Truth Like the Sun

by Jim Lynch

  “So what’s your strategy?” asked an elderly woman at the corner of Fifty-second and Palatine.

  “To go everywhere the mayor doesn’t go and meet as many voters as I can,” Morgan cheerfully replied. “And to tell the truth—all the time, every time.”

  “Tell your people,” she said loudly, “they can put one of those big signs in my yard.”

  Helen tried to conceal her mounting panic. The afternoon was fading fast, and she still didn’t have a formal interview set up. Ask your questions in front of everybody else, Ted Severson had suggested, or hope for a break in the schedule.

  When the repetitive doorbelling—“I’m Roger Morgan, and I’m running for mayor”—continued south into the Fremont neighborhood, she broke from the pilgrimage, even though the Times reporter was still eavesdropping on Morgan’s every utterance, and called Shrontz, pleading for more time. “Lock and load,” he said. “Competitive market.”

  “Right.”

  “Huh?”

  “I came from a competitive market.”

  “Why are you shouting at me, Helen?”

  She hung up and, instead of rejoining the paparazzi, tailed Severson into a neighborhood espresso shop, where she watched him lean on his cane and order a drip coffee.

  “Cool,” replied the sleeveless, tattooed barista. Once he got his steaming mug, Severson dropped with a groan into a chair at a tiny square table, glaring at all the red stools and the people wearing funny hats, throwback glasses and striped shirts.

  “You mind?”

  He shrugged, though it was clear he did. He studied the heart-shaped foam design atop her latte and then the barista, as if uncovering some lesbian tryst. He obviously wanted to get up and leave, but his coffee was still too hot to guzzle and he hadn’t gotten a go-cup.

  Sitting this close, she noticed just how narrow his skull was, his nose and chin coming to points, his eyes reduced to slits, as if he’d seen more than enough already. She started gently, but even the friendliest question about Roger Morgan prompted the stink-eye and a bland response. Impatiently, she prodded him about the fair’s little-publicized downsides.

  “Can we go off the record for a minute?” he asked.

  “You mean not for attribution?”

  “I mean off the record, as in what I’m about to say can’t be printed or repeated.”

  She hesitated. “You’re running his campaign, Mr. Severson. You’re one of his closest friends. I’d like whatever you might say to be on the record.”

  “Who told you I’m running his campaign?” His voice rose. “You’d think a trained observer would’ve noticed by now that Roger runs his own show.”

  When his responses to her questions slowed down, as if his batteries were dying or he was doing his damndest to bore her to death, it crossed her mind that Severson probably didn’t even think women should be reporters. He told her how many years—forty-six—he’d been around politics and the press, leaving the number hanging with its insinuation that he knew exactly what she was up to. She pretended to listen but mostly watched, noting how his ash-colored hair hovered like a messy halo over his freckled scalp.

  “What did you want to tell me off the record?” she finally asked.

  “Thought you weren’t interested.”

  “Deep background, just for my edification.”

  “Call it whatever you want.” He glanced out the window. “You listening to me now?”

  “Of course.”

  “Sure?”

  “Yes.”

  “You should be ashamed of yourself for trying to tear down such a great man.”

  Helen blushed. “You went off the record to scold me?”

  “I’m not finished,” he snarled, breathing audibly now. “I suggest you take a good look at those chips on your shoulders and see whether they factor into your sense of fairness with Roger and the others you’ve skewered for sport through the years, including a certain senator from South Carolina. Okay, now we’re back on the record. Any more questions, Ms. Gulanos?”

  She found her voice, but there wasn’t much behind it and her heart was kicking. She hadn’t moved all the way out here to get lectured on newspaper shit storms back East. “Mr. Severson, I’m putting a whole lot of extra time into this, to be absolutely fair. I wouldn’t—”

  “What are we even talking about?” He brought the cup to his mouth again, but it was empty and he looked away. “I’ll try to get you some time with him around dinner, but no promises, okay? Good day.” His voice rose on day the way Paul Harvey’s did on the radio, a squiggly vein bulging near his temple, his fingers going white as his weight shifted onto the cane, his suit coat hanging so wide open that Helen couldn’t miss the dark handle of a pistol bulging from his left armpit.

  PAIN HAD CRAWLED up Roger’s calves into his knees and was headed for his hips by the time this doorbelling marathon approached the last house, where there was supposed to be a barbecue in his honor.

  The front yard of the mustard-yellow three-story was adorned with Tibetan prayer flags, a ceramic Buddha, African masks and plastic pink flamingos. Getting closer, he saw much more—a metal sun, birdbaths, clamshells, wind chimes, sneakers wrapped around overhead telephone lines, kites and swings dangling from maple branches. The largest bumper sticker on the VW van parked out front read Visualize One Love. He heard excited voices rounding the far side of the house, repeating his name. People stepped outdoors to eyeball the novelty candidate in his button-down shirt, nobody knowing what to say. It was all he could do to sustain his smile, perspiring there on the cracked walkway, eager blades of grass sprouting around his wingtips. Young and old people, dozens now, tittering, waiting. He dabbed at his brow with the back of his wrist. “So what’s for dinner?” he finally asked, his eyes stinging, and everyone acted like Seinfeld had just showed up.

  They limply shook his hand and offered beer. What he needed was food and water, a bathroom and a couch, but he accepted a warm Pabst and stood there, his feet sizzling as if he’d scaled some peak. The chicken’ll be a while, he overheard, still raw on the grill. He had trouble following questions and suggestions, everybody’s eyes on him, half of them drunk and overly earnest, trying too hard to be substantive.

  Nodding along, as if he knew precisely what they meant, he looked around to see how many reporters were still shadowing him. He spotted the Times guy, a snide columnist with one of the weeklies, the KING-5 airhead, another who claimed he was writing for Slate magazine and, of course, Helen Gulanos, who was insisting on talking to him today. He desperately tried to stay alert, to be on, but he was finished, hopelessly repeating himself and answering questions that hadn’t been asked. Finally, he excused himself to the bathroom, hoping the domineering woman he’d just abandoned wasn’t in mid-question.

  The tiny, windowless dollhouse bathroom made him perspire even more, the walls a frightening blood-red, the mirror a foggy antique, the sink barely large enough for his swollen hands. He splashed his face repeatedly with cold water to shake the grogginess, trying to hide the one thing an old candidate can’t show: exhaustion. The day had started with such giddiness, but he should have known better. A poll this early meant less than nothing, and while the machinists and Asians were kind, it’s not as if they were campaigning for him.

  Cornered as soon as he stepped outside, this time by a bearded man with a Fuck Capitalism T-shirt, he got quizzed on same-sex marriages, organic-food certifications, the plight of polar bears and other issues he didn’t much care about while overhearing drunks explain in the background that yes, they in fact had run out of propane. So yes, they’ll either have to borrow a tank from a neighbor or bake the chickens in the oven. Feeling dizzy, he scanned the room for snacks but saw only potato chip crumbs. Meanwhile, he was getting grilled by a man with oven-cleaner breath and ogled by three older women too shy to approach. Behind them, another ring of gawkers monitored his availability, waiting for an opening so they could say they met him.

  Annie finally rescued him, ap
ologizing profusely to everyone within earshot, pulling him outside as if some emergency had arisen, whispering that Teddy insisted they get him dinner right now. Roger stopped at the gate to thank everyone but his voice was too weak, his words lost in the confusing bustle. They all assumed he’d come back shortly. The entire departure was muffed, his largest crowd of the day squandered.

  • • •

  HELEN LET HIM FINISH chewing the oyster crackers. They were in Ivar’s Salmon House now, across Lake Union from downtown, waiting for his dinner while frat boys cussed at the happy-hour bar and Severson and Annie eavesdropped from an adjacent table.

  She tried not to look frazzled, but she’d raced here from her apartment after explaining Elias’s allergies and food and video preferences to yet another new babysitter, this one a big-eyed fourteen-year-old who kept bragging that she had a Girl Scout badge for child care. The thrill of the hunt had faded anyway, especially given that Morgan looked half-dead. Behind his head was the cityscape with the Space Needle off to the side, as if the other buildings were either in awe of it or refused to be seen with it.

  HER HAIR WAS so thick and unruly that it made her face seem small and intensely focused, with a contained desperation in her eyes and unasked questions tightening her expressions. Despite all her nonchalance, he could tell she was burning inside. He pointed out a seaplane on the lake so she wouldn’t notice his hand trembling as he sipped his water.

  There was no rhythm to her queries. She went from asking about hobbies—mountains he’d climbed and sports he watched—to his churchgoing habits. She followed an aside about whether it was true that he’d paid bums to tell him stories with a point-blank question: Was there anything apocryphal about how he’d come up with the idea for the Space Needle?

  He’d lost track of what he was saying, mumbling through what felt like yet another minefield, knowing her questions deserved more thought. Mercifully, a tray of oyster shooters was set down in front of him.

  SHE LOOKED AWAY when he threw back what resembled slugs crammed into shot glasses and forced herself not to glance at her watch, breathing through her nose to slow her pulse.

  “So what have you done since you moved here?” he asked. “Have you canoed through the arboretum yet?” She shook her head. “Sailed in the duck dodge?” She squinted. “Rode the Burke-Gilman Trail? Climbed Mount Si? Taken a ferry ride? Driven up to Paradise?”

  “Paradise?”

  “On Rainier, my dear. The lodge. You haven’t been there yet either?”

  She was running out of time for major changes before the first deadline. “Mr. Morgan,” she said, “I just work here.” She let him take a bite, waited a beat, then said, “You look tired.”

  He stopped chewing and grinned. “Am I too old for this? Is that the question?”

  “It’s a fair one, isn’t it?” she said neutrally. “Doorbelling is hard work, even for young legs. That was a long day. I’m impressed you held up as well as you did. I mean, you’ve had some joints replaced, haven’t you?”

  He groaned and glanced at Teddy. “You’re serious, aren’t you?” He squeezed out a smile. “Left hip twice and right knee once. So far. Why? What’d you hear?”

  “That you’ve got a pacemaker too.”

  “Wow!” His short, hard laugh alarmed Teddy, who cocked his good ear closer. “No, ma’am! My heart beats entirely on its own volition. But you know, my father, uncle and grandpa didn’t make it out of their sixties, so this is all bonus time.”

  She studied him. “How’d they go?”

  “Aneurysms. All of ’em. And it’s a hereditary thing too, a narrowness of the blood vessels up here.” He tapped his skull. “My grandfather went mid-sentence. He was a history professor at the U-Dub and explaining Manifest Destiny to me in the backyard when”—Morgan snapped his fingers—“he was suddenly gone. So either I’m likely to go at any minute or I’ll take after my mother and be around forever. Anything else you’d like to know about my mortality?”

  He swallowed a cup of Manhattan chowder and plowed into the halibut—“the steak of the sea,” he informed her—and she saw a new alertness, the seafood working like a defibrillator.

  Wiping his mouth, he leaned toward her and lowered his voice. “What you need to understand, Ms. Gulanos, is that it’s not my body that’s having a hard time with all this. It’s being old enough to smell bullshit a few miles away and yet still having to pretend it’s valid. That’s what I’m getting too old for.”

  She’d lost control of the interview and didn’t know how to regain it, scribbling in her notebook even though the tape recorder was running. She concentrated on appearing neither friendly nor hostile and waited to see what he’d say next.

  SEEING HER FLUSTERED, he offered his damn-the-consequences smile. He was used to rolling this one out to relax people, though it wasn’t working on her, and he couldn’t tell if that was because she was wound too tight or, worse yet, simply immune to it. “I’m clearly not used to talking so much about myself,” he said finally. “So you’re from Ohio?”

  “Originally, yes.”

  “Which part?”

  “Youngstown.”

  “Rust Belt.” He resisted mentioning that her eyes were steel-gray in this light. “Parents still there?”

  “Listen, I’m sorry, but I’m up against a deadline and still have more questions. And I know you have to leave in a bit to—”

  “You don’t like talking about yourself either.”

  “I’m not running for mayor, sir.”

  “That’s a diversion not an excuse. I doubt you share much of yourself with anyone.”

  She stared at him, clearly weighing her options.

  “Tell me something about you,” he pressed, pointing his fork at her. “Please. Anything.”

  She inhaled. “I live in a small apartment a five-minute walk from here, but it feels like it could be anywhere, in any city. I rented under the freeway because it’s across the street from a preschool and day care that’s a ‘peanut- and coconut-free zone,’ which caught my eye, seeing how Elias is allergic to peanuts. The paper snowflakes the kids made in January are still up on the windows for reasons I don’t understand.”

  He waited for more, then nodded. “Thank you for that. It wasn’t much about you, but what was unsaid was actually rather generous. You’re a single mom with a demanding full-time job, yet you’re willing to live like a troll under the freeway if you think it’s good for your boy.” He wiped his mouth, his energy and imagination returning in waves, picturing her thirty years from now, still beautiful, her face rounder, less defined, the skin of her neck loosening enough to cover that fading scar. And it hit him right then—the familiar old woman volunteering at his campaign was Deborah. Deborah Barrows! She still even looked something like her forty-year-old self. He’d ended that one so poorly that he teared up now at her forgiveness before he could stop himself.

  As he dabbed his eyes, her questions started up again, in a much firmer tone, about his consulting work through the decades. Then, out of nowhere: “Did your parent company profit off the Space Needle restaurant during and after the fair?” Obviously, she already knew the answers, which made this a lie detector test as well as an interview.

  “I’d appreciate your help,” she said now, “at putting me in touch with people who know you well instead of just acquaintances who admire you. I’d like to talk to your mother.”

  “Teddy knows me as well as anybody, and he definitely doesn’t admire me.”

  “Mr. Severson thinks I’m out to get you.”

  Roger glanced at Teddy, who looked like he was about to rupture. “Loyal to the brink of paranoia, isn’t he? My mother’s not well. I will thank you in advance for not bothering her.”

  It took them forever to get the bill, but once they finally escaped her and her questions, he debriefed Teddy while Annie drove them toward a nearby retirement home.

  “She’s clearly under a lot of pressure to break new ground on me,” Roger said. “I al
most feel sorry for her.”

  “Don’t,” Teddy instructed him. “I just skimmed her stories on some poor senator from South Carolina. She chopped off his head, stuck her knife in his ass, slit open his belly and tossed him on the grill.”

  Roger laughed. “Maybe he deserved it.”

  “She thinks you all do. Don’t feel sorry for her. The bunny rabbit doesn’t feel sorry for the hungry eagle. She’s a shark.”

  “Teddy, please. Pick an image and stick with it.”

  SPEEDING BACK to the office, she was redesigning the story so feverishly in her head that she glided through a red with that familiar rush of clear thinking that comes with attempting to not only get everything precisely right but also to make it engaging, even irresistible—maybe even artistic—without bending a single fact, on deadline. But truth and art are moving targets. Stories change and evolve. Bigger news breaks. And even if she did her part and lucked out with the timing, the story still had to survive several editors, a headline writer, a page designer and maybe a half dozen others with the authority to fuck it up. But if this were easy, it wouldn’t be exhilarating, and she wouldn’t be blowing through red lights rewriting in her head. Her thoughts hopped into the future, picturing tomorrow’s readers. Marguerite, Birnbaum, Steele and, of course, Morgan himself, Teddy and Annie, then her parents, friends at Roll Call and the only two people in her courtyard who get the P-I every morning. Probably only six inches of copy on the front, the other fifty inside, but people would read every word. The phony way Morgan had teared up at the restaurant over her plight as an overworked single mom suddenly infuriated her all over again.

  She realized she hadn’t checked her phone messages in more than an hour. Four. Two from Shrontz demanding updates, in that Morse-code brevity of his. One from Omar Duran: “My guy saw the poll this morning and says he’ll talk to you next week about Morgan—off the record.” The last one, yet another from Shrontz: “Birnbaum’s holding it. You’ve got another day or two.” She was so distracted by this news, so simultaneously disappointed and relieved that she crossed the center line into oncoming traffic until the medley of horns revived her and she swerved back on course.