Chapter 11
It seemed like forever to Ben before Brian got a call on his cell telling him
Julie was downstairs. The four of them were going to have dinner at the
hotel before the event at 7. Brian went down to meet Julie and Josh
promised to meet them as soon as he got off the phone.
“Dad, come on!” Ben urged him.
Josh covered the mouthpiece of the hotel phone. “I need to finish this Ben.”
“Then can I go down with Brian and Julie?”
“You know where the restaurant is?”
“Brian showed me. I can go down by myself.”
Josh weighed the pro’s and con’s, then tossed Ben his cell phone. “If you
don’t see them right away, come straight back up here.”
“I will.” Ben promised on his way out the door. He bypassed the slow
elevator for the stairs and took them two at a time. He navigated quickly
through the lobby and spotted Julie within seconds. He almost called out to
her, but then saw Brian pull her into a hug and kiss her; right on the lips. He
froze for a second, then approached more slowly and heard part of the
conversation. Adults didn’t usually notice kids right away and these two only
had eyes for each other anyway.
“How’s your dad?” Brian was asking.
“Fine…a little lonely, but fine. Tell me about Josh. What’s this whole thing
about?”
“It seems to be exactly what it looks like; a drop in on the campaign.”
“I told you there was nothing to worry about.” Julie nudged him before
kissing him again.
“Maybe…but something is off about this and Billy was giving me some
strange looks while he was here.”
“Why are you so convinced Josh’s visit has something to do with us? Why
can’t we just tell Josh straight out we’re involved anyway? I never
understood the need for secrecy to begin with. It’s not like either of us are
married or behaving inappropriately on the campaign trail.”
“If you feel strongly about it, we can do that, but just be prepared to not see
me for the rest of the campaign.”
“Why would Josh move you out if it’s not affecting anything professionally.”
“Because it could. Because of how it might look to others. Because I’m on
his payroll. Because it could distract me from my job. Because-“
“Okay, okay, enough! You’re depressing the hell out of me. We do it your
way for now.” Julie acquiesced. “How long do you think they’ll be?”
“Who knows? Josh was on the phone, so….Let’s get a drink at the bar
while we wait.”
“Sounds perfect.” Julie agreed and took his outstretched hand.
Ben felt sick. He knew he was just a kid, but Julie was always so nice to him.
She wrote him emails and sent him things from the campaign and always
took the time to talk with him when they were together. At the very least, he
thought they were good friends. But he saw her kissing Brian and it didn’t
look it was a friendly kiss. From what they were saying it was much more
than that. Ben felt betrayed, hurt, and more than a little heartsick.
He couldn’t eat with them right now. He turned away from the restaurant
and walked sadly back to the hotel room. In his hurry to see Julie, he hadn’t
brought a key card with him so he had to knock. His dad opened the door
right away and was surprised to see him.
“I was just heading down. You couldn’t find them?”
“No.” Ben walked past his dad and sat on the nearest bed.
“Well, between the two of us, we ought to be able to find them. Let’s go.”
“I don’t want dinner….I’m not feeling good.” Ben still hadn’t made eye
contact with his father. Josh came immediately to Ben’s side and felt his
forehead.
“You don’t feel warm. Maybe you’re just hungry.” Josh suggested.
“I’m not hungry at all. You can go ahead. I’ll just lay down up here.” Ben
stretched out on the bed. Josh thought he saw tears in Ben’s eyes.
“No, I’ll stay here with you. I’m not leaving you alone when you’re sick.” Josh
picked up the hotel phone to call Brian.
“Just go, Dad.” Ben nearly shouted. “I’m not going to throw up or anything.
Just go have your dinner meeting with the candidate.”
“The candidate?” Josh’s eyebrows shot up. “When did Julie become the
candidate to you kiddo?”
“She’s always been the candidate, right? I just forgot for awhile that’s all.”
Ben muttered.
Josh might not be the most perceptive man in the world when it came to
personal relations, but something here was very off and it went off between
the time that Ben went downstairs to find Julie and Brian and when he
returned to the hotel room. Putting that information together with the
information Billy had alluded to gave Josh a pretty good idea what had
happened downstairs.
“Sometimes it’s easy to forget that the person and the candidate aren’t
always the same. It can be hard to separate it out.”
“They shouldn’t be different.” Ben argued.
“No, they shouldn’t and the good ones, the real ones, they aren’t. But they
still have to be careful about what they say and do as a candidate. It’s
that…everyone is watching everything they say and do; recording it to play
back and scrutinize. So sometimes they keep the personal things, the
private things, to themselves. They don’t do it to hurt anybody, they’re just
being protective of what little privacy they have.” Josh was flubbing this and
he knew it. “Come down and sit with us. You don’t have to eat anything.
Just hang out. Julie will be happy to see you.”
“I don’t think so.” Ben debated. “I’m just a kid. I can’t even vote yet. She
doesn’t have to waste her time pretending to be friends with me.”
“Ben…that hasn’t been pretending; I know that for a fact.”
“Why? Because she told you?” Ben sat up again and looked right into his
father’s face. “Politicians say anything to get what they want, right? You told
me that millions of times. She wanted you to work for her so she was nice to
me. Big shock.” Ben laid back down. “I’m not going down there.”
“Okay.” Josh relented. “I’m not going to force you. Stay here.” He picked up
the cell phone Ben had thrown on the bed. “I’ll take this with me. Call if you
need me or want me to bring something back up for you.” Josh almost bent
to kiss his son’s head, but thought better of it. Ben didn’t want a reminder
that he was a kid right now.
Once he got out into the hall he called Donna. “I think I just messed up our
son for life. Our health insurance covers outpatient mental health, right?”
“God, I hope so, or we’re both in trouble.” Donna quipped.
“Nice.” Josh allowed. “As much as you love giving me shit, Donnatella,
could you take a time out and concentrate on our son?”
“What’s up with Ben?”
“Oh, nothing much, just got his heart broken, that’s all.”
“What happened?”
“I suspect he saw or heard something with Julie and Brian. He’s now
refusing to have dinner with them and calling her ‘the candidate’.”
“Ohhhhhh…that is bad.” Donna paused. “Should I give him a call?”
“Not at the moment no, maybe later. I tried the whole friendship with
candidates speech and that went nowhere.”
“Hard to imagine.” Donna drawled.
“Are you going to mock or help?”
“Since I can’t do anything to help, I thought I’d just mock.” Donna replied.
“Honestly, Josh, he’s just going to need some time. We knew it was bound
to happen sooner or later. No one can stay on a pedestal forever.”
“So I should just let it run its course?”
“I guess so. The truth is, I’ve never been a 10 year old boy with a crush so I
was kind of hoping you would know how to handle this.” She replied.
“Yeah, I got nothing.” Josh ran a hand through his hair. I’ll call you later and
let you know how it went.” Josh promised.
“Call after the kids are down. Then we can have a…private conversation.”
She teased.
“Why Donnatella, what ARE you suggesting?”
“Only one way to find out Joshua. Call me after 10. Love you.” Josh
disconnected the call after he returned the sentiment and spotted Julie and
Brian deep in discussion at a table in the corner.
“There you are!” He called to them and saw them both jump apart a bit. Uh-
huh, he thought, Ben saw something alright.
“Where’s Ben?” Julie asked looking behind him.
“He’s skipping dinner; didn’t feel too well.” Josh explained.
“He seemed fine when I was upstairs.” Brian noted.
“I know. It was the strangest thing.” Josh told them. “He ran ahead down
here to meet you two while I finished a call, and when he came back up he
said he didn’t feel good and didn’t want dinner.” Josh noted the look
exchanged between Brian and Julie. “You didn’t see him I guess?”
“No, no we didn’t see him.” Julie said quietly.
“Apparently he didn’t see you either since he came right back upstairs.”
Josh drank the water that had just been poured for him.
“You shouldn’t leave him alone upstairs if he’s feeling sick.” Julie said.
Josh shrugged. “He didn’t seem really sick to me; more like upset or
something. I’ll go check on him in a little bit and he has my cell.”
“Josh…would you mind…I’d like to go up and see him. Would that be okay?”
“I think that would be perfect.” Josh said handing her his key card and
telling her the room number. Julie would have to be dense not to catch the
subtle message Josh was sending her, and she was far from dense.
Once she’d left, Josh turned to Brian. “Now that we have a moment alone,
why don’t you fill me in on what’s going on over here.”
Brian didn’t even pretend not to understand what Josh was asking. “For the
record, she wanted to say something to you, and I said no.”
“It looks like the novice is smarter than the professional in this case.” Josh
noted and took another drink.
“Josh I-“
Josh leaned forward and Brian got a taste of what it was like to cross Josh
Lyman on something.
“No. I don’t want excuses. I have never interfered in your personal life,
Brian, in the personal lives of any of the people who work for me. It’s none
of my business and it’s none of my concern, but when you do something
that by association reflects on the company that bears my name then I step
in.”
“I haven’t done anything to-“
“How do I know that, Brian?” Josh interrupted him again. “Julie’s numbers
have flatlined here, how do I know that it’s not because you’ve been
distracted with romancing the candidate you’re supposed to be promoting?”
Brian sat back in his chair his jaw on the proverbial floor. “I would think my
years of service for this company would have some bearing on that.”
“People do stupid things when they’re romantically involved. It happens all
the time; ask Gary Hart.”
“That’s not fair and you know it’s not.”
“My ten year old son figured it out in under 5 minutes, Brian, how long do
you think it takes some reporter or photographer? I’m guessing the only
reason they haven’t already is that she’s so low in the polls nobody cares.”
“Am I being fired?” Brian asked point blank.
“Do I have a reason to fire you?”
“No, sir.” Brian spat out. “Julie and I aren’t sleeping together. We haven’t
done or said anything inappropriate and it has NOT affected how I’m
running the campaign.”
Josh sat back and sighed. “Of course it has, Brian. Of course it has. How
you see Julie, how you see any candidate, naturally colors how you run that
candidate. And more importantly, how you see that candidate shows to
everyone around you. You’re playing Russian roulette here, don’t you see
that?”
“No, I don’t. I see great things in Julie. I’m willing to admit that colors how I
run her campaign, but not in a bad way.”
“And when something goes wrong between you and you’re working day and
night together?” Josh pressed.
“That’s not- Look, you do what you have to do. Then I’ll do what I have to
do.” Brian stated defiantly and stood up. “Tell Julie I’ll meet her at the
event.” Brian threw a $20 on the table and left without another word.
“Can I take your order, sir, or will you be waiting for your companions to
return?”
“I think that might be a long wait.” Josh mused. “Look like I’ll be enjoying
room service tonight. Thanks anyway.”