Storm Front

“Well, hello yourself, young man,” Donny said, feigning warmth. Damn caller ID. You didn’t even get to say “This is Senator Whitmer” anymore.

“I’m fine, I’m just fine,” Donny said.

“Thank you for asking. How’re you?”

Southern charm. Donny had lots of it.

“Well, that’s just great to hear. And how are the wife and kids?”

The personal touch. You had to give it the personal touch.

“Kindergarten? Is he in kindergarten already? My, my, it seems like just yesterday I was getting that birth announcement. How time flies.”

He was now strolling around his office. Clyde May was calling to him.

“Readin’ already? Smart boy, smart boy. He’s just a chip off the old block, isn’t he?”

Flattery. It gets you everywhere. God, he despised this.

“Well, if that private school of his needs a little something-something, you just give ol’ Donny a call, you hear? Turns out the junior senator in your state owes me a favor.”

Or at least she would if Donny needed her to. Thank God she wasn’t one of those uppity women senators who refused to play ball with the boys.

“That’s mighty nice of you to notice. Sissy put me on one of them low-carb diets. I miss her cornbread something awful, but I lost ten pounds since March.”

Yes, apparently flattery went both ways.

“Wouldn’t that be nice. We’ll have to get the NIH to look into that,” Donny said, laughing a little too hard at a joke that wasn’t even that funny. When you got right down to it, nothing about dieting was funny.

Finally, they were through with the necessary small talk, and Donny heard the donor say the words that could get the conversation rolling: To what do I owe the plea sure of the call, Senator?

“Well, I’m glad you asked,” Donny said, eager to get on with it. “You may have heard, but it looks like I’m going to be facing a little primary challenge come June.”

Little primary challenge. A euphemism if ever there were one. Donny Whitmer was facing a little primary challenge in the same way Sandy was a little rainstorm.

“Mmm hmm, he’s one of those Tea Party assholes. Goes on and on about how he’ll never raise taxes, he’ll cut guv’ment spending, cut this, cut that, won’t compromise, won’t work with no one on nothing. Now, you know I’m a proud conservative, but we still need to be able to reach across the aisle if we want to get anything done in this town. It ain’t enough just to stick your fingers in your ears and say ‘no, no, no’ all the time. But that’s what these fellas want to do.”

Donny listened for a moment. This whole thing had to go at the right speed. He felt like he was making good progress.

“Yep, you know the type. And to make it worse, the sumbitch thumps the Bible every chance he gets. Now, I’m as God-fearin’ as the next man. And if you want to pray in school, I say go right ahead. But this sumbitch, he’s talking like he’s gonna get a cross stuck atop the Washington Monument. I don’t need to tell you, we can’t let these people take over the party. They got this social agenda and—”

The donor interrupted him with enthusiastic agreement. That was good. Donny took over where he’d left off:

“Exactly. A distraction. That’s what I always say, too. It’s a distraction. I mean, I’m not too fond of these queers marrying each other. But we got bigger problems in this country right now than whether a couple a dykes get to say ‘I do.’ ”

More listening. The guy was ranting a bit now, but ol’ Donny was going to let him. Donny strolled over to the putter and golf balls he kept stashed in the corner. He used the head of the putter to position a ball just right, then with a nice smooth stroke rolled it across the carpet toward a coffee table leg. The ball stopped just short of the leg. Damn it. Donny hated short putts.

The guy finally finished, and Donny dove in with “Well, that’s what I’m saying exactly. Guys like this, they just have no understanding of… of… the sensitivity of some of these more complex issues, especially in the financial markets.”

And then, without hesitating, without giving the guy a chance to say anything, Donny started putting the hammer down: “It’s like that rider I was able to get passed for you a few weeks ago. You remember that?”

Yes, the guy remembered that. Of course he did.

“Well, that’s just the kind of thing I’m talking about. You think that Tea Party sumbitch would do that for you?”

Subtle, Donny. Subtle. But at least it redirected the donor into talking about this, ahem, little primary threat.

“Well, it’s nothing to be too concerned about, but you never can be too careful,” Donny said. “I pay my pollster to worry about these things, and he’s doing his job, that’s for sure.”

His job. Right. Thirteen friggin’ points of a job.