Hold Me Now

Part Nine

A few hours later, Donna heard Josh's cell phone going off. Looking over and seeing it on the bed, she realized he forgot to take it with him when he left the hospital to get dinner. She thought about ignoring it but decided it might be important. She reached with her left hand and grabbed it.

"Josh Lyman's phone."

"Donna? Is that you?"

"Hey Sam." She greeted.

"How are you?" He asked. "Everyone has been so worried."

"I don't honestly know anymore." She chuckled softly. "But I'm alive so that's a start."

"It's a very good start." There was silence on the phone for a moment. "Look, is Josh around? I feel bad about interrupting, but I wanted to ask his advice on something."

"He actually isn't here. He went out to get us food that isn't from the hospital cafeteria but forgot his phone." She explained. "And you aren't interrupting anything. It's actually boring being in the hospital. What's going on?"

"I'm trying to work on crafting statements for if or when the President lifts the media ban. I wanted a second opinion about a line." He explained.

"I can give you the second opinion if you want." She offered.

"Are you sure?"

He sounded hesitant and she could understand why. It had to do with this situation and he didn't want to trigger her. "Yes. Or you could wait for Josh to come back."

"What do you think of this line?" He asked, pausing for a moment. "It is times like these that remind us our leaders are also people. People who love their family, love their friends and grieve the same kind of loses as everyone else. It's easy to criticize leaders when they don't act the way we want them to in times of trouble. But we must remember that our leaders are human."

He paused again before speaking. "I'm just not sure if I should put that in or not. I feel like there needs to be some kind of explanation for why the President hasn't made any statements though. What do you think?"

She thought about it for a moment. "I think you do need to mention something, but I'm not sure that's the right wording. Maybe it should be something like this. It is times like these which remind us that the people we have elected to lead us are only human. They are humans who experience the same emotions as everyone else during times of crisis—love, grief, anger and disbelief. This situation serves as an example of that fact. It's easy to criticize our leaders for their actions or perceived inactions. It is much harder to recognize our leaders are doing the best they can with the circumstances they are given."

"Wow." Sam scoffed. "I like that a lot better."

She looked over at the doorway and saw Josh there, staring at her.

"Thanks Donna."

"You're welcome Sam." She said. "Josh just came in. Do you want to talk to him?"

"No." Sam laughed. "I doubt he could come up with something better than you just did."

"Ok. Bye." She said before hanging up.

"What did Sam want?" Josh asked, coming in to the room and setting the bag of food on the bedside table.

"He wanted your help on a statement." She explained. "But you forgot your cell phone."

"What you said…"

"I know." She shook her head. "It was stupid."

"No." He shook his head. "It was really good."

She couldn't help but smile a little. "Really?"

"Really." He leaned in and gave her a quick kiss.

"You know, this shows that they need you." She mentioned. "He called wanting your opinion."

"No." He shook his head. "Not this again. We aren't having this conversation again. What am I supposed to do? Leave my wife completely alone while she is in the hospital to go to work?"

"Knock knock."

Donna looked over at the doorway and smiled widely. "Mom? What are you doing here?" She watched as her mom strode into the room and headed straight for the other side of her bed.

"I know you both said I didn't have to come but I couldn't help it, Donnatella." Gabriella Moss explained. "You are my daughter and you were almost killed. I had to see for myself that you are alright."

"It's good to see you, mom." She smiled.

"Yes, it is good to see you Gabby." Josh chimed in.

"Sweetheart, how are you?" Gabby asked.

"I'll be ok." She shouldn't have been surprised that her mom showed up. It seemed like her mom always knew when she needed her.

"You gave your father and I quite a scare." Gabby told her.

"It wasn't my intention." She shrugged.

"We were about to have dinner." Josh spoke up. "I have more than enough. You're more than welcome to have some."

"Thank you Josh." Gabby said, turning her head to smile at him.

Later that night Josh was on his way back to the hospital. He had found his mother in law a hotel room and got her settled in. He was surprised to see her, but he shouldn't have been. Of course her mother would want to check on her. She had bed timing though. At the time he wanted to finish the conversation with Donna about how he wasn't going to leave her to go back to D.C.

He wasn't sure why Donna seemed so convinced he should leave. Was she trying to push him away? Did she truly not want him around right now? All he wanted was to try and help her get through this. But she seemed like she was fine.

Other than her initial reaction to the loss of their child and the death of the First Lady, there wasn't any other reaction. There was no crying, no talking about it and just an overall avoidance of the subjects in relation to her feelings.

He knew she had to have feelings about it. He did.

The fact that she wasn't sharing her feelings concerned him.

He walked back into her hospital room and saw she was flipping through channels on the television. "Well your mom is safely in her hotel for the evening." He went over and sat in the chair next to her.

"Thank you." She smiled at him. "I appreciate you making sure she was taken care of."

"Why do I get the feeling she still doesn't like me much?" He asked with a slight chuckle.

She grinned. "Don't take it personally. She just doesn't like that it took you so long to realize your feelings for me. She'll come around. After all, at least now she calls you Josh instead of Mr. Lyman."

"It is progress." He conceded.

"You know you don't have to stay here at the hospital tonight." She told him. "I know that chair can't be comfortable."

"I don't mind." He assured her. "Besides, if I was in a hotel I wouldn't be able to sleep because I would want to be here with you."

"That's sweet, but you can't keep sleeping in that chair."

"Maybe they have a cot they could bring in. I can go see." He got up from the chair and was going to go check with the nurse when she called out.

"Josh…"

He turned around. "Yeah?"

"Before you go check, we need to talk."

Those were the words he had been waiting to hear. He immediately sat back down. "Ok. Yeah. We do need to talk. So let's talk."

"Can I go first?" She asked.

"Absolutely." He grabbed her left hand. "What's on your mind?"

"Well my mom is here now, which means that you could go back to D.C."

He sighed. This wasn't what he wanted to talk about. "No. Donna, I don't get it. Why are you so gung-ho about me leaving you?"

"It's not necessarily that I want you to leave me." She explained.

"You sure about that? It sure feels that way because every time I turn around you are trying to push me out the door! Are you mad at me or something?"

"No." She shook her head. "I'm not mad at you. I loved that you were here when I woke up and I love that you are trying to take care of me now. But I have nurses that can bring me what I need and I now have my mom to keep me company. There isn't much for you to do here, but there is back home. The President and the team need you."

"You need me too." He tried to tell her.

"But you can't sit there and tell me that you don't want to go and fix things. This is the biggest crisis the President has ever faced. I know you. I know you already have a strategy planned out in your mind for how to get the President through this without him losing the support of the American people or Congress. Don't you?"

"That's…" He couldn't tell her that she was wrong because he did have a strategy. It wasn't fully formed but the bare bones of it was there. "That's not the point."

"That is exactly the point." She calmly argued, squeezing his hand. "I'm going to be fine. The doctors say I'll be released in one or two more days. Then I'll be back in D.C. But the President can't wait one or two more days. He needs you now before this thing goes sideways more than it already has. Every hour he stays silent and refuses to let the team engage with the media is another hour that he loses support."

"I don't know if I feel comfortable leaving you though." He admitted. "With everything that has happened, we haven't had a chance to really talk about it."

"I know." She nodded. "But I'm not ready to talk about it yet."

He couldn't get upset with her about that. If she wasn't ready to talk then he wasn't going to push her. He was quiet for a moment as he considered his options.

He could stay with her. She would likely be upset that he was staying with her instead of going to help the team get the President through this crisis. He would be happy that he was with her. Yet he couldn't say that he wasn't torn about being so far away from the White House at a time like this.

He could go back to D.C. without her. He could go and make sure that the President didn't mess up and ruin every piece of political goodwill he had with the American people and Congress. After all, they still had plenty of time left in his second term. If he wanted to get anything done, he had to make sure he didn't mess this up. He would be glad to be making a difference but would torn about being so far away from Donna at a time like this.

What if he left and she ended up resenting him for it?

It was a no win situation.

"You think this is a no win situation, don't you?" She said.

"How did you do that?" He marveled. "How did you read my mind?"

"You're just getting predictable in your old age." She teased. "But honestly I just know you. This isn't a trap. I'm not going to resent you for leaving. I knew how much you love your job when I married you and these are extraordinary circumstances. In any other circumstance you would stay here. But you need to go. I know it and you know it too."

"I don't want to leave you though."

"It's just for a day or two." She reminded him.

"And this is really what you want?"

She was quiet for a moment. "Yes."

He was getting to the point where he didn't have it in him to keep fighting her on this. He sighed heavily. "Ok. Fine. You win. I'll go back to the White House."