Everyone except the older candidate, Sen. Penfield, raised their hand. He was well into his eighties, and in that split second, he hesitated. The crowd booed.
Fletcher cringed and Dot shook her head.
The debate rolled along with questions about health care, climate change, jobs, artificial intelligence, and trade. After an hour, the moderators went to a commercial break, noting they’d cover education, immigration, and foreign policy in the second half.
The candidates scrambled off the stage for the five-minute break. For the Win’s volunteers kept a close eye on them all, trying to anticipate their needs. Dot and Fletcher scanned the greenroom to make sure everything went smoothly.
Governor Cal Ashby raced to the men’s restroom, beating Senator Penfield in some sort of bladder power move, and then took his sweet time in there.
“Unbelievable!” Penfield yelled. He pounded on the door, knowing exactly what his much younger opponent was up to.
Mary distracted the senator by offering him the snack-size bag of the Skittles he’d requested. He funneled several pieces into his mouth straight from the bag and chewed grumpily.
The tech bro, Theo Maddox, stood in a corner scrolling through his phone, checking his site’s engagement. Dot offered him a bottle of water, which he took but didn’t thank her for. He downed it in one go. “‘Thirsty’ described him in more ways than one,” she thought.
Rushing into the greenroom, Mayor Grant grabbed his phone, checked his messages, and angrily placed a call. When someone picked up, he started yelling, unaware he was still mic’d and his words were playing over the speakers in the debate hall. He was cursing someone out for not getting his signs in the crowd shots.
“My own mother sent me a message saying no one in her assisted living facility could see my signs!” he ranted. “What in the hell do I pay you for?”
Kitty ran into the greenroom from the auditorium, frantically waving her arms and pointing at Mayor Grant. “Hot mic!” Kitty yelled, and Fletcher, quick to catch on, leapt over a sofa and muffled the mic on Grant’s lapel.
“What in the actual...” Mayor Grant cursed at Fletcher.
“Your mic is still hot... sir.”
Embarrassed, the mayor yanked off the mic and tried to hold his head high, smoothing down his suit as he stomped away.
In the meantime, Harper overcame her shyness and approached the young governor of Kentucky, Ramsey Stone.
“Governor, may I introduce myself?” Harper put out her hand, and he shook it.
“Please do. I could use someone to talk to.”
After just a couple of minutes, Harper came away impressed. “He’s got his act together,” she told Dot.
“Good to know. I heard the donors really like governors in general. They have a lot more experience than congressional members. And they don’t have that D.C. stink.”
“At least not yet,” Harper said.
In the meantime, Kitty sought out Lucy Lopez.
Lopez was under forty and striking. Slim with long black hair, she rocked a red lip and would raise her eyebrows and give a sharp nod of her chin to make her points. She was so different from the older yet more experienced candidates the Democrats had been saddled with, despite the party’s efforts to move them into retirement.
The young state senator wasn’t married and kept her love life to herself. She had two small Havanese dogs that filled her social media and gained her a lot of followers. She carried herself well, her excellent posture the result of years of competitive Latin dancing. She was a natural in front of the camera, speaking from the heart and without notes.
Her dad was an immigrant from Cuba, and her mom had moved from Puerto Rico to Georgia with her parents when she was a girl. Her father had spent his career in the military and her mom had raised their three children while working as a hotel maid.
Two months before the debate, she’d gone viral for a speech about how Democrats needed to get it together or they’d never win again. Her major issue was education. She thought it was criminal that kids in public schools weren’t learning to read or write at grade level but being passed along anyway.
“We are robbing children of their future. It will beourfault when they lose confidence in themselves and don’t see any opportunity to succeed. Are you willing to be guilty of that? To take away their chance of achieving the American dream? I ask you!” and then, in her signature stage whisper, “I ask you.”
Kitty had picked up on Lopez’s growing popularity. She had early on sent a note to the entire FTW team. “Lopez has potential. People are falling in love. And she’s not afraid to take on one of the Democrats’ sacred cows, the teachers’ unions.”
Lopez didn’t come across as a left-wing Democrat or a squishy moderate. She was independent-minded and blunt when telling the truth. Her authenticity was part of her appeal. Add that to her being a party outsider, a Latina renegade, and she had a shot to appeal to the sliver of independents they’d need to win the election.
Chapter 22
At the end of the break the debate audience found their seats and a bell rang signaling one minute until they were back on air. The volunteers herded the candidates back to the stage. But their older New England senator, Virgil Penfield, was missing.