Hospitals.

Josh hates hospitals.

He knows he has every good reason to hate hospitals. He's lost too many people: some in a hospital, and some never made it to a hospital and he wishes they would have so maybe they would have had a chance. Sometimes they made it to a hospital, but he was too late to get to the hospital to say goodbye.

Of course, he got shot and had a life-threatening injury and fourteen-hour surgery in a hospital. Then Donna was nearly blown up in Gaza and he sat by her bedside in Germany (after worrying the entire flight there that she might be another on the list of people that he was too late to get to) in a hospital. He was called into her OR when she was rushed into emergency surgery, terrified, and it took everything in him not to show her he was terrified, too (he's not sure he hid it so well). He and Donna ran through a hospital lined with secret service agents leading them to Leo only to find Annabeth sobbing, "He died, Josh!" to him at the end of the trail.

He's never really been good with blood, either. No one would guess it, those who know Josh Lyman- "Bartlet's Bulldog." They would never imagine that such a force to be reckoned with could be knocked down by the sight of blood or the thought of a bone protruding through someone's skin. Colonel Leahy in Germany just tried to brief him on Donna's status and he almost passed out right there in the hallway, leaning over to catch his breath. He couldn't even stay in the room when the nurse drew her blood. Maybe he started hating blood a lot more after he got shot, after he sat there watching his hands stain red as he clutched his abdomen, after all the wound dressings he had to change, after his hand went through a window.

He's looking forward to meeting their daughter. He's excited to be a father, he truly is – something he never even knew he wanted until Donna. He's excited to watch Donna become a mother, but he's terrified to see her in pain again. He never speaks it into existence, but his Josh Lyman brain worries about things that could go wrong. He hates the idea of seeing her in a hospital bed again, despite the fact that he knows this situation is completely different and this occasion will be a much happier one.

She's only on day four of maternity leave when she goes into labor. Josh rushes out of the White House and it's not entirely different from when he rushed out of the White House to run to her in Germany – except that it's different people telling him to "go!" this time and he has a bag prepared, just in case.

It turns out the rush was unnecessary because it's a long labor.

And despite his anxiety prior to this, he is completely unprepared for how hard it is to watch Donna suffer.

Donna's a trouper at first, poised as she ever is. She asks for ice chips, she breathes the way she practiced, she takes all the poking and prodding, she squeezes his hand when a contraction hits. She's chatting with the nurses – she's made friends with the new one on the nightshift, Matilda – and she's even skimmed a few magazines and has recited all the current celebrity gossip to him. Sometimes she works on a crossword puzzle, refuses to let him help.

When she finds out she hasn't dilated anymore between hour three and hour four, she laughs it off.

When she finds out she's only dilated one more centimeter between hour seven and eight, Josh can see the frustration – but she's still trying to hold it together.

Finally, they suggest that she's far enough along for the epidural, but the anesthesiologist is nowhere to be found, so she waits some more. She tries to be patient, understanding, even cracks a joke or two again. Josh knows her well enough to see it's a façade at this point.

She finally gets the epidural, but her mood starts to decline when she still feels the contractions and she can tell it isn't working. The doctor gives several options for how they can manage her pain if the epidural doesn't kick in, including redoing the placement of the epidural catheter.

Frustrated, she cries and Josh hates every second of it. He tries to soothe her, hugging her as best he can while she's seated in the hospital bed, wiping the tear off her cheek when she finally calms down.

The anesthesiologist is missing again and Josh wants to find this guy and kick his ass or better yet, send one of the secret service agents after him to give him a good scare.

She'd been strong the first time they gave her the epidural, barely flinching. But now her strength is waning as they change the placement, frustrated that she has to go through it again.

"I'm sorry," Josh blurts out suddenly.

"For what?" she wonders.

"For… this," he says, gesturing at the situation she's in and she just laughs but she plays on his sympathy for her and entices him to play a game, various versions of it she's roped him into before.

"Tell me a time you knew you were in love with me… before."

He rolls his eyes at her, but plays along. "The night of President Bartlet's second inauguration," he says.

She scoffs. "That one is obvious. Another one."

"When you tried to pretend you weren't disappointed that I got you a Tower Records gift card for Christmas."

Her eyes light up in glee and she actually laughs at this and he feels a little better that he is able to distract her for a moment, make her smile again.

By hour seventeen, they've gotten her some pain relief but then she's nauseous and she vomits as he holds her hair and gently rubs circles on her back and - she cries again. He tries his best to comfort her but nothing makes her feel better. He doesn't know the words to say because none of them can take away her pain.

Instead, he tells her, "When you would always eat my fries," and she understands and cracks a smile as the nausea fades.

By hour twenty-two she's exhausted – the nurses tell her she can try and get some sleep since things are still progressing slowly and she's finally out of so much pain. Donna yells at them (to Josh's surprise, because he's never seen Donna unleash on someone - other than him, when she was his assistant and she'd had it with him – that way) that Of course she can't get any sleep, are you crazy?! but the nurses just take it in stride (another day in the maternity wing, he supposes).

His detail is never far away and a few expectant mothers are sufficiently freaked out. Others just curiously try and see who may be inside. He overhears one asking a nurse, who gives no comment.

He goes to the vending machine around hour twenty-two. Donna has sent him to eat something. Though he's refused until now since she can't eat, he knows better than to argue with her when he sees that ire in her eyes, so he goes for a quick snack. On his way there overhears two people wondering if it's a celebrity. Little do they know the person who's actually being trailed is walking right past them.

A man approaches him, says hello – tells him he recognizes him and congratulates him. "I've followed President Santos since day one," the man tells him. "Big supporters in our house! My wife thinks you and your wife are an adorable power couple. She's going to lose it when she finds out she's giving birth at the same time as her." Josh thanks the man and files away the story to tell Donna later, when she's less likely to kill him at any given moment. Sometimes it still smacks him in the face that people know them.

During hour twenty-three he rubs her back to comfort her – sometimes it works, sometimes she snaps at him. Later, she cries again, apologizing for snapping at him. He just tells her it's okay but she insists that it isn't and that she's a horrible person.

"When you came to check on me after the shots outside the White House," he recalls, brushing her hair out of her face and proving to her that she is not horrible, not in the slightest. She lets out a noise that's a cross between a laugh and a cry, sniffing as she smiles at the memory.

But maybe the crying was easier on him than hour twenty-six when she's moaning that she can't do this, that her head hurts, that she's hot and itchy and uncomfortable and exhausted and she wants to give up. She tells the nurses maybe something is wrong with her, maybe her body doesn't know how to have a baby and they should just give up and take the baby out on their own. He's never heard Donna say she wants to give up on anything before.

The nurse brings her a cold cloth which Josh applies to her forehead and she closes her eyes with a contented sigh, relief flooding her head and her body at the feel of the cool cloth.

"Thank you," she tells him softly and his answer is to give her hand a squeeze.

"Nothing's wrong with you," he tells her with a kiss to the cheek and she opens her eyes to look at him. "You're amazing."

She gives him a soft smile and closes her eyes again, trying to relax against the towel.

He doesn't know what he'd pictured, but he hadn't imagined the long, agonizing hours of labor spreading out before them with no end in sight when he can't do anything to help relieve her pain. Perhaps he'd simply imagined she'd get the epidural and then sail through – he hadn't known how uncomfortable she'd be, the side effects she might have from it, how frustrated she would be that things were going so slow. He thinks about asking the doctor when enough is enough, when they might do something to give his daughter a nudge.

Finally, after twenty-eight hours, the doctor says, "Congratulations! It's finally time to push!"

Josh feels so much relief at that because he just wants this to end for her, but now she looks at him with those same scared eyes that he saw in Germany.

"You can do this," he tells her gently, understanding, pushing a strand of hair behind her ear. "You're so close, you're almost there – she's almost here."

She closes her eyes for a moment and nods as he kisses her on the forehead.

"I don't know if we really thought this whole thing through," she grumbles and he has to laugh because he knows she's joking but she's also serious.

"I'm right here with you," he assures her.

From there it all happens so quickly – the labor had been long, but the delivery is short.

"Are you going to be okay?" Donna wants to know as nurses rush around her, preparing for her to deliver. She can't believe there's a newborn baby's bed right next to her that very soon her child will be in. She looks to Josh with wide eyes because she knows his penchant for feeling queasy at the sight of blood.

"Yes," he tells her. "Don't worry about me, just – I'll be fine," he assures her.

"Maybe stay towards my head," she suggests helpfully.

"Donna," he chides. "I'm fine, you don't need to worry about me right now."

He holds her hand, is shocked to find that suddenly at the doctor's request he's even holding one of her legs. "Don't look!" she reminds him urgently, clearly still worried he may faint in this delivery room.

She pushes a few times until eventually the doctor tells her, "Just one more push, Donna and we'll be all done!"

She nods and looks to Josh who is looking back at her with that face like she's everything in the world to him, the face she's seen for many more years than they've been together, which gives her the energy and motivation she needs to get across the finish line.

"This is it," she tells him softly. "This is the last moment it's just the two of us."

He takes that in, thinking back to the moment he met her in Manchester, New Hampshire all those years ago. How they'd gone from there to here, everything in between and this was it: after this there was someone else joining them in their journey.

A minute later there's a cry and Josh lets out a breath that he didn't know he'd been holding. Donna's crying (again) but this time it's out of joy so he doesn't feel quite so terrible about her tears.

"It's a girl!" the doctor grins, holding up the tiniest little baby that Josh has ever seen in his life. He supposes she's no smaller than any newborn baby, but he's never seen a newborn baby in the delivery room, never seen a baby that's his.

They're asking him about cutting the cord and to Donna's surprise he doesn't even hesitate, doesn't even have a moment to think about fainting because he's so overcome with amazement. Then they place their daughter on Donna's chest.

He knows everyone says it: you have no idea what it's like when your child is born until it happens to you. But it's true and in this instant he's overcome with so much love for a baby he's just seen for the first time thirty seconds ago. He can't believe that this little baby is a part of him and a part of Donna and watching Donna hold her to her chest he knows he's witnessing the first moments of a mother-daughter bond that will last their lifetimes.

"Can you believe it?" Donna asks, looking up to him from his place by her side. His own eyes are glistening and really, he can't. "She's beautiful," Donna adds.

Josh pushes a strand of loose hair out of Donna's face and says. "She's amazing." He reaches out to stroke the baby's back, her fingers, her head. Then he leans forward and gives Donna a kiss. "So are you. I'm so proud of you," he adds.

Maybe hospitals aren't so bad.

Later, Josh holds his daughter while Donna closes her eyes. He knows she's not asleep (though she should be) because she's too wired up from the whole experience to really fall asleep. He knows when visiting hours start that Sam will be there, and probably Annabeth. They've promised Miranda she can come visit though her parents are out of the question (that amount of secret service clearance will clear the whole floor). There are flowers on her bedside table, a gift from the man who he met at the vending machine and it strikes Josh as absolutely crazy that their first congratulatory gift is from a Santos supporter. Donna opens her eyes and looks at him with a smile, watching him hold the baby.

"Donna," he says softly, though his eyes never leave the baby.

"Yeah?" she asks quietly, not wanting to disturb their child which, she realizes, is probably her life now.

"In Germany, I-" For some reason this whole day has brought up memories of that experience. "When I came, I never told you… I should've told you how I felt after that."

She lets out a soft sigh, eyes full of warmth. "I knew."

Things had taken a strange turn for them after Germany, but she always knew.

He nods and looks up at her to smile at her, that smile that she loves so much and he doesn't often give to just anyone. "I love you."

"I love you, too," she agrees. "Hey, I have an idea for her name." Josh nods, indicating he's listening. She'd already brought up naming her after Joanie, but Josh hadn't wanted to use it for her first name. As much as he wants to honor his sister, Joanie is perpetually a child in his mind, never older than a teenager and strapping her name onto a new child almost feels jarring. He loved Joanie and he knows he loves his daughter, but he can't imagine using Joanie's name on someone else. "What about Leah?" Donna asks.

"Leah?" he repeats, trying it on for size.

"It's not technically the female version of Leo, but it's close enough I think it could be a tribute to him. I heard it the other day. Someone yelled out 'Leah!' at the store and my first thought was of Leo."

Josh nods. Having had so many memories of Germany today, he remembers Leo then, too. If there's some place you'd rather be, everyone would understand, he had said. He knows Leo knew how he felt about Donna, he was sure he knew it back when he said, Get it together, will you? and maybe long before that. What surprised him is he never warned him about it, never tried to discourage the notion that feelings for Donna were dangerous.

"It's perfect," Josh tells her.

"Leah Joan?"

"Leah Joan," Josh agrees, "looks like you."

Donna scoffs. "She's hours old, Josh, she doesn't look like anyone."

"Trust me. She looks like you. I've spent enough years looking at you to know."

The sweetness of it takes her aback for a moment but he's not even looking for a response, he's too absorbed in his daughter.

"Yeah, but her stubborn refusal to be born is all you."

He smirks at that and looks at Leah, seeing her as Leah for the first time. It scares him in that instant, the intense feeling of love he has for this little being. He feels for this tiny human that he's just met the same way he feels when he looks at Donna.

It's a scary thing to love her so much, but Josh supposes that's life.

Leah Joan won't be the child that reminds him of his sister – Leah will be the child that reminds him of Donna, completely (which amazes him just the same). Sometimes he will call her Leah Joan or Leah Jo in the same manner that he calls Donna "Donnatella" in moments of playfulness or teasing. He's the only one who calls her that, and Leah will enjoy the special nickname from her dad. Eventually Leah learns who Joanie is (as well as Leo) and the middle name fills her with pride. Though he hadn't wanted it to be her first name, every time Josh says it he's connected to Joanie a little bit, again, as if she's living on through his eldest daughter. It makes it feel all the more special, though, that it's something just between him and Leah, a part of her name that for the most part only he uses.

He knows his life is forever changed the day he meets Leah – similarly to how his life was changed the day he met Donna in a bustling campaign office in Manchester, New Hampshire.