Read Online The Candidate by Paul Harris - Free Book Online

She did not seem to mind. “No problem. You want to go for a coffee somewhere? I promise no campaign talk. I’m kind of sick of it for a moment. I haven’t met anyone in weeks who has any kind of a personal life. I thought that was kind of sad and then I realized I was one of them.” She smiled again.
    Mike looked at her for a moment. She really was pretty and the thought of spending an hour talking about anything but the campaign was alluring. Her smile broadened and she touched his arm.
    “Come on, Mike,” she said.
     
    * * *
     
    FIFTEEN MINUTES later they sat in a little diner just off Newton’s pretty town square. It was a quiet place, just a handful of tables, a paper menu encased in plastic and a threadbare carpet on the floor. A waitress poured them coffee and Lauren stretched her arms backwards reaching over her head in a manner that suggested, had she been at home, she would be kicking off her shoes.
    “So what’s the deal with you, Mike? Are you married to the campaign or do you have a wife and kids praying that Hodges loses and Daddy comes home.”
    Mike laughed. “Single as they come,” he said, but he noticed his hand was absent-mindedly tugging at his ring finger as he said the words, feeling for a band of gold that had not sat there for years. She noticed too and raised an eyebrow.
    “Divorced,” he said. “Married too young and she’s got a lot of… problems. Not her fault. She just didn’t know to cope with the hand she got dealt.”
    Lauren looked sympathetic and instead of shying away from the issue she asked to hear more. To his surprise Mike found himself opening up about Jaynie, abandoning any pretence that this was some sort of date. He talked of the recent phone calls and his desire to help her. But he explained that he could not leave this campaign. Not now. It felt good to unburden himself, like letting the steam out of a kettle that was threatening to boil. Lauren listened and long before the coffee was cold in his cup, her hand was resting on his, telling him not to worry.
    “It’s okay, Mike,” she said. “You think you’re alone in this circus. But you’re not. Everyone here is carrying their past behind them somehow, ignoring it while the campaign unfolds. Sometimes I think most of the people involved in this game are only doing it to run away from things in life. To throw themselves into causes bigger than themselves.”
    Mike had never thought of it that way. He always saw his intense attitude towards work as a savior, not an excuse. Life was a mess back in Corinth Falls. Jaynie hurtled down a path of abuse and crime and he failed to stop her. Now he thought his work filled the gap she left behind. But maybe Lauren had a point. Maybe it all just bandaged over a still bleeding wound, not actually healing it. He smiled at her and then caught a glimpse of the clock on the wall. An hour had already passed. He stood up suddenly, remembering that he needed to make his appointment at the jail. He felt his chest constrict at the thought.
    “I gotta go. Important meeting and I’m a bit late,” he said. He threw a few dollars down on the table and headed for the door. But then he stopped and turned around.
    “Thank you, Lauren,” he said. “I mean that.”
     
    * * *
     
    THE WOMAN remained as blank as the first time he saw her. Her coal eyes did not even settle on him as she was led into the interrogation room. She sat just three feet away from him across a gray expanse of desk that might as well have been a vast desert, stretching out to some unseen horizon. She seemed unreachable. The prison guard from Mike’s first visit remained in the room this time. Mike noticed the smack of the man’s lips as he chewed on gum.
    “She’s a crazy bitch, son” the guard said, as if the woman was not in the room with them, but instead still locked in her cell. “She might as well be dead.”
    Mike felt a flare of anger at the words. It was disrespectful to talk about her as if she