Synonyms, a west wing fanfic

Synonyms

TEASER: "Dear Abby" and a Celine Dion song set Josh to wondering.

DISCLAIMERS: The characters herein don't belong to me; I've borrowed them from Warner Brothers, Aaron Sorkin, and John Wells, et al. I promise to return them relatively unscathed and to cherish them as though I made multi-millions on each episode. I own neither "Dear Abby" – that belongs to Jeanne Phillips, who isn't quite the Abigail Van Buren her mother was (IMHO) – nor Celine Dion's lyrics.

RATING: PG-13 for sexual content

SPOILERS: Anything through "A Change is Gonna Come" is fair game.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Dribble drabble sparked by a slow night in my lonely bedroom with my local newspaper – companion pieces in the "CSI" and "JAG" sections, as well.

Donna came in without her crutches today. It was a good day.

Well, not really. I mean, we almost went to war with China, John Hoynes played his opening gambit in his bid to take the Democratic Presidential nomination next year, and Bob Russell is still an idiot.

But Donna came in without her crutches today, so it was a good day in the most important respect.

Donna.

Donna and her utter inanity.

Donna and her pointless trivia.

Donna and her fascination with "Dear Abby."

She has no concept of what it's done this time.

There I was, just walking by the cafeteria table at which she sat with Ginger and Carol, minding my own business, when out of her mouth came the words, "There are few things in life more freeing than taking a hot shower and jumping nude into bed with fresh, crisp sheets."

And then I think she must have looked up and seen me standing there gaping at her, because she shut the newspaper in a hurry and said to her companions, "Josh is taking me on the China trip."

I was going to take her. Hell, at this point, I'm not letting her out of my sight for longer than overnight. But we aren't, as it turns out, going to China because – actually, since it wasn't my fault, I'm not exactly sure why CJ and Toby are going instead of Donna and me.

I will confess to wondering if I could or should even let her out of my sight overnight when, this afternoon on three separate occasions, I heard Donna's voice in my head saying, "Jumping nude into bed."

But it wasn't until just now, after I've come home to my empty apartment and CNN replays of Hoynes' interview, the President's speech, and pictures of demonstrators in Taiwan, that I admitted something incredibly important to myself.

Something tells me that Toby's reaction to my self-revelation will be something akin to, "Well, duh." Leo will just smile at me like he did when he told me to go to Germany, only the pain of why I needed to go to Germany won't be there. CJ will smack me upside the head on sheer principle, but she might actually be happy for me after she finishes lecturing me on all the reasons that this self-realization needed to become self-actualized a long time ago. Sam will ask me to have CJ smack me again for him for the same reason, but he will trust CJ to give the lecture the proper gravitas and forebear repeating it.

They would all laugh if I ever told them that it was "Dear Abby" and Celine Dion who caused this admission.

Maybe not so much "Dear Abby" as Donna reading "Dear Abby" out loud.

Yeah, I confess to looking it up in a Google search. I mean, there aren't too many options in newspapers for a phrase like that, so I was pretty sure it was Abby, but I had to be sure. And there it was, part of a letter written in response to a mother who was concerned that her 14-year old daughter sleeping nude was a sign of some kind of dysfunction or obsession with sex.

I was tired of CNN's constant blathering and went into full male "channel surfing mode" for a while, looking for something interesting on one of my 210 digital cable channels. I was hoping for a Mets game on ESPN Classic or a good commentary on the Mets' chances of landing Pedro Martinez from the Red Sox on one of the other sports channels.

What I got, after 20 discouraging minutes, was the pop music channel – one of those extra features for which I pay through the nose without ever benefiting. I listened to the end of Lionel Ritchie's "Lady", which sent me down memory lane to a time I held Donna in my arms and swayed on a dance floor, totally oblivious to everyone else in the room but her.

That, I have to say in hindsight, should have been a revelatory moment in itself, because I was in a room with the Queen of England and two of the three surviving Beatles. But I don't think even Mike Piazza calling me "dude" right then and there would have taken my attention away from the woman in my arms at the time.

Celine Dion's "Naked" stirred me out of my reverie, which I noticed to my dismay had lasted over 10 minutes. Stupid cable channel clocks.

For the record, Celine Dion isn't one of my favorite artists. I used to think that maybe Joanie would have sounded a lot like Celine if she had lived to have a professional career. Now I think Joanie would have been Celine Dion, after coming full circle to hearing Ave Maria in my memory as Joanie used to sing it. That makes Celine hard for me to listen to.

Be that as it may, Celine or whomever writes her songs for her is a brilliant lyricist. The words got me connecting dots with lines that should have been drawn and colored in a long time ago.

Under this midnight sky
With you here by my side
There's nothing that I could hide
You know me better than anybody else

All of myself revealed
There's nothing I could conceal
My soul is yours to steal
Take me wherever you want to baby

Baby I'm naked
So naked with you
Feels like the first time
I'm trembling, shaking
My heart's overtaken
Feels like I'm falling
All over again
Baby come and take me
'cause I'm trembling shaking
My heart's almost breaking
Baby I'm naked with you

Baby when you're away
It's almost like I'm afraid
I only wanna stay
Caught up in these stolen moments

So let's lose ourselves in the night
Forget the world for a while
Make love till the morning light
Take me wherever you want to baby

This is how I feel in Donna's presence.

She so totally disarms and unmasks me that I feel like she can see through my very soul. I feel emotionally naked.

Naked. It sounds so raw and unbridled, unlike its synonym, nude, which imbues a sense of grace and innocense.

I think hearing Donna say "jumping naked into bed" would be even more exciting than hearing her say "jumping nude into bed" actually was.

So what revelation did I come to tonight that has changed my entire future?

I would very much like to be physically naked with Donna. Repeatedly. On a regular basis.

Every night for the rest of my life.

Okay, naked except for our wedding bands.

God help me.

I love Donnatella Moss.

-- FIN –