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and it’d be me and you
riding it together
and the things we do
going like we planned
- the last five years
*
“You know like three of these kids are probably mine.”
“Okay.” Gary mutters and goes back to his pathetic ceramic monkey. Amy’s standing in the doorway, arms folded, looking annoyed in a sea of tiny heads.
“Can we go?”
“Jesus, relax, we’re going, they’re just kids.”
“Yeah, and some of them might already be yours, apparently, so we need to get out of here before the four horsemen of the apocalypse show.”
“Aw, don’t worry Ames, our kid will always be my favorite.”
Amy’s face contorts in a grimace. “And spend the rest of my life in places like this? Pass. Let’s go.”
He holds the door open for her—Amy practically dives through it—and before he follows he makes sure to smile at one of the mothers who’s been checking him out from the corner. Kids are a nightmare and he’s definitely not planning on having any of his own, but…you never know, he wasn’t lying that time he told Selina he was into older women. Moms are hot, in their own way.
Out in the front of the building, Amy turns to him, looking visibly more relaxed, and blows out her cheeks in an expression of disbelief.
“Wow. What a fucking shitshow.”
“Uh, yeah. How desperate do you have to be to send Gary to do anything?”
“Pretty fucking desperate.” she laughs. “And with a vote in a week.”
“Yeah I wonder how much we can extort from Ben.” Dan muses. “We’re not talking to anyone until I have a fat fucking check in my hand.”
Amy clucks her tongue at him. “Don’t be a dumbass, they have to be a little subtle about this. Not that subtlety was ever Selina’s strongpoint.”
Dan tilts his head up at the sky. It’s a gorgeous fall morning, crisp and bright.
“Wanna go eat?” he suggests, ready for something else besides coffee.
“Fine,” Amy says, eyes back on her phone. “The regular place?
“Sure.”
She drives them back into D.C—Gary, of course, had picked some fucking suburb miles away—and parks near his apartment. Amy likes driving. That was something new he had discovered, since they started lobbying together (just because Amy stole all his big clients didn’t mean he was going to let her work them without him, fucking hello.) She likes driving, and sometimes she gets so wrapped up into it she starts singing, which delighted Dan to no end the first time he heard her off-key rendition of Walking on Sunshine (she didn’t speak to him for a whole day).
“The regular place” is a divey gastropub around the corner from Dan’s, way too casual for lobbying clients, but the food isn’t bad and the drinks are strong. They go there after work or to prep before difficult meetings and more recently they’ve started going there during weekends to strategize and talk shop as their client list grows. Sidney’s goal appears to be pimp them out to any corporation who’s ever fucking thought about the Meyer administration, but it suits Dan just fine. And by now, Amy’s calmed down enough that she doesn’t get all rage-y and bitter whenever someone mentions the White House in her hearing.
They get a table on the back patio (the bartenders know them by now), and order and check their phones while they wait.
“Sidney’s sending us out to the Chesapeake on Tuesday…some seafood magnate wants to show off some fancy new crab farms. From Sidney’s email it sounds like he wants us to watch him fuck a crab.”
“Ugh, does this mean I’m going to have to listen to you make a million bad jokes about crabs on the trip out there?”
“Uh yeah, absolutely.”
“Fucking nature.” Amy mutters.
“Hey, feel free to blow it off, I can handle it on my own.”
“No no no,” Amy counters. “I have an email specifically from Sidney that says I have to be there in case you get seasick and fall off the dock and lose the client.”
“Careful, Amy, I might just grab you on my way down.”
“Another reason to stay ten feet away from you at all times. You fall in, it’s just you and the crabs. It will be a slow death, and I’m going to savor it.”
“Shit, you have already my parking space, what else are you after, the fucking pens in my desk drawer?”
“Dan, the only reason Sidney gave me your parking space in the first place is because I’m so much better than you at lobbying.” But her voice is playful and warm as she smiles triumphantly at him across the table, practically shining in the autumn sunlight. He grins back at her. It’s not even mostly a smirk.
This was another discovery he had made, Amy away from Selina: relaxed, playful, bold, even. This version of Amy is…something new, that’s for sure.
But also bored. Definitely bored.
Their food arrives (waffles for Amy, a burger for Dan) and they dig in and start abusing Gary in more loving detail, mostly insulting his pathetically mortifying espionage skills.
“And why the fuck did he make us go so far? Jesus, we were practically in Pennsylvania.”
“God, can you imagine having a kid and having to spend every Saturday in cutesy crayola god-forsaken places like that? I’d have to tranquilize myself.”
Dan laughs. “I’d pay good money to see you spend more than an hour in there.”
“Please, like you’re any better.”
“Hey now—“ he points a fry at her. “Need I remind you who once charmingly entertained an entire classroom of second graders?”
“Giving out your business cards to innocent children who don’t know any better is not the same as getting them to like you.”
“Still, could you have been more freaked to be in the presence of baby humans?”
“I think it was the idea of Gary having his own kid that was so disturbing.”
“Well shit, now you’ve ruined this nice conversation, Ames.”
“I will gladly change the subject.”
“Except can you imagine Gary as a parent? I mean, if he could clone a baby Selina, he’d do it in a heartbeat.”
Amy makes that grossed-out expression she usually employs in the presence of Furlong, where she scrunches up her whole face. It’s pretty cute. “Ew, seriously, stop talking.”
The conversation subsides a bit after that, although the patio is buzzing with conversation so it’s not really quiet. The other good thing about this pub is that it’s not one of those DC faux-casual hotspots that politicians use for meetings in order to send covert messages through the blogosphere, so it’s nice for the (admittedly rare) occasion Dan doesn’t want accidentally-on-purpose bump into anyone from the Hill or the White House.
It’s just full of…normal people. Boring people, to be sure. Voters, people Kent needs to poll to figure out how badly Families First is doing, and who don’t understand shit about how the government works. But still…enjoying a regular Saturday. The stereo system is pumping out some popular pop song that Dan doesn’t know because he hasn’t listened to normal-people radio in years, but that everyone else seems to be enjoying.
While they were in the White House, he can’t remember ever taking a Saturday off. Maybe they actually left work before 7pm, and that’s how they could tell the weekends apart from the week. It’s another perk of lobbying, besides the disgusting amounts of money he’s making—getting most of his weekends back. It almost makes up for not working in the most important building in the world anymore. (Almost.)
Across the table, Amy’s staring into space, her chin resting on her hand, clearly a million miles away.
He nudges her foot under the table. “Whatcha thinking about?”
“Hmm? Oh, nothing.”
“Admit it,” he tells her, “this is nice.”
“What is?”
“This,” he gestures vaguely at the busy patio. “Well, not the people. Being out on a weekend. Your phone’s not even blowing up. You don’t have to be anywhere until Monday morning.”
“You’re here, though.”
“Yeah, I know,” he says smugly, “It’s an embarrassment of riches.”
“It is nice having weekends.” she admits.
He doesn’t know what makes him say it. “And, if you wanted, you still have the whole afternoon left to watch your hypothetical kid paint a crappy ceramic kitten. It wouldn’t even be hard to fit it into your schedule.”
“If I were still doing this, no, it would not be hard.” she replies, carefully, and then takes a bite of her waffles.
Dan lets the moment hang; Amy’s never been in lobbying for the long haul and they both know it. She’s absolutely glued to the election news and complains to him constantly about Selina’s campaign strategy. She’s not talking about going back yet, but she will. Not to Selina, if he can help it, but she’ll find some up-and-coming senator on the rise and that’ll be that. He doesn’t like thinking about it.
“You could do it either way.” he finally says. “You could just get a nanny, like everyone else. Or, hell, take it to work with you.”
“Uh, wow, you’re naive.” she says, sharply. “I’m a woman, Dan. God forbid I brought the living proof of my decision to procreate within five hundred feet of the Mall. Selina didn’t even let Catherine near her Senate office until she was practically in college.”
“You’re not Selina. And she fucked up universal childcare. All you’d have to do is make it a real issue in the next election. Boom. Dump the kid in the basement of the Russell building, go to work, problem solved.”
Amy rolls her eyes like it’s the stupidest thing she’s ever heard. “That’s the stupidest fucking thing I’ve ever heard. You’re a man. You could bring five kids to work and nobody would say anything. They’d just talk about how devoted you were to fatherhood.”
Now it’s Dan’s turn to make a face. “Now that’s a nightmare scenario.”
Amy’s not listening, wrapped up her own thoughts, her expression dark. “If I had a kid, it’d be like a big fucking target on my back, professionally. You said it yourself.”
Had he? “Well yeah, if the dad wasn’t in the picture.”
That filters through her mind-fog. “Why are you talking like this? Did bribing that kid suddenly kick-start that rusty, broken-down motor inside your chest that you call a heart?”
“Fuck no.” he replies emphatically. “I was…just thinking.”
“Well, stop.” and she kicks him lightly under the table. “Any more of this and you’ll sound like my mother.”
“Now that’s low, Ames,” he replies, trapping her knee between both of his, and she presses her lips together, fighting a smile, and the expression is so endearingly familiar, he knows she’s feeling better.
“This is a useless conversation anyway,” she says loftily, picking up her fork again. “I’m not having a kid.”
“Atta girl.”
*
Amy’s in the bathroom when the server brings over their bill. While Dan’s calculating the tip, the guy asks “So how long have you guys been dating?”
“Oh, we’re not.” Dan says, signing the receipt without looking up. It’s not the first time it’s happened. Clients think they’re dating or married all the time; Dan’s trying to convince Amy to use it to their advantage.
“Ah,” he nods knowingly. “She’s already got a boyfriend, huh?”
“Uh—no?” Dan scoffs. As if Amy could find anyone in D.C. who wouldn’t be intimidated by her relationship with him. Meanwhile, he’s currently got four different women in rotation and Amy’s perfectly aware of that fact, because sometimes they call the office when he ignores them on his cell. True, she hasn’t said a single word about any of them, which is vaguely annoying—you’d think she’d have something to fucking say, obviously he’d have an opinion if Amy went about trying to pretend some infantile minor staffer over on the Hill was worth her time.
Whatever. They’re not dating.
“Huh,” muses the server. “Well, keep trying there, buddy.” He scoops up the receipt and the tip and turns away.
“Wait, wait, wait, hold on there a second, buddy—I’m not trying to date her—“
The server actually snorts. “Whatever man, just calling ‘em like I see ‘em.”
And he goes back inside before Dan can start elaborating on all the reasons he is not trying to date Amy Brookheimer.
Well, fuck that guy. So much for ever getting tipped again, buddy. And he could date Amy if he fucking wanted to. But he doesn’t need to, he’s already got her all the time, all day and practically all night, and he’s made sure she’s attached to him and only him professionally—Sidney doesn’t even bother assigning clients to only Amy anymore—and so he doesn’t have to actually date her.
Amy reappears. “What’s wrong with your face?” she asks, smirking. “It’s frozen in a weird way.”
“Nothing,” Dan snaps crankily. “Jesus, you took long enough in the bathroom, let’s get out of here.” He grabs her bag and tosses it at her.
“You know, I actually don’t need a kid, I have you.” she grumbles.
On their way onto the sidewalk, Dan’s holding the door open for her—because he’s a fucking gentleman, not because he wants to date Amy—when he catches the sight of the bartender from earlier watching them. He winks and gives Dan an exaggerated thumbs up.
Dan mouths “fuck you” over Amy’s head and slams the door on his way out.
On the short walk back to his apartment, he shoves his hands in his pockets and suggests, “Maybe we should find a new bar.”
“What? No, I like it there. I can’t stand going anywhere we take clients.” she replies, back on her phone. “Whatever happened to you while I was in the bathroom, I don’t care enough to find a new bar.”
Damn it.
Amy’s phone rings just as they reach the stretch of sidewalk outside his apartment.
“Well hello, Ben. Are you calling from a payphone in a dark parking garage?” Her eyes dance mischievously at Dan. “I gotta say, you need to upgrade your special agents. Gary is the best you could do?”
She clears her throat in a business-like manner. “So, let’s get down to business, obviously, this is going to cost you, let me hear the starting—uh huh—“
Dan grabs the phone from her, darting up a few steps toward his front door so she can’t tackle him right away. “Ben, it’s Dan, listen very carefully, this moment is how you’re going to make up for firing me—$1100 an hour, or we walk.“
“What the—give the phone back to Amy, you punk-ass hairdo—“ Ben growls in his ear.
Amy snatches the phone back from him, glaring. “Ben, it’s me, ignore Dan, we’re still working on basic house-training skills.”
Whatever Ben says next makes her cheeks go pink. “No,” she snaps.
Dan squints at her. “What did he say?”
Amy ignores him, turning away and tossing her hair behind her. Dan, naturally, crowds up against her back, so that she’s caught him between him and railing. He tilts his head over hers, trying to hear the full conversation.
A brief pause, and she laughs coldly. “That’s funny, Ben. Please remember that we are literally the only two people in the world who can do this for you.”
There’s a few seconds of silence before she says, more threateningly. “Oh, I know exactly how much money you’re bringing in.”
Behind her, Dan starts to fidget, impatient.
“Uh huh…” she muses, slowly. Then: “$1050. I’ll give you a major discount on Dan, $875, because he’s still learning.”
“Hey,” he mutters, pinching her waist. Amy squeaks and elbows him back.
“$975?” She repeats, turning around to raise her eyebrows inquiringly at Dan. He nods emphatically at her.
“Yes, that’s acceptable.” she says coolly, turning back around. “Uh-huh. Yes. Well, we look forward to doing business with you too, Mr. Cafferty.”
She hangs up and whirls to face him proudly. “Ah ha!” she exclaims, actually jumping in glee. He laughs at her excitement, shaking his head.
“Wow, not gonna lie, Ames, that was….that was something.”
She shrugs coyly. “Dan, I will always be better at this than you. Get used to it.”
“See, I always thought I was the bad influence on you, not the other way around…”
“In every other way, you are absolutely a bad influence.” The way she says it, though, looking up at him with that exhilarated, daring look on her face…it takes him a few seconds longer than it should to realize they’re just standing on his front steps, grinning triumphantly at each other.
“Uh, okay,” he says, taking a step back toward his door. “Okay, this is good, I guess, Ben’s gonna pay us, so…”
“So yeah, I’ll see you Monday,” Amy finishes, her cheeks a bit pink. “I should go home and…do nothing.”
“…Yeah, I’ll see you later.” Dan replies. He’s supposed to meet up with one of his girlfriends later, for some important professional reason, but, right now, he can’t remember what it is.
“Yeah, thanks for the food.” Amy calls awkwardly over her shoulder, digging in her bag for her keys so her hair blocks her face.
Inside his apartment, he sits on the couch, gets up, sits back down, turns on the TV. After thirty seconds, he wanders restlessly into the kitchen, opens the fridge, closes it again, opens a cupboard, stares unseeingly inside. Then he practically trips over himself racing for the front door.
He yanks it open, prepared to dash back outside, and—there’s Amy, her hand poised to knock.
When he starts smirking at her, she makes a little exasperated grimace at him.
“Did you forget something?”
“Ugh, never mind, you insufferable—“ She huffs dramatically and starts to turn away.
Rolling his eyes, he reaches out and grabs her wrist. “Hey Ames, you wanna start strategizing on how to sink Families First?”
“God, yes.” Amy says emphatically, immediately brushing past him like she owns the place. “And no, whatever you’re already thinking is the wrong approach. Also, Jesus, do you ever get a fucking maid in here? This place is a tip.”
Dan grins.