by Claire Adams
His masculinity struck me. I swallowed, feeling this unarticulated sense of emotion, of vibrancy course through me. “I suppose so.”
“I suppose at 44 I need to begin catching up with the younger crowd. I was always the youngest, you know. Youngest governor of California. Youngest man in Congress. And now—the youngest president. But I suppose that doesn’t really illustrate itself to the rest of the American people.”
“It’s tough keeping up,” I admitted, trying to joke with him. “I’m already 29.”
“And already interviewing for the position to be my personal re-election organizer? Hmm. Please. Tell me why you—and you alone—fit the role.”
I felt nervous once more, nearly stuttering into the words. “Well. I was very much involved with your first election. I worked closely with your manager—Rick Selman—to create the perfect campaign for you. He will tell you that I contributed many ideas—ideas that ultimately created a fruitful campaign. In many ways, you wouldn’t be sitting in that chair without me.” I raised my left eyebrow toward him, creating a sense of sass that I knew was probably one or two steps over the line.
He brought his hand to his bearded, handsome face. The first president to have a beard in many years; it had created quite a frenzy throughout much of the United States. But honestly, it was stunning.
“You’ve brought up some interesting points. I think I remember you.” He stood then. He swung his long, strong legs out from his body, tapping around to the side of the desk. He leaned on it easily, gazing down at me. I wasn’t sure what to do; his gaze was so penetrating.
“I feel very confident in this role,” I continued then. “You must know that I have the relevant experience, and I can speak to the younger audience as well as traditional voters. I know how to create a campaign that will be even better than the one before.”
He nodded toward me. A tension had risen around us, making me feel so strange. I brought my hand to my ear, bringing my hair behind it. I averted my eyes toward the desk, where I saw a pleasant photo of the president and his beautiful, blonde wife. They were gazing at each other with such passion. I wondered what their actual relationship was like. I knew that often, during the most previous campaign, the men and women on the campaign trail with me had mentioned that she was mean, always making sly remarks about the women on the team. She was jealous, sure. And maybe she should have been. The women on the campaign team were young and vibrant, swinging around the soon-to-be president with fine, 20-year-old asses and breasts, without a thought of the soon-to-be first lady. Why would anyone think of her? Why should we care what she thinks of us?
I cleared my throat, trying to slice through the tension and still create a good interview for myself. “How is the first lady?” I asked him.
He tipped his head to the right, looking at me curiously. “She’s wonderful, thank you for asking.” His tone had switched. Before, it had been almost intimate, talking to me like we’d been friends for ages. But now: his voice was dominant, presidential. He removed himself from the side of the desk and collapsed into his chair once more, picking up his pen. He began making notes on a white piece of paper before him. He didn’t say anything or glance in my direction.
The silence stretched. I felt so strange. Was I supposed to leave? “So. I have a great deal of experience, and working as lead of your next campaign team would be a supreme pleasure,” I muttered. I stood from my chair, realizing that he’d lost interest in me. “Have a good afternoon.” I then spun around, back toward the door that camouflaged itself into the wall.
Still, only the scratches from his pen were brought back to my ear. I shuddered.
The door opened and I stepped into the hallway, where I found Dimitri holding the door knob and nodding toward me. I didn’t realize that I was visibly shaking. Dimitri closed the door and placed his hand on the small of my back. “You okay?” he whispered, jostling his microphone from his face for a moment.
I nodded, still feeling the waves of panic as they rushed over me. “Of course,” I whispered. “Now get me the hell out of here!”
Dimitri laughed and led me back down that illustrious stairwell, back into the air. I felt unsteady the entire way down those stairs. I grasped on his arm in the free air, looking up at the sky. “That was rough,” I confided him. “I don’t think I got it.” I hadn’t ever felt that way before—that I’d completely failed at something. Every word I’d said in the beginning had felt perfectly orchestrated. I’d felt like I was on track until—until I’d felt something between us. Something that I couldn’t readily speak about.
“I’m sure it went better than you think,” Dimitri said, nearly laughing.
But I shook my head vehemently. “No, Dimitri. No. But thanks for saying so. You’re a good friend.” I said these words to him and watched as his eyes winced at the word—friend. But I couldn’t be anything else to him.
“We should get coffee sometime, Amanda,” he said then. His words were broad and vague. “As friends, of course.”
I nodded, stepping back from him. I smiled. I didn’t have many friends, and I think he knew that. “We’re both married to our work, aren’t we?” I asked him.
“I don’t see how the president can have a wife; I don’t even have time to watch football,” Dimitri said.
I laughed appreciatively. I reached into my pocket and grabbed my phone, making a quick call for a taxi. “You’ll be around?” I asked him as I hung up the phone.
Dimitri nodded. “You know I’m always around.”
The taxi arrived quickly. I leaped into the yellow cab and we revved toward my home in Trinidad. I folded my hands in my lap, still feeling the shakes coursing through me. I tried to steady my head, to tell myself it was all going to be fine—it was all going to be fine. I would keep my job with Carlman; I’d work my way up steadily. So, I didn’t get the job.
So what?
Chapter Three
It was growing dark outside the taxi as we pulled up to my apartment building. I leafed through my billfold and paid the driver in cash. “Thank you, beautiful lady,” the man said. Part of me balked at this. Truth be told, I wasn’t always so proud of my looks. But I thanked the foreign man anyway. “Have a good night,” he returned.
I sauntered up my steps, feeling the glow of the moonlight on my back. It was a hazy summer evening, one I knew was best spent with friends, with lovers. But I didn’t have those people in my life. Work friends, sure. They’d all been friendly enough over the years, always inviting me out to events, to the bar. But I never readily agreed to go out with them, always assuming that my desires, my needs, were far more important than anything they could create for me: laughs over a drink, inside jokes. I didn’t need them. I only needed my career, my intelligence—my success.
I reached my apartment and removed my keys from my coat. I entered the apartment—it had been an upgrade for me a few years back, this one with much more square feet. I flung my stuff on a chair and began unbuttoning my shirt one button at a time, gazing around the room. The wine bottle I’d opened the previous evening was still resting on the counter. I reached my hand up to grab a wine glass from the top shelf, feeling my bra tighten against my breasts with the stretch. I poured the glass of wine, remembering all the long-lost nights of college and post-college, drinking my red wine by myself in the shadows of my living room.
I took in the first sip of wine slowly, easily, tasting every morsel of it. I walked toward the chair by the window, still removing each button from my shirt. I tapped the wine on the table and removed the rest of my clothes, standing in only my tights and my gray bra, feeling the warm air emanating from the window. I felt relaxed for the first time all day.
I peeled off my tights and then collapsed into the chair, continuing to drink the wine slowly, tapping the remote control to my side to create tip-tapping jazz music in the background. I allowed my mind to ease a bit as I sat there, lost in thought. I’d been so consumed with thoughts of the interview all week, I hadn’t had time to do anything
else.
Of course, this wasn’t strange. The past year and a half, I hadn’t thought about much beyond work. I’d been consumed with it, truly. Working beneath George Carlman was a continuous struggle. He wanted the best of everything, of course, and I gave it to him. I stayed up countless nights making phone calls, assuring his re-election—everything. He trusted me to do good by him, and goddammit, I did. But at what cost? I already felt like I was aging far too quickly. And in many ways, I wanted to be old: to have those wrinkles that George Carlman dripped onto your face, making you look wise beyond your years. I knew that those wrinkles made you formidable in office.
Of course, because of this continuous struggle, I’d lost my interest in men, in relationships. I’d had a boyfriend in college, certainly, but he’d been a passing fad. He’d moved to New York to make millions on Wall Street—and I didn’t miss him. I knew we were both driven by our goals. I respected this.
There’d been that man in Congress, as well, during the past election. But I’d lost interest in him during the course of the campaign. He’d been sexy, in this elusive, older way; a real silver fox. His power had certainly captured my attention—not that I slept with him for the power. But I’d lost interest in him, just as I’d lost interest in all the others. During the campaign process, my eyes had flitted upon something else—something incredible. Something I knew was special.
I couldn’t linger on those thoughts. I couldn’t linger on the fact that every time I met with the president, or even stood in his presence, my heart started beating rapidly—my mind started racing. I never felt like myself around him. I felt like a blushing girl—like the kind of girl I rejected so readily in the rest of the world. His passionate eyes and those firm, handsome eyebrows, that curled head of hair, the way he looked in suits. God. I moved this way, then that in the chair, feeling the nakedness of my body, exposed to the rest of the room.
I remembered the afternoon’s interview, the way he’d looked at me with such curiosity. Layered in clothing, I’d felt nearly naked in his presence. However, I’d interrupted that romantic moment.
I’d turned his attention toward his wife.
I knew that he and his wife, Camille, weren’t happy people—not together. They’d been married right after college. Many in his staff—including myself—speculated that the marriage had been a sort of political decision. Camille’s father was an important man in the south, and Xavier had needed backing. They did look beautiful together on camera. All throughout the past 20 years—the entire length of my political comprehension—I’d seen them photographed from place to place, as Xavier moved up the political ladder. I remembered thinking that they were the most beautiful people in the world. And they knew, in many ways, that they fit the bill of what the American people wanted.
But the reports of fights at home, whispered throughout the White House and throughout the Hill made many in his staff nervous that a divorce or a scandal would spark. For this reason, Xavier was continually watched. He wasn’t to have an affair; the Secret Service men would be sure of it.
Knowing that there were problems at home—or at least, rumor of it—made me feel safe to engage in my fantasies. Letting my mind wander, I could tell myself that he’d be much happier with me. We’d be happy together, the two of us. I imagined standing before him, naked; I imagined him wrapping his arms around me, leaning toward me—the dark eyebrows furrowed…
My daydream was interrupted by a sudden vibration in my bag that was sitting on the counter. I jumped from my chair and rushed toward it, leafing through the papers for my phone. George sometimes called me that late in the evening with a job emergency. I immediately prepared myself to stay up all night.
But the number was unrecognizable. The area code was D.C., and I tapped the screen, ready to answer. I breathed into it casually. “Hello? Amanda Martin speaking.”
“Amanda. Yes. Miss Martin, could I please invite you back to the White House?”
My heart dropped into my stomach. It was Xavier. It was the President of the United States.
I swallowed. “Absolutely, sir. I can be there first thing tomorrow morning.” I couldn’t focus; my tongue felt so heavy in my mouth. Did this mean I got the job?
“No, no. I don’t think you understand. I need you to arrive as soon as possible. I’m sending a car now.” Suddenly, I heard him call into the distance. “Dimitri! Take a car. Go pick up Miss Martin!”
I heard emptiness after that. He’d hung up on me. Realizing I had less than 15 minutes, I gasped, grabbing my skirt and shirt from the floor and flinging them over my body once more. I needed to hurry. I flounced up my brunette hair and spun around, already feeling the vibrations, the excitement of the following few hours. I didn’t bother with the tights—I knew I didn’t have the time.
I’d gotten the job, I knew then. I was literally on top of the world.
Chapter Four
I rushed out onto the sidewalk and found Dimitri already outside, waiting for me in a simple, elegant, black vehicle. I opened the rear door and swept in. “Long time, no see!” I called up to him, tapping the back of his seat in hello.
“I told you, Amanda,” he said with a grin, peering at me through the rear window. “You have to start trusting your old friend, Dimitri.”
“All right, all right,” I said sarcastically, laughing. I gazed out the window at the incredible city—my adopted home. In the darkness, it looked so beautiful. The moon shone on some of the statues we passed as we swept along. “What’s going on up there?” I asked Dimitri, trying to orient myself into the chaos.
“I think you’ll see. It’s—it’s madness,” Dimitri said, laughing.
Dimitri parked the car in the exterior garage, and he walked me into the White House, giving me a brief pat-down in the hallway. “Sorry. Every goddamned time, I swear,” he said.
I didn’t have time to banter. My head was elsewhere. I tapped away from him after he swatted my ass once, and he didn’t say anything, already so aware that I was in the zone, ready to take over the show.
I walked into the West Wing, already feeling the chaos brewing before me. Several desks were positioned in the great room, side by side. People in various states of panic were calling into their phones, even at 9 o’ clock at night, spitting words with anger. I blinked my eyes wildly, wondering where to turn. Had I gotten the job? Or was this some sort of mad ruse?
Suddenly, a man approached me. He was wearing this suit that seemed nearly lived-in. He was a bit overweight and bald. His mouth was nearly barking at me as he spoke. “Thank God you’re here. Finally, he made a decision on who to lead us.” He brought his hand forward and grabbed mine, shaking it. “I’m Jason Ritz. Your second-in-command.”
My mind spun with the news. “So wonderful to meet you,” I declared, nodding with affirmation. I knew, in that moment, that I had to act like the smartest in the room. I was their leader. “Please. Brief me on what’s going on.”
Jason led me through the hallway, back toward the Oval Office. He stopped at a glass door and we swept inside, into a small conference room. “Okay. First of all, welcome to the team,” he began, pacing back and forth. “It seems you’ve been hired on a very dramatic day.” He swept his hand through his balding hair. “We’ve dropped in the polls significantly in the previous 12 hours. The drop seems incredibly random—as in, we don’t quite know where it originated.”
I brought my hands into my pocket and took out a notepad and a pen. I began scribbling. I oriented myself with great authority. “We’ll craft a statement and get it out for the morning news. And then we’re on serious damage control. Agreed?” I said to him, my eyes on fire. I still felt the wine buzzing in my head. But I felt the anger mixed with power fuel me. I was going to get the president out of this mess.
Jason’s eyes widened at me. He wasn’t sure how to proceed, I knew: not with this sudden knowledge that I—this young, 29-year-old woman—could handle this near-catastrophe. A bead of sweat rolled down his face.
> Suddenly, he shot forward and opened the door. “MR. PRESIDENT!” he called down the hall. Xavier had just walked past the small room we were in, on his way toward the West Wing. My heart began to beat so quickly. I continued to scribble my first formation of a statement for him for the following morning—an outline to pass on to the public relations specialists. But even through the noise of my beating heart, I could hear Xavier speak the words: “Follow me” in the hallway.
Jason sped out into the hall and I followed, tapping quickly.
“Amanda’s beginning to draft the statement,” Jason said succinctly, sniffing toward the president.
For all the chaos surrounding him, Xavier seemed so calm, so cool. He simply nodded toward me. Eyeing me in that peculiar way he always did. “Good start, Amanda. Welcome to the team,” he stated.
We walked into the swarms of people—the campaign team I’d been a part of only four years before. Now, I led them.
I stood at the helm of the swarming crew and I tapped my hand on a desk, allowing it to rattle back and forth. The people slowed down, placed their phones on their desks. They blinked up at us.
“Okay, crew,” I called to them, utilizing that firm voice. The president stood beside me, and I could feel his attention like a blanket, wrapped so firmly around me. “My name is Amanda Martin. Many of you know me from the last round of elections. Those of you I don’t know, I look forward to getting to know you.” I nodded to them, driving my speech forward. “As you know, we lost a few notches in the polls today. Nothing we can’t jump up from. Nothing at all. I will be stopping in with each of you as the night goes on to see what you are doing and to work on an action plan.” I passed my pencil over them, sort of like a wand. “Let’s get this thing under control.”
With that, I nodded toward them once more, allowing them freedom to continue on their phone calls, their tap-tappings on the keyboard. I turned toward the president and nearly bit my lip with anticipation.
