The Zero Game

57

“Everybody smile,” Congressman Cordell said as he stretched his own practiced grin into place and put his arms around the eighth-graders who flanked him on both sides of his desk. It took Cordell the first six months of his career to get the perfect smile down, and anyone who said it wasn’t an art form clearly knew nothing about making an impression when cameras were clicking. Smile too wide and you’re a goon; too thin and you’re cocky. Sure, going no-teeth was perfect for policy discussions and sophisticated amusement, but if that’s all you had, you’d never win the carpool moms. For that, you needed to show enamel. In the end, it was always a range: more enthusiastic than a smirk, but if you flashed all the Chiclets, you went too far. As his first chief of staff once told him, no President was ever a toothy grinner.

“On three, say, ‘President Cordell’…” the Congressman joked.

“President Cordell…” all thirty-five eighth-graders laughed. As the flashbulb popped, every student in the room raised his chest just a tiny bit. But no one raised his higher than Cordell himself. Another perfect grin.

“Thank you so much for doing this — it means more than you know,” Ms. Spicer said, shaking the Congressman’s hand with both of her own. Like any other eighth-grade social studies teacher in America, she knew this was the highlight of her entire school year — a private meeting with a Congressman. What better way to make the government come alive?

“They got a place we can get T-shirts?” one of the students called out as they made their way to the door.

“You’re leaving so soon?” Cordell asked. “You should stay longer…”

“We don’t want to be a bother,” Ms. Spicer said.

“A bother? Who do you think I’m working for?” Cordell teased. Turning to Dinah, who was just making her way into the office, he asked, “Can we push our meeting back?”

Dinah shook her head, knowing full well that Cordell didn’t mean it. Or at least, she didn’t think he meant it. “Sorry, Congressman…” she began. “We have to-”

“You’ve already been incredible,” Ms. Spicer interrupted. “Thank you again. For everything. The kids… It’s just been amazing,” she added, locked on Cordell.

“If you need tickets to the House Gallery, ask my assistant out front. She’ll get you right in,” Cordell added, doing the math in his head. According to a study he read about the pass-along rate of information and gossip, if you impress one person, you impress forty-five people — which meant he had just impressed 1,620 people. With a single three-minute photo op.

Giving the top-teeth-but-no-gum-line grin, Cordell waved as the group filed out of his office. Even when the door slammed shut, the smile lingered. At this point, it was pure instinct.

“So how do we look?” Cordell asked Dinah as he collapsed in his seat.

“Actually, not too bad,” Dinah replied, standing in front of his desk and noticing his use of the word we. He trotted that out whenever the issue at hand was potentially ugly. If it were pretty — like a school photo op — it was always I.

“Just tell me what they’re gonna bust our nuts on,” he added.

“I’m telling you, not much,” Dinah began, handing him the final memo for the Conference on the Interior Appropriations bill. Now that pre-Conference and the hagglings with Trish were over, the Final Four — a Senator and a House Member from each party — would spend the next two days hammering out the last loose ends so the bill could go to the Floor, thereby funding all the earmarks and pork projects tucked within.

“We’ve got about a dozen Member issues, but everything else played out pretty much as usual,” Dinah explained.

“So all our stuff’s in there?” Cordell asked.

Dinah nodded, knowing that he always covered his projects first. Typical Cardinal.

“And we got the things for Watkins and Lorenson?”

Again, Dinah nodded. As Members of Congress, Watkins and Lorenson weren’t just the recipients of brand-new visitor centers for their districts, they were also the Cardinals of, respectively, the Transportation and the Energy and Water subcommittees. By funding their requests in the Interior bill, Cordell was guaranteed to get eight million dollars in highway funds for a Hoover Dam bypass, and a two-million-dollar earmark for ethanol research at Arizona State University, which just happened to be in his district.

“The only speed bump will be the White House structural improvements,” Dinah explained. “Apelbaum zeroed them out, which truthfully doesn’t matter — but if the White House gets pissed…”

“… they’ll shine the spotlight on all our projects as well. I’ll take care of it.” Looking down at the memo, Cordell asked, “How much did you offer him?”

“Three and a half million. Apelbaum’s staff says he’ll take it — he just wants a big enough fuss to get his name in USA Today.”

“Any others?”

“Nothing big. You should probably give in on O’Donnell’s Oklahoma stuff — we gutted most of his other requests, so it’ll make him feel like he got something. By the way, we also got that South Dakota land transfer — the old gold mine — I think it was the last thing Matthew grabbed from the goody bag.”

Cordell gave a silent nod, telling Dinah he had no idea what she was talking about. But by bringing the gold mine up here — and pairing it with Matthew’s name — she knew that Cordell would never give it away during Conference.

“Meanwhile,” Cordell began, “about Matthew…”

“Yes?”

“His parents asked me to speak at his funeral.”

Dinah paused, but that was all her boss would say. As usual, though, she knew what he meant. Staff always did.

“I’ll write up a eulogy, sir.”

“Great. That’d be great. As office mates, I thought you’d want to take the first draft.” Turning back to the memo, he added, “Now, about this thing Kutz wants for the Iditarod Trail…”

“I marked it up how you like it,” Dinah said as she readjusted her fanny pack and headed for the door. “If it’s got a K next to it, it means keep it; if it’s got a G, it means we can give it away. Truthfully, though, it’s been a pretty easy year.”

“So we got what we wanted?”

Just as she was about to leave the office, Dinah turned around and smiled. All teeth. “We got everything and more, sir.”

Cutting back through the welcome area of her boss’s personal office, Dinah said a quick hello to the young receptionist in the denim shirt and bolo tie, then grabbed the last cherry Starburst from the candy bowl on his desk.

“Bastard eighth-graders cleaned me out,” the receptionist explained.

“You should see what happens when the AARP people come visit…” Never slowing down, she zigzagged through reception, bounding out through the front door and into the hallway. But as she glanced right and left up the white marble hall, she didn’t see the person she was looking for — not until he stepped out from behind the tall Arizona state flag that stood outside Cordell’s office.

“Dinah?” Barry called out, putting his hand on her shoulder.

“Whah-” she said, spinning around. “Don’t scare me like that!”

“Sorry,” he offered as he held her elbow and followed her up the hallway. “So we done?”

“All done.”

“Really done?”

“Trust me — we just solved the puzzle without even buying a vowel.”

Neither of them said another word until they turned the corner and stepped into an empty elevator.

“Thanks again for helping me out with this,” Barry began.

“If it’s important to you…”

“It was actually important to Matthew. That’s the only reason I’m involved.”

“Either way — if it’s important to you, it’s important to me,” Dinah insisted as the elevator doors slid shut.

With a single sweep of his cane, Barry looked around, listening. “We’re alone, aren’t we?”

“That we are,” she said, stepping closer.

Barry once again reached out for her shoulder, this time lightly brushing his fingers against the edge of her bra strap. “Then let me say a proper thank-you,” he added as the elevator bucked slightly, descending toward the basement. Sliding his hand up the back of her neck and through her short blond hair, he leaned forward and gave her a long, deep kiss.