|
An Innocent Kiss 5/6 by Jo March Disclaimers, etc., in part one.
I love my family; I really do. It's just that I love them more when I'm in DC and they're in Illinois. This is not to say that Christmas wasn't good. I had fun. I went shopping with my mother and my sisters; I ate too much turkey; I watched "A Charlie Brown Christmas" with my nephew. I argued politics with my Aunt Sadie's new husband, who is a Republican and remarkably ill-informed. I watched Josh on "Meet the Press," during which my mental enemies list hit fifty. But when my ten days of vacation were up, I headed back to DC with a certain sense of anticipation. I love my work; and what with the State of the Union speech coming up, I knew Josh needed me. In a purely professional manner. Still, coming back from vacation always makes me melancholy. I usually feel like I'm the only person getting off the plane who doesn't have someone waiting for her. If I'd been thinking clearly Christmas Eve, I could have made plans for someone from the office to pick me up. Instead, I was trudging along toward baggage claim alone when I heard a familiar voice yell out, "Donnatella Moss!" He was sitting at a Starbucks kiosk, looking extremely rumpled. I wondered briefly if he'd bothered to go home most nights without me there to remind him. "Josh, what are you doing?" "Picking you up at the airport." He took my overnight bag out of my hand, which immediately made me suspicious. That's just the sort of ordinary courtesy Josh tends to ignore. He started carrying on a monologue about all the work that had piled up while I was away. "Is that what this is about?" I asked. "You think you can talk me into going to the White House and working tonight? Well, no, Josh. Just no. I have ten hours of vacation left. No." "Well, it's just-there might be a message on your answering machine when you get home. I didn't want you overreacting to it. I'm sure we can straighten everything out." "Straighten what out? What have you done now?" "I didn't do anything. It was Sam. And Toby. CJ didn't exactly offer to help, but that was probably because I compared it to her thing with Danny." I stopped, nearly colliding with a family of five wearing identical Disney World sweatshirts. "Josh, please tell me this isn't about what I think it's about." "Do you think it's about what happened at the Christmas party?" "Yes." "Then it's exactly about what you think it's about." "What did Sam do, Josh?" "And Toby. CJ is not without blame." "What did they do, Josh?" "They talked." "To whom?" "Each other. Initially." "Initially?" I heard my voice come out about three octaves too high. Josh noticed too and grinned. "You're sounding like Minnie Mouse there, Donna." "Josh, please just tell me what happened." We started off toward baggage claim again. "Well, Sam knew that CJ knew, and he sort of forgot that Toby hadn't been there." "Okay. Toby knows. That's embarrassing, but I suppose we should have expected it," I said. "Yeah, but Sam told him while they were on their way to the senior staff meeting yesterday. And by the way, I would have been there to head off disaster myself if I hadn't been running late because I generously gave my assistant an extra three days off." "Your assistant worked five weekends in a row to get those three days, and will you please just get to the point?" "Promise you won't get upset?" "Josh, I've gone way past upset already." "Well, Sam was telling Toby about-about the thing that happened Christmas Eve. And you know how preoccupied they get. So I guess they weren't paying attention to where they were going or who was behind them and, well, Leo sort of overheard." I grabbed Josh's arm for support. (And by the way, he must have left the office some time during the last ten days cause from the way his muscles felt he'd been working out.) "Leo knows?" I squeaked again. "Yeah." "Leo McGarry?" "Do you know another Leo?" "Leo McGarry our boss?" "Well, technically Leo's my boss. You've got to get clear on this whole chain of command thing, Donna." "Leo knows." "We've established that. It's time to move on and develop a strategy." "Josh, there is no strategy. You kissed me-" "You kissed me back." "That is so not the issue. You kissed me. Leo knows. We're screwed." "Now that's what Sam would call an unfortunate choice of words." "This is serious, Joshua." "Yeah, that's what Leo said. And Toby. CJ said it twice." "Which is when you mentioned Danny." "Yeah, I think she's kind of pissed." The problem, from my perspective, was that Josh wasn't pissed. Or worried. He was gearing up for a fight, which always makes him happy. "Josh, just tell me about the message on my answering machine." "Oh, that's from Leo. He wants the two of us in his office at 8 a.m. tomorrow." And that brings us to today. ***
|
|
|