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Chapter Text

James Buchanan saw double. He liked most things about his body: he was strong and broad-shouldered, and he had a handsome face in certain respects, or so people kindly said. Even his hair, now graying, was doing so elegantly: his puffy locks stayed in and turned silver, saving him from looking like a half-bald old man, without even the old-fashioned fallback of a curly wig. There's no worse dilemma: to look like either a grandfather or a magistrate. But Buchanan was handsome, apart from the eyes.

He could hide it, almost, by tilting his head, but he always felt that itch of self-consciousness when someone's face got close to his: they were looking at his eyes. One went in one direction, the other in the other. All the bifocals in the world couldn't fix that (a glass eye could, if he scooped one of them out, but he had only briefly ever entertained the notion). That had been one of the problems with Anne: a man should stare deep into his lady's eyes, and find love and affection there. But looking into her eyes only made him feel like she was staring at him. She had been a nice girl, but he couldn't relax around her as he could with a lover. He could knit his brows and force together the two overlapping images of his vision, bringing things into perfect focus. But it gave him headaches; he quickly started refusing to do it for Anne, and surely she knew what that meant.

He felt a pang of guilt, thinking these things, with poor Anne dead in her coffin of a broken heart. Might she have been happy enough with him? And he with her? It was impossible to imagine. Two overlapping pictures.

William and Anne. North and South. In old age, James Buchanan could feel still feel himself being torn in half.

~~~~~~

Even after Anne, there was a time when the world felt whole.

~~~~~~

The best thing that ever happened to Buchanan was coming to Washington. When he came to Harrisburg, to serve in the Pennsylvania House, he thought that was the best thing that would happen to him. But now it was second, and mainly because it had allowed him to come to Washington.

Because before he came to Washington, before he came to Harrisburg, he had lived out in the country, deep in Pennsylvania where the old Quakers and Mennonite preachers were tougher than the birch. Apart from his own brothers amd his mother there'd been no one much around who wasn't a stern old zealot. The city had been a breath of fresh air.

In Harrisburg he could drink, and dance, and talk about law and politics with clever young lawyers. But Harrisburg had nothing on Washington, D.C.

Washington was positively soaked in whiskey and good company. Back in those days, the heady '20s when there were hardly even parties yet apart from the fun kind, Washington was a town full of friends - potential and actual. By the '40s they were calling those days the "Era of Good Feelings", but that said more about the '40s than anything.

There was something else in Washington that he'd seen little of in backwards Pennsylvania: holding drinks and driving carriages, tending stoves at every party and peering through window shades when you galloped past, Washington was full of slaves. Slaves made good roast turkeys, and slavery made some people very angry (as a sputtering and intolerable Mr. Adams made painfully clear after buttonholing him at an otherwise rowdy mixer). But as far as he minded, slaves were another thing like strong drink and fast dancing: stern-eyed Quakers might not approve, but there was more than enough to go around in Virginia.

Those were exciting days. In James's mind, his riotous days in the '20s were inseparable from two figures - two men - in particular.

The first was General Andrew Jackson. Tall and high-browed and quick as a badger to the claw, Old Hickory was already a legend to James when he arrived in Washington. Who couldn't love that steely general, who had held the line in New Orleans against the redcoats thirsting for conquest? They had come back for plunder, and Andrew Jackson had licked them right back.

In person, he was even more magnetic. You had heard he was a hero, but when he slashed his cane right past your nose and thumped you on the back you were sure of it. Here was a man who could do anything, anything that needed to be done. And James was happy to work with him, not only for all those reasons but for one more: it was obvious that General Jackson was headed for power.

In 1824 James did his damnedest to win the race for Jackson, cornering men in the cloakrooms before Clay could get to them. But there was the problem: Clay did get to them, and that choir-boy scoundrel Adams (pure northern ice, and a lecturer like his father) stole the presidency from under Jackson's nose. After that, politically, the '20s were a time of real darkness. John Quincy Adams, stern-eyed ice floe of a president, loomed over Washington, and amongst the loyal friends of Jackson they were already plotting their king's return.

But politics wasn't everything, back in those days. It wasn't even close to everything. As much as Jackson towered, he wasn't the sun and moon to James Buchanan all on his own. There was another man who characterized this period for James, one who really was deserving of that celestial honor.

That man was the Honorable William King.

Representatives in the House, for formal purposes, sat together by state. So from where he sat in Pennsylvania, when roll was called, James could just about make out the half-moon sliver of William King's small, handsome face, leaning back lazily from the very middle of Alabama. If he could, he would've stared into that milk-white face for hours, that handsome brow.

Alabama...

When James and William Rufus King were formally introduced, at one of Mrs. Brockhurst's famous socials, he had feigned surprise.

"Alabama? I would never have imagined they made men as handsome as you in Alabama," he said, tilting his head to bring his eyes as close together as possible. It hurt, but nothing could really pain him right now, swirling a drink with William Rufus King.

William laughed, a slow, honeyed laugh, and when he spoke it was in the sweetest drawl. "Perhaps I should be hurt you say so. I think Alabama is the beautifulest place in the world -- although maybe you would say the same thing for Pennsylvania. By my lights, the wind blows nowhere sweeter than on a field of sugar beets in the Alabama sun."

James blushed. "I wouldn't say a thing like that about Pennsylvania. As far as I'm concerned it's all oat-fed preachers who would steal the rye from your lips if they caught you in a place like this. Honest folk - but honest folk can't dance," he said, smirking as best he could while listing his head so drastically to the side.

Mr. King just gently shook his head. "The preachers in my country know right from wrong sure as you and me, and by my lights there's no sin in gin; you can write that down. But I reckon your soul grows more on a plantation - reading the bible, learning and reaping the fruits of your land," he said, and he trailed off for a moment. James was desparate for him to go on; they way he swallowed those a's and i's in his sweet drawl was enough to make James's heart flutter right out of his chest.

Someone struck up a waltz, although fully half the room was too drunk to dance, possibly including James himself. A handsome girl came up and offered her hand; James shook his head, trying not to let his aching eye dislodge where William could see it.

"Two steps together, til we break for partners?" William asked, and James could only grin. He grabbed the man's hands.

One-two

One-two

One-two

and on and on, forever...

Chapter Text

The way that the Honorable William King described Alabama, it sounded to James like a heaven on earth. Pennsylvania was cold, and austere, and men had to break their backs all year to live through the winter. Washington was warm, and everything flowed like honey. In the South, William said, in Alabama, it was hotter, and the sweat just poured out of your skin on some summer days; in the South, the winter was just a vapor. And the sugar beets that grew in the slaying heat were worth their weight in silver, so every man was as rich as he could make himself; and the best families could sit inside and study while their land was farmed.

That was freedom. And this was freedom - it all made sense. Heaven is the heat, and mud, and drinking. Oppression was the lash of dark cities, and the stern eyes of watchful Quakers, and the frost.

He had tried to explain to William what Pennsylvania was like, but it was all so far away, and they were here, in Washington; where the swamp bred sparkling flies, and, after years of abominable disappointment, General Jackson would finally rule. Andrew Jackson had been elected president.

That made 1828 an exciting year. James and William got absolutely stinking drunk at James's house the day that the result was known; they had whiskey after whiskey and then lay together on the gray sedan, touching each other, enjoying the night... everything seemed perfect. They could do whatever they wanted. James let his eye roll back as William sprawled across him, straddled him on the floor. There were no Quakers here. Andrew Jackson was president.

~~~~~~

That was four years. It was an ecstatic time. The Whig newspapers (or whatever those moldy journalists were calling themselves at the time) said that at Andrew Jackson's inauguration, the mob had run down the White House doors, drunk themselves into a stupor and smashed Washington's china against the once-clean floors. In point of fact, James was at that party, and it was nothing of the sort.

But God, it kind of felt like it, didn't it? In later years, James Buchanan decided that those four years of President Jackson's first term were the happiest years of his life.

Because life was fun in Washington. With Jackson in the White House, James could get up in the House and fight for him day after day. A soldier of General Jackson! And by night he could go out, and charm his colleagues and the Senators and the secretaries and everyone's wives, making himself talk of the town by flaunting his love for Jackson, and by standing entirely too long by the punch bowl where he could demand the attention of the room.

And he danced with William. They could hold their faces close, then spin apart and link up with someone's sisters, make their way back and forth, eventually link arms again, and often enough, at the end of the night, they went home in the same carriage.

Maybe somebody talked. James secretly suspected that it was one of the slaves, but he never felt like bringing it up. Surely William had heard the whispers too, the snide names people called them. Jackson, he heard whispered at a drinking party, from Mr. Clinton to Mr. Gerald. President Jackson had called James Buchanan a "Nancy" - hardly kind. But who was Jackson kind to? Politics, he told himself, was about loyalty, not friendship.

And James had all the friendship he needed, from his dearest friend, sweet honeysuckle William King. That had nothing to do with politics at all.

~~~~~~

Politics went on, and Andrew Jackson was re-elected. He was America's favorite general.

There was a certain sense in which James was victim of his own success. He had become close to Jackson, politically, and was positioned well in the spring of 1833 to benefit from the General's famous generosity of patronage.

James Buchanan was named Minister to the Empire of Russia.

"Russia is in the far north," William teased him, one night, lying next to him on James's downy bed. "I thought you didn't like the cold."

James shivered. "I don't. If it was up to me I would follow you home to Alabama, you know that," he said, giving his friend a little squeeze. William smiled just a little bit.

"I am not as Jacksonian as you, dear James, though I'd thank you not to say it past that door. But I understand this is a grand opportunity. You may fete the crowned heads of Europe!" (There were words that sounded funny coming from William's Alabama lips.)

"I don't set off tomorrow," James said.

"I know," said William, touching his chest. "But you do set off."

It was true.

~~~~~

Russia was cold. Russians drank, which was a happy surprise, and James found ample opportunity to practice his previously-abominable French. God only knew, after how he embarassed himself at their banquets, what the Russians thought of Americans.

But the Tsar favored him, and the women paid him undue attention because of his novelty. He didn't pay much attention to anyone, other than the Ministers and the Tsar, and the owner of the stinking tavern he could stagger to in the middle of the night.

Vodka was warm, but Russia was very, very cold, and the cold was lonely. James Buchanan drank, and at night he dreamed of Alabama.

That was a year and a half. Later, he would come to bitterly regret how he had wasted those eighteen months thawing open his eyelids while William King was still alive, half the world away, lonely for more than a long year save their letters. But they did write letters, and they were restless spirits; they thought that they would live forever.

When James came back, they moved in together.

Chapter Text

It was nearly imperceptible at first, but somehow, politics became less fun. The year-long break from normal politics -- in which James had only to worry about letters from Washington, and how to understand a drunk Russian colonel's muddled attempts at speaking French -- may well have magnified his sense of the difference. And James was in the Senate now, closer to William, which should have made things easier.

But it was different. They all got older, and Jackson started limping more noticeably, which seemed an especially pathetic sight -- although he'd duel the fool who'd bring it up to his face.

But Jackson passed, as presidents do, and Van Buren rewarded Buchanan well but it felt like -- well, this was silly. But it felt like the magic was leaving Washington.

You could feel it at the parties, especially. People were just less sociable. One would think -- this was a point that William made to him, and it was exceptionally well-taken -- that men would start to split themselves apart, Democrats from Whigs, or Federalists, whatever they were calling themselves. That was the logical way to divide up a dinner party. But a subtle rift was opening up, in parallel with that one, and eventually much stronger. At parties, the men would cling together, Northerners on one side of the room and Southerners on the other.

It was an awkward position, and one that got more awkward over time. The turning point (Buchanan would later decide) was when President Harrison died. William Harrison was a drum-banging general in Jackson's mold, and even though he was a Whig, James was an admitted fan. His campaign set all of Washington in a tizzy, and when he gave his inaugural address James and William bundled up for the uncharacteristically cold day and waddled out to see the skipping and jumping old man deliver his speech.

Cold. That should have been an omen. Barely a month later, William Henry Harrison died. The doctors reckoned that he had frozen to death, caught pneumonia from from the freezing wind at his inauguration.

It was always the cold.

Tall, sallow, imperious John Tyler became the president. That was how the '40s really started. Something about that long-faced old dog just set people in mind of hate.

James and William were still the closest friends, and they held each other close under the covers as the deep snows fell outside. But fall they did.

The two of them would stand together at parties, far away from James's fellow Pennsylvanians. Here was a new word: "doughface". Not appearances - James still had his rugged good looks, or so the society women told him, when they'd all been drinking. No, a man of doughy allegiances. A northerner, in league with the South.

In some kind of league.

The world was changing. And their careers were going places. With Harrison, and now Tyler in the White House, that meant the Democratic nomination was up for grabs, and James Buchanan was a distinguished Senator. He spoke to the right people, tilting his head more aggressively than he ever did in casual talk -- as if to prove to them that he could look good in a photograph. Van Buren, who was back with a vengeance, was seen imitating the head locked into a leftward tilt. Har de har har.

The bitter cold won out. It was clear Buchanan was no match for Van Buren, and he bowed out. Just as well. And then Polk got it anyway, pulled the rug from under him. James could stay in Washington, drinking whiskeys and cracking peanuts and going home to William every night. Congressional duties, consisting largely of cursing out that rotten old nut John Q. Adams, were hardly a burden. Far from it. Roasting walnuts (of a similar shape to Mr. Adams, no coincidence), he and William traded belly laughs about it. Parties were quieter, chillier, and everyone's flame burns lower as they age.

But they were still happy.

~~~~~~

Then, 1844 gave them one more president worth celebrating. They drank a few toasts, more merry than ecstatic.

"One man of the South for another, and this one is even a Democrat!" William said, as they clinked their glasses. A sign of the times, maybe. To think of things like that. James would often wonder, in later years, exactly what William would say if he saw everything that followed, or if they had been together for more of it. William was a real Southern gentleman; maybe he would've understood.

But the Democrats were in charge again, praise be, and William became the Minister to France and James became the Secretary of State and for even longer than before, they were far apart.

James would regret this too, but on the other horn, who could really pass up the opportunity to serve in France? Now there were crowned heads. When James read William's letters from Paris, he couldn't help but imagine his dear friend's sweet, earthy tones serenading the noblemen of France. He smiled, half laughing, half happy for William. Sweet William, always of Alabama.

So they served for years, and sent each other letters and saw each other when they could in Washington, once William had returned. By that time, 1848, when William came back, the end was very near. But neither of them knew it.

1848. Another general, but this one ancient, decrepit, pigheaded. Zachary Taylor. Scarcely two years later he died, too.

Things were falling apart.

~~~~~~

So, 1844 was the last election James and William celebrated together. In one way, this was for a happy reason: in 1852, William King was on the ticket.

When James got word from Baltimore that William had been selected to run for vice president, it seemed for a moment almost surreal. When William came back, they hugged, and laughed, and swilled some whiskey, and in the dark in the townhouse they kissed each other. James was incredibly happy for his friend.

That night, almost at midnight, William Rufus King shook his friend awake. The room was lit by feeble gaslight.

James blinked the sleep from his eyes. "What's the matter, Wil?" he asked.

William shuddered. "I- I- I-" he seemed at a loss for words, something this smooth-tongued Southern gentleman never was. James suddenly felt awkward; they had never had a conversation quite like this before. Not under these circumstances.

"What is it?" he asked, hesitantly.

"I- I don't rightly know, James. I keep waking up in cold sweats. We're Senators, that's one thing. But even to be the vice president... they killed Taylor, didn't they? That was our fellows, but what if their fellows get me next?"

James smiled softly and put his head on William's slender shoulder. "They would have to get through Pierce, first," he said.

William laughed. In their minds' eye the two of them could see it: handsome, baby-faced Pierce, with his floppy curls. Impervious to death.

They talked a little bit longer, laying in bed, and then they fell asleep, holding each other against the cold.

The next day, Will left Washington to campaign, and James was all alone.

~~~~~~

The Pierce/King ticket won, but William never came back to Washington. In a letter, James learned that Will had come very ill; the doctors told him that he had tuberculosis.

On the day he should have been in Washington, to be inaugurated, William was far away. In Cuba.

In a letter, he wrote:

"On one occasion I believe I told you that Alabama is the most beautiful place in the world. This I know no longer to be true. For not only have I known your embrace, and the little townhouse where we have spent so many years, but Alabama does not even rank second because I have been to Cuba, too. Oh, how I wish I was not so ill, that I could stand up and walk among the blossoming flowers. This seems a wonderful place to wait out this sickness. I may see you again, and I most fervently, ardently hope that I do.

Forever, your dearest and most loving friend,

W. R. K."

A week later, James Buchanan received the news that William Rufus King had died.

Chapter Text

Here is something James Buchanan knew: that William Rufus King, vice president-elect of the United States, was dead.

Here is something James Buchanan didn't know: that there was a reason Franklin Pierce, young and handsome and gregarious president-elect, appeared so haggard and broken when he took the oath of office. That the reason was that on a train ride from Boston just two months earlier, the train car he and his wife and little son were riding in derailed, rolling off the tracks down a steep hill. That there was only one fatality. That they found their little son's body in the wreckage, his head caved in and nearly separated from his body.

Here is something James Buchanan would soon find out: that the world can always get worse.

That the depressed and sleepless Franklin Pierce would allow the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which would trigger a vote in Kansas over the question of slavery. That this election would be carried out by an undemocratic process, of voters slaughtering each other like animals to reduce the other side's numbers. That Kansas would bleed.

That long-bearded Mormons with seven wives would take up arms against the US Army in the desert they named Zion.

That the Quakers would be afraid.

Here is something James Buchanan would see: His fellow Senator Charles Sumner beaten to a bloody pulp by Senator Preston Brooks on the floor of the Senate. The rest of the Senate looking on. The end of the world in Washington he knew.

James Buchanan would remember a feeling. Something not being fun anymore. Even that feeling would be beyond him now.

Eventually he ran for president, in 1856. One more doughface, to heal our wounds.

His opponent, Charles Fremont, was, in James's view, a free-loving miscegenating northerner who intended to destroy the South. Somewhere in the world of stern eyes and long beards and many wives and cold cities, they wanted to destroy Alabama. James Buchanan roared.

The world roared back. He barely bothered to bring his eyes together anymore; it hurt, and there was nobody to look at. He still tilted his head, out of habit, when he spoke. In Republican newspapers it was reported that this tilt was because he had tried to hang himself to death.

Here's something that was not important: The truth of that accusation. In fairness, Fremont was not as much a free-lover as the Democrats described him. In fairness, Fremont cared about the matter of freeing slaves.

The Republicans would not win this time. James Buchanan prevailed. James Buchanan took the oath of office under black clouds, in the freezing cold.

For four years, James Buchanan ruled.

~~~~~~

Here is something you may not know: That James Buchanan is the only American president who served his entire term a bachelor.

Here is something you may have guessed: That since the spring of 1853, James Buchanan had taken much, much less pleasure in the word "bachelor".

When the world collapses, the last place you should be is rattling around in an empty house, alone with your thoughts.

The last thing you should be doing is drinking.

In 1859, a radical abolitionist attacked an armory in western Virginia, attempting to seize weapons with which to arm slaves to rise up against their masters.

Here is something we do not know: When, if ever, James Buchanan realized that Alabama would not be saved.

Chapter Text

In 1861, Abraham Lincoln arrived in Washington, D.C. Several Southern states had already left the Union. It is reported that when they met, James said this: "Sir, if you are as happy in entering the White House as I shall feel on returning to Wheatland, you are a happy man indeed."

James Buchanan was not happy. At home, in Wheatland, he took to drinking; the kind of drinking which one does alone, not at a party. He spent his time defending himself in newspapers; no effect of these efforts on his reputation was ever evident. He died in 1868.

His nieces, having read some of the letters between himself and William King, ordered virtually all of them to be burned.