Page 114 of Hits Different

“Of course”, I say, after a moment.

“Parker…”

“Course I do”. I’ve reached the front of the line. “Gotta go. Call you later”.

A smart-looking woman in a brown suit steers me forwards. I take a seat in-front of Senator Carter. His eyes widen with recognition.

“Remember me?” I say, “We need to talk”.

* * * *

My feet barely touch the ground before I’m whisked into a tiny backroom.

“Out!” The Senator commands his staffers. The woman organising the queue gives me a strange look, like maybe she messed up. “What do you want, Parker?”

He’s used to intimidating people, but it doesn’t work on me. I’ve seen him eviscerate people on TV. I watched him in a debate once, running rings around his opponent. He just kept hammering them until they gave up. “I wasn’t sure you’d remember me”.

“Remember the boy who’s hell-bent on ruining my son’s future? You’re hard to forget”. His eyes land on the autobiography in my hands, “I assume you’re not here for an autograph”.

“I want to talk about Brandon”, his face clouds over before resettling again. “He doesn’t know I’m here and I’d like to keep it that way”.

He raises an eyebrow. “Do you really think you’re in a position to negotiate?”

“The tabloid’s favourite senator just pulled a college dropout into a private room in the middle of his book signing and ordered out any witnesses”, I reply calmly. “Isn’t that what you folks call ‘optics’? I’d say I’ve got some leverage”.

I’ve got him there, and he knows it.

His lip twitches in annoyance. “I was right about you”.

I don’t bother to ask him to clarify. Brandon’s dad’s low opinion of me goes back over a decade. “You need to forgive Brandon”.

“What the…”

“Get over it. He needs you. He loves you. For reasons I’ll never understand, he continues to defend you. Pull whatever corrupt behind the scenes shit you have to so the gutter press backs the fuck off him, and then you need to forgive him”.

“Forgive him for what?”

“You’ve got me there, because I can’t understand for one second how you can blame him for not telling you about your wife mattress-surfing with…”

“Watch it”, he snaps. “Don’t forget who you’re talking to”. He pauses. “Brandon can’t possibly believe I blame him for my wife’s indiscretions. Why would he think that?”

Is he kidding me?

“Maybe because youtold himyou did”. I prompt him, “Hamptons. Fireside cabin. Father and Son trip from hell. Ringing a bell?”

“I can’t… I don’t… I’d never say that”. His face twists from anger to confusion and back again. “What journalists? They shouldn’t be coming near my family”.

“They came to Summit”, I’ll be honest, having the Senator as mad as I am about the treatment his son is getting wasn’t on my bingo card for today. “I guess you saw the pictures. Of us”.

“It’s reassuring to know that he still doesn’t listen to me. But then, I never listened to my father either. Maybe if I had…”. His eyes rest on me. “It’s almost as if the conversation we had after his graduation never happened”.

“He doesn’t know about that”.

The Senator looks up in surprise. “Didn’t you tell him?”

“It’d only hurt him”.

“And you’ve done enough of that”.

---