Chapter Seven
Over the following few weeks, I found myself continually in the president’s presence. We’d built a rapport that seemed so natural. We’d speak sincerely—with these small smiles on each other’s faces—as we discussed the seriousness of the polls, of the employees. I’d fight with him a bit, still feeling like we were playing this strange game—one that had begun in earnest with that private lunch. I felt like every time I walked away from him, back toward my desk, I could feel his eyes on my body, on my slim waist. I shimmied this way, then that as I walked, playing to his wants. I couldn’t help it; I just loved to win.
The lunches grew more frequent, as well. And the late-night drinks in the office happened more and more. Often, other people were there, complaining about the other party, wringing their hands about the polls. But a few glasses of wine in, and Xavier and I would be laughing, holding our stomachs in such a way that looked nearly comical. I can say honestly that I’ve never laughed that much, not in all my years. I’d always been so serious. But I felt it fall away from me like a shadow whenever he was around.
Of course, I tried to shake myself out of it every evening when I arrived home. “What are you doing?” I’d whisper to myself in the mirror, removing my shirt at nearly 1 in the morning, tired from a full day of working and a full night of drinking. “Get a grip!”
A few weeks after our initial lunch, we sat together in that same room off of the kitchen. Again, the light filled it. But the light was different, illustrating a different time: the coming of late summer, the coming of fall. By this time, the waiter had learned my name and my tastes. He made me a beautiful green salad with strawberries, blueberries, and spinach. “For the lady,” he said, winking at me once more.
I pierced my fork through a strawberry and lifted it to my mouth. I looked up at Xavier, who hadn’t touched his food yet. His eyebrows furrowed into his eyes. He was thinking about something that troubled him.
“Are you all right, Xavier?” I asked him softly. I’d grown to understand that he liked a soft touch, sometimes—that the stresses of his presidential lifestyle didn’t allow for simple, easy conversation. He was always concerned with the state of the world, and he wasn’t allowed to look inwardly. Not often, at least.
He shook his head, trying to push beyond the muddled nature of his brain. “Of course,” he said. “Of course.” He smiled at me, shifting in his chair. “Can I ask you a personal question, Amanda?”
I raised my eyebrow at him, sensing a serious issue fueling from his lips. “Sure.”
“I just. I wondered about your love life. If you’re—if you’re seeing anyone.”
My face burned, suddenly. I shifted my gaze out the window, where I saw a small, white bird floating through the easy, late summer breeze. The question felt inappropriate—as though it was leading to something more. I instantly told myself I was silly; had I not asked him questions of a similar nature? But I told myself that I had reason—his personal life is his professional life, as far as the public is concerned. What interest should he have in mine?
Though I was beginning to suspect that I knew.
“I’m not seeing anyone,” I said, disallowing myself from giving him another response, telling myself to not let things go there.
He hung his head. “I shouldn’t be talking about this, of course. I just feel like we’ve grown close over the weeks—that you understand me, in a lot of ways.”
I nodded, biting my lip. God, I was usually confident and commanding, but every time I was around him he made me nervous. “I feel the same way,” I said quietly and with more sincerity than I had anticipated. “I don’t have many people to talk to.”
I still gazed out the window, uncertain about the ways in which my words would affect our relationship, the very beautiful friendship we had cultivated. And while I knew my feelings were growing, surely it could go no further.
He cleared his throat for a moment. He looked so gorgeous in the light. His dark hair curled perfectly on his head, and his trimmed beard made him look so suave, so mysterious. I swallowed in the tension.
“I need to ask your advice,” he said in a humble tone.
“Relationship advice?” I asked him then.
He nodded. “I need advice on how to fix things with my wife. You see, I can’t tell anyone that we’re having problems. We can’t even go see a counselor. This would be reported to the public. The opposition would jump on it as a sign of weakness in my character—a moral flaw. And I just can’t—I can’t have it. I can’t have them thinking I have a single weakness that they can exploit.”
“For the polls’ sake, please don’t,” I said, smiling at him. I knew how it would look, however. The American people wanted a firm marriage at the helm of their great country. They almost didn’t trust that this president didn’t have children; it was a topic we often had to deal with on the re-election campaign team. “But in terms of advice, I’m honored that you came to me,” I began. “I honestly don’t know a great deal about your situation. But I do know that women love to be treated like they’re the only parts of your life you care about, you know? It’s just you and your wife, against the world. If you make her feel like she’s the only woman you’ve ever dreamed of—“
“And if that’s not true?” the president asked me then. His dark eyes forced mine toward him. The gaze caught me off guard. I dropped my fork onto the white tablecloth.
“Everyone has needs. Perhaps yours are simply—not found in your relationship with your wife,” I said, knowing that I was overstepping my boundaries. Could I come back from this? He continued to gaze at me. I didn’t know what else to say; I certainly wanted to dissipate that terrifying, completely passionate moment between us.
I ripped my eyes away then. I formed the statement easily, with precision. “You have to know that I am so envious of your professional success,” I began, bringing my hands to my forehead. “It’s an eternal burden to me. I am always searching for ways to get ahead, for ways to enhance my relationship to my career. But I don’t know how, you know?”
Xavier looked down, toward his plate. He’d hardly eaten anything. I knew what sadness did to the appetite. “Sure. Well. You know all about success, after all.”
“Not like you, Mr. President—“ I began, a bit of laughter laced on my tongue.
But he stopped me, his hand high in the air. He shook his head vehemently. “It’s Xavier, Amanda. You know that.”
I bit my tongue in those moments, nearly frightened of him and his sudden desire to tell me things, to make an intimate connection with me. I didn’t know how to fit this information into my head; I didn’t know how to comprehend it.
I swallowed and pulled myself back from the table, tapping at my mouth with my napkin. My nearly uneaten salad sat before me, gleaming in the light from the window. “I’m stuffed,” I said, even as my stomach ate at me. “I think I’ll—I’ll head back up to the office. See what those goons have messed up now.”
I stood up and flung myself toward the door, still feeling his eyes on me. The door to the kitchen swung back behind me, delivering a real-life boundary between Xavier and me. I hustled up the steps and found myself in a sea of work, of questions, of emails. Downstairs, in that breakfast nook, Xavier and I were safe from the rest of the world. But out here, in the madness, it was just a cacophony.
That evening, I gathered my supplies for the night. It was strange; after our lunch, I hadn’t seen Xavier anywhere throughout the West Wing. I’d asked Jason about him, of course, but he’d been far too busy to answer—flying from one end of the room to the other with a phone strapped to his ear. He was a dutiful worker, this second-in-command. I knew he hadn’t even noticed the tension between the president and I, despite our many late-night drinks, despite our intimate sneak-aways during lunchtime.
I shook my head over and over, trying to refute these thoughts from my head. The president wasn’t anything to me; we didn’t have anything intimate. We didn’t.
I followed my shadow away from the well-lit room. I saw Dimitri off to the side, guarding the Oval Office once more. I nodded to him. “Goodnight, Dimitri!”
Dimitri took a slight step forward, his eyes eager. “If you wait a few moments, I can give you a ride home!”
But I shook my head, not wanting to alert Xavier that I was leaving. I could nearly feel his presence in the other room—such a continuous shadow. “No. I’ll catch a taxi, Dimitri. You shouldn’t have to drive to Trinidad every day.” I winked at him and swung back around, back toward the stairwell.
But suddenly, I heard a door spring open behind me. The Oval Office. I kept walking, pretending I didn’t sense anything; that I couldn’t hear his footfalls behind me. Keep walking, I thought to myself. Keep going. No one can know about your attraction to him—especially not him.
But suddenly, as I reached the steps, I felt his hand on my shoulder. I looked up, feeling my heart rattle in my chest. His fingers were strong, and he swung me around, forcing me to look at him. The President of the United States was breathing heavily. A small vein pulsed in his forehead.
“What is it?” I asked him in a whisper. My eyes lurched left, noting that Dimitri was no longer in the hallway. What was going on?
Xavier licked his lips for a moment, visibly trying to calm himself down. He closed his eyes, shaking his head. “I wondered if you’d go to dinner with me. Sometime. Tonight, even.” His eyes pleaded with me.
My head spun for a moment. I could almost hear myself saying yes. It was all I wanted in the world. But then I shook myself out of it. This man—this man before me. He couldn’t be mine. He was another woman’s already. He and Camille had married, for better or for worse. He was just a stressed man with the entire nation at his feet, looking for relief. It wouldn’t come from me. I had too much to do.
I couldn’t jeopardize my career.
Slowly but surely, I shook my head no. I watched as his eyes sunk into his head with the realization. For the first time in perhaps his entire life, someone had told him no. I bit my lip, trying to make up for my decline. “Xavier. You know you’re a wonderful friend. But I just can’t allow people to get the wrong impression about us; it would bring you far too many problems.” I tipped my head to the right, trying to make him understand with huge, glowing eyes. “Please. Your friendship means so much to me and your presidency too much to this country.”
Xavier nodded, coughing a bit. His face had reddened. His eyes skirted back down the hallway, where a few members from the campaign re-election committee were walking companionably, eagerly anticipating the comfort of their own homes. The president turned toward me once more, only for an instant. “You get to leave this place. Remember that,” he said. And then, he was gone. It happened so suddenly, leaving me in a sort of desolate haze.
I spun back around on my heels and darted down the steps, feeling my heart so fast in my chest. I thought surely I was having a heart attack—surely it was all over. But as I burst into the late summer night, I breathed a sigh of relief. I had looked my destiny in the face, and I’d turned back, refuting it. This, beyond anything else, made me strong.
This is what I told myself, of course.
But as I tossed and turned throughout the night, dreaming only of the sheer need brimming in the president’s face, I didn’t know right from wrong. I didn’t care, either.