“I do want them to watch it all, though,” she said. “And read them the newspapers, okay? I want them to appreciate their father. I think it might help, if they see how important he is.”
“They know he’s important, Madison,” I told her. “They don’t think they’re important.”
“Well,” she said, “you have to make them think otherwise.”
“That’s all I’ve been doing, okay?” I said, getting angry.
“Let’s not fight,” she said, reaching to touch my arm, so calculated, her skin on mine. I let her hand sit there, like a butterfly on my arm, its wings beating just so.
“Sorry,” I said. “Okay. You’re right. Okay.”
“This is how the world works,” she told me, and she meant this was how her world worked, as if I didn’t already know. “Things are bad and crazy and chaotic. But you ride it out and you don’t let it hurt you, and then there’s this stretch of time that is so calm and perfect. And that’s what was always waiting for you.”
“Okay,” I said, ready to be done with all this.
“That’s what you tell them,” she said, removing her hand from my arm. “That’s what you get them to understand.”
After we had lunch, the vote came in, no surprises, and Jasper Roberts, Bessie and Roland’s dad, was the new secretary of state of the United States of America. I finally turned on the volume, but it was just more words, nothing that really mattered.
“Your dad did it,” I told them.
“Well, okay,” Roland said.
Bessie said, “I remember something,” and scattered index cards until she held up a name, Elihu B. Washburne. She flipped it over to the back, where there were one or two interesting facts that we’d written. She held it out to me.
“This guy only did it for eleven days,” she told me. “Maybe Dad will be like that.”
“Maybe,” I told her.
And then, on the steps of the Capitol, there was this podium and all these people milling around. I sat on the sofa with the kids. I was looking for Madison, wanted to see what she was wearing. And then there was applause, and I saw all three of them, Jasper, Madison, and Timothy, walking to the podium. I saw Carl behind them, official and serious. Madison was holding Timothy, resting him on her hip. He had a little sports coat with an American flag pin on the lapel. Madison had on this tight maroon dress, like Jackie O or something. Jasper, who the hell cared, had on a boring-ass gray suit, but he looked handsome enough. They looked like a beautiful family, no denying it. They looked so complete, so compact, so perfect. We were here, and they were there, and this all made perfect sense to me.
Jasper started to talk, and it was like when he prayed at dinner that night, just platitudes, like a computer program had written them based on phrases in the Bible and the Constitution mixed together. He talked about responsibility and protecting the country and yet also ensuring its growth and prosperity. He talked about his own military service, which I actually hadn’t known about. He talked about diplomacy, but I wasn’t watching any of that. I was looking over his shoulder, at Madison, who was beaming. She was stunning, the ease of her posture, how relaxed she was now that she had something she wanted. And resting on her shoulder, there was Timothy, who was making this weird face. He was frowning, like he heard a little sound that no one else could hear. And then, there was this noise, like a firework exploding, and someone gasped. For a second, I thought someone had been shot.
Bessie and Roland stood up, focused on the screen. And all three of us could see it so clearly. It was right there.
Timothy was on fire.
He was completely ablaze, not like the popping and crackling, no little sparks. Real fire. Madison screamed, dropping him on the ground, out of sight of the camera. Her dress was smoking, just these little wisps of smoke rising off of her. Jasper didn’t seem to understand what was going on, kept looking ahead as if turning around would be a major sign of weakness, as if someone else would handle it. But now Madison was really screaming, and there was Carl, his jacket off, slapping the ground, where I imagined Timothy was. And finally the camera kind of moved, adjusted so that Jasper was now offscreen, who gave a fuck about him, and there was Timothy, kind of crouched on the ground, burning so perfectly, brilliantly burning. I could hear all these voices, but over the noise there was Jasper’s voice, distorted and angry, yelling Madison’s name over and over.
“Holy shit,” Bessie and Roland said at the same time.
And then, like magic, Timothy wasn’t on fire. He was fine. He was actually smiling, not a hair out of place. Carl wrapped him up in the jacket and lifted him into his arms, and some other men in suits and sunglasses kind of blocked everything off, and they all ran toward this long line of identical black cars. And the cars drove off. And that was it. They cut back to the studio, where a man in tweed looked like he’d eaten poison. He made this dry little hissing sound, like we hadn’t all just seen this kid on fire, and he said, “A historic day as the Senate confirms the appointment—”
I looked over at the kids just as I felt the temperature of the room subtly shift. And they were rigid, staring at the screen, their eyes so wide. And even with the Nomex clothing, I could see them starting to burn. “Outside!” I shouted, because I knew that fucking breathing exercises were not going to work. I knew what was coming. But the kids weren’t moving, and now they were really smoking, and the air smelled like chemicals, so dense and acrid.
“Bessie!” I shouted. “Roland! C’mon, kiddos. Let’s go outside.”
I started pulling on them, and they finally seemed to snap out of it. They walked with me to the front door and we stepped outside, the weather so clear, so perfect. The sun was high up in the sky. Bessie and Roland walked onto the lawn. And they were laughing. They were laughing hard. And it was difficult to look at them, they were so bright, this white, blinding light. And then they were on fire, too, these vivid red and yellow flames. They stood there, burning. And I was happy. I knew they were okay. I knew that they couldn’t be hurt. The grass turned black at their feet, and the air around them turned shimmery. It was beautiful. They were beautiful.
Inside the guesthouse, the phone was ringing, again and again and again, but I didn’t move. I looked across the lawn, and Mary was standing on the back porch, watching the children, completely unaffected, as if she were watching some ordinary birds at a feeder. I waved to her, and she waited for a few seconds before she waved back.
The kids ran in circles, the flame trailing off of them and falling to the ground, where the grass caught fire for a second before it smoldered. They burned and burned, like they were eternal. But I knew that it would die down, that it would fade away, back inside them, wherever it hid. I knew that soon they would turn back into the kids I knew so well, their weird bodies and tics. I didn’t try to catch them or put them out. I let them burn. I sat on the porch, a perfect day, and watched them burn. Because I knew that when it was over, when the fire disappeared, they would come right back to me.
Eleven
We barely slept that night, so revved up, nothing we could do about it. The minute the sun rose, the kids jumped out of bed. The sheets were sticky from the fire gel, beyond saving, and the kids took turns in the shower to wash the rest of it off. I didn’t try to stop them. It seemed pointless. Either they’d burn the house down or they wouldn’t.