The Senator's Choice

by Combs, Sasha

  LaShawn addressed them as if they were two clients ushered into her office by her secretary. Her professionalism was the only thing keeping her from ripping William to shreds without a hint of remorse.

  “All right...it’s obvious that you wanted to share this information with us...and that’s the reason you’re here together. So, I’m to understand that you are a couple and you’re expecting a baby...now what comes next?”

  After listening to William and her daughter, LaShawn left them alone in the sitting room. She went in the part of her home where she knew she would find her sulking husband. With each step, as she strolled down quiet hallways, she was grateful that her husband had left the room before Pamela announced that she was carrying William’s child. As her thoughts mulled over all that she’d heard, LaShawn kept reminding herself that Pamela wasn’t her little girl anymore. She was a grown woman, fully capable of making her own mistakes and decisions without suggestions from her concerned parents.

  When she rounded the corner entering the room, she watched as Michael rolled the billiard balls across the pool table with his hand in lieu of using the pool sticks lined up in storage on the wall. He didn’t bother with the sticks because playing pool wasn’t something he had in mind. Currently, he was furious with his best friend and his sentiments weren’t much better when it came to his impressionable daughter.

  LaShawn crossed the floor, looking at Michael intently while she did this. She didn’t want to spark another flame if it could be avoided. So, she choose her words wisely, knowing her husband as well as she did.

  “I left them alone in the sitting room to talk. William had suggested they go to Pamela’s apartment but I insisted they stay here for the night. We’re closer to the airport than her apartment. So it made sense that I offer.”

  LaShawn eased her way over to the table, inching closer to him as she continued to talk, while carefully gaging his mood.

  “Pamela came up with an idea and so did William. They reached a compromise which I think will work out fine. I believe even you will be able to appreciate the wit behind their conclusion.”

  LaShawn reeled out the bait but Michael wasn’t biting. He could be as stubborn as a mule and she wondered why he expected anything different from his daughter. Pamela was so like him, which is the reason she understood her daughters actions. She fell in love with William and that was all that mattered. Presently, Michael was being just as dogmatic with his convictions. He was angry with them both and he wasn’t ready to budge not even for his only child.

  While rolling a red ball across the table, Michael lifted his eyes and said...

  “Is it me or do you think that there’s more than one thing wrong with William and Pamela having a relationship other than that of being friends.”

  He waited for his wife to answer him but LaShawn looked at him puzzled. She wasn’t following his train of thought. Especially after the detailed version she’d been given in his absence.

  Michael’s eyes narrowed to thin slits as he angled his head to the side. By his mannerisms LaShawn knew that he’d been thinking things over while he’d been in this room alone and now he wanted her take on William and Pamela.

  “Don’t tell me that you bought into that line about them loving each other and how their relationship budded out of nowhere after William buried his wife.”

  LaShawn cringed at the mentioning of Bianca in such an unpleasant way. She scolded her husband for his insensitivity.

  “Michael....you should be ashamed of yourself. Bianca was your friend just like she once was mines. How could you speak ill of her knowing that you may be wrong? You’re besmirching her name because currently doing so suits your agenda.”

  Michael scowled due to his wife's assessment of his comment.

  “I’m not speaking ill of the dead but I am speaking truth. William used the death of his wife as his reason to seek out our daughter’s affection. You’ve got to see that LaShawn. You cannot tell me that you believe their love just innocently happened.”

  No, she couldn’t but she also couldn’t say that it didn’t. LaShawn was on the outside looking in because this is what her daughter wanted. Pamela had kept her parents in the dark when it came to her relationship with William. They knew nothing about her countless visits to Washington to see him nor did they know the moment when William and Pamela fell in love. LaShawn hated that her own daughter saw fit not to include her in this part of her life. She felt so helpless talking to Michael about these truths because for him it wasn’t about truth. Michael felt betrayed by his friend and it didn’t matter if love played a part in that betrayal.

  After listening to him, she knew there would be no easy way to drop the real bomb because it was a doozy. Even she had to sit back in her chair after hearing the words. She’d sat silently on pins and needles while Pamela nervously broached the topic. From the second her daughter began toying with her fingers, LaShawn knew something more than them dating had brought them down from Washington.

  “Michael, I didn’t come in here to debate William’s intentions. It is, what it is and we can’t change that. At most, we’ll just have to learn to live with it.”

  “I don’t have to learn to live with anything because I give the relationship less than six months. You’ll see... Pamela won’t want to break up our friendship. Even though I think any relationship that we had is a dead duck after the mess he’s created.”

  “Well,...that would be a shame if you don’t think a friendship spanning over twenty years is worth saving.”

  “LaShawn...do you hear yourself? This is about our daughter, not my friendship with William.”

  “That’s right Michael. This is all about Pamela. Not you or your feelings or William. It’s about our daughter.”

  “What...?”

  Michael had stopped rolling the round balls across the table because he knew when his wife was holding back information.

  “LaShawn, what did they tell you? What compromise did they reach?”

  It took him longer than she’d hoped but finally Michael had taken the bait and was asking the right sort of questions.

  With a sharp intake of air, she said...

  “Darling, we need to stand by Pamela and William. They’re going to need our support because not only have they been dating for nearly a year; our daughter is pregnant with William’s baby. Pamela had wanted to postpone a wedding until after the baby was delivered but William wants to get married right away. He has a friend in Las Vegas who can help in this area. A judge... He says that they went to school together. Maybe you know him.”

  Michael became as still as a statue while looking at LaShawn. He was trying to place the pieces to this scrambled puzzle in some sort of order. All at once, he learned not only would he gain a son-in-law but soon he would become a grandpa. As his body whirled like a violent storm, he noticed that LaShawn was quite the opposite of how he felt inside. In a calm voice, she’d just shared that their daughter was pregnant and soon to be married and she’d told him this information with a straight emotionless face. No anger, no fussing or cursing. He wondered why. He wondered if perhaps there was more to this. Some bit of information that he wasn’t privy to know.

  “Pregnant...? She didn’t look pregnant. How many weeks?”

  “She isn’t far along. She just found out...and Michael it doesn’t matter how far along she is in this pregnancy. Our daughter is carrying our grandchild and she needs our support and not our judgmental attitudes.”

  “LaShawn...you aren’t bothered by any of this? This whole idea of the pregnancy and them being married by a judge in Las Vegas... You’re supporting all of this after talking to them for less than one hour?”

  “That’s right Michael and, I do not see any problems with any of this.” LaShawn said with certainty. Then she added, her clarifying points.

  “Not only have I bought into it...whenever they do get married, I plan on being there. I also plan on being at the hospital when she goes into labor. So I guess you
can say that I’m all in.”

  Michael stepped away from the pool table, staring at his wife. He knew once she’d made up her mind, there would be no changing it or getting her to think anything different.

  His eyes traveled to the door, then he wondered what he should do next. If Pam and William were staying overnight, he wondered tomorrow, where would their travels take them.

  With his mind made up, Michael walked towards the door, then out into the hallway. He heard LaShawn walking behind him, trying to match his stride.

  “Michael...where are you going?”

  “You had your turn with them, now it’s my turn.”

  Michael was walking so fast, LaShawn had forgotten how long his legs were in comparison to hers. She had to jog to keep pace with him. While nearly running, she said... “Michael...perhaps you should wait until you cool down.”

  “I won’t be any cooler than I am now.” he said with a steady voice. When he reached the sitting room, they both noticed that Pamela and William weren’t there.

  “Which bedroom suite did you tell them to stay in?”

  LaShawn wondered if she should tell him, then she considered that Michael would just check every bedroom in the house until he found the right one.

  “The east bedroom suite.”

  Michael turned, moving swiftly in the direction that would take him up the stairs to the east wing of the house.

  Pamela sat on the love seat watching as William talked on his mobile phone to Frederick. Hotel accommodation had to be made for his driver, and his campaign manager wanted to be brought up to date on what had happened with Michael and LaShawn.

  “Fred, everything is going as planned. Now that her parents know about us, we’ll leave in the morning. If there aren’t any delays, we should arrive in Montana by the evening. Once we’re there, I’ll tell my family about us, then we’ll make our other arrangements after that.”

  Pamela couldn’t hear the other side of the conversation but she guessed that Frederick had asked William, when they planned to get married.

  “I don’t know Fred... But I still think going to Las Vegas is the best bet because it’s the one place that doesn’t require any planning on our part. My friend will perform the ceremony discreetly and right now that’s what Pamela and I believe will be best. This is a delicate situation and she doesn’t want a large ceremony.”

  When he said this, William looked over at Pamela seated on the sofa. She was doing well, managing the fake smile that she had on her face. He wanted to hug her but for some reason he didn’t dare. Being in Michael’s house without his blessing had him on edge and he really wanted to steal away to talk alone to his friend if that was possilbe.

  After Frederick made a few more adjustments to his travel plans, his campaign manager felt it would be best if he were to join William on his vacation. He believed with so many things happening all at once, the situation warranted his constant monitoring.

  “Fred...take this time to catch your breath. You’re going to need your energy in the coming days. I can handle my parents and Morgan. Besides...I need you listening out just in case this news leaks to the press. I don’t expect it will, but you can never be to sure when it comes to things like this.”

  Pamela noticed that William was quiet for a while, listening to Frederick talking on the other end. She wondered exactly what information was he sharing.

  Due to his silence, Pamela heard a light knock on the bedroom door. William didn’t hear the noise because his full attention was directed on his conversation with Frederick. Pamela stood, crossing the room to open the door. On the other side, she saw her mother and father.

  Michael looked at his daughter with a tinge of guilt. He hated being so rude to her earlier but he couldn’t excuse his shock. His emotions had overtaken his actions and he couldn’t be faulted for that.

  “Are we disturbing you?” he said in a low polite voice. LaShawn wondered what had occurred between the distance of the billiard room and the east wing of their house. Somewhere along the way as they closed the distance, Michael had regained his civility. This was the man she’d married and still adored.

  Pamela looked over her shoulder and she noticed that William’s eyes were on them. When she looked back at her parents, she saw that they were patiently waiting for her to answer.

  “No daddy, you aren’t disturbing us. William is talking to Frederick, his campaign manager. He needed to keep him up to date on our progress here. We have to leave early in the morning to fly out to his place in Montana.”

  “The Barn Wood Hudson house.”

  “Yes,... When you told me that he was going to Montana, I had no idea you knew about the place.”

  William’s family owned property all around the world. In the past, before Bianca’s death, as couples the place they preferred to frequent was located in North Carolina’s Outer Banks. Every year, while their children were off at summer camp or old enough to travel with friends; Bianca, William, Michael and LaShawn would spend three weeks in the summer enjoying the seclusion at William’s beach front home. Michael had never visited the homestead in Eureka because he wasn’t an avid hunter like William. The rough terrain and untamed surroundings were more to his friends liking and not Michael’s but he had heard about the place. It was just as magnificent as all the other properties owned by his family. But for the life of him, he couldn’t figure out why William would be taking his daughter to Eureka, Montana; given this new turn of events. In his mind a better idea would have been to call off his vacation plans all together.

  When Pam stepped aside, allowing her parents entry, by then William had ended his call.

  “LaShawn...Michael...” he said by way of greeting. They all stood in the room, evenly spaced apart, not knowing whether to sit or stand. The awkward tension was as thick as pea soup and it took LaShawn to shift the brew into something a little less murky.

  “I told your father about what we discussed and how you and William plan to get married in Las Vegas.”

  Pamela smiled tightly while looking at her father for his approval. But Michael’s face showed very little in the way of emotions. After a few seconds had passed, he looked to William when he finally chose to say something.

  “When is this marriage going to happen? I’m just asking because...I was wondering why you’re wasting time taking Pamela to Eureka when she should be here planning her wedding while you keep your vacation plans with your family.”

  Pamela spoke up before William could.

  “Daddy...I don’t want a large ceremony. William and I have already discussed this. His friend in Vegas can perform a quiet discreet ceremony.”

  “That still doesn’t answer my question.” Michael said, and Pamela noticed how her father’s dark gaze still rested squarely on William.

  Again, Michael asked his question, using the same words as before.

  “Why are you flying Pamela to Eureka when she should be here planning her discreet ceremony?”

  “I’m taking her with me Michael because we need to tell my parents and my daughter about us. After that, I’ll contact my friend when Pamela feels up to traveling to Las Vegas. I know this is a lot to process in such a short period but believe me...we are getting married.”

  “If you’re so intent on marrying my daughter, then why do you need to stop in Montana first? It shouldn’t matter what your parents or your daughter think about you two being together.”

  LaShawn could see the potential for trouble, so she stepped in, hoping to douse Michael’s flames.

  “Michael...it’s not up to us to tell them when to get married.”

  “Daddy...we are going to get married. Its just that... Well,...” Pamela stumbled because the truth was that she wanted to wait until after they had told Morgan. It was important to her to know that the child would accept her as being her new stepmother. She had not shared these feelings with William yet. She wasn’t sure when the idea planted itself in her brain but the thought was there and she didn’t kno
w when it occurred but that wasn’t important. Telling Morgan first was the right thing to do.

  Looking at LaShawn, Michael said...

  “I thought you said they have a plan. I thought you said they had reached a compromise.”

  “We have daddy.” Pamela spoke up, wanting to defend her choices.

  “Michael...I do plan to marry Pamela. I’ve wanted to marry her for a very long time.”

  “Then do right by here.” Michael said, staring at him angrily. “You wanted to have a relationship with her...well you’re getting exactly what you want. Now that a child has been factored in, Pamela will be a permanent part of your life.”

  William lowered his brows, while surrendering his hands as a yielding gesture. He knew exactly what Michael was insinuating but he didn’t want to argue. William wanted peace in this situation and nothing more.

  “Fine...what do you suggest we do?”

  “You two aren’t waiting to get married. Before we go to Montana, we’re making a pitstop in Las Vegas. I want this resolved here and now.”

  “We...?” LaShawn said in a high pitched voice.

  “Yes, we... There is no way in hell that my daughter is going to get married and I’m not there to witness it.”

  William was doing his best keeping his anger in check because Vegas had never been his ideal place for a wedding ceremony. When they talked about marriage, it had been Pam’s idea to go to a city that didn’t require a waiting period. When William told Pam about his friend the judge, she reminded him that in Vegas they wouldn’t be recognized. The decision had been made and everything had been settled...that is until Michael came into their room. The way his nose turned up when he said the word Las Vegas. It was like a person smelling something stale. There had to be a better compromise. William raked through his brain for the right answer. After a few seconds, he said...

  “Michael, I have a better idea.”

  “I hope that idea involves you and my daughter not delaying this marriage.”

  The anger lines that streaked across Michael’s face, raised with expectation. He’d said his peace and he wanted action. He still didn’t understand why LaShawn wasn’t as angry as him.