Chapter Text
“What are you doing?”
Donna Moss whirled around, clutching her phone to her chest. Above, the silhouette of her dark-haired boss, Josh Lyman, smirked over the edge of the cubicle, his head at an odd angle, eyes squinting where her screen had just flashed out of sight.
Heart beating, she readjusted the phone against her breast. “That’s none of your business,” she sniffed.
“See,” said Josh. “That’s where you’re wrong. This is our place of business, and you’re my employee, so de facto, what’s on your phone at work is my business.”
It was a typical Saturday night. The bullpen was empty except for the light in Josh’s office haloing over Donna’s desk. Completely alone in the maze of cubicles leading up to Toby’s open door, Josh leaned against the white wall, grinning, and Donna felt her resolve softening.
“Oh, I see,” she said. “And your employees can’t take breaks once in a while to check their very private correspondences on their private cell phones, my mistake.”
“Once in a while? I let you have a lunch break last week and you returned at 3 with a pedicure!”
“I got a pedicure because my grinch of a boss won’t let me have weekends and I had a wedding that Sunday!”
“Wedding shmedding, you got that pedicure for a date,” sneered Josh, and Donna couldn’t help but roll her eyes. “It’s always a date with you. Always.”
“Really?” said Donna. “If it’s always a date, then where are these men? These many many men I have at my fingertips? Who I summon like—” she snapped her fingers, “that? If it’s always a date, why am I…?”
“Why are you what?” balked Josh.
Silence fell between them. Donna remained at her desk, still clutching her phone. Josh bounced from the wall to lean over her cubicle again, staring at her with renewed anticipation. For the first time that day, Donna felt the hair rise on the back of her neck.
“Fine,” she sniffed. “You’re right. I was signing into Tinder.”
“I knew it!” said Josh. Then his mouth hung open. “Tinder? Donna, you can’t do that at work. In the West Wing.”
“And why not? I was on a break. I was taking a little break, and I just thought—”
“You just thought, who in a 3 mile radius can I hook up with tonight?”
His voice was high and faintly squeaking.
Calmly, Donna watched Josh unclench his hands from her desk and stride back to his office door only to spin around at the frame.
“You know what, I don’t get it. I don’t even get the point,” he said. “What’s the benefit of having sex with a total stranger you met three cocktails ago?”
“Josh, that’s a very regressive opinion,” said Donna. “The Apps aren’t just for hooking up. They’re for meeting people. Meeting people that you couldn’t meet otherwise because, I don’t know, maybe your boss does a great impression of Ivan the Terrible and sees your life as his personal fiefdom.”
“Oh, I see, so it’s me driving you to this state of wanton desperation?”
“Desperation!” said Donna. Now she, too, was standing, glaring at her boss. Despite his evident fury, he looked overwhelmingly endearing with his red tie askew, his white collar crumpled, and his hair messily hanging over his forehead. “I’ll have you know,” she breathed, “I’m not desperate. I’m practical.”
“Practical?”
“I’m saying, it’s 9 pm on a Saturday night, and look around you.” Donna steered Josh’s shoulders to face the bullpen so that he could take in the maze of empty desks and unlit hallways, not a soul (except Toby) to be found. “It’s 9 pm on a Saturday night, and where am I? I’m with you. Like I am everyday. I’m with you when you first get in and I’m with you until go home. So what does that mean? Where am I not on a 9 pm on a Saturday night if I’m with you? I’ll tell you,” she said, before Josh could jump in. “I’m not at Dupont Circle, at a bar, meeting a nice guy who’s new to the Hill and who wants to impress me with how little he knows. I’m not at Georgetown, in some red brick tavern being wined and dined by a PoliSci PhD who’s writing his thesis on voter suppression. I’m here with nobody but you.”
A silence fell. Josh continued to stare at the empty bullpen, and for a moment Donna wondered if she had been a little too curt. This thought, admittedly, did not often occur to her. Their back and forth, their repartee, was simply how things were between her and Josh. Mocking each other was practically a testament to their mutual affection. Amidst all Josh’s exclamations and tireless insults, Donna never doubted that he thought work was more fun with her. And she could only assume that Josh knew she felt the same way.
But lately, another feeling was intruding on this quiet balance.
At times, Donna had found herself staring up at her ceiling in the middle of the night to find a vision of Josh leaning toward her with his mouth open. In those moments, she found herself delicately closing her eyes, parting her lips, thinking about the skin between his neck and his chest. Feeling her hands in his hair, pulling it, hearing him gasp her name as she fastened her mouth to his—
That’s where it stopped. That was the moment that Donna always repossessed herself, her mind having ventured too far into that dangerous territory where images of Josh Lyman began to do all sorts of unexpected and terrifying things.
And they were terrifying. Looking at Josh any other way than the way he looked now— standing stiffly beside her, staring at the empty bullpen, the gears in his mind turning—would be more Josh than she could take.
If Donna was being honest with herself, she couldn’t even remember when these dreams had begun, although she knew they were growing more frequent. In very small ways, they had started to take over her life. Like tonight, for instance. Seeing his hair brushing over his forehead, Donna had the strange—and wholly unpleasant—urge to run her hand through it. And when she came near him, her body began to thrum with energy, like an electric current sizzling through her.
She had no idea why, after such a long time, her body would betray her like this. So, having no answers, she had decided she would go on Tinder, and she was determined to make the best of it.
Shaking his head as if to dislodge a thought, Josh looked over at her with eyes that were suddenly warm and sympathetic.
“Can I see your profile?” he asked.
“You want to—what?”
“Your profile, on Tinder, I mean. You know—what you’re putting out there?”
At once, Donna felt a hot wave of embarrassment. She turned her face away.
“I don’t know,” she said. “Isn’t that weird?”
“Well, it’s out there for everyone else,” he whined.
“Yeah, but. I don’t know.”
She paused for a long time. Josh stood still, waiting patiently, slightly hanging his head.
“Okay,” she said finally. “But you can’t make fun of me. That’s rule number one.”
“Are there other rules?” he asked eagerly, following her from the door to her desk as she bent to retrieve the cellphone that she had quickly tucked into a hidden fold in her purse.
“Yes,” she said. “You can’t make fun of the guys I matched with either.”
“I get to see your matches?” Josh exclaimed, taking the phone from her. “Oh, good.”
Donna covered her face with her hands and wouldn’t look at him for a full three minutes as he scrolled down her screen.
“I love this picture,” he murmured softly.
She glanced over. It was the first photo on her profile, a picture taken at a benefit at the White House two years ago.
“Thanks,” she said, with the sensation that she was blushing.
She watched him flip to the second, a holiday photo, which he passed without remark. When he got to the third, which was of her in a bikini at a beach in Florida, his mouth fell open.
“Donna, what in the—what!”
“What?” she said. “It’s a nice photo.”
“You’re practically naked!”
“I’m in a swim suit—it’s normal! It’s fine.”
“It’s not fine. It’s … It’s presenting yourself on a platter.”
“Josh, no,” she said, almost laughing. “It’s what we call a body shot. It lets men know what …”
Josh stared at her.
“What your body looks like,” she said. “Don’t look at me like that. Men don’t want to go out with a woman unless they know what size she is.”
“But Donna!” Josh’s voice rose. “That’s sexist! That’s misogynist! By posting this, you’re—you’re giving into the man!”
“Josh, I hate to break it to you, but when it comes to dating, I gave into the man long ago,” Donna deadpanned.
She watched Josh flip furiously into the chat bar to see her various matches. He scoffed at the first, snorted at the second, loudly guffawed at the third. Donna felt herself roll her eyes, her heart simultaneously flooded with the sense of affection that came whenever she watched him get outraged, jealous, and then nonsensical.
Then she reminded herself that this was forbidden, and she turned back into stone.
“Well, okay,” Josh began to say, “this was—hey, wait. I know this guy. This guy … This guy works at the White House.”
“Oh?” said Donna innocently, although she knew exactly who he meant.
“Yeah, Gabriel Winser. I know Gabriel Winser. He’s down … He’s down in the …”
“He’s in the East Wing.”
“Yeah, he’s in the—hey, you knew he was in the White House.”
“So?”
“So!” Josh thrust her phone back at her. “Donna, this is totally inappropriate. You can’t—”
“Date someone in the White House?” she asked. “Josh, that’s ridiculous. You didn’t even know Gabriel was in the East Wing. There’s no conflict of interest. And who else would understand the long hours, the urgency, the call of duty, yada yada? It makes perfect sense.”
“Donna,” Josh repeated. “You can’t hook up in the West Wing.”
“Good thing,” said Donna, “he’s in the East Wing.”
For a few seconds, the two of them stared at each other, challengingly. Then a fluttering feeling began at the bottom of Donna’s stomach. She could see Josh’s chest thumping from under his collar shirt, a rosy flush creeping into his cheeks.
Sometimes, Donna could swear that Josh looked at her in ways that were not so innocent either. Part of their banter was flirting, of course, but that was always whimsical, meaningless. Probably he found her pretty. But she was certain that he couldn’t feel the same gravitational pull that she did toward him, not to mention the lustful sinful thoughts.
Nevertheless, staring into his intense eyes, in that moment, she thought that something else might be there too. And in that second, a stab of heat entered her body, turning her legs to jelly, and when she opened her mouth, she saw Josh glance down at her lips. He seemed to gulp, then say nothing.
Suddenly, Donna was painfully aware how alone she and Josh were in this corner of the office, and that if anyone saw them, they might wonder why the two of them were standing so close to each other, in a silent staring contest.
She hung her head.
“Anyway,” she said, with faux lightness. “It wasn’t my idea. I’m not the only one doing it.”
“Oh, really.” Josh said, his voice slightly funny. “Who else is doing it? Who’s the genius who came up with the Apps for staffers?”
“I don’t know who started it, but Carol is definitely—” Donna stopped, suddenly mortified. “I mean,” she said, and Josh smirked. “I know of … a few people who are, you know.”
“And that’s … In the White House?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean.” Josh said, not quite meeting her eye. “I mean, are they going to home to … you know. Or are they … you know, in the White House?”
“You mean, like, in a bathroom, like this is Grey’s Anatomy?”
“Forget it,” said Josh.
“No,” Donna said, thoughtfully. “I don’t think so. But you never know. Given … the late hours.”
“Like now,” said Josh.
He was staring at her and Donna felt light-headed.
“Yes,” she said. “Like now. Ed and Carol are probably—”
“Ed and Carol? That’s … I’d never thought of that combination before.”
“It’s not that weird.”
“It is weird. But why would they need the app? I don’t get it. They know each other.”
“Kind of,” Donna said. “But they don’t really know each other, not really. I think the App gave them the opportunity to … experiment. And to mutually declare an interest, I guess.”
“So by day, they’re colleagues,” said Josh. “And by night they’re …”
“Having sex and not telling anyone. Except for me, I guess. And, well, you.”
“And probably Larry.”
“And probably C.J.”
“So not that secret.”
“Not really.”
“I think if you’re hooking up with someone in the office, it has to be a total secret,” said Josh. “You don’t need politicos trying to manipulate you because they know you have an in with someone else.
“Don’t I know it,” said Donna. “People always come to me for ins with you.”
“Yeah, but that’s your job,” countered Josh.
“Is it? Is managing your life really my job?”
“It is,” said Josh firmly. “I can’t do anything without you.”
It was a bizarrely sweet and dysfunctional thing to say, and it made Donna’s stomach flip. What was it about tonight that the air in here was so charged? Josh was suddenly straightening his back, probably aware that he should not lean over his blonde assistant in an unlit corridor in the dead of night. They were standing at the door to his office. He was a foot from her and her body responded instinctively to the closeness. She was leaning back against the frame, her hips slightly out, her body arched toward him.
This was pathetic, she thought. Talking to her boss about other people having sex was the most turned on she had been in a month, which was almost the entire time she had been on the Apps.
She’d been on four bad dates so far, and one mediocre one that went nowhere. In truth, it was hard to amp yourself up for what was essentially a blind date. Sure, you had a few photos, a few lines of bio, and you could create an attractive prototype based on those features. But they were empty holograms. They were dreams waiting to disappoint. And so, once every week or so, she’d put on a nice dress, some expensive make up, and she’d meet at a bar for a single drink if the date was bad, two or three if she needed more time to evaluate. And every night, she still went home alone and thought about her boss kissing her.
She thought about her boss kissing her so much that she had to remind herself that this could never, would never happen. She would never let it. But more importantly, Josh would never do anything of the kind.
“You’re not seeing anyone,” she said, almost accusingly. “And you’re not on the Apps.”
“No.”
“Don’t you ever get lonely?”
At this question, Josh looked at her softly, sadly, and then smiled. “Sometimes,” he said.
“You don’t want … more?”
“Who has time for more?”
“I don’t know if that’s an answer.”
“I don’t know if it is either.”
Josh was staring at her again in a way that made Donna’s cheeks inflame. She turned. She didn’t want to begin interrogating the meaning of that gaze. Josh remained by the door, arm fixed against the frame, looking at her curiously. Maybe with amusement. Did he know how she felt about him? Did it entertain him? The idea made Donna want to faint of embarrassment
Clearing her throat, she straightened up.
“Hey, do you need something else?” she said. “Or is it time to go home?”
“Home? You mean …?”
“Separately,” she said slowly. “To our respective homes. Are you going to do any more work tonight? If not, there’s really no point …”
“Of course,” Josh said. “Yeah, yeah. Let’s get out of here. Let’s go.”
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah, why wouldn’t I be. Hey,” he said, his voice high again. “Nine thirty isn’t too late. Maybe you could still go on a date. If you wanted. You could go on a date. I could even drop you off.”
“That sounds weird,” she said. “That sounds awkward.”
“I just wanted to be … not Ivan the Terrible,” he replied.
“You’re not a Tsar. I’m sorry I said that.”
“Yeah?”
“You’re actually kind of a great boss,” she said, shyly. “But don’t tell anyone.”
Josh was grinning at her from inside his office. He had turned out the lights and put on his jacket. His backpack was over his shoulders.
“I can drop you at home,” he said.
“Thanks. That would be great.”
While she was in the car, Donna withdrew her phone from her purse and sent a quick message to Gabriel Winser: “Late night in the WW. Late week actually. Don’t suppose you’d be free for a drink now?” Then she whipped the phone back in her purse, her heart hammering. It was like she had stolen something. Like she had shoplifted from under Josh Lyman’s nose.
She glanced at him sitting at the wheel, boredom glazed over his face. They were stopped at a red light. He hadn’t seen anything, surely.
It wouldn’t bother her necessarily to know that Josh had seen her message, but she didn’t want to advertise it. Whenever she starting dating anybody, he inevitably punished her. He became aloof and distant, or else he was angry and annoyed. At other times, he would pull on his greatest charms, then withdraw immediately if he saw that she still planned to go out.
This was the only part of their relationship that Donna was willing to put under a microscope because it involved Josh’s feelings, not hers. Josh didn’t like it when she went out with men. That meant something, didn’t it?
It means nothing, she rebuked herself.
“We’re here,” said Josh softly, and Donna realized they had been parked outside her building for several seconds now. She looked over at Josh tentatively and he smiled back, seeming tired but not unhappy.
“Thanks for the ride,” she said, undoing her seatbelt. “Text me when you get home?”
“Sure. I will.”
“Okay.”
Leaning forward to grab her bag, it would be so easy to kiss him briefly on the lips, like this was an everyday thing. At once, the idea was so embarrassing that she fumbled her bag, dropped it in the seat, and Josh raised a curious eyebrow.
“Bye bye,” she said, and exited the car.
The winter air hit her harshly on the face. It was January. Great daggers of icicles hung from the eaves over her building, and threatened her as she fiddled with her keys at the doorway. Behind her, she could hear Josh’s car slowly drive off, and even this small departure left her feeling much colder than seconds before.
This really was a ridiculous crush, she reminded herself, and she needed to get over it.
At that moment, her cellphone dinged and she looked down. A text from Gabriel Winser: “Yes. Service Bar, U-Street. In twenty? Does that sound okay?”
She replied: “See you there.” Then she rushed into her apartment for a wardrobe change.
Even as she fumbled through her closet, trying to find something pretty but warm, she thought about how Josh’s eyes would rank her clothes, what sweaters he had liked but not loved, what skirts made his eyes travel to her knees. The memories made her skin itch. She almost wanted to cancel on Gabriel, curl up in her bed and watch Harry Met Sally and find some reason—however pedantic—to call Josh.
But this was exactly why she was going out in the first place. So, with that knowledge, Donna turned her head. She mustered up her resolve. She picked out a black skirt and a thick enough sweater, and summoned an Uber to her door.
It is hard to say why, exactly, she thought Gabriel Winser would be any different, simply because he worked in the East Wing. This was Donna’s realization on the first drink of four. For four drinks, she valiantly tried to create a spark.
Oh, he was cute enough. He had a shock of dark hair that hung in a fringe over his eyes. And those eyes were blue and bright, staring at her from behind fashionable wire-rimmed glasses. He was well dressed. He was hardly uninteresting. They spent the first drink talking about Donna’s departure from Wisconsin, and how Gabriel had left the United States at the age of 21 on the Fulbright program to India—his first time out of the country.
He seemed genuinely caring too. He had joined the East Wing team because he was drawn to the First Lady’s initiative on breast cancer, and he was impelled by all the ways that women were underserviced by the health care industry. He wanted to work for a powerful female doctor, a great public figure, to right these disparities.
Donna found herself nodding and smiling, and feeling sincerely moved when he spoke. But even as Gabriel flashed his most charming smile, or unveiled his most compelling story, Donna thought to herself how much easier, and better, it would be if Josh was the one across the table from her. And that realization soured her. The next three drinks all saw Donna ritually cast Josh from her mind, only for him to inevitably creep back in, smiling devilishly, whispering at her how she longed to be with him.
“I think it’s time I go home, Gabriel,” she said. “But I had a lovely time.”
Gabriel looked surprised.
“Should I take you?” he said.” I can go in the cab, if you’re nervous about heading out alone.”
This was a lovely line, and of course, a walk to her door was never just that anymore. And Donna thought about it for a moment: this handsome man with dark hair and nice eyes, a lovely replacement for the figure she banished nightly from her dreams. And still, she gave him only a tight smile.
“It’s okay. I can get home just fine. But really, this was nice. We should do it again.”
“I would like that,” said Gabriel sincerely.
He accompanied her to the Uber outside, and Donna climbed in, relieved at once to be alone. In the back of the cab, she watched her cold breath drift in clouds toward the ceiling, the night lights of D.C. passing in flashes through the glass. Something about their misty form made her remember the look in Josh’s eyes as they had stood in front of his office door.
He’d stared at her through slitted lids, a slightly drugged expression on his open mouth. And her body had responded as it would to any other man in the world who looked at her like that—wanting her—except this was Josh, and that was impossible, wasn’t it?
And yet, he was interested by the Apps and the world of West Wing hook ups. He had wanted to see her profile. And he’d said he felt lonely sometimes. Then she remembered another remark he’d made that night: I don’t get it. I don’t even get the point. What’s the benefit of having sex with a total stranger you met three cocktails ago?
Josh was not the kind to go home with strangers. Deep down, she had always known this about him. It was what explained the revolving door of recurring girlfriends, the ghosts that continuously resurrected. He liked to be familiar with his partners. He liked to know them, know who they are.
And maybe it was this realization that suddenly flared up inside her—surely not the four whiskeys that she had consumed with dinner—that led Donna to the bravest act of her life. Taking the phone out of her purse, she wrote a message before she could think clearly.
To Josh: “I have a question. More like a suggestion.”
A reply appeared immediately. “And that is?” said Josh.
Donna paused over the phone screen. She wavered. Then, well, what the hell?
“I think we should sleep together and not tell anyone,” she said.
Three miles away, a phone in Georgetown dinged, the invitation bleared across its screen.