Title: 20 Hours in Wisconsin by Bramble
Rating: PG-13 (this part)
Full info in Part I


---



The meeting with Falk went well, I had tried to call home earlier but no one was there. Josh did his Josh-thing, true to his word, we zipped in, we zipped out.

"So, let's go meet the Mosses."

I take my eyes off the road to turn and stare at him for a second. "Josh, I'll drop you back at the hotel."

"Nope, I want to come with you. It'll be fun."

"Fun for who?"

"Me."

"Joshua.."

"Donnatella..if for no other reason, I want to meet the people who named their daughter Donnatella."

"I don't think this was part of the plan, this wasn't supposed to be punishment for me, just you."

"Yeah, but this is a convenient by-product of that plan. C'mon, I'll be good."

I roll my eyes and consider this; what the hell, I'm already feeling slightly uneasy, how much worse could this get? I sigh, trying not to remember a secret plan to fight inflation as I turn out onto the highway and prepare to bring Josh home with me.

***

The house is quiet and dark when we finally get there. I still have a key; my parents insisted before I even went away to college in Madison, so that's not a problem. The temperature has dropped to about 40 degrees and I realize I haven't packed for this type of weather at all. The house is cold inside and I'm shivering -- great. Welcome back.

"So, this is the Moss family homestead?" He interrupts me from my musings.

I turn to watch him fling his suit jacket over a hook by the door and look at me. This *is* very odd. Josh is standing in my house, or rather, my parent's house. I feel both sixteen and twenty-seven at the same time; I can't decide which impulse is stronger. I walk over and turn on the heat.

"Yep, this is it."

"Where is everyone?"

"Well, everyone being my parents -- I'm not sure."

He looks around the entryway and living room. Growing up I didn't think much about it but looking at it from more of an outsider's eye it is a nice house; very comfortable and homey.

He wanders past me as he takes everything in. I can tell he's analyzing the furniture, the books on the shelves, everything, trying to get more information on me. It's the kind of thing he does.

"Nice house, lots of books."

"Yeah, my parents both read a lot."

"They teach, right?"

"Yeah, my Dad high school English and my mom at UW-Waukesha."

He makes a 'hmmmmm..' noise, which I'm going to take as some kind of approval.

"So, this is interesting."

"Interesting how?"

"Just interesting in the way that you grew up here."

"It really wasn't that interesting, Josh."

"Okay, if you say so.." He's picking stuff up off of shelves and turning them over, examining them. His eyes light up as he grabs a cheesehead hat by the TV.

"Okay, *this* is interesting," he puts it on, "can I ask what in god's name this is?"

"It's a hat shaped like a wedge of cheese." I'm not going to give him the satisfaction of making some stupid Wisconsin joke.

"How do I look?"

"Like you have a big piece of cheese on your head."

"But it a good look for me? Seriously though, I will wear this the next time I go on Larry King if you bring me coffee for the rest of the year."

"No."

"Are you sure? I bet I look pretty stupid."

"You do, but the chances of you looking stupid without wearing the hat on CNN are pretty high, so I think I'll just take those odds."

"Okay, but I'm going to wear this around for a while so you can take it all in, you know, just in case you want to change your mind."

I give him the tour and we end up in my old room. Watching Josh look around in here unsettles me even more, but not in an entirely unpleasant way. In fact, seeing him in my old room is giving me ideas that I'm not sure I should be having. I mean, ideas where I fling him on the bed and do things to him that would make sixteen-year-old-Donna run screaming from the room.

The cheese hat is helping me keep those desires in check.

It's certainly not the first time I've thought of Josh like this, though. When I first started working for him in Manchester, I had a bit of a crush. Okay, okay a *big* crush. I would think about having sex with him sometimes when I... um...relieved stress. That made me feel kind of weird about him at work though, so I tried to stop doing that; I was moderately successful.

As time went on we developed this sort of rhythm to working together and I swear, it seemed like it was almost better than sex. Okay, not really, but you get what I'm trying to say.

While he was recovering after Rosslyn sometimes he would wake at night with a nightmare. I would hear him tossing about from my bed on the couch and rush in there to wake him and hold him until he calmed down. There were a few nights I considered offering my body as a comfort, thinking that, even for a little while, I could help him push back the terror of what had happened to him. I knew it would be for the wrong reasons though, so I just held him instead. On excessively bad nights I would stay in bed with him until morning or we would wander out to the living room to lay on the floor and watch TV, trying to get his mind off Rosslyn.

But right now, I don't feel any of the familiar obstacles, if anything, we've been flying the innuendos and double entendres excessively since that one night a few weeks ago, when I ended up at his place after drinking too much. It's been awkward occasionally since then and I can't help but think that maybe we should just act on the impulses I'm pretty sure we both have, so that there aren't anymore uncomfortable silences at work.

I shake my head lightly, trying to physically make myself focus and stop rationalizing reasons to jump on him. I need to get out of this room and I should really find out where my parents aren't home.

I don't think he can do much damage in here; a lot of my old stuff is boxed up and all that's really out is some books and my twin bed. It's kind of embarrassing really, my parents have almost left the room as it was when I went to college. I picked some stuff up before I moved in with my ex-boyfriend, the infamous Dr. Freeride, then dropped some boxes off before I drove to New Hampshire after that ended, but really, it looks pretty similar to when I actually lived here. It always kind of freaks me out when I visit, it's like being sucked through a time warp or something.

"Josh?"

"Huh?"

"I'm going to go call my sister and see what's up with my parents. Will you behave yourself?"

He smiles, "Of course."

"I mean it, no opening boxes or anything."

"You bet. Hey, maybe you could find some food or something -- this hat is making me hungry." He gives me a grin before turning his cheesy head back to my bookshelf.

***

I am in some sort of a Donna Moss museum. I would know it's Donna's room even if she hadn't told me because all of her stuff is still here. I mean, some of it's in boxes and it doesn't appear to be recently used, but, there's still enough of her here to identify it as such. I can't believe her parents left it like this. Maybe they're hoping she moves back one day -- a thought that troubles me.

I look through the books on her shelves. Our Bodies, Ourselves, The Hobbit, Mists of Avalon, Are You There God, It's Me Margaret, The Origin of the Species, a book on Navajo witchcraft... I smile at the variation of interests she had even while growing up. I grab a few of the books and bring them over to the bed with me.

Donna's bed. It's stripped of sheets or pillows; there's just an afghan down at the foot of it. I sit down and bounce a little; it squeaks, that can throw a damper on trying to be stealthy, say if your parents were obliviously sleeping a few rooms away. Okay, that was a weird thought.

Of course, her parents aren't here right now so it wouldn't matter if we made her bed squeak while she had her way with me, maybe the headboard would bang against the wall as Donna wrapped her legs... Huh? I didn't mean...yes, I did. I did mean that. I am a very bad Deputy Chief of Staff.

Holy shit, I am the Deputy Chief of Staff and I'm on a squeaky bed in Walkinsauce, Wisconsin, wearing a cheese hat; oh yeah, and evidently, I want to do very unassistantly thing to my assistant. I sigh as I take off the hat and rub my head, trying to stimulate my brain into rational, adult thought.

While leaning back, my eye picks up something on the floor, sticking out from under the bed.

A few seconds later I am about to go nose-deep in what I am guessing is Donna's old journal. This is so horrible. I should not be doing this. I know that, I really do, but, maybe, just a quick peak. You know, just to get more insight on Donna before I knew her; but it's wrong. It's really, really wrong.

I'm starting to feel slightly schizophrenic; I think I need guidance.

"Sam." I say into my cell as his voice greets me.

"Yeah?"

"I'm Donna's old bedroom and I'm having a moral dilemma."

"Did you trip?" I can hear him laughing after he says this.

"Ha, that's amusing."

"You're doing that thing where you pretend to laugh, right?"

"How'd you guess that? Anyway, she's doing something, she left me in here alone, and I think I found an old diary or something.."

"Are you reading it?"

"No, see that's the dilemma."

"You're a very bad Deputy Chief of Staff.."

"Yeah, that thought actually crossed my mind before I even found the diary, but.."

"You can't read it."

"Yeah.."

"Diaries are sacred Josh. You'd be violating her trust and.."

"Yeah, I probably shouldn't violate Donna should I?" Yeah and I'm still talking about the diary here. Right.

"Umm, well, probably not..."

Suddenly the door opens and in comes the journal-girl herself, carrying a pint of haagen-dazs, "Hey, look what I found in the freezer.."

"Gotta go," I say into the phone quickly, trying to pretend I wasn't just talking into it.

"Uhhhhh..." I try to hide the journal and pick up a book, any one of the books that I brought over to the bed. I try to pretend that I've been reading it this whole time. Granted, this is not the brightest idea I have ever had since she saw me talking into the phone. I'm not sure it's working because she's staring at me. Okay, I can fix this.

"I love this book! I was just discussing it with Sam," I say enthusiastically.

"Are You There God, It's Me Margaret?" She's got an amused look on her face.

"Uh-huh. It's great."

"Josh, it's about a girl who wants to get her period."

Ahhh! I toss the book into the air like it just suddenly caught on fire. I know, I know, I am an idiot, believe me when I say that I do know that.

I work for the President of the United States, I routinely meet with senators, governors, heads of state, government officials, and I am one of the smartest political minds in Washington, DC but for some reason, Donna Moss seems to be able to turn me into a blundering idiot lately.

Her eyes study me a bit better and then travel down to the bed and she sees the journal under my elbow. In three quick strides she's over to me.

"What the hell, Josh?"

"Ummmm.."

"Josh, this is private. I never would have let you stay up here if I thought you were going to snoop," her eyes get wide and her voice gets a bit higher, "Were you *reading* it to Sam?!"

"No, no, no, never, I would never do that. I'm sorry, I just found it, I didn't read any of it, I promise."

"What were you doing talking to Sam?"

"I was getting a second opinion on the fact that if I even opened it I would be the worst man on the face of the planet."

"Josh, you promise you didn't read it?" She looks calmer than before but still not entirely convinced.

"Yes."

"Promise like you promise someone on the hill or promise like you promise Leo?"

I don't even have to try to look sincere when I say, "Promise like I promise you."

"Oh", she sits down on the bed next to me and sets the ice cream on the floor.

I hand the journal to her and she promptly takes it and bats me on the back of the head with it.

"Oww! Okay, okay, I deserved that. That was fine." I say rubbing my head.

"There's just stuff in there from a long time ago, stuff I'm not sure I'd want you to read."

"Okay."

"I mean, I wrote in that when I was seventeen and eighteen, I had it out the Christmas before last when I was here visiting, I must not have put it..." She trails off, then starts again, "Did you know that April is National Uh-Huh Month?"

"What does that mean?" If I hadn't known Donna for so long I'd be really confused now.

"I don't know, but it seems important somehow, doesn't it?" She's got a faraway look in her eye and I can see she's distracted by something.

"Donna, are you alright?"

"What do you mean?"

"Are we alright?"

She looks at me but her face is unreadable, not even 'the look'. "Of course we are, I'm just...", she pauses and adds, "My parents are out of town." There's something in her voice when she says it, if I didn't know better, I'd say it was a little sexual. Okay, a lot sexual.

"Really?" I ask with a smirk and it just comes out so dirty sounding even I'm shocked.

I don't mean it like that, well, I did but I didn't mean to actually say it like that, the dirty tone was just supposed to be in my head, kind of a follow-up to her possibly sexy voice that she just used.

She looks at me and I look at her and we both start laughing.

"Where are your parents?" I ask, inching a bit closer to her on the bed.

"In Minnesota, visiting my sister." She answers not breaking eye contact.

"Minnesota's nice. It's not Wisconsin."

"Nope, it's the Land of 10,000 Lakes.."

"Are there really 10,000 lakes in Minnesota?"

I reach my hand up and circle the back of my fingers across her cheek, letting my hand shift up and around her ear, then run my fingers slowly down through her hair and against her back. She leans into my hand and closes her eyes.

"I don't know...m-maybe?"

"Are you sure that's where your parents are right now?" I ask in a quiet voice, as I start to pull her shirt out the back of her pants, still looking at her face.

God, I hope I'm right about this, I hope Joey Lucas was right about this, because otherwise this could get very embarrassing, very fast. She doesn't seem to be stopping me, so I think I'm right about this.

"Yeah, I just talked to them.." She's biting her lower lip now and I'm pretty sure that's a positive sign, at least I'm going to interpret it as such.

"Good, because Donna," I stop, one last deep breath before take off, as she opens her eyes and looks at me, "I don't want them to suddenly walk in and find me doing what I'm about to be doing to you."

She makes a little squeak as I pull her to me and slide my hands underneath the back of her shirt.

***

End Part II | Skip to Part IV or go to Part III to read the smut :)

Back to the main page.