The abolishment of the filibuster didn't altogether eradicate obstructionism in Congress. But for sure, it unjammed the particular wall that Sara had been running against for the past six months.
Then, it was a booming, incredible period of fertility for lawmaking, to the extent that Sara felt her first hundred days had only started kicking off then.
Not that Sara had been inactive before. Especially in the sphere of immigration, she'd kept a lot of the promises that had got her into office. Taking on more refugees, simplifying the program, and sending not only money and food but boats to save those hundreds of thousands drowning on the shores of Europe. That had gotten some criticism, even from Kellerman.
"Europe's business is Europe's business," he said, an altogether clear reminder of how unlike they were.
"People are dying by the thousands, Paul. It's the business of anyone with a conscience."
He chuckled, like this were a personal jab.
"Presidents send their marine forces all over the world when it's to plunder countries and make war. Guess what, Paul – with everything that's going on in the world, with our nuclear armament, and the way the planet is going down faster than any of us can prepare for, I don't think we should waste time warmongering anymore. It's a waste of lives. I'm interested in saving lives. I can't think of a better job for our trained forces."
Paul shrugged, with that somewhat pleased smile as he looked at her. "France won't like it."
"Screw France."
"Is that an official statement?"
Sara smiled back. She might have said, Screw you, and Paul would have liked her the better for it. Their friendship had partly been founded on her sending Paul to hell – it was part of what structured their views in contrast with each other. Where he was pragmatic, she was passionate, and where she could be earnest, he was cold.
Not so cold as he looked.
It was better to remain professional.
"Just do the press talks," she said. "Tell people we're going for a humanitarian presidency. Humanity first. See how they like that."
Most had liked it, as a matter of fact.
Immigrants had made up a non-negligible portion of Sara's electorate and, even before Sara got rid of her congressional block, she'd done what she could to show she hadn't just been courting their vote.
But the Senate had blocked her on education reform, gun reform and on her new budget. The new "People's Budget", it was being called.
In June, as they lifted the filibuster, all the energy and the passion that had gone into creating fresh, more equalitarian laws, all unbottled onto Congress like a torrent of sea water that's broken through an ice wall.
Yes, the Republicans still had the majority in Congress and technically didn't need the filibuster to block their laws. Except partisanship was no longer a thing that went without saying, among Republicans, especially since the split created by Bagwell's resignation.
In one month, already a radical minority – but a considerable minority, nonetheless – had declared their support for Bagwell, and some actually went as far as sporting a capital K on their suits, from discreet pins to more sizeable badges. It made Sara sick to her stomach.
Sometimes, she wished she could hear Michael about this – just the sound of his voice, on this increasingly irrational world, would make her feel better.
No.
Really, it might actually make her feel worse.
Now's not a good time for you to get involved in politics, Michael. Now more than ever, it is a jungle, and all the laws in the food chain have been altered. We don't know what's eating what anymore, and there are some that'll eat anything to get to the top.
The months wore on, and Sara managed to pass an impressive amount of bipartisan legislation – increased access to scholarship in July, healthcare in August, when she improved Obamacare by extending the number of people it covered throughout the country, and in September, signing into law some protective measures to prevent discrimination based on gender and sexual orientation.
Still, part of her remained unsatisfied, and it wasn't even because of the rising popularity of the radical Knights, and the shiver of disgust that ran through her every time she heard Bagwell's voice on the radio.
The way Sara missed Michael was by no means your typical case of heartbreak. 'Heartbreak', she felt, couldn't cover what had happened between them, and anyway, Sara had been so unimaginably busy since she'd stepped into the White House that she didn't have much time to miss him, plain and simple. Sometimes, when she tried to think about what he was doing, how far deep he might have sunk into these deep waters she had learned to swim in for most of her life, a great fear took over her, and it was like the jaws of hell had opened up beneath her.
It wasn't only concern for the man she loved, but guilt.
She remembered the discreet beautiful man she had met at Charles's charity center, who had been content to help people on a smaller scale.
It was her fault he had nearly found himself catapulted in the midst of a sex scandal, her fault he had felt so helpless in the face of injustice that there was nothing to do for him anymore but take up arms and fight.
And nothing could stop her from feeling as though she had come through Michael's life like a red storm and left him shipwrecked, ruined, after having destroyed what had been the most meaningful relationship in his life.
Sara's friends used to chaff her about that.
Taking the full blame of the world on her shoulders, like every wrong anywhere was somehow hers to make right. What was she, Superman?
That last was a real proper question. Who but a superman could fix the issues plaguing their modern world, could feel concerned not only about the suffering of those he knew, but everyone's?
Empathy was at the heart of what had plunged Sara into that jungle, before it could even feel like a choice. She knew deep inside her that it was the same for Michael.
That there was no one to talk to about him, no one that knew about their story, made it even easier for the whole affair to feel like a dream. When Sara went to sleep, still unused to her surroundings, she often thought about the motel rooms, and how for a few hours, she would feel like a normal woman. How she wouldn't think at all, sometimes, until she and Michael had half-consciously gotten each other out of their clothes, how desire pulsed inside her so quick and hungry, it seemed to have a mind of its own, and she would only breathe, relax, once Michael was inside her, and the warmth of his body against hers recalled to life undreamt of appetites, unforeseen passions.
He's the only thing in my life that's ever been mine. The one thing that's ever been about me, not about the world.
And what did I do with it?
Why, the same thing Sara had always done with her personal desires.
Pushed him aside.
Politics, or love for humanity, was the single-most demanding husband – a wounded, crippled body that required your full attention, every minute of every day, so you could never full devote yourself to something else.
Michael had once told Sara he would wait for her, but Sara was coming to realize she also needed to wait for herself.
Because she couldn't afford to turn her back on her country, now of all times.
"Men pick duty over desire all the time," she told herself, "and no one finds them heartless for it."
Though the thought of her lover tormented Sara's sleep, she had enough self-collection that it did not affect the rest of her life.
That was true until the first week of December 2021.
Being in Washington is no guarantee that you'll run into the president. Lincoln actually pointed this out to Michael, when the younger brother mentioned his project. In all those months, they had had more than enough time to work on the strategies and characters of the political elite, whom Lincoln had either eavesdropped on at the Everest, or whom Michael had worked to gain information about in his industrious way. Over the past year, he had established an actual network of people who could be persuaded to help him gather small scraps on information, all of which pieced together amounted to quite an avalanche of knowledge.
No doubt, this was a considerable weapon they held between their hands. The only question now was, what to do with it?
By that time, Lincoln's notebook had been copied and recopied, then all but the original and a well-hidden safeguard had been destroyed. What remained in Michael's hand was a large, well-filled black notebook. He had insisted on the color. Had enough humor left that the elite's little black book should actually be black – poetic irony.
"So," Lincoln waved at the notebook, one day when he was getting ready to leave his apartment. "What do we do with it now?"
Michael flicked his thumb over the binding, a line of deep focus furrowing his brows.
"Now," he said, eyes on the book still, "we give it to the president."
Lincoln's jaw slackened. His brother was a man of great self-composure, would have no doubt stopped it from dropping even a little. "What?"
"We can't email it to her. Not without this getting to an army of other people first – her people, no doubt, but that she must be smart enough not to trust completely. Phone conversations are out of the question, too. Even if I had means to contact her, I don't trust they're as private as she believes. And this is too serious to be handled lightly."
"So, what?" Lincoln shrugged, in that way he had of shrugging when he was astonished. "You'll just fly to DC and go knocking on the door of the White House: 'Hi, I'm a justice vigilante and I'd like to see the president' –"
"Don't be a fool," Michael said, and walked towards the door, where Lincoln still stood, coat-clad, all ready to leave but for the actual leaving.
He seemed to get the hint and reached for the knob.
"I know Sara," Michael added, so maybe his brother would leave with his mind at ease. "I'll think of something."
…
The temperature was a little below zero degrees, and Michael's cheeks turned pink with cold as he waited outside the Hamilton, on 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, the White House in view.
Thank God, the weather was dry, but he had to flex his fingers inside his pockets to keep the blood in them running. He could feel the cold wind through his wool hat, snaking through the knots of his scarf. Patience was an important quality to have. His lips cracked into a smile as he pictured what Lincoln would do in his shoes – shift from one foot to another, pace, maybe. Telltale signs that people would notice. Linc had always hated waiting.
By the time he caught glimpse of her, Michael had been steeling himself for impassiveness so long, he'd almost cheated himself into thinking this would work.
Maybe it did. On the surface.
But inside, at the first flash of auburn hair, Michael catapulted back in time, months turning to years, the smell of her in motel room sheets – she always left faster than he did, so he had a little more time to replay what had happened, to grab a fistful of bedcover and inhale her, one last breath of air for his intoxicated lungs; they never knew exactly when they would see each other again.
Half-crescents of blood were forming in the insides of his palms, where his fingernails were planted hard.
A flock of bodyguards around her, as he had expected, and she hadn't spotted him yet.
He couldn't move, of course, couldn't so much as wave his head so her eye would be drawn to him automatically.
But Michael had faith.
Not much of it left, but some, and it kept him still and patient.
She'll see me. She has to.
Beside Sara, a little closer than the bodyguards, there was a man, maybe six two, black suit, black sunglasses, who looked like he could have been a guard himself, but whose attitude tore him apart from the rest.
It looked like he was talking to her.
Michael thought this was probably Paul.
The go-to-guy, the right-hand man. The very thing that Michael himself couldn't be.
Michael took full advantage of this moment, to look and not be looked at. It's a good thing to know your rival and though the two men may not have been competing for Sara's love, they were rivals, all the same, each of them drawing her toward different poles.
But Michael's gaze soon returned to Sara. Her red hair gleamed in the winter sun, her cheeks had that warm peach tinge that Michael remembered marveling at, with a lover's adoration, stroking his index across the soft skin, each line, each curve, was to him an unexplained miracle he only knew how to worship.
Michael tried to swallow the knot jamming his throat.
A gust of wind carried the smell of her hair into his nostrils.
He hadn't expected for it to be this hard, to just stand there, not to move, not to speak, knowing he would most likely catch a bullet if he tried to reach out to her –
To his mind, at this second, it seemed unfathomable why two lovers should ever have so many mountains to cross.
Not mountains, he corrected himself.
Jungles.
Then there was a light shift in the air, and Sara's eyes darted from Paul and all the way across the street, until they set on him.
Somehow, she didn't stop, didn't even pause.
She was in moving waters, and they carried her along without effort. But her eyes remained frozen, fixed on the inexplicable glimpse of the past who had materialized before her, her lover in the flesh, her lover that she hadn't spoken to or heard of in nearly a year.
Transparent feeling traveled between them.
If they had been able to talk, he would have spoken her name – always her full name, never affectionate diminutives. She was never love, or darling, those nicknames that were too familiar, inadequate for the awe she still inspired inside Michael.
Sara.
He wished he could say it now, so she could hear the full weight of his respect, could hear that she was still the sole master of his whole being – that she still had his absolute devotion.
Somehow, she knew how to show things with her eyes much better than he did.
Already, in her cinnamon gaze, he could detect bewilderment – did she see coldness when he looked back at her, did his efforts to check any outburst translate as impassiveness?
There was no time for such thoughts.
Michael had to act fast, as long as she still had her eyes on him, as long as he hadn't been noticed.
Lowering his eyes, so she would know where to look, he removed the black woolen glove that had been nicely waiting inside his coat pocket, and let it fall to the ground.
Then he walked away, before his gaze could will him to straighten his head for one last look, before temptation could take roots strong enough to shake his resistance.
She'd seen him, he thought. She'd seen him drop the glove and she'd be back for it, and she'd find his message, in the shape of an origami crane.
But these thoughts were swept away in a tumult of greater strength –
I've seen her.
For over a year, Sara had been only a voice, a face in the news. Her pervasiveness would have made it impossible to forget her even if it had been Michael's wish, or something he thought was possible. But somehow, when he focused on work, he had been able to restrain the flow of feelings she still triggered when he saw her in dreams, when the taste of her skin was fresh as yesterday on his lips. During the day, Sara was nearly back to being what she had been before Michael actually met her – one of the rare sensible voices left in America, in today's politics.
Now, as Michael fled down 14th Street, he realized what a complete delusion that had been.
He hadn't flown to Washington DC and spent the past two hours waiting out in the cold to be of service to his president.
What he had loved about Sara in part was her belief in righteousness and justice, but it was clear now that his love went far beyond either of those things.
It could just be you and me against the world, Sara, and right or wrong, I'd follow you, for better or worse, I'd follow you anywhere, if it should kill me, if it should damn us both.
"If you'd asked me," he spoke in a breath, even as he hurried in the street, the crowd a dizzying carousel of winter coats and fading faces.
One day, maybe he'd ask her, maybe he'd say it.
To hell with the world. She, too, deserved peace, and freedom, and all the happiness he could give her.
If things got desperate enough, he didn't want to have to watch her go down with the ship. He hoped there was still enough chivalry in the world that they could save each other, and at least have the comfort of each other's arms as they watched the world burn.
…
End Notes: That was an intense chapter to get down. Please share your thoughts!
