How Not to Run for President

To my daughter, who's full of new ideas

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I had the good fortune to have an editor who closely follows politics and has a good sense of humor, so a huge thank-you to Ruth Katcher. When I came up with this idea, I had no way of knowing it would end up being your project. How lucky for me!

Thanks also go to Erin Downing and Jill Grinberg, for writerly support; Amy Baum, for telling me about upper registers; Laura Morlock, for lending me her clarinet; and of course, Ted and Cady. Cady, you will be taking clarinet lessons soon, so just accept it.

Standing there in my uniform, I felt like I was about to faint.

I couldn't tell if it was the hot, humid July day making me dizzy or the fact I was nervous about playing my clarinet in front of so many people.

Or was it the tall, poufy, fake-fur marching-band hat that was making even my ears sweat? Up until then I didn't know ears could sweat. Stupid band hat.

My best friend, Simon, did a few drumrolls. “Can we start already?” he asked. He adjusted the neck strap that held his snare drum in place. If he tripped, it would strangle him.

“Um, I think that would miss the point,” I said. “The big shot's not even here yet.”

I'd never seen so many reporters and video cameras. TV news crews from Cleveland, Columbus, and who knows where else were on the square to cover Governor Bettina Brandon's presidential campaign stop in our small Ohio town.

Tons of citizens were sitting in folding chairs, perched on curbs, or milling around downtown—hundreds of people, probably thousands, at least half our town and many more from neighboring ones. Everyone wanted to meet Governor Bettina Brandon on her latest tour through Ohio. Everyone wanted to hear what she would say. Maybe today was the day she'd announce her pick for vice president; maybe it would even be someone
from
Ohio. She was the independent, Internet-sensation candidate for president, the governor from Minnesota who'd created the Fresh Idea Party, otherwise known as FIP.

When I got the call from my band teacher Sunday night, asking me to come to an emergency rehearsal, my mom had been excited; she likes Governor Brandon because she's a woman and a mom and because she's in a third party, which means she was “outside the political machine.”

What machine? I didn't see any machine. What would it do, anyway? Produce senators and presidents the way our town's FreezeStar factory produces refrigerators, ovens, washers, and freezers?

My mom told me that Governor Brandon was running against two guys who were insiders and didn't care about small-town people like us. One was a republican senator named Fred Flynn, and the other was a former Democratic vice president, Jack Mathias.

Mom had bad things to say about each of them, but I didn't really know much about them or about the election. Dad was voting for Senator Flynn. He'd already made up his mind, he said.

It was a very close race, and from what Mom said, getting closer all the time.

The three candidates were virtually tied in the latest polls, which was supposedly unheard of for a third-party candidate, never mind a woman. My mother was very excited about Governor Brandon. Mom said she stood for people like us in towns like ours, or something like that.

All I knew was that neither of the other candidates had come to see us, so maybe my mom was right.

I looked around the crowd. The Fairstone Fire Department was out in full force, along with the sheriff, state troopers, and us, the Fairstone Ferrets middle-school marching band. We'd been roped in to play with the high-school band to give it bigger numbers—and we'd only practiced together once, the day before, because the campaign had just announced two days ago that they'd be coming here.

It definitely had the makings of a bad performance, but thankfully, we were only playing patriotic numbers, songs we all knew well.

“Well, if I stand here in this uniform any longer, I'm going to pass out.” Simon peered at the sun as if it were an evil being, robbing him of his power. If he were a superhero, his weakness wouldn't be Kryptonite—it would be ultraviolet rays. Simon has sandy-brown hair and lots of freckles—he can sunburn in five minutes flat.

I hate the middle-school band uniforms. They don't match the high school's new ones at all. In fact, they're so old, they're historic. We look like an army from a country that was killed off in a war.

Our uniforms consist of blue jackets with brass buttons and shoulder pads. White ropes and tassels hang off the shoulders. The pants have white stripes down the outer sides. Oh, and everything smells like mothballs. And we have to wear spats.

Spats are white, plastic, fake-leather things that you put over your required black shoes or sneakers so everyone appears to be wearing the same shoes.

Girls' shoes.

At least, that's what they look like.

So there we stood, waiting, and feeling slightly ridiculous, right in the midst of news vans, satellite trucks, fire trucks, sheriffs, and state troopers. Up on the grandstand, which was made of bleachers brought on trucks from the football field, I spotted Mayor Lewis, his wife, and their annoying son, T.J., who had just finished sixth grade with me.

T.J. officially stands for Tyler James, but in my head I always think of him as “That Jerk.”

Even though he was way up there on the grandstand, I could guess what T.J. was thinking. I could read his very limited mind, which was thinking, Don't tell me you're playing.
I'm going to pummel you after this, Shrieking. I'm going to take your clarinet and bash you in the Shrieking gut.

He said that to me whenever he saw me with my clarinet, which was how I knew it must be in his thoughts. He's boring and unoriginal that way. My last name is Schroeckenbauer, which is too hard for him to say, so he just calls me “Shrieking.”

But then I looked closer at T.J. and saw he was playing with one of those wooden paddles that you bounce a red rubber ball against. That would take up all his brainpower for at least ten minutes. As my dad would say, he isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer.

“I really hope T.J.'s dad doesn't introduce him to the governor,” I said to Simon. “Can you imagine how much he'd brag about that? We'd never hear the end of it.”

T.J. tends to act very important just because his dad is the mayor. Also, he is really good at sports and about half a foot taller than me and Simon.

“I hope she doesn't end up hating our town. Probably take away all our funding,” Simon said.

“We get funding?” I asked.

Simon rattled the drums. “Did you pay
no
attention in current events?”

“I paid attention plenty,” I said. “Go ahead. Ask me who the sixteenth president was.”

Simon did a quick drumroll, then said, “Abraham Lincoln. And that's way too easy—everyone knows that.”

Ms. Stoneburg, our band teacher, was making her way down the line, handing out bottles of cold water. I glanced at my watch. The governor was supposed to have arrived an hour and a half ago. She wouldn't be a punctual president, that was for sure. That probably mattered when you were meeting people like other presidents and prime ministers. She would have to work on that. All I knew was, this definitely wasn't the way
I
would run for president.

I glanced around the crowd again, looking for my family, and spotted T.J. making his way across the town square. He was headed for the food carts. Big surprise.

I recognized him because of his buzz cut and the fact he has this wrinkle on the back of his neck. It isn't fat, I swear. It's muscle. Everything about him is muscle.

Cotton candy was just one of the weird things in the middle of town that day—we usually only have that at the county fair. There were hot-dog, popcorn, and ice-cream carts cluttering the sidewalks.

But that was a good thing. Eating cotton candy would keep T.J. occupied long enough so that he didn't think up some new way to torture me or mock me in my band uniform.

T.J. lives to threaten me. I've gotten used to it over the years, and a lot of the time he doesn't do anything about it, but that doesn't mean I like it. Since we live in a small town, we see each other all over the place, whether I want to or not. It isn't like we have four sixth grades. We only have one.

But I was not going to let T.J. ruin the day for me. This was a major event, covered by national news media. And I had a clarinet to play.

Behind me, a couple of seventh-grade girls were warming up on their flutes. They sounded completely out of tune, but it was hard to tell who was the worst.

As my clarinet teacher, Mort, always tells me, “Flute players are a dime a dozen.”

Two eighth graders were competing to see whose trumpet could blare the loudest. Meanwhile, our best saxophone player was away at basketball camp, and her backup sounded out of tune. The high-school band was trying to keep its distance from us, even though we were all supposed to be playing together. Ms. Stoneburg kept pacing back and forth, looking nervous, which wasn't very reassuring. Was she thinking, like I was, that this performance was going to be a major disaster?

Suddenly, I spotted a motorcade pulling up on Main Street. Two motorcycles rode ahead of a big tour bus. As it passed us, I saw brandon: think fresh and vote for the fresh idea party! in huge, bright green letters on its side.

Behind it were more vehicles: SUVs, a limo, and several white news vans with satellite thingies on top. They parked on the grass, and soon men and women in suits were fanning out around the bus. I noticed that most of them were wearing wires in their ears.

“She rates Secret Service agents? Cool,” Simon said.

“I don't know why they call them secret,” I said, watching them move through the crowd. “There's nothing secret about them.” If you wear a black suit in our town and there isn't a funeral or a wedding, you pretty much are going to stand out.

“Let's try to meet them,” said Simon.

“I don't know. They might shoot us,” I said.

“Good point,” Simon said. “But let's get a little closer so we can get a better view.”

“But we're playing soon—”

“We'll have plenty of time to get back.” Simon pushed forward, using his drum to gently nudge people out of our way.

Just then, I saw a couple of the agents parting the way for the governor as she stepped down from the bus. She was followed by a girl around our age, who was followed by even more agents and other people. It was like a clown car.

We got close to the grandstand, which was decorated with red, white, and blue streamers and balloons. There were giant
BRANDON: THINK FRESH AND BRANDON FOR PRESIDENT
signs everywhere: on the podium, tacked to trees and light posts. Two women in a Fresh Idea Party booth were selling bumper stickers, buttons, and T-shirts. On the grandstand, a banner was whipping like a flag in the hot wind.

The grandstand was in front of the town hall, where the governor was going to speak. Our downtown is historic. Sometimes I think it looks like an old Western movie set, like if you pushed gently on any of the fronts of the buildings, they'd fall down. Some of the stores are vacant.

Those “hard times” everyone on the news keeps talking about? That economic crisis or whatever? It was born here. It lives here.

A reporter paused in front of me and Simon. “Zoom in on that ‘Going Out of Business' sign right there, over their heads,” he told the cameraman. “Then back to me.” He cleared his throat and spoke into the camera. “Doesn't this signify the effect the recession has had on our country? Look at this town. Once a thriving center of industry, now hanging on by a thread. And so the new economy bites another victim. Score: New Economy: one, Fairstone, Ohio: zero.”

“Did he just call us a zero?” I asked Simon.

“I want to clock him with my drumsticks,” Simon said.

Suddenly, the reporter seemed to notice us. “How about you guys? Would you care to comment on the election?” He pointed his microphone toward us.

I stared at the black, spongy microphone, stalling for time. It kind of looked like a Whac-A-Mole hammer—or maybe that was just my mood. “Um, no thanks,” I muttered.

Simon shook his head.

“But surely you have something to say,” the reporter pressed. “You're in one of the most hotly contested battleground states in the country. How exciting is it to have Bettina Brandon in your town today?”

“We just found out, uh, Sunday, so I haven't had that much time to think about it,” I replied. “But it's cool. really cool.”

“Is it the coolest thing that's ever happened around here?” the reporter asked us.

“What? No way!” Simon practically pushed the reporter to grab a chance at the mike. “Last year the girl's basketball team went to state.
That's
the most exciting thing that's ever happened here,” he said.

“Let me rephrase the question,” the reporter said. “What are the most important issues facing the country today?”

Issues facing the country? Was I really someone who could comment on that?

I adjusted my giant puffy band hat. A clump of fake fur was missing on the side because our dog, Sassafras, had gotten hold of it one night, thinking it was a cat, I guess, and fought it to the death.

And then suddenly, there was Governor Brandon, standing right behind the reporter, looking tall and imposing. She had short blond hair, and she was wearing a sleeveless dress.

“Yes, I'm interested to hear what you think,” Governor Brandon said with a smile. “Fresh ideas come from young people. So, what's the biggest issue facing your town?”