11

The President of the United States nodded to Mattie, his secretary, and quietly walked down the carpeted hallway to his chief of staff's office. He passed a mirror and noted once again the gray at his temples. It had happened to every president before him, but when he had entered office he thought he was going to escape it because of his youth. The First Lady said it made him look distinguished, but she was biased. It wasn't six and a half years of being the leader of the free world that aged you-it was having all those people who hated you.

An ordinary guy in his fifties had a few good friends, a bunch of acquaintances and maybe a few vague enemies. The President of the United States rarely had friends who didn't want something from him, no acquaintances at all and all sorts of enemies, from wacko heads of state with unpronounceable names to members of his own senate and congress, to half the population of the country that didn't vote for him.

He'd never once been hung in effigy while he was teaching law at Yale, but now it happened somewhere at least once a week. It was a very pissed-off world out there, and a lot of people, rightly or wrongly, thought it was all his fault.

He turned into his chief of staff's office at the end of the hall. He liked it better than the Oval Office. Morrie Adler kept it messy, with papers piled everywhere and the whole place stinking of cigar smoke. Morrie also got to put his feet up on his desk-a luxury not allowed to presidents, at least not without criticism. Morrie had a fishbowl full of miniature Mars bars, which he occasionally sent down to the kitchens to be deep fried in batter-a habit from his days at Oxford as a Rhodes scholar. It was funny how things worked out. Morrie'd gone to Oxford right after their time at the Abbey School in Winter Falls, while he'd gone on a backpacking tour of Nepal, but he was the one who wound up being President of the United States. He smiled. He'd long ago learned that life and politics were a crapshoot; you never knew how it was going to all turn out.

The president gave a little knock on the doorframe and stepped into the room, closing the door behind him. Morrie was reading the New York Times op-ed section. The president dropped down into the only other chair in the room, a Barcalounger that Morrie'd had back in their days rooming together and taking One L.

"Do I have to go to the Pope's funeral?"

"One of the Castros will be there. You want to be shown up by a graybeard commie commandant in his eighties?"

"I'm serious," said the president.

"So am I," said Morrie, putting down the paper. "Yes, you have to go. If for no other reason than protocol and tradition. The Prime Minister of Israel will be there. Muslims will be there. Even Tonto's going." Tonto was the Secret Service code name for the vice president. The president himself was the Lone Ranger. Morrie's nickname was Bullet, the Lone Ranger's faithful German shepherd, which was appropriate enough; they'd been best friends since high school.

"Speaking of Tonto…"

"I know," said Morrie. "I heard. The party isn't going to back his nomination. He's too old and he's too tired, among other things."

"He's also too stupid," said the president. "I mean, he's a nice guy and all, but if we hadn't needed Chicago so badly, he never would have been on the ticket."

"True enough," said Morrie.

"Any ideas who they'll pick?"

"Rumor says our esteemed secretary of state. A woman, maybe-there's that California senator. And then, of course, there's Senator Sinclair."

"You've go to be kidding," said the president. "Put that trigger-happy lunatic within a heartbeat of the big chair? Sarah Palin was a pussycat in comparison."

"Sarah Palin couldn't find Canada on a map of North America," Morrie said, laughing. "Choosing her was the last act of a desperate old man. Besides, Sarah Palin didn't have any money. William Sinclair does. Lots of it. And he's also got his mother."

"He's got to know I won't endorse him. He's the kind of knee-jerk, 'Take my assault rifle from my cold, dead hands' kind of idiot who gave us the hillbilly reputation that's been keeping us back for the past few years. He's a Glenn Beck, weep-for-joy wet dream. He's got to be weeded out."

"Kate Sinclair doesn't care and neither does the party. The other guys are putting together a slate of hardnosers and gun-toters, and that means we've got to do the same. In eighteen months you're old news as far as they're concerned."

"Where does that put you?"

"Onto the lecture circuit with a seven-figure book deal, kemo sabe. That's where it puts me."

They both laughed for a moment. The president leaned dangerously far back in his chair, a habit they used to take bets on back at Yale Law. Finally, almost sadly, the president spoke.

"Can you imagine him in the Oval Office?"

"No, but that's not the point. Nominate him for vice president and it gives us a bit of breathing room to find a real candidate come election day. A candidate who'll reflect your legacy."

The president stared out Morrie's window. The view was pretty much the same as the one from the Oval Office, but here it wasn't obscured by drapery and thick, bulletproof glass. "You know what I really hate?" the president said finally.

"Bad Chinese food? Those creepy vampire books the First Lady reads?"

"Funerals. They depress the hell out of me."

"Get drunk on the trip home," suggested Morrie.

"You know I'm not much of a drinker."

"Sorry, kemo sabe, this one you can't cut. It's not like Tank Gemmil's Latin class back at the Abbey." There was another silence. The president folded his hands behind his head and closed his eyes. Morrie found himself thinking about the bottle of Glenlivet in his desk drawer. Was it half empty or half full? An alcoholic's philosophical conundrum. One way or another the problem was always solved the same way and the bottle was eventually completely empty.

"It's the fortieth reunion in a few weeks," murmured the president.

"It's been that long?" Morrie said. The fact was enough to make him take the bottle and its accompanying shot glass from his drawer and pour himself a wee dram.

"I'll go to the funeral if you'll come with me to the game," said the president, opening his eyes.

"The game?" Morrie said. And then he remembered. "Not the Abbey School-Winter Falls High game?" The chief of staff groaned.

"Glory days," the president said with a grin.

"For you, maybe," said the chief of staff. He snorted. "You were the star, the captain of the team. I was a third-string goalie because I had weak ankles."

"It'll be fun," said the president.

"Shannon O'Doyle," said Morrie. He poured himself another shot.

"Shannon O'Doyle." The president nodded, remembering the Winter Falls Snow Queen as though it was yesterday. All that long blond hair and the whisper of her panty hose when she crossed her legs.

"You sure you want to remind the electorate you went to a fancy prep school?"

"What have I got to lose?" the president said.

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