Long May She Reign (75 page)

He sniffed the air. “Someday, I want you to teach her how to bake something else.”

Trudy smiled, and went back to her yarn.

In due course, Neal came out with plates of freshly-sliced, only slightly overbrowned cake for everyone, while Steven sat down at the mahogany table to finish what was left in the frosting bowl.
Purple
frosting. Then, her mother appeared with a large bowl of homemade vanilla ice cream that the chefs had sent upstairs, and served some to each of them, using a delicate silver spoon which had not, in any way, been designed for such a demanding task.

“Quite an impressive effort, Katharine,” Meg's father said, looking down at his cake. “And so very colorful.”

Her mother nodded. “I thought the frosting was ill-advised, but sadly, my lobbying efforts were ineffective.”

“We could
completely
score with this on eBay,” Steven said to Neal, who laughed.

The listing would probably get thousands of hits, along with many outrageously high sham bids, and read: “Cake! Baked and Sliced by the Cold and Unloving President Herself! RARE!”

Her mother put some ice cream onto Meg's plate. “Is it helping?” she asked, indicating the prescription bottle on the coffee table.

The only difference she'd noticed with this latest one was that while everything still hurt like hell, she didn't
mind
quite as much. “Fly me to the moon,” Meg said.

Her mother smiled, but gave her father a worried look. “Then, don't take any more, okay? We'll have to try something else.”

Meg shook her head and reached for the bottle, pretending to pour several pills into her mouth. “No, I'm sorry, your lobbying skills remain unimpressive.”

Fortunately, her parents were amused. They might all be walking on eggshells, to some degree, but so far today, they were keeping their collective, intricate balance.

“You know, we could certainly arrange to have you fly back
tonight
, instead of tomorrow,” her father said.

“And deprive yourselves of my joie-de-vivre?” Meg asked. “I so very much think not.”

Her mother picked up the bottle and held it far enough away to be able to read the label, since she didn't have her glasses on. “What
is
this stuff? I think I want some, too.”

“Okay, but save a few for me,” her father said, and Meg laughed.

On the whole, it was quite a relaxing afternoon, although her mother did end up going back downstairs for a while, and then spent most of the evening holed up in the Treaty Room with various advisors, and part of her kitchen cabinet. In fact, it was pleasant enough for Meg to start having some major doubts about the wisdom of going back to school at all.

Hanging out and watching movies with her brothers was
nice
. Knowing that her parents were nearby felt safe. Being able to see Trudy and Preston was swell. Having physical therapy at home, instead of driving miles away, was so much easier. Hell,
everything
was easier.

And, it was less dangerous at home. Less scary. Even with radiation detection devices, bomb-sniffing dogs patrolling constantly, various sensors everywhere, regular lockdowns, fence jumpers, mysterious planes straying into protected airspace, occasionally being hustled down to the bunker, and the like.

By this time tomorrow, she would be alone again, surrounded by strangers, none of whom liked her very much. She would have to drag herself up and down stairs and sloping walkways constantly. She wouldn't have any privacy. She would have to
study
.

Christ, it was going to be awful.

She was sitting in her room, pretty much consumed by worry and dread, when her father knocked on the open door.

“Are you all set with your packing?” he asked.

She wasn't, but she nodded.

“Everything okay?” he asked.

She nodded.

“Do you need anything?” he asked.

She shook her head.

He started to leave the room, then paused. “Can't decide whether you're ready to go back tomorrow?”

Something like that. “Mostly, I think I want to stay here,” she said.

He looked at her, and then nodded. “Today was a good day.”

Yeah.

“Been a while since we've had one of those,” he said.

Double yeah.

He came all the way in, and sat down in the rocking chair. “I think you've talked to your mother and Trudy, but you really haven't told
me
much about school.”

Probably because the two of them had been too busy quarreling with each other.

“And I mean how you actually feel,” he said, “as opposed to platitudes.”

Which was going to limit her ability to communicate.

“Freshman year is difficult for people who
aren't
facing all of the extra challenges you are,” he said.

Judging from the endless glum visits everyone in her entry made to Susan's room, day and night, he was right. Meg sighed. “I don't have any privacy, but it's also really lonely, a lot of the time.”

Her father nodded.

“And—I don't know,” she said. “I guess I thought college would be all good fellowship, and traditions, and everyone smiling and crammed into each other's rooms, and—” In other words,
movie
college.

Her father looked concerned. “But, you seem to be making friends.”

Well, that was open to debate. Unless—Jesus, had her mother told him? He had been the one to drive her over to the infirmary, in one of the Camp David golf carts to see Dr. Holtzman, but she'd just said that she was having a checkup, and he hadn't seemed to suspect otherwise.

No. Her mother would never betray her confidence that way—she didn't
think
. And, even if she had, her father wouldn't be dumb enough to let her know about it.

“Should I allow you to use platitudes?” he asked.

It might be easier. “I think I
was
maybe starting to make friends,” she said, “but then, after the whole mess with Susan, people got really mad at me, and—well, most of them stopped liking me anymore.” Not that it had been perfect before that, but still.

“It'd be nice if a few more of the things that happen to you were actually your fault,” he said.

She couldn't really blame the inability to maintain friendships on anyone other than herself. Enticing, though it might be. “Juliana—” She glanced at him to make sure the name was familiar; he nodded— “thinks I'm really impersonal, or—I don't know—aloof, I guess.”

Her father sighed. “Why
wouldn't
you be aloof?”

Good point. Why, indeed?

“And, unfortunately, your two primary role models both have strong tendencies in that direction,” he said.

So, what, she was genetically destined to be distant and reserved? Terrific.

“And you've also learned the hard way that you have to be very careful about trusting new people in your life,” he said.

An idle remark, or
had
he and her mother been talking about her being involved with Jack? Time to redirect this topic, maybe. To find a clever diversion. “There's a girl in my political science class,” Meg said, “who wears this ‘I'm Glad She's Not
My
Mother' button, and shoots down everything I say—” on the rare occasions she actually spoke up— “even though
Vanessa
understands more about the machinations of government than she does.”

Her father nodded. “I've always had the feeling that Vanessa knows a great deal more than she's telling.”

Meg grinned, and patted her cat. She often had that same sneaking suspicion herself.

“But, that's a more unpleasant button than usual,” he said.

Yeah. It almost went without saying that the same creep also sometimes came to class in a “Wicked Witch of the West Wing” sweatshirt.

Beth had once come to visit with a “But I thought the President was going to fix
everything
!” pin on her jacket, and her mother had been amused enough to ask if she would bring a few extra ones next time. She had a great t-shirt, too, with the slogan “No Boys Allowed” displayed across a picture of the White House, which Meg, quietly, coveted.

And, in the case of her obnoxious classmate, her general feeling was that she was also glad that the President was not her mother, since then, the two of them would be
sisters
—which would really suck.

“Are you physically well enough to go back?” her father asked.

Hell, no. “I wasn't well enough to go in the first place, Dad,” she said.

He nodded, and she wondered whether her parents had any idea how lousy they were at hiding how very depressed she made them. It would be nice to be loved,
without
being pitied. But she didn't want to start another argument, because, for all she knew, her father's stomach hurt as much as her mother's did these days—and he just hadn't been able to bring himself to admit it to anyone yet.

“I'm worried about Steven,” she said.

Her father nodded. “With good reason, I'm afraid. Your mother and I are, too. He's been having a very hard time adjusting to your being away.”

Which made her wonder whether she really should stay home, instead of going back.

“When your mother got shot, I was horrified,” he said, “but I wasn't
shocked
.”

Privately, all of them—especially her mother—had probably anticipated that some coward or other would inevitably take a run at her while she was in office.

“But, with you, it was different,” her father said. “Preston came into my office, shaking so hard that I thought he was going to fall down, and—I couldn't get my mind around it. It was even worse than the night I got the phone call about my parents.”

Her grandparents had been killed in a car accident—by a nineteen-year-old drunk driver—a couple of months after her first birthday. The guy was already out of jail long before she turned three. Her aunt sometimes talked about it, but as far as she knew, her father never did.

He also never said anything about what it had been like to have his wife almost assassinated while he was standing right behind her, and then come very close to bleeding to death in his arms, while Secret Service agents fought to keep her alive during the frantic six-minute ride to the hospital.

“You've always been the one person your brother completely trusts,” her father said, “so he was particularly devastated by what happened. And I don't think—” he glanced at her— “that either of you has been able to figure out how to handle the fact that you have a different relationship now.”

Because she couldn't play sports. Because she never had any energy to do things. Because she was always so miserable, and scared.

Because he could no longer depend on her to be there, when he needed her.

Because she'd stopped being
funny
—the most unforgivable change of all.

She wanted to complain that she was doing her damned best, and why couldn't they give her a chance to try and get well, instead of pressuring her all the time, but what would that accomplish? Like it or not, all of their relationships with one another
were
different now. It would be absurd to argue otherwise.

With one exception. “How come it isn't like that with Neal?” she asked.

“Because, for reasons which still escape me, he never doubted for a second that you were coming back,” he said. “The whole time, he kept saying things like that you were
way smart
, and you'd be fine until some of our commandos burst in and rescued you.” Then, her father sighed. “He was so optimistic, that, to my everlasting shame, there were moments when I found it difficult to be around him.”

Which he would consider an unforgivable lapse of his parental responsibilities, and an indication that he suffered from a deep, heretofore unrecognized, character defect.

Not that any of them were hard on themselves.

“But, he didn't know about the teeth,” Meg said quietly. Or her abandoned clothes.

“No,” her father agreed. “And he was wrong about the commandos. But he apparently understood more about
you
than the rest of us did.”

Maybe. “Or he got lucky,” Meg said.

Her father managed something that resembled a smile. “Or that, yeah.”

She looked down at the bottom of the bed, where her Camp David duffel bag was open, and much closer to being empty than full. It would be so nice just to hurl it into her closet, shut the door, and maybe give college another try in the fall. “Dr. Brooks and a couple of the surgeons could hold a press conference tomorrow, and say that the operations didn't go very well, and they need for me to stay here in Washington to have any chance for my rehabilitation to work,” she said.

Her father's expression looked all the more haunted. “They really wouldn't be stretching the truth.”

Nope.

“Your mother and I could make the arrangements in about thirty seconds,” he said.

Yep.

He studied her. “Do you want us to?”

God, yes. And if she left school, it would take the pressure off Susan and everyone else in the dorm, too. They could all go back to leading ordinary college lives, with no security issues or media assaults, and she could go back to—total isolation and despair. Sitting alone in her room for hours on end. Everyone looking at her miserably. Nobody talking during meals. The staff treating her like a tiny glass sculpture they expected to see shatter right in front of them at any given moment.

Her father came over to sit next to her. “How about I give you a hand with the rest of your packing?”

As kicks out of the nest went, that was a very gentle one. Meg nodded. “That would be good, Dad,” she said. “Thanks.”