Dropping Stones / Kingmaker SET

by Paul Cwalina

  I went back to pacing and internet surfing until the first results were finally, thankfully, being broadcast. Massachusetts and Vermont were the first to be called and, as expected, Rick lost both, coming in third in Vermont. I hoped that would be the extent of the bad news for the night. Georgia was next and we hit a home run, winning the state by eight points. Then Tennessee and Virginia went Rick’s way. Within minutes, I was stunned to see the networks call Minnesota for Rick. The polling must have been off for some reason because were in a dead heat in the final Gallup poll before that day and we won by six.

  We were all in touch with each other throughout the evening and all bemoaning the slow results coming from Ohio. While we waited, though, Oklahoma and Colorado were called for Rick. Even American Samoa reported results before Ohio. It wasn’t until a few minutes before midnight that Fox and CNN called Ohio for Rick. That made it eight, one more than Ed wanted. It was essentially over. It was over, but I couldn’t let it sink in for some reason. No matter how we sliced up the remainder of the delegate map, and as long as we held onto our leads in California and Texas, Rick Roman was going to win the nomination.

  While I tried to wrap my head around that, I received an email from Ed. The subject line read ‘Assumed Inevitability’. I immediately opened and read it: Tonight, we won the nomination. It’s truly over. Texas and California will never turn away from us at this point, and they are all we need. Forget New York and Illinois. From this point on, we change our approach. We write every speech with the assumption that we’ve already won the nomination. We also ignore the other candidates and focus on Peters. The general election starts tomorrow. You have been a big part of getting the nomination for Rick. You need to take some time to appreciate that and pat yourself on the back. The hard part, though, starts now. It’s one thing to write for primaries. You’ll now be speaking for an entire party. You need to get alone with your thoughts and your core beliefs. Take a good inventory of those beliefs. Then it will be time for you to meet Rick and get an inventory of his and see where they come together.

  It will be those mutual beliefs that will form the most convincing core of Rick’s message. You can’t write as effectively about that which you do not support wholeheartedly. Doing so results in speeches becoming nothing but words and you must never accept that. Words mean something. You trade in them and they are a huge part of the political and legislative process. Never forget that. Make every word count.

  I’m going to make arrangements for dinner with Rick in DC within the next two weeks, if possible. If you have a wife or girlfriend, bring her with you. When I have a firm date and time, I will let you know.

  Nice work. Be proud. Talk soon.

  Ed

  I read the note again. Then I read it again. It was 1:30 in the morning and I had forgotten just about everything that happened in the previous six hours. The email meant a thousand times more than everything and anything that happened that night. I checked the return email address several times. Is this real? Did this actually come from Ed?

  There was no feeling to compare with what I was feeling at that moment. It was a drug injected directly into my ego. I was high with no plans of coming down.

  Chapter Sixteen

  I slept in the following morning, exhausted from the intensity of the previous day. I woke up a little after nine to another email from Ed, detailing plans for dinner with the senator and his wife the following Friday in DC. Well, he works fast.

  I couldn’t wait to tell Jennifer. Even if she wasn’t as passionate about politics as I was, who wouldn’t be excited about meeting the person who has a fifty-fifty chance of becoming the leader of the free world? At the very least, it would make for a nice selfie, right? I showered, dressed, and called Walter to let him know I wouldn’t be at the office that day and to apologize for wasting his coffee. He was kind about it and thanked me for the call. He told me that he didn’t know anyone more in need of a day off than me. Whether that was true or not, I don’t know, but it felt good to shake off the remaining residue of tension from the previous day. I spent the next two hours reveling in every headline and story from every newspaper from every one of the eight states we won.

  The networks were already on board with the inevitability of Rick winning the nomination. Some of them were projecting who would drop out of the race and when. Some of the talking heads were even questioning the wisdom of the other candidates staying in the race. Fox and ABC went so far as to create an electoral college map and forecast which states Rick and governor Peters would win in a matchup. It was exactly what we wanted to hear. It was as if we were writing the script for them. Every story I read and television segment I watched brought more relief and satisfaction.

  I sent Jennifer a text to let her know that I’d pick her up at the bank and take her out for lunch. When I arrived, I saw Michael and told him I was there for Jennifer. He smiled, shook my hand and pointed me to the stairs that led to the second floor and her office. The door to her office was open, so I poked my head in and waved. She was on the phone, so she just smiled and gestured to tell me to go in and sit down. I sat in one of the burgundy leather guest chairs. She leaned back in her chair and put her feet up on the large mahogany desk. The sun coming through the window behind her shone through her hair and formed a halo around her head.

  As I took in the decor of her office, I listened as she conducted what seemed to be a fairly serious business call. The longer she talked, the more intrigued I came, not by the content but by her voice and her unusually sharp sense of herself and self-confidence. She spoke with the innocence and immeasurable capacity to love of a Shakespearean Juliet, yet she could easily summon at will the strength and ambition of Lady Macbeth when necessary.

  I was being seduced and she wasn’t even trying, and it was all in her voice. She was effortlessly making words and phrases like “flattening yield curve” and “loan modification” sound elegant and seductive, while talking circles around me and whoever was on the other end of that phone.

  Maybe it was the relief from the previous day’s tension and the comfort of knowing that Roman was safely on his way to the nomination. Perhaps it was just a case of my guard being down, but I was seeing Jennifer in a whole new and different way. This woman was suddenly extraordinary and I felt an odd privilege to be in her presence. I was seeing for the first time everything about her that I cheated myself out of knowing the night I met her. She was completely oblivious to it.

  A man truly falls in love with a woman from a distance, as an observer, as a spectator taking in her true essence when she is unguarded, when she is wholly and honestly unaware of his attention. And she was.

  She finally ended the call and apologized, but I didn’t respond. “Why are you staring at me with that goofy smile on your face?” she asked.

  I wasn’t even aware that I was wearing my admiration so openly and put my head down briefly to hide it, though I didn’t know why. “Oh, sorry. I didn’t realize. Sorry,” I said sheepishly. “But I do have an interesting offer for you.”

  “Oh, you do, do you?” she said with a hint of sarcasm. “I’m intrigued. Go ahead and lay it on me.”

  “How would you like to have dinner with the next president of the United States?”

  “Governor Peters? I didn’t think you knew him,” she joked.

  “Very funny,” I replied. “No, wise guy. Senator Roman and his wife next Friday in DC. I thought we could make a weekend out of it. Take Friday off and fly into DC, have dinner, and then do the tourist thing on Saturday and fly home on Sunday.”

  She did her best to hide her lack of enthusiasm. “That sounds nice. I think I can take that day off, but…”

  “But what?”

  She sighed. “You know I’m not exactly excited about this guy.”

  “Oh, really? You hide it well,” I said sarcastically.

  She smiled. “Funny. Look, I know it’s important to you and I want to support you, so I will go,” she said, still not having solved
the problem of hiding her lack of enthusiasm.

  “I appreciate that,” I said. “What is it about him that you don’t like, exactly?”

  “How much time do you have?”

  “Still the comedienne, huh?” I said and thought briefly of Chelsea.

  She sighed and slumped back into her chair and just stared at me. Then, suddenly, she sprung back up toward the desk and grabbed her phone. “Here, look at this. It’s a video of one of his speeches. Watch as he’s shaking hands afterwards.”

  I walked behind her desk to watch over her shoulder. “Okay, I’ve seen this speech. What are you trying to tell me?”

  “Just watch him. He barely touches the hands of the men and certain women, and with others he stops shakes their hands and puts his arm around them or even hugs them. See?”

  “Yeah, I don’t follow.”

  “What do all of the ones he’s hugging or paying special attention to have in common?”

  “They’re probably connected politically somehow.”

  “Um, no. They’re all young and attractive. He’s a creep. He’s disgusting. And isn’t it that his wife walking behind him?”

  “Yeah, but come on. That’s why you don’t like him? Awfully thin.”

  “Hang on. Here’s another. Same thing. Look,” she demanded as she fast forwarded through another video.

  “I get it. I get it, okay? But you’re going to fault him just for being a man?” I said, as I made my way back to the front of her desk to sit back down.

  “A man? You think that’s what being a man is? You think that’s acceptable?” Before I could respond, she continued, “That’s a pathetic excuse for a man. He has no respect whatsoever for women. We’re just playthings to him. Remember when you told me he was struggling with women voters? That’s why. Smart women see that and sense that.”

  “Oh come on. He’s with women on all of their issues…abortion, equal pay, discrimination…”

  “All for show. All just for votes. Deep down, he doesn’t respect women. His actions speak louder than words, especially the words of a politician. And what makes you say he’s with women on abortion? I’m a woman and he’s not with me. Most of the people that oppose abortion are women. There are feminists who are opposed to abortion. There are atheists who are opposed to abortion.”

  “So, you would rather he be anti-abortion?”

  “Pro-life and yes, I would.”

  “How could you say that? You were sitting in an abortion clinic not too long ago.”

  That one got to her. She stopped and stared hard at me. “To my great shame, yes, I was. But then I saw abortion for what it truly is. It’s just another form of abuse. It’s just another form of child abuse and another form of domestic abuse.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

  “Let me guess. You’re pro-abortion, right?”

  “Choice and yes, of course I am. I’m a guy.”

  “Only weak and pathetic guys are pro-choice.” Subtlety was a foreign concept to Jennifer. I was beginning to lose that lovin’ feeling.

  “Where do you get off saying something like that? Who do you think you are?”

  “I am the mother of the children you wanted me to kill. That’s who I am.” You heard what I said about subtlety, right?

  That one cut deep. “That’s not fair,” I said.

  “It’s fair because it’s true,” she said, folding her arms across her chest . “Tell me why you and every other guy, according to you, is pro-abortion?”

  “Because that’s a woman’s choice to make.”

  “Bull. You couldn’t care less about that. What’s the real reason?”

  “You’re asking that like an attorney who already knows the answer.”

  “I do know. I want to see if you know it or realize it.”

  “Because women don’t want a guy that’s pro-life. A guy tells a woman he’s pro-life and it’s ‘nice meeting you. Now, goodbye.’ A guy tells a woman he’s pro-choice and he’s suddenly Mr. Sensitive and Caring.”

  “That’s only part of it. That’s your crotch talking. Now, tell me the bigger reason. Tell me why guys are really pro-abortion.”

  I stalled by looking down at the floor and then at every object in the office, avoiding eye contact with Jennifer. I started to say something, then stopped. I tried to dance around an honest response.

  “Come on. You can do it,” she said, provoking me.

  “All right, fine. We want a way out. We want to get out of having a kid, okay? There. Happy?”

  “Ding, ding, ding. We have a winner,” she said with a satisfied smile. “See? It’s all about you, isn’t it? From the sex to the moment the baby is put into a hazmat box, it’s all about you, right?”

  The closing argument wasn’t necessary, but it was devastatingly effective. She tapped into my dormant guilt and shame. Despite our differences on this, she still proved she was a remarkable woman. I couldn’t help but have my feelings for her deepen even more.

  I exhaled hard. “Fine, but can’t you get past that for one dinner?” I pleaded.

  “I haven’t been there since I was a kid. It was the one good thing I remember about my father.”

  She relaxed again and sat back in her chair. She put her head back and stared vaguely at the ceiling, no doubt summoning a memory. “We flew to Myrtle Beach in South Carolina and spent a couple days there. Then we drove up the coast through North Carolina and Virginia and ended up in DC. We toured all the monuments and everything. I was only eight or nine, so I didn’t really get what everything was. I guess it would be nice to see them again.”

  “I promise to take you to every one of them. Deal?”

  She turned and smiled at me. “Deal.”

  “I’ll buy the tickets and make the reservations.”

  “Separate beds.”

  “I know. I know.”

  She shut down her computer and gathered her purse, phone, and coat and we left for lunch. Over soup and sandwiches, we discussed the trip and the need to start preparing for the arrival of the twins. I tried not to focus on our abortion debate. Rather, I just wanted to fade back into the role of distant observer and simply watch her and let that warm wave ripple through me again.

  The week flew by with little fanfare and little news, except three more primary wins for Rick. The states were falling like dominoes and we concentrated more and more on the general election. Equally uneventful was our flight to DC and cab ride to the W Hotel, which stood in the shadow of the White House. We each slept about an hour before getting ready for dinner.

  The Fourth Estate restaurant was just a block away, so we walked and took the elevator up to the thirteenth floor of the National Press Club building to the restaurant. The decor was elegant in its simplicity, with wood paneled walls, navy blue carpeting, and linen-covered tables. Ed was already seated and the hostess led us to the table, which was set apart from the others for some privacy.

  I introduced Jennifer to Ed. We sat and ordered drinks while we waited for Rick. It wasn’t long before we heard and noticed some clamoring and heads turning as Rick and his wife walked into and through the restaurant to the table. He stopped first to shake hands with Ed and then turned to me. He had a deep Southwestern tan and unnaturally white teeth. The muscles in his face defaulted to a politician’s smile as he reached for my hand.

  “So, this is the man with the golden pen, huh? Pleased to meet you, pard’ner.”

  “It’s my honor, Senator Roman,” I nervously said.

  “Pard’ner, this is my wife, Vicki,” he said gesturing toward her. She was thin with auburn hair and an awkward, almost forced smile. She shook my hand weakly and rather coldly.