“Quit being such a snob! There's nothing wrong with serving on the town council. Considering how thankless and miserable those jobs are, it's amazing anybody is willing to serve in local governmentâespecially anybody as smart as Peter. But thank heaven they do, because somebody has to.
“And I told you, Peter is not my boyfriend. Don't you ever listen? He's just an old friend who has been kind enough to help me out after Alice's death and to keep me from getting bored while I'm stuck here. Did I tell you that he coaches hockey for five-year-olds? They're adorable. I went to watch one of the games last weekend. They looked like a squad of drunken bumblebees, buzzing around the ice and bumping into each other, falling down and then getting back up. Peter is incredibly patient with them. This weekend, he's taking me ice fishing.”
“Ice fishing,” Joe deadpanned. “As in standing around a hole in subfreezing temperatures waiting for fish to bite?”
“It's not quite that primitive. There is some kind of a shelter to keep you out of the weather. But yes,” I said, frowning a little as I realized what kind of picture I was painting, “that's more or less the idea.”
“Uh-huh. And you find that more appealing than staying in your nice warm house and working on an interesting project that will net you a few thousand dollars?”
“It isn't an interesting project, Joe. It's a scheme to help one rich man get richer by skirting a whole bunch of very good laws. And even if it weren't, I've made up my mind to spend my time here doing things that I enjoy with people I enjoy.”
“Like your friend Peter. Well,” he sighed, “at least we know he really
is
your friend and not your boyfriend. Can't see him trying to make a big move on you while ice fishing.” He let out a short laugh.
“But really, Lucy, are you sure that you couldn't spare just a
few
days to knock out this campaign? If you pulled a few marathon days back to back, I bet you'd have it done in a week. I know how you can produce once you get into the zone, Lucy. You're a machine.”
“Yeah, and when I get to Washington I'm going to have to be a machine again for the next four years. Maybe eight. Which is why I'm going to relax and enjoy myself while I can. Life is short.”
“All right, all right. I won't beg. I know your implacable voice when I hear it.” He groaned. “I hope you enjoy your Christmas season. Mine has just gotten a lot more complicated.”
“I'm sorry,” I said, and meant it.
“At least
one
of us will have happy holidays,” he said.
“Hey! Did I tell you? The library is sponsoring a snow sculpture contest! Doesn't that sound like fun?”
“Snow sculptures? Ice fishing? Quilts?” Joe made a
tsking
sound with his tongue. “Who are you and what have you done with my friend Lucy? Don't tell me you've gone off and decided to be happy. What a waste of a promising career.”
“Ha-ha. It's a break, Joe, not a lifestyle transformation. And I intend to enjoy it while it lasts. In another month, I'll be back to work and back to my cranky, overwrought, overworked self. Promise.”
“Well, that's a relief. All that homespun happy talk was starting to make my teeth hurt. Just too sweet.” He laughed. “Well, I'd better let you go. Have a nice Christmas, kiddo. See you in DC. Oh, wait! Speaking of DC, have you talked to Ryland lately?”
“No, not since the funeral. But I didn't expect to. He's got a few things on his plate, you know. Why do you ask?”
“No reason,” Joe said quickly. “I was just wondering if he's been calling to check in. He's always depended on your advice.”
“He has armies of people to advise him. More now than ever.”
“Bet their advice isn't as good as yours. You've always known how to handle him.”
“I never handled Tom Ryland. I may have nudged him now and again, but I didn't handle him. He didn't need it. He's a pro.”
“Yeah. I'm sure you're right. Well, I'd better let you go. See you in a few weeks. And, hey! Next time you talk to the office, put in a good word for me, will you? I want good seats at the inauguration.”
I smiled. “I'll see what I can do.”
Chapter 29
S
hoveling the driveway took a little longer than I'd thought it would, and so I didn't get to the school until about ten minutes after eleven. Mrs. Swenson, bundled up in a coat, scarf, and snow boots, was standing in front of the entrance, pacing.
“So sorry I'm late!” I called as I jogged up the sidewalk to the door. “You didn't have to come out to meet me. It's been a while, but I still remember the way to your classroom.”
I laughed and gave her a hug. She gave me a quick hug in return and off we went, walking quickly past the principal's office and the trophy case. I would have liked to have slowed down and have seen if they still had the plaque that listed Alice as captain of the 1995 girls' track team, but Mrs. Swenson was holding on to my arm, propelling me down echoing, empty corridors that smelled like floor wax, cafeteria taco meat, and disinfectant. Every high school I've ever been in smells just the same. It's weird.
“Lucy,” Mrs. Swenson said as we rushed down the hallway, “I probably should have asked if it was all right beforehand, but . . . I told one of the other teachers that you were coming. I just couldn't help myself. I'm so thrilled that you're here! Anyway, she asked if she could bring her students too. I didn't think you'd mind.”
“Oh, that's all right,” I said. “A few more won't make any difference.”
It was a small school so the news that one more class would be joining us wasn't a big concern.
“How many is she bringing? Ten? Fifteen?”
“Well, that's just it. I told that one other teacher, but she told a couple more, and then somebody went and called the superintendent, and next thing I knew . . .”
I stopped in the middle of the hallway. I wasn't moving one more inch without better information.
“Mrs. Swenson? How many kids are we talking?”
She turned around to face me, took in a breath, her lips pressed tight together, and then blew it out. “All of them. Every student from ninth grade on up. From both schools.”
“
Both
schools? What are you talking about?”
Mrs. Swenson spread out her hands helplessly. “The superintendent decided we should include the students from Sturgeon Bay too. She thought it wouldn't be fair for them to miss out. Oh, Lucy! Don't look at me like that. You can't blame her for being excited. To think that you grew up right here in Nilson's Bay, went to our schools, sat in
my
classroom! And now you're going to work at the White House! You can't blame us for being proud.
“The buses from Sturgeon Bay arrived about twenty minutes ago. We moved everything to the auditorium. Wait till you see! There's not an empty seat in the house!”
I felt beads of sweat popping out on my forehead. “The auditorium?” I asked weakly. “How many does it hold?”
“Three hundred and twenty-five, but we've got a few more than that. Some of the teachers had to stand in the back with the reporters.”
“You invited the media?”
“I didn't invite them. They just showed up. Not too many, maybe six or seven. But,” she said in a voice that was meant to be reassuring and then grabbed my arm again and started pulling me along, “I told them that you're
only
taking questions from the students. They can listen and take pictures, but that's all!”
“Mrs. Swenson, you really should have told me about this before.”
“I know, I know. But I honestly didn't realize things had gotten so out of hand until yesterday, when the superintendent called. At that point, I thought telling you ahead of time might make you nervous. Also,” she said, a slightly sheepish expression on her face, “I was worried that you might cancel.”
She knew me too well.
Taking questions from a handful of teenagers was one thing, but speaking to an audience that numbered in the hundreds and doing so in front of a gaggle of reporters was a whole different ball of wax! I've never enjoyed public speaking. I can do it if I have to, but I don't love it, not like Tom. He always found it energizing, but I'm always drained after giving an interview or a speech, even to a small group. That's why he's the president-elect and I'm happy to stand in the background. Far, far in the background.
We reached the double doors of the auditorium. I could hear the rumbling murmur of voices and shuffling of feet coming from inside.
Three hundred and twenty-five people! Wasn't there some way to get out of this? But after taking another look at Mrs. Swenson's face, I knew there wasn't. She really
was
excited, and proud that I'd been one of her students.
Let's hope that she felt the same way an hour from now.
“Ready, dear?”
“Oh, I doubt it.”
“Lucy,” she said, in a tone that was half-scolding and half-mothering, “remember when you took my debate class? You always got so nervous, but you never lost a debate. Not one. This is even easier than that. Everyone in there is on your side, excited to hear what you've got to say. Trust me. You're going to be fine.”
“If you say so.”
Figuring there might be a photographer in there, I brushed my hand quickly across my jacket to make sure there weren't any unsightly flakes on my shoulders, and ran my tongue over my teeth to feel if there might be anything stuck there. Then I took a big breath. I could do this.
“Okay. Ready.”
Mrs. Swenson reached for the door handle. “Oh, Lucy. One more thing. Right before your talk? They're going to give you a key to the city.”
My eyes went wide. This was really too much! But before I could protest or change my mind about changing my mind, the doors swung open and I was greeted by the sound of three hundred clapping, stomping adolescents, who, I was sure, were way more excited about missing their third-period class than they were about listening to some old broad gab about government. Though cell phone coverage is lousy in Nilson's Bay, it seemed like every kid in the room had one and was using it to snap pictures of my entrance.
When my eyesight recovered from temporary flashbulb blindness, I walked toward the stage at the front of the room. And who was waiting there to greet me? Peter Swenson.
He had a big silver key in his hands and a big smirk on his face. He knew that I was hating this, and yet there he stood, enjoying my misery.
If there hadn't been so many witnesses, I'd have walked right up there and kicked him in the shins, maybe even higher. But there
were
a lot of witnesses, so instead I walked up the stairs, shook his hand, accepted the key, and posed for pictures.
Â
It honestly wasn't as bad as I had anticipatedâor would have anticipated, had I known about it in advance. Maybe it was a good thing that Mrs. Swenson hadn't told me about it until the last minute. Still, even though things turned out for the best, she should have told me ahead of time. So should Peter; it was his fault that I'd gotten into that mess in the first place. At least . . . I thought it was. Okay, maybe not his fault exactly, but Mrs. Swenson was his mother and so, somehow or other, that meant he was responsible.
Anyway, it went off pretty well. My throat felt really dry at first, so I took a big drink of water from the bottle on the podium, choked, and started coughing, but after that, I was okay. The kids asked good questionsâreally intelligent questions about the nature of partisanship, the two-party system, the influence of money on government, and how we can get people from all points on the political spectrum to work with common purpose instead of spending all their time wrangling and harassing one another. I don't know that I had any deep insights or real solutions, but, as I told the kids, the fact that they're concerned about this even at their young ages was a really good sign because change is created by the people who care enough to ask questions and show up.
Juliet was sitting in the fourth row and gave me a shy little wave when I stepped up to the podium. I winked so she'd know I'd seen her. She didn't raise her hand during the presentation, but afterward she came up to talk to me. I had the feeling she wanted to ask me something, but her boyfriendâI think his name is Josh, but Daphne just calls him The Slothâcame up and stood next to her, sighing and shuffling his feet, and generally making his boredom clear. After a minute she looked at him and then at me and asked if it would be all right if she came over to the cottage sometime. I said yes. Daphne's right. She's a bright kid. She could do anything she wants with her life, as long as she manages to untangle herself from The Sloth.
A lot of other people wanted to talk to me, too, mostly students and teachers, but a few people from the community as well. Mrs. Lieshout was there and stopped to give me a hug. “We're all just so proud of you, Lucy Toomey!”
Once the crowd thinned out, the reporters asked me to pose for a few more pictures. Like they hadn't had time to get what they wanted during the forty-five minutes when I was speaking? Who were they trying to fool? I'm not stupid; I knew they were just using this as an excuse to get closer and ask me questions, in spite of Mrs. Swenson's ban on it. But trying to make nice with the media is a sort of default mode for me, and they were just local people trying to make a living reporting local news, so I said yes.
The questions were all softballs, stuff about how it felt to be back in Wisconsin, and if the school had changed much since I'd graduated, and who my favorite teacher was back in the day, etcetera. You know, human interest stuff. After a while, somebody asked if we could get a few more shots of me receiving the key to Nilson's Bay and so they found Peter and had him stand next to me and smile as we shook hands and held the key. Yeah, I know. Really an original shot, right? But, like I said, they were just local reporters.
Or so I thought.
After a couple of minutes, one of the reporters, a skinny guy with glasses and greasy hair, held a tiny recorder out to me and yelled out, “Lucy, are you looking forward to working at the White House?”
“Well, it's a little premature to discuss that. The president-elect hasn't even been sworn in yet, but certainly I'd be thrilled to serve if given the opportunity.”
“Is there any reason to think you won't get that opportunity? After all, Tom Ryland likes having a cadre of young female staffers working for him, doesn't he?”
“What?”
The question took me by surprise; it wasn't the kind of thing a local reporter working on a puff piece about a hometown girl who made good would ask. Unless this wasn't a local reporter.
I dropped my smile and Peter's hand. “Excuse me, who are you and who do you work for?”
“Brandon Kimble. I'm with JaybirdNews.com,” he said and started lobbing questions faster than I could answer or even take them in.
“Lucy, how many women does Tom Ryland have on staff? When you were on Ryland's staff, you traveled with him extensively, didn't you? Stayed in the same hotels? Why did you suddenly stop traveling with Ryland? Why did you step down as campaign manager?”
“I stepped down as manager because I'd never run a national campaign. At that point, we needed someone with more experience, and so I stepped aside and handed the reins to Miles Slade. Which, seeing as Candidate Ryland is now President-elect Ryland, seems like it was a pretty good decision.”
I grinned, trying to make light of the question. The other reporters, who had stopped taking pictures by now and were just standing around listening to Brandon Kimble batter me with questions, chuckled at my answer. Brandon just kept at it.
“But why did you stop traveling with Ryland?”
“Because I was working on other projects at that point.”
“Isn't it true that Ryland likes to travel with young, pretty women?”
This was not going in a good direction. If Tom had been standing there, enduring a barrage of questions by some reporter who was clearly on a fishing expedition for something salacious, I'd have pulled him out of there but quick, making some excuse about being late for a meeting or something. That's what staff does. But I didn't have a staff. Walking off in a huff, which was what I felt like doing, would only fan the flames of prurient interests, so I'd have to figure out a way to get myself out of this.
“Well, I don't think of myself as all that young anymore, but I'm glad you think I'm pretty. And no, I'm not going to give you my phone number.”
That got a big laugh. For a moment I thought I was out of the woods, but Kimble just wouldn't give up. He shouted to make himself heard above the laughter.
“So is that why Ryland stopped having you travel with him? Because he preferred the company of younger female staffers?”
“What!”
My jaw dropped to my chest. The first rule when dealing with nosy reporters is to never let them see you sweat or take you by surprise. I blew it on both counts. But, in my defense, I hadn't planned on fielding questions that day. I wasn't prepared, especially not for a question that was so blatantly, over-the-top sleazy and rude!
“Lucy, your former assistant, Jenna Waters, who is only twenty-four, is working on the Ryland transition team. Whose idea was it to promote her so quickly? Yours or President-elect Ryland's?”
I started to stutter, literally stutter. My mind was whirring, but I couldn't formulate a coherent sentence. Suddenly, I felt a hand on my arm. Peter gently pulled me one step backward.
He took one step forward, said, “Hey, guys, this has been fun, but Lucy's old teachers have planned a private little celebration for her. She's got to go before the ice cream melts,” and then placed his arm near my back without actually touching me, escorting me out of the room, like a faithful sheepdog putting himself between the lamb and the wolf pack. It was the same move I'd performed when Tom got himself in too deep with the press.