Long May She Reign

by Ellen Emerson White

  Her father nodded.

  “And—I don’t know,” she said. “I guess I thought college would be all good fellowship, and traditions, and everyone smiling and crammed into each other’s rooms, and—” In other words, movie college.

  Her father looked concerned. “But, you seem to be making friends.”

  Well, that was open to debate. Unless—Jesus, had her mother told him? He had been the one to drive her over to the infirmary, in one of the Camp David golf carts to see Dr. Holtzman, but she’d just said that she was having a checkup, and he hadn’t seemed to suspect otherwise.

  No. Her mother would never betray her confidence that way—she didn’t think. And, even if she had, her father wouldn’t be dumb enough to let her know about it.

  “Should I allow you to use platitudes?” he asked.

  It might be easier. “I think I was maybe starting to make friends,” she said, “but then, after the whole mess with Susan, people got really mad at me, and—well, most of them stopped liking me anymore.” Not that it had been perfect before that, but still.

  “It’d be nice if a few more of the things that happen to you were actually your fault,” he said.

  She couldn’t really blame the inability to maintain friendships on anyone other than herself. Enticing, though it might be. “Juliana—” She glanced at him to make sure the name was familiar; he nodded— “thinks I’m really impersonal, or—I don’t know—aloof, I guess.”

  Her father sighed. “Why wouldn’t you be aloof?”

  Good point. Why, indeed?

  “And, unfortunately, your two primary role models both have strong tendencies in that direction,” he said.

  So, what, she was genetically destined to be distant and reserved? Terrific.

  “And you’ve also learned the hard way that you have to be very careful about trusting new people in your life,” he said.

  An idle remark, or had he and her mother been talking about her being involved with Jack? Time to redirect this topic, maybe. To find a clever diversion. “There’s a girl in my political science class,” Meg said, “who wears this ‘I’m Glad She’s Not My Mother’ button, and shoots down everything I say—” on the rare occasions she actually spoke up— “even though Vanessa understands more about the machinations of government than she does.”

  Her father nodded. “I’ve always had the feeling that Vanessa knows a great deal more than she’s telling.”

  Meg grinned, and patted her cat. She often had that same sneaking suspicion herself.

  “But, that’s a more unpleasant button than usual,” he said.

  Yeah. It almost went without saying that the same creep also sometimes came to class in a “Wicked Witch of the West Wing” sweatshirt.

  Beth had once come to visit with a “But I thought the President was going to fix everything!” pin on her jacket, and her mother had been amused enough to ask if she would bring a few extra ones next time. She had a great t-shirt, too, with the slogan “No Boys Allowed” displayed across a picture of the White House, which Meg, quietly, coveted.

  And, in the case of her obnoxious classmate, her general feeling was that she was also glad that the President was not her mother, since then, the two of them would be sisters—which would really suck.

  “Are you physically well enough to go back?” her father asked.

  Hell, no. “I wasn’t well enough to go in the first place, Dad,” she said.

  He nodded, and she wondered whether her parents had any idea how lousy they were at hiding how very depressed she made them. It would be nice to be loved, without being pitied. But she didn’t want to start another argument, because, for all she knew, her father’s stomach hurt as much as her mother’s did these days—and he just hadn’t been able to bring himself to admit it to anyone yet.

  “I’m worried about Steven,” she said.

  Her father nodded. “With good reason, I’m afraid. Your mother and I are, too. He’s been having a very hard time adjusting to your being away.”

  Which made her wonder whether she really should stay home, instead of going back.

  “When your mother got shot, I was horrified,” he said, “but I wasn’t shocked.”

  Privately, all of them—especially her mother—had probably anticipated that some coward or other would inevitably take a run at her while she was in office.

  “But, with you, it was different,” her father said. “Preston came into my office, shaking so hard that I thought he was going to fall down, and—I couldn’t get my mind around it. It was even worse than the night I got the phone call about my parents.”

  Her grandparents had been killed in a car accident—by a nineteen-year-old drunk driver—a couple of months after her first birthday. The guy was already out of jail long before she turned three. Her aunt sometimes talked about it, but as far as she knew, her father never did.

  He also never said anything about what it had been like to have his wife almost assassinated while he was standing right behind her, and then come very close to bleeding to death in his arms, while Secret Service agents fought to keep her alive during the frantic six-minute ride to the hospital.

  “You’ve always been the one person your brother completely trusts,” her father said, “so he was particularly devastated by what happened. And I don’t think—” he glanced at her— “that either of you has been able to figure out how to handle the fact that you have a different relationship now.”

  Because she couldn’t play sports. Because she never had any energy to do things. Because she was always so miserable, and scared.

  Because he could no longer depend on her to be there, when he needed her.

  Because she’d stopped being funny—the most unforgivable change of all.

  She wanted to complain that she was doing her damned best, and why couldn’t they give her a chance to try and get well, instead of pressuring her all the time, but what would that accomplish? Like it or not, all of their relationships with one another were different now. It would be absurd to argue otherwise.

  With one exception. “How come it isn’t like that with Neal?” she asked.

  “Because, for reasons which still escape me, he never doubted for a second that you were coming back,” he said. “The whole time, he kept saying things like that you were way smart, and you’d be fine until some of our commandos burst in and rescued you.” Then, her father sighed. “He was so optimistic, that, to my everlasting shame, there were moments when I found it difficult to be around him.”

  Which he would consider an unforgivable lapse of his parental responsibilities, and an indication that he suffered from a deep, heretofore unrecognized, character defect.

  Not that any of them were hard on themselves.

  “But, he didn’t know about the teeth,” Meg said quietly. Or her abandoned clothes.

  “No,” her father agreed. “And he was wrong about the commandos. But he apparently understood more about you than the rest of us did.”

  Maybe. “Or he got lucky,” Meg said.

  Her father managed something that resembled a smile. “Or that, yeah.”

  She looked down at the bottom of the bed, where her Camp David duffel bag was open, and much closer to being empty than full. It would be so nice just to hurl it into her closet, shut the door, and maybe give college another try in the fall. “Dr. Brooks and a couple of the surgeons could hold a press conference tomorrow, and say that the operations didn’t go very well, and they need for me to stay here in Washington to have any chance for my rehabilitation to work,” she said.

  Her father’s expression looked all the more haunted. “They really wouldn’t be stretching the truth.”

  Nope.

  “Your mother and I could make the arrangements in about thirty seconds,” he said.

  Yep.

  He studied her. “Do you want us to?”

  God, yes. And if she left school, it would take the pressure off Susan and everyone else in the dorm, too. They could all go back
to leading ordinary college lives, with no security issues or media assaults, and she could go back to—total isolation and despair. Sitting alone in her room for hours on end. Everyone looking at her miserably. Nobody talking during meals. The staff treating her like a tiny glass sculpture they expected to see shatter right in front of them at any given moment.

  Her father came over to sit next to her. “How about I give you a hand with the rest of your packing?”

  As kicks out of the nest went, that was a very gentle one. Meg nodded. “That would be good, Dad,” she said. “Thanks.”

  * * *

  THE PLAN WAS for them to have a private family lunch the next day, before it was time for her to head out to Andrews. In the morning, to her father’s barely-concealed annoyance, there was a coffee reception scheduled to be held downstairs in the Blue Room, with the French Ambassador and the First Lady of Mali included among the guests. One of those foreign policy encounters which appeared friendly and informal, but, in all likelihood, involved all sorts of unspoken geopolitical strategies and goals.

  Neal was the only one who was enthusiastic about the get-together, and he spent about twenty minutes on a settee in the Center Hall, swinging his legs back and forth, and yapping happily to a very patient protocol aide about how he should behave when he went in to say hello. Of course, he liked meeting absolutely anyone anywhere at any time, and was famous for having long, intense “Do you like your job? Show me all the stuff you do!” chats with everyone who worked in—or visited—or, hell, walked by—the White House, but he especially enjoyed official functions. He had even voluntarily put on a tie.

  Steven didn’t want to have anything to do with any of it, but when her mother remarked that he always looked very handsome in his blue turtleneck, he came out of his room wearing it a few minutes later. Meg didn’t feel like making an obligatory “Yes, I’m still sane, and vaguely mobile” appearance, but it would only be a few minutes out of her life, so what the hell—and her mother seemed both abashed, and very pleased, when she suggested doing so. Her father frowned, but made no actual comment.

  She didn’t have the energy even to consider getting dressed up, but in an attempt to look presentable, she changed into a red cashmere sweater and grey wool pants, fastening her surgical brace over the pants. She also put on her sling, so no one would forget and try to shake hands with her. Then she went to wait in the West Sitting Hall with Trudy and her brothers, until it would be time to go downstairs.

  Neal had either taken notes during his meeting with the protocol aide, or gone off and spent ten minutes on the Internet, because he was full of unexpected tidbits, including the fact that Mali had celebrated its annual Democracy Day holiday recently, that the climate was hot and dry during most of the year, and that the country’s motto was “One People, One Goal, One Faith.” Trudy listened intently to all of this, asking several questions, and Meg pretended to listen, while Steven yawned and ate his fourth cinnamon roll of the day and read the Red Sox articles in the Sunday Globe.

  When Frank came up, and signaled to her that it was time, she made her way to the elevator, her brothers trailing along behind her.

  “I’m staying like, two seconds,” Steven said grimly.

  His father’s child, although by now, she assumed he had steeled himself to face the inevitable, snapped into his First Gentleman persona, and was being warm and charming to one and all.

  One of the social aides who had been assigned to the event met them at the elevator door, and escorted them across the hall. There were a lot of people around, including a few reporters and official White House photographers, all of whom perked up when they saw her, and she braced herself so that she wouldn’t flinch when they were hit with the inevitable camera flashes.

  “This sucks,” Steven muttered, and the social aide looked uneasy.

  “Hey, you’re the one who went and put on your turtleneck,” Meg said. “If you’d said no, they wouldn’t have made you come.”

  Since they all knew that was true, and that his appearance was, therefore, entirely self-inflicted, Steven scowled. “Yeah, well—you’re the favorite.”

  Always the ultimate trump card to pull on one another. They’d started having this exact same argument pretty much as soon as they learned how to speak. “I’m not the favorite,” Meg said. “Neal’s the favorite.”

  “I’m not the favorite,” Neal said instantly.

  More cameras swung in their direction, and they all smiled broad, friendly smiles.

  As they went in to the reception, she tried not to limp too badly, but she must not have done a very good job, because people either stared or quickly averted their eyes.

  Which made her feel like the god-damn Spirit of ’76, but okay, fine, whatever. She didn’t mind.

  Also, like Steven, she would lose the moral high ground if she complained about being down here.

  Neal waved at their father, who was over by the windows talking to some guests, and made a beeline for their mother, who was near the fireplace, surrounded by an even larger group, including the First Lady of Mali, and the French Ambassador and his wife. Her mother’s French was superb, and the First Lady apparently spoke quite good English, but there were a couple of interpreters strategically posted a few feet away, just in case.

  “Bienvenue, Madame Her Excellency et Monsieur Ambassadeur!” Neal said, as chipper as ever, and everyone standing within earshot grinned.

  Christ, no matter what he claimed, the kid wasn’t going to go to West Point; he was going to be the Secretary of State someday. Or, possibly, both.

  Steven’s entire appearance consisted of saying, “Bonjour,” and then, “Excusez-moi,” before he retreated from the room and went back upstairs.

  Despite having studied it in both junior high and high school, Meg’s French was pretty lousy, but she was able to produce a reasonably competent “Bonjour, comment allez-vous? Il fait très beau de vous rencontrer.” The First Lady and French Ambassador smiled, and responded in kind, but they spoke too quickly for her to be able to translate much of it, so she glanced at her mother, who mouthed, “They want to know how you are.”

  Okay, she could do that, too. “Je suis très bien, merci,” she said. “Et vous?”

  She could tell that, although they were trying to hide it, the First Lady and the French ambassador’s wife—and most of the other women in their vicinity—were watching the way she and her mother interacted in a subtle “So, what the hell kind of parent is she?” sort of way.

  Which made her feel very self-conscious, and awkward, and couldn’t have thrilled the President much, either.

  Without giving it much thought, she leaned against the thin upholstered arm of the nearest gilded chair—probably not a great idea, since it was an irreplaceable antique, dating back to James Monroe—so that she could set her cane down without falling. Then, she reached into her pocket with her good hand, took out the watch she always carried, and passed it to her mother, who looked surprised, but then fastened it around Meg’s left wrist, which she gave an affectionate tap when she was done. She also glanced at Meg’s slightly too long fingernails on that hand—the only way she could do them herself was to drag her fingers back and forth across the nail file Cheryl had suggested that she tape down on her desk—and Meg nodded, her mother nodding back.

  All of which took about fifteen seconds, but visibly put the other two women at ease.

  The First Lady asked her a couple of questions in English about college, to which she responded, just as politely. Then, her mother rattled off something, and Meg picked up very few words other than “airplane.” Possibly “vacation,” too.

  “Oui, nous allons nous ennuyer d’elle beaucoup,” her mother was saying. “Elle est étée merveilleuse pour avoir sa maison.”

  After Neal answered the same sorts of questions about his school and they had both said a respectful good-bye to everyone, Meg leaned towards her mother.

  “Sacre bleu, you have another hair-bump,” she said, ver
y softly, so that no one else would hear.

  For a split second, her mother eyes widened and she started to lift her hand, then smiled and lowered it. Nevertheless, just for fun, right before leaving, Meg let her gaze drift up to the crown of her mother’s head, and shuddered slightly. Her mother seemed determined not to fall for the same joke twice, but then, took a quick peek in the mirror above the fireplace—to Meg’s great amusement.

  When she and Neal got upstairs, Preston was in the West Sitting Hall, talking to Steven and Trudy, because he had promised to have lunch with all of them. Since it was Sunday, and a day of relative leisure, he wasn’t wearing his jacket over his shirt and tie, although it was neatly draped over a nearby chair.

  “Taking advantage of the chance to get some extra face time with the President?” she asked.

  Preston nodded. “My ambition knows no bounds.”

  Which she had no doubt that a number of people down in the West Wing currently believed about the guy with the new corner office.

  The chefs cooked enough for a group considerably larger than the seven people who ended up sitting at the table, but it all looked delicious. She was so nervous about going back that she didn’t eat much, but as always, having Preston there kept the mood light, and they mostly talked about things like the fact that the next day, her mother would be off to the Nationals game to make her yearly inept throw for Opening Day, with a visit to Camden Yards planned for the Orioles’ home opener later in the week.

  After she and her father left for Andrews—he was going to accompany her to the plane, although not fly on it this time, her mother and Steven and Neal were maybe going to go outside and practice on Steven’s pitching mound, which the gardeners had set up, long ago, on one of the most private sections of the South Lawn. With this in mind, the President had changed into tailored khaki pants, a perfectly starched white Oxford shirt, and Top-Siders—which, for her mother, was a very sloppy, even slovenly, outfit. The throwing session was probably going to be funny as hell, and Meg was sorry to be missing it.