After my brief, stolen moment with Governor C. at the charity fashion show, my life returned to its usual mundane routine. I was a nobody. Why would C. even remember me?

So when I answered my cell phone after class Monday afternoon, I was astonished to find myself on the line with C.’s assistant. Apparently, the Governor had been impressed by me and wished to meet me under better circumstances, and would I be available Friday night? I would. I was instructed not to tell anyone the Governor and I would be meeting, nor was I told where the meeting would take place.

The week passed by me as I sat through my USF classes, unable to concentrate, my entire attention on C. What should I wear? Where would we meet? Was it a date? But the biggest question I had was, why me?

Finally at eight o’clock on Friday night, I stood on the stoop of my apartment building, in a black dress pilfered from my older and more fashionable sister Fate’s closet, and held my breath in anticipation.

Suddenly, a bright light illuminated the scene, accompanied by a loud noise and gusting wind. I didn’t know what to secure first, my hair or my skirt. So I halfheartedly tried to catch both while managing to hold neither, as a shiny, black helicopter descended in front of me.

C. stepped down, wearing a white shirt and a tailored navy blue suit, looking as dashing as when I had first laid eyes on him. “I hope you don’t mind I took the chopper. I wanted to be discrete.” He laughed a little as he took in the sight of a helicopter on my lawn. “But I guess that didn’t quite work out.”

As we lifted off, C. handed me a champagne flute. “Cheers. Here’s to an enjoyable evening.” I sipped my champagne as I glanced out the window and caught a view of my apartment complex getting smaller beneath me.

We landed. Descending the mini-staircase, I saw where C. had brought me. The distinctive glass roof of the Florida Aquarium arched in front of me. “I got them to open it. Just for us,” C. whispered, holding the door for me as we entered the vast, darkened building. We were alone, except for the sleeping stingrays.

C. and I began to talk, getting to know each other as we walked through the artificial recreation of a natural wetland, our footsteps echoing down the empty corridor.

“I don’t know, I guess I always liked it,” C. mused, “being a politician. It was always something I wanted to do.” A white egret ruffled its feathers and yawned as we passed. “Ever since I was a little boy. I saw my own father run for office. I helped him by waving signs by the side of the road, and I loved it. Every minute of it. I’d watch my dad and it kind of made me think, ‘I want to do that. I want to run for office.’

“And you know, when you’re a little boy, you see the show, but you don’t see the business. So I thought it just meant going around and talking to a lot of people, which looked like fun. I didn’t realize the hard work that went along with it. It’s silly, but I thought the job of politician was just someone who shook people’s hands and asked them to vote for you.

“But I learned more, I learned the law, and I realized it was something I loved on a deeper level. I just love people, you know? I want to see them treated fairly. And if I can govern them fairly, I think I’ve done my job.” C. spoke from the heart, so unlike the pandering of most professional politicians, telling people what they wanted to hear, devoid of any real meaning or feeling. I could tell that C. meant every word, that he wasn’t just trying to win my vote.

“Anyways, that’s my rambling little speech for the evening,” he said sheepishly. “I’m probably boring you. You don’t want to hear me talk business like that.”

“No, C. It’s interesting. I care.”

He stopped. “Really?” he asked sincerely as he looked at me. “You’re the first woman who’s ever said that to me.”

He gave me a little smile, as we continued walking the maze-like halls of the Florida Aquarium. I felt at ease with C., as if I could open up to him and tell him anything. I revealed so much to him about myself, more than I could have with anyone else. I found myself telling him things I wouldn’t even tell my best friend, despite having just met him. I felt safe, comfortable, as if I had known him my whole life.

My attraction to him grew with each step we took, walking deeper and deeper into the aquarium as the pathways grew darker and darker. Never in my life had I found myself so attracted to a man. His scent. His tan. His moderate politics. I was nineteen, and I had never been this close to a man before. A real man, in every sense of the word. It stirred something inside of me that had lain dormant for so many years, something I didn’t know I could be a polite girl and still feel. He could have conquered me, all of me, right then and there. But proof he was a gentleman, he didn’t.

Finally, we found ourselves in a cavernous empty room, illuminated only by the faint aqua glow of a giant fish tank in lieu of one wall. We stood in front of the glass, the light filtering through the tank dancing in blue-green ripples against the room and playing across our skin.

“The manatees were always my favorite animal.” He was whispering. “When I’d go fishing with my dad on Sundays in the Tampa Bay, we’d almost always see at least one or two.”

I could feel the governor’s eyes on me as I watched the silvery fish swim by. We stood so close together, yet without touching. My skin prickled with delight as I felt proximity of his body. I looked up at him.

“I know they’re not as lucky as dolphins, but they’d always seem to be guiding us, blessing us. And..” He trailed off as he looked into my eyes. “And…”

And he leaned in and kissed me. Gently. On my lips. Without warning, his tan lips pressing themselves against mine.

He pulled back, worriedly gauging my reaction. I smiled. He touched his hand to my cheek and kissed me again. I relaxed into it, as if kissing the 51-year-old governor of my home state was completely natural. He was incredibly good at it, and I found him to be very not gay.

”I can’t believe I’m making out with the governor!” I thought.

“Believe it,” C. said.

I was amazed that we were already so in tune with each other that he could read my thoughts, until I realized, embarrassingly, that I had been thinking out loud.

“I can’t believe it either,” C. said. “That I’m kissing someone as beautiful as you.” He looked at me and bit his lower lip. “Pretty good first date, huh?”

I nodded.

And we continued to kiss underneath the menagerie of silvery fish.

Stay tuned for the next chapter of the satirical romance novel, The Governor’s Mistress, by Heidi Lux. Missed the last installment? Read it here.

Artwork by Alex Doroin: escapetomars@hotmail.com

By Heidi Lux

I did not go seeking my scandalous affair with Governor C., it found me. 

The first time I met C. was on a freezing cold February evening. The temperature had fallen to an unbelievably low 68 degrees, and I was forced to wear a t-shirt due to the extreme temperature. Fate, my older sister, had dragged me, reluctantly, along with her to a charity fashion show she was modeling in at the Vinoy in St. Petersburg.

It was a half hour drive from our apartment in Tampa. If I had known the way things were going to turn out, would I have still crossed the Howard Frankland, or would I have paused and reconsidered when I reached West Shore Plaza, stopping in the mall for some window shopping at BCBG before heading back to my mundane middle class life? I cannot honestly say whether the Destiny St. Clair I was then would have been so bold as to willingly embark upon the life I have since lived, but as I reflect now, I’m glad it all happened.

The evening’s charity was an eating disorder clinic. The ballroom was filled with socialites and models as skinny as the bulimic girls who would receive their tax-deductible generosity, throwing money at a problem they would never admit they might suffer from themselves, and a horde of local bigwigs were on hand to lend their support and publicly demonstrate their lack of superficiality for everyone else’s sake, and perhaps go home with a model or two.

I knew my way around The Vinoy; some of the beauty pageants Fate had competed in as a child had been held there, and since my mother never wanted to leave me sitting alone in the house, I would always be brought along, and would wind up being an extra hand in Fate’s preparations. Tonight was no different.  As I sat backstage helping Fate glue her false eyelashes, I overheard some of the other models gossiping.

“Yeah, right, he’s here checking out the ‘models’. I don’t buy it for a second. He’d be more interested in what we’re wearing than us!”

“Governor C. is so gay. Did you see how hot his staff is?”

I was pretty sure she was referring to his aides, so I cut in. “But he’s a Republican, and Republican men are usually better-looking. They’re so clean-cut.”

The model turned to me, annoyed by my intrusion. “His seem to be especially gorgeous, as if chosen for their good looks, and not their politics.”

“But that doesn’t mean that he’s gay.”

She took a deep breath, than explained to me as if I was a child, “Unmarried men in their fifties are either womanizers or gay.”

“But what if he’s neither? Maybe he’s just too busy to have a personal life.”

“You can’t be in here if you’re not a model,” she said with passive aggressive anger.  “You have freckles. You have to get out.” I shook my head as I made my way out the nearest exit.

I grabbed an unsatisfying small appetizer off a tray — a shrimp and phyllo dough Thai/Greek fusion spring roll, and popped it in my mouth as I headed upstairs to the mezzanine to get away from the crowd and noise.

When I wandered into the darkened corridor, I noticed one of the doors was open, letting in the cool air from the outdoors. I opened the heavy glass door further and slipped outdoors, unnoticed.  I cringed as the unbearably frigid temperatures hit me. It was barely beach weather! I leaned against a railing and stared out at the bay before me, feeling the biting breeze against my flesh. I shivered.

As I looked down at the bustling Vinoy entrance beneath me, I was suddenly aware of a presence to my left, the two of us separated only by a large stone plant holder between us.  I leaned forward, a stealthy attempt to find out who it was.

Governor C.

There he stood in a crisp white shirt, tall hand handsome, thick, dark eyebrows curled on his furrowed brow as he stared out at the boats resting in the bay, lost in thought. His silver hair sparkled in the dappled moonlight as a few strands of hair blew in the light breeze.

It was a private moment for someone who was never left alone.  He had escaped from the party, and his obligatory public appearance, and I did not want to disturb his one stolen, tranquil moment.

As I started to turn back, leaving the Governor undisturbed, my knee collided with the plant holder, and a faint pained gasp inadvertently escaped my lips. C. looked up. I had broken his trance.  He looked at me, and I trembled, and then a faint smile spread across his face, intrigued by this rogue redhead who chose to stand alone outside despite the glamorous fashion inside.

“You must be as bored as I am,” he said.

I nodded, and smiled a little, relieved he wouldn’t behead me. He leaned against the railing.

“What’s your name.”

“Destiny. Destiny St. Clair.”

I expected him to laugh at my unusual name, as most people did. I couldn’t help it if my mother was poetic with her name choices. But he didn’t laugh. He just smiled, and said, “It’s nice to meet you, Miss St. Clair,” in a sophisticated purr.

Suddenly, I was overwhelmed with feeling. It must have been his charm, a charm I suppose all great politicians posses. At that moment, I was girlishly, giddily in love with him, as if he were a movie star. Our eyes met. His brown gazing into my green, and I felt a connection, as if I had known him from a past life.

Realizing he could see me staring at him, I looked down and away, awkwardly, then muttered the first words that came to my lips.

“Unmarried men in their fifties are either womanizers or gay. Which one are you?”

“Neither, Miss St. Clair, I am neither. Merely a civil servant.” And then I sensed a pang of loneliness from him. A term full of lonely nights spent alone.

Just then a handsome, clean-cut assistant stepped outside. “There you are, Governor C. I’ve been looking all over for you. You have to make a statement for the St. Petersburg Times.”

“I’ll see you around,” C. said as he disappeared through the doorway. Even though he promised it, I doubted I ever would see him again, not in person. I would watch him on TV and remember the moment I had shared with him at The Vinoy, but it would never be more than that, a moment. Or so I thought. Little did I know I was about to receive a phone call that would change my life forever….

Stay tuned for the next chapter of the satirical romance novel, The Governor’s Mistress, by Heidi Lux. Missed the last installment? Read it here.

Artwork by Alex Doroin: escapetomars@hotmail.com