Chapter 4 #4
Her hair was still arranged, though a few strands had escaped around her face.
Her makeup had survived the day by some act of chemical warfare.
The suit had done its job, just like her smile and the cadence of her voice.
She had carefully measured each nod, every pause before answering a question, and mastered her calm expression while someone tried to turn nonsense into crisis and crisis into theater.
The president looked tired. Candace looked hollow.
She turned away before the mirror could whisper another truth.
Thankfully, the bathroom lights were softer. Candace turned on the shower and stood with one hand braced on the vanity while steam slowly clouded the glass. She waited for the water to heat, though she had no idea why. She could have stepped beneath ice and not felt it.
Her mind kept moving through the day, and the day before that, and the day that was yet to come.
Down the hall, Cooper was reading in his room, lost somewhere with dragons and impossible quests, still young enough to believe every monster could be named and beaten if the hero was brave enough.
Candace pressed her fingers against the edge of the sink until the pressure hurt.
Brave.
She was tired of that word.
Everyone expected her to be brave: the country, her party, her family, even the press. They either praised their idea of bravery or tore it apart. It depended on the minute.
Maybe she was... brave. Or at least, she wanted to be.
That was something no one understood. She loved the work—the work of leading her family, her party, and the nation. She believed it mattered. And she believed and hoped she could make a difference.
But belief and hope didn't always quiet the small, ugly voice that sometimes whispered, What if you are not enough?
Candace stepped into the shower.
The heat hit her shoulders first, then her back, and she exhaled sharply. She turned her face into the spray and let the water beat against her closed eyes. For a few seconds, she did nothing but stand there, palms flat against the tile.
Pearl was right. She needed to wash something off. It wasn't frustration.
Frustration would be easy to wash away.
This was something else.
This was the endless translation of fear into calm.
It was the knowledge that if she snapped at the wrong moment, hesitated at the wrong time, trusted the wrong person, missed the wrong signal, someone else might pay the price.
A soldier she had deployed. A child she'd never met. A family who had trusted her with their vote. A town that fell prey to a disaster. A country that needed her to be brave.
People who loved her reminded her that she needed time alone to regroup. But few understood that leadership was lonely in the moments after everyone left the room.
They talked about loneliness at the top as if it were some elegant, philosophical thing. Like a marble column, isolated in the middle of a room, responsible for the weight above it. There was solitude in power. Even when someone was right beside you.
It was standing naked in a shower with water running too hot over your skin because it was the only place in the world where no one could see your face.
It was wanting your wife close and not wanting to need her too much.
It was wanting to be honest with your children and not wanting to frighten them.
It was still craving your mother's acceptance and remembering she was gone.
It was wanting to spend time with someone who didn't need a decision, a statement, a strategy, a blessing, an answer, or a piece of you to carry away.
Candace's breath caught.
She lifted one hand to her mouth, pressing her knuckles against her lips before the sound could escape.
For a moment, she thought she'd won the battle.
The moment passed quickly.
The first sob broke quietly, more a breath than a sound. Her shoulders shook once. Then again. She bent forward, one hand still braced against the tile, the other pressed hard against her mouth as if she could force herself back into shape by sheer will.
She couldn't. Not this time.
The water covered the sound. That was a small mercy.
She cried in a way she never allowed herself to cry where anyone could reach her.
Her body and soul took what they were owed.
She cried for the exhaustion.
For the anger she felt that she couldn't show.
For the loneliness of being surrounded by people and still having to be the one to decide.
For the little boy reading about dragons down the hall who she couldn't pick up from school on a whim.
For Jameson, who deserved more than the scraps she sometimes had left at the end of a day.
For Marianne and Jonah and Michelle and Pearl and every person she loved who had learned, in one way or another, to orbit the demands of the president's life.
For the nation that needed so much and forgave so little.
For the people who hated her without knowing her.
For the people who loved her without understanding that behind the president was a scared little girl who just wanted to be loved.
And for setting aside that little girl behind the suit, makeup, shoes, and practiced expressions.
She cried until her chest hurt.
The president of the United States was losing a private war with herself beneath a stream of hot water.
She stayed there for a long time. Long enough for the water to begin to lose some of its heat.
Eventually, she reached for the soap.
She washed her hair and her face, letting the soap run over her tired body.
She stood beneath the spray until her skin was pink and her eyes no longer burned.
Then she turned off the water.
Candace reached for a towel and wrapped it around herself, standing still while water dripped from her hair onto the bathmat. The mirror was completely fogged over, reflecting a blurred suggestion of herself.
That seemed fitting.
She wiped a small circle clear with her palm.
A tired woman looked back at her. Not anyone's symbol, or a headline, or the most powerful person in the world.
Just a woman who felt like a little lost girl.
Candace stared at her reflection and took one slow breath.
Then another.
"You're okay," she whispered.
A soft knock came at the bedroom door.
Candace froze.
"Candy?" Pearl called, her voice muffled but gentle. "Food's warm when you're ready. No rush."
Candace closed her eyes.
No rush.
Pearl knew what happened in these moments. Of course Pearl knew. She always did.
Candace drew the towel tighter around herself. "I'll be there in a minute."
"Take as long as you need," Pearl said. "I learned how to use a microwave in the eighties. Not my eighties. The eighties."
Candace let out a broken laugh she had not expected. Somehow, Pearl always knew what she needed.
A few seconds later, Pearl's footsteps faded.
It stopped Candace's heart for a moment. What would she do when Pearl was no longer there to know?
Candace looked back at the blurred woman in the mirror.
A few deep breaths. That was all she needed.
Then she would put on pajamas, comb her hair, and walk into the kitchen. She would ask Cooper about dragons and let Pearl feed her. She would answer whatever small, ordinary questions waited for her there.
And maybe that was bravery.
Not never falling apart. Falling apart, so you could put the pieces back where they belonged, or close enough that you could carry on.
Candace took one last breath.
Then she smiled.
She felt it—the slow coming back together.
For these few minutes, Pearl had been the mother letting Candace be the child underneath the woman people recognized. In a moment, Candace would become the mother who wanted to understand what Cooper needed.
That was life, wasn't it?
Everyone played different roles at different moments. Candace's roles were not greater or lesser than anyone else's. They were different. They carried weight. Heavy weight.
And she was not made of marble.
No matter what people outside this room needed to believe.
"Dragons," she whispered. "Maybe that's what you need, Candy. A dragon slayer."
She looked back into the mirror and laughed earnestly at the mess of her hair and the dark circles under her eyes.
"You'd better hope no one mistakes you for the dragon!"