Chapter 129: Home Again, Home Again

With that we shut off the mikes and despite the reporters still calling out questions, we all started moving out. Behind me at my feet was the soiled newspaper. Great! I dropped to one knee, to try and roll it up one handed, when the young assistant dropped down next to me and said, “I’ll get that, Congressman.” He already had a small trash can ready. I steadied the trash can for him and he rolled it up and stuffed it inside. “We’re out this way, Congressman.”

I looked around and saw that the twins had already bundled up the mutt and were following their mother out the door we were heading towards. “What’s your name?” I asked him. He was about twenty-four or twenty-five.

“Frank Stouffer, Congressman.”

“And what do you do in this traveling circus?”

“Mr. Rove has me assigned to the Governor.”

I nodded and was about to speak further when Doctor Shooster tapped me on the right shoulder. “Congressman, you can’t leave yet. I need to check you out first.”

I grumbled at that but was much more polite when Anna Simpson came up and shook my hand and kissed my cheek. “Thank you so much, Congressman! I know Tom and Sylvie want to thank you. Maybe when you come back you can meet them. You are coming back, aren’t you?”

I smiled. “I just said it on national television. I don’t think I can back out now. If she’s not out of the hospital by then, I’ll look her up, for sure.”

“Thank you.” She kissed my cheek again and then looked over at the twins. “You did real good with those girls.” Then she was gone.

I said good-bye to the other politicians. They were planning on an inspection tour of Springboro, to ‘assist.’ God help Springboro! Before they left, I asked George Bush, “What’s that kid of yours, Frank, do for you?”

He gave a shrug. “He’s one of Karl’s boys. Why?”

“Can I have him? He seems smart.”

“Why? What do you need him for?”

“I need a dog-robber,” I told him.

He glanced at Frank and pointed at me. “Stick with the Congressman. You belong to him now.”

Stouffer looked surprised with that but rolled with the flow. “Uh, okay.” He turned to me and said, “What’s a dog-robber?”

“Old time Army term. It means an aide-de-camp, somebody who helps out a general, who will rob a dog of his bone if ordered. Go get your stuff from wherever you’ve got it stashed and get back here before we leave. Pick up a dog crate big enough to handle Stormy and a few dog bowls,” I told him.

“Where?”

“Figure it out, dog-robber!”

He looked alarmed but took off.

Marilyn looked over at him as he left, and then smiled at me. “Behave, Carl, he’s not a second lieutenant.”

“Honey, that is exactly what he is!” At that I followed the good doctor back to my room for a final checkup.

Unfortunately for the billing department, I proved healthy enough to be released and deny them the pleasure of another day’s charges. We were on our way towards the door by five or so. As we reached the lobby, Frank Stouffer came racing in, out of breath, and yelling, “Wait!” He had a suitcase in one hand, a hanging bag over his neck, a large plastic animal crate in the other hand, and stuffed under that was a bulging plastic bag with the name of a pet store on it. He was being followed by a protesting cab driver, demanding payment. “I caught you!” Frank said.

“A good thing you did, too. It’d be right embarrassing to miss the flight.” I reached into my back pocket and pulled out my wallet but couldn’t handle opening it and paying the cabbie. I handed it to Marilyn and said, “Can you pay this guy?”

Marilyn snorted and smiled and pulled a fifty out. “This cover it?”

The cab driver was suddenly all smiles, and he took the fifty and took off. The rest of us distributed the loot and Jerry McGuire, who had miraculously reappeared after the press conference, led us outside to a limo. From there we headed towards the airport, where the G-IV was waiting for us. We got on the plane, and it was wheels up for Westminster.

My daughters had been wearing nice knee-length dresses, which combined with some high heeled sandals, made them look older and more mature. I noticed that Frank had eyed them curiously. When he sat down in front of me, facing backwards, I told him, “Frank, you do realize that they aren’t even sixteen yet, don’t you?” That wouldn’t happen until tomorrow. “Do I need to take you down to the range and show you what happens to a hollow point when it hits something?”

He laughed at that. “No sir, I’m good on that. They are pretty cute, though, you have to admit that. They’ll turn eighteen sooner than you think.”

I waved that off. “So? Six months from now I’ll be the Vice President and have access to military weaponry. You have any idea what happens when a beehive round goes off? It’s awesome!”

“I’ll take your word for it, Congressman.”

“So, Frank, you work for Karl Rove? What’s your background?” I asked.

Frank explained that he was a graduate of Princeton with a degree in Political Science and had attended Yale Law. He was one of the young political class flocking to Washington, with no experience outside of Washington or the Ivy League. His job with Karl Rove was his first job. He was twenty-five.

I nodded as he told me this. “Okay, first things first, you no longer work for Karl Rove. You work for me now. Is that understood?”

“How ... am I on your Congressional staff?”

I shook my head. “When we land, get Brewster McRiley on the phone and I’ll handle it from there. You’ll technically be on the staff of McRiley Associates. You have a problem with that?”

“Uh, no sir, why would I?”

I eyed him curiously. Was he naïve or dumb? “Let me be very explicit. You do not talk to Karl Rove from here on in without clearing it with me first. I am guessing you got orders from him to give him a daily report on what I was up to?” Frank turned beet red at that. He’d be a lousy poker player. “I’ll take your silence as a yes. No more. You work for me, not Karl. Is that understood, or do we need to part ways?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Yes, sir, which?” I pushed.

“Yes, sir, I understand. What’s the problem with Mister Rove?”

“No problem, but Karl Rove doesn’t work for me and doesn’t have my best interests at heart. I pay Brewster, and as long as my checks clear, he stays loyal to me. Karl Rove ain’t loyal to me. You following this?”

“I follow you sir. Uh, how do I contact Mister McRiley?”

“Figure it out, Frank!”

Marilyn had been listening to us, and she reached across the aisle and swatted at me. “Will you behave?” She turned to Frank and said, “Get a pen and pad and I’ll give you a few numbers.” He scrambled and pulled a pen and notepad out, and Marilyn read off some numbers from her cell phone. She gave him Brewster’s, but also Marty’s and mine, and the numbers for my offices in D.C., and the ones for the campaign and the local Westminster office for the Maryland Ninth, and several others.

I chuckled at all this, and then said, “Now, when we land, I want you to get yourself a room over in Parkton and rent a car. We’ll get somebody to give you a lift over. Make sure you keep receipts for everything. Always have at least a grand in cash in your wallet, mostly twenties and fifties. You’d be amazed how much easier things work when you deal in cash. You can take tomorrow off, since it’s Sunday, but be at our house early Monday morning. I might be on sick leave, but I still need to work.”

Frank kept jotting down notes. The next few months would either break him or make him. We’d have to see which.

Marilyn asked me, “You really have to work this week? You need to rest. Doctor Shooster said you needed to rest.”

“It will be a working vacation. You need to finish whatever they have you doing with the convention speech, and I have to write one of my own. I started one, but just don’t like it,” I told her.

Frank popped up at that. He shuffled through a briefcase and handed me a manila envelope. “Here’s your speech, Congressman. Mister Rove gave this to me to give to you.”

I eyed the envelope curiously. Up until now, all my speeches I had written myself, although I had frequently gotten some input and editing assistance from my staff. Now I was going to give a speech written by somebody else. “Who wrote it?”

“Mister Scully.” I gave him a blank look. I knew Mike Gerson was the chief writer for Bush but wasn’t aware of the second tier yet. “Matthew Scully, he works for Mister Gerson.”

“Well, give it here, let me read it.”

I took the envelope and opened it to read it. The best speechwriters would write for the speaker’s voice, using his tone and his style and his substance. The worst would simply slap some shit together. This was about in the middle. It wasn’t just slapped together, but it was obviously written for somebody else. It was also rather generic. I was going to have to write my own speech and incorporate what I could of this one. I needed to give the speech of a lifetime; this one wasn’t that. It was okay, but I wanted more.

I started reading but drifted off and slept most of the trip back to Westminster. We had some limos and vans waiting for us when we landed. As we walked off the plane, Marilyn said, “You need to rest. You look pale.”

“If you are going to play nurse, shouldn’t you get one of those little nurse’s costumes?”

“OH, THAT’S SO GROSS!” yelled Molly.

“THAT’S ... I DON’T WANT TO HEAR IT!” screamed her sister. “ LA ... LA ... LA...”, she sang out loudly.

Marilyn and I looked at each other and grinned. Neither of us had known they were within earshot.

My entire traveling circus went over to the house, and then I sent most of them off to either find some motel rooms nearby or simply to go home and rest. I was still tired and needed to rest for a bit. I told Marilyn I wanted to sit in my chair for a bit, but she pushed me down the hall into the bedroom. I did give the girls a few orders, but simply to get the puppy situated and sorted out, and to unpack and relax. They needed some down time as much as I did.

I sat down on the bed and kicked off my shoes. I looked at my wife and smiled. “You never did answer me about the nurse’s costume.”

“GROSS!” she said mimicking her daughters, making me laugh.

I stretched out on the bed and eyed her invitingly. I had been away from home for too long.

Marilyn grinned and closed our bedroom door, flipping the lock. “Would you prefer me to wait until I went out and got the outfit?”

“It’s not all that critical to the healing process.”

She came closer and spoke seductively in my ear. “How about I simply take off my clothes and suck your cock? Think that will help you heal up some?”

My temperature must have risen at that, among other things. “It’s an excellent start! I’ll probably need some additional treatments like that later, too.”

“We’ll see. You’re not as young as you used to be. You might not be able to handle the treatment!” I snorted derisively at the comment. Marilyn did a quick little striptease in front of me and then undid my pants and pulled them down to my knees. Then she knelt by my good side and went down on me. I ran my good hand over her naked back, and then, as I got closer, ran my fingers through her hair and kept her head in place. I sighed happily as she got me off and swallowed me down.

She sat up on the bed and wiped her lips on the back of her hand. I smiled and said, “Nurse, I’m feeling better now, but I think I need another treatment.”

Marilyn giggled and said, “Sorry, but that will have to wait. Your insurance won’t cover multiple treatments.” I swatted her bare behind and she scampered into the bathroom and cleaned up and brushed her teeth, and then slipped into a simple halter top sundress. I had my own pants pulled back up by the time she came back, and she helped me with the belt and zipper.

Before she left, I slipped a hand under her dress and ran my fingers up to her pussy, to find that she was going commando. “I like the way you nurses dress when you’re off duty.” She just laughed and told me to get some sleep.

It was late when I woke up, after dinner, in fact, and I went to the bathroom and cleaned up some before limping out to the living room. Marilyn was watching Wheel of Fortune while the girls were teasing Stormy with an old sock. She came over and sniffed at me, and then headed over towards a corner. “Grab her! She needs to go outside!” I yelled at them, and they picked her up and ran her out the patio door.

“Feeling better?” asked Marilyn.

I glanced and saw the girls were outside still, and replied, “Still looking forward to a few more treatments.”

My wife blushed and grinned. The twins came in and she said quietly, “Later.” The she raised her voice some, and asked, “Want some dinner? We heated up some canned beef stew.”

“That’s fine. I’m not ready for anything big. Anything’s got to be better than broth and Jell-O!” Marilyn laughed at that and headed for the kitchen. “How about some booze, too!”

“Are you taking those pain pills?”

“Advils only.” I reacted well to ibuprofen. Most people can take one pill an hour, or up to twenty-four a day, before their liver explodes. I had popped half a dozen when I woke up. I was good at the moment.

When the girls returned with the pup, I played with her for a bit, and taught the twins how to housebreak her. It was going to be their responsibility. If they saw her heading behind the furniture or looking for a place to squat, grab her and get her outside. If you catch her too late, rub her nose in it and swat her with a newspaper. Praise her when she goes outside. All the standard stuff that people having been doing for millennia to housebreak dogs. “Most importantly, don’t listen to your mother about what to do; she thinks Stormy can speak English and will understand without rubbing her nose in it or smacking her.”

“I heard that!” came from the kitchen. That just made us speak a little more quietly.

It’s not hard to housebreak a dog. It just requires some patience and vigilance. I remember hearing somewhere that the bigger the dog the easier it is to housebreak them. I have no idea if that was true or just an old wives’ tale, but if so, I expected Stormy to be incredibly easy to train. She had all the earmarks of being a really big dog, much bigger than I was used to. All my dogs, this life and last, had been some form of hound mix, in the thirty-to-fifty-pound range. At barely three months, this thing was already about ten pounds, and seemed to be growing just in the few days we already had her! She was sure devouring Puppy Chow, that was clear!

By now Stormy was snoring in my lap, so when Marilyn brought me some stew and a gin and tonic, we traded. After dinner, I read Scully’s speech while Marilyn watched television. I hadn’t known what I was going to say, but while listening to the late news, everything sort of crystallized. I would spend the next couple of days working on it.

We put some newspapers down in the laundry room and I let Stormy out on a leash before we put her in the room and went to bed. I was ready for another treatment, so Marilyn stripped me naked, and then pulled off her dress, and we made love - carefully! I had to stay on my back, and I only had one hand to work on her with, but we figured it out, and finished with her riding me while playing with her clit, and with my fiddling with her nipples. My ribs were aching afterwards, but I could live with that.

Frank Stouffer showed up the next morning while we were eating breakfast, so I invited him in and made him some eggs and bacon. He had managed to get some hotel rooms for himself and some of the other staff in Parkton and had rented a car. I hadn’t expected him that morning, which was a Sunday, but I shouldn’t have been surprised. Until Election Day, there were no days off. I gave him orders to get in touch with Matt Scully and have him come on out here. At the minimum, if he couldn’t make it out here today, I needed the speech in a digital format, Word or a text file, something I could begin changing. He would complain, like any good author would, but he would feel better about it if he was involved.