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Authors: Ellen Emerson White

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BOOK: Long May She Reign
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He nodded.

It hurt like hell, and she shut her eyes. “I mean, if I can't get around, I'm going to be stuck in this god-damn house forever.” Or, at any rate, until her mother left office. At which point, she'd be trapped in the house in Chestnut Hill, presumably.

“We need to figure out a way to help you past that,” he said.

She nodded. The pain was actually starting to make her feel faint, so she slipped the rubber band off and put her splint back on, keeping her eyes closed until she was sure she wasn't going to cry. Her putty exercises were going to have to wait until later.
Much
later.

“What's your feeling on next semester?” he asked.

“I don't know,” she said. “What do you think?”

He looked at her thoughtfully. “Truth?”

That was a moronic question. Meg frowned at him. “No, Preston—
lie
to me.”

He grinned, then looked serious. “My feeling is that you should get the hell out of here. Maybe you're making some progress with the PT, but the rest of you is going way downhill.”

She'd asked for honesty; she got honesty. “
Way
downhill?” she said.

He sighed, and put down his coffee cup. “Meg, you're eighteen years old, and you're practically a shut-in. You don't eat, you don't sleep, you don't see anyone your own age, you suddenly think you're stupid—” He shook his head. “I'd like to see you go away before it gets even worse.”

She couldn't really contradict him, but it wasn't quite that easy. “How many people do you think there are out there who cut my picture out of magazines, hang them up on the wall, and—make plans?” she asked, looking right at him so he wouldn't avoid the question.

He did, however, avoid her eyes. “I don't know. I hope there aren't any.”

The man was a cockeyed optimist. She leaned forward to steal a bite of his cake, remembered that she didn't want any, frowned, and put her fork down. “Care to put money on that?”

He pushed the plate closer to her. “Well, for sanity's sake, let's assume they don't exist.”

She shook her head, and pushed the plate back to him. “They got to my mother; they can sure as hell get to me again.” Or her father, or her brothers—which was too awful to imagine, in all three cases.

“Unfortunately, your mother makes some kind of twisted sense as a target,” he said. “You don't.”

Christ, was he really that naive? Or just trying to sound reassuring? “We're dealing with maniacs, Preston,” she said. “I don't think they're real
logical
about these things.”

He glanced down at his plate, and set it aside.

She looked at the remaining cake, then decided that she would have—what the hell—just one bite.

“It's good,” he said.

She nodded. Maybe two bites wouldn't be the worst idea she had ever had.

“You know what I think?” he asked.

Three bites would be pushing it. She lowered her fork. “This isn't going to be more honesty, is it?”

He nodded. “I think it's worth the risk.”

Jesus, what was this, Bluntness Day? Maybe he should try reading his trauma books more carefully. “Yeah, well, you're not the one they're going to blow away,” she said. Bluntly.

He nodded.

“So, you can afford to be sort of—free and easy—with advice,” she said.

He nodded again, and this silence lasted longer than any of the others had.

“I'm often very rude to you,” she said.

He grinned at her. “Actually, I figure it's a compliment.”

She really
was
having lunch with Annie.

“Maybe a little backhanded,” he said.

She laughed. “Maybe.”

They sat there.

“So,” he said. “Sure you don't want to hang out downstairs for a while?”

She nodded.

“Some other time, then,” he said.

She nodded.

*   *   *

HER MOTHER DID
not, in fact, make it home in time for dinner, although after checking the White House closed-circuit television feed, Meg caught ten minutes of a speech she was making in Detroit to some auto workers who had just begun production on a new, much more energy-efficient line of hybrid minivans—and that was
almost
like being in the same place together.

Or, maybe not.

After supper, her father went wherever the hell it was he went— usually, they found him reading in the Yellow Oval Room, or out on the Truman Balcony—and her brothers headed up to the solarium to watch some action movie, while she stayed in her room, finished
Winesburg, Ohio
, and started
Main Street
.

At about nine-thirty, her phone rang. She didn't feel like talking to anyone, but she sighed and picked it up.

“Good evening, Miss Powers,” a White House operator said. She had
all
of her very few calls routed through the switchboard these days, instead of the direct line, so that she didn't have to answer them. “Miss Shulman for you?”

Beth. “Okay,” Meg said. “I mean, thank you.”

There was a clicking sound, and then Beth came on. “Meg?”

“No, this is her secretary,” Meg said. Who did she
think
it was? “Can I take a message?”

“You may,” Beth said cheerfully. “Tell her to get up here and visit me—this town is great.”

Jesus. Meg grinned in spite of herself. “You're already calling it ‘town'?”

“Well, hey,” Beth said, somewhat self-consciously.

Another month, and she'd be a native. Pick up an accent and everything.

“So. How's it going?” Beth asked.

“Super,” Meg said. “It's kind of like a carnival.”

“You hate carnivals,” Beth said.

It was nice to have someone appreciate the subtext in a joke. “Yeah,” Meg agreed. Circuses, too. She—and, oddly, her entire family—particularly despised clowns. The Moscow Circus had once come to the East Room to perform after a state dinner, and they'd had to sit there in the front row and look happy. It was very hard. Even Neal hated every second of it, and later that night, had actually thrown up. Naturally, they all blamed the clowns.

“How are you, really?” Beth asked.

Meg shrugged. “Well, you know.”

“I
don't
know,” Beth said.

Upon which, Meg decided to change the subject. “How about you? Things are—okay?”

A month or so earlier, Beth had been completely freaked out when her period was three days late, and Meg had come up with a wildly impractical and potentially politically inflammatory plan wherein she would get herself admitted to the hospital, under the auspices of another surgical revision of her hand or knee, and Beth would conveniently come down to visit—and instead, they would take care of the situation somehow, as quietly and privately as possible. Maybe not the most ideal stratagem in the world, but it had been her first, and best, suggestion. Of course, Beth had promptly gotten her period the next morning, and neither of them had brought it up again.

“Fine,” Beth said, sounding embarrassed. “I mean, things are good, except for finals. What about you?”

“Well—I have finals, too,” Meg said. Defensively. Especially since she
didn't
have a sex life about which to fret, or celebrate, as the case might be. And, of course, she had only two finals, instead of the normal four or five other people had.

“You worried about them?” Beth asked.

What, because she was psychologically delicate? “No more than anyone else,” Meg said.

“Well, since I've missed like, every other class,
I
sure am,” Beth said.

Hmmm. Beth hyperbole, or reality? Meg thought about that. “Do you really miss that many?”

“Yeah,” Beth said, and then laughed. “Don't tell anyone.”

“What do you do instead?” Meg asked.

“I don't know.” Beth paused. “Sleep. Go to movies. Drink coffee in disreputable cafés.”

Often, she very much wished that she were Beth. If she went off to college and did any of that, the wire services'd probably pick it up.

“How's physical therapy?” Beth asked.

“The same.” Which sounded kind of self-pitying. Although Beth had sat in on a few sessions, so she knew what it was like. “I mean, you know,” Meg said. “Um, how's Ramon?” Beth had pretty much joined the Man of the Month Club since she'd been away at school, and Ramon was the replacement for Jimmy, who had been her not-particularly-gentlemanly cohort in the pregnancy alarm.

“He's okay,” Beth said. “Hear that noise?”

Meg listened, hearing indistinct, but monotonous, music. “Is that a bass?”

“Yeah,” Beth said. “Catchy, hunh?”

Oh, yeah. Terribly. Even so, it was hard to suppress a flash of envy.

“I'm being careful this time,” Beth said. “I mean, I'm not—well, anyway, he's all right. But, I don't know. I don't think we're going to make it through winter break.”

Not exactly a ringing endorsement. Meg frowned. “I thought you said he was really cute.”

“He is,” Beth said. “I mean, he could give Preston a run for his money, but—oh, I don't know. I'm bored.”

“As cute as
Preston
?” Meg said. No small feat.

“In a different way, but yeah. He's just—he sort of walks around trying to be this real hip inner-city guy, but he's actually from Shaker Heights, you know?” Beth said. “Not your type.”

Beth had not, to Meg's knowledge, ever spent time with anyone who was even vaguely her type.

Whatever the hell her type was.

Emphasis on the past tense.

“You're still not telling me anything about your life,” Beth said.

And, gosh, there was so much to tell. “Where should I start?” Meg asked.

“Anywhere,” Beth said, sounding just the tiniest bit too supportive.

She knew everyone was just trying to be nice to her, but
Christ
, it was patronizing. Meg gritted her teeth, the implants on her left side—yet another one of her many physical souvenirs—still feeling unfamiliar in her mouth. “Before or after the strip-tease at the Washington Press Club?”

“Oh, during,” Beth said. “Definitely during.”

The bass had stopped playing, and Meg could hear a very deep male voice saying, “You done yet?”

“No,” Beth said, sounding impatient. “I'm on the phone.”


Still?
” the male voice said.

“Wait a minute, Meg,” Beth said, and Meg could hear her covering the receiver with her hand. “I'm on the phone, Ramon, okay? Jesus.”

“Look, it's not a big deal,” Meg said quickly. “I kind of have to go, anyway.”

Beth sighed. “Meg, I'm not—”

“I really do,” Meg said, even more quickly. “I mean—uh, talk to you later. Or, you know, sometime.” She hung up, feeling unexpectedly shaky and upset. In case Beth was going to call back, she disconnected it, holding the plastic cord tightly in her good hand. So, she wasn't away at school, or having a social life, or—it wasn't a big deal. She should just sleep. It was the easiest—the
only
—way to get through the—but first, some ibuprofen.

As she reached for her cane, she heard someone at her door and turned, angrily, to see who it was.


What
, for Christ's sakes?” she asked, and saw her mother standing there.

Naturally.

Her mother spoke as carefully as ever. “I just wanted to let you know that I was back.”

“Good,” Meg said, not looking at her. “Fine.”

Her mother hesitated. “Is there anything—”

Jesus! “No,” Meg said. “Give me some god-damn space, how about?” For
once
.

Her mother nodded and withdrew, and Meg limped over to close the door behind her. Slam it, really. Christ, her room was about as far from a sanctuary as—she swung the cane,
hard
, at her dresser, hoping to chip the antique wood. To smash it. But the cane glanced off the side and down, knocking her off-balance. She landed on the rug, groaning as her knee buckled underneath her. It hurt so much that she wanted to cry, but someone would probably open the god-damn door to check on her, and—oh, Christ, it really hurt. And she'd managed to bang her hand pretty badly, too.

She stayed on the floor, eyes closed, fighting off an absolute
torrent
of tears. If only they would prescribe some real painkillers again, instead of just useless over-the-counter stuff. But, she'd better take some now, so maybe, in an hour, her leg would feel less—she pulled in a couple of deep breaths, trying to get under control. She was tired of hurting. Beyond tired.

She took one more deep breath, rubbed her sleeve across her eyes—she was probably god-damned entitled to cry, but she still hated doing it—and reached for her cane, slowly dragging herself to her feet.

Her life was a complete and total fucking nightmare.

4

PHYSICAL THERAPY WAS
awful. And she had to do it day after day, week after week, month after month. Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays, without fail, and then, more often than not, occupational therapy on Sundays.

Although she had had to deal with so many different medical and dental professionals during the past six months that she had, frankly, lost track of who most of them were, a hand rehabilitation specialist named Carlotta came to the White House regularly, and a somewhat shy woman named Edith was the physical therapist who usually worked on her knee, as well as her balance and general conditioning, often under the supervision of one or more of the military nurses who were assigned to the White House Medical Unit. The occupational therapists were almost always from Walter Reed or the NNMC, and instead of worrying about names, she just called them by their ranks. None of them ever talked much during the sessions, by Meg's choice. She would just sit there quietly and let them hurt her, cooperating when it seemed to be indicated.

BOOK: Long May She Reign
10.4Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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