The Frankenstein Candidate (17 page)

John Logan had been going around saying he was the man for radical reform. Pressed for specifics, Logan said his team was considering extending the NAFTA provisions to include several other Central and South American countries, but he never committed to anything specific. When he proposed “no welfare for immigrants,” he was misquoted by a tabloid as having said “let them die in the streets.” That was all the others had needed. Once that was on the air, every other newsmagazine, newspaper, and television had their ass covered when they could scandalize the news by quoting their source. Olivia now knew why message discipline was so crucial.

Chris Reed wanted to have creationism taught in schools as an equally credible alternative to evolution. Reed often talked about his faith, the teachings of religion and compulsory prayer in schools. When confronted with budgetary questions, Reed always emphasized the trivial: earmarks; one specific bureaucratic approval cut, and nonspecific efficiency gains. Neither foreign policy nor economics was Reed’s forte, but he was out first with a proposal with regard to the new crises. He asserted that he would prevent the Chinese takeovers and refuse any negotiation. The media didn’t mind this. At least here was someone with a quick decision—but it was his response to the Iranian crisis that sparked disbelief across the nation. Reed said that it was the duty of America to restore a proper democracy to Iran and that he would commit three hundred thousand troops to invade Tehran from the north. “Be careful, specific answers like that can land you in hot water,” Larry said to Olivia.

For Quentin Kirby, the UN Security Council meetings were a welcome relief from the crisis that was swamping the candidates in New Hampshire. He had won Iowa because he ran on a get-tough campaign. Get tough against Iran was what he had said in 2017. Get tough against China was what he had said in 2018. Get tough on illegal immigrants was what he said in 2019. If Spain had Middle America and Logan had radical reform, Kirby wanted his own catchphrase. His media spinners told him to act tough, act presidential, stand fully to his imposing height and say “Get tough” as often as possible. He always talked about one last military surge to “finish the operation,” a phrase that everyone had got tired of and that, quite frankly, no one believed. The pro knew that the less one said, the less one was attacked. Spencer had drilled that in him for four years. Olivia realized that he concentrated on buzzwords and phrases: “investment for the future”, “get tough on…,” “hard work,” and “work ethic.”

James Ellis, widely touted as the fourth Republican challenger to enter the race, announced soon after the twin crises hit that he would quit before he started. The campaign was less than four weeks old, and the first casualty had already been counted. The fact that none of the six candidates from the two major parties still in the race had any framework by which one could actually anticipate their calls was not a concern for the American media. A lack of ideology had so long been touted as a positive that the new generation of media professionals had grown up assuming that to be an axiom. Politicians routinely advertised themselves to be non-ideological and pragmatic, and most Americans shockingly assumed that ideological and impractical were synonyms. Their new thesauruses even told them so. Olivia often found herself wondering about that, she had always been comfortable with ideology.

But now I know how the game is played
, she thought to herself.

At precisely eight forty-five a.m. on a Monday morning, Gary Allen drove into the school car park. Georgia and Natasha got out of the car. They never let him kiss them good-bye when he drove them to school. That kind of thing never happened in front of school friends. He had long since reconciled himself to that.

He was about to start the engine again when he saw her. She was walking up the road. Her two little nephews were with her. He fondly remembered the time he had met her the very first time. It was only four months ago, out in the schoolyard. He thought she was a teacher. She had explained, in her delightful Belgian accent, that she was taking care of her nephews for the week while her sister was away. He had introduced himself. She didn’t have a car so was bringing the boys down in the public bus. The next day, he made sure he was early and had parked in a vantage point where he would not miss her coming, her two little nephews with her. That’s when Georgia had noticed he was staring. Poor Georgia—she thought that maybe her dad liked boys more so she had asked him whether he would have rather had boys. Only once he had said to Olivia how he might have enjoyed playing ball with a son. At the time, he was sure that the girls were not within earshot. Just as well Georgia thought he was staring at the boys. After all the children had gone in, he had offered her a lift. She had politely refused at first despite his insistence.

His pensive reverie about their first meet ended abruptly with her voice in his ear.

“Maybe today you can take me back to Virginia,” she laughed, confident he could not refuse.

It had been a few weeks since that message on his cell phone. He struggled with himself. He thought he could avoid going inside the apartment.
Just drive her back home, chit-chat, that sort of thing and…that’s it.

She was already in the car. Her musky perfume filled his nostrils again. He revved up the engine. She laughed again. It felt so good to be with people who laughed a lot. There was almost no one his age who did that any more. He had not been back to her apartment in Virginia. There had been no more calls. It had almost ceased to bother him.

Gary drove his little Volkswagen Eos, which he could ill afford to keep given his current lack of income, but Olivia was making more than enough for the two of them. His Eos swerved into Virginia on the I-495, encountering the western terminus of the George Washington Memorial Parkway at a trumpet interchange.

He decided to take a detour. He let the car wander around, not deciding what direction to take until he hit a fork in the road.

“Where are you taking me?” she asked.

“A picnic.”

“Haven’t got a hamper.”

“We don’t need a hamper. Just a walk maybe, along the river. Let me find the right place to park.” He loved being so impetuous. Life with Olivia was about diaries and scheduled free time and appointments. Hell, even their love making was diary-scheduled for the days Olivia would be home early enough.

The Potomac Heritage Trail followed the Potomac River and the George Washington Memorial Parkway for ten miles. Following the road by the trail, he had only just gone past Roosevelt Island when a large truck came ominously close from behind and honked, its brakes screaming.

The large honk scared the living daylights out of him.
What’s a truck doing in this part of town?
he thought.

The large white truck stayed right behind him. He speeded up, hoping to lose him, but the truck matched his speed.

“Don’t know why we can’t lose him,” he said.

“Well, what’s the hurry?” she cooed. “We have all day, don’t we?”

She was right. He slowed down, veering to the right to let the truck pass.

The truck slowed, but it still nudged into the little Eos, jarring its passengers. He stopped the engine, expecting to get off, but the truck revved up again, pushing the Eos with its nudge bar that seemed to sit right under his car’s number plate, gathering speed. Gary whipped around and screamed, “Hey.” He saw that the driver wore a balaclava and was not slowing down.

Fear gripped the car’s occupants as they were helplessly pushed along the scenic trail.

“Gary, should we jump out?” Francesca yelled.

Abruptly, the truck driver stopped. He reversed and veered to his left and then took off, leaving a shaking Gary and Francesca unable to muster enough presence to jot down any numbers. Not that there were any. The truck’s number plate was missing.

It took him awhile to try his door. It worked. He went back to inspect the damage. It was considerable, but the car was still functioning.

Francesca’s trembling hands were holding her phone.

“Wait, what are you doing?” he was still shaking.

“Gary, we need to call the police.”

“No.”

“No?”

“What are we doing here in the middle of nowhere?”

“You are the one who took the detour.”

“Forget the police.” He was thinking how he was going to explain all this.

“But someone may have tried to kill us.”

“No…no…someone tried to warn us. Listen, let me just drive you home. I will report it to the police later.” He knew he wouldn’t.

She sat speechless and shivering as he drove his wrecked sports car back onto the highway.

An hour later, Gary was at a mechanic’s garage. Joe Dalgedi was a large man with an unshaven face who had known Gary for a long time. Joe quoted him six thousand at first, but upon hearing that Gary was not going to report it to insurance, he lowered his quote to four.

“So you can’t collect insurance because you need a police report?”

“That’s right.”

“You don’t want to tell the police what you were doing at the time.”

“Something like that.”

“How’s Olivia?” Joe asked. “I saw her on the news the other day.”

“She is fine. She is in New Hampshire at the moment.”

“Okay, not my business to get too nosey here. I will have her ready in two, maybe three days. You gimme cash, my friend?”

“Of course.”

“I can give you a ride to the terminus. You can get a cab there.”

“Or a bus.”

“Yeah, when was the last time a dude like you caught the bus?”

“I can’t remember, maybe ten, fifteen, twenty years ago.”

“You are sure everything’s okay?”

“Yeah, why do you ask?”

“There is fear in your eyes, my friend. My imagination tells me someone rammed you on purpose. You could have been killed or badly hurt. Sure you don’t want to go to the cops?”

“Yeah, I’m sure.”

“Awright, just asking. Okay, man, let’s go.”

As he was getting into Joe’s car, Gary’s phone beeped. He looked at the text he had just received.

“And that was your final warning.”

Gary’s face turned ashen, but Joe had decided it was best not to ask any more questions. Gary tried to call Olivia to see how she was, but her cell was turned off. Gary got off at the bus terminal to make his own way home. His normally striated mind, which so cleverly made work/life/family distinctions, was overcome with a mixed bag of feelings ranging from confusion, fear, and dread to anger, each taking its turn to further ravage his already guilt-ravaged brain. By the time each of the four monsters had a turn, he was slouched, broken-down, and zombie-like on the bench, awaiting the bus that came and went without so much as an upward glance from him.