Page 33 of Campaign Season
Chapter
Four
Halloween
Candace was grateful for a couple of days off from campaigning before the final push to Election Day. Halloween falling on a Saturday felt like a small mercy, especially since a president’s schedule rarely obeyed a Monday-to-Friday rhythm. Washington slowed on weekends, and the White House followed suit—slightly. Most weekends, she savored long mornings with Jameson, Cooper, and Pearl in the Solarium, or, in warmer months, by the pool. But this morning, she’d been granted something rarer still: solitude.
Pearl had returned to Schoharie for two weeks to help Laura, while Jonah alternated visits with Marianne to check in on Jonathan. Cooper had gone to Alex and Cassidy’s, eager to help Mackenzie prepare for her self-declared “Haunted Halloween House Party.” Jameson was shut away in her downstairs office, working on some surprise Candace thought best not to question.
She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had more than a fleeting moment completely to herself—no phone buzzing, no aide knocking on her door, no family member peeking into the kitchen. The quiet made the coffee taste better. Or maybe it wassimply the chance to sip it without her thoughts racing ahead to the next obligation. Countless issues still sat waiting on her desk, and more hovered in her mind. But she pushed them aside this morning, letting herself drift instead toward memories: her school years and the first time Jonathan Fletcher asked her on a date.
They’d grown up in the same neighborhood, even attended the same schools, but it wasn’t until college that friendship ripened into something more. Candace smiled into her mug, recalling Jonathan—so sure of himself in his senior year at Cornell—teaching her to throw darts in a cramped dive bar off campus. He’d stood behind her, his hand guiding her wrist, the scent of cheap beer and too much cologne clinging to the moment like a permanent stamp.
“Loosen your grip,” he’d teased. “You’re strangling the dart.”
The warmth of the coffee matched the warmth of the memory. Those had been simpler days—before careers and politics, before children and the weight of expectations turned their lives into something more complicated.
Jonathan had been the first to introduce her to what he called “real” beer, scoffing at the canned light stuff as “glorified water.” He’d ordered her a Heineken on tap, insisting it was worth every penny. Eventually, she acquired a taste for it, just as she’d acquired a taste for his company.
Leaning back in her chair, Candace tilted her face into the sunlight streaming through the window. It felt strange remembering who they’d been back then—before lovers, before spouses, before the burdens of ambition and loss carved lines into both their lives.
There was a time when even the thought of Jonathan left her hollow. Their separation hadn’t been marked by slammed doors or shouted accusations but by a silence heavy enough to fill every room. She remembered staring at her phone, wondering how tobridge the gap between them. So many things had carved the valley between them: lipstick smudges on his collars, the small white casket they had stood beside in the rain, and the truth she knew about herself that she had tried to deny. For years, they exchanged polite smiles that never reached their eyes and engaged in conversations that skimmed the surface like stones skipping across water.
The thaw between them had been slow: a shared laugh over a memory, a real conversation during a college visit weekend. Gradually, the edges softened. And then Jameson completed the bridge between them, reshaping what seemed impossible. They built a new friendship that respected their past while embracing the present.
Now, with Jonathan’s illness shadowing every day, those old memories pressed more insistently at the edges of her mind. The dartboard, the Heineken, the crooked grin—all of it felt both painfully close and impossibly far. She could almost hear his voice, teasing her about her grip on the dart or coaxing her into one more game before she went back to study.
Candace set her coffee down and rubbed her temples. It wasn’t regret she felt—it was a strange mix of gratitude and grief. Gratitude that time had allowed them to salvage their friendship from the wreckage of their marriage, and grief that the man who had once stood firmly beside her was now slipping away.
A breeze stirred the curtain at her side, lifting the fabric like a reminder that nothing ever stays still. For a woman who had built her life on control—on measured responses, deliberate choices—that truth still had the power to shake her. She thought about the small white casket, about the years of silence, and about the laughter that had returned slowly, fragile as glass.
And she thought about Jameson. Jameson, who had walked into her life carrying neither expectations nor judgment, only love. Jameson, who had somehow made space for all of it—forthe past, for the pain, for the pieces of Candace that even she struggled to hold.
Candace closed her eyes, letting the sunlight warm her face, and whispered to herself, “One day at a time.”
The floorboard creaked outside the Solarium. Candace didn’t move, still cradling her mug, the steam brushing her cheek like a quiet ghost of memory. Then the door eased open, and Jameson stepped in.
Candace blinked once—and then burst out laughing.
Jameson stood framed in the doorway, swallowed head to toe in a ridiculous shade of green, her costume unmistakable: a giant Hungry Hippo. The oversized mouth of the game’s character bobbed a little as she tilted her head, her grin peeking out from beneath the foam contraption.
“Oh my God,” Candace wheezed, setting her coffee aside before she spilled it. “Please tell me you’re not serious.”
“Dead serious,” Jameson said, shuffling forward and striking a pose like she was modeling couture. “Melanie said she wanted something the kids would appreciate. They all love Hungry Hippos. So…” She spread her arms wide. “Here we are.”
“We?” Candace asked, trying to catch her breath between giggles.
“Michelle is blue. Melanie is orange. That leaves me.” Jameson gave a mock bow. “Your very dignified First Lady of Green.”
Candace pressed her fingers to her lips, laughter spilling out again. “Oh, Jameson…”
“Don’t act like you don’t love it. Besides, it’s not much different from your turtle pajamas.” Jameson crossed the room, the foam bumping lightly against the edge of a chair. “And here’s the best part—we still need a yellow hippo. Any chance you’re free tonight, Madam President?”
Candace shook her head, still laughing, tears prickling the corners of her eyes. “Absolutely not. Though I have to admit… you wear it well.”
Jameson leaned down and kissed her forehead, the ridiculous snout of the costume bumping her hair. “Are you sure? Not hungry?” she asked, the mouth of the costume bobbing again.
Candace slipped an arm around her waist and pulled her close. “You are insane.”
