Power by Claire Adams

Author:Claire Adams [Adams, Claire]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2015-03-17T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 8

A few days passed. I hardly saw the president at all, but it didn’t seem to matter. I was caught up in the poll counting, in the re-election procedure. It seemed strange. While the president continued with his various meetings—one, I saw on the news, with the president of France—I was working tirelessly to ensure that he would remain in office, able to do these things year after year once more.

“I wondered if you’d go to dinner with me.”

The words still haunted me a bit, even as I stood in front of the television, watching Xavier and the President of France walk together by the monuments. Xavier gestured toward Abraham Lincoln’s statue and made a small joke, making the French president scoff in a very Parisian way. I longed to hear the joke; I longed to hear his voice.

That evening, I learned on the news, Xavier and Camille were meant to have dinner with the French president and his fiancé. I looked down, hearing the words. It bothered me how much the words got to me—how much they altered the perception of my day. As the lead of his reelection campaign, I knew it was the right move. Still, it stung. I skirted back from the television and swept back to my desk, ready to busy myself with anything and everything else.

Each night of that week, I returned to my home in the back of Dimitris’ car, feeling the sadness creep up around my neck. Sadness at losing my opportunity with him. In the front, Dimitri continued to ramble on, cracking jokes. Why can’t I just love him, I thought to myself. God, wouldn’t it be so much easier to be with Dimitri? Couldn’t I just want something that was actually in my reach? I hadn’t wanted something and not gotten it during my entire life. And now: here I was, faced with my ultimate desire. And I couldn’t force myself to reach out and grab it. It went against everything.

The following evening was a Friday night. I’d wrangled together a long meeting, one that swept into the evening. All around me, my employees were yawning, upset at the length of time I was keeping them into the weekend. Of course: their first few weeks of flurry had slowed down. They couldn’t keep up that endless activity for so long.

I tapped my heel slowly, gazing at them. “Okay. Okay. You can all go home,” I finally said, slapping my portfolio down on the desk before me. “I know we won’t get anything done here, anyway.”

The people before me erupted into the air, all of a sudden talking like a group of elementary kids. Their smiles were broad. They were eager to get down the hill, back to their bars and their wives and their boyfriends. I shook my head as they went, wondering about the life I was missing elsewhere.

I sat at my desk, then, tipping back a bit. I reached into the bottom drawer and pulled out a bottle of wine and a small, paper cup.

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