White House Autumn (15 page)

“That the best you can do for reading material?” Preston asked from the door.

“They’re pretty bad,” she said.

“I know. That’s why the three of you weren’t supposed to see them.” He was wearing dark brown flannel pants with a brown, tan and white argyle V-neck, a white shirt, and skinny brown tie. His loafers were so pristine that it looked as if people carried him around all the time so that his feet wouldn’t touch the floor. “How are you feeling?”

She shrugged.

“Too shiny?” he asked.

She looked up. “What?”

“My shoes,” he said.

“Oh.” She nodded. “Well, yeah. They look too new.”

“They
are
new,” he said.

Oh. She frowned.

“I really wonder what goes on in your head, kid,” he said.

She shrugged.

“What’s going on in it right now?” he asked.

She shrugged again. “Nothing much.”

“You’ve been reading those,” he indicated the magazines, “and nothing’s going on in your head?”

“Not really,” she said stiffly.

“Been all over the Internet, too?” he asked.

Which, the last she’d heard, wasn’t against the law.

“Well, I envy you,” he said. “I think I’d be going crazy.”

Was this the part where she was supposed to dissolve in tears? She didn’t say anything.

“Not that it’s not upsetting, anyway. Your family is very important to me.” He looked right at her, and she nodded self-consciously. “How do you feel?” he asked, his voice gentle.

Christ, how many people were going to ask her that?

“Public composure,” he said.

Something like that, yeah. She shrugged.

“Have you had lunch?” he asked.

She shook her head. “I’m not hungry.”

“Well, I am,” he said. “And I missed breakfast, too.”

“Why don’t you just go down to the Mess,” she said. Most White House staffers ate in a special dining room on the ground floor of the West Wing. “Or you could have someone in the kitchen make you something.”

“I thought we could cook,” he said.

She looked at him suspiciously. “What do you mean,
we?”

“Get cleaned up,” he said, “and I’ll go tell Carl we’re taking over.”

Jesus. Couldn’t he figure out that she just wanted to be alone? Why was everyone so god-damn dense?

“Hurry it up, okay?” he said, closing the door behind him as he left.

Not sure what else to do, Meg changed into sweatpants, a blue Lacoste shirt, and her Topsiders. She always wore her Topsiders around the house, because slippers looked stupid. Once, someone had given her a pair of slippers that looked like pink fuzzy rabbits, and she had had to wear them to be polite, in spite of the fact that she felt like an idiot. Slippers were not cool.

Preston was alone in the upstairs kitchen, wearing a white
Presidential Food Services apron—and was, she assumed, devastated that it wasn’t color-coordinated.

“Where is everyone?” she asked.

“I gave them a break.” He handed her a glass of dark liquid. “Want a Coke?”

“Well, yeah, I guess.” She sipped some, watching him rummage through the cupboards and refrigerator. Preston wasn’t a person she thought of as being an industrious little chef.

“Do you cook?” she asked.

He laughed. “What do you think—I go home, open cans of ravioli, and eat them cold?”

Probably, yeah—on the rare evenings when he didn’t exist on take-out, since she had seen him grabbing a slice of pizza or eating out of take-out containers more times than she could count. She frowned. “I don’t know. I never really thought about it.”

“Well, think about it,” he said, turning on the coffeemaker.

“What’s your apartment like?” she asked.

He grinned. “Immaculate. What do you want to make?”

“Um, sandwiches?” she said.

He shook his head. “I was thinking more along the lines of a glutinous pasta concoction.”

“Okay,” Meg said, suddenly feeling hungry.

“Great.” He started wiping off mushrooms with a damp paper towel—which made her suspect that he really
did
know his way around kitchens. “Your job is to create something absolutely wonderful for dessert.”

“Wait,
she
had to work, too? “Dessert?” she said.

“You have no idea how hungry I am.” He opened the cupboard where the baking supplies were kept. “Here. Use your imagination.”

At first, the whole thing seemed kind of dumb, but Preston’s enthusiasm was contagious and the cooking started being fun. He was
sautéing the mushrooms, along with onions and peppers, which he assured her were an integral part of his pasta plan. End quote. She was whipping cream, and when he asked her why, she said that it was an imperative component of her dessert plan—which was a lie. Actually, she had no plans whatsoever, but whipping cream might give her time to think of one. Not that she wouldn’t be happy slopping the cream onto graham crackers and eating them without further adornment. But, Preston probably had a more discerning palate.
Most
people probably did.

They ate at the table in the West Sitting Hall. Preston had combined his sautéed vegetables with noodles, fresh dill, cracked pepper, and lots of buffalo mozzarella cheese and butter, and it was one of the better pasta concoctions she had ever eaten. He had also made a salad: spinach, romaine and Boston lettuce, cucumber slivers, purple onions, shaved carrots, and Heirloom tomatoes. She drank Coke, and he had coffee, and they didn’t talk about anything difficult—just football, and skiing, and their favorite paintings in the White House, and Great Meals They Had Known. She felt better than she had in days.

“Well.” He sat back. “Let’s see this dessert of yours.”

“Okay, but you have to wait here.” She carried their plates towards the kitchen. “I’ll just be a minute.”

She scraped and rinsed the plates, trying to think. Maybe she would have to go with graham crackers, after all. She took down two nice hefty bowls and broke graham crackers into them. The freezer had homemade chocolate and chocolate-chip ice cream, and she filled the bowls with alternating spoonfuls of the two flavors. Then, she melted chocolate chips in the microwave, with a dash of vanilla, to make a sauce, which she poured over the ice cream, before adding more-than-generous spoonfuls of the whipped cream. But she needed one final—
elle ne savait quoi
—there were some Oreos and she crushed a few, covering the whipped cream with the
pieces. Finally, she stuck a spoon in each bowl and carried them out to the table.

Preston grinned. “Way to go, Meg.”

“Old family recipe,” she said.

He nodded and picked up his spoon. “I could tell at once.”

They talked about the best ice cream places in the city—about which they strongly disagreed, Woody Allen movies—before he got weird, and their favorite Robert Parker mysteries, Meg feeling so relaxed that she finished her entire dish of ice cream.

“What a little piglet,” Preston said.

She grunted cooperatively. “How come you’re not over at the hospital or anything?” Propping up the First Gentleman, presumably.

“Because I wanted to have lunch with you,” he said.

She moved her jaw. “Summoned to try and cheer up the fraying-at-the-edges First Daughter?”

He shrugged. “Why not?”

Good to know that no one was talking about her behind her back, or anything.

“Steven’s pretty upset with his agents,” Preston said.

She looked up sharply. Was that meant for her? “Oh. Did they do something to bother him?”

“I guess he’s blaming them for your mother being shot,” he said.

Meg flinched at the word “shot.” How could he come right out and say it? “Sounds pretty immature,” she said, calmly.

He shrugged again. “People do funny things when they’re upset.”

Meg let out her breath, annoyed. Preston didn’t usually play games. “What, did my agents fink on me, or something?”

“They didn’t ‘fink,’” he said. “They’re worried about you, Meg.”

She nodded. “They should be, if they have that much trouble protecting people.”

“Is that really fair?” he asked.

Like she cared, one way or the other? She played with the sauce and melted ice cream left in her dish. “What difference does it make?”

“I don’t know.” He drank some coffee. “Bert Travis’s family is probably feeling pretty lousy about the whole thing.”

“He’s not even on crutches,” Meg said, irritated.

“He could have been killed,” Preston said.

“Yeah, well, so could—” She stopped. “Forget it, I don’t want to talk about it.”

He nodded, and it was quiet for a minute.

“You know,” he said, “sometimes things like this make families even closer.”

“What do you do in your free time,” she asked, “read Hallmark cards?”

“Everyone needs a hobby,” he said.

She frowned, not amused.

“Okay.” He finished his coffee. “It’s just something to think about. Want another Coke?”

She shook her head.

He made a tennis swing with his arm. “Feel like hitting a few?”

Oh, yeah, right. “Why?” she asked. “I’m not allowed to play anymore.”

“You might feel better if you got some exercise,” he said.

“Oh,” she said, nodding, “so now I’m fat?”

“No. Just thought it might make you feel better.” He reached across the table to pat her shoulder, then collected the dishes, carrying them out to the kitchen.

“Are you mad?” Meg asked, when he returned.

He tilted his head. “Should I be?”

“Well,” she didn’t look at him, “I guess I was pretty rude.”

“So, you were rude,” he said, shrugging. “No problem. Just be selective. You want to be rude, come find me.”

Meg frowned uncertainly. “I don’t get it.”

“You don’t want to take things out on the wrong people, that’s all,” he said. “Your agents. Your friends. Anyone who isn’t directly involved.”

Meg folded her arms. Was he bugging her about Josh now? Nothing like having a private life.

“Can’t keep these things inside, Meg,” he said. “You do, and they come out at all the wrong times, you know?”

She didn’t say anything.

“You have to find someone to talk to. It doesn’t have to be me, but—” He paused. “If you don’t talk about it, you’ll drive yourself crazy.”

Meg looked at her hands.

“Well,” he said. “I guess I’ve annoyed you enough.”

She nodded.

“Then, maybe I’ll head back over,” he said. “Unless you feel like hitting a few, or checking out ESPN, or something.”

She shook her head.

“Okay. Whatever.” He stood up. “You know where to find me.”

She nodded.

“Good.” He bent to kiss the top of her head. “Thanks for letting me have lunch with you.”

“
Letting
you?” she said.

He looked sad. “You didn’t have a nice time?”

She had to grin. “It was swell.”

When he was gone, she sat at the table for a long time, thinking. He was right—she had to talk to
someone
. But, this wasn’t exactly a great time to seek Josh out. And if she couldn’t talk to Josh, who—she glanced at her watch. Going on to four. That meant that school had been out for—she picked up the nearest telephone.

Beth answered on the third ring.

“Um, hi,” Meg said.

“Hi,” Beth said. “Everything okay? What’s up?”

“Nothing. I mean, things are—I don’t know. Pretty bad.” She swallowed. “I was wondering, um—do you think you can maybe still come here?”

“Sure,” Beth said. “When?”

BETH TOOK AN
evening shuttle down, the White House sending a car to the airport to pick her up. Meg was just as happy to stay at home, and avoid her agents. She waited downstairs in the Diplomatic Reception Room, slouching on a yellow sofa. Since she wasn’t in the family quarters, her agents
were
around, but at least they weren’t making themselves obvious.

“Miss Shulman is arriving, Miss Powers,” a Marine guard told her from the door.

“Thank you.” She went through the vestibule and outside to the edge of the South Drive.

One of the inevitable black cars pulled up and Beth got out.

“Hi,” she said, grinning.

Meg grinned back, especially at her rust felt hat, a small feather in the band. “Nice hat.”

“Fall,” Beth said, and glanced around. “I was kind of expecting photographers.”

“Disappointed?” Meg asked.

“Yeah, actually.” She picked up her overnight bag and a Barnes & Noble bag, and they looked at each other. “Never done much hugging, have we?”

God, no. “Not really,” Meg said.

Beth nodded. “Well. No point in starting now.”

Definitely not.

Beth’s grin came back. “Then again, what the hell?” She gave Meg a quick hug, then continued past her into the house.

“You’re really weird,” Meg said, following her.

“But,
oh
so charming,” Beth said.

Depending upon one’s definition.

Beth stopped on the red carpet outside the Diplomatic Reception Room, looking up and down the Ground Floor Corridor at the Presidential Seal, and the portraits of First Ladies. “This place could grow on me.”

“Oh, yeah,” Meg said. “It’s terrific.”

Beth pointed at the paintings of Jacqueline Kennedy and Eleanor Roosevelt. “Those don’t impress you?”