Extract from an interview with Fox News, April 14:
Interviewer: I'd like to come back on what happened on the Senate floor earlier today.
Theodore Bagwell: Good. So would I. See, I've been getting a lot of anger from radical socialists – boy do they have things to say. That I disrespected my president, my rank, my Senate seat – so I'd like to make things clear. I interrupted the president? Fine, and why shouldn't anyone who's making a mistake be interrupted by any means necessary, especially when they're the president."
"By any means necessary?"
"She was the one to mention war, not me. You have to understand, I got nothing against Sara Tancredi personally. Hell, I'm sure we'd get along fine in private, you know. And I do respect her. That, I do. It's no mean feat for a woman to make it as far as she did. No mean feat. Unfortunately, she's the president of this country, and we can't risk a bomb blowing up every time she loses her nerves – or worse, loses touch with reality."
"What do you mean by that?"
"I mean Tancredi should have resigned after the shooting. It's clear she's not in her right mind any longer. Hey, she's done her bit for this country, hasn't she? Got shot for it. Nearly died for it. Time we take care of her now, and she lets us take care of fixing things."
"So what you said earlier, that you chose war…"
"I meant that completely. Some people are saying that I stir up hate, that I push people to violence – but that's because they don't know me. I'm all about love. And sometimes, you've got to fight for what you love. To protect this country, the rights our founding fathers passed on to us, to keep the innocents safe and preserve America as we know it – I'd do anything."
…
It was five in the morning, April 15, when Sara dashed out of the shower and slipped on her clothes in record time. If Henry Pope, a staunch Republican, had been brave enough to defy his party and see her tonight, she didn't want to keep him waiting.
"That's good news, right?" Michael said. "He wants to talk to you about the bill, Kellerman said so."
"No," she zipped up her black tube skirt, and realized her tights were inside out. Well, surely Pope wouldn't notice that. "All he said was Pope wanted a chat, and he's going to get one."
"But it's about the bill. It's got to be about the bill."
"Michael, I don't want to play the grownup here but you're really stressing me out."
"Right."
She checked she had all her clothes on, made sure her hair looked all right – she'd kept it dry in the shower – and met Michael's eyes.
"Go change the world," he said.
"I just might."
…
Henry and Paul were smoking cigars when Sara made it to the oval. Usually, she had a strict policy about smoking – and about letting people use the office like it was a goddamned waiting room – but if Henry Pope really had come here to save her bill, then she could care less that he spray-tagged the walls to draw a red elephant.
"Senator," she said.
"Madam President," Pope rose from his chair respectfully and bowed his head. Signs of respect shouldn't count for much, but after the hostility that threatened to turn the air on fire yesterday on the Senate floor, she appreciated it very much.
Sara glanced at Kellerman. He looked confident, powerful, and his face gave nothing away. But like Michael said – this had to be good news.
"First of all, I wanted to apologize, on my behalf as well as that of my fellow senators. The way Theodore Bagwell treated you was no way to speak to a president, and someone should have said something. I'd like to think I would have, if I hadn't been so taken off guard, like we all were," he sighed.
His cigar dangled from his hand, but he put it out in an ash tray before ash could trickle down and give the office's famous blue rug a permanent smell.
"That being said, you made a very bad decision today. Will you allow me to speak plainly?"
"Please," Sara said.
"You made a damn fool of yourself, and by no means do I want to give you the impression that your speech swayed me. It was rookie of you to think you could rally us to your bill, like we didn't have our careers on the line, and we could just side with you without it meaning we wouldn't get reelected if hell were to freeze over. I'm not happy that's the way it is, and you don't have to be happy with it – but it is the way is."
Sara sighed. Her eyes lingered to the portraits that hung on the wall – JFK, Obama. "I made a mistake," she said, "by thinking I could get any of you to vote for the people's interests, rather than your own interests."
"In this respect, ma'am, the Democrats are on par with the Republicans. We all have our electorate to think about. Your people don't make free choices any more than mine do."
"Yes, I know that."
"Still, you wanted to change the system, even though the people in it hadn't changed. Like I said, that's rookie, and foolish – but I think I like you the better for it. That's not why I'm going to give your bill my vote, though."
Air stole out of Sara's lungs like a wisp of smoke. She didn't try to catch it, didn't think, and for the next five seconds, didn't hear a word that came out of Pope's mouth.
I'm going to give your bill my vote, he'd said.
She could care less why. Could care less whether he'd taken pity on her, or just wanted to give a middle finger to his colleagues after a thirty-some-year career, or maybe some Catholic saint had spoken to him in a dream.
Some said the journey mattered more than the destination, but in this case, the destination was all Sara had eyes for.
The need to focus pressed against her elated brain, and Sara managed it just as Henry Pope said, "be damned if I let a man like Bagwell undermine everything I've worked for. Our institutions, our government – he'd set it all on fire, you know, if it turned people crazy enough to look to him for an extinguisher."
"I know."
"When he disrespected you yesterday, he disrespected our whole nation. You're my president, too, ma'am, and the Republicans' presidents. If they cared about democracy a little bit more, they'd remember that. Anyway. I won't hide from you that Bagwell's comment was what earned you my vote, so I don't want any special treatment for it. The fact that Mr. Kellerman here didn't bite my hand off when I switched on my cigar was plenty enough."
"Thank you, senator. With that in mind, I'll only offer you my gratitude." Sara extended her hand. Pope shook it. "Whatever you did it for," she said, "you're doing your people a great service."
Poke shook his head. "I'm glad I can serve my president and my country – but this isn't about the bill. Tomorrow, I'll go to the press and make a statement to condemn Bagwell's behavior. I'll also endorse your piece of legislation about gun control, not because I agree with it, or because I'd been planning on taking my retirement – but because you need a win now, Madam President. Or rather, Theodore Bagwell needs a lose. He can't get away with what he said, because some people are taking him very seriously – and when he says war, whether or not he means it, they will mean it. When America turns on their TV tomorrow, they need to see reconciliation, a handshake between red and blue. If I have to sign the end of my career to stop this country from going to war against itself again – I'll do what I have to do."
…
"You look weird," Nika said.
Michael shrugged, tried to take the huge grin off his face. All day at work, people had looked at him askance, and even Bruce had squinted his eyes at Michael, as if concerned for his sanity.
"What?" Michael said. "I can't have a good day?"
It was eight p.m. Michael had just returned from work, half-demented with exhaustion – he felt the crispness of each blink, saw again the look in Sara's eyes when she'd left the motel. She knew she was going to do it – and she had, somehow.
Nika squirted a nut of glittery gel inside her palm and stretched it in tear like streaks around her eyes. Michael knew her get-ready-for-work routine, saw it every time he got home early enough to watch her leave.
"You never told me what she thinks of it."
"Sorry?" Michael said.
"My tattoo," Nika said. "Does she like it?"
"You ask too many questions, Nika."
Michael twisted the ring on his finger. Nika had thought they should get one, so their marriage looked more genuine, but since no one would ask for the receipt and they only had to last a couple of years, they'd gotten both rings for a fifty-dollar bill.
"Maybe you have too many secrets," Nika teased back.
In fact, there was no secret to unravel here. Michael was having a good day. When Sara called to tell him the bill was a done deal, he could hardly believe it. Worry weighed down his limbs like lead. Maybe the GOP was playing her. Michael knew Henry Pope by name, and as a matter of fact, he liked him – at least as much as he could like a Republican. Still, maybe they'd decided to play some kind of trick.
Until Pope released his statement at two p.m. that day, Michael hadn't allowed himself to believe. "We can't have senators behaving as T. Bagwell did yesterday. He makes a buffoonery of our institutions, and we ought all to urge him to apologize for disrespecting the president. On a less dire note, I've been meaning to announce my endorsement of the piece of legislation that has been dubbed 'The People's Bill'. S. Tancredi has my respect and my support, and her bill will have my vote."
The reconciliation appeared all the more indelible when a handshake between Sara and Pope made the front page of every news platform. The bill would happen. Maybe that wasn't a revolution, maybe not all the have-nots inside and out of the country would know a better life because of it – but it was revolutionary, and enough good news that nothing could shake the smile off Michael's face all day.
Even that thing Bruce had said, about scheduling an interview with some Late Night Show host.
"Hey, you're the expert," Michael told Nika, because he felt bad for his evasive answers. "How do you think I'd look on TV?"
"You keep smiling like that, you'll look good even on a mug shot. Why, you want to try your hand at reality shows?"
She chuckled, because that was about as likely as for Michael to grow butterfly wings.
"My new boss thinks I need to develop a public persona."
"Wow," Nika said. "Didn't you have this obsession about not even getting photographed by the press?"
Michael shrugged, instead of saying that that was before. Before he got his picture taken alongside Bruce, entering the hospital where the president was being cared for. He and Nika had a brief chat about that, and she said something like, "You really climbed that important-people ladder if you're working for someone who knows the president."
"I'm not happy about it," Michael said, "if you must know."
"Hey, it's a good thing." Nika got up and lay her small palm on his shoulder, careful not to damage the drying varnish on her nails. "Going public. You fight for people's rights, then they should see your face. Give them hope, forget about the vigilante shit."
"I'll have to, won't I?" Michael sighed. If superheroes had been invented in the digital age, they probably wouldn't have thought it looked credible to wear a mask.
…
Sara stared into the eye of the camera. Naturally, the whole scene had been staged as much as possible. Henry Pope stood visible in the background, among several of her cabinet members: Gretchen Morgan, Paul Kellerman, former Republicans that Sara had 'rallied' to her cause. On the left side of the office: Bruce Bennett, who filled in for the paternal figure her father had refused to occupy.
Sara held the pen above the cream-colored paper – the bill to which she had sacrificed most of her sleep and sanity.
Something will go wrong, she thought. The pen will break. A hurricane will chase us all out of the room. A perfect bullet will slice through the window and hit me square in the head.
The cameraman's fingers moved above the camera: three, two, one.
Sara looked down at the paper, made a show of perusing it for two seconds, and signed it.
Blue ink marked the paper almost faster than thought. Sara stared at her own signature, unhinged. Like two virgins who've saved themselves for their wedding night and reach climax almost before they're out of their clothes.
A hand weighed on her shoulder. Sara closed her eyes. An absurd idea – that the hand was Michael's – made her let go of the breath she'd been holding for what felt like several months.
Bruce's wrinkled face looked back at her when Sara turned around. "Congratulations," he said.
Of course, Bruce had come because her father wouldn't, to signify the past proudly standing behind the future. Sara had called Frank herself to ask if he'd be there, because she didn't want anyone from her team to have to take his anger when he answered, "You want me to show my approval for a bill that almost got my daughter killed?"
The camera stopped. Sara rose from her seat to face her team – no grinning faces, as on election night. They all looked as serious as if someone had died.
Sara knew she must break the ice, must give the proper launch to their celebration. They had won. No matter what else happened until the end of her term, she had made 'the People's Bill' into law.
But words failed her. The sound of her heart pumping blood became deafening to her own ears. A sudden wish flashed by: that she could stand with her team, instead of before them. Better yet, that she could be watching this on her TV screen with Michael, drinking cheap champagne, huddled beneath a plaid cover.
"Uh – give us some space," Kellerman told the filming crew. "You know what?" he added when they were on their way out the door, turning to the team. "Why don't we all clear the room? We'll have plenty of time to celebrate tonight," he meant the party – because of course, there would be a party.
Sara gave Kellerman a nod, suddenly incapable of putting words on her gratitude.
When the last member of her team had left the oval, Sara dropped on the couch, and her eyes closed of their own volition. If her phone rang, or knocks at the door attempted to draw her back to her presidential duties, Sara never knew.
There, in the office where she had worked day and night to arrive to this moment, she slept for nine hours, better than she had slept since she had thoughtlessly spoken her wish to become president on the TV set of Stephen Colbert's late show.
…
End Notes: Share your thoughts in the comment section, and have a merry Christmas!