Independence Hall

by Roland Smith

  “Do we have time?”

  “We’ll make time. Can’t pass it up. We’ll head down to D.C. tonight after the concert. He said he wants you and your kids to stay at the White House.” He looked at his watch. “Go, band!”

  The band headed out onto the stage.

  Buddy positioned Mom and Roger at the entrance.

  They took each other’s hands.

  “Now!” Buddy said.

  Roger and Blaze Tucker walked out onto stage.

  A wild cheer went up.

  Match began to sing.

  I, Q

  ( Book Two: The White House )

  Roland Smith

  Sleeping Bear PressTM

  1600 Pennsylvania Avenue

  Boone pulled the coach up to the back gate of the White House. It was 2:00 in the morning. While Mom and Roger packed their overnight bags in the master suite, Boone gestured me and Angela to the front of the coach.

  “Buddy and the band are staying at the Willard Hotel two blocks away,” he explained quietly. “I’ll be at Blair House right across the street from here. It’s the official residence for visiting dignitaries and heads of state. My point is that the SOS team will be close by. Not that you’ll be in any danger inside the White House… It’s probably the most secure building in the world.”

  “Why do you think my moth—” Angela stopped herself. “—Malak wanted us to come down here?”

  “I’m sure she’ll let us know when she’s ready,” Boone said. “Under no circumstances, and I mean this, are you to disable or turn off your BlackBerrys. We’re past all that now. We need to know exactly where you are every second of the day from now on. Is that understood?”

  Angela and I nodded.

  “I’ll be in constant touch with you either by phone, text message, or E-mail. And I expect you to do the same.”

  Again Angela and I nodded.

  Roger and Mom came out of the bedroom with their bags. They were tired after their concert at the Electric Factory in Philadelphia a few hours earlier, but excited.

  “Do you have everything?” Mom asked me.

  I gave her a smile and showed her the small bag I was carrying.

  “Let’s go see the president,” Roger said.

  I doubted President J.R. Culpepper was going to be greeting us at 2 A.M. at the security gate. And I was right. We walked up to the gate and were met by a man and a woman dressed in business suits and big smiles on their faces. They looked like public relations people, but the earpieces in their right ears gave them away. They were with the Secret Service. I wondered if they had known Angela’s mother, and if Roger and Angela were wondering the same thing.

  “I’m glad you were able to make it down here on such short notice,” the woman said. “You must be exhausted.”

  “We’ll have to run you through a little security check before we let you in,” the man said. “But it will only take a couple of minutes.”

  Uniformed White House security checked out identifications against the computer they had in the guard station, gave our bags a quick search, then ran the bags through an X-Ray machine. We walked through a metal detector and were wanded after we passed through.

  “You’re all set to go,” the man in the suit said.

  “We are very excited to have you here,” the woman said. “I simply love your music.”

  “Thank you,” Mom said.

  “The president has put you and Roger in the Lincoln Bedroom, on the second floor,” the woman continued.

  “Wow,” Roger said.

  “Where are Q and Angela sleeping?” Mom asked.

  “They’ll be up in the residential quarters,” the woman said. “The bedrooms are not quite as historical, but they are very nice rooms and adjacent to each other. You can sleep in tomorrow. The president and first lady have a brunch planned for you at 11 A.M., but if you get hungry before then all you have to do is call the kitchen and they’ll bring whatever you want to your rooms. The kitchen is open twenty-four hours a day.”

  Whatever I want, I thought. Twenty-four hours a day. I was going to pick up my phone bright and early and order a platter of food with absolutely no vegetable matter on it.

  Angela and I left Mom and Roger in the Lincoln Bedroom, after a brief tour, and the woman led us to our bedrooms, which were great. I said goodnight to Angela, put on my pajamas, and crawled into the biggest and most comfortable bed I had ever slept in. I thought about testing the kitchen offer by ordering a small vanilla milkshake and an order of fries before going to sleep, but I decided to wait until I woke up.

  I closed my eyes thinking that J.R. Culpepper, the most powerful man in the world, the commander-in-chief of the United States, Potus, was probably only a few yards away, snoring.

  I fell asleep with a smile on my face, but I wasn’t asleep long. I woke to a light tapping on my door. Angela had slipped into my room before I was able to sit up.

  “What’s the matter?” I asked groggily.

  “I just got a text message from Malak,” she said.

  I sat up. “What’d she want?”

  “See for yourself.”

  I turned on the light and read the short message on Angela’s BlackBerry. I was suddenly wide awake and out of bed. “Did you call Boone?”

  “I forwarded him the message,” Angela said. “He wrote right back and said that he would be in touch.”

  “That’s all?”

  Angela nodded.

  “What should we do?”

  “Wait,” Angela said.

  We waited for half an hour, expecting Boone to call any moment, but he didn’t call. Instead there was another knock on my door. I opened it.

  Standing in the hallway was a very serious and alert (considering the time of morning) Secret Service agent.

  “The president would like to see you both in the Oval Office,” he said.

  “Now?” I asked. It was 3 A.M.

  He gave me a curt nod.

  “Maybe we should change,” I said.

  “You’re fine,” the agent said. “He’s waiting. Follow me.”

  Angela and I were going to meet the president of the United States in our PJs.

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