William Johnstone - Fire in the Ashes

“Which ones?” Ben asked sarcastically. “The ones that accuse me of being a racist because I told the president of the NAACP to get the hell out of this office because I was tired of listening to him bitch? Or maybe the one where the AFL-CIO has accused me of being anti-labor because I ordered that pack of assholes down in Florida to either get back to work or get off the job and I’ll put someone in there who would work? Or maybe it’s the goddamn teachers this go-around? Eh? Oh, and let us not forget that blazing headline in the Richmond Post about me being a baby-killer because I made the statement that whatever a woman wishes to do with her body is her business and nobody else’s. Huh? Which one is it this time around?”

Cecil sat calmly and sipped his coffee, letting Ben get it all out of his system. He knew Ben had not wanted the job; and felt pangs of guilt because he had been one of those who pressured him into taking it. But he had to smile at that, recalling just a few hours after Ben had been sworn in.

“Well, Cec,” Ben had said, walking up to him at the reception. Cecil had thought the smile on Ben’s face sort of resembled a tiger’s smile. “What plans do you have for your immediate future?”

“Going to go back to Tri-States and get the schools and colleges open again,” Cecil said, not quite comfortable with that odd smile grinning at him.

“Oh, no, you’re not,” Ben’s smile had broadened.

“I beg your pardon, Ben?”

“You folks been complaining for years you don’t have enough people in elected positions of power; that you don’t have enough blacks in high government positions. Well, guess what, old buddy, old pal?”

“I don’t like the way you’re smiling at me, Ben.”

“Don’t want to play guessing games, Cec?”

“No! Why are you smiling like that? You’re grinning like Lady Macbeth after a hard night with the knife.”

Ben leaned close and whispered in Cecil’s ear.

Cecil recoiled like he’d been touched with a cattle prod. “Not this nigger, you ain’t!”

“Cec! Shame on you. I’ve never heard such language from a Ph.D. in all my days. The Reverend James Watson would be ashamed of you.”

“Fuck the Reverend James Watson, and fuck his brother, too. You’re not putting me in that hotseat. I know what you plan to do with it.”

“That’s right,” Ben said soothingly, but still with that smile. “We discussed it, didn’t we?”

“Ben—I’m warning you.”

But Ben had already turned around and was calling for silence in the reception hall.

“All right, people! Could I have just a moment of your time? Thank you. Now you all know what I plan to do with the vice presidency—the president and the VP will share equal power over an equal number of departments. One will not interfere with the other. And you know I have been giving considerable thought to the man or woman who would fill that slot. I have made my decision. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the new vice president of the United States: Doctor Cecil Jefferys.”

While the applause was still thundering in the hall, Cecil leaned to Ben and whispered, “You honky motherfucker.”

But he was smiling, and his smile was full of love and admiration for the man who stood by him.

“No, Ben,” Cecil said. “Those aren’t the headlines I was referring to.”

“Well, for God’s sake, Cec, what else could it be?”

“The doctors. They don’t like this plan of yours for a national health care program.”

“Cecil,” Ben said, drumming his fingertips on the top of his desk, “that is your baby. You asked for it, you got it. What we had in the Tri-States will work anywhere if the people will just give it a chance. Not all of what we had there,” Ben amended. “But a great deal of the programs will. You enforce that program in any manner you choose. But make it work.”

“If I have to, Ben, I’m going to get nasty with it,” the first black VP in the history of America told Ben. There was a grim look on his face.

Ben noticed the age in the man’s face—for the first time he really noticed the gray in Cecil’s hair, the deepening lines in the man’s face.

“What are you holding back, Cec?”

“Still read me like a good book, can’t you, Ben?”

Ben smiled. “What are you thinking about, Cec?”

“That time back in Indiana—about a thousand years ago.”

After visiting his brother in the suburbs of Chicago, and having bitter words with the man—a man Ben felt he no longer knew—he drove fast and angry, crossing into Indiana, finding a motel. He prowled the empty rooms, finding the east wing free of stinking, rotting bodies. He gathered up sheets and pillowcases and was returning to his chosen room when he saw the dark shapes standing in the parking lot.

About a half dozen black men and women. No, he looked closer, one of the women was white—he thought.

Ben made no move to lift his SMG, but the click of his putting it off safety was very audible in the dusky stillness.

“Deserting your friends in the suburbs?” a tall black man asked. Ben could detect no hostility in his voice.

“I might ask the same of you,” Ben replied.

The man laughed. “A point well taken. So… it appears we have both chosen this motel to spend the night. But… we were here first—quite some time. We were watching you. Which one of us leaves?”

“None of us,” Ben said. “If you don’t trust me, lock your doors.”

The man once again laughed. “My name is Cecil Jefferys.”

“Ben Raines.”

“Ben Raines? Where have I heard that name? The writer?”

“Ah… what price fame?” Ben smiled. “Yes. Sorry, I didn’t mean to be flip.”

“I didn’t take it that way. We’re in the same wing, just above you. My wife is preparing dinner now—in the motel kitchen. Would you care to join us?”

“I’d like that very much. Tired of my own cooking.”

“Well, then—if you’ll sling that Thompson, I’ll help you with your linens.”

Ben did not hesitate, for he felt the request and the offer a test. He put the SMG on safety and slung it, then handed the man his pillows. “You’re familiar with the Thompson?”

“Oh, yes. Carried one in Vietnam. Green Beret. You?”

“Hell Hound.”

“Ah! The real bad boys. Colonel Dean’s bunch. You fellows were head-hunters.”

“We took a few ears.”

They walked shoulder to shoulder down the walkway. Cecil’s friends coming up in the rear. Ben resisted a very strong impulse to look behind him.

Cecil smiled. “Go ahead and look around if it will make you feel better.”

“You a mind reader?” Ben laughed.

“No, just knowledgeable of whites, that’s all.”

“As you see us,” Ben countered.

“Good point. We’ll have a fine time debating, I see that.”

They came to Ben’s room.

“We’ll see you in the dining room, Ben Raines. I have to warn you though…”

Ben tensed; he was boxed in, no way to make a move.

“…The water is ice cold. Bathe very quickly.”

Ben didn’t trust black people. He didn’t know why he didn’t trust them. He just didn’t. He despised the KKK, the Nazi Party… groups of that ilk. And he asked himself, as he bathed—very quickly—have you ever tried to know or like a black person?

No, he concluded.

Well, you’re about to do just that.

As he walked to the dining area, the smell of death hung in the damp air. But it was an odor that Ben scarcely noticed anymore.

The dining area was candlelit. Cecil smiled as Ben entered and offered him a martini.