Election Day dawned gray, foggy, and cold beneath a lowering sky. The tangled atmosphere mirrored the political situation. Half of the people who had mailed in their ballots claimed they’d voted for Kim Flanders; the other half voted for Albee. According to every poll, the election was up for grabs.
Lance and I had fallen into bed late on Monday night, and my alarm clock jolted us out of our dreams at a shockingly early hour. We hastened into our clothes and clambered up the cellar steps. Mom was cooking breakfast, but Pop hadn’t come downstairs yet. The Portland Bee lay on the kitchen table unopened. I looked at the virginal newspaper, glanced at Lance who shrugged and muttered “Que sera, sera,” and opened the Metro Section.
A few days earlier the editorial board had endorsed both President Bush and Justin T. Albee for reelection, and the editorial page was packed with letters either praising those choices or fuming against them. I’d fired off a letter, but my besmirched civic reputation had forestalled the paper from publishing my opinion. However, Lance’s letter was the first one printed, and under his name the editor had seen fit to include “Former Chief of Staff.”
The letters for and against were the typical ones printed across the nation; the ones attacking Albee generally mentioned the mayor’s hypocrisy, his intolerance, his viciousness, and his stupidity. The letters supporting Albee were the most comical; one writer asserted that he wouldn’t believe Albee wore women’s panties even if he, himself, witnessed the mayor “prancing around.” (With a start, I glanced at the writer’s name and realized I’d once polled him).
On Friday, the day after Lance returned to me, he summoned the print reporters and the television news stations to City Hall for a major news event. He promised the editors would get a story and pictures that would blister their readers’ asses, and the reporters had descended like buzzards onto a downer heifer (Bunny’s description). If Lance had promised blood, he couldn’t have gotten a better response.
Wearing a dark green suit, pastel yellow shirt, and green necktie, Lance mounted the steps of City Hall, faced into the assembled television cameras, and elocuted like a valedictorian into the microphones. “My name is Lance Hancock,” said he, “Chief-of-Staff to Mayor Albee and the City of Portland. In view of the homophobic tone adopted by Justin T. Albee and his toadies, I have no choice than to expose my personal life. I am coming out of the closet. I am gay.”
I was standing on the courthouse steps, but somewhat apart. Abruptly, Lance darted away from the microphone, rushed to my side, and drew me to him. “Mike is my lover,” Lance shouted. He pressed his lips to mine, a kiss that would be run and rerun on every local news program for the next two days, and which would finally sweep across the country via the national television news programs until CNN broadcast it around the face of the globe.
Our kiss became so notorious that even President George W. Bush was forced to comment, “We’ve got an issue in America. Too many gays are getting out of the closet. Too many gays aren’t able to practice their love with women all across this country.”
This fictional quotation was adapted from the real president's comment, “Too many good docs are getting out of the business. Too many OB-GYNs aren't able to practice their love with women all across this country.”
The kiss Lance gave me was no minor peck. He seared me with a deep soul kiss, a tongue-in-mouth, underwear-charring kiss, which came powerfully close to launching me into a spontaneous discharge, not-to-mention quivering the crotches of the assembled reporters. When Lance and I broke apart, I found that I’d kicked off my left shoe and had to scramble down the steps to retrieve it.
Nothing Lance could have added would have provided a more dramatic conclusion, so we sauntered into City Hall and marched up the stairs to the mayor’s office. Once they recovered from their vicarious homoerotic experience, the media pounded up the steps after us.
Jack Fasco was standing defiantly before Albee’s securely closed door, a Roman Praetorian guarding his Caesar.
“Dirty Jack,” Lance said in greeting.
Jack Fasco scowled at the nickname, so clearly spoken in the presence of cameras. “Mayor Albee has no intention of sitting down with the viper who hoodwinked him,” Jack the Knife announced, an evil glint hardening his eyes. “You’re a imposter and a double-crosser, and our leader has left orders for Homeland Security to escort you out of City Hall.”
At Dirty Jack’s gesture, two uniformed guards stepped forward, and I nearly reeled when I recognized them. Short & Hairy seized Lance by the arm, and Hatchet Face latched onto me, while the television cameras recorded our humiliation. I couldn’t believe that Dirty Jack thought broadcasting this abuse would make his candidate look strong, especially with Albee hiding behind his door throughout the eviction.
“Don’t let them steal anything on the way out,” Dirty Jack ordered. “These shirtlifters can’t be trusted.”
“You don’t know the half of it, Jack,” Lance whispered, turning his lips away from the cameras. “Take a look at the campaign checkbook.”
Jack the Knife snarled, but his lips whitened and his crow’s feet sharpened. Of course, Lance and I had met Lisa and Lou in front of Albee’s bank a few minutes before it opened, and we’d been first in line to present our checks to the astonished teller.
The teller studied the two checks with trembling hands. “I’ll have to check with my superior,” he temporized. He summoned the bank manager, and she examined our checks. “I’ll have to call the account holder,” she said.
“That’s not a problem,” I said, but Lisa grimaced. The bank manager stepped to a phone behind the tellers’ cages and punched in the telephone number listed on the checks. Abruptly, Lance’s cell phone tinkled, and he edged away from the counter.
A minute later, both Lance and the bank manager were back. “Mr. Hancock okayed the checks,” the manager told the teller.
The teller looked at Lisa and me like we’d pulled a fast one. “I’ll cut your cashier’s checks.”
“We’d prefer cash,” Lisa said.
The teller and the manager rocked backwards at that request. I laughed like Lisa had been kidding and surreptitiously gave Lisa a sharp nudge in the ribs. “Fuckin’ hell,” Lisa yelped.
Lou gave me a menacing look but said nothing.
“She was kidding,” I said. “Cashier’s checks will be fine.”
Once we were out the door, I told Lisa to deposit the cashier’s check in her own bank immediately. “And don’t forget that we’re going to pay income taxes on it,” I added.
“That’s why I wanted cash,” Lisa said.
I stepped to Lisa’s opposite side. I was afraid that Lou would punch me in retribution for my elbowing Lisa. “That’s what I thought, Lisa, and you’d have gotten into trouble. Government agents are everywhere these days. You’re forgetting the number one rule in politics.”
“What’s that?”
“Never, never, never get caught,” I said. Lisa rolled her eyes and Lou snorted like a bull about to charge. I jumped into the passenger seat of Lance’s Saturn for the drive to my bank. Thirty minutes afterward, with my checking account looking rosier than it had ever been and after my bank’s manager virtually bowing me out the door, we drove to City Hall for our press conference.
After Short & Harry and Hatchet Face had tossed us out of City Hall, our civil rights as citizens hideously violated in the most public way imaginable, we rode to Lance’s apartment to meet with further violation. His roommate Jennifer, attired in only a crimson bra and panties, was sprawled on the couch in front of her gigantic television. Seeing her in mere wisps of clothing awakened a clandestine heterosexual urge – I was stirred like a Harold Stassen Republican.
“Holy shit, Lance,” Jennifer groaned. She pointed toward the television, which had interrupted the morning soap operas with breaking news and was broadcasting, commenting on, and rebroadcasting highlights from Lance’s coming out announcement, our incendiary kiss, our encounter with Dirty Jack, and our unceremonious booting from City Hall.
“Holy shit,” Jennifer swore again. “That goddamn kiss was hotter than Hell.”
Representing the liberal wing of the Republican Party,
Harold E. Stassen ran for president nine times.
Lance took my hand. “Come on, Mike,” he urged, dragging me to his bedroom.
“Hot shorts!” Jennifer moaned. “You boys are gonna fuck.” She leered at us lasciviously. “Let me watch.”
“No way, Jennifer,” Lance said with some exasperation. “We need a private moment.”
He wasn’t so far off, I thought. We were so hot, any sex act would climax as soon as it began.
“You won’t even know I’m there,” Jennifer urged. Her voice had taken on a desperate tone.
Jennifer didn’t force her way into Lance’s bedroom; she maintained that much dignity and self-control. Wordlessly, Lance shut the door against her and turned the lock. We looked at each other with wild lust and expectation, stripped out of our suits, and jumped into his bed. The public was deprived of that image since the news media were no longer following us. Nonetheless, our lovemaking was worthy of recording for posterity. And when we were satiated, pressed naked against each other, and whispering secrets, we once again heard Jennifer scratching at the door. “Can I come in now?”
“Go away,” Lance shouted. “Mike and I won’t stage a porno-play for your jill-off entertainment.”
“Shit.”
“I’ve got to get away from her,” he said. “She’s starting to sound like a nut case.”
“Yeah,” I agreed, my heart in my throat. “You can move in with me.”
Lance wrinkled his face. “Into your parents’ basement?”
“Why not? Mom and Pop will be happy I found someone.”
“We could rent a place of our own,” Lance suggested.
“Yeah, but the rent’s free at my place. Also I don’t really want to give up my family or my home. That house is a piece of my heritage.”
“What about your sister?”
“What about her?” I bargained. “She’s not going to change, Lance, not soon, anyway. But she’s harmless, and she’s kinda funny—in a gross sort of way.”
“Okay,” Lance agreed, glancing around. “All I own is my car, my clothes, and my books. Some of my books are fairly valuable.”
I looked at the expensive books. “We have glass-enclosed bookcases in the study upstairs in my parents house. Your books will fit there nicely.”
“I couldn’t put your parents out.”
“You wait. Just because you and I will sleep in the basement doesn’t mean we live in the basement. We live in the house. Mom and Pop—and Janet too—are going to treat you like a member of the family.”
With the living arrangements settled, I turned the subject to a question that had been trembling on the tip of my tongue since Lance had returned. I started by telling him of my dream and what I thought the green tiger had meant. “When we were visiting the zoo,” I said, “you mentioned something that didn’t register with me. You scoffed at Justin T. Albee’s underpants.”
“Oh, that,” Lance said with a short laugh. “Our mayor is such a hypocrite. Imagine him gassing about Kim Flanders’ scampish panties while he was wearing his wife’s underwear.”
I was so knocked out that I felt dizzy. Nothing I’d imagined in my wildest fantasies could top this revelation. I tried to swallow and my swallow reflex seemed out of order. Finally, I gulped and gasped, “Justin T. Albee wears women’s panties?”
“Yeah,” Lance said. “I saw them a couple of times, but he doesn’t know I know.”
“Does he wear a brassiere too?” I asked.
“I don’t think so. Just the panties. From something I overheard once when I was in their house, I’m sure Albee’s wife knows. In fact, I’m pretty sure she buys panties in his size.”
Fervently, I gripped Lance’s naked thigh with both hands. “Lance. We have to expose him.”
“Display the mayor in his panties? How?” Lance asked, going right to the heart of the problem. “What are you going to do, Mike? Rip off his belt and yank down his trousers? That’d be difficult since neither his bodyguards—you’re not going to believe who else is guarding him—nor Dirty Jack are going to let us into the same building with Albee.”
The problem only seemed like a mice-trying-to-bell-the-cat obstacle. I thought deeply for a few minutes. “Does he poop?”
“What a question,” Lance declared. Suddenly his face lit up like he’d seen the light. Had Mom seen Lance then, she’d have declared that the Buddha of the Boundless Light sitting upon the Lotus Pad of the Universe had revealed his splendor to Lance. “He does poop. Every afternoon, right around four. His lunch must kick in then.”
“Great,” I said, projecting more confidence than I actually felt. “We’ll snap a picture of him when he lowers his pants in the men’s room stall.”
Lance looked at me, impressed. “That would be a trick all right. Holy Cow, can you imagine how his supporters would react to his panties.”
I cackled evilly, and to my own ears I sounded like a mad scientist who’d just discovered the powerful ray that would turn straight church-goers into compulsive butt-fuckers (not that many aren’t already).
“Jet back, Mike,” Lance asked. “How are we going to shoot a picture? Those security goons won’t let us into the courthouse.”
I picked up my cell phone and summoned Bunny, the Buckaroo, Lisa, and Neil. “Meet us at that costume shop on Morrison Street,” I urged. “We’re going trick-or-treating.”
Since Halloween fell on Sunday that year, it wasn’t so strange to see kids trick-or-treating on Friday afternoon, and City Hall always distributed candy to the voters’ children. When a bunch of kids dressed as a Pinto Pony (Bunny at the head with the Buckaroo forming the ass end); a Corn Maiden (Lisa); a Shock of Cornstalks (Neil); and a pair of reddish Medicine Men in loincloths, full body make-up, and masked faces (Lance and I) invaded City Hall around 3:45, city employees weren’t surprised.
Guards were watching, so we shouted “trick-or-treat” at the doors of ground-floor departments, striving to appear considerably younger than our years. Lisa and Neil’s higher-pitched voices helped maintain the illusion. After we’d collected a respectable booty of lollipops, tootsie rolls, candy corn, bubble gum, tiny candy bars, and one disappointing apple from a health nut in the Traffic Division, we trooped upstairs. Real kids were entering the front doors in costume, so the guards hardly glanced after us.
Mayor Justin T. Albee was making his way toward the men’s room as we reached the top. He stopped and examined our costumes. “Cute,” he said, giving the Corn Maiden the twice-over. “See the receptionist. She has some candy for you kids.”
Lance and I gave the mayor a chance to get seated. Dirty Jack bulled out of Albee’s office, glanced belligerently at us, and stomped to the elevator. Meanwhile Mrs. Lincoln was dumping packs of black and orange jelly beans into our Halloween bags.
“I gotta pee,” I yelped, grabbing my crotch.
“Me, too,” Lance shrilled, masking his voice from one who knew it well. We rushed for the men’s room, while our partners in crime watched the door and kept Mrs. Lincoln occupied.
Lance and I had purchased a pair of 35 mm cameras with powerful strobes, a trick we’d been concealing in our bags of treats. When we blew into the restroom, Lance dived under the door of Albee’s stall and I scrambled over the top.
“Jesus H. Christ!” Albee screamed.
Lance squeezed his eyes shut while I shot two frames. “Oh God, I’m blinded,” Albee howled. However, as Lance’s strobes illuminated the stall, I realized that the mayor’s pants were not sitting around his ankles. He’d pulled them off entirely so that his trousers and panties were hanging from the hook on the stall door. Reacting without thought, I reached, grabbed his pants, and bolted for the door.
“Guards,” Albee was screaming. “Guards. I’ve been assassinated.”
As we nearly tumbled down the stairs, I discarded Albee’s trousers. However, I kept the frilly female panties and stuffed them into my bag of candy. As we turned the staircase, we slowed so the Pinto Pony, the Corn Shock, and the Corn Maiden could catch up. We strolled past the guards who were just becoming aware that some catastrophe had befallen the mayor. I handed the guard at the door my package of candy corn. As the guard took the candy, I recognized the disgracefully-fired, sucker-punching, partner-shooting cop, Scout Macmillan. Like hell he’d gotten six months in the county jail; Albee had pulled this rogue cop’s nuts out of the fire. I was glad that Macmillan couldn’t recognize me in my Medicine Man getup. It was a bad moment, but I’d never liked candy corn. I hoped Macmillan would choke on it.
I had notified Bill’s friend with the color darkroom that we’d be dropping by with an important roll of film and needed fast pictures. Still in costume, Lance and I rushed our cameras into his building. “You don’t need to schlep these anywhere,” I assured him. “Were going to change, and then we’ll come back and wait.”
Back on the sidewalk, I met with the rest of the costumed crew.
“I like this Corn Maiden outfit,” Lisa said. “I’m going to wear it to Poppy Reed’s party tomorrow.”
“I’m not going as Corn Shuck,” Neil complained. “I can’t see, I can’t walk, I itch, and I’ve got a corn stalk riding up my butt crack.”
“Oversharing,” Lisa yelled, and both ends of the pinto pony snorted.
“You mean shock, Neil. Corn shock. Shucking is husking corn. A shock is a bundle of corn bound upright to dry.”
“I’m freezing,” I said, caring nothing about Neil's diction. The temperature was dropping as night descended, and Lance and I were wearing loincloths.
Lance and I drove back to Ladd’s Addition, showered off the makeup, and dressed in jeans, heavy shirts, and jackets. By the time we got back to the photo studio, Bill’s friend had blown up a pile of sixteen by twenty shots. “I want to keep copies,” he said.
“Are that that good?”
He presented an overhead shot that depicted Albee sitting pantless on the toilet while his suit coat, his pants, and a pair of purplish panties hung from a hook. I reached into my jacket pocket and pulled out the panties. “Victoria’s Secret,” I announced.
“Holy shit. After what he said about Kim Flanders.”
“I’ll bet he offers to show his panties to girls in their early teens,” I speculated.
Lance shook his head. “He’d like to, I think,” Lance said. “But I don’t believe he’s ever gotten that far. His tactics creep out every girl he shows an interest in.”
I called The Portland Bee and asked for Tad Manes. Tad wasn’t in, but Sharon Hobbs was available.
“I have some information,” I said quickly when she answered. “Can I come to your office?”
“Who are you?” she demanded.
I hesitated, considered several lies, and finally spilled the truth.
“This is Mike Dodger. Lance Hancock is with me. We need to show you something.”
“What have you got? Another Spiro Agnew quotation?”
“Not this time. I’m not telling over the phone. You’ve got to see it. Will it kill you to take a look?”
“Alright,” she agreed. “But you boys better not be fucking with me.”
Lance and I drove downtown to the Bee building, parked on the street, and gave our names to the security guard. “Fifth floor,” he said. “She’s waiting for you.”
Five minutes later, Sharon Hobbs was studying the photograph and comparing it with the panties I was holding in my hand. “I don’t know how you can touch those things,” she finally said.
“I’ve been washing my hands a lot since we pulled our panty raid.”
“You broke a few laws,” she said. “You know, I’d like to help you gay boys, and Albee creeps me out.”
“What did he do to you?” I asked.
“You mean after you nearly cost me my job?” she said. “No, don’t apologize. I learned an important lesson that could save me from something worse later, and I don’t hold grudges.” She stopped and thought. “Albee didn’t actually do anything. I don’t like the way he looks at me. I’ll bet he was fantasizing about his panties while he was talking my editor out of firing me.”
“Did you notice he stared at your bottom?” Lance asked.
“At my ass, you mean? The way your boyfriend’s staring?”
I hastily averted my eyes. “Mike’s evaluating the competition,” Lance said.
“I’m used to pervs checking out my booty,” Hobbs sneered. “However, Albee was unusually creepy.”
“So how about writing the story?”
“I’ll write it up for my editor,” Hobbs promised, “but he’s going to spike it. Even if he did want to run it, the paper’s lawyers would never let him.”
“Thanks for trying,” I said.
“No problemo,” she said, looking again at the photo on her desk. “Can you let me have an extra picture?”
“Sure,” I said. “What for?”
“Souvenir,” she said. “You guys could get rich selling these fuckin’ things.”
On Halloween night, Lance and I climbed out of a taxi two blocks from Poppy Reed’s house. The streets were so packed with cars that our driver couldn’t get any closer. Poppy Reed lived in a small Southeast Portland bungalow situated in a high-walled yard the size of a city block. Ralph, Poppy’s pet human, had wired the yard with colored flood lights illuminating every tree and bush. Ralph had constructed fish ponds and waterfalls, and along the wall of the garage and shed where the garden implements were kept, he’d erected a speaker’s platform. He’d also built two outdoor bathrooms.
A gigantic canvas canopy had been erected for the party, dwarfing Ralph’s small tent. Beneath the canopy, long tables groaned under the weight of food and beverages. Hams sliced in spirals, turkeys, chickens, standing rib roasts, salads of potato, green pea, macaroni, chicken, tuna, greens, and odd gelatin combinations, cookies, cakes, pies, candies, soft drinks, punches, beers, wines, and liquors awaited the devouring crowd.
Poppy Reed, though a fictional character, is a tribute to a great American, the late Harry Reid, scientist, libertarian, and member of Mensa, who lived and died in Safety Harbor, Florida. Harry threw dynamic parties four times a year, hosted numerous political and Mensa meetings, and performed as a brilliant public speaker, including a speech to the Tiger Bay Club. Harry Reid had a pet human living in his beautiful, fenced, lighted yard, just as the character in this story does.
Most candidates seeking elective office were in attendance be they Republican, Democrat, non-partisan, Pacific Green, Libertarian, Socialist, or Constitution party members, but Justin T. Albee and his scowling henchman Dirty Jack were obvious by their non-appearance. Lance and I rubbed shoulders with congressmen, senators, state legislators, city commissioners, county commissioners, and school board members, all costumed for the day’s sake. Lance and I greeted Kim Flanders, dressed as a hobo, and the pirate suited Bill St. John, replete with sea boots. Both laughed when they saw my costume, for I had come as Mephistopheles in a red spandex, complete with a horned cowl and a forked tail.
“I never saw a guise more appropriate,” Kim said, as Lisa joined us in her Corn Maiden outfit. Then he checked out Lance, garbed as Peter Pan, and nearly swooned at the gorgeous sight.
“Hot stuff,” the candidate commented.
“He is,” I agreed. “You don’t know how hot.”
Lance blushed. A few seconds later Neil joined us. Neal was wearing a black cat suit, and he’d come along with Bunny and the Buckaroo. The cowboys were wearing togas and peppering their speech with Latin. At first I didn’t recognize them.
When a firm lesbian hand swatted my ass with greater vigor than I could appreciate, I whirled to find Satoko and Stacy had joined the happy throng. Satoko had costumed herself in a modest ninja outfit, but Stacy Sawyer was letting it all hang out. Wearing about a ton of barbaric jewelry including a chain-mail thong, she had painted her bare breasts blue and daubed pagan symbols elsewhere on her body. Her nipples were erect in the chill air, but she was fighting the cold with a hearty cup of hot white rum and lemon juice.
I distributed our special photographs of the mayor. Kim moaned over the ethics of showing Albee sitting on the crapper, but Bill pulled him aside and whispered furiously in his ear. Satoko placed her hand over her mouth and giggled over Albee’s picture, but Stacy Sawyer got a funny look on her face.
“Remember that day outside the Rainbow Club? The day I had the Victoria’s Secret bag?”
“You bought these panties?” I asked, whipping out the sprightly purple wisp of nylon.
“You never told me,” Satoko said.
“The bastard told me they were a present for his wife,” Sawyer said. “Besides he was paying me to keep my mouth shut.”
The issue seemed to be settled, so we scattered through the crowd, giving souvenir pictures to anyone who wanted one and telling the tale of how we’d stolen the mayor’s feminine underpants.
Shortly after midnight, I hit the floodlights and Lance leaped onto Poppy Reed’s stage, held up Justin T. Albee’s purple panties, and called for attention. “Women’s underwear,” Lance shouted. “The panties we swiped from Mayor Justin T. Albee.” While Lance stretched the panties with both hands, numerous cameras snapped pictures.
“What’s wrong with men wearing women’s panties?” I shouted, a prearranged gambit.
“Not a thing. However, when the mayor—while wearing panties like these beneath his suit—stands up on the courthouse steps and derides a fine statesman like Kim Flanders as a namby-pamby pantywaist in scanty panties, such hypocrisy demands a public rebuke.” Cheers and applause greeted Lance’s announcement, so I signaled him to stop talking. He had made his point, and the crowd had received the message.
Following the announcement, Lance and I ate and drank more than was good for us, and we were both happy that we’d taken a taxi to the party. Some time during the small hours of Sunday morning, we summoned another taxi to carry us home to Ladd’s Addition, fell onto our bed, and slept until late afternoon.
On Monday and Tuesday, Lance and I campaigned with Kim Flanders, and Lisa rode with us. With hours to go before the votes were counted, no one would notice that Lisa and I were actively campaigning, and besides, we were no longer on the campaign payroll—nor did we need to be. Albee’s campaign account had provided for our current needs.
By late afternoon on Election Day, we were standing beside the Eastbank Esplanade, waving “Flanders for Mayor” signs at passing cars, joggers, bicyclists, dog walkers, busses, and Max passengers. Bunny and the Buckaroo had turned out for the last ditch effort, dressed again in cowboy drag.
“My arm hurts,” Lisa cried.
I could’ve cried too. My arm was so tired that I could hardly lift it to wave to the screaming, horn-honking drivers.
“That’s enough,” Kim announced, consulting his watch. “It’s five o’clock. Everybody go home and rest.”
“Voters have another two hours to turn in their ballots,” Bill protested.
“We agreed on this earlier, Bill,” Kim said. “Everybody gets a nap before we meet to watch the returns.”
“Kim, the last poll showed you and the mayor dead even,” Stacy Sawyer said, exhaustion evident in her voice. “If we only picked up five votes in the next two hours, they could make the difference in who wins.”
“Tonight I ahall make a victory speech in front of the television cameras,” Kim said. He didn’t mention the possibility of his making another kind of speech, but he knew it and we, his supporters, knew it too. “When I offer a fresh start for Portland, I shouldn’t look like a soggy old tea bag. I’m going home, grab a two hour nap, shower, change, and I will meet you in the Governor Hotel ballroom at 8:30. I expect everyone to be rested, spruced, and ready to cheer.”
No further objection was forthcoming, so we gathered our signs and trooped to our cars. Lance had driven; I climbed into the passenger seat while Lisa sprawled in the back. As we drove Lisa home, I pondered my dilemma.
“Lance, do you trust me?” I asked after we’d seen Lisa safely through her front door and into Lou’s arms.
“No farther than I can spit,” Lance said with greater truth than tact. “I love you, but everybody hass warned me to keep my eye on you.”
In a way I was pleased, but he hadn’t solved my problem. “I need to do something, and I’d rather you didn’t know about it.”
Lance looked sad. “We made an compact, Mike. Remember? No secrets between us.”
I didn’t see any way around it; I was going to have to confess. I lead up to my revelation gradually. “Have you already mailed in your ballot?”
“Are you fretting over whether I voted for Kim?” he asked. “Don’t bother about that. I bubbled in Kim’s circle, and dropped my ballot in the mailbox Thursday afternoon—before I met you at the Rainbow Club.”
“That’s not it.”
“Then what?”
I drew a deep breath. “I need to pick up a few ballots I’ve stashed overhead in my closet,” I temporized. “I’m taking Mom’s, Pop’s, and my own to a drop-off site.”
“So? No big deal,” Lance said. “We’ll swing past the drop-off box beside the Safeway supermarket.”
I hesitated. “Suppose I asked you to wait in our room while I ran the ballots over to Safeway?”
Lance stopped for the traffic light before turning right on red. “What’s wrong with those three ballots?”
I wavered, dithered, vacillated, floundered, and admitted, “Nothing. I have more than three stashed away.”
Lance kept his eyes fixed on the road as he navigated through Ladd’s Addition. “How many more?” His voice was tight.
“Slightly over eight hundred.”
Lance pulled up behind my Honda, turned in his seat, and bored his eyes into mine. “Mike, are you voting the cemetery?”
I nodded. “Yes, Lance, that’s exactly what I’m doing.”
