The Ex-President

by Jeff Soloway

  “When they marched us out to the lifeboats? Sure. Some crew guy had to wake me up from a nap first. I was sleeping off a headache. Those cops got me pretty good. Some dicks in my muster group were laughing at my bedhead.”

  “Do you remember which crew member led the group?”

  “The Ping-Pong instructor. Some smartass from Argentina. I was the only one who laughed at his jokes.”

  “Would he remember you? Could you get me his name?” It would be a decent alibi—better than mine. “If I’m going to profile you in an article,” I explained, “I’ll need perspectives for background.”

  “Wow. So this is serious. Who do you work for?”

  “I write for The New York Times.” I’d written one article for the magazine. But my first hit on Google.

  “Wow. Okay. Then you want to see me in action. Good. I have a plan. Are you eating at the restaurant tonight? Chomp’s supposed to be there. So will I. It’ll be like the Redneck Oscars. Look for me.”

  “Why?”

  “We both know my dialoguing sucks. Time to try a new approach. They can’t shoot me in public, right?”

  Sure they can, I thought.

  After we parted, I had to pass by the casino again. The Witch and her friends were gone, but, off to the side, pictures of Carlos’s sister still lay scattered on the carpet. Several were wrinkled from the spilled beer, like leaves after an autumn rain.

  Chapter 15

  The Admiral Nelson Dance Hall was dominated by a colossal painting of Britain’s greatest naval hero, shoulder tassels glittering, medals shining. Hadn’t the French sniper sighted on those decorations when he shot Nelson down? The admiral had insisted on wearing them on deck and thus died for his vanity. Or perhaps, as the TV shrink had suggested of Chomp, he had subconsciously wanted to die. After all, what was left to accomplish after Trafalgar? What was left for Chomp after the presidency? Both Nelson and Chomp had conquered their greatest enemies. They might have found new ones, but even legendary heroes understand their limits, usually better than the public.

  The room’s other ornaments included maps of the Iberian peninsula, cross sections of the HMS Victory and Albermarle, a poster from the movie Master and Commander, and, closest to the entrance, a freestanding plaster reproduction of Nelson’s Column at Trafalgar Square, that enormous penis with a statue of Nelson at the tip. Here, of course, someone had taped over Nelson an action figure of Chomp.

  A handful of Chompians were milling about, drinking and waiting for the start of Stomp for Chomp, which was set to run more or less concurrently with the early dinner. Not everyone could score reservations for the Redneck Oscars. A bald Swede billed as DJ Smooth Knut was setting up his equipment. He paused frequently to look over the crowd, perhaps to check whether a Las Vegas talent scout had popped in—it was well known that some of Chomp’s best friends owned casinos. A woman in the center of the floor was dancing by herself to no music. The hair piled on her head flopped around like a palm tree in a hurricane. It was Shell. Behind her a quartet of young men swayed more or less in time to the movements of her body.

  The men stared me down as I approached her but withheld objection. She closed her eyes; presumably the music in her brain had reached a crescendo. The spaghetti straps of her top were knotted in little roses over her breasts.

  “I lost your water bottle,” I said.

  She opened her eyes and smiled. “I’ve got lots.”

  Two of the men exchanged glances, already negotiating who would fetch Shell another bottle.

  I lowered my voice. “I spoke to Chomp.”

  She slowed her body, though her bare shoulders continued to sway. “When?”

  “A few hours ago. In his room.”

  “Were you stalking him?” She seemed to hope so.

  “We had an interview. I told you.”

  “What did he say? What was he like? You better tell me.” Her eyes were full of awe, envy, and a little fear, as if I were a mortal who’d slept with one of the gods. “Was that why he stood us up at the Sailaway? Because he was talking to you? Were you the incident?”

  “I’ll tell you all about him, but first you have to answer a question.”

  “Okay.”

  “Not around them.”

  She took my hand and slithered away with me behind the column, not that it provided much shelter. The men exchanged more glances. She shook her head at them with some pity. “They remind me of my husband. All he wanted to do was hang with his cousins and play poker and drink beer or that fancy moonshine that tastes like peed-on iced tea. He never lost much or won much but he always got drunk. When he heard about the cruise, he tried to invite himself, as if that shit never happened.”

  “What shit? Your divorce?”

  “No, everyone gets divorced. I mean the shit with the dictionary. Merriam-Webster’s, unabridged. Get me two or six drinks and I’ll explain. Thing is, he pretended to like Chomp, like he pretended to like me. He drank beer at the fundraisers. He voted for him. What I love about you is you need more. So what was he like?”

  The word love worked its spell on me, however casually she meant it, as did her undisguised joy at being in the presence of a man who had been in the presence of Chomp. She took more pleasure in worshipping her earthly hero than most people do in worshipping God. I was charmed. Innocence was a quality I sometimes associated with activists like Carlos but never before with Chompians.

  She squeezed my hand, both coaxing and flirting. She thought we shared a cause. I’m not above seizing on a misunderstanding to win over a good-looking woman, or a potential source, let alone both; but this misunderstanding struck at my core beliefs. After the day’s events, I was more than ever convinced that Chompism was the rabies of American society, capable of converting harmless masses into frothing maniacs. The sportsification of politics, which demanded the exaltation of winners and mockery of losers; the spirit of not policy but victory, which valued self-congratulation over the common good; the elevation of quips, boasts, and put-downs over traditional rhetorical values such as logic—Chomp embodied all these disastrous transformations in American political life. Now that I had watched him incite protesters to riot, brag about his sexual and vehicular exploits (where do you put a mattress on a double-decker bus?), and delay preparation for the most important speech in his life to flirt with my mother, I had no doubt what type of man we were dealing with. One whose self-worth depended entirely on the accumulation of triumphs. I can forgive selfishness, even when it hardens into callousness, since we all, from time to time, turn our faces from suffering; but Chomp’s spirit of unrelenting antagonism, his enduring struggle, not for his own side’s gain, but for the other’s suffering, whether this particular other consisted of Mexicans, Muslims, feminists, liberals, tea drinkers, schoolteachers, rap singers, tree huggers, or any other group of weirdos—it struck me simply as evil.

  But Chomp himself wasn’t evil. He had, after all, shown some compassion to Carmen, once my mother had properly nudged him (if only more people in his life were nudging him the right way, were nudging all of us). And Shell was certainly not evil. In misunderstanding our common cause, she misunderstood not just me but herself. She was better than her beliefs. Wasn’t she?

  “Tell me your secret first,” I said. “The one you mentioned on the bus.”

  “What secret?”

  “The purpose of this cruise.”

  She pressed my hand. “Didn’t he tell you?”

  “Maybe he was lying.”

  “He never lies.”

  “He does, Shell.” I caressed the back of her hand, to sweeten my blasphemy. “We all know it. He exaggerates for effect. He fibs in public to make people cheer. That’s still lying.”

  “He gets excited. We all do.” Her smile softened into something less brilliant but more affectionate. She had no doubts but forgave mine. We were two peop
le of goodwill, each convinced the other was strolling alongside the brink of hell.

  “He flirted with my mother.”

  “Oh. I’m not surprised. She’s so beautiful.”

  She grinned at her own wistful tone and wiggled a little to her inner music, as if to demonstrate that youth could make up for my mother’s advantage. Which, as Clark’s assistant had proved, it could.

  It seemed to me that Shell was the key to understanding Chomp’s appeal. I wanted to ask directly why she believed in him, but I was afraid of her answer, and not just because it might reveal her as a racist. Measured against my own complicated moral compromises, the straightforward simplicity of Chompian self-interest was bound to be appealing. His rules were so much easier to follow. His philosophy blessed rather than condemned our worst tendencies. The more I listened to her, the greater the chance that I could be persuaded: not to believe in Chompism, but to give in to it.

  “It’s okay,” she said. “You’re just learning. I can’t tell you yet. We have to keep quiet till tonight. I was hoping he’d tweet a hint, but he hasn’t. They say his people delete all the best tweets. And maybe there’s more than I know. More than anybody knows. Like when they say Fox won’t show tonight. I bet they will. Not even my dad knows everything. We had to hear about his resignation from our phones, like everyone else.”

  “I bet you all cried for a week.”

  “Not me. He had his reasons.”

  “You should have cried. He gave up on you and everyone else who voted for him.” She shook her head but held on to my hand. I would take my chance: “He quit, Shell. So why do you still believe?”

  There was no point in attacking Chomp for his xenophobia or authoritarianism. After all, most of his followers loved just those qualities most about him. But everyone hates quitters.

  “Did he tell you why he quit?” she asked.

  What if Shell loved him because he quit? “I want you to tell me. I trust you more.”

  She slipped her hand out of mine and shook her finger. The rest of her body shook with it. “You have to learn to trust him.”

  “I’ll tell you what I know already. This cruise is Chomp’s last stand. He wants to save the country from cultural invasion, so he’s gathered his favorite supporters as a show of force. The thing is, Shell, I like other cultures. Look at the workers on this ship. They’re hardworking, accommodating, patient, cheerful, and friendly. And hardly any are American.”

  “Did you say ‘last stand’?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Last stand to save the country?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You’re such a goofball! Which country?”

  “Ours. I assume.”

  “Please!”

  Maybe it wasn’t our country. Maybe Chomp was saving a different country. Russia. The opposition was right all along.

  Shell’s body shook in an orgasm of disagreement. “That’s just it!” She’d caught me joyously in her trap. “The workers on this boat, all those busy bees by the pool or the buffet, they all have their own countries. Right? You can read them on the name tags. They’ll tell you all about them if you ask. I’ve met tons of people from other countries. They’re always blah-blahing about the castle in their hometown and what their grandmother cooks on Sundays and what day they get presents on Christmas or whatever they call Christmas in their language. Okay? They have their own history and their own songs and their own food and their own TV shows. It’s what makes their country special. It’s what makes every country special. And what do we have?”

  “Our own country. America.”

  “Yeah! But America is not enough! Not for us. And not for you. We want what they have”—she pointed across the room at Knut, who was frowning down at some recalcitrant dials on his amplifier—“a country all to ourselves, with one language and one kind of people. Where we all watch the same TV shows, sing the same songs in music class, eat the same junk food with the same kind of wrappers, celebrate the same holidays the right way. There are millions of people in this country who eat chips and hot sauce for breakfast, who think Yankee Doodle Dandy must be some kind of porn, who celebrate the twelve days of Christmas in freaking January. And that’s if they’re Christian! Plus we have to celebrate all their holidays too. I don’t even know what Cinco de Mayo is for, only that if you’re at a party at a college, only Mexicans can wear sombreros.”

  “I’m a travel writer, Shell. I love different countries. I love trying different breakfasts and hearing different music.”

  “Okay! But we’ve got different shit right here in our country. Colorado and Arizona and New Hampshire and Alabama. Ever been to those places?”

  “Sure.” Had I been to Alabama?

  “Good. Because they’re dying. Most places in our country are dying. The jobs are gone. The schools are half empty. The stores are boarded up. The towns are ruined. There’s nothing to do but give them up. And that’s okay. Because Chomp has a plan. He wouldn’t tell you because he doesn’t know you. I don’t know you either. But I trust you. You goofball. So maybe I will tell you.”

  Music started, low and canned, just ambient pop to test the system. Shell started swaying, not quite to the beat, but like seaweed twisting in its own strand of current.

  “Why do you trust me?” I asked.

  “Because you want to believe.”

  “Chomp’s not God.” Or an alien.

  “I know. He’s Columbus.”

  “What has he ever discovered?”

  She leaned closer. Her voice brushed the side of my neck. “Tell me you want to believe.”

  Knut’s voice blasted from the speakers: “Now we welcome the mistress of the ceremonies and of everything else—Erica!”

  Erica’s presence was enough to elicit cheers throughout the crowded room. Everyone expected her to rev up the party with one flick of her hips. Instead, to my discomfort and my pride, she marched straight up to me.

  “I got news.” She glanced sidelong at Shell.

  Shell stood her ground. “Are you gonna teach us another dance?”

  “You bet!” Erica’s grin said, Let’s have the night of our lives! while her eyes, settling back on me, said, Who’s this bitch?

  “You still want to hear the secret?” Shell asked me.

  “Can it wait one minute?”

  “Not for her.”

  Shell let the music carry her away. She rejoined her quartet of men, who were dancing just with their heads, and were obviously relieved to once again have some female companionship.

  “Hope I’m not blowing your chance.” Erica’s grin was now flatter and more sincere. I would have to remember it, so I could distinguish the real smile from the fake.

  I lowered my voice. “Hablaste con—”

  “I can’t speak fucking Spanish up here.”

  “Did you talk to your sister?”

  She pulled me into a sheltered nook with a loveseat, where dancers could rest or snuggle.

  “We got like two minutes before I have to work,” she said. “They’re questioning her. Somebody died in one of her rooms. You already knew, didn’t you? She’s got the shit luck, island luck.”

  “Did you get to talk to her? Does she know anything about the dead passenger?”

  “Maybe. They’re saying the guy didn’t just die, he was killed. Is that true?”

  “That’s what I hear.”

  “Okay, but it wasn’t my sister who did it! It wasn’t any crew.”

  “How do you know?”

  “You get a lot of sneaky-ass bitches around here, but no murderers.”

  “What does your sister know?”

  “She saw something.”

  “What?”

  “Maybe—maybe the killer.” Erica looked back across the dance floor at Knut. He was glaring at her. He needed her to start
the show. “She saw some passenger banging on the guy’s door. Like he was angry.”

  “When?”

  “Before Fernando fired her. Before the evacuation drill.”

  “What did the passenger look like?”

  “I don’t know, ask her! She just said it was some guy banging on the door like a maniac. She didn’t know him. They don’t wear name tags like we do. I wish they’d put cameras in the hallways. Passengers are freaks sometimes, you got no idea. Did you talk to Chomp about her? She needs your help bad right now.”

  “I haven’t had time yet. I’ll keep on it.”

  “You got to already be on it. I told you, she’s getting questioned right now. They looked pissed, like they were blaming her. Especially after that shit in Chomp’s room. She could be saying anything. She could confess to murder and have no idea. She lived all her life in the fucking sticks in the DR, she doesn’t know shit.”

  At that moment, the words Let’s get this party started, altered to sound like they came from Stephen Hawking, blasted from the speakers, the overhead light shattered into a hundred colors, and Knut called out something no one could understand, at least no one who hadn’t recently been to Ibiza. Thudding music shook Nelson’s Column like a flagpole in a gale. The Chomp action figure shuddered.

  I had to lean in and shout. “I need to talk to your sister. I need to know what the passenger looked like. I might know him. I might be able to prove she’s telling the truth.”

  “How can you talk to her? She’s not allowed on deck anymore.”

  “Sneak her up or smuggle me down. It’s the only way I can help her.”

  Erica shut her eyes as she thought. She began unconsciously to nod her head in time to the thud of Knut’s music. Even in distress, she moved with precision.

  “Okay.” She opened her eyes and bent to my ear. “She told me she likes you. And your mom too. I feel so shitty. It’s all my fault she’s here. I’ll try to talk to her. Let’s meet later.”

  We set a meeting place. She cracked her knuckles, set her smile in place, and went to start the party.