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“Thank you again for what you did-tried to do,” the Senator says, as they're carrying Sarah's kids out to the car after one of the Walker three hour dinner parties. He smiles at Kevin likes he's auditioning for a part in a toothpaste commercial, all blinding white teeth, no sincerity.
And Kevin is tempted to blow him off again, because nothing's changed, but at the last second he sees Kitty's tiny, hopeful face grimacing up at him from under Robert's arm, and he says, “Put your money where your mouth is, McAllister. If you're so grateful, you could at least buy me a drink sometime.” Kitty smiles, and at least he's made someone's day. And he thinks McAllister will recognize it for what it is, a bluff that need never be called. They don't like each other. They both know that. They're busy men.
So he's forgotten all about it by the time he gets to the office on Monday. He's late, and he has meetings, hundreds of emails, an outbox that's on the verge of overflowing into the hall, senior partners to impress.
He's on a call with a client when his cell vibrates in his pocket. The caller i.d. reads R McA, for what's possibly the first time ever. He excuses himself politely to the client, but all he can think is Kitty. It's been two weeks since the last disaster. They're probably overdue for another one.
“Senator,” he says into the phone. “Is something wrong?”
McAllister sounds like Jason, only more so. It makes Kevin hot and cold at once, hearing him. He is not precisely sorry that things didn't work with Jason: he knows, all too well, that he was never going to be able to compete with Jason's God. And he was getting tired of trying to, tired of virtue, monogamy, going to bed alone. But that doesn't mean he hadn't loved Jason. That was the part the McAllisters didn't seem to understand. That didn't mean breaking up with Jason hadn't hurt.
“Kevin,” Robert says. “I had an unexpected cancellation. It looks like I won't be flying to Idaho tonight after all. I wonder if you'd like to get that drink?”
“I can't,” Kevin says reflexively. “I have plans.” He does, too. Drinks, with people from work. They'd ditch him, in a heartbeat, if they got a better offer. And he'd ditch them, to be fair. They're lawyers, after all.
“Kevin,” McAllister says. “I'm trying to make a peace offer, here. I'm a Republican. It doesn't come naturally to me.”
“You're stepping on all my best lines,” Kevin says. “If you really want to pacify me you should at least let me make the jokes.”
“Go ahead then,” Robert says. “Everyone else is laughing at me.” And there's finally, finally, a hint of petulance in that, a hint of whininess. A hint that Kevin's brother-in-law might actually be a bona fide human being.
“Somewhere expensive,” he says grudgingly. “I can be bought.” Just like the American people, he thinks, but he doesn't say it out loud. Kitty likes to pretend Robert is different, honorable, entirely without cynicism. Kevin has his doubts, but he's trying to be polite.
“I'll send a car,” Robert says, like he thinks Kevin will stand him up otherwise.
“Fine,” Kevin snaps, and hangs up on him. It feels wonderful. He almost calls Robert back, just so he can do it again, but he knows it won't be the same.
The car he sends is the McAllister standard, a Lincoln towncar. Buy American, Kevin thinks sourly as he climbs in. Even for a Monday, the day's dragged on forever. He wants to go home and curl up on the couch with Scotty and watch Top Model. He doesn't want to make nice with the Senator, doesn't want to call a truce, doesn't want to pretend to like Jason's brother or Kitty's husband.
The bar Robert's chosen is discreet, manly: dark leather, wood paneling, like an English gentleman's club. Kevin hates it, but then, in the mood he's in, he'd have hated anywhere Robert chose. He takes off his jacket before he sits down across from the Senator, rolls up his shirt-sleeves and loosens his tie.
Robert looks tired. The lines around his mouth and eyes shadow his face in the dim lighting. For once his shirt looks like he's been wearing it all day, and his tie is missing all together. There's a glass on the table in front him, half full of something amber and expensive looking.
“Bourbon?” Kevin guesses, curling his lip at it.
“Scotch,” Robert says, looking amused. And to the waitress, “Another one, please. What are you having?”
“Tanqueray and tonic,” Kevin says. “Double. Extra lime. And can I see a menu, please?”
“You're going to make me pay, aren't you,” Robert says, and there's a smile in his voice if there isn't one on his face. “Kevin, why don't you like me?”
“Christ, you are a politician, aren't you,” Kevin spits. “Can't stand not to be Mr. Popular?”
“I'm hardly Mr. Popular now,” Robert points out.
“Senator Popular, then,” Kevin says, when they both have their drinks. “Apart from your abysmal political views, you mean.”
“Views your sister shares,” McAllister says dryly.
Kevin could tell him that he tolerates Kitty's politics because he loves her, that the two of them have this shared history, this tragic and magical language from their sometimes lonely, sometimes lovely childhood between them. That politics are beside the point. “You're smug,” he says instead. “Overconfident. Patronizing, even. I don't trust you with my country anymore than I trust you with my sister.”
He should stop. The last thing he should do is keep talking. But Kevin's never walked away from a fight in his life. “When I look at you,” he says, “I see the son my father always wanted, the son none of us, Tommy and Justin and I, were able to be. When I look at you,” he says, “I see my father. You pretended to be a hero, just like he pretended to be an moral, upstanding family man, and you're every bit as much of a hypocrite. When Kitty told me about your little fuck-up in the Gulf, I was thrilled. You have no idea what a relief it was to find out that you were just as big of a fake as I'd always suspected.”
“I guess I deserved that,” Robert says slowly. “God knows, I haven't exactly been fair to you, Kevin. Jason-well, when I talked to Jason yesterday, he said he'd exaggerated. Was he right about that?”
“Yes,” Kevin says sullenly. He can hold a grudge for months, even for years, but once he's lost his temper he has a hard time staying righteous.
“I would never cheat on Kitty. I will never cheat on Kitty. I promise you that. Politics is mistress enough.” And when Kevin doesn't smile back at him, “I've been there, Kevin. I've been the victim. I would never do that to her. I'm nowhere near perfect, either. Your sister can attest to that. And I'm not your father. I can promise you that, too.”
“Can you promise me that if you get elected you'll let gays get married?” Kevin asks.
McAllister looks flustered, for what's practically the first time ever. “No,” he says.
“I still hate you, then,” Kevin says, and for once Robert gives him a smile that almost looks real.