Crossing Borders: A Continental Love Story
By William Monette
“…while President Obama and the new Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, have met only once, their chemistry seems to have ushered in a renewal of a cooperative relationship…” – Gregory Korte, USA Today, March 10, 2016
Justin Trudeau, his long flowing locks wet with sweat, enters the oval office, as Barack Obama—standing by the moonlit window in sweats—ponders the rose garden, and the fate of the troubled world.
“Barack,” Justin says, “I need you.”
Obama, strong and proud and freedom loving, rips off his American-made Hanes muscle shirt, and shows off his once proud abdominals, which are now buried under a layer of age and stress and worry and parental laziness.
“I know Justin, I know.”
They embrace, the sweat from their suits still fresh on their photogenic bodies. They kiss, and hug, and dream of the babies they kissed, and the awkward cross-national jokes they made during that morning’s press conference.
“Thank you for the dinner,” Justin says, as he remembers that he is the first Prime Minister to have a White House dinner thrown in his honor since the 1990s, when Justin was still blessed with a set of rigorous pecs and less dyed curls.
“It was my pleasure,” Barack says, as he runs his palm down Justin’s strangely hairless midsection. “You’ve been working out,” he says.
“What about our Sophie and Michelle?” Justin asks. But he knows this is foolish, since their wives’ romance blossomed, in photos and in reality, just as fervently and as passionately as his and Barack’s did. For the women looked lovely, strong, and proud in their sleeveless dresses of silk as soft as Barack and Justin’s mutual touches, here, alone before the window looking out from the romantic, circular womb of the oval office, into the wide, spectacular green of the lawn, beneath the starless, romantic skyline.
“I think everyone knows,” Barack says, “I was hugging you, in all the photos, while Michelle and Sophie hugged one another. This is destiny.”
They fall upon the floor, spread on the wings of the eagle on the presidential seal. Fireworks rise up outside. They are red, white, and blue…
“Hey,” Justin moans, “why not my colors?”
“Because,” Barack pants, “America comes first.”
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William Monette is an MFA in Fiction candidate at Columbia University. He is from Dearborn Heights, Michigan and currently resides in New York City.
