… she challenges me and I like spending time with her."
I don't think about Donna when I'm with Amy.
Sam's got that look, he's gonna say something that is a) going to make me hate him and b) keep me up all night.
"So, back to Donna…" Great, why can't he let this go? "…Considering you don't have feelings for her - in the romantic sense that is - it would be ok for me to ask her out?" Sam is managing to keep a straight and sincere face, waiting for the reaction he knows I'm going to give.
Only I don't. I know his game. I'm better at this, there's a reason I'm the master politician. Take that Samuel Norman Seaborn.
WAIT.
Did he just say he wants to ask Donna out? No, that would be, that would be… wrong. He didn't just say that.
He did.
This conversation just got serious.
"What did you just say?" He just sits there, with a look that says 'I know you're trying to buy time, and that you're avoiding answering the question, but It's not gonna work.'
Sam has a talent for saying a lot with one look.
There's a long and uncomfortable pause before one of us speaks again.
"She doesn't have those feelings for me." I didn't just say that.
Oh shit, I did.
I actually do think she has feelings for me. She doesn't know what they are, and for that matter, neither do I.
I think.
In trying to pre-empt Sam in deciding the nature of this conversation, I've just taken it to a place I did not want it to go.
Following what seems like an eternity - during which, both Sam and I reflect upon my revelation - he finally asks, "What happened Josh?"
After another lengthy pause and a deep sigh, I finally answer, "She had a relationship with someone." She had feelings for me; Joey said so, and then there was the thing about how she wouldn't stop for red lights, not forgetting the fact that she went way beyond the call of duty in taking care of me after Rosslyn. She had feelings for me, or at least I thought she did, and she went with someone else, how do you do that?
"So? You're with Amy." Sam answers with confusion evident on his face. He doesn't get it.
"No, I mean before Amy."
"Oh… Is she still with him?"
God I hope not. I'm pretty sure she's still single. And I really don't want to know otherwise.
"No."
"How do you feel about her?"
"Who?"
"Josh," he says in this, 'I'm serious here,' tone.
I stumble as I try to come up with an honest answer. "I… I honestly don't know, I thought I had… but now I… I just don't know. And then there's Amy, I know I have feelings for Amy, Donna can't mean that much if Amy's in the picture, right?" That logic makes sense. I mean. I don't really see Donna that way anymore.
I mean, I've never seen Donna that way.
"If you say so."
"Ok, so what does that mean? 'Cause you just lost me there."
"Think about it Josh, Donna's still there with you, day in and day out. If you had to picture your life without one of those women, who would you chose to leave out?"
Amy.
"That's not fair, Donna's been there for the last five years and Amy has only been there the past five months."
"Please! Like time is a factor."
Again, I'm lost.
"Okay, Sam? That thing you do, where you talk in riddles and then you lose me, you just did it there." I add a smirk for good measure. I really don't want to be doing this now. Whatever feelings I had for Donna are… dissipating, and Amy means something dammit.
"Josh, to this day you bitch about the time Donna went back to her ex, and you'd known her for what, a month and a half? You were a pain in the ass when she left." Sam finally adds in a serious and meaningful tone, "You missed her."
"Yeah," I sigh, scrubbing my hands over my face. I really did. It's the reason that I choose to celebrate the day she came back to work for me, rather than the day she actually started. Those dissipating feelings? You guessed it, still there. I'm pretty sure I'd bitch for eternity if Donna ever left me.
I'm also pretty sure that I just said something significant there.
But I'm choosing not to think about it right now.
"Look I don't know what happened. There's more to this than Donna being with someone else. But you know what? Let's forget about Donna for a minute." Sam pauses a moment, after taking off his glasses and releasing a heavy sigh, he finally says in an exhausted manner, "Josh you're in a relationship with Mandy all over again. Seriously, is that what you want?"
Amy, Mandy. Amy, Mandy. Amy…yeah, I see it, and the answer to that question is a resounding, Hell No.
"No."
"If Amy isn't another Mandy, and you really want this, then go for it. Make it work. But if she isn't the One, walk away before it's too late."
She isn't the One.
I have no idea if Donna is, but Amy isn't. I'm just not ready to give up on this.
"I don't want to be the hit and run guy."
"Just because you recognise a relationship isn't working doesn't mean you're that guy."
"Yeah…" I answer absently as I consider what he just said. It actually makes sense. "When in the hell did you get so smart about this?"
"You think I'm smart about this?" He asks disbelievingly.
"Well, yeah?" I answer, now questioning my previous statement.
"Ok."
Yeah, I'm gonna be up all night. My reasons for being with Amy have to be separate from Donna. And Donna? This relationship with Amy doesn't seem to be bothering her.
If she had feelings for me, there'd be some kind of reaction, right?
I need to stop thinking about this.
Hey, he didn't answer my question. I still have no idea what Sam's planning. I know he's up to something. I should ask him.
"Hey, you didn't answer my question."
"I don't exactly have an answer."
"You want some help?"
"Not yet. Anyway, you already have enough to worry about. Think about what I said, Josh."
"Yeah."
He gets up to leave and he's at the door, standing there weighing if what he has to say is worth it.
"Sam, spill."
"This relationship she had--"
No, definitely not going there, because I handled it so well the first time round.
"No, Sam…"
"No, just listen. She doesn't know how you felt. Hell, you still don't know how you felt, correct that, how you feel. I think, if she did, it wouldn't have happened."
I have nothing to say to that. Except question if he's right.
"Yeah?"
"Just ask yourself… look…. whoever this guy was, their relationship was enough to cause a problem in yours. She's not with him, I'm guessing you had something to do with that?"
He's looking for confirmation. Sorry Samuel, it really wasn't me this time.
"No, circumstances stopped them from seeing each other," I answer smugly. Why? I'm not so sure.
"So if whatever happened, didn't happen, they could still be together."
This right here? This right here is why I did not want to have this conversation. The smugness? Gone. I really do not want to be thinking of her and that… that - 'where's the 760 verbal when you need It' - together.
They could still be together.
If he wasn't forced to read her diary, they could still be together. At least I don't think she would still date him after that. But then again, she did say she was seeing a lawyer.
Great.
Thanks Sam, I'm gonna be up all night now. Like I didn't already have one-hundred-and-one things to think about.
I don't answer, so Sam continues.
"Next time, the circumstances might not stop her and whoever being together. How are you going to handle that?" He pauses for a moment waiting for my reaction before saying, "I've got a conference call, so I'm gonna go."
And with that, ladies and gentlemen, he leaves.
I have no idea how I would handle that, but what I do know is that, this is something I'm not going to concentrate on. My relationship with Amy is rocky, but it has… potential. I want to see where it could go. I like her and it's as simple as that.
I don't want to end it simply because of politics.
Oh wait, he's coming back in.
"There was something else."
I really don't want to talk about this anymore, so I say in an exasperated tone, "Sam."
"Don't worry, it's not about your love life, but if you want, we can talk about that some more." He says this with an evil kind of grin. Gotta get him back on track.
"No. What was the something else?"
"Hannah's back, here in the US."
"Yeah?" Ok, now I'm interested.
"Yeah."
"So you think we should…"
"Yeah, I think we should."
"We'd have to get rid of Bruno, she won't work under him."
"Yeah, and I can see you're really broken up about that. But seriously, she'd help us kick ass."
"Yeah." Despite the really bad week we've had, and not to mention that tonight alone has been a roller coaster, we're here at - I look at my watch and work out - one thirty in the morning, (meaning that yesterday was a roller-coaster, semantics) and grinning like idiots during this whole conversation.
Which is not surprising considering we both really like Hannah.
She's sort of a little sister to both of us. We're both really paternal towards her, even though she never actually needed us to be. We both tried to protect her when Chris died. We play big brother with her, although it's not really an act.
Professionally though, the roles are reversed and she often tries to protect us. The girl - sorry, woman - is extremely politically savvy and you do not want her as an enemy. Of course… I taught her everything she knows.
Stop rolling your eyes.
"So, I'm thinking we should talk to Leo and the President. Now."
"Are they here?"
"Yeah."
"Lets go."
***
January 2003
***
Present Day
I've just entered my apartment, dropped my backpack and am walking toward the bedroom. She's in bed, sleeping in a pair of my sweats and a Harvard T-shirt. Her hair is sprawled all over her face and God she looks beautiful.
I get changed and join her; she instantly molds herself to me, which is something girlfriends always did, but I never fully appreciated it until now. I get to sleep with her in my arms and wake up with her tomorrow, something we haven't done in a while.
Seriously.
Loving.
Life.
TBC…