"Josh, I have no idea what you are talking about." Donna's face had her confusion painted all over it and her eyebrows threatened to overlap they were so furrowed.
"Donna, don't play dumb with me…" his voice was high, a few octaves above his normal speaking voice. "I saw you in the hall with him, I saw you and I am not ok with this."
"Josh, what did we do? What were we doing that you are soooo not okay with?" The confusion Donna felt was turning to anger faster than she would have anticipated that it could. "Who is he to treat me this way?" She thought. "As my supervisor I can understand a professional reprimand but to threaten to fire me? He is way out of line." Donna's inner commentary was the perfect demonstration to herself that she had indeed grown during her time away from Josh while working on the Russell campaign. She was not about to stand here and let him treat her this way. Just as she was about to open her mouth to say so, Josh spoke up:
"Donna, I thought you aware, I knew I was at least, of the importance of maintaining professional relationships with your co-workers. The kind of trouble and scandals this could cause are catastrophic to a political campaign and I CAN'T BELIEVE I AM EVEN HAVING TO TELL YOU THIS." Josh's voice was still filled with anger but a certain level of incredulousness had crept in leaving him to finish his tirade almost with smirk on his face, albeit a "what the hell are you thinking" type of smirk.
"Is he talking about us?" Donna held her breath as she listened to her hysterical friend's bluster. She felt her face flush as his voice went from an uncomfortable squeak to an all out shout. Suddenly she didn't care if he was proposing marriage to her in this roundabout rant; she was not about to be spoken to in this manner.
"Josh!" She made her hands into fists and punched them down to her sides. She stood up as straight as she possibly could and with all the strength she could muster began her response to his attack. "First of all you are not simply telling me anything, you are shouting at me! And while I know you are my supervisor and friend, this is not an appropriate way to handle a conflict and I expect courtesy and respect from you when dealing with professional issues." Donna knew she was rambling slightly, but she also knew that she was making good, sound sense. She was not about to stand there and let him take out his problems on her, not anymore anyway.
Then he began to laugh. Not a good laugh either. Again his incredulousness was so heavy it was practically making Donna ill. "FRIEND? You call us FRIENDS?" He was shouting even louder now than before as he motioned his arms between the two of them. "I would not say that this is the way you treat a friend, Donna. This is not the type of courtesy that I would like from my friends…and who the hell are you to lecture me on professionalism when you are SLEEPING with WILL?" He had gotten right up in her face to scream the last part.
"Oh, I guess he is not talking about us." Donna thought. Her emotions were all over the map, she went from fear to rage and simple shock in a matter of seconds. It was right then, when he was inches from her face and breathing heavy, his eyes practically bulging from his head, that two secret service agents came jogging around the bend in the building, apparently they had heard a "slight disturbance" from their posts on the other side of the convention center.
"Mr. Lyman? Ms. Moss? Are you two…ok?"
OK was about the last thing either one of them felt. The agents caused Josh to do a reality check, he stepped back from Donna, this time turning so that the guardrail was to his side insuring that he wasn't trapped between it and Donna. He cast his glance over her face. She was staring at something behind him, her eyes cast downward, anger seeping from them. Her breathing was heavy, as was his, and her fist were still clenched at her sides, squeezed even tighter than a moment ago.
"Yeah, we're just fine" Josh lied. Waving his hand in the air to the agents, who had stopped after turning the corner and remained a full 30 yards away.
"Ms. Moss?" The second agent called to her, following standard protocol of receiving affirmative answers from both parties that they were ok.
"I'll be fine, Derek." Donna spoke but did not turn around. She had a special bond with these agents, she took the time to learn their names, learn who they were. She didn't want to take them for granted.
"Alright then." Derek seemed slightly reluctant, but he and Agent Kline turned back, and went to resume their positions out of sight and, under normal circumstances, out of earshot of Donna and Josh.
Donna looked up from the point on the ground that she had been focusing all her attention on. She was practicing relaxation techniques she had learned in a yoga class. The instructor had called them: techniques for when you feel nuts. Donna was sure that she had never felt this "nuts" in her life, she could even think of a few more descriptive words for it if she wasn't such a lady.
"Derek?" Josh said the agent's name in the smuggest of tones; "What, are you sleeping with him too?"
Donna opened her mouth to begin what he assumed was an apology and what she meant as a telling off for his unbelievable behavior. Before she finished her first syllable, he put his hand in the air to silence her and said bitterly, "I don't even want to hear it."
He turned and began to walk away, tears forming and nausea retaking its place in his gut.
Donna was stunned for a moment before spitting to his back "Good, because you are not even worth the breath." Her first were so clenched at this point that they were starting to hurt. She released them, but felt the tension in her shoulders increase ten-fold. She stood still, tempted to either throw a rock at his head or charge him at full speed and tackle him. She chose to do neither. She watched as Josh stormed away, looking less and less like the man she felt so strongly for, and more and more like an angry old man.
Donna felt nothing inside. That's not entirely true, it is just that she was pushing out all her emotions in order to keep herself from bursting into tears. "What just happened?" Never in her life had she seen the bitterness in Josh reach such a level, and never before had this much of it been directed anywhere towards her. "What am I going to do?" She knew Josh may very well been serious about firing her, and she also knew that at this moment she had no problem with leaving.
"I guess I should pack." Donna stated this out loud, though no one was around to hear it. She nodded her head and mustered up all her resolve to move upstairs. She arrived to her room and carefully placed her newly purchased wardrobe items into her bags. She had bought these in celebration of the new job, the new opportunity to be with Josh. Now, she doubted she would ever want to wear them again.
She sat down on the bed and reached for the hotel phone. After several ticket counters and call transfers she had finally secured herself a seat on a Delta flight that left at 9:30 tomorrow morning. She was going to go to Wisconsin. "A trip home is certainly in order." She thought, "I haven't been home in months."
She sat at that side of the bed, staring at the phone and wondering what was going on. Before the first tear could fall, she rushed to the bathroom and jumped into the warm shower, allowing her sobs to be drowned out by the forceful and steady stream of water.