The Day of the Donald (25 page)

“W
here does it end?” Jimmie said.

Trump squinted. “Where does what end?”

“The trail of bodies . . . the thirst for power. Where does it all end?”

“I’ll tell you where it ends,” Trump said. “It ends with me on top of the world. I don’t care if the world is a nuclear wasteland. You ever see
Mad Max?
Not the girl one, but the good one. The one with Mel Gibson. That’s going to be me.”

Jimmie wasn’t buying it. “Cool story, bro.”

“You don’t think I have it in me?”

“You’d never let the world slip into chaos—all your money would be worthless. Anarchy is the enemy of the ruling class.”

“Okay, you got me,” Trump said. “You’re learning a lot about politics. I’m almost impressed.
Almost
.”

The president pulled his gun out of his jacket holster. If the Secret Service were around, they would probably have flipped out. But Trump had apparently given them the slip. Even the Navy SEALs were absent. Only his top two henchmen had the pleasure of joining him on Mission: Clean Up the Loose Ends.

“Lester’s recordings,” Jimmie spat out.

Trump gave him a quizzical look.

“I made a backup of Lester’s recordings,” Jimmie said.

“Don’t ever play poker,” Trump said. “You’ve got a terrible poker face. Worst I’ve ever seen. And I’ve played against Anne Hathaway.”

“Look me in my eyes and tell me I’m lying.”

Trump narrowed his eyes at him. Dark-orange crevices formed on the president’s brow. “Where’s the backup?”

“Up my ass,” Jimmie said with glee.

Trump slapped him. “Don’t screw with me. Where is it?”

“On a Hello Kitty flash drive, up my butt. I’d need someone’s help to get it out.”

There was only one way for them to check whether or not he was lying, and that was to untie him from the pillar and give him an unlicensed prostate exam. Once they untied him, however, he’d find a way to slap the gun out of someone’s hand. Then he’d save the goddamn day. Check. Mate.

“It’s in your butt, huh?” Trump said. “Then you’re going to be buried with it. That was easy.”

Mission
not
accomplished.

“Not that it would matter,” Trump said. “Haven’t you figured it out by now? There’s literally nothing I can say that will actually hurt me. It’s just ‘the Donald saying what he thinks.’ It’s just ‘the Donald telling it like it is.’ If you published them as a book, you’d hit number one on the
Times
best-seller list.”

“Telling it like it is?” Jimmie said. “That’s just another way of saying you call people names. You’re just . . . being shitty.”

Trump nodded. “I’ll let you in on the secret: All these yahoos out there in flyover country don’t
want
to be fat and poor with
crappy jobs in towns with no live theatre. That’s the hand they were dealt, and they’re frustrated. Their lives are shitty, and they want to take it out on someone.

“Used to be, you could be shitty to the blacks. Then somebody said,
Oh, no, we can’t be shitty to the blacks anymore
. Then we were shitty to Kardashians and somebody flipped out about that too. The real problem in this country is the PC police. Who do they think they are, trying to guilt-trip us over wanting to exercise our God-given American right to be shitty to people who are different than we are? It’s been bottled up for too long—you can taste it in the air when it’s released.

“So when people see me saying the stuff out loud that they can only scream at their TVs? I’m their hero. I’m living the new American dream, Jimmie: being an asshole and getting away with it. And if I can do it, maybe they can do it too.”

Jimmie gaped at Trump. “That’s crazy.”

“No, the Republican establishment was crazy for ignoring such a huge sector of angry registered voters. Millions of pissed off, frustrated people just waiting to be mobilized. The other Republican candidates acted like they were too good for them. Not me, my friend. Know your market. Maximize your options. That’s from the expanded edition of the number-one best-selling book of all time,
Trump: The Art of the Deal
.”

“I know,” said Jimmie. “It took me six full boxes of crayons, but I finally made it through the damn thing.”

“So you know the first rule: Think big. Did you ever stop to ask yourself why I chose Lester Dorset as my ghostwriter? Why would I invite one of my harshest critics into the White House?”

“To neuter him,” Jimmie said.

“Wrong. I didn’t want to neuter him—quite the contrary. When no one in the intelligence community could pin down the blue-cap threat, I decided to throw a little chum into the water.

“Dorset jumped at the chance to spend time with a sitting president. We gave him the same deal we gave you. He could follow me around and whatever, but he didn’t seem as interested in that as in the interview sessions. The beauty of it was I just had to be myself in the interviews. I think he believed that ‘the Donald’ was this persona. A TV character. That in private, I’d tone things down. Instead, I put a little extra polish on my bon mots, just for him. You should have seen him! His eyes lit up like a kid on Christmas morning every time I said something that offended him. It was only a matter of time before he started telling his libtard friends about the killer quotes I was giving him. I just had to sit back and wait.

“After a couple of months, the sharks started circling. The Socialist Justice Warriors. Before we could reel them in, though, Kitty Cat over here throws our bait right off the goddamn roof! We should have just pinned Lester’s death on her right then and there.”

“Why didn’t you?” Jimmie asked. “It would have been easy, especially if you had the surveillance video.”

“Then we would have had to explain why the Secret Service shot him, and it would have opened a whole barrel of monkeys. No thanks. Christie thought it was best to forget about the whole thing. Hang onto what we knew for the time being, in case we needed to put pressure on the
Daily Blabber
. The bigger problem was that we couldn’t find the recorder. I thought we’d have to start all the way over with you and string you along the
same way to draw these social justice clowns in. I didn’t count on you being so strangely . . . competent.

“I told Emma we should go for another
New York Times
liberal patsy, but she insisted you were a better choice. Now I know why—she was trying to undermine me. She wanted someone who wouldn’t get involved in the politics. Someone who would stay in their lane. How wrong she was.”

“So you didn’t know she was a spy?”

“No idea! When I mentioned a ‘leak,’ I was just trying to make you dance a little. See if it wouldn’t help stir up the resistance into making a move. Which Cat here was willing to assist with by acting as bait, once we let her know that
we
knew where she’d been that night with Lester. And I was right—I always am.” The president pointed his gun at Jimmie’s head. “But if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a show to watch. I hear tonight that the dragon chick is finally gonna bang Tyrion. Too bad you won’t be alive to see it.”

Jimmie closed his eyes. Before he could recant his atheism once more, he heard the clang of metal on the floor. He opened one eye. Christie had Trump in a bear hug from behind. The gun was lying on the floor at Trump’s feet. Lewandowski was pounding away at Christie with the butt of his rifle, trying to get the former New Jersey governor to release the president. It was like watching the panda fight all over again.

Christie lowered a shoulder and twisted, rolling Trump onto the ground. Lewandowski fell forward, slamming the butt of his gun accidentally into Trump’s face and impaling himself on the knife attached to the barrel.

The president uttered a string of expletives that would have gotten a lesser politician impeached. Christie slammed
the president’s head into the ground with his ginormous paw. Trump slumped over onto the lifeless body of his press secretary.

Christie pulled a switchblade from his pocket and sliced the ropes binding Jimmie in one swift motion.

“Why are you helping me?” Jimmie said. “I led the Socialist Justice Warriors right into Trump’s tiny hands.”

“You’re a good guy,” Christie said. “But you’re dumb as shit. This was never about the Democrats or Republicans for me—or, God help me, the Clintons and Bushes. I deserved that VP slot, not that pretty-boy ball-licker. I was biding my time until the right dirt showed up on Trump. I don’t know what’s on these interview tapes, but if everybody wants it, it must be pretty important.”

“There’s nothing on them! Weren’t you listening?” Jimmie said with a sigh. “Don’t you get it?”

“No,
you
don’t get it,” Christie said. “Bend over and spread those skinny cheeks so I can get my hands on that Hello Kitty flash drive—”

Christie’s eyes went wide. He toppled forward, and Jimmie crashed to the ground underneath the janitor’s massive girth. Jimmie fought for air. He hadn’t come this close to the end game to be smothered to death by a Dallas Cowboys fan. Jimmie summoned the power to roll Christie off of him just enough to slide out.

A machete was buried deep in Christie’s back.

Jimmie snatched up the switchblade and spun around, looking for the assassin. The hallowed halls of the Lincoln Monument were empty of lurkers, though. He was the last man standing. Lincoln’s somber visage stared across the carnage, disapproving but unable to do anything about it.

A closer look at the machete revealed an inscription, which read, “PROPERTY OF CARLY FIORINA.” Apparently the former Hewlett-Packard CEO was cutting more than jobs now.

Jimmie’s eyes flicked back to where Ted Cruz had been tied up. There was a pile of cut rope at the base of the pillar . . . and a deflated orca. Cruz and his oddball running mate Fiorina had absconded together, apparently. One of them had saved Jimmie from Christie, though, and he owed that person a debt of gratitude. Or possibly not. Maybe they could just call it even. Yeah, that sounded about right.

Jimmie limped over to Cat, who was just waking up. Sure, she’d planned to kill him. But she’d been acting on Trump’s orders. At least that’s what he told himself as he cut her free.

She fell into his arms. Her eyes fluttered open.

“I tried to kill you,” she said.

“You weren’t going to do it. I could tell all along, you weren’t going to go through with it.”

“I was, though. I had no reservations about—”

Jimmie placed a finger on her lips. “Shhhhh. You’ve been hit in the head pretty hard. Definitely a concussion. You don’t know what you’re saying.”

“I was choked out,” she said. “I never hit my head. I—”

“See? You don’t even remember it. We’d better get you an MRI. Do you have a phone on you? I’ll call the hospital—”

“You can use my helicopter,” Trump interrupted. He was staggering toward them with Fiorina’s bloody machete in one hand. “Except we won’t be going to the hospital. I’ll be taking you both to the morgue.”

J
immie lowered Cat to the ground and stood guard in front of her. He waved the switchblade at Trump.

“Mine’s bigger,” the president said, pointing the blood-smeared tip of the machete at Jimmie, who had to admit that he was right. Trump had a full foot-long on him. But there was more to sword fighting than size. He hoped.

“Your janitor is dead,” Jimmie said. “How do you expect to clean all this up?”

“I could just drop a bomb on this whole area. Wipe away the evidence with the push of a button. Wipe away DC with the push of a button.”

“A nuke.”

“It’s actually not a button, did you know that?” Trump said. “All this talk in the campaign from people saying, ‘Do we really want Trump’s finger on the button?’ And it’s not a button! There are codes, there’s a key. No button.”

“You wouldn’t do it.”

Trump shook his head. “Not in a million years. But it’s a nice thought. I prefer to keep my hands clean of dirty business like this . . . but you knew that I couldn’t help myself from getting personally involved. Especially with the stakes. I had Corey tail you on Friday, when you left to see your ex. Using
a microphone hidden in a salt shaker, he was able to listen to your entire conversation. He made a game-time decision to cut Emma from the game.

“Then he followed you back to the White House,” Trump continued, “and you’ll never guess what kind of trouble he saw you get up to.”

Jimmie gulped.

“It was then that I decided you were a nuisance. I told the Navy SEALs I wanted you dead or alive. I specifically said,
If he accidentally gets shot in the face, it wouldn’t be any sweat off my sack
. I show up at the museum, and there you are—still standing! Who knew that the Human Hiroshima had a code of honor? I left SEAL Team Sixty-Nine at home tonight. Some things are too big to trust others to do. If you want something done right . . .”

“You do it yourself,” Jimmie finished. “Rule twelve, right?”

The switchblade trembled in Jimmie’s hand as he backed up. He felt cold stone with his other palm. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Cat crawling toward the gun that Trump had dropped. Was she going to use it on Trump . . . or on Jimmie? He would have to take his chances. And to do that, he was going to need to keep Trump talking.

“If you wouldn’t drop a nuke on your own country,” Jimmie said, stalling, “I’m going to guess you wouldn’t risk starting World War III with the UK.”

“You know, we kicked their ass twice—once in seventeen-whatever, then again in eighteen-whatever. It wouldn’t be too hard to do it again. Usually, if you set up a best-of-three series and win the first two, you scrap the third one. Internal polling suggests the American people are all for it, though. But don’t worry: I’m not going to war with England. I’m going to buy them out. It’s a merger.”

“The British people would never go for that.”

Trump nodded. “Hence the threat of war. That’s why they call it a hostile takeover. The queen won’t get her bony ass off the throne. She’s sitting on a gold mine of cash and jewels, which certain members of the royal family can’t wait to get their hands on.”

“Prince Charles?”

“That pussy? Puh-lease. Think further down the line, Jimmie,” Trump said. “We’re moving our ships into place as we speak. Before any shots are fired, England is going to wave the white flag. Great Britain and America are going to become one united country again: Great America. I’m going to be president still, of course. The Brits can keep their silly royal family. However, my first act will be to force the queen to hand her crown over . . . to Kate.”

“Kate Middleton?”

Trump nodded. “We struck a deal. The prime minister and Parliament are in her pocket. The whole country loves her and her royal spawn. We ran into a minor snag with Hillary and Jeb!’s rebel alliance. Kate found out from British intelligence, who must have gotten word of it from Emma. Kate got cold feet—she said she’d call the deal off if I didn’t clean up my own house. A hard body who plays hardball. I like her. Got a coupla kids, but she’s a solid ten.”

Jimmie shook his head. “Great America.
That’s
what you meant by making America great again?”

“We’re reshaping the world, Jimmie,” Trump said. “Great America is going to be top dog. With England back in the fold, we’re going to get a piece of that European economy—which will be incredibly strong, once we sell off Greece to the
Palestinians. Putin was going to bite off a piece of the European Union from the other side . . . but with him out of the way, Russia’s no longer a player. If anyone wants to take us on for the title of biggest, baddest superpower, go for it. It’d be like showing up to a gun fight with a knife.”

“Or a knife fight with a gun,” Cat said, shooting the machete out of Trump’s hand. It clattered to the ground several yards away. “Put your tiny hands above your head, Mr. President.”

“Or what? You’re going to shoot me?” Trump said, advancing toward her. “I was right about you illegals—just a bunch of murderers and—”

Another shot rang out, echoing through the monument’s halls. At first, Jimmie thought she had missed Trump entirely. Then he noticed the tufts of wispy blond hair floating to the ground like cherry blossom leaves. She’d blown a hole the size of a fist in his famously unflappable mane. Trump held his palms out, desperately trying to catch the clumps of hair as they fell. He dropped to his hands and knees and began frantically scooping the rest into a pile.