Cancer, the word invaded Emily's mind, pushing away all her conflicting thoughts about Aaron, and work, and what it would mean to be the woman behind the man, and left her with pure terror. As she pounded her feet against the pavement, she tried to banish the sobering statistics she'd foolishly googled last night. Numbers telling her that five more years with her mom would be considered a gift, a miracle even, when Emily needed so much more than that.
She tried to focus on her mom's cheery disposition. Her promises that she would be around to annoy Emily for a long time. But the appointments with the oncologist that she didn't 'need' Emily at, and the closed door conversations with her friends kept her from feeling any relief.
This was nothing like her mom's first fight with cancer. Back then they talked on the phone every night and Emily flew home for every big appointment. This time she wasn't even sure when she would have found out her mom's cancer was back if she hadn't taken advantage of losing her job and come down to Florida. Emily wondered if she'd changed or if it was her mom. Back at twenty seven Emily was still the girl that called her mom after every date and dutifully came home at every holiday. She wasn't sure if it was getting older or the capitol bombing, but somewhere between then and now she'd grown so distant from her mom that when she'd arrived in Florida, her mom had excitedly asked her how things were going with Seth.
But her mom had changed too. The day she found out she was in remission she quit her job and moved down to Florida. She had a whole new circle of friends, a new job, and even dated sometimes. The same woman who had always said 'who needs the ocean when you have Lake Erie' started every day with a swim in the Atlantic. At the time Emily had been happy to see her mom finally getting on with her life which she'd always secretly considered stagnant ever since her dad left, but now she worried it had all been part of getting in one last adventure, or really one adventure to start with, before the end.
As she turned the corner to her mom's house she debated taking another lap around the neighborhood. Physical exhaustion was the only thing that would let her sleep these days. And it would delay another round of questions about what it was exactly that Emily was planning on doing with her life. A question she had no clearer an answer to than she'd had when she'd arrived here. But then she saw flashing lights parked outside her house and broke into a true sprint. It was way too soon for this, her mom was fine this morning. It was only when she got closer to the house and realized it was black sedans not an ambulance whose lights she'd seen that she stopped and allowed herself to catch her breath. Then she saw a group of neighbors congregated on a front porch clearly interested in her mom's visitors.
"Friends of yours Emily?" Mrs. Kalochaireti, her mom's next door neighbor, was sure having Emily in town meant she would be meeting the President any day now.
Emily gave a big smile and wave and pretended not to hear her as she rushed in. Her mom claimed they were harmless but after the year she'd had the last thing Emily wanted was to talk politics with her mom's friends.
She stopped short when she saw Aaron and her mom chatting at her kitchen table drinking tea like old friends. Really he was the only logical person whose presence would have required a motorcade, but there was something so off about seeing him drinking out of a floral 'This is probably wine' mug, gossiping with her mom like they were old friends.
"Aaron." She didn't know what else to say.
"Emily." He stood and gave her a big hug, as if this was a planned trip and there was no reason for her to be surprised to see him.
Still not over her shock, but also not wanting to have this conversation in front of her mom who was sitting at the table looking like the cat that got the canary, she said, "So you've met my mom?"
"Yes. I was just telling her that now I know where you got your intelligence and good looks from." Aaron said with a million dollar smile on his face, as he wrapped an arm around her. Suddenly she felt very sweaty, and very short. Normally she wore heels around Aaron so she had never quite realized just how much taller than her he was.
"And I was just telling Aaron how surprised I was that you've been hiding him from me all this time." Great, so everything was out there. She didn't even know why she hadn't told her mom she was dating Aaron, except that she'd left DC three days after hooking up with him and insanely agreeing to be his Second Lady, whatever that entailed. Granted they had been an amazing three days, but once in Florida, or perhaps more accurately, once out of his bed, she found herself questioning what the hell she was thinking.
Emily laughed weakly.
"Well I'll let you two love birds catch up, I'm sure Mrs. K wants to talk my ears off about our guest."
"Mom, don't-"
"Don't worry honey, your secret's safe with me." Her mom gave her shoulder a squeeze on the way out the door. "Aaron sweetie, very nice to meet you, don't let my daughter run you off too quickly."
"Mom!"
"I'm going, I'm going."
And with that it was just the two of them. She wasn't sure where to start, ask him what he was doing here, apologize for the fact that her mom had no idea about them, or tell him this had all been a big mistake. Or hey, she already had her running shoes on, she could just make a break for it.
"Sorry to just show up, but something came up that I thought we needed to talk about in person." For the first time she noticed that he looked tired, but as she well knew, trying to put a government together was not easy work. At least this time all he needed was to usher in a new President.
"Oh." She cast a look around the kitchen and decided she didn't want to have any serious relationship discussion under the watchful eye of her senior portrait. Eighteen year old Emily was judgmental and there was nobody she would judge more than thirty year old Emily. "Come on." She said, leading the way to the living room.
Aaron collapsed onto the couch almost groaning.
"Darby's really putting you through the paces, huh?" She said as she sat next to him more gingerly.
"You could say that." He wrapped an arm around her, and now she was reminded of just why she had thought it was a good idea to pin her future to Aaron. He leaned over and kissed her, softly but long enough that she thought it might be heading somewhere when he pulled away. "I missed you." He said kissing the top of her head.
"Missed you too." She wondered if this was a good time to explain to him exactly why she hadn't followed her explanation to her mom of her and Seth's break up with the news they were dating. She would just need to figure it our for herself first.
"Your mom's looking good." He said enthusiastically.
"Yeah, this new treatment seems to be going really well." Emily crossed her fingers and toes.
"Good." He said, and then paused leaving a silence clearly meant for Emily to fill if she had more thoughts she wanted to share about her mom's cancer. But she wasn't ready to share her greatest fears with Aaron so she stayed quiet. Finally he broke it, "They did my vetting today."
"Ah. How did that go?" Emily did now remember from their phone call last night that he was doing that today. She felt like a bad girlfriend, or whatever she was, but cancer didn't leave a lot of room for other thoughts.
"Could have been better." He said, sighing.
"Did they- but she still wants you right?" She would be lying if there wasn't some small part of her that thought their lives would be a hell of a lot simpler if Darby said 'nevermind.'
"They do." He paused, "but it was rough. I mean you've been on the other side of them. All the questions about your family, you love life."
"Me?" She said in a squeaky voice she didn't recognize.
"Yep, they would like to talk to the special lady in my life."
It made sense, she'd been stupid really not to think about it. Anytime they vetted someone for higher office they needed to look into family as well. It wasn't only the politician that could be hiding a scandal after all.
"They said they would come down here. But, if this is all too much right now. Or you've realized this isn't for you, no hard feelings."
She couldn't blame him for wondering, she'd been far from communicative these last weeks, and her mom not knowing about them must have seemed worrying. "No, no. I want this." Really she wasn't sure what she wanted beyond the fact that with her mom sick she couldn't also lose Aaron.
"Well then better get cracking on your list of sexual partners."
She groaned. "Are you serious?" She didn't think she'd ever asked anyone for that much detail, but maybe people cared more about the Second Lady than the Secretary of the Interior.
"Trust me it was delightful. Can tomorrow work? The team is pretty eager to get things going."
"Are you going back to DC?"
"That was the plan."
Her mom would probably prefer it if she followed Aaron back. She let Emily feel helpful by driving her to appointments and picking up her meds at the pharmacy, but really Emily couldn't help but feel somewhat superfluous to her mom's life. Which she knew wasn't fair, her mom loved her and loved having her here. But now that they were onto week three of her visit, Emily could see her itching for space. Something that had never been an issue before. "Maybe I could come back with you?"
"That would be nice, but if your mom needs you here."
Emily wondered how bad karma it was; using your mom's cancer as an excuse to hide from your life. Probably pretty bad. "I think she'd be happy to have a break."
Aaron laughed. "You can be an overwhelming presence." She elbowed him, but couldn't really argue the point.
"What am I going to do?"
"What do you want to do?"
It was a good question. She couldn't find the version of herself that had a plan, and a million opinions on the right way to execute it. She could only think of the unrealistic, she wanted her mom's cancer gone and Kirkman back. She wanted things back to normal. "I don't know."
"That's okay." But she could hear pity in his voice. Aaron, she thought, would never be caught without a plan for what was next.
And then she started to cry. At first it was just a few tears that she tried to wipe away but then it was full sobbing knees pulled up to her chest, head down.
"It's going to be okay." Aaron murmured platitudes while running a hand down her back.
It wasn't, she thought, there was no way any of this would ever be okay. But she didn't know what else to do other than move ahead so she wiped her eyes, cleared her throat and said, "What do you think about making some senior citizens days? I'm sure my mom's whole walking group is assembled next door.
"I'm going to have to get used to this, aren't I? Being charming." He said with a comical grimace on his face.
She laughed, she needed a joke to cheer her up. "You can be charming?"
"I was very charming with you mom."
"Doesn't count, she's hoping you'll be giving her grandkids." His face went blank for a moment, and she worried it was way too early for that joke but then he laughed, and she tried to pushed the scared thought that her mom might not live to see any grandkids aside and put on her best smile for her first foray into the world of a politician's spouse.
The Naval Observatory was grand. And a ridiculous place for just two people to live. Which was how Emily managed to internally justify moving in with Aaron so quickly. Surely she couldn't leave him living here all alone. And if that meant she didn't need to be alone either, well that was just a side benefit.
"Imagine how much this place would be to rent." Aaron said, poking his head out from the ensuite bathroom.
"I don't even want to think about it." Emily replied, laying back on the bed.
Not thinking about it could be the motto of her new life. Her mom's cancer: impossible it could harm someone so happy. Her lack of a job: apparently there was plenty for a Second Lady to do. The warnings and glances she'd been given during her vetting session: not an issue, what did a bunch of twenty somethings know about politics anyway. Aaron outright anxiety about his being VP: nothing sex couldn't solve.
It really wasn't like her. Honestly, it was alarmingly not like her. But she wasn't thinking about that either. So just like everything else, it couldn't be a problem.