Chapter 10

Reality comes crashing down around him in an instant. Things aren't perfect, things aren't easy, and things certainly aren't figured out. He's still looking at her and she's still smiling, her lips swollen and her face flushed, but it suddenly seems unreal to him, like it didn't even happen. Like he's living two different lives; the one with her and the one without her.

"Yeah," he says quietly. The phone feels heavy in his hands and all he really wants to do is throw it across the room. "I'll tell her."

He hangs up and looks away from her to his bookshelf. "Will called," he says in a quiet, almost dead voice. "He wants you to meet with the vice-president today."

She doesn't say anything, confirming that things are far from ok. He knows it's ridiculous and beyond unlikely, but he finds himself wishing she'd say too damn bad, she's not working for that idiot. She doesn't though, and his curiosity finally gets the better of him and he looks over at her. She's watching him with a look on her face that's somewhere between resignation and anger. He knows his own face isn't hiding his frustration, and suddenly they're miles apart regardless of the two feet between them.

"I thought you were ok with this," she finally says.

He furrows his eyebrows and stares hard at her. "I don't know what gave you that impression."

"You haven't said…"

"What the hell was I supposed to say, Donna?" he shouts loud enough for people in the bullpen to hear.

"You're supposed to say 'good luck with whatever decision you make, Donna,'" she yells back.

"You want me to wish you good luck with Russell? A child would make a better president!" He shouldn't say anything like that in the White House; certainly not as loud as he just said that, but there's no going back now.

Donna shakes her head quickly and lowers her voice. "I'm not having this fight with you again."

"Hence me not saying anything," he says, turning to face the wall.

The room goes silent save for their labored breathing. He stares at the wall, not really seeing it, and he can't believe how badly they've messed this up.

"What are we doing?" she breathes out a long moment later. She's not asking, not really, she's just saying it to herself, but he finds himself answer anyway.

"You're pulling away at all costs," he says bitterly. "I'm trying to hold on."

"Don't," she says in a stern, commanding voice. "Don't turn this all around on me."

He spins back to face her, his hands on his hips. "Why not? You're the one who wants to leave."

"Professionally," she says emphatically, her hands balling into fists in front of her. "I want to leave professionally."

"Which will destroy us personally."

"It doesn't have to!"

"Listen to us, Donna. It is."

Her faces changes and she looks at him almost pleadingly. "Don't let it. It doesn't have to matter. Who I work for doesn't have to mean anything to us personally."

"What do you want me to do?" he asks. "Pretend I don't hate what you're doing? Pretend it's not beneath you? Pretend everything's fine? You really think that will help us personally?"

"No," she says, shaking her head. "Hate it. Hate every minute that I work for him. But don't let it affect…" she gestures between the two of them. "Don't let it affect us personally."

He chuckles harshly. "It affects us personally because it affects you personally. You don't do this; you don't work for the wrong guy to further your career. That's not you. I know I did it; I know I made those mistakes." He stops and pauses, the shrugs and looks at her again. "You're better than that."

His words give her pause, but only for a second. "So if I went to work for the EPA, you'd be ok with it?" she asks doubtfully.

He opens his mouth to speak, but nothing comes out. No, he wouldn't be ok with it. He wants her with him and they both know it. There's no use pretending.

"That's what I thought," says quietly. She looks at the floor, then bends over and picks the attaché case from where it fell when they kissed.

"What's so wrong with staying with me?" he asks, choking out the last word. "We're a great team; why is that so bad?"

She smiles, but it's sad; she's anything but happy. "In case I haven't made myself clear enough over the last eight years, let me spell it out for you, Josh. I want to be with you in a way that has nothing at all to do with work."

Her admission takes him by surprise even though what she says doesn't. But if she can lay it out there, he can too. "And I want to be with you in every way, including work."

"Josh…"

"Why can't we have that?" he asks, and now it's his turn to plead with her. "Why is that suddenly so wrong?"

She takes a deep breath and walks over to him, handing him the attaché case before walking towards the door. "Because you may want both, but given the choice, you choose the attaché case over the necklace every time," she says softly before walking out the door.

He feels like he's riding a rollercoaster that just derailed. Donna's gone for almost two hours, which means she didn't walk into Will's office and say 'thanks but no thanks.' He knows he's made it worse; that by pushing he talked her into the job he was trying to talk her out of, but it's as much her fault as it is his. She's being pigheaded and stubborn; she knows she shouldn't be working for Russell. He won't take all the blame here.

Forty-five minutes after her departure from his office, after staring at the door and wondering what the hell she meant by the attaché case remark, and then being pissed off by it, he wanders over to CJ's office. She's busy trying to do everything that her staff could be doing if she'd trust them to do it, but that only makes the thought of leaving easier.

Her door is open, but she doesn't notice him until he's sitting across from her. When she looks up, he quietly says it. He's approached someone about running for president, and if he agrees, he'll be leaving. He doesn't know yet, but he wants to her to be prepared.

She looks almost scared when he says it, like she doesn't know what she's going to do without him, and it's the most valued he's felt there in months. But she doesn't delegate, and even though she does need him and she knows she needs him, she's not using him.

He tells her it doesn't have anything to do with her or the administration, which is only mostly true, but that Russell can't and really shouldn't beat Vinick and that either one of them will destroy what they've all spent seven years there doing. The old CJ would understand, but this one's so busy holding on to this term that she can't see beyond it to the next one. Still, she nods and tells him that if it doesn't work out he damn-well better come back. He smiles at the glimpse of the CJ he used to know and gives her his word, then heads back to his office.

Donna's only been back for five minutes when he has to leave for a meeting on the Hill, and they spend it avoiding each other. When he does leave, he spends three hours arguing with Hefley over the preliminary budget for next year. Hefley's trying to get what he wants, but he's not stupid enough to take them on the way he did a year earlier when the president's numbers were in the toilet and he was too much of a father to be a leader, so Josh gets more than he gives. He gets back to the office a few minutes after six. She's still there, but she leaves a half hour later and they still haven't said a thing to each other.

The next day is pretty much the same, making it a hundred times worse. He's in the office all day, which makes avoiding each other harder to do and completely obvious to everyone in the bullpen. They correspond through Windows Messenger. 'Senator Roberts on line 1.' 'Toby's looking for you.' 'I'm going to the OEOB.' Things like that. At one point he needs a file he can't find and yells for it. When she brings it to him, she avoids looking at him and turns to go without a word.

"I chose the necklace; you just got back early," he mumbles as she's walking out the door. He doesn't really say it to her, but he wants her to hear it. He's been saying it to himself almost non-stop since she walked out of his office yesterday, including the two hours last night he spent drinking himself to oblivion.

She stops walking but doesn't turn to face him. "I'm not doing this here," she says in a monotone voice before leaving. And he lets her, because as much as he hates to admit it, she's right. This is not the place to do this.

She waits until he's back from grabbing a burger in the mess before messengering him and telling him that she's leaving for an appointment and will be back in an hour or so. He's almost grateful for it, because it means less time together, which in turn means less awkward silences.

She's been gone about twenty-five minutes when there's a tap on his door. He looks up expectantly and Janice tells him Congressman Santos is at the front gate.

Josh's eyes widen and he stands quickly and starts out of his office towards the lobby. "Tell them to let him in."

He gets to the lobby just as the congressman passes through the metal detectors in the lobby. "Josh," he says with a smile.

Josh shakes his hand and starts them on the path towards his office. "Congressman," he says partially excited and partially nervous. "How was your holiday?"

The congressman raises an eyebrow. "A bit stressful, and yours?"

"Fine," Josh replies even though it's a lie. He ushers the congressman into his office and shuts the door behind them, then stares at him, trying to figure out what he's going to say.

"My wife hates you," the congressman says out of the blue, surprising Josh enough to makes him smile an almost real smile.

"I'm… sorry to hear that."

"You're both going to have to work hard to win her over. I suspect it'll be easier for Ms. Moss than it will be for you."

Josh glances down at the floor. He should be thrilled. This is what he wanted; this is the congressman telling him he's going to run. But it won't be the same without Donna and he finds the excitement nearly gone.

"Sir…"

"I don't like being called sir," the congressman says, cutting him off.

"Well," Josh drawls out. "That's what one calls a candidate for president."

"Hmmm…" the congressman mumbles noncommittally. "What were you saying?"

"I was… I don't think Donna's going to be joining us, sir."

"Oh?"

"I'm not going to lie to you. It's going to be tougher to do without her. She's an invaluable asset. But she…" he looks up to the ceiling and takes a breath. "She's been working for me for a long time and she'd like to step out on her own professionally."

"That's a shame," the congressman replies. "I was looking forward to working with her."

Josh nods. "So was I."

The congressman looks around the room. "Well then… where do we start?"