Jennifer Close - The Hopefuls

Everyone in the car, even Jimmy, who was driving, just turned to look at me, and then turned back without saying a word.

I felt horrible for Matt. I really did. He was struggling and there was nothing I could do to make it better. I tried to be supportive, to talk to him about how hard this must be, to reassure him that he was doing all he could, but often it felt like I was making things worse. Once, I said, “It must be so frustrating to put everything into a race and still be losing.” He turned to me, like I was stupid for thinking such a thing, and said, “It’s not like this is a surprise. We always knew this would happen.”

He was so angry that he couldn’t even remember what he was angry about. He shut down in a way I’d never seen before, acting like a sullen teenager, not looking at me when I’d talk to him, grunting in response. Often, I’d say something to him and he’d pretend not to hear me, hoping that I’d go away if he ignored me long enough. I didn’t know how to deal with this, so mostly I’d just stand there and say, “Matt,” over and over, until he’d looked up from whatever he was doing, already annoyed by my presence, and finally answer me. “What?”

—

Ten years earlier, Matt and I had gone to South Africa for our honeymoon. He’d been dying to go to Cape Town and thought a safari would be amazing. I agreed, because I didn’t really care where we went — our honeymoon, I assumed, would be amazing no matter where we were.

The flight to Cape Town was over twenty hours and I barely slept. Still wired from our wedding weekend, I sat awake on the dark plane while Matt snored beside me. We’d both taken Ambien, but it didn’t work for me — I’d woken up after only about thirty minutes, feeling nauseous and disoriented. When we landed, I was so exhausted that I had trouble walking through the airport. Everything was so loud and bright and I kept tripping over my feet.

“I’m so tired I can’t see straight,” I said to Matt.

“I told you to sleep on the plane,” he said, like staying awake was a poor choice that I’d made. I walked behind him trying not to fall, stepping where he stepped, keeping my eyes on his feet.

That night, I crawled into bed, took another Ambien, and closed my eyes, hungry for rest. But three hours later, I sat up in the dark room, my heart racing, my mouth dry. I looked over at Matt and for a few minutes didn’t recognize him, had no idea who was lying next to me. Finally, my mind cleared and I remembered: That is my husband, I’m on my honeymoon. And then I tried (unsuccessfully) to go back to sleep.

We were in South Africa for fifteen nights, and I spent most of them staring into the darkness and wanting to cry, because more than anything, jet lag is lonely. During the days, I’d nod off at lunch, beg Matt to go back to the room in the afternoons for a nap. Once, I laid my head down on the table in a restaurant like a child, not caring what anyone around me thought.

“Maybe I have a resistance to Ambien,” I told Matt.

“I don’t think that’s the problem,” he said.

It was the worst during the safari. At night, the noises around us made me shiver, and the days made me feel like I was losing my mind. I’d look at the animals — so large, so beautiful, so frightening — and I’d tell myself to pay attention, to appreciate that I was seeing a lion, an elephant, a goddamn hippopotamus. But I was so tired that my eyes pulsed, light danced in my peripheral vision, and all of it felt unreal, like watching a nature documentary on PBS.

Matt wasn’t very sympathetic toward me. If anything, he was irritated that my insomnia was interfering with our trip. “You need to get on schedule,” he’d say, not bothering to hide his impatience. And soon, it wasn’t just at night that I didn’t recognize him. I’d look at him through my foggy eyes as we walked around in a foreign country and think, I don’t know you at all. I married a stranger.

After we were back in New York and sleeping again, I didn’t tell anyone about my jet lag or the thoughts I’d had about Matt. It didn’t seem normal, so when people asked about the trip, I just said, “It was amazing. A once in a lifetime experience.” And after enough time had passed, I almost believed it.

But that year in Texas, it started happening again, and there were times that Matt seemed unfamiliar to me, when even his voice wasn’t his own. I remember once staring at him across the room, an expression on his face that I’d never seen before, his eyes blank and unreadable, and my chest got so tight I could barely breathe, because I didn’t recognize him at all.

—

One morning, we drove four hours to Arlington, Texas, to visit a woman named Angela Kinsey, who’d just been diagnosed with cancer, most likely the result of exposure to the chemicals from the nearby drilling. Angela arranged for a few other women from the neighborhood to join her, so they could share their experiences with Jimmy, tell him about all the health problems they were facing.

We dropped Ash and Viv off at the hotel — it didn’t seem right to bring a healthy, squealing sixteen-month-old along while these women talked about the nosebleeds and headaches that their own children were having — and I went along, supposedly to get pictures, but I knew as soon as we stepped into the house that I wouldn’t even bother taking my phone out. (How crass would it be to snap a photo of Angela crying as she told Jimmy she didn’t know who would care for her children while she started chemo? I didn’t care if Katie got mad at me. Some things weren’t meant to be photographed.)

The house was small and dark, even though it was sunny outside. For a brief moment, the darkness was a relief from the heat, but then almost immediately, the air began to feel stuffy. There was an overpowering mothball smell inside and I figured I’d get used to it, but it seemed to get stronger the longer we were there.

Angela took us into the living room, where a few women were already sitting on a flimsy-looking floral couch. Jimmy sat at one end and I found a seat on a rocking chair in the corner, while Matt sat on an orange recliner.

By this point, Jimmy’s spiel was so polished — he was fluid when he spoke, sure of his words. He was great in front of crowds, could get up in front of fifty people and capture their attention. “These failed policies are hurting us,” he’d say. “I want to be an advocate for all Texans, an advocate for you. We’ve had enough with the insiders, who are only concerned with protecting the oil and gas industries. You deserve someone to protect you. They accuse me of being an outsider, and you know what I say to that?” Here Jimmy would smile and pause and wait for a couple of laughs. “I say, You’re right! I say, Being an outsider is what makes me so qualified for this job. I’m not in bed with oil and gas — I’m just a Texan interested in looking out for other Texans.”

But where Jimmy was his best was in small, unscripted moments. No other time on the campaign showed this more than the afternoon we spent at Angela Kinsey’s house. It was amazing to watch him there, looking like he belonged among all of these women. He sat on that floral couch in that mothball house and talked to them like it was something he did every day. His body was relaxed as he accepted tea from Angela. He didn’t shift as the couch sagged underneath him. I wondered if these women knew that Jimmy had grown up in a mansion, that he’d gone to boarding school, that his whole life was unrecognizable compared to theirs. Maybe they did know and it didn’t matter. Maybe all they cared about was that he was there now.

He sat forward as one of Angela’s neighbors told him about her son’s asthma. “You must feel like you’re living in a nightmare,” he said to her. “You don’t deserve this, none of you do. These health problems aren’t a coincidence and everyone knows it. We need to do something — and I really do believe that something can be done. People might be turning a blind eye to you, pretending that this isn’t happening, that you don’t exist, because it’s easier for them. But this is happening. I’m here and I’m a witness to it. I want to be the one to help you, to make sure you’re heard.”