Page 1 of Bi-Partisan

Chapter 1

Jamie

Song: Numb Little Bug – Em Behihold

“Jamie, what the fuck are you still doing here?”

The sound of my best friend and communication director’s voice from the doorway to my tiny private office has me nearly jumping out of my seat. My head snaps up, and it takes a few slow blinks for my eyes to adjust to the relative darkness of the rest of my office compared to the bright lamplight I’d been reading under. Once they do, I see Mina leaning against the freshly painted white door jamb, her arms crossed over her black long-sleeved jumpsuit.

“I thought you left to get dinner with Chloe,” I say.

“I did. Three hours ago.”

“Shit, really?”

It’s only Tuesday, and we weren’t in session today, so in theory, I should probably be home by now. But since it was a light day, I thought I’d take the opportunity to catch up. Between the seemingly endless commitments and responsibilities that go along with being a congressman, I’m almost always behind. But I didn’t mean to stay this late.

She clicks her tongue, then flips on the overhead light. I press the heels of my hands into my eyes and let out a soft whine at the sudden assault.

“Yeah, I was on my way home and had a sneaking suspicion you might still be here, so I checked your location,” she says, pushing off the door frame to come closer. “And I’m glad I did because, honey, you look awful.”

“Gee, thanks,” I deadpan as she drops into the worn leather armchair across from my desk. “You do realize adding ‘honey’ to something doesn’t automatically make an insult sound nicer, right?”

Mina rolls her eyes and kicks her heeled feet up on the corner of my desk—one of the only places not covered in papers, legal pads, and open books. “I wasn’t aiming for nice. I was going for tough love. Seriously, have you even moved since I left?”

My face pulls into a grimace. I honestly can’t remember, but seeing as I didn’t realize how long it’s been since Mina and the rest of the office went home, it’s safe to say I haven’t. And now that I’m not in focus mode, I’m starting to feel it. My neck is stiff, my eyes are dry, and there’s a dull burning in my chest—although that last one is probably more due to the slightly cold coffee that I had at 4:00 p.m. than me not moving from my desk for over three hours. It’s that or the fact that I had to basically inhale my lunch while walking between committee meetings today. Both are surefire ways to set off my acid reflux—something that feels like I’m way too young to have at barely twenty-eight. My doctor suspects that it might be gastroesophageal reflux disease, or GERD, which is becoming increasingly common amongst people in their twenties. Still, I can’t help but feel about ten years older when I need to pop an antacid before eating Italian or anything fried.

“I’ll take that as a no. What even is all of this?” She gestures at the clutter on my desk, then drops her feet back to the navy blue carpet and leans forward to pluck the bound document I was reading off the top. “Is this the environmental bill again? I thought this was basically closed out.”

“It was, but Johnson’s team made some ‘minor grammatical tweaks’,” I say, putting air quotes around it, “again, even though this is supposed to be introduced Thursday. So now, I’m going through the whole thing with a fine-tooth comb to make sure he didn’t try to slip something in at the last second. I swear, that guy thinks that just because I’m in my first term that I’m naïve or an idiot. I don’t even know why he approached me to cosponsor this bill with him if he was just going to try to steam roll over me. But he has another thing coming because I’m not a—”

“Pushover,” she finishes for me. “Yes, yes, I’ve heard the Johnson rant. I’ve heard almost all of your rants because you’ve been doing a lot of that recently. And do you know why that is? Because you haven’t taken a fucking break.”

I’m usually better at managing it, but as much as I hate admitting it, the stress of the last few weeks has been getting to me. I knew being in Congress would be a demanding job. Working as a policy writer for the governor of North Carolina gave me a glimpse at how fast-paced a career in politics can be. But I thrive in high-pressure situations, so I thought I could handle it. And I have been handling it pretty well, I think, given that this is my first term. I feel like I’m finally doing real good for my community and have managed to maintain a semblance of a work/life balance. Okay, maybe not a balance in the traditional sense, but I make time to see my parents for dinner at least once whenever I’m back in my district, spend at least twenty minutes outside every day when the weather isn’t shitty, and listen to non work-related audiobooks on my drives to and from North Carolina. The thing is, maintaining even that small of a balance is infinitely harder when you throw in a re-election campaign.

“You’re taking on too much. Like this—” she waves around the bill before tossing it back onto my desk. “Why are you taking the time out of your day to look for changes that might not even be there instead of passing it off to Ben to figure it out? He’s your chief of staff. It’s his job to make sure things like this get done—and done by one of at least five other people in this office that aren’t you,” she says with a pointed look.

“Ben was in a meeting,” I say, although it’s a flimsy excuse. In all reality, I could have given it to Riley in Ben’s absence. As staff assistant, she’s basically his right-hand woman. This office wouldn’t run without her, so she would have figured it out. But I didn’t even think about asking her to deal with it for me.

I just jumped headfirst into doing it myself because that’s what I do when my stress levels are through the roof. My perfectionist and controlling tendencies rear their ugly head, and I take on too much. And based on the narrowed look Mina is giving me, she knows that too.

I expect her to call me out on it. Instead, she asks, “You were planning to go back down to Cary this weekend, right?”

“Yeah, I need to meet with some potential campaign donors.” Which is the last thing I want to do right now. It’s my least favorite part of being a politician—practically begging people for money so I can continue to do my job instead of actually doing the fucking job. But every time I have to do it, I hear Ben’s voice in my head telling me to “grit my teeth” because it’s a “necessary evil.”

“Send Andrea or someone else from the campaign to do it. Tell them to make up some reason for you to need to stay in Washington. Because, honestly, you look exhausted, which, as your press secretary, is not the image you want to project to potential donors.”

“But—”

“No. No buts,” she says firmly. “I realize that technically you’re my boss, but I’m putting my foot down. You need to make time for yourself, otherwise you’re going to burn out. Actually, I’m worried you’re already burnt out. You’ve been going non-stop since your birthday—which, if you didn’t realize, is the last time I saw you outside this office or Ben’s dining room to work on the campaign. That was October, and it’s nearly February.”

Shit, is that really the last time I did something other than work? No, that can’t be right. “Wait, we went out for your birthday, didn’t we?”

“We did, but you and Ben talked about the campaign in the corner for a solid forty-five minutes, so I’m not counting it.”

“I didn’t realize you could hear us.” I sigh and shove a hand through my hair. “Fuck, I’ve been bad at being a friend, haven’t I? I’m sorry. I’ll be better.”

“Of course that’s what you take away from this,” she says, leveling an unamused look at me. “I’m not mad, Jamie, and you haven’t been bad about being a friend, just bad at being a human. You desperately need some self care at, like, the most basic level. You need a proper meal, some sleep, and to think about something other than work or the election.”

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