James Smythe: No Harm Can Come to a Good Man

‘If they’re dead they can’t vote for me,’ he replies.

‘Then knock ’em into a coma until the election.’

‘Better.’ She kisses him, and she tastes the butter, the marmalade. The same taste every morning for eighteen years.

‘Right,’ she says, pushing away from him. ‘Time to go. Call me.’ She shouts for the kids and Laurence leans to one side and watches down the hallway as they all leave. They wave at him from the front door and wish him luck, and he smiles and waves back. He watches them as they get into the car. The Hendersons are walking on the other side and Deanna talks to them, as she always does, every single morning. She tells them that she’ll be along later to pick up one of their fresh loaves. They tell her that they’ll put one aside. She laughs, because every conversation about anything here is somehow gently amusing. Laurence watches it happen; he’s seen this a thousand times before. His car is waiting as well, and he grabs his jacket and briefcase. As he gets into the car he asks which way they’re going because there’s probably going to be traffic going into the city their usual way. The driver tells him a route.

‘You want me to go a different way?’ he asks. Laurence brings up the ClearVista app and searches the route finder. All the options are just as likely to get messy at this time of day.

‘It’s fine,’ Laurence says, ‘whatever you think is best.’ He watches as the driver lets the app pick the route for them. Hell or high water, it’s what’s easiest.

Deanna is at home and writing – or rather, the laptop is open, along with document that’s meant to be her new book; and she has reread what she wrote the last time, deciding that it’s fine and can stay, for now, when she hears Laurence’s name mentioned on the news, saying that it’s time for the live coverage of the press conference. She turns the volume up and watches him at the podium, surrounded by blue banners and badges. And his tie has been replaced with one that matches the color of everything else, a blunt-force sign of unity and support for the party that he seems so estranged from, at least on paper. He’s a new breed, a potential future. These are the words that he’s introduced with by the ex-President who stands by him, who is diametrically opposed to so many of his policies, but is tucking that behind them for the sake of what Laurence could do. This is an opportunity, they all know.

‘So – and I realize that I am getting ahead of myself, but what the hell, that never did me any harm before in life – let me introduce you to the future candidate for the Democratic party, and the next President of the United States, Laurence Irving Walker!’ He stands to one side and applauds so loudly that it’s all that can be heard for a beat over the microphones on the podium. Laurence looks slightly sheepish, humbled by the words, and he shakes the ex-President’s hand, almost cupping it, a gesture that’s focus tested and proven to show security, strength and power. He stands up at the front, and he smiles. The crowd cheer and he works it like a comedian; letting them have their moment, stepping back as the applause overwhelms him. He nods, and he laughs, and he steps back.

‘You’re too kind,’ he says. ‘I haven’t done anything yet.’ That gets a laugh, and he puts a hand on the podium, the other into his trouser pocket, which brushes back his jacket. Deanna can hear Amit telling him the things he can do, the gestures and phrases that will work in this situation. Humble, but not too humble; strong, but also showing that he’s human; a leader, but not unable to listen. She recognizes these things as being a part of Laurence, but not like this. This way they’re exaggerated, offered up like evidence. ‘But I hope to. And that’s what today is all about, really: hope. That’s something that the people who live in New York State tell me all the time. They say: we feel like our hopes for our children, our health, our homes – our hopes for the future – they’re being lost in the chaos of life. You wouldn’t believe how common it is to hear that.’ Everyman, but not too casual. The camera focuses on him, shows him in a good light. He’s got make-up on, Deanna thinks, and his hair has been coiffed, like something from that old TV show about advertising, a slick and neat look that’s pushed back from his face. It says he’s a family man, but not too married.

She’s heard the speech, and she knows he won’t fumble it. He’s never fumbled a speech in his life. He’s going to slyly announce his intentions, set this all up. This is how it works, now. It’s all about starting a quiet storm. She shuts off the TV and walks around the kitchen, thinks about what happens next. This house will be gone, sold to somebody else. They’ll start a family in it, and the place will get its own memories. And Deanna and the family will live … where? An apartment in Georgetown until they move. She doesn’t want to think about the end of this: a giant house where their every movement is monitored, where they can’t go for a walk without somebody wondering if they’re okay; what they’re doing; if somebody might make some foolish attempt on their lives.

She sits at her laptop and minimizes her book, and she opens a browser window. She types www.ClearVista.com into the window, and the site loads.

Will Laurence Walker ever be President? she asks. The site does its thing, the little icon spinning and folding itself into itself, a perpetual loop of folding and unfolding, and then spits out an answer. There is a sixty-three percent chance of Laurence Walker becoming President.

She stares at the screen. That’s based on today. It’s based on right now, the data mining – she hates the idea of it, as if thoughts, emotions, journalism and tweets and whatever else can be broken down into something that’s utterly tangible and totally immutable – having trawled the latest reactions to Laurence’s statement. She imagines that Twitter is full of #Walker2020 advocates, buying into both the message and the man.

For a second she hates this. For a second, she wonders what might have happened if she’d given a different answer when he told that her wanted to run; when he asked her if she thought it was a good idea. She had said, ‘It’s what you’ve always wanted’, and now she thinks that saying that wasn’t really an answer at all.

Laurence’s team takes a detour to Nassawa after the speech is done, already arranged but spontaneous-seeming. This is the start of the process: a meeting with Laurence’s current constituents, the beginning of the handshaking and baby kissing. They stop off at the town hall, and they walk in, unannounced, and the people working there laugh and smile and take photos. Somebody from the Nassawa Tribune comes down and writes an article, takes a short interview with Laurence.

‘Earlier on, your speech? Seemed like you were hinting at a bigger platform for your message. Any chance you can confirm, absolutely, your intentions of running for office?’ the interviewer asks, and Laurence almost laughs at their moxie, at their attempt to get an answer far bigger than their paper probably would usually get. Despite what others are saying, he hasn’t shown his hand yet. Everyone in the room smiles; they all know what the reporter is asking.

‘Not a chance am I answering that one,’ Laurence says, with a smile, and that gets a laugh; and he shakes the journalist’s hand and grins for another photograph. They move on, to a local café, and they eat lunch with the locals there, and Laurence fields questions about the current government, the policies being pushed through. He takes his platform stands: he believes in free healthcare for all, and he believes in the right to a free education that stands head-to-toe with the best that private education can offer. That’s where money should be going. He wants to siphon off far more money from the richest 0.5% – this isn’t about the 1%, he says, it’s those earners who manage to somehow take in the bulk of the country’s income in one fell swoop – and put that back into the country itself. ‘If you’ve got an income that would allow us to give everybody in the country a personal doctor and teacher, why shouldn’t we be taking more from you? If you’ve got money you won’t miss, that you won’t even notice is gone from your accounts, why shouldn’t you help where you can?’ That gets applause, the people cheering over their sandwiches and salads. When they’re done they go to the local high school, and there’s a buzz because this doesn’t happen often – Nassawa isn’t big on the map, one school and one hospital – so there’s an impromptu assembly, all the kids brought into the gym for the chance to ask Laurence questions. He’s one of them, and he sells it like that. He grew up in the city, sure, but he lives in the sticks now – ‘The boonies,’ he says, and that gets a laugh, because he’s old and he’s using language like that – and he answers more questions. One younger boy asks if he wants to be President somebody. ‘Someday, sure,’ Laurence says. ‘That, and an astronaut. But President most of all.’