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Chasten sat on the dock, watching sunlight flash across the dark ripples on their lake.
It was late in the day, so the light came in at an angle, casting long shadows. If he'd just woken up after a long rest, he'd have no way of knowing if this was dawn or dusk, or if hours or decades had passed since he fell asleep, or what direction the tradeoff between sun and moon was going. Liminality in any context attracted him, the way it could be spun one way or another. It comforted him when he was sad. It gave him a kind of freedom.
He remembered the homily at his wedding: love is found in the space between the sublime and mundane. And in every in-between place. Between the dawn and high noon. The dusk and moonlight. The start and the finish.
He wasn’t surprised to hear footsteps behind him. “Hey,” Pete said.
“Hey,” Chasten echoed.
Pete sat down beside him. He was dressed in a worn, touchable flannel to guard against mosquitos, and was carrying two beers.
“I had one earlier.” He'd had two earlier.
But Pete didn’t pull it back, so Chasten exhaled and took it. They each cracked open their bottle and drank in silence.
“I keep having a dream,” Chasten said. He was grateful that one of the luxuries of being in the sixth year of a relationship was never needing to preface his thoughts. “That we’re here on the dock, and Dad’s here, too, fishing, and there’s this kid, but they’re wearing a rain jacket, and the hood’s up, so I can never…” He trailed off. “I never see their face.”
"Mm." It was a noncommital syllable designed to hide pain.
He prodded the fresh wound in the gentlest way. “Do you ever dream,” he asked, “or think about…?”
Pete considered. He took off his sandals and dipped bare feet into the dark water. “I told you.”
“When?”
“In the documentary.”
Chasten took another sip. Waited for more.
“I said I think about parenting solely through you. I think about you being a dad. Not me.” He shrugged. "So I feel bad, obviously, but... I feel worse for you."
“I thought you were lying. When we filmed that.”
Pete's soft face turned skeptical. “Why would I lie about that?”
Chasten shrugged. “I don't know. To make me look like I had a heart.”
“You're not the one who has to prove he has a heart,” he said. “You are the heart. You are the imagination. Always have been. Always will be.” He reached out his hand. Brushed their skin together.
Chasten watched their hands, the watches they'd given each other ticking on their wrists. He wondered how many times the thin hand had to tick past twelve before he’d finally feel better, even just a little bit.
“Peter,” he said, looking down at the face of the watch, looking away from the face of his husband. “I've been thinking today. I think I need a favor from you.”
“Anything.”
His voice only wavered a little. “I need you to tell me we can’t keep doing this anymore.”
A moment of shocked silence. Then he pretended he didn't understand. “How’s that?”
Chasten took his hand back. Wiped off a tear he blinked out. He gathered himself. “The adoptions. I can’t… I can’t keep going through this...cycle of thinking it’ll happen, and getting excited, and getting attached, and getting the room ready, and thinking I know what’s going to happen, and having it about to happen, and then - ” He didn’t finish. He didn’t have to.
Pete said what he’d said half a dozen times before. “It’s been a bad month. Bad year. Just - you know what they say. It doesn't happen until it does. I know that's not - ”
Normally he’d listen to empty words, and at least try to believe them. But tonight he didn’t. “I’m serious,” he said. “I can't keep breaking my heart like this. I need you to tell me it’s okay if it never works out. Since you can’t imagine it. Sell it to me. Sell not being a dad. Because I just – fuck. I’m… I’m at the outer limit of what…” He shook his head, started over again. “I’m not strong enough to keep trying to bring love in. Balancing Washington, and the books, and work, and this, and - ”
Pete was quiet. “You were strong enough when you kept dating.”
“Barely.”
Pete grew more insistent. “But you were. You kept fighting for it, and you found me, and I am so fucking thankful. You know that. What’s the saying? You’re the liquor in our cocktails. You made everything happen.”
“Well,” Chasten said. “It was you, too.” He thought it over. “A little bit.”
“I love you,” Peter said. “Always. You know that.”
“I do know. And that’s why I’m telling you the truth. I can't do it anymore without having some kind of, I don't know, total mental breakdown. End of story.”
Pete took a moment. Took that in. Chasten didn't realize he was looking for permission until Pete said, "Then we'll stop." He swallowed. "We'll stop, and it'll be okay."
After that, they didn’t say anything for a long time. The shadows kept getting longer. The tilt of the light grew more extreme. A flock of geese flew across the water, wings flapping, throats honking. Finally they splashed down into the lake, disturbing the reflection on the ripples.
Eventually the sun set far enough that they turned into shadows of themselves. Neither of them had their phones or a flashlight. The only thing Chasten had slipped into his jeans pocket before he left the house was a lighter and a pack of cigarettes. He took out one. Lit it. Smoked it. He hadn’t had one since they'd celebrated securing the cabinet position the year before. But he’d had a feeling he’d want one tonight. And he'd been right.
“So. If kids are out of the picture, what’s the plan?” he asked, and at least he sounded much calmer than he felt.
“Professionally?”
“Yeah. There has to be something else. It has to be big.”
Pete thought about it. Chasten absentmindedly flicked the lighter, turning the flame on and off. “Well, I suppose the first step would be to toss out the timeline.”
Chasten took a deep breath. “Right,” he said, because it wasn’t wrong.
“UN Ambassador?”
Chasten cast an exasperated glance. He kept the lighter on and close enough to his face so Pete could see it.
“It would be fun,” Pete protested.
“You’re better than fun.”
“But New York penthouse, remember?”
Chasten let the lighter lapse into darkness. His scorn was audible. “The crowning achievement of your career is not going to be moving me into a penthouse, Peter. Think bigger.”
“Are there any seats you’d be interested in?”
The idea had sounded crazy when he was a kid in his twenties. Not anymore. Funny, he thought, how sometimes once you let something go, that's when it comes back to you. “Problem is, I like consulting,” he admitted. “I like it a lot. I'm good at it.”
“You are. And the money’s nice, too.”
“The money's a nice consolation prize, yes.” Chasten laid down. Crossed an arm behind his head. Looked up at the pinprick patterns in the sky. “So,” he said. “New path. Let’s game it out. ‘24. Biden and Trump. If Trump wins… Exile?”
Pete laid down next to him. Rested his head on his shoulder. “Execution?”
“Military tribunal.” He mused. “Think I could rig a military tribunal?”
“TBD,” he heard from his shoulder.
“Okay. Put a pin in that. So… If Biden wins. Balloon drops. Confetti. Etcetera.” He took another drag from the cigarette. “Maybe '24's your chance to take a swing at UN Ambassador.” He felt Pete move and quirk an eyebrow at him. He interrupted him before he had a chance to ask. “I never said I don’t want the penthouse! I’m just saying the penthouse isn't the final destination.”
That placated Pete. They both thought some more before Pete said what Chasten knew he would. “I still like Michigan governor.”
Chasten sighed. “Fair. So…without kids, what? Governor in ‘26 and ‘30. Term-limited out in ‘34. But then… Who are the national players? Kamala will be first in line for the nomination in ‘28, no matter how ‘24 goes. You really want to primary the Black woman veep you served under? What’s the narrative there? I’m open to it. I've just turned it over and over in my head and I just don’t see it.”
“I don't know,” he admitted.
“See, Gretchen's playing this smart. She’ll have a reason when she runs in ‘28. She’ll be the plucky outsider who got things done. But the timeline is trickier for you. Less clear-cut. And that’s assuming you get past the carpetbagging accusations and win the ‘26 primary. And I don't care what you think, there aren't any guarantees there.”
“I know.”
“Does Gretch like you enough to endorse you on her way out? She wouldn’t defect to McMorrow?”
“Mallory’s an...obstacle.”
“Well,” Chasten said. “I’ll work on her. Do you think we can do that? Maybe do some writing and non-profit work in the meantime? I’ll prioritize Michigan clients. Do the media training for their families. Keep building the network. Endear myself.” Even as he said it, he noticed his voice was dull. Sapped: like he was trying to convince himself. He sighed.
“Love,” Pete said.
“Mm?”
He shifted and sat up. “There’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you.” Chasten raised an eyebrow and did the same, and handed his husband the cigarette so he could steel himself.
“And?"
“Now, before I tell you, I need you to understand, I didn’t hold this back because I don’t trust you. It was because I know you’ve been sad. That's all. Okay?”
“Okay,” he said, cautious.
Pete’s voice dropped to a gravely half-whisper, as if he was afraid the trees could hear them. “When I was in the Oval last month, the President said some things I didn’t understand.”
Pete handed back the cigarette too soon. It felt like it was turning into a hot potato. Chasten took it anyway. “Like what?”
“Well, I don’t… It’s hard to describe, and I wasn’t expecting it, so it took me off guard and I don't remember exactly. But there were stretches when he didn’t make any sense at all. He was trailing off. Mixing up words…”
Chasten flashed a tense smile despite himself. “Called me Chastain again?”
Pete let out a breath of smoke. “No," he said, tone sober. "This was different. So I asked Jennifer and Gina.” Chasten raised an eyebrow again. Pete reassured him. “It was all very discreet. Nothing on the phone or in writing. We're not idiots. Apparently some of their staff has started going through the West Wing generally. Things always come back signed, but…” He shrugged.
Chasten shook his head. “No. That’s absurd. He’s been fine every time I've seen him.”
“Sure, but when was the last time you saw him on-camera and off-teleprompter?”
Well. He thought about that for a moment, then took the cigarette back.
“Maybe there’s a reason.”
“Has Kamala noticed?”
“I haven’t said anything to her. It didn’t feel right. I wondered if you could have Doug over to the apartment and ask him. Friend-to-friend. Not coworker-to-worker.”
“Sure. I can try. Doug's always talkative. Sounds like it gets lonely locked up in that Second Gentleman tower.” He noticed suddenly that he’d gone tense. He tried to relax. “It was probably just a misunderstanding with the president. A bad day. The job ages anyone.”
“Chasten.” Pete’s voice was even quieter. “He called me Beau. I think he thought I was him. For a few seconds.”
Chasten took it in. Tried to take it in. He couldn’t. “I see,” he said instead.
“I think… Maybe it cracked something in him,” Pete said. “Losing a child. And now that he’s getting older, it’s harder to hide.”
He handed the cigarette back to Chasten. Chasten answered the sudden wave of bitterness by throwing it into the lake.
They sat thinking together in the ensuing hush, broken only by the lapping of the black water beneath them and the occasional unseen splash of a fish.
Pete said it first. “Maybe you have to be cracked to get that job. Or broken completely." He hesitated. "Maybe that’s our upside.”
A question suddenly struck Chasten. “Why are you bringing this up now?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Pete said, even though he clearly did know.
“No, you know,” Chasten insisted. He was going to make him say it.
“Well, I... Don't like to say it, but I’m not sure ‘24’s a given.”
And there it is, Chasten thought. There it fucking is.
Pete kept going: “And if I'm right, and he doesn't run in '24, or can't, Kamala will need a VP. And I said we wouldn’t put little kids through a national campaign, and I stand by that, but if we don’t…”
“Right,” Chasten said. His voice grew fainter. “Holy shit. You’re right.”
“Our calendar opens up. We could help a lot of good people.”
In his current state of mind, Chasten wasn’t so sure he wanted to do that. He wasn't sure he had the strength or the desire to help good people. But – “We could hurt a lot of bad ones,” he offered. And that sounded more enticing.
“Yes. We could.”
The conversation stalled. Maybe there wasn't anything more to say.
Pete rested an arm around his shoulders. Left an affectionate kiss on his cheek. “You understand how much I love you, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“How much I want you?”
“Yes,” he said again. He tried to push everything else away. He tried to focus on the perfect kiss there on the water. A kiss with his husband, on the dock they owned, at the lake house that he had paid for with his book and his consulting work and the paycheck of the man he had elevated to the Cabinet. Isn't this more than you ever expected to have? he thought to himself. Isn't it beyond selfish to want anything more?
“The story will make sense eventually,” Pete whispered against his cheek. “You always make it make sense. I don’t care about the kids or the plan or anything else. I care about you. You’re the only one who’s real.”
“I know.”
“Say it.”
“I’m real,” he echoed.
Satisfied, Pete stood up. He picked up the two empty beer bottles with his right hand and held out his left: an invitation. “Let’s go to bed.”
*
Chasten was brushing his teeth when Lis sent the group chat a picture of her cats and a link to a youtube video. All she said in the text was “solidarity.”
He turned off his phone and spit into the sink. His eyes were leaking salt against his will, and he wasn’t in the mood to be cheered up by some pro-union cat video or whatever-the-fuck they'd just been spammed with. He only pretended to like the cat TikToks, for her sake.
He was rubbing in moisturizer when he heard a blowhard in the other room, coming across loud and tinny on Pete’s phone.
“We’re effectively run in this country, via the Democrats, via our corporate oligarchs, by a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices they’ve made, and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable, too. And it’s just a basic fact. You look at Kamala Harris, Pete Buttigieg, AOC…”
He shoved the vanity drawer shut in pique and strode into the bedroom. “Can we not?” But Pete was too engrossed to answer.
“The entire future of the Democrats is controlled by people without children. And how does it make any sense that we’ve turned our country over to people who don’t really have a direct stake in it?”
He blinked a tear out of his lash, hard, then confiscated the phone out of Pete’s hand. Pete didn’t react.
“Who’s this asshole?” he demanded. “His voice carries into the bathroom.”
“It’s me,” Pete said.
Chasten’s looked at the man on the screen. At Tucker Carlson. At Pete. Pete’s gaze was abstracted. He was inside himself, seeing something. He handed the phone back. “So you're a loudmouth bearded dick now?”
“He's me," Pete insisted again. "Fortyish. From the Rust Belt. Military man. Ivy League. Wrote a memoir about all of it. Started in the private sector. Two dogs. Two kids.” He paused. “He’s the straight me. He’s me without you.”
Chasten watched Pete watch him. He rewound the clip. They both listened again. Chasten’s eyes didn’t leave the screen, but he sat down on the mattress, beyond repulsed...beyond fascinated.
Suddenly he was thrown backward to a speech at a fundraiser, seeing his husband under bright lights. Chasten knew he'd been sweating with nerves, but the man hadn't shown a drop. If you could have offered me a pill that could make me straight, I would have swallowed it before you could give me a swig of water. It’s a hard thing to think about now. If you had shown me exactly what it was that made me gay, I would have cut it out with a knife.
“He’s you if you'd used the knife,” Chasten realized.
“Maybe,” Pete said. “If I'd used the knife, and just a few other things had been different..." He kept studying the screen. "Maybe he’s me if I never needed the knife in the first place.”
They watched again. And again. Studying the message. The messenger. The casualness of the cruelty. Thinking of everyone who it would hurt. Everyone it would haunt. The way how, in the end, their paths diverged.
Finally, mid-sentence, Pete had enough. He turned off the phone, and the bedroom was plunged into silence. When he leaned over and turned off the light, the room went dark, too.
“I have a new rule of the road,” Pete said into the darkness. “It’s vengeance.”
Chasten smiled weakly. Reached out a soft, gentle hand. Brushed it against his husband’s, in just the same way they’d brushed beside the river in South Bend all those years ago. The electricity burned hotter than it ever had before.
“Whatever plan we make, we graft him onto it.”
“We have no choice, do we?”
“No.”
"He fired the first shot."
"He did."
“Use that knife on him - ”
“Carve him - ”
“But strategically.”
“We have time to be strategic. That’s the silver lining here.”
“We have nothing but time.”
“Yes. Just you - me. No escaping us. No mercy. A coordinated, choreographed - ”
“What’s the Joyce quote - ?”
Immediately he knew: “Think you’re escaping and run into yourself - ”
Chasten finished: “Longest way round is the shortest way home.”
*
I knew a lot of guys like JD Vance when I got to Harvard. People who would say whatever they needed to get ahead... He called Trump an opioid, which is kind of a weird thing to say about a person. But I mean, for somebody whose identity is that they're connected to Appalachia, which has an opioid crisis, that really is the darkest thing you could possibly say. - Pete Buttigieg, Real Time with Bill Maher, July 20, 2024