Galatea Rising

He'd been operating the past few weeks as though in a fog.

Donna was prompt, professional, efficient to the point of being abrupt, and it was driving him crazy.

She haunted his dreams - and his daydreams. He was constantly envisioning her the way she'd looked that night. Pale, statuesque, her hair falling down her shoulders in loose curls, and later her make-up smudged, the smell of sex overpowering the subtle scent of her perfume.

He found himself taking far too many cold showers, and washing his sheets far too often.

Her reaction still puzzled him.

More than once, he made – and then broke – plans to confront her. To get everything out in the open, and then finish off with a bout of passionate sex. Yes, sex would make everything better.

He'd stopped by a bar after work, and sought a few glasses of liquid courage. After the third or fourth, the bartender had agreed that his plan to win Donna back was an excellent one.

Donna, however, had disagreed.

She had opened her door, and immediately put her hands on her hips and chastised him for being drunk.

Ignoring his protests, she shut the door--which led to where he was now.

He knocked again.

She answered, and glared at him. "What are you doing here?"

"I made a mistake," he blurted out.

"No kidding," she answered sardonically, relaxing slightly as she said it. Inhaling, she grimaced and asked, "How drunk are you?"

"I dunno," he slurred. "I slept with Donna."

Amy took a step back, her eyes wide. "Tonight?!"

"Inauguration." He drew the word out drunkenly and leaned against her doorstop.

"Come in." She stepped aside. "Sit." Amy gestured in the general direction of the couch. "I'll make you some coffee."

Her apartment was Spartan—bare walls, minimal furnishings, few touches that would convey any sense of permanence. The only exception was a small fishbowl in the corner with a Siamese fighting fish placidly blowing bubbles.

"His name is Harry," Amy indicated having noticed Josh's obvious interest. She handed him one of two steaming mugs of coffee and sat down next to him.

"Harry?" Josh asked after an uncomfortably long silence.

"Harry VI, actually," Amy clarified. "I don't seem to be having much luck with them."

"Ahh . . ." Josh nodded and sipped his coffee, and her living room again fell into silence.

"Are you in love with her?" Amy finally asked, both of their mugs now empty.

"What? No!" He was incredulous. "She's . . . she's Donna!"

"Is she in love with you?" Amy asked the moment he'd closed his mouth.

"Of course not!"

Amy quirked an eyebrow. "Are you sure? Donna doesn't strike me as the type of girl to sleep with anyone she's not in love with."

Amy's words penetrated his drunken haze, and his heart lurched at the possible truth in the sentiment. Still, there was an exception to every rule, and he knew he was it.

"It wasn't like that," he protested. "We were drunk; we were emotional. It . . . just . . . it wasn't like that."

Even as he spoke, his mind's eye was relaying the events – how she'd been both shy and unabashed, how soft she was, how good she'd smelled, and he suddenly stood, and walked to Amy's tiny balcony to clear his head. Quietly, he mumbled, "She didn't even want to talk about it the next day."

"What'd you say?" Amy dropped a few flakes of food into Harry's bowl.

"Nothing." Josh shook his head, and came back inside. "It's just . . . We were really . . . I'm not even sure how we got from the dance to my apartment."

They both watched as Harry dashed around his bowl, scarfing down his food – deep red tail trailing like a streamer behind him. "You wanna know what I think?" Amy asked.

He looked at her blankly, "Not really."

"Too bad," she responded, "I'm not the one that showed up drunk on your doorstep in the middle of the night."

He rolled his eyes and sank back into the sofa, defeated. He didn't want to be here, with her; he wanted to be with Donna. And yet, he couldn't shake the feeling that this is where he belonged. There was something about Amy – even with her temper, and her unpredictability, and her brittleness – that made sense.

He forced his mind back to what she was saying. "—fooling yourself. She loves you. In her naive, Wisconsin farm-girl way, I think she's trying to protect you."

He couldn't help his immediate, incredulous response, "Donna doesn't need to protect me!"

"Maybe not," Amy answered, simply, "but it's what she does. It's what she's always done, and you don't do anything to stop her."

"That's insane!"

Amy smiled. "If you say so."

Only later, did he begin to wonder whether there had been a secondary meaning to her reply. That evening, he only looked at her, his expression grim, and said, "I really fucked things up."

"Yeah, well, you've got a habit of doing that." She smiled gently at him and added, "Go home, Josh. I'll talk to you tomorrow – if you even remember this conversation."

* * * * *
When she was a child, she had expected the world to be logical, if not fair. For every action, there was an equal and opposite reaction – a Newtonian physics based philosophy of life. If she hit her younger brother, she could expect to sit in the corner for an hour. If she didn't study for her math test, she could expect to fail it. The good guys won, and the bad guys went to jail, and everything worked out just fine in the end.

Then she got older. She met the man Josh liked to refer to as Dr. Freeride. She learned that in matters of the heart, logic rarely applied. Then she met Josh, and learned that it was much the same way in matters of politics.

The vice president had resigned – hobbled by a scandal not only political but also sexual in nature – an intersection of those two illogical sectors that so bothered her.

She was now stuck in a closet, with Amy searching through files, and records, trying to make sense of everything and forcing her mind to come to some sort of order in spite of it all.

She couldn't help it. She lost her temper in the face of Amy's constant need to be right, to prove herself the superior in their relationship. Amy's reaction, however, had caught her completely off-guard.

"I beg your pardon?" Donna froze and stared at her.

"I asked if you were in love with Josh."

She felt cornered, and a flush rose to her cheeks – ignoring her, she returned her attention to the files.

"It's not as though it's anything to be ashamed of," Amy mentioned casually. "Plenty of women have slept with their bosses, and even more of those are in love with them – or think they are."

Donna put the file down, and turned slowly to face her. "He told you," she said, simply, in a passionless monotone. "He told you," she repeated, the facts sinking in and swimming in an emotional sea of betrayal.

"He told me," Amy couldn't deny it. "He was a little drunk at the time – I don't think he meant anything by it."

"Story of his life," Donna murmured and rolled her eyes. "Josh gets drunk and does stuff he doesn't mean."

She turned to leave, and Amy stopped her with a hand on her shoulder. "Donna, really, don't be upset. It was nothing."

"Yeah . . ." she answered, shrugging away coldly from Amy's touch. "Nothing."

Josh's office was empty when she walked by. She'd leave it to Amy to explain why she left.