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Toby is the first to know. He’d been sitting at the front of the campaign bus, anxious to review the big picture calendar with Leo when Josh came in, backpack strung over his shoulder. But instead of taking his typical seat three rows back, he stops and looks at Toby “I’m going to ride with a new volunteer, she’s promising. Get her up to speed. We’ll see you in Charlotte.” Josh doesn’t have a poker face.
The first hour of the car ride is spent reviewing the campaign structure as they pass the outskirts of Boston. Josh wonders silently if Donna had already driven fifteen hours that day so he offers to switch off driving while pumping gas at a service plaza.
He starts to figure it out when Donna returns to the car with a plastic bag of sodas. “They have coffee in there but you need to get it yourself.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m not going to be the type of assistant who brings you coffee.”
“Okay then.” Josh grins, turns to head into the rest station, and steadies himself for what he’s sure will be a very long drive.
The corridor between Boston and New York is all too familiar to Josh. He’s driven it hundreds of times by now. And in Connecticut, out of habit, he finds himself taking his old exit before he even knows what he’s doing. Donna stirs in the passenger seat as the car slows and he doesn’t know where to begin explaining. But they’re off the Merritt now, and something in his mind tells him he needs to visit his parents. If they were still on the highway it’d be different, but he’s here and he’s five minutes away.
*****
Josh’s mom figures it out second. Shortly after her son knocks at her door without warning late on a Monday.
“Sorry for dropping in, we were driving to South Carolina and out of habit I guess. Once I was off the highway it felt wrong not to stop.”
He’s never been concise. “Josh” She stops him. “Welcome home. You said we?”
“Oh, I was driving with a new volunteer, Donna. We won’t be long. We need to be in Charleston by noon tomorrow.”
Donna’s tall and willowy, and young. “Welcome, Donna. Come inside while Josh continues rambling to himself.” Donna looks at her with a conspiratorial glance. Josh would be worried if he wasn’t so focused on seeing his father.
Josh drops his backpack in the hallway, “Can I see dad?”
“He’s in his study.”
Josh doesn’t say anything in response as he turns down the hallway. In the background he can hear his mom leading Donna to the kitchen with the promise of some food to go and fresh coffee.
The door to his dad’s office is cracked, and he decides the surprise is better if he doesn’t knock. He does take a moment to collect himself. The last few times he’s seen his father have been hard, he knows the treatment is going well, but chemo compounds on itself, and the fifth round was harsher than the fourth. And the sixth starts all too soon.
He only gives himself a half hour, knowing they need to be on the road and Donna has been plopped into one of the stranger experiences of a lifetime.
Donna hugs his mom when they leave, a promise to stay in touch and a LL Bean tote bag of leftovers and snacks, complete with a thermos full of coffee.
Donna starts to figure it out as she’s pouring coffee into his styrofoam cup from the gas station.
“I thought you weren’t going to be the kind of assistant who gets me coffee.”
“I’ll make an exception when your mother brews it.” She grins behind her own coffee cup. “You take all the new volunteers to meet your parents or am I special?”
“You're definitely special.” Josh looks over to catch Donna’s face, lit by the red of the stop light and the glow of street lamps. He’s sat at this intersection thousands of times, going home, leaving home, sad, happy, excited. He’s not sure what he feels tonight, he can’t parse out the feelings about his dad, about the campaign, about Donna into their separate categories. He knows he feels overwhelmed, so he focuses on the easiest thing. Donna, who just endured a half hour with her fake-boss’s parents on a whim. “Thanks for indulging that, I don’t get to see them often.”
“They seem nice. I think your mom and I will get along well. You should call her more often.”
“Did she put you up to saying that?”
“She didn’t have to.”
Josh catches another glance at Donna as he merges lanes back onto the highway. Her hair now looks like a halo in the light and he can’t help but think he’d like to make this drive with Donna a hundred more times, that he’d like to tell her about state beach they used to spend weekends at, and the DIY projects his dad has planned, and the game he and Joanie used to play at the gas station right before the state border. That thought pushes the anxiety and dread that lives in Josh right to the forefront of his mind and he doesn’t want to talk about his family any more. He doesn’t want to talk to Donna anymore.
Donna can’t become another thing he loves because that only means she’ll be another thing he’ll lose. And so, he starts quizzing Donna on South Carolina voter turnout and focuses his eyes ahead on the road, rather than her soft blonde hair and her wide smile and the way her voice calms him.
*****
CJ is the third to figure it out. Donna’s car pulls into the campaign headquarters at 11 in the morning. Josh jumps right out of the passenger side, as if anxious and unable to sit still for a minute longer. He’s rewarded with a deep ache in his back that he has to stretch out. Donna takes a minute to collect herself. When she exits the car she’s got a bag full of coffee cups and soda cans that need to be thrown out. She’s got a vague annoyed look on her face.
“I told you we could have taken another stretch break.”
“We had to get here, the campaign bus was here half an hour ago.”
“Nice of you to join us.” CJ yells from where she’s finding her own duffel bag in the bus’s cargo hold. “You must be Donna?” She asks the blonde woman. “Toby mentioned you.” She’s tall. CJ’s grateful for that. There’s not a lot of tall women in the campaign.
“He took me to meet his parents.” Donna’s tone is half joking and she’s rolling her eyes just a bit. “It’s a strange volunteer orientation if you ask me.”
“You took her to meet your parents?” Josh is walking right by her now. “A stretch break? What’s going on here?” He wasn’t going to engage in the conversation, but he stopped, avoiding eye contact, doing his best to take on an air of dismissiveness with just enough honesty to be believable. “I took the exit out of muscle memory, by then we were five minutes away and my dad had a rough chemo session last week.”
“Are you going to cause problems for me?”
“No.”
“I’m going to hold you to that.”
Josh almost figures it out that night, when he’s lying in bed wondering if Donna’s comfortable in the room she’s sharing with three other volunteers. They really should reconsider the policy of four volunteers to a room. Neither slept much the night before while on the road, chatting between switching off driving every few hours. He’s exhausted, and he’s never thought about another volunteer’s comfort this late into the night before. But campaign’s move quickly and he remembers the school lunch research that was missing rural communities that needed to be finished by the morning and he dives back in.
Governor Bartlet is the fourth to know. He’s trying to find a memo on beach erosion in the south atlantic. He’d yelled at Mrs. Landingham for it five minutes ago and was told to lower his voice. A tall blonde woman walks in the room when the collapsible table being used as his desk is only more chaotic than when he began digging for the file.
“Governor, you asked for the 1997 erosion report? We’re locating it but I’ve got the 1996 one here.”
“Who are you?”
“I’m Donna Moss, I’m with the campaign.”
“Since when?”
“Two days ago.”
Josh, he’s fairly certain it’s Josh, anyways, comes barreling into the room 90 seconds behind her. “Donna”
“I was just giving the requested report to the governor.”
“Which I asked Mrs. Landingham for.” President Bartlet pipes up.
“She described it as barking when she relayed the request to Josh, who asked me to find it. Which I did, and now I’m delivering it to you. Or trying to. If you’ll accept the 1996 data.”
“What are you doing on the campaign?”
“I’m Josh’s assistant.”
“You have an assistant?” Governor Bartlet looks up at Josh.
“She’s already organized our policy briefings for the next five states.”
“Alright then.”
Donna begins to figure it out as she overhears Governor Bartlet tell Josh that hiring an assistant is the first smart thing he’s done on the campaign, and Josh simply says “Her idea, actually. She basically hired herself. She’s good at this. She’s going to help us win this thing.”
But she just gave seven years of her life for a man. She’s here for Donna, not Josh. And she’s going to make a career out of this. And so, she opens another cardboard box labeled “EPA notes” and begins to sort through them one by one.
*****
Sam is the fifth to know. He’d closed out his life in New York, half ended an engagement, and licked his wounds on a flight into Boston. And then he dove right into work. Josh is a good model for that. So when Josh starts making puppy eyes at his new assistant, it adds an extra level of insult for the way Sam just imploded his own life. Unlike the others, he confronts Josh with more than a single question after a few weeks of the anger boiling over.
“You really let me implode my life for this campaign just to follow some new girl around.”
“I cannot possibly begin to tell what you’re talking about.” Josh stares at Sam, paper in hand like he can’t remember if he was picking it up or putting it down when Sam interrupted him.
“You’re dating Donna.”
“I’m really not.”
“Your entire demeanor says otherwise.”
“You think I’m dumb enough to date my assistant?” Josh puts the stack of paper down. “No, actually, do you think she’s dumb enough to date her boss? How many times does she have to prove herself?”
“I don’t think you’re dumb enough to believe it looks like anything else.”
“So now I should fire a capable woman because it looks like she’s dating her boss, even though she’s not?”
“This is going to end badly if you don’t get in line, and not just for you.”
Sure, he’s close with Donna. They spend time together, she briefs him for meetings. She does venue walkthroughs, she gets him lunch, never coffee, but she makes sure he has a sandwich on his desk by 3pm if he hasn’t already eaten. He teases her about her handwriting and limits the Freeride jokes to one a day after he made one that made Donna wince like it hit too close to home.
And sure, there was the night she slept in his hotel room. As Donna tells it, Josh kept her up revising the Illinois strategy and she had forgotten her room key. As Josh tells it, Donna had asked for 2 hours of refuge when one of the other volunteers had company. They did, contrary to Sam’s implications, stay up most of the night working. Donna had been the one to break through a tricky part of campaign language. They’d hugged, and almost kissed, but at the last second they both went for the other’s cheek before falling asleep on top of the hotel comforter.
While making coffee in the small hotel machine the next morning, Donna had quietly said, with her eyes pointed at the floor, “You know, I’m good at this, you should consider putting me on payroll.”
Josh had muttered “I know you’re good at this.” As he tied the same tie from the day before around his neck and poured his own cup of coffee.
Josh does pull back after hearing Sam’s words. When he notices himself glancing at Donna for a moment too long he turns back to the paper in front of him. When he takes Donna to lunch he makes sure to get takeout instead of making it a working meeting. The professionalism, the change in demeanor, the coldness confirm to Donna that Josh doesn’t like her like that. And she can’t spend the next four (hopefully eight, she corrects herself) living for a man that doesn’t live for her.
Donna leaves the next week and it confirms to Josh that she didn’t feel the same way. He spends forty eight hours silently doing his work, yelling when anyone enters his office. Leo tells him to take the night to get himself together and come back in the morning ready to launch the Illinois campaign.
*****
Leo is the last to know. He’d been able to ignore the signs for weeks, right up until Donna leaves just as quickly as she joined the campaign. He’s seen Josh heartbroken before. As a seven year old boy who lost his home and his sister in one evening. As a thirty-four year old man whose father had just gotten a stage three cancer diagnosis. He knows what it looks like. It takes him a minute, but he can tell Josh didn’t just lose an assistant, and the campaign didn’t just lose a volunteer.
Once Leo can see it, it’s all he can see.
Leo can see it when Donna returns a week after she left and he has to field half as many complaints from volunteers about Josh’s attitude.
Leo can see it when Josh returns two days after his father’s funeral and doesn’t smile for a week until Donna gives him a piece of good news about a tracking poll.
He hears it in Josh’s voice when his first response to being berated about his on-air comments to Mary Marsh is to ask about Donna’s job security.
Leo can see it when Josh buys a calfskin covered book on skiing in a rare book store, and spends the drive back to the white house tracing the embossed cover with his finger.
Leo can see it when Josh, through an oxygen mask, asks for Donna after a fourteen hour surgery.
Leo can tell five months later when Donna knocks on his office door at one in the morning, fighting back tears and whispering “I think I need your help.”
Leo can see it when Josh walks downstairs in a Manchester hotel three steps behind Donna and not talking about RU-386 for the first time in three days.
Leo can tell when his and President Bartlet’s plan of distracting Josh with biblically impossible tasks fails and he has to put Donna on a helicopter to get them away from each other.
Leo can tell as Josh puts him on hold to update Donna’s mom in a hospital room halfway across the world.
*****
The Santos campaign is hard for Leo. He’s never been the candidate before. And he’s never been this lonely before. You’d think it’d be hard to be lonely on a plane with 20 people who work for you and 50 reporters who want nothing more than your time. But he sits in the back, watching Josh slowly unravel before his eyes. Donna’s sitting next to him, leg outstretched into his space a bit, shifting awkwardly as she sometimes needs to after Gaza. He can see Josh starting to formulate a comeback as he turns to face Donna, words stopping and Leo can read lips well enough to know his final words are “Yeah, Okay.” Before he stands up and walks right back to Leo.
“We were thinking about this thing with Bono.”
“Oh leave me out of it, would you.”
Josh takes a seat, grabbing one of the water bottles littering the desk and spinning it in his hands. “That’s exactly what we were thinking.”
“Good.”
Josh looks back at Donna, leg stretched on his seat now, talking to Lou.
“Would you do something about that already?”
“About what?”
“How are you this dumb?”
“I don’t know. I was dropped on the head as a child or something.”
“It’s getting pathetic.”
“We’re two weeks out. I need you to be channeling the Vice Presidency, not my mother.”
I can multitask.” Leo says, turning to the stack of papers. “Josh.”
“Yeah?”
“Do something about it.”
“I’m working on it.”
“Work harder.”
“The vice presidency.” Josh pleads with his voice as he returns to his seat, handing Donna the bottle of water.
*****
Sam is the first person Josh tells. It happens accidentally, Sam is interrogating him on his personal life in the harsh California sun. And Josh defends himself before thinking about it. “There is someone.”
“Who”
“None of your business.”
“Who is it, Josh?”
“It’s poorly defined and we’re not telling people yet.”
“What an advertisement for healthy relationships.”
Josh closes his eyes and breathes in through his nose. “Donna and I have started to figure things out. I’m gonna talk to her this week.”
“You’ve figured things out but you’re talking to her this week.”
“I’m not asking for your commentary on my life. I’m asking you to serve the president of the United States. Come to the airport with me, get on a flight, and figure out the rest tomorrow.”
“I have a life here, Josh. I need a few days. Because some people talk to their fiancees before making unilateral decisions about their lives. Maybe you should call Donna and do something crazy like talk to her. Actually, with you, maybe it’s better if you don’t. You’ll just scare her away.”
CJ is the first person Donna tells. They’ve dranken the better part of a bottle of wine. CJs on her couch, hair swept into a ponytail, in her pajamas. And Donna’s on the floor, still in her black suit, pantyhose covered toes tracing the foot of a coffee table.
“Tell me about that odd moment you were mentioning?”
“What?” Donna turns, bringing her glass up to take another sip of wine before putting it back down.
“A series of odd moments between you and Josh. A few weeks ago.”
“It’s nothing.” Donna does finish her glass now, putting it on the coffee table before leveraging herself up. “We should get food. Are you allowed to order in with the secret service or does someone need to test your food like they do the president’s?”
“They don’t care about my safety that much. What do you want?”
Donna distracts CJ for a full ten minutes deciding between Chinese and Pizza.
When CJ’s finally putting the phone back in the cradle, “That was a nice bit you just did there, odd moments, spill.”
“I don’t want to talk about it.” Donna’ opening a bottle of water now. In the kitchen. She’s drunk and she doesn’t want to think about what’s going on between her and Josh, or what isn’t. If she starts to think about it she might start to cry and she doesn’t want to cry on CJ’s couch tonight.
“Did something happen?”
“No.”
CJ pours more wine into Donna’s glass. They sit in silence until CJ bursts out with “When are you two going to figure your shit out. It’s exhausting watching it. And Josh has an excuse, because he’s a dumb boy. But you. What’s yours?”
Donna’s back in the living room, water bottle half drunk and standing still over the coffee table. “I love him and he doesn’t love me.” Donna brings a hand over her mouth, like she can’t believe the words that just came out. Water sprays over her hand and now there are tears in her eyes as she tries to put the cap back on the bottle. “I didn’t. I just.” Donna’s mind struggles to find the right way to walk back the truth. But CJ is the former press secretary. If there’s anyone who knows spin, it’s her. She can’t undo the words just put into the universe.
Donna sits down in the armchair. Ten seconds ago she’d been too shocked to hear her words aloud, to know that CJ had also heard them, to fully process that she, too, had heard them. And now, five days after election day, she’s processing the truth herself. She finishes the remnants of the bottle of water and puts her head in her hands, trying not to let CJ see the tears.
“Oh for fuck’s sake. I’ve never met two smarter idiots than the two of you.”
“I don’t want to talk about this anymore.”
“I don’t think I’m the one you need to be talking to about it with anyway. But you’re dead wrong if you don’t think he loves you.”
“I’m gonna leave.” Donna stands up, feeling the wine rush to her head. She doesn’t bother to gather her duffel bag as she puts her coat on at the front door.
“Are you going to Josh’s?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Donna” CJ calls after her.
“Thanks for waiting until I was no longer the press secretary.” CJ attempts to diffuse the situation with a joke.
Donna is calling a cab on her phone now.
“Donna” CJ repeats. Humor gone from her voice.
“What?”
“Two years ago, when I told you to get away from Josh. I made a mistake. It’s good that you’re getting away from him professionally, but whatever these odd moments are, and I’d need another bottle of wine before getting the details, they’re long overdue.”
*****
President Bartlet learns the news from President Elect Santos. Sam following him into the oval office is a nice reunion, but the absence of Josh feels palpable.
“You already got fed up with Josh Lyman? I guess that’s understandable but I found he’s worth a second chance.”
“Vacation, if you can believe it.” Santos says.
“I really can’t.” President Bartlet dashes his eyes towards Sam. “Is this some kind of practical joke? Josh, you can come into the oval now.”
“Not a joke, he’s on vacation.”
“No really, how long do I have to hold out until someone gets ten dollars?”
“President Bartlet, Josh is in Hawaii. I’ll be handling transition items for the next week.” Sam moves the folder to the coffee table, opening it up and pulling out the briefing on nuclear safety.
“Really, we’ve got a country to run. Where is he? Next time come up with a more believable lie than Joshua Lyman taking a vacation.”
Santos chooses to chime in then, “It may be more believable when you also know that Donna Moss is with him. But Josh is on vacation right now and won’t be joining today’s meetings.”
Not many things with silence President Bartlet, but he does let that piece of information settle in the room.
“You know, one time Josh had me call up Donnatella’s high school English teacher to congratulate her on her retirement. If I hadn’t made the call I’m fairly certain we’d be celebrating Molly Morello day in June.”
“I’m not too surprised to hear that, sir.”
“You’ll let them visit up in Manchester every now and then?”
“I can see to that.”
*****
Josh’s mom figures it out between an email from her son and Donna’s out of office message with perfectly overlapping dates. She keeps quiet, fearful of overstepping, and squashes every urge to cheer when she’s invited to Thanksgiving with the two of them.
Josh had asked for the family ring at the end of the conversation. She doesn’t bring it to her jeweler in Palm Beach to be cleaned, she treats herself to a weekend trip in New York, where she brings the ring to the jeweler where Noah bought her engagement ring and various birthday and anniversary presents over the years. She sits outside the apartment building where she lived the first time she rebuilt her life, the apartment building where she brought her kids home and where they ran up and down the hallways. She meets up with an old friend, one from the past, from a time when she had two young kids and a husband, and a future in front of her. For the first time in a long time, she talks about her kid’s future with hope in her voice.
She gives the ring to Josh the night before Thanksgiving, with nothing but a “Was it really necessary to make me wait eight years? I could have told you you were going to marry her in 98.”
*****
Toby is the last to be told. He’d kept his distance at Leo’s funeral. But he calls Josh’s apartment on the first night of Hanukkah. He doesn’t know if he’s trying to catch up with Josh, catch him in an act of non-observance, or what, but he wants to hear Josh’s voice.
Instead, it’s Donna who picks up the phone.
“Bob?” She says out loud, looking at Josh.
“It sounds like you’re busy - I’ll let you get back to work. Sorry for interrupting.”
Donna places the voice.
“Josh is just getting out the candles. Let me put him on the phone.”
Josh takes the phone from her hand, squeezing her hip slightly as he hugs her from behind. “You’ve got five weeks before you’re in the oval and you’re not working?” She hears come out of the receiver.
“We’re taking a minute for dinner. Chill out.”
“Did you just tell Toby to chill?” Donna whispers to Josh.
“I just told Bob to chill.” Josh looks over at Donna, now moving their plates of takeout to the table. “It’s different than telling Toby to chill.”
Toby counters with, “This seems a little irresponsible.”
“To eat dinner?” Josh meets Donna at the table, catching her and bringing her in for a quick kiss before returning to his phone call with an annoyed look.
“It’s transition, eating a bag of chips between meetings is an irresponsibly long dinner.” Donna can hear Toby’s voice rising through the phone.
“Donna and I haven’t seen each other all day.”
“Josh” Toby says, in the tone he uses only when he knows he’s right and the other person isn’t going to be happy about it. “Are you dating Donna?”
“Yes.”
“About time.”
“Yes.” Is all Josh says as he puts the phone back in the cradle.
*****
It’s not until years later, when most of the Bartlet administration had happened to be in DC on the eve of Donna’s fortieth birthday, that conversation had turned into a competition of who knew about them first. Toby is declared the winner when he recounts Josh’s face on that bus, all those years ago, following it up with “It’s the same face he has right now.” Josh, of course, is looking at Donna from across the room. “See, my unfortunate habit of being right continues.”
Donna’s sat in an oversized armchair, a curly headed toddler napping against her baby bump. Josh had spent most of the evening following their six year old closely, she’s been overly invested in Zoey and Charlie’s newborn and Josh has been trying to distract her all evening.
“She must be excited for this new one.” Abigail whispers to Donna, ignoring Toby’s victory lap happening across the room.
“Josh and I are hopeful we’ll be allowed a cuddle with them every now and then.”
“And you know the sex, you’re just pretending not to.”
“Yup.”
“That’s just no fun.”
“Live with it.” Donna gives a mock stern response, before turning to her oldest. “Soph can you come here baby?”
Sophia does as she’s told, but does take a moment to correct Donna. “I’m a big girl, mommy.”
“Do you like it when someone gets in your face when you’re trying to eat?”
“No.”
“Then maybe we should give baby Olivia some space.”
“I need a taste tester for the whipped cream.” Abby pipes up. “Do we think there’s anyone set for the job?”
As Sophia follows Abby into the kitchen Josh takes the opportunity to sit down where Donna’s feet are outstretched, taking in the sight of Noah, and his full head of curls. He’s usually full of energy. But earlier he’d tired himself out keeping up with the older kids, desperate to be grouped with the big kids rather than the growing generation of babies.
“Can I get you anything?”
“Take Noah so I can -” She gestures towards the bathroom.
Josh leans over carefully, scooping Noah up and immediately collapsing him into his shoulder, stilling for a few seconds to make sure the disruption didn’t wake him.
When Donna comes out of the bathroom she stands next to Josh, whispering, “You couldn’t have made a move at some point in that car ride to Charleston that apparently clued everyone else in the world in?”
“Why do you care about that now?”
“Because now I’m forty weeks pregnant, turning forty and we could have been done having kids years ago if you’d gotten your head out of your ass. Instead I’m just here with my stupid geriatric pregnancy.”
“You want to get out of here so you can ridicule me in private?”
“Would you mind?” Donna has one hand on her belly and one on her back, and when Josh takes a moment to look more closely he can see the sheen of sweat on her face and her shirt crumpled like she’s been readjusting it all evening.
“Let me go see if Soph can have a sleepover with the twins or Ellie.”
Toby, overhearing, butts in, “We’ve got her. Both of them, if you need it. Go home. Happy Birthday, Donna.”
Donna and Josh share a look, silently asking the other if Noah will be joining. After a few seconds, Josh nudges Noah awake, “Hi big guy,” he says to the big brown eyes looking up at him.
“Why am I baby and Noah’s big?” Sophia complains. Donna takes the chance to sit back down on the Ottoman, maneuvering Sophia to stand between her legs.
“Hi big girl,”
“That’s better.”
Donna stifles her chuckle, continuing on “You and your younger brother are going to spend the night with Huck and Molly. Is that okay?”
“Why?”
“Because you’re playing so nicely, we thought it would be fun for you.”
“But baby Noah is sleeping. Why is he staying?”
“So he can have breakfast with you all. Toby makes a great breakfast.”
“That’s right.” Toby pipes up. “And I’ll even let you choose what we’re having.”
With Toby occupied getting Sophia onboard, Josh is looking around the room for someone to hand Noah off to, finding President Bartlet sitting on the couch, in conversation with Ellie and CJ. Quickly making eye contact before walking over.
President Bartlet eagerly takes the toddler, clearly drowsy again. “I don’t think your dad’s ever been this still in his entire life.” As he settles in his arms.
Josh’s focus is across the room, where Donna is hugging Sophia tightly, before peppering her face with kissess.
Josh leaves his son safe in President Bartlet’s arms, kneeling down to give a similar goodbye to Sophia, before helping Donna off the ottoman and placing an arm firmly around her back.
“Do you want to say bye to Noah?”
“I don’t need to wake him back up. I’ve had him all evening”
“When did you know?” Josh asks, as he’s sliding into the driver’s seat.
“Know what?”
“That you loved me?”
“Jury’s still out.”
“If you weren’t in labor I might take issue with the amount of times you’ve insulted me in the last twenty minutes.”
“I’m not in labor.”
“Where have I heard that one before?”
Donna reclines the passenger seat a bit, “When you gave me your name tag. I like it when you give me jewelry.”
“If that’s all it takes, I’ve got a whole box of white house badges with your name on them.”
“My standards are a little higher these days. I want you thinking diamonds and sapphires.”
“Consider it done.”
Donna turns to the window, hiding her face from Josh as she grimaces. “I should come up with a list of other things to ask for while I’m not in labor.”
“That one started at 7:03, if you’re timing them.”
“No earrings.” Donna rolls her head towards Josh as they roll to the red light. “Sophia asked to get her ears pierced when I was getting ready for Sam’s fundraiser last month. And I’m not ready for her to have pierced ears and I don’t want to be the kind of parent who says no to it, so we’re just going to delay her asking again for as long possible”
Josh looks over, catching Donna in the glow of the red light, rambling aimlessly about their kid. “I know when I fell in love with you.” He blurts out.
“Yeah?”
“It was in the car, driving away from my parent’s house that night.”
“The first time I got you coffee.” Donna smiles, reaching to squeeze his hand.
“Yeah, One of only five times or so you’ve brought me coffee. Some husbands might take issue with that.”
“Well, they wouldn’t be very good husbands and the thing about my husband is that he’s actually pretty fantastic.”
“Fair point.”
“So I won the game.”
“You get to be married to me, of course you win.”
“I wouldn’t push your luck when you think I’m in labor.”
“You just complimented me, a sure sign you’re not in labor.” Josh does take a moment to look over at her.
“I knew first. You knew fourth. I win. I’m gonna have to do a little victory lap around Toby next time I see him.” Donna’s breath catches towards the end of the sentence.
Josh pulls the car up to their townhouse, “I’m just gonna go grab the hospital bag, I’ll be right back down.” Josh squeezes her hand and presses a kiss to it. “I love you. Even if I was the fourth to know it.”