* * *
The President was giving his annual speech in front of AARP. The group had never really liked Bernstein. Some presidents gave the organization everything they wanted and some presidents had trouble with their outsized power. Bernstein was in the latter group.
His speech received polite applause with lines like “We must preserve the dignity of our senior citizens” and “No matter how old you are, you are still an American.” But when he tried to hint about generational fairness, saying, “All Americans should feel they have the same rights whether they are one or one hundred,” the audience just sat there.
Bernstein had almost lost the election because of his “generational fairness” platform. Fortunately for him, he was able to get an unusually strong turnout of younger voters, but those voters were fickle. After an election they disappeared. The older Americans had the lobbyists and the town halls and the time and energy to devote to politics; the younger people were too busy looking for work. And although the seniors were the parents or grandparents of the young, the older they got, the more selfish they became. They did not want to give up rights that were promised to them for any reason, even for their own children. Not one said, “My medical care costs too much, don’t treat me, just give that money to my kids.” It just didn’t happen. So the question for any candidate dealing with equality was, Could you win without the seniors? And as time went on and the numbers of older people only increased, the answer was simple. No.
When he finished his speech, the President took ten minutes of questions. The first question out of the box was “Are you finding the people who have been creating the violence against us and putting them in prison?”
“We are making great progress in identifying the groups that are causing these problems,” the President said. “The Justice Department is working vigilantly in this area.”
The second question was about his mother. The President had delivered a heartfelt eulogy at her funeral and had hoped that she, along with the questions, would be laid to rest. But here it was again. She was dead and it was still coming up. “Mr. President, you campaigned against using excessive measures to keep people alive. But when your own mother was in that situation you seemed to have changed your mind. Don’t you think that is hypocritical?”
“I have never said that if there is any chance of survival people should not be treated.” Before he could answer further, someone blurted out the next question.
“Is China going to take over the country?”
“I hope so,” the President joked. But realizing that these people did not have a sense of humor, he decided to wrap it up. “What is happening in Los Angeles is exciting. We are very hopeful as to the outcome. Thank you all very much for coming out today and have a great afternoon.” And even though there were five minutes left for questions, he exited the stage. The applause barely lasted until he reached the curtain. They really did not like this man.
* * *
When the speech was over, Paul Prescott went back to his new apartment near Dupont Circle. He had moved out of his place with Owen Stein and was living alone for the first time in years. He had been dating Jack Willman, insisting that they still could see others, but slowly they were becoming an exclusive couple. And they were a good team.
Jack continued to feed Paul extraordinarily helpful information regarding the names of potential troublemakers, people who wanted to do harm to the seniors. Even though these were Americans who hadn’t done anything wrong yet, and therefore were difficult to legally spy on, Paul took whatever names he could get and used his connections in Congress to alert representatives from those areas of the country about the potential troublemakers. A congressman, in turn, could talk to a local police chief and ask him, as a favor, to keep an eye on someone. It was never done officially, but it was at least something AARP could do preemptively, instead of just waiting for the next act of violence. One morning Jack reminded Paul about Max Leonard. “Remember that guy I told you about in Indiana? The rich kid?”
“The rich kid?”
“The one who started Enough Is Enough?”
“Yes, I remember.”
“Well, there was a commotion in Dallas, where he was thrown out of a hotel.”
“Why?”
“For harassing Dr. Sam Mueller.”
“Why would he harass him?”
“I don’t know. I’m just giving you a tip. This guy’s name has been coming up more frequently. Have you seen a picture of him?”
“No.”
“I’ll send you one. He’s handsome, like a movie star.”
“Really?”
“If you saw him, you would stare.”
“That’s funny. A handsome terrorist. You don’t see that very often.”
“I’ve never seen it. The closest was Timothy McVeigh and he was ugly.”
“Who?”
“You don’t remember the Oklahoma guy?”
“No.”
“Well, look it up. This guy’s ten times better-looking.”
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Shen Li had lived his whole life without falling in love, and now he couldn’t stop thinking about Laura Markum. They had been almost inseparable since they met at the barbecue, and it was altering his life. He thought he had enough going on, being the most important force in health care change in the United States, but love was a whole different ball game. He hadn’t realized the parts of him that were in hiding until they started demanding his attention.
Before Laura, Shen woke up each day and all he thought about was work. He was making great strides and the people of Los Angeles took to him like to a pied piper. Of course, he had an advantage. Anyone taking over from the army was going to look like Mother Teresa, but Li really did know what he was doing and it showed. He thought that his job alone would sustain him, which it did—until he met her. Now when he awoke, the first thing he thought about was calling Laura—that is, if she wasn’t lying next to him.
He had been so nervous when they first made love. After all, Shen Li was a world-class nerd. He did have sex in high school, but he was the last boy known for his prowess. When he became one of the richest men in China, the ladies followed the money, and many of them told him he was a wonderful lover. He used to joke with a friend of his, “Isn’t everyone good in bed if they have a hundred million dollars?”
But with Laura it was different from the first kiss. And the first time they made love, they really did make love. She thought he was the brightest man she’d ever met and she admitted to having an “Asian thing.” She’d once had a professor at Yale who was from Taiwan and he was so brilliant, and she had had a mad crush on him, too. Laura loved smart. Cute wasn’t bad, either, but with every ten points a man’s IQ rose, she thought he was that much better-looking. And besides, Shen was always considered just fine in the looks department. He would neither stop traffic nor start it, but whenever he spoke he looked to her like a movie star.
As if falling in love with this woman wasn’t enough, Shen fell in love with her father, also. It was mutual. Senator Markum obviously loved power and so did Li. The three of them had many dinners together and Li and the senator would talk nonstop for hours. Markum had been in favor of partnering with China in order to save his home state, and he thought they should partner up in all the other places in the U.S. that were deteriorating, too.
During one of their many nights out, when he was alone with his daughter for a moment, Markum said, “That is the best man you have ever dated. I’m crazy about him.”
“I am, too.”
“So don’t waste any more time. Marry him, have children. He can go all the way and so can you.”
“He hasn’t asked me.”
“Laura, the man would be your slave. He would sell his soul to marry you. Just make it easy. And do it quickly. Don’t waste time like with that first one.”
Laura left that particular dinner early, leaving her father and Li talking about steel prices and copper futures. When she
walked into her house later that night the message center was lit up. She watched the screen as she got herself a glass of orange juice. It was Shen. “Sorry you left early. I love your father. I love you. I want you to marry me. I so love you.”
Laura sat there. This was a new one. A proposal stored as a message. At least the message center could have gotten down on one knee. She got Li on the screen. “You ask me to marry you on a machine?” Li thought she was angry.
“I’m sorry. I couldn’t help it. I love you.”
“Well, I should give you my answer in a message, so disconnect and let me leave you my decision.”
“Are you kidding?”
“No, disconnect.” The screen went blank and Laura called him back. Li’s face appeared in a recorded message.
“Hello, I am unable to talk to you now. Leave me the particulars and I will contact you.” A red light went on and Laura looked into the camera.
“Yes.”
Li called her back in thirty seconds. “Yes?”
“Yes.”
“You make me the happiest man in the world.”
“As you do me—woman—you know what I mean.”
“May I come over?”
“I wouldn’t sleep if you didn’t.”
“This is the happiest I have ever been.”
“Me, too.” And that was it. Laura Markum and Shen Li were engaged on a video link. It wasn’t so uncommon anymore; there were even marriages performed this way. It was just something that Laura had never imagined when she thought of how the perfect moments in her life were supposed to unfold. Then again, her first marriage proposal was perfect. The restaurant on the beach, a beautiful ring, a violin player, the very best champagne, and the marriage stunk. So maybe this was a good sign.
* * *
The President had had his share of arguments with his wife, but he couldn’t resolve this one. When Betsy was angry, she did not confront, she became passive aggressive. Her answers to questions were as few words as she could manage, and she didn’t ask anything about her husband’s day. If her husband had worked in a factory, that might have been understandable. But as president of the United States, his day was everyone’s day, so not to ask about it was clearly hostile. This went on for about a week, until one night the President let loose. “Goddamn it, I have the hardest fucking job in the world, and I don’t need the silent treatment in my own home.”
“It’s not your home. It’s the people’s home.”
“Oh, screw you. What did I do?”
“You told a woman you were in love with her, and it wasn’t me. Comprende?”
“In my sleep, Betsy. In my sleep.”
“If it was only that, I would try to let it go. But we haven’t been right for so long, that was just the icing. It took a long time to sink in, but I realize now that if it wasn’t her, it would be someone else.”
“That’s not true.”
“It isn’t? You treat me like a secretary, and not the cabinet kind. I didn’t run for this office. I serve as First Lady because you wanted to be president. I did this to support you. And now you seem to have left me behind. It feels bad. Can you understand that?”
“You have one of the most important jobs in the world.”
“I never wanted it!” And Betsy walked out of the sitting room, trying to hold back her tears. The President followed her.
“You don’t hate the job. Do you?”
“I wanted to be partners, Matthew. I’m all right with being a partner. Just like China. But if you’re no longer there, what am I doing?”
“I’m here.”
“No, you’re not. We both know that. When was the last time we were physical?”
“Oh, stop it. It’s hard to be physical in the White House.”
“You’re so full of shit.”
Bernstein knew what he had to do at that moment to smooth this whole thing out. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t fire Susanna Colbert. He would look foolish having three people in that position in his first term. And he loved Susanna. That was the real issue. His head was throbbing. The person he wanted to call at that moment was the reason this was all happening. There were times like this when he was jealous of the religious presidents. To be able to dump this in God’s lap would be such a luxury. But that wasn’t an option for him.
* * *
Brad Miller had to admit he was adjusting well to his surroundings. He’d gotten used to the food, he liked his new friends, and he was falling in love with Barbara. He also liked the fact that the ship only moved about three months out of the year. Many of the passengers thought that being on the open seas was what it was all about, but Brad liked the ports. They would spend a few months in the Bahamas, then Mexico, Florida, and California, alternating between San Francisco and Long Beach.
The first time they dropped anchor in Long Beach, Brad got a chance to see what the Chinese were doing with the city, and he was amazed. What everyone on the ship noticed first was the construction on four large desalinization plants. It took a great earthquake to finally wean California off the Colorado. When these plants were up and running they would supply fresh water from the ocean to sixteen million people.
Brad even took a day trip to his old neighborhood, where everything was now cleared. As it turned out, owners of condominiums were going to be given first choice and a favored price on new development, and if they chose not to return they would be given money, though not anywhere near what they had invested. It was unfair, but that was the only way it was going to be, and now that Brad was safely ensconced in his new digs, he was less upset than he would have been if he had remained homeless.
His son, Tom, was not happy with this outcome. He had been counting on that money to pay back the loans he’d taken out to help his father. But even he had to admit that, if it weren’t for the Chinese, these properties would have sat rotting for years and there would be no money at all, so something was better than nothing.
The activity over the month they spent docked at Long Beach impressed everyone on The Sunset. At any given time there were at least a hundred ships from Asia, mostly Chinese, unloading what was to become the new Los Angeles. Sometimes on the larger ships they could see already-constructed partial buildings, which were unloaded and put on the backs of supertrucks.
Brad and his friends would sit outside and play a guessing game of what the construction was and where it was heading, and he could never get over how much had changed within his one lifetime. He remembered the first Japanese car he ever saw when he was a boy. It was a Datsun and everyone thought it was cute. No one believed at the time that it would be anything more than a cheap alternative to the great American automobile. And now the American automobile was no more. Sure, people bitched and moaned, but the fact was that the consumer ran the world. And the same reason Jews bought Volkswagens was the same reason the Chinese were now partners in the greatest construction project the world had ever seen. People wanted it done quickly, and at a low price, and that was the way it was always going to be. It started with cars, went to food and clothing, and now it was the very places they were going to live and work. Resistance was not just futile, it was gone. As long as the name sounded somewhat American, what was behind it was unimportant. Wal-Mart had known that fifty years earlier, and now everyone did.
Brad and Barbara Nestor were taking a deck walk one particularly clear afternoon when they saw a group of people gathered around someone giving a talk. “Who is that?” Brad asked.
“It’s a new fella who boarded yesterday. He took Marvin’s room.”
“What happened to Marvin?”
“He didn’t wake up.”
“I didn’t know that. When?”
“A week ago.”
“My God, I kept leaving him messages about a poker game. Well, at least it was a DIS.”
“DIS” was an acronym for “died in sleep,” the gold standard way to leave life. When someone died in their sleep, everyone thought they were blessed; it was almost as if t
hey didn’t die at all. Some people actually thought that if you didn’t know you were dying, maybe you weren’t really dead, so a DIS was what everyone wished for when their time came. “So who took over his room?” Brad asked.
“Some suicide doctor. Masters.”
“Walter Masters?”
“That’s it. You know him?”
“I know of him. He’s famous. After the quake he was down in Los Angeles helping the suffering.”
“You think he’s moved here to up his business?”
Brad laughed. It wasn’t so far-fetched, but Masters had never had a reputation as a murderer. He was someone who was there if you needed him. However, it was a little odd that he was now living right down the hall. “I’ll have to be careful not to complain too much when I’m feeling lousy,” Brad joked.
They walked over to where Masters was holding court. Twenty or so people were gathered around him, listening to his stories with rapt attention.
The few people who were known to practice euthanasia had become famous among the older crowd. It was as if they held the power of life and death in their own hands. And when people did meet Masters, they always liked him, because he wasn’t anything more than a man with knowledge that others were afraid to talk about. It wasn’t difficult to look up the information on what medications or potions could end your life, but when that information was one man’s specialty, and he actually practiced it, it gave that man an aura. He was a celebrity, whether he liked it or not.
Brad and Barbara sat down while Walter was in the middle of what would be a thousand stories that everyone wanted to hear. “So I asked her if she was sure,” Masters said. “And when she said yes, I took out my old laptop. I had designed a program where the individual had to press the ‘return’ button three times before the end.”
“Three times?” someone asked.
“Yes. Three steps before the injection. That was to make absolutely sure that they chose this of their own free will.”
“What did the steps say?”
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