Retrograde

Lying is much easier without your face at the forefront.

“What do you mean they know?” The rhythmic clapping of the crowd and patriotic chanting has me screaming in a whisper trying to make sure I heard Eid correctly.

“I mean they know about us. About you. The whole room was torn apart. The Floppy, the tapes, all of it. Gone. I’m taking Mary and the kids to Retrograde. Do the same.”

“Retro…what? Three days to the election and you’re just bailing?”

“There’s no way out of this, B. Mary's tired. My kids deserve to know who their dad really is. They’re all fucked in the head from me on tv versus me at home. We did all we could.”

I can keep my posture composed, but my eyes slowly close, “It’s just The Floppy…maybe some tapes? Voters are clueless, they might not know wha—“

“They knew exactly where to look. It’s like they were in our heads. They probably know where to find everything. They’ve gotten close before. Now they got it all.”

There were more than a couple times it felt like fate itself willed us through the probability of being exposed.

“I mean Jesus, we would’ve been screwed if the Belmont CEO hadn’t had that accident. Or the photos from the Kentucky Affair hadn’t got to The Journal.”

“I still have no clue how those came out.”

“Me either. But our time is done. History will remember it, you should be proud, but they won. And you know what they’re capable of. Let's go. Now.”

“Sir, nine minutes to call. Ten minutes to entrance. Eid, what the hell are you doing back here?”

Jess was a true believer. And a hard worker. But she fell for everything I put before her. She wasn’t that bright. That’s why I hired her. My movement depended on people like her.

“Just giving our man a pep talk.”

“Well get to the spin room and stay there.”

“Yes ma’am.” Eid stared at me and I knew he was waiting to see if I would follow him out.

“Thanks, Jess.” I acknowledged her without breaking eye contact with him.

Eid shakes his head and backs away, “I’m sorry, B,” in a moment my only friend was gone.

Between hammering heartbeats, I mull over which path to walk. Delivering the speech just prolongs the inevitable. Meeting Eid at Retrograde guarantees a beer and a cigarette in my hand by noon tomorrow.

I can feel the cancer in my hands. It’s nice.

I shift my gaze to the crowd to more easily rationalize the horror on my face. And conveniently allow myself to look for threats. I can’t trust the Secret Service team. Too easily bought. Though they would probably send someone to end it in front of the world. On stage. Make a statement. I can’t go out there.

There’s a woman in the front row wearing a “Wilson-Sicks” t-shirt. She looks like Mom. All the women here look like Mom. I miss Mom.

Signs like “Brooks Not Crooks” and AI images of me wrestling Gorillas, Sharks, and oligarchs make me look like some mythological savior. But me and every other powerful person are the same as them. Except they’re desperate for a deity. And we’re desperate for immortality.

The room is spinning so fast. How did I even get here? I remember the genesis. Seeing them pack children into vans in handcuffs while the easily impressed half of our country cheered. The anger from that moment is still here somewhere, but the idea of perpetuating this lie in the name of my morality is nauseating. I just can’t do this anymore.

My decision may have been made already. Everyone is suddenly consumed with their phones. Tugging on each other, surely combing through the decades worth of evidence spelling out that I am in fact the opposite of everything I’ve claimed to be.

Recordings. Lobbyists. News organizations laughing at the very people here to see me tonight. Plotting how the cattle would be persuaded to turn on the fowl.

“S-sir,” I heard the quiver in her voice before I see Jessica with her phone open in her hand, “4…minutes.”

I say nothing. In her I see nothing. Just one of many who fell for all this greed in the first place. It was the easily manipulated; the manically ignorant, privileged scum like her that forced me to live this lie. She’s useless in her own right, no one here was worth more than the whole.

We stare at each other before she backs away from me. Never breaking eye contact. Pathetic puddles pooled around her pupils. She fears me. She should. I am the monster I told them to fear. The monster they made me become.

My toes curl. Neck rolls. Face relaxes. It’s been…arduous. Gaining the trust of the ignorant. Convincing them not to eat the poisoned apple just so they can watch others starve.

I looked again at the woman in the front row. Tears dried. Mouth no longer agape. She wears only panic.

The inevitable jeers have begun. I can’t help but dream of the little spot where Eid will be by noon tomorrow. A cigarette will be nice.

My watch says two minutes to call. Jessica always gives me a minute by minute update in the last five before a rally. She’s nowhere to be seen.

In a way, I’ll miss her.

The public tightrope has officially snapped. I look at her in the front row again; she’s now joined the crowd in my admonition. Fist shaking, words cursing all that I was and am. Or who she thought I was. Some amalgamation of what I have presented to the world, and the truth of myself.

Watch says one minute to call. It’s now or never. The allure of release from my contrived existence is enticing. So close to freedom I can taste the Marlboro already.

The boos have morphed into a hive of anger and desire for violence. These people; whose fear and insecurity I have gleaned into hope and optimism; now feel only betrayal and hatred. She’s taken off her shirt with my name and is launching it onto the stage. In her blank white tank she looks more like mom than ever. She looks vulnerable. Again.

Why can’t they see who is truly deserving of their disdain. Those who I have infiltrated and betrayed for them; not me who has been fighting with them. Not me.

Is there still me?

The despicable things I’ve said behind closed doors; the rhetoric of division, and scarcity that I’ve lauded time and time again for years has gotten us closer to unity and surplus than protests or exposés ever could. I thought the lying was a byproduct of the liberation I sought. Now it’s more of me than the ideal.

But who else could do what I’ve done? Maybe in the right context the truth could spell victory.

“Ladies and gentlemen, please stay calm. Do not throw objects onto the stage. Anyone who violates this order will be detained.”

Trash is flying from all parts of the arena. I’ll have 30 seconds at most to earn their trust before riot ensues.

The security guards are in the crowd dragging people away as others fight to free them. Scuffles are breaking out. Riot is imminent. All for me.

“Now introducing; the next president of the United States,” curses of my name and cries of betrayal drown out Jessica’s defeated voice, “Brooks… Wilson.”

Looking at Mom in the front row, it’s clear now. Who I was before is dead. If deceit has made my bed. Then in it I’ll lay.

“Sorry Eid.” I whispered it so quietly I wasn’t even sure the words came out of my mouth before I walked out onto the stage.

30 seconds. Rings around my thoughts in the walk to the island on the stage.

“My fellow Americans,” I say to louder and louder dissent.

Even if it was all true, what gave them the right to turn on me?

Their impotence was their fault. It took my sacrifice to bring them here; to the doorstep of their own autonomy. They, selfishly, were only doing what they truly thought was best for their families and themselves.

Animals.

They have forced my hand. To plant the seed of revolution. Now they would hang me from it?

I hate them. And that hatred I can no longer contain.

“MY FELLOW AMERICANS!”

Cathartic.

But a bit much.

I still need them.

Swine.

20 seconds.

“I have just been briefed on the publishing of information that betrays the very foundation of our mission. It is a dissembling of all that you have worked and fought to achieve in this election.”

The crowd is a mosaic at the tip of my brush; faces of anger, faces of confusion, faces of grief.

10 seconds.

“I’m here to tell you… it is ALL. A lie.”

I wonder what Eid is thinking. I’m sorry, too old friend.

“For years I have told you that the other side and their greed would stop at nothing to seize our assault on their reign of power. Well, today. Today we see what they resort to when they realize that our eyes are open!”

Her face now resembles intrigue. I can see glimmers of hope returning one by one.

“They tried to silence us, then they tried to defeat us. Now, they’re only option; is to divide us. You. Can. Not. Let. Them.”

Sparse exclamations of agreement. Murmurs of “no” as they toil with what their eyes see but their hearts don’t want to believe.

“They count you as suckers, but I know who you are. I know your true power. And in the face of our final challenge, we will fight. And with me leading your charge. We will WIN!”

The eruption of their roar of submission nearly floors me. Creating emotions takes years. Manipulating them takes only knowing no one wants to be a fool. People will always believe a lie that makes them feel like they’re right. I’d feel proud if they weren’t so embarrassingly predictable.

Over the next 30 minutes I remind them of the same distrust I created in the build up to the election. Some think it is other countries, others think it the other party, some think it the relics of their own party’s past. It doesn’t matter. All I had to do was convince the masses it was them. And that I: am one of us.

“God Bless you all. And May God Bless the recapturing of our great country!”

The ground shakes and for a moment I’m worried about the integrity of the foundation of the building, but I know lives lost from a fallen upper deck will only further cement my immortality. A sacrifice I am willing to make.

Normally I would go into the front row and shake hands, but for some reason a new member of my security rushed me into the armored limousine.

“Jesus, was it that bad?” I joked in the warm silence of an unusually empty transport.

I check my phone. No texts from Eid. The exhaustion forces my eyes closed but the peace is nice. He must be really pissed. I’m too tired to care. One day we’ll get to Retrograde. When we’ve earned it.

This silence is welcome but deafening considering the circumstances. Normally the debrief of my security detail would’ve begun by now.

A quick open and close of the door prompts my eyes open to a very large, very bald man. His eyes so close together and nose so spearing my first thought is I need a bigger boat.

“Well,” he says with a calm Australian accent, “hello, Mr. Wilson.”

And a harpoon.

His motion in his jacket pocket is slow and rehearsed. He flashes a Polaroid and throws it onto my lap.

It’s Eid and his family. The photo’s taken from their backyard while they’re eating dinner. Time stamp last night.

“You fucks.”

His eyebrows raise and his pompous smirk demeans me.

“It’s nothing personal, mate.” like a priest giving last rites.

“What did you do to them?”

“Your lad and his family are just fine. Just give us the wheel of your little ship.”

“And you’re what…? The Aussie Illuminati?”

He chuckles.

“We’re the resistance, mate,” he says tossing another photo—this one from inside Eid’s house, “just not yours.”