Celtic Circles by Lynn Jepsen

She stares at the image on her wall. Her roommate enjoys regaling her

with Irish folklore. The interwoven strands of the circle bring her to

her feet and she traces a line with her finger. Interwoven. Completely

interwoven. She wonders how the artist could see an image this detailed.

She wonders what it means.

She leans back on her couch, propping up her feet. She shakes her head.

He doesn't listen to her and sometimes she wonders what he's thinking.

She's still confused by his passionate defense of Mexico, and she wonders

if someone defended the Lend-Lease Act with the same passion. She wonders

if an equally practical person tried to rationalize the spending of such

large sums of money. She thinks about the beginning of the debt during

that war, and she frowns.

If Franklin Roosevelt had listened to his secretary the way Josh listened

to her... She shudders. If Franklin Roosevelt listened to his secretary

the way Josh listened to her, Josh wouldn't be around to listen to her.

If Franklin Roosevelt has listened to his secretary the way Josh listened

to her, the picture of a man who survived Birkenau would not hang on the

walls of the White House. She feels the weight of a thousand bricks on

her shoulders.

She's never thought of what she does... of this White House.... of any

White House, as essential to life. She thinks of politics as important.

She thinks of government as a safeguard, but time and time again, she

finds herself sounding jaded and Republican. She wants the surplus to be

used for tax cuts and the thirty billion dollar bailout to stay in the

bank. There is no deeper philosophical meaning behind those opinions -

she thinks of the government's resources in much the same way as her own.

The money in the bank should be saved, or spent on those who earned it,

not spent by government for the sake of government.

When Josh didn't bring on the banter, she should have known she'd done

something wrong. Again. She never tells anyone how afraid she is that

he'll discover she's a fraud and send her on her way.

But she didn't back down. Instead, she brought in the textile worker and

the telemarketer paying for trumpet lessons. She should have thought

twice when he told her he expected her to say scrubbing floors. She tried

to revive the banter, but he shut the door. And still she didn't think.

When he walked by and told her she had a message from 1939, she thought

he was ready to banter. He told her about the destruction of Europe, the

isolationism of the United States, and she spent the time planning her

rebuttal. She didn't know if it was his pantomime of a moustache or the

heft of a high school textbook in her hands, but her mind jolted into

another gear.

The urge to flee was intense, and she suddenly wondered how many extra

classes Josh's mother taught to pay for his sister's music lessons.

Somewhere deep in her gut, she knows it wasn't the wife of the textile

worker who scrubbed floors, and she remembers his mother playing the

piano once when she visited. Those kinds of lessons aren't cheap -

especially in Europe in 1939 - and especially when you're Jewish and an

Austrian with a moustache is Chancellor.

She wonders if someday a man in Mexico will hand over a textbook, and

explain US bailouts in a tolerant tone. She wonders if that man will work

for the President, and she wonders if his secretary will be a great fool.

She wonders if those circles - intertwined, with no beginning and no end

- are universal. She thinks they might be.

She works in the White House, yards from the Oval Office, and she's never

really understood what it is they do there. They don't argue with

Republicans, they don't spar with the press, and they don't punch

numbers, file paper, or play with matters of law. They remake people's

lives. They guarantee things like life, equality, and opportunity, and

she can't say she's forgotten those things, because they've never really

crossed her mind before.

She wonders what that says about her, and she wonders what he says about

her. She wonders what it says that she wonders so many things about this

man she loves - his motivations, his family, his health, his heart. She

sobs and she doesn't know where it came from.

The couch is suddenly uncomfortable, and she heaves herself up. She hits

the street running, and is halfway down the block before she pauses to

think about where she's going. Realizing she can't be stupid twice in one

day, she hails a cab.

Standing in the hall, she realizes she has no idea why she's here. His

light is still on, and his head is bent over his desk. She watches from

the doorway until he glances up. "Donna?"

"I'm sorry, Josh." She sobs again, and she realizes she never really

stopped. She sobs because she watched him settle stiffly into his chair

all afternoon and couldn't help him. She sobs because she didn't see the

big picture. She sobs because it's two am and he's sitting at his desk

waiting for a chance to give money to Mexico and hoping it turns out like

the Lend-Lease act of 1941.

She watches him stand from his desk, and stare at her. "Donnatella? Was

he a jerk?"

She shakes her head. There wasn't a date tonight, and there hasn't been a

real one in so long... "I'm sorry, Josh. I'm sorry. I've just been...."

He crosses the room and pulls her into a strong embrace. A moment later,

his shirt is damp, not because she isn't comforted, but because his right

arm lays stiffly against the small of her back. She can feel the knots in

his arm, and a soft tremor she didn't know was there. She sobs because it

all runs together and tonight it's all too much. "I've been faking it,

and it's too much, and I shouldn't be here, Josh. I shouldn't be here."

She feels a pressure as he strokes her hair and leads her towards his

desk. He sits her in his chair and kneels in front of her. She feels

guilty because he should be sitting down. She feels guilty because it's

two am and he's waiting to give a loan to Mexico. She feels guilty

because Franklin Roosevelt's secretary could have killed her Joshua, and

she feels guilty because there's a scar in his chest and one on her heart

and she never understood why they were there - not before.

She wouldn't stop for red lights, and he is a better man than Dr.

Freeride, but she never knew up from down before. She knows she's been

faking it, because she was always working hard for him, and not for a boy

in Mexico that she's never met, that's never even born, but who will work

hard for another boy in another time, and on, and on, and on. It's a

strange chain, and it's startlingly clear to her, and it breaks her heart

because this morning her view was narrow, and tonight it's so broad her

shoulders shake and he kneels in front of her. She shakes, and his

fingers are intertwined in hers. Suddenly she's unsure where he stops and

she begins.

He hands her a box of tissues, and she blots at her eyes and nose. She

stands shakily from the chair, and picks up the files he dropped on the

floor. She pushes him into his chair and picks up an old high school

textbook. "Tell me about the Lend-Lease act. Tell me why we're doing a

good thing tonight."

He stares at her.

Then he talks.

She finds her focus.

She smiles.

The circle isn't completed, but there's a new twist now. Two more strands

are intertwined with the whole, and she doesn't wonder any more.

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