THE PRESIDENT'S GIRLFRIEND (25 page)

     “To hell with Kate!” he yelled back.

     “Okay, forget Kate,” his mother said.  “What about your child Kate’s carrying?”

     Dutch was stunned.  He had no idea that his mother even knew about that.  “She told you about that?”

     “Of course she did.  She’s a wonderful girl who would have made you a wonderful wife, this country a wonderful first lady, but you couldn’t see it.  Now she’s about to have your child, my first and only grandchild, and you choose to dump her for some . . . some social worker!”

     “She’s an attorney,” Dutch reminded his mother, as is she didn’t already know, “not a social worker.  And even if she was a social worker, so what?  You as well as I know that Kate and I broke up long before I began any relationship whatsoever with Regina.” 
That night in Miami a decade ago notwithstanding
, both he and Gina thought inwardly.  “So don’t you dare attempt to put any home-wrecker labels on her.”

     Victoria was surprised by her son’s harsh tone.  “If your father was alive,” she began, but Dutch didn’t want to hear it.

     “I am going to marry Regina,” he said.  “That’s why I came here.  To let you know.”

     “But what about the child Kate’s carrying?”

     “If after she delivers and DNA testing proves that I’m the father, I will take care of my child.  But I will not marry Kate, a woman I could barely stomach, just for that sake.”

     “Oh, you can barely stomach her now,” Victoria said.  “When you were impregnating her just four months ago, you could more than stomach her then.  You were loving her then.”

     “No, mother,” Dutch admitted, “I was not loving Kate when I impregnated her.  I was just fucking her.”

     This astounded Victoria.  The vulgarity!  Even Gina was surprised.  And Victoria stood to her feet.  Dutch, nor Gina, bothered to move. 

     “You disgust me,” Victoria said with the venom now toxic on her tongue.  “You have always disgusted me.  That’s why our relationship has never been anything but eye candy, a smile, a kiss, hello and goodbye.  Because I knew you were like this.  I saw it in you as a child.  Always had to do things your way, not the way of our circle, but your way.  Tried to befriend that little black boy from Cape Cod when you were a child.  Always dating black women in college.”

     “I dated all kinds of women, Mother,” Dutch said.

     “But you favored the black ones, don’t tell me you didn’t.  Even Caroline, God rest her soul, was said to have some black blood in her.  That was your attraction to her, I’ve always believed.  But when you met Kate, I thought that there was hope for you yet.  Maybe political reality woke you up to how foolish you’d been and now you were ready to commit to a real woman, a woman with background and breeding, of a pedigree that impressed even me.  But oh no, not Dutch.  He has to be his own man, do things his own way, love whomever he chooses to love, even if that choice would destroy everything he has worked so hard to build.” 

     She exhaled, looked him dead in the eye.  “Well I tell you, Walter Harber, that I will oppose this farce of a marriage with every breath in my body!  And I will let the world know how vehemently I oppose it!” 

     She said this, and just stood there.  As if, to Gina’s amazement, she expected Dutch to back down, to say, okay, Mother, you’re right, and call the marriage off.  When that didn’t happen, when Dutch just sat there, still holding Gina’s hand, still looking like a man who always knew his own mother was never in his corner, she left the room.  Left it with a harrumph that could still be felt by the vibrations of her door slam. 

     Gina looked at Dutch, her heart breaking for him.   But he seemed more determined than she had ever seen him before.

     “Okay,” he said.   “Now we know what we’re up against.”

     “Meaning?”

     “Before the gates of hell can gather their minions for the onslaught, we had better get on with it.”  He turned to Gina.  “You said you would marry me,” he said.  “But will you marry me today?”

     Gina stared at him.  “Even without your mother’s blessing?”

     “Especially without her blessing.  Or anybody else’s.  I will not let them turn our life into their political football.  This is about us.  And tonight, when I lay my head on my pillow, I want my wife, not my girlfriend, not my fiancée, lying beside me.”

     Tears dropped from Gina’s eyes.  After this train wreck with his mother, she expected him to have second thoughts at least.  He, instead, had stiffened his resolve.  “Yes,” she said.  “I’ll be honored to marry you today.”

+++

She had seriously doubted all along if this could be pulled off in a matter of hours.  But he orchestrated the entire affair.  And by the time they arrived at the White House, and up to the residence, the decorations were up, LaLa and Dempsey were waiting, the minister was there, Christian was there, and they were married.   Married as a firestorm of hate and objection gathered around them.  Married as his mother issued her press release, condemning any relationship her son was having with Regina Lansing.  Married as Kate waited for him to ask, under duress even she would admit, for her hand in marriage. 

     Despite it all, and because of it all, they became husband and wife.  And that night, when they lay down to sleep, Dutch pulled the spanking brand new Mrs. Regina Harber into his arms, and held her, with tears in his eyes, all night long.

SEVENTEEN

At the daily presser in the briefing room, Max and Allison were reviewing the president’s schedule for today and answering any questions the press might have.  Of course, most of the questions centered around the statement issued by Victoria Harber disavowing the president’s relationship with Regina Lansing.  Although the statement didn’t mention the marriage proposal, since it was not yet public, it was still enough of a slap in the president’s face to make what Max called the media hounds bloodthirsty.

     But before any definitive answer could be given, other than the obligatory
the president was disappointed with his mother’s decision not to be supportive of him
, the president himself, along with Gina, came into the briefing room.

     The entire audience of reporters and White House correspondents stood to their feet in pleased surprise.

     “Please, be seated,” Dutch said as he and Gina stood at the podium.

     Max and Allison, just as surprised by his appearance as the press, stood back, both deeply concerned because Regina was with him. 

     “I have a brief announcement,” Dutch continued, pulling out an index card from his coat lapel.  “Regina Lansing and I were married last night at the White House residence.” 

     The gasps of shock that filled the room were so loud and so contagious that it sounded almost like high-voltage firecrackers had just gone off.  Nobody saw this coming.  Not even Max and Allison, who had not been told of the proposal, let alone told that they were already married.  And although they were stunned beyond belief, they were political pros and looked out at the amazed press with stoic faces.

     “In Regina,” Dutch continued, “America will find a first lady who is smart, industrious, and with a heart of gold.  She’s a fighter and champion of the poor and disenfranchised and I am so honored, so unbelievably proud to have her as my wife.  The love of my life.  Thank-you, and have a nice day.”

     Dutch and Regina left the podium.  No looks at Max and Allison, no responses to the myriad of questions the press stood and threw their way, with the dominant questions centering almost exclusively on how this marriage would affect his reelection campaign.

     That was the question on Kate’s mind, too, as she saw a rerun of the statement.  And although she was devastated that her plan had blown up in her face, she held her own press conference, later that evening, where she announced to the world that she was pregnant with Dutch
Harber’s
baby.  And although he claims to be a family values president, she went on, he would not even marry her.  That was why they broke up three months ago, she lied to the press, because she had told him she was pregnant, and he had told her to take a hike.

     It was a lie, a bald-faced lie, but that same lie went viral.  From U-Tube to
Facebook
to Twitter to good old fashioned news cast, the talk of the town was all about how Dutch Harber, family values president, was about to become a deadbeat dad.

     It dominated the cable news channels that night.  Dutch and Gina lay in bed watching them, flipping through channel after channel, and the commentary was all negative.  No-one, not even members of the Congressional Black Caucus, who were often able to see a silver lining in the ways of their hero Dutch Harber, could see no positives in this. 

     “It’s over,” David
Kirlings
, a well-respected commentator for MSNBC, put it bluntly.  “America is a forgiving country.  And they like their president.  But for Dutch Harber to dump Kate
Marris
because she became pregnant, is unconscionable.  And yes, I know Max Brennan has been all over the airwaves beating back that assertion, saying it isn’t true and that Dutch only found out about this pregnancy a few nights ago.  But it still looks bad.  And in Washington, how it looks matter a whole lot more than the reality of the thing.  No, I’m afraid Dutch Harber is dead.  He’s done.  There is no way he can overcome this and get reelected.”

     Dutch clicked off the television set and wrapped his arms around Gina.  They were now on their sides, facing each other.  “Put a fork in me, babe,” he said jokingly, “because I’m done.”   

     Gina stared into his eyes, refusing to minimize what she knew had to be very painful for him.  “You can’t resign,” she said.

     “Oh, I won’t.  I won’t give Kate and her groupies that satisfaction.  I’ll see it to the end.”

     “Can you pull it out?” she asked him.

     “In a word, no.  David
Kirlings
right.  But damn if I’m not going down without a fight.  They can have this presidency, it’s not mine anyway, it’s the American people’s, but they will have to take it from me.”

     Gina smiled.  She loved his toughness.  Almost as much as she loved him. 

     She put her hand on the side of his face.  He was drained, she was drained.  Everything had been such a battle for them.  “I love you,” she said to her husband.

     “I love you more,” he said to his wife, his face smiling a smile of weariness and expectation.

     “That’s what you think,” she said, as she moved on top of his naked body.  She kissed him so passionately in the mouth that he wrapped his arms around her and stopped her progression, stopped her from doing anything else but lay there and kiss him, his tongue exploring hers with the kind of urgency that belied his drain.

     When he finally allowed her to come back up for air, she turned her own naked body around, until her back was to his face, until her ass was on his chest, and she leaned forward, to his engorged penis that was already long and thick and at her attention.  And she took it in full into her mouth, licking and teasing it, smelling the sweet scent of the silk that sprang ever so slightly from it.