In Her Eyes

by Renée J. Lukas

  “Exactly.” He’d seemed hopeful.

  “Well,” she’d told him, “it can’t be done. In order to bring ’em all down, one has to get her hands a bit dirty.”

  As much as she had tried to dismiss them, her brother’s words had an effect on her. That and the desire to be a positive role model for Kendrick whenever that was possible. She was a stickler for accuracy and never publishing anything until it had been verified by three or more sources.

  A strong ray of sun burned my face, reminding me where I was. Robin had stood suddenly, depriving me of the shade her body had been providing. She was obviously concerned about my pleas for her to go public.

  “Don’t you go gettin’ any ideas, y’hear?” She was nervous, viewing me as if I were the enemy.

  “I promised I’d never blow it for you,” I said. “I just wish you’d tell. Someday? Like an autobiography? Something that you control?”

  She shook her head and took a final sip from the cup she was holding. “I like the white chocolate best,” she said, setting it down.

  Suddenly we were talking about coffee flavors?

  “Okay, I hear you.” I reached for her and drew her to me until she was straddling me on my lap. I opened her robe slightly, at just the right spot and kissed her softly at the base of her throat. Her skin so silky, so perfectly touchable…in all the songs I’d written or would ever write, I’d never find the words to describe this.

  There was a clamor in the kitchen. Carol must have come back.

  Suddenly she stood in the doorway, looking like a hippie folksinger who had lost her guitar. Since Robin broke her out of the mental hospital and paid for all her medications, Carol Munson, our former FSU classmate, had been living near Robin and helping her with her subversive work.

  “Oh, please, get a room,” Carol snapped.

  “This is our room,” I said.

  “Never did like you, Austen.” Carol gave me a bitter smirk and turned around to go inside.

  “How do you stand it?” I asked Robin.

  “She has her good days and bad days,” she said. “Mostly good.”

  “It doesn’t hurt that she’s still carrying a torch for you, does it?”

  “We’re way past that.”

  Somehow, she thought it was her duty to save that woman’s life, though I’d always found Carol to be pretty thankless about it. Robin kept reminding me that she had an illness and not to expect her to react like everyone else. I guess she was more understanding than I could be, especially when I wanted Robin all to myself.

  “It’s not up to you to fix everything,” I reminded her.

  “I know.” Robin was unconvincing. She gave me one last kiss and collected our coffee cups.

  “Don’t run the dishwasher yet!” she called to Carol. Then she put a hand on my shoulder. “Breathe in the air. You’ll find it’s very refreshing.” I watched after her as she went inside. She really seemed to belong to this place, and I felt lucky I could share it with her.

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  Cory

  I switched on the radio as I sailed down the Merritt Parkway. I usually liked driving, but there was a jumpiness to the drivers on this stretch of two-lane highway—they’d leap forward, seem to find a nice pace, then jam on their brakes. The stop-start rhythm put me on edge, along with the information from Kendrick that I was trying to process. I settled on a familiar rock station where they’d just mentioned “the new single by Eye of the Storm… ‘In Her Eyes.’”

  I smiled to myself at the irony and turned up the volume.

  The lyrics were curious, to say the least:

  Until you’ve seen it in her eyes,

  don’t be so quick to crucify.

  Sometimes it takes so long,

  sometimes you have to be quiet to be strong.

  I felt as though I was standing upon the tip of a colossal iceberg that had yet to be fully revealed. As things stood now, my story would be an in-depth profile of Adrienne Austen, the woman behind the music. But I knew there was more. Maybe someday I’d find out what it was. Someday.

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  Adrienne

  After a day or two Robin and I visited our favorite art museum on the outskirts of the city—a place where the locals went to escape from tourists. Robin bought the museum director’s silence with generous donations, and now the woman would alert us whenever the place was mostly empty.

  Climbing the narrow walkway, breathing in the fresh sea air, I felt free from the stuffy, smoggy city, the frenetic pace of rush-hour corporate types all scrambling to get a spot at a coffee counter and fighting over the same latté. I was millions of miles away, not only in body, but also in spirit. This morning Robin wore silky white from head to toe, her outfit topped off with a wide-brimmed hat and sunglasses. She seemed to fit in here, her clothes blending with the ivory, sun-kissed architecture along the coast.

  This particular gallery offered a different exhibit every few weeks. Today we were treated to paintings of nineteenth century prostitutes. We saw a quote from Charles Baudelaire as we walked in to view the exhibit: “What is art? Prostitution.”

  “That’s one way to look at it.” I laughed to myself.

  “We’re all prostitutes,” Robin said in a low voice.

  I couldn’t tell if she was kidding.

  We perused the collection, moving slowly along the wall of reclined nudes, Robin’s arm around my waist. We had an ease with each other, a natural way of being, like older couples I used to see in Florida strolling among the hibiscus flowers. The old couples had an otherworldly quality—they’d been together so long, they practically moved as one. There was such peace and comfort in knowing someone for so long you could flow together just like water.

  I thought about how nice it was to grow older together. Of course, Robin’s underground status infused our relationship with a certain excitement. Whenever I was back in the US, I felt as though I had a secret love. After all this time, though, the secrecy was stressing our relationship. Seeing couples walking by the sea, some of them same-sex, now as comfortable in public as anyone else, I longed to be more open—to go out with Robin without her disguises, in the daytime and without checking how crowded our destination would be. It was like being part of an undercover mission that never ends.

  I think she offered the art gallery visit to appease me. I’d been complaining about us acting like vampires, cooped up until nighttime, and I knew she wanted to make me happy. Outings like this made her anxious, though. She’d been in the habit of looking over her shoulder for so long, I don’t think she knew of any other way to be anymore.

  When nighttime came, of course, we ordered in as usual, rather than eating out. Sitting on our balcony, our unique vantage point on the world, we watched the pink streaks of sunset spread across the sky, like wisps of a dying fire. We had fresh lobster by candlelight. And Robin’s staff—hovering over us and patrolling the grounds outside. I knew they were necessary, but it sort of killed the mood.

  “The things that were important to me when I was forty…” Robin said. “They…aren’t as important to me now.”

  I think I knew what she meant. She tried to sound like a woman who was unfazed by regrets, in spite of my long face.

  “You’ve had it your way for years,” I said.

  “I haven’t had much of a choice,” Robin argued.

  “I’d like people to know the real you.” I let out a long sigh. “I’m tired of being so goddamn secretive all the time. And yeah, it would be nice not to be a murder suspect.”

  She looked at me, startled. Sometimes she was so oblivious to the impact her status had on everyone else. I told her a little more about the sweaty young reporter who nearly peed his pants at the chance to ask me questions.

  “I would’ve thought by now I was old news,” Robin said, not meeting my eyes. I knew she didn’t really believe that.

  “Hardly.”

  A certain sadness had overcome me, and had been building all day.
She seemed to sense it. She reached across the table and touched my face. You can tell from a touch just what you mean to someone. And tonight, I had to close my eyes—the weight of it all was almost unbearable.

  “You’re my world,” she said softly.

  When I opened my eyes, I saw that the pink had faded from the sky. But I knew her words foreshadowed a change. A sense of hope lifted inside me, the idea that we could live freely together after all… Everything I’d done, each step of a career, trying to carve out some kind of a life on my terms—and now, all I wanted was to be able to live openly with the woman I loved.

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  Two Years Later

  Bombshell: A Secret Life,

  The Autobiography of Robin Sanders

  “As Told to Cory Watson”

  I didn’t attend the rally the day after that last debate. I was not, nor would I ever have been, a no-show at a rally being held for me, no matter how contentious it might have been. I was told it had been canceled, that there just wasn’t much interest in rallying for someone you thought was no longer representing your values. That turned out not to be true—party officials just didn’t have the balls to tell me they’d effectively decided to end my candidacy—but I understood the desertion. My views about the gay community no longer squared with the views my party wanted me to have.

  The gay community wanted nothing to do with me either. Again, I understood. Why would they embrace someone who had endorsed fining same sex couples for public displays of affection? The PDAF that I’d proposed was absolutely an extreme measure. When you’re in a school of sharks competing for the same fish, you have to come up with something bigger than the rest. Even outrageous. All of us were on record as being anti-gay. As I explained later to Adrienne, in order to stand out I had to take it a step further, the more outrageous, the better. My proposal got me on the evening news when their humdrum bigotry got them nowhere. I had to be the best at everything—even bigotry. I’m not proud of it, but it was my mindset at the time.

  After the debate, though, I was the odd fish in the tank, as my daddy used to say. A Republican who defends the rights of gays? There wasn’t a name for a species like me. My daddy would’ve turned over in his grave had he been dead. Unfortunately for him, he was still very much alive at that time. I’m guessing that by then, he wanted to be dead, though. It must have been painful for him at cocktail parties, although in deference to him, they probably avoided all discussion of his disappointing daughter.

  It was my daughter who helped launch my career as The Eye. She was more technically savvy than I, and was able to help me set up a special network. When she was older, she was able to use her connections to provide crucial intel. In the beginning, though, it was my father, unbeknownst to him, who provided the dirt with which to take down each of my opponents. I’d intended to use the opposition research he had collected on them only in the event of dire necessity, but when the powers that be immediately stopped returning my calls, I decided I wasn’t going to sit idly by and watch one of those hypocrites elected as president of the United States. With the additional help of some friends who worked in cybersecurity, I went after each of them deliberately and decisively. At the time, I had no long game other than revenge. But my success created a snowball effect. The operation expanded, giving me access to other underground networks. I was intoxicated with the realization of my power, and I used it to effect change wherever and however I could.

  I suppose I should feel a measure of guilt about the ruthless things I’ve done and the people I’ve disappointed. I comfort myself with the knowledge that I did it not out of ambition but in order to make the world a better place. But, truthfully, it was my ambition that originally drove me higher and higher up the political rungs. Once at the top, however, the view made me sick to my stomach.

  I never lost my conscience, though—or, I should say, Adrienne Austen and my brother, Kenneth Sanders, helped to revive it when it was at its lowest ebb. I regret the deceit and secrecy in the years that followed, but I will never ever regret my reasons for the things I’ve done. I remain unapologetic about my work, much to the frustration of many. Those who truly stand for something will understand my reasoning. They may be the only people who can.

  My convictions have cost me dearly—the freedom to live a full and open life in the country of my birth and the ability to see my daughter and grandchild as often as I’d like—and it has placed tremendous burdens on the people I love the most. Those have pained me greatly, but not as much, frankly, as the loss of the influence I might have had if I could have stayed in the public eye. It may sound petty to some, but it’s true: giving up my political ambitions was the hardest pill for me to swallow—until I realized I didn’t have to, until I discovered that public service wasn’t only about giving speeches, and that real change could be accomplished through other channels as well. After I had that awareness, the only sacrifice I seemed to be making was my own vanity.

  I used to think politics was about winning and losing. But I’ve learned, it’s easy to win arguments. It’s not as easy to do the right thing. You’re always a winner if you’re a good role model. So I hope others will take up the mantel and work toward doing what is right.

  The revelations here will be a bombshell to all but a handful of people. Some who read them will salute me, others will condemn me. I choose not to worry about those things that I cannot control.

  I have passed my responsibilities as The Eye to a new watchdog, who will continue the work I began two decades ago. I am not, however, going to end my efforts to find ways to make the world a better place. Though we may have different ideas of what a better world looks like, I hope to live in a place where love and kindness always prevail—especially in our leaders. And to those who criticize, ask yourself, what are you doing to make a difference? As I always said to my daughter when she was growing up: “If you don’t like the world, change it.”

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