VELVET #1: Self-Help Tapes That Worked
But would they turn him into Andrew Jackson ... or Barack Obama?
VEVLET is a serial novel by Emily Sanders Hopkins about Donald Trump’s longtime imaginary friend.
The President’s closest advisors—his daughter Ivanka, her husband Jared, and a fat man in his late thirties named Wallace who was unknown to the public —were very pro the tapes. Had they vetted them? Yes, yes. And all he had to do was turn them on at night before he fell asleep? Exactly. Just that.
The problem was, he slept very little, usually no more than two to three hours. Nighttime was for sitting in his white robe watching TV and drinking Diet Coke from a very heavy crystal tumbler, with Velvet by his side, balanced on the arm of his chair, nearly naked, her large breasts visible through her short, diaphanous nightie. “With a joint, Marilyn Monroe acts juvenile. Very hot tits poke through flimsy petticoats.” This was the sentence the President had come up with to remember the first few U.S. Presidents in order, Washington, Adams, Jefferson, etc.
He had tricks like that for remembering things, if he wanted to, but fuck it, he rarely wanted to. It would be satisfying, of course, to shock the press one day out in the Rose Garden with his sudden encyclopedic knowledge of the name of every foreign leader, every foreign leader’s predecessor and challenger, every country name, the names of every weapons system, the name and number of every bill and law. But life is short and he had higher priorities.
OK, he would listen to the tape for a bit with the TV sound down low. He could multitask.
“You are the greatest multitasker the world has every known,” Velvet said as she uncrossed her legs and recrossed them in the other direction. It was a little difficult to balance on the arm, in heels and a nightie with so much extra material, and her back hurt her, for some reason.
“True,” he said. Who else in the free world could serve as president, give long and very well-received speeches totally off the cuff, attend hundreds of high-level meetings, keep up with the news, stay abreast of intelligence, command an army, navy, and air force, take care of a large family, stay current on Hollywood comings and goings, run a global brand, choose fabrics and tiles and other important design elements for multiple residences and hotel properties, and on top of all of that, maintain a living, breathing, miniature personal knock-out like Velvet, invisible to all but himself? Nobody, that’s who.
“Let’s give these tapes a listen,” he said.
“You are supposed to listen when you are asleep, though,” Velvet reminded him.
He shot his elbow out fast and hard, into her side. She flew off the chair and landed on the carpet with an “oof.”
“I’m sorry, Donny,” she whispered, not getting up, not stirring. He said nothing. She waited a bit for him to forget her, for his attention to turn back to the television, or to the little black octagon in his hands, “the tapes.” He fingered the octagon gently, drawing light little circles on its surface, thinking. Then he pushed the smallest blue button and the audio started:
"Every day, day after day, you know more and more about the Persian Gulf and China…”
Velvet slowly low-crawled along the thick white carpet, away from Donny and the chair. “If I can reach the other side of the bed,” she thought, “I can be out of his sight, in the dark by the bedside table. I will sleep there tonight, unless he pulls me up into the bed with him.” She pictured him pulling her up by the arm and dragging her over to him. It was love, it really was. She hoped he would pull her up to the bed with him. Maybe if she made sexy sleep noises down on the floor, he would get the idea to do it. That was, if he ever left the chair and came to bed.
She decided to stay awake by listening to the tapes. So many names and dates! So much double-crossing. So many treaties. Who were these people who had negotiated and signed treaty after treaty after treaty? Assholes. She shared Donny’s hatred of the parts of the world that were so stubbornly difficult, with layers of complication and protocol and wordiness and stupid rules. But her hatred was even more justified, because she was locked forever away from so much of the world. She would give her life to push a single piece of paper off of a table.
Although Donny didn’t snore, he did have a loud way of breathing through his nose, intermittently drawing air in sharply, when he slept. He must be asleep now, in his chair. Would he stay there the rest of the night? And would he remember any of this information from the tapes in the morning? She doubted if she would, and she was paying attention.
Continue reading the story: VELVET #2 …
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