Randall has no time for his daughter’s Delphic pronouncements. He points the remote control at the stereo and presses a button. When the strains of bland pop kick in he takes Brittany’s right hand in his left, places his other hand on her flat hip and proceeds to guide her clumsily around the room. Past the Eames chair, beneath the faux-Warhol lithograph of Randall, around the glass topped, teardrop table they glide. Randall moving lightly, heel to toe, heel to toe, the girl showing all the enthusiasm of a hostage. Maxon had told Randall to practice dancing with his daughter before the Purity Ball so they could get some video that might make the evening news. Failing that, it would look good on the campaign website. So Randall views this tripping of the light fantastic as campaign-related activity. Brittany is, in Randall’s view, Kendra’s project. When she was young and cute he took more of an interest, but the advent of adolescence has stripped her of what little charm she possessed and now his goal is to exist in some kind of uneasy truce. He enacts the role of doting father and hopes that his example will motivate the girl to act the role of loving daughter.
They are on their third self-conscious circumnavigation of the room when Kendra enters from the kitchen. Randall smiles at her, thinking she will be heartened to see this bit of family fun, however forced and uncomfortable it might actually be to the participants. He is surprised when his wife does not return his smile but instead informs him she would like to confer outside. Right now. Randall asks her where she’s been.
“I had to get a new phone,” Kendra says. “Mine broke.”
As he follows his wife toward the backyard Randall looks over his shoulder and sees Brittany watching them with catscan eyes. He marvels at his daughter’s ability to go from appearing bored to focusing with the intensity of a doctor preparing for surgery. The moment she sees her father has noticed her watching, she flits away.
Kendra stands in the backyard, her face lit by the gauzy light emanating from the swimming pool. Expensive reproductions of vintage 1950s steel and vinyl patio furniture are arrayed on the flagstone deck. The barely discernible silhouette of the dark San Jacinto Mountains looms like a reproach in the western distance. She briefly considers informing him of their daughter’s “sexting” incident in the hope that this will reduce the impact of the Nadine fiasco, but she had given Brittany her word she wouldn’t say anything. So she gathers her courage and launches into an account of the ill-considered fling, the trip to Mexico and the story of the matching tattoos before concluding with an aria of apologies.
How would Randall process all of this? What would he do? Should she expect a flash of anger, a wild-eyed lashing out, or a heartfelt mea culpa about how his behavior must have led her to this and could she ever forgive him? Whatever she was anticipating, it was not the sight now in front of her: Randall seated on a chaise longue with his head in his hands, muttering no, no, dang it, no.
The reflection of the pool lights play delicately on his exposed neck while Kendra’s mind drifts back to their honeymoon cabin on the California coast, the surf pounding the rocks below, Randall holding her in his arms and promising he would always take care of her. Looking at him doubled over, she is not so sure he will be able to deliver.
Emitting a low moan, Randall lifts his head and stares out over the desert, as if an answer lies somewhere in the parched darkness. The election is close and might be decided by just a few votes, the votes of people who will be put off by Kendra being at the center of a particularly lubricious scandal.
“You got matching tattoos?” he says, as if repeating the simple fact would somehow allow his bruised psyche to gain purchase long enough to halt its plunge into the abyss.
“I told you I was sorry.”
“When you think about what’s going on right now? I don’t know that sorry cuts it.”
“You want to talk about that chambermaid in Arizona, Randall? Because I’ll talk about her if you want.” Randall does not respond to this. What would be the point? The moral high ground has no empty parking spaces. For all of his serial pulping of marital vows it had never occurred to him that his wife could do the same, much less with a woman, and the shock to his system is profound. His mouth is dry, his stomach rising. The backyard surroundings are familiar yet everything looks slightly different as if animated by a heretofore-undetectable vibration. Randall is seized by a desire to make the movement cease, to return his world to a state of rest. And he can avoid the sense of betrayal by dealing with logistics.
“Are you gay?”
“Not that it matters, but no.”
“It matters if we’re going stay married.”
“Do you want to?” A challenge.
Randall considers this a moment before responding, “Heck, yeah. Of course I want to stay married. Look, I’ve made mistakes and all. And I can’t even say I don’t deserve this. I probably do. But dang it, a lesbian affair?”
“Maybe part of me was trying to get back at you.”
He thinks about this a moment. It is a sentiment that is impossible to disagree with. Although he has no interest in using this as an opportunity to end his marriage, he’s justifiably concerned that the condition of his marriage could have a deleterious effect on his career. Who wants to be known as the Congressman whose wife became a lesbian, even temporarily? Let him try to explain that to his colleagues on the Homeland Security Committee. “Your timing, darlin, is impeccable.”
“Does it at least help that it was over a year ago?”
“You think anyone ever forgot Chappaquiddick?”
“Ted Kennedy kept getting re-elected.”
“That was Massachusetts!”
Kendra considers Randall’s point. The Kennedys are a dynasty well known and beloved, sufferers of tragedies great and small. Sympathy could be called upon in the case of Teddy, the car and the bridge. In the unforgiving Mojave, there is no reserve of good will upon which Randall can draw.
“I was thinking about leaving,” she says. “If you want to know the truth.”
Randall looks up, genuinely surprised. The wages of his behavior are not something he has ever bothered to calculate. So prevalent is his approach to marriage in the political class, he has assumed discretion would deliver him from divorce. It isn’t like he has ever fallen in love with anyone else. He loves Kendra. As much as he can love anyone. At least he believes he does.
“You were thinking about leaving?”
She nods her head, exasperated that he could be so obtuse as to not consider this possibility. “Randall, your life’s a permanent campaign. Your daughter barely knows you. You keep this up and what’s going to be left?”
Randall lifts his head from his hands, straightens his back. What she said is true, there is no doubt. Since being elected to Congress he has flown home for the weekend every two weeks and his time in the desert is devoted to fundraising. Brittany has become entirely Kendra’s responsibility, the family little more than a photo op for his campaign literature. But Randall is ambitious and this is the price. He talks to his colleagues in Washington and he knows his choices are not exceptional. Contemporary American politics fetishizes the family while decimating it. This is how things are. As marriages go, theirs isn’t worse than a lot of others. Kendra has been a superb political spouse. He doesn’t want to leave her and he doesn’t want her to leave him. But the lesbian disclosure is troubling. He is not the sort of male who finds it titillating. Did she have to so utterly un-man him? Has his behavior been deserving of such abasement? Unfortunately, it is done. He has no choice but to take his medicine.
“Well, if you had to fool around, I’m glad it was with a woman,” he lies. He can’t even envision her with another man. Right now Randall is amazed he can even produce a coherent sentence. Kendra places a comforting hand on his shoulder and he puts his hand on hers. They remain silent for a few moments.
She says: “So should we just pay her?”
Rising from the chaise longue, Randall walks toward the pool and stands at the edge. A light breeze caus
es a barely discernible ripple. He peers to the bottom willing the answer to bubble up and burst through the surface. “I thought she didn’t ask for money.”
“She didn’t. At least not directly.”
“Then paying her now? That’s irresponsible and we’re not going to do it.” The energy that seemed to have drained out as he processed Kendra’s information slowly surges back. The internal math has been done, the sums rendered. Randall says things others have said thousands of times before, but he says them with a sense of ownership, as if he had been the one to think of them. He’s quiet for another few moments but Kendra thinks they will be all right. A desert hawk wheels overhead, its wings backlit by the rising crescent moon. “What do you think she’s going to do, best guess?”
“Can’t say.”
“I’ll take care of it.”
He has regained his footing and is calculating how this obstacle can best be dealt with in a mode that will address the short-term needs and minimize the long-term ramifications.
“I figured you’d know what to do.”
“Mind if I ask you a personal question?” He takes her silence for assent. “All the bull we’ve gone through, we still love each other, right?”
Her relief at the manner in which Randall is now handling the remarkably inconvenient revelation is overwhelming. Despite this, Kendra starts to laugh.
“I’m sorry,” she says, regaining control.
“You think it’s funny?”
“If this is love . . . I don’t know, maybe it is.” Her hands are on her hips and she is shaking her head in bewilderment. “Do we love each other?”
“Do we?”
“I’m not sure that’s relevant right now.”
And a deep place in her is touched by the softness of his voice when he says, “I know what you mean.”
“Do you want to stay married?”
“Kendy, we’re good together,” he says, taking her hand in his.
Kendy, she thinks. Kendy! He hasn’t called her that in a decade. The plangent tone and the disquietude of his manner tell her how deeply he is unnerved by the situation. She was in no way certain he would react like this. Kendra Kerry Duke knows she stands at the most critical juncture in her married life. Were she to tell him now is the time for their union to end her timing could not be more auspicious. The campaign will soon be over and they will be able to separate quietly. She will be able to move on to the next phase, get an apartment, perhaps resume her singing career. She could remarry if she wants. There will certainly be a willing suitor eager to have the still-youthful ex-wife of Randall Duke on his arm. So she knows what she says now will resonate for years to come. And what she says is:
“I think we’re good together, too.”
When they walk back in the house it is with the tacit agreement that they will do whatever they must, no regrets.
http://WWW.DESERT-MACHIAVELLI.COM
10.30 – 11:49 P.M.
While you Blogheads have been sleeping the Machiavelli has been rooting around the foul rag and bone shop of Mary Swain’s past. What do we really know about this woman? Did she even graduate from college? She served drinks on her husband’s jet while he was still married to his first wife, that much we know. That she says she goes to church a lot, we know that, too. Mary Swain says she loves Jesus the way most of us say pass the salt. But Jesus loves mankind, does he not? And that includes gay people. Did Mary Swain tune that part of the universal love message out? Whatever you might say about Randall Duke, his wife Kendra is a friend to you gays out there. A gay birdie whispered in my ear that her appearance at the Palm Springs Charity Drag Ball last year had people saying she looked like a female impersonator, which was meant as a compliment, I think. So while her husband is a little wishy-washy in the area of gay rights, his wife is a friend of the Friends of Dorothy. As for the Stewardess, although she claims to have gay friends, she has said she thinks homosexuality is a choice. Think of this on Election Day, my Desert Queens! The American Hero, or the Closet Canadian?
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
It’s after midnight and Jimmy and his former police force colleague Cali Pasco are seated on the sofa in his trailer listening to Waylon Jennings on the stereo. Cali drinking a beer, Jimmy sipping herbal tea. Their relationship has always been within respectful professional boundaries so, although neither will acknowledge what has taken place this evening as anything more than two former co-workers spending some time together, the hours have passed with the ease of a marble rolling down a chute. At Pappy and Harriet’s, a barbecue joint deep in the hills north of the Morongo Valley, they had danced to a country band and ate and danced and drank, or, Cali drank and Jimmy wanted to, but didn’t, then they danced some more before Jimmy started telling Cali about the Book of Dogs and Cali asked when he was going to show it to her. After stopping at a market to get one last beer, Cali followed him home in her Green Volkswagon Jetta. Now the book is on her lap and she’s flipping through the pages.
“Tell me about this one,” she says, pointing to a picture of what looks like a Chow-Shepherd mix. A strand of hair falls over Cali’s eyes and she delicately places it behind her ear. Jimmy notices her graceful fingers for the first time, the unblemished skin, clear polish on the nails, a thin band of silver on her thumb.
“Owner’s house had been robbed.”
“How about this one,” pointing to an old beagle.
“Two guys have an antique store downtown. Dog’s name is Oscar.”
“Why’d you start doing this, making the book?”
“Something to do after I left the force, help chill me out.”
Keeping the book on her lap like she doesn’t want to let go of it Cali takes her boots off, first one than the other, places them next to each other on the floor. “What was it that happened with you and Hard, exactly?”
Jimmy exhales, thinks about whether he wants to get into it, such a pleasant night so far. He takes a sip of tea, leans back and considers. This is a barometer. The way Cali reacts will tell whether they’re going out together again. Bruno wanders over and puts his head on Cali’s thigh. She scratches behind his ears.
“I was doing a search and seizure in a joint operation with the Sherriff’s Department at a meth lab in a trailer east of town and we got two dogs with us. One of the suspects, this wiry tweaker is cuffed. He’s standing there all agitated and for no reason he kicks one of the dogs. Well the dog doesn’t like that and he bites the guy’s ankle, draws some blood. Just a flesh wound.”
“I remember when this happened. Didn’t realize you were involved.”
“He was a citizen in custody and he claims the dog attacked him. Now Mr. Meth Dealer’s suing the town and the lawyer for the city council is all over Chief Marvin telling him he needs to show he values the lives of everyone in his jurisdiction, and that means criminals, too. So word comes down from Hard that the dog is headed for death row. This didn’t go over well cause I worked with the animal and I liked him, but I kept my opinions to myself. Some whiny please-sir-don’t-kill-the-doggie speech wasn’t gonna fly. Kind of surprised by Hard’s attitude about this dog, though. The man has a Rotty he loves. So I tell him I’ll take the dog on his last ride, bring him down to the animal control station for the trip to Dog Heaven. I pull into the Animal Control parking lot and park but I leave the motor running and I don’t move. I’m thinking the only way to do this is do it fast.
“My wife left me, I’m living in a trailer, I got this dog and now I’m supposed to kill him? Before I know it I’m crying. Then I feel this cold wetness on my neck and I look over and see the dog’s face right next to mine. So I take out my cell phone and lean back in the car seat to get a better angle. I snap the dog’s picture before I slip the choke chain over his head and lead him across the parking lot and into the building. They got the walls decorated with framed posters of kittens and puppies if you can believe it. Lady named Coral works there and I hand her the choke chain.
“I could tell Hard was pleased wh
en I put this cardboard box with the dog’s ashes on his desk. He showed the box to everyone who came into his office, even took a picture of it and sent it to the Mayor and the Town Supervisor to show them Chief Marvin was on top of the situation. So it kind of bites Hard in the ass a few weeks later when he’s going over some routine reports from Animal Control and he doesn’t see the dog’s name listed. I’m staking out another meth lab with the Sherriff’s Department when Hard calls me, wants to know what the hell’s going on, was the dog dead or alive? And he had better be dead, Hard says. I knew lying was pointless so I say I couldn’t kill that dog, Chief. And Hard says What’d you do with him? I tell him I took the dog down to Anza-Borrego and set him free in the desert. You set that dog free? And I say In the desert, Chief. He’s got to be dead by now.
“He’s waiting for me back at headquarters, curses me out, says I’m suspended pending further investigation. That’s when I tell Hard I’m gonna throw him out the window.” He pauses. “Here’s something I read in this Asian philosophy book: wait long enough on the river bank and you’ll see the body of your enemy float by.”
Cali nods, takes this bit of ancient wisdom in. Jimmy hopes to convey a sense of newfound depth, to make Cali understand he is no longer the guy she knew on the force but has morphed into someone more sensitive, someone with whom she could have sex and possibly not regret it in the morning. He’s actually trying to become deeper, and it’s a tricky transformation to convey. It wasn’t something you could brag about without sounding like a fool. But to his relief, Cali doesn’t pursue it. She wants to know: “What happened to the dog?”
“That’s his head you’re scratching.”
When Cali smiles he knows telling her every detail was the right decision. She gives a little laugh, looks at Bruno, then back at Jimmy.
“I’d like to think I would’ve done the same thing,” she says. “No way I could put down this handsome guy.” She rubs Bruno’s head, nuzzles him. The dog licks her cheek, her nose, her eyelids.
Angry Buddhist (9781609458867) Page 10
