by King, Imani
Seven and a half weeks pregnant, says the internet. A May31st due date. I patted my belly. Even though I wasn’t supposed to quite yet, I felt a gentle swell there. A small pat, almost instinctive. I closed my eyes and imagined what it might be like to have a child. A tiny person, following me through life. I’d be a single mother, quite likely, and everyone would know that she was John’s child. I’d have to move from DC, find a job somewhere else. Give up the dream of working on a presidential campaign or gaining a directorship at a political nonprofit. I gulped, nearly unable to breathe, my throat tightening into an angry knot.
“Kelly, please come in with me. I think I need someone there,” I said, my voice cracking. I felt the bagel sitting like a hard lump in my stomach.
“You are fine,” she said, pulling her Prius into a parking space across the street. “You can go in there by yourself, and I will make arrangements for the wedding. We’ll make sure that we have a story concocted about the two of you if the press finds out about... any of it. We can say, ‘Look how respectable, how romantic, they were married in secret so that no one would pull her into the publicity mix.” I opened the car door and stepped out, my stomach steadily gurgling and rolling. I tasted bile at the back of my throat.
“I don’t think I can tell him. About the pregnancy. I can’t do it,” I whispered. “I don’t even know if I’m going to keep it.” Kelly took my hand in hers, holding it tight as we crossed the street.
“Darling, I’ll be next to you whatever you do. I can’t tell you it’s okay not to tell him. In this instance, it is not okay. Very decidedly not okay. It’s not just his job, it’s your future on the line. Telling him now is an act of self-preservation. It’s an absolute must, darling. The quicker the better. And it’s the only reasonable explanation for why I just told him he needs to marry you. Though to be honest, I think he was a little bit more excited about the marriage than I expected.” She winked. I nodded, remembering the anger John had displayed when he thought I was working with Janice. And this, this would be even worse in his eyes. I steeled myself as I stepped inside the empty living area, waiting as Kelly walked down the hall. She knocked softly at the door.
“Sonia is here, Mr. Reynolds,” she said, cracking the door open. There was a muffled response, and Kelly gestured for me to come and join her. I hurried down the hall to John’s office. Kelly pulled the door shut and left me standing in front of John.
“Sit, sit,” he said, waving his hand absently. His wavy, dark hair was a mess, and he wore a plain gray t-shirt and jeans instead of his suit. I raised an eyebrow as I sank into one of the leather chairs. He paused, looking down at his desk and letting out a deep breath.
“I’m so—”
“Sorry? No, I’m the one that’s sorry, Sonia. I was the one who knew all along that Janice could put you in a vulnerable situation, even when I first met you at Rye. I shouldn’t have been talking with anyone, let alone taking a woman back to my room. Janice has been watching me like a hawk ever since my bid went in, and I knew it. I should have told Kelly, I should have told you. I’m the sorry one.” I looked down at the floor. There were dust bunnies under his desk, and it occurred to me that the place should probably be cleaned after so many people had been in and out.
“What do we do?”
“Kelly says we need to be married.” He leaned back in his chair, and I felt his cool eyes watching me. “She says that it will look better if we have that to fall back on, if anything should come out to the press.”
“It’s extreme. And I don’t see how it protects us…” Except for the pregnancy, the one thing that makes the wedding seem like a viable option. Tell him. Tell him. I looked up at him. “Janice wants me to quit and join her campaign. In exchange, she’ll leave you alone.”
“She’s against everything you stand for. If I know you at all. And maybe I don’t.”
“I don’t care about me,” I said. “I’ll work for her if I have to. I think you deserve to win, and I’ll do what’s right for the campaign.”
“I care about you.” His words were quick and crisp, his eyes honest.
“Do you? I guessed we skipped that part. The getting to know each other bit.” My hand went to my stomach, resting for a moment.
“You know me as well as anyone, right now. You know my politics and my ideals. You know what I’m going after.”
“Do I? I didn’t know about your marriage.” I crossed my arms. “And I still don’t know exactly what you’re after, even if I do think you’re the best person for the job.”
“Then why don’t you care about what happens to you? You should care about your career. Your life. Your ideals.”
“I’m not the man in charge. Just the woman behind the scenes.” I shifted uncomfortably as he watched me. Those dark blue eyes piercing through to my core, sending heat through me even as I fought to control it.
“That’s not the confident girl I met in the bar.”
“That girl was a lie, John.” He sighed again and sat back in his chair.
“I wasn’t lying when I told you that you’re beautiful. The sexiest woman I’ve ever met, here or anywhere.”
“John—”
“We could make it work,” he said.
“What? A marriage? You’ve got to be kidding me. Kelly’s high if she thinks this is going to fool the media. Or if she thinks it can be kept secret. Or whatever she’s thinking—I have no clue.” She’s thinking about the pregnancy, I thought. She knows that will come out if the marriage does. She knows that a marriage is the only way John could ever write off the scandal.
“Well, not a marriage.”
“That’s what we’re faced with, you realize. A marriage based on nothing, on keeping whatever we were a secret.”
“It’s not an ideal solution, no.” He knitted his fingers together and leaned back in his chair, nearly tipping over.
“And I still don’t understand why you neglected to tell us about Janice. That would have saved us from all this trouble.”
“Would it? You wouldn’t have come to see me a second time?” I looked at the floor again. For that, I didn’t have an answer. He sighed, pausing again for so long that I thought he might not speak.
“We were foolish, and young enough to think that we could work together. It was clear from the beginning that it wouldn’t, but we held on. I wanted kids, even then at twenty-two. Came from a big family, wanted loads of them running around. When Janice got pregnant, she was tortured about it. Seems like it was something we should have discussed—I never assumed she wouldn’t want a child. But she kept it, of course. She always did the right thing, back then. We were five months in when she lost him—a little boy, they told us at the hospital. Our world came crashing down around us.”
“I’m sorry.” The words came out in a whisper.
“It’s ancient history. Everything with Janice is ancient history. I’d be running for Senate no matter what. I’ve been pushing toward it for years. The Democratic candidate sent me over the edge. I think Janice is bad for the Senate. And honestly, I think it’s bad for her. Brings out her bad side.”
“I can see that.” My throat tightened again, a knot settling there and refusing to leave.
I can’t tell him. Not before I’ve made up my mind. Not before I have it all figured out. I closed my eyes and imagined that life again. There was another option. To give it a try, like he’d said. A family. I thought of my own mother and father, stowed away in North Carolina, living out their retirement years. I tried to imagine a relationship with John, sitting together on a front porch in our rocking chairs. I opened my eyes, feeling queasy again. There were miles of distance separating us, every obstacle in our way. None of this would be good for me, or for him.
“And again,” he said, “I’m sorry she got to you. I didn’t want that to happen. Sonia?” I looked up at him. “You’re important to me. I don’t want to force you into anything. But I do think Kelly is right.” My heart pounded.
“About the mar
riage?”
“It’s just signing a contract, for right now. It’s a solid idea. Janice releases the pictures. We say we were married, but the campaign was more important to us both, and we got married in private.” I gulped. It was foolish for him to think of the marriage as protection. Foolish. And when he didn’t know about the baby, it could only mean that he felt something for me, that he wanted the marriage. “The issue of you and me... That’s separate. We can figure that out down the line, after the election.”
“I’d really rather not sign the contract. At all. I’m no romantic, but I don’t think we ought to do this. I can quit. I can work for her. I can do what she asks. But I’m not marrying you for some half-cocked idea about protecting us from scandal. Married or not, we’re facing a gigantic scandal. You should be smart enough to know that. Even if the marriage keeps Janice quiet for a while, it will just be because she’s figuring out more shit to say about me, finding more dirt on you.”
“Sonia, she’s trying to cripple the campaign by taking you away. And the hit would be hard. We need you. The connections you’ve built up, the people you’ve recruited. The supporters you’ve won over. They want you. Sonia, I want you, too.” I smiled weakly. I smoothed out my skirt, wondering how long it would take me to get big. How long was it before anyone noticed? How long before John realized? “You can... you can think about it overnight. Janice won’t expect this move. She won’t expect us to legitimize the relationship.”
Legitimize the relationship, for the sake of what? For some relationship that didn’t fully exist? For a shoddy, half-baked chance of protection? I nodded.
“It feels wrong,” I said. “And it won’t protect us.”
Hurt flashed across his face for a moment.
“She gave us the week to decide. Janice Howell will release the pictures next Saturday morning, just in time for people all across the country to wake up and check their Twitter feeds. And won’t they love it?”
“This does sound an awful lot like pressure.” He laughed, an unhappy sound.
“We’re both backed into a corner. And quite honestly, I can think of worse people to be married to.” I stayed silent, thinking about the ticking time bomb in my body. The pregnancy put an unwanted twist in things. And it sure as hell explained Kelly’s push for the marriage. She didn’t want claims about illegitimate children floating around John’s campaign, and I could’t blame her. But this was all so soon, before the baby was any more than a small idea, a tiny bunch of cells.
“Give me the day, and I’ll decide. We can make it to the end of this week, and we’ll... do it then.”
“Okay.”
“Can I leave?” I rose to go, my limbs weak and heavy. The door seemed so far. If I could keep the pregnancy hidden, I’d be able to convince John it was a ridiculous idea, maybe even get Kelly on my side. She must have told him some thrown together bullshit about privacy and protecting the campaign. I couldn’t even wrap my brain around it.
“I guess so.” He stood, running his fingers through his hair. “Listen, Sonia. I feel like I’ve said things all wrong, and done everything all wrong... all for want of success in this campaign. I want to do right by you. I want to protect you as much as I can.” He stepped over to me, catching me in his arms just as I was about to step to the door.
“John, don’t. This is what got us in trouble in the first—” He put his lips to mine before I could say another word. And like whenever he’d held me before, the room went blank around me, my mind tipping into that place of pure abandon. He pulled away and gently traced his fingers over my cheek and down my neck.
“You could meet me again tomorrow night,” he said. “You know, if we’re married...” His voice trailed off.
“John, don’t. This confuses things.” He took my hands in his, his warmth sparking through my body.
“Things were already confused. I’ll tell you though, Sonia. Maybe I just don’t know you well enough, but I’m crazy about you. Even if it ends up that we’re only friends, we’ll always be something to each other. Don’t you see that?” I swallowed hard, trying not to retreat into my blubbering anxious self again. “I’m conflicted too. But strategically, it’s the best thing we can do. If it doesn’t work out after the election, then it doesn’t work out.”
“Are you saying that it would be more than a contract to you?” My body buzzed with adrenaline. How would that be possible? This seemed like even less of a good idea.
“Maybe. Yes. I don’t know. But it wouldn’t be the craziest thing I’ve ever done. Running for Senate against my ex-wife would probably qualify for that award.” My stomach dropped. I craved John—craved his hands on my body, hungered for him with a delirious, aching need. But this was too much. It was too much pain for both of us, too much complication.
“I’ll talk to you on Monday, John,” I said, pulling away from him and walking towards the door. His eyes were still on me as I left, bringing that feeling of heat back to my center.
“I’ll be waiting.” His words hit me, sending a shock of anxiety through my body.
And still, he didn’t know.
CHAPTER TEN
October 3, 2016
Five Weeks until Election Day
I woke up on Monday morning after sleeping nearly twenty four hours. I went through the motions of preparing for my day, like everything was fine, everything was normal. But it wasn’t. It had all gone to hell and I couldn’t change it back. Anxiety rose in my gut. I was no closer to getting to the answers I needed, no closer to deciding whether or not to quit or marry John. As I got ready to leave the house, I tried to imagine what it would be like to be married to him. A thrill ran through my body as I thought of it—we would be able to meet, even if it was secretly. For now.
“Get ahold of yourself, girl,” I muttered to myself as I ran out of the apartment with my purse and my iced coffee. I’d neglected to eat breakfast, but there would be some kind of leftover food from the previous week at the campaign office. My stomach gurgled, threatening me with its pangs. But I hailed a cab and sipped at my coffee, letting the caffeine buzz take me over for a spell as I rode through DC’s streets, headed out toward Virginia. Towards the decisions that would change my life forever. I stepped out of the cab in front of the old mansion that John had bought for his campaign, walking up the steps with trepidation. John would expect an answer from me today no matter what, and I’d have to provide him with one. I shuffled through my purse and found my key, letting myself in and finding a room full of our people, cheerfully working. I made a beeline for Kelly’s office, locking the door behind me. I knew she wouldn’t be around, so I could take advantage of the space.
The hours passed as I emailed supporters and set up meetings with college volunteers and organizers. We were gaining headway in the polls, and John was looking like a crowd favorite for Virginia. A few articles had even mentioned a possible bid for president over the next few years. I smiled, ignoring the horrible growling of my stomach. Until John came to get me, I was staying right where I was. I worked, entering the zone of shooting off emails and making cold calls to the few business owners in the state we hadn’t hit quite yet. For the end of September, we were doing well.
Unless there’s a scandal. Unless everything is revealed. Unless those pictures hit the internet.
“I have to. I have to leave the campaign. I can’t be here,” I muttered. “This is too important. John is too important, and I can’t ruin his campaign with this insanity.” I closed my laptop and stood, woozy from the head rush I felt. My arms and legs ached as I walked, but I knew I had to talk to John while I was still determined. While I had my wits about me. Before he distracted me with those eyes... that body. I unlocked the door and walked down to his office, knocking on the door.
“Just a moment,” he said, that voice sending an immediate ache into my core. I sighed and leaned against the wall, my head spinning. My stomach cramped hard, and I felt pain, lower, spreading out through my pelvis.
