Imprudence

The kitchen wasn’t visible from the side door of the house, but Prudence knew that her daughter was there as soon as she came in. She didn’t want to see Sonya, but she needed to pass through the kitchen to get to the rest of the house.

“You’re here,” Sonya said when she saw her. She was sitting at the table, arms crossed. “You’ve got some nerve, coming here now.”

Prudence didn’t know how to respond. “Where’s your father? I need to talk to him.”

“I don’t think he wants to talk to you,” Sonya said. Her mother’s shoulders drooped, and Sonya seemed to take pity on her. “But he’s not here, anyway.”

Prudence nodded. She started up the stairs, each step an effort. She hadn’t eaten since the story hit the news a few hours ago, and she was feeling weak. Her knees felt like they would give out any second. She needed to eat something, but not with Sonya in the kitchen, sitting there, judging her. She was feeling a bit queasy, though, anyway.

It wasn’t a surprise that Truman would have gone out. He would have found a quiet place to have a beer or ten, a bar where they showed sports, or at least not the news. The poor man. He knew, of course, how long it had been since the two of them had been intimate - but he couldn’t have expected this.

The public hadn’t foreseen the scandal any more than Truman had. Prudence was low-profile, a backbench Conservative well-liked in her rural Alberta riding but unknown otherwise. She wasn’t young or attractive; her body was lumpy and always concealed under a sedate pantsuit. No one thought twice about her sexuality. She was seen as asexual, if anything. She knew this; she had never cared.

Not knowing what else to do, Prudence sat down on her bed. She pushed her pointed-toe leather flats, the female MP’s go-to footwear, halfway off her feet, but didn’t have the energy to kick them all the way off. Bits and pieces of her conversation with the lawyer repeated in her mind. “I don’t know what you were thinking, Prudence. This really wasn’t a good idea.”

“Do you think I don’t know that?” She wasn’t sure what she had been thinking, either.

Prudence had found out at her office, when a Google alert for her name popped up. She had read the story quickly, then again slowly. Staying as calm as she could, she told her staff to go home, then called her lawyer. She had talked to him all afternoon, first getting his advice and then practicing over and over what she would say at the press conference. The call waiting had beepedincessantly, but Prudence had ignored it, talked over it. She didn’t want to think about who was calling. There were a lot of things she didn’t want to think about, at the moment.

She couldn’t help but think of the girl, the reason for all this. She called herself Chardonnay, but Prudence had never been able to think of her as such a fake name. She was a sweet girl, just doing this to put herself through school. Yet it must have been her that had gone public with the whole thing.

Prudence had been careful. She had used her own pseudonym, and told the girl she was a businesswoman. At their last meeting, though, a few careless words had slipped out. The girl had acted like it was nothing, but she was quick, Prudence knew. They had had long conversations in the hotel rooms on Prudence’s business trips, or at her house when Truman was away.

The press conference was in half an hour; Prudence needed to practice her brief statement again and then drive to the location. The conference had been the lawyer’s idea. “It’s good PR,” he‘d said. “Do it as early as possible and get it over with. Act like you’re sorry, and don’t take any questions. There’s not much you can say. We’ll think about what happens next later.”

Prudence was sorry, and she didn’t have much to say. She just hadn’t thought the girl would do this to her. She had always been so thoughtful, so affectionate. Of course, Prudence had been paying more for the “girlfriend experience.” After the first few times, the girl had offered to bill her credit card automatically. “So you won’t even have to think about it,” she had said.

Maybe after her slip, the girl had found out that Prudence had campaigned against legalizing prostitution. It would have been impossible to resist going public then, knowing that the scandal would be colossal. The girl would probably become famous, maybe be interviewed on talk shows or get a book deal; there would be money in it for her in one way or another. Prudence felt betrayed, but couldn’t muster up much anger. She couldn’t blame Chardonnay for being opportunistic.

Prudence’s life, on the other hand, would be ruined. She expected she would have to resign; that was what people did in this situation, although if she was lucky there might be a board appointment for her, or a private company that would be willing to take her on. Sonya hated her, and Truman, of course - she had never meant to hurt Truman. She had just never expected to be caught.

But Prudence had already laid about for too long. She pulled herself into a sitting position and tried to repeat the words that she had practiced on the phone with her lawyer. “I am deeply sorry. I apologize to those whom I have hurt.” She spoke in a whisper so that Sonya, downstairs, wouldn’t hear her.

She didn’t hear Truman come in. He opened the bedroom door slowly, as if he was afraid of what he might find. His face was reddened, which meant Prudence’s guess about the beer was right. She turned to him, hesitant to speak. He waited.

“I was about to leave,” she said, still in a whisper. She cleared her throat and spoke louder.“I have to do a press conference in a few minutes.”

Truman nodded solemnly. “I’ll go with you.”

They went, together, to the car.