Possibly Forever
Fandom: West Wing
Pairing: Donna/Will
Spoilers: None but set
near the end of season four
Rating: PG
Notes: For the
LiveJournal writers_choice open challenge, back to
#55, breakfast.
Summary: A conversation over breakfast.
“Why didn’t we do this before?”
They are in Donna’s apartment, having breakfast – scrambled eggs,
toast, coffee so strong that a mouse could dance across it – when she asks the
question, and Will freezes with his fork halfway to his mouth. Blinking once,
then twice, he returns the fork to his plate, the clink of metal against china
loud in the suddenly too-quiet kitchen, and he finally comes up with an answer.
“What? This, go for a drink together? This, coming back to your place?
This, breakfast?”
Well, he didn’t say it was a good answer.
But good or not, it has Donna smiling almost fondly, shaking her head.
“Dodging an answer…” she declares. “You’ve been working in the West Wing for
way too long.”
Will lifts an eyebrow. “What does that make you?”
“A woman who’s still looking for an answer to her question.” Donna
doesn’t blink, and he grins wryly, because he walked right into that one. “And
the answer to yours, by the way? Is all of the above.”
Her blue eyes are fixed on his, and he can’t dissemble when she’s
looking at him like that. The trouble is, he’s not sure how well honesty is
going to go down either. “Because I
thought you were in love with Josh.”
Wonder of wonders, she smiles again. “Nothing ever went on with me and
Josh,” she says, without a flicker of guilt or shame or any sign that she’s
uncomfortable with this topic of conversation. Not that she should feel any of
those things, he reminds himself, because he happens to know that she’s telling
him the truth. Just like he knows that just because neither she nor Josh chose
to act on their feelings, that doesn’t mean the feelings weren’t there.
But if he’d been asked him a week ago – hell, if he’d been asked
yesterday – he would have said that Josh and Donna were meant to be together.
Waking up with her this morning had been a hell of a surprise, but not
an unwelcome one by any means.
She must see his hesitation as something that it’s not, because she
tilts her head, blue eyes darkening. “You know that, don’t you?” she asks, her
voice nervous. “Because I like you, Will… this has nothing to do with Josh.”
“I know that,” he says, reaching over to lay a hand over hers. “I’m
just saying… I never thought you’d look at me like that.”
She chuckles, turning her hand over under his, wrapping her fingers
around his hand and squeezing. “I thought the same about you,” she admits
quietly, sincerely, and he’s pretty sure his head is literally spinning around,
because Donna could have her pick of men, and he’s got no idea why she thinks
he wouldn’t look at her that way. Then she looks up at him, with twitching lips
and dancing eyes, and Will’s head is suddenly very much on straight. Since
working in the West Wing, he’s become very adept at recognising when there is
trouble, or at the very least, teasing, on the horizon, and sometimes, the two
are the exact same thing. If the look on Donna’s face is anything to go by,
this promises to be just such a time, so he’s expecting it when she says,
“Besides… I thought you were more interested in younger women.”
Will bites back a groan with difficulty, closing his eyes as he tilts
his head back towards the ceiling. There’s no doubt in his mind as to what
she’s referring; after all, it wouldn’t be the first time he’s heard that
particular rumour. “They’re my staff,” he says succinctly, opening his eyes to
glare at her, hoping she’ll leave it there, knowing better.
“Wouldn't be the first time,” she says airily, and he’d start talking
about Josh were it not for the fact that she steams right on. “You know what
their nickname is, don't you?”
Only the fact that there’s a plate of scrambled eggs in front of him
stops Will from banging his head against the table, because he does know, and
his face crinkles with distaste as he says it. “The Boiler Room Girls,” he
says. “They're incredibly insulted by that.” Which they have told him. Many and
oft. Loudly.
Donna tilts her head in acknowledgement. “Know that feeling,” is all
she says, and he thinks for a moment that she’s going to change the subject.
Hope is fleeting though, because she fixes him with a narrow-eyed stare. “They
all have crushes on you, you know.”
“They do not.” Will rolls his eyes for good measure, but Donna is
relentless.
“Cassie does.”
“And you know this how?”
Donna shrugs. “Elsie told me.”
At that, Will laughs aloud. “You're taking the word of the woman who
told my high school girlfriend that I was a changeling child who was found on a
doorstep and who wouldn't be available to date her during a full moon?”
Once again, Donna does not blink. “Doesn’t mean it’s not true,” she
says, her voice light, too light, Will realises, as the penny finally drops.
“Donna…” He draws her name out, still not quite daring to believe what
he’s thinking. “Are you jealous?”
He’s amazed that he has the courage to say it, amazed still further
when a dull coat of red covers her cheeks. One shoulder rises and falls in a
shrug, and she looks away, and he shakes his head, standing up, pulling her up
and into his arms. “There’s only one woman in the West Wing I’m interested in,”
he tells her firmly. “And I’m with her right now.”
Donna’s lips on his make his head spin, and the next thing he knows,
they’re on their way to her bedroom. Pulling away, he’s ready to remind her of
breakfast on the table, about work waiting for them, but then she is kissing
him again, and he thinks that work and breakfast can wait.
Possibly forever.