The beggar woman reminded me of my brother who travels on trains. Well, he says he does: Lou says he does a lot of things that he doesn't do. I've never seen or heard of him on a train, per se. He prefers to hitchhike.
It's an era when people are getting turned out of their homes more and more, and so there are more and more people like him and her running around the country. They hunker down in box cars and under railway bridges, or they like her stay in their cities moving from shelter to shelter, and occasionally getting themselves into a seedy motel or so just outside town, when they can beg for enough to do so.
I should know, because I put him - and her, and anyone else like them - into that situation. You see, I'm the President.
Or else I was.
I saw the beggar woman sixteen days ago, when March Madness was just starting on television and the cherry trees were getting set to bloom. I'd gotten into the White House via a landslide, because of my clever campaign manager who'd managed to turn around my opponents' rude comments about Lou and his lifestyle into something that was hopeful. "The previous administration put him and everyone else like him in that position," my campaign manager directed me to say though I knew it wasn't true. He had me go out and get my ass seen at soup kitchen after soup kitchen, shelters, flop houses, and so on, talking to every crazy he could get his hands on. But Lou isn't crazy; so my campaign manager wanted him to "disappear". He thought if he paid Lou off, he could get him to stay in a nice home, and to give a wonderful interview all about how his sister was going to change the world. He was so wrong.
I saw the beggar woman on the train tracks, when I'd managed to get my ass into the White House and I hadn't heard from Lou in a month. He'd laughed at me on the phone last we spoke, about how I'd end up like the rest of them, I'd see. I'd felt hurt but kept to my ground; I've learned since childhood when he used to pull my hair and sneak out of the house to drink with his buddies, that it makes more sense to Lou for a woman to not act like a dumb blonde. I'm a smart blonde, dammit! Anyway, I saw that beggar woman by the tracks and she looked at me like she knew me. You wonder when you run for President whether or not everyone doesn't.
"You that byotch in the White House," she said. No bottle, no shopping cart. I'd learned from my term in the soup kitchens and what-all, that like most Americans, homeless folk come in all shapes and sizes. So this didn't faze me. She did have a patched blanket on for a shawl.
"Not me," I told her. "If I really was the President, you think the FBI would let me walk around down here alone?"
She snorted. "Can't fool me. I could spot your tail a mile off. He's a nice piece o' prime rib, that one!"
I was surprised. Mort's pretty good at hiding himself; they're all supposed to be, that's their job, but he really is. But Lou told me years ago that if you're going to survive out here, you need to be able to tell who's where and what they're like. I didn't believe him till last month.
"'Sides," she continued, "you've a whiff o' spensive hairspray an' a nice jogging suit on you."
"I give up," I said, "so I'm President."
"You suck at it."
Tell me something I don't know. First woman in the office, and I was blowing it only two months in. True, the previous administration had sunk our economy into the ground, and had started us into World War III. I was supposed to fix all that. All at once, it seemed. That's a hard one on anybody. I didn't hear Herbert Hoover had done it. But every week I was getting knifed on live television, and in the news. I didn't like it, but I didn't like giving press conferences, so I'd only spoken once since I got into office. I would rather have slunk off into the shadows. Every night I cried into my pillow!
I squatted down in the reeds. "What should I do? I'm not able to work miracles," I said.
"Stop whining," she said. "So you got stuck with a bad position; lots of presidents have. Gonna cry about it? Why not go out there an' do that crap you said you would? It's so hard to give people jobs?"
"The Congress can't agree about that," I told her. It was true. They'd been howling back and forth about the best way to fix the economy since day one.
"Listen, I been out here forty years, since I was a pregnant teenager an' my dad wouldn't let me stay in the house. Free love, hah! Didn't care 'bout that one. But hell, you got all these houses with no folks in 'em 'round the country, an' you 'specting me to believe you can't do nothin'? You got twenty states full o' farmers can't pay their bills, y'know. Can't keep businesses runnin'. I'm not stupid, I say put people as wants those jobs in those jobs! Then pay them farmers more fer their goods."
"Where did you get those ideas from?"
She grinned a set of pretty good teeth for someone who'd been on the road so long. "Dated a stock-broker for a while," she said, "back in the turn o' second century."
I thanked her and went back to the White House via my secret door. I flopped into bed without even a shower.
It was a good plan. I knew damn well it wouldn't go through legislation though. The Congress wouldn't allow it. Some would call it socialism, a word that had taken several Presidents down. Others would love it; the liberals, some of the independents who weren't waiting for the other shoe to drop. Some of the right-wing extremists would call for impeachment.
I had to talk to Lou. I hadn't spoken with him in weeks, not since he took the money - the money!
Suddenly I had a sneaky suspicion about something. You see, Lou never did want much with cash. It was how I knew my campaign manager's payoff wouldn't work even though I tried to tell the man it wouldn't and he still tried it. But every time Lou had gotten cash from me or my parents when we could find him, he'd given it away. He'd even shared the food or blankets I'd given. That was Lou, the last hippie on earth. Guy who believed in total democracy.
The beggar woman was right: I was horrible at being President. At least I understood that. Now I could do something about it.
"Berty, I'm going out," I said, "and I want to know where my brother was last." As soon as I finished my little upload, to every minor liquor store, supermarket, motel chain, mom 'n pop stand, and pharmacy - all of their stocks would get a boost from me, using all the money given me for work as Chief of Staff. "I don't have time to tell you; I just need to know."
He checked. They can do that.
"Gone," said the big ex-WCW fighter. He looked puzzled. "But a quick trace on that money we gave him says it's scattered all over the country."
He didn't get it, but I did. I hurried down to the train tracks. The next one was showing as a tiny light in the distance, and Berty who had night duty looked nervous. "It's ok," I promised him. "I'll be out of here in time."
"You again?" asked the beggar woman, who was finishing a cheeseburger. It was hot, too; I could smell it.
"I need to know one thing," I said. "You seen my brother?"
She laughed. "'Course I have, honey! Two weeks ago I done him, not far from here. He proud an' he's a good man."
"Gave you money, didn't he?" I asked but I knew the answer.
She looked this way and that before nodding cautiously. Then she reached into her chest and pulled out a small wad. "For you," she said softly, "in case."
I leaned closer and whispered something in her ear.
When I was a kid, I was labeled a genius by my doctors early on. I had fun in those enrichment classes you get for that one, and even less having my hair pulled by my older brother who said I was "stupid" and what-all. It was better at Quantico, and even better when I ran for office. Hours after the discussion that never took place at the tracks, I was snipping wires at the White House. I just wanted to disable the security system.
"I don't like this," Berty hissed at me but I shook my head.
"For the people, by the people," I said. "That lady's heading west right now with an important message. And by dawn, I'll be gone too. But the people who are going to come in are not to be stopped, hear me?" I'd already paid off the guard on the doors to let them in. All of them. I didn't know what they'd do, but some one of them would have a better idea of running the country than I.
By the time I was done I had raw hands, and the Secret Service was going this way and that, the Vice President was yawning and on his third cup of coffee, but he knew what I was going to do and he thought he was going to be the one running the country now. Not on your life would I hand it over to that slimy bastard; the instant I was gone a certain envelope with a tape was going to go to the head of the Secret Service. I had it on every person who could stand in my way. They hadn't called me a genius for nothing. I'd discovered something in my two months there: I can help the country better by doing little things on the outside, without all that red tape, than as President.
I'd do it as a beggar woman.