One agency I really wanted to see get better was FEMA. I had been trying over the past few years to beef it up. It might have been a dumping ground at the top for political operatives in need of a job, but a lot of the people at the lower levels were quite dedicated. I had been pushing since 2001 for realistic and large scale exercises and disaster training. I remembered back during my first trip, FEMA had been sucked willy-nilly into Homeland Security, and it hadn't done well there. One thing that Homeland Security had done was imbue everything it touched with antiterrorism. They no longer practiced for routine disasters like tornadoes or floods or earthquakes. Everything became terrorism related disasters, like nuclear drills, chemical attacks, biological attacks, and such. Never mind that none of that ever happened, and that we were hit with natural disasters on a routine basis. FEMA didn't worry about those.
Well, this time around we didn't have a Department of Homeland Security. FEMA's main focus was still natural disasters, and I had hammered both Joe Allbaugh and Michael Brown, the heads of the agency. Allbaugh was leaving after the inauguration, and Brown was taking over, and I was stressing the need to handle disasters proactively. There was a really good reason for that. In seven months the largest natural disaster in U.S. history would be barreling straight for the Big Easy. Hurricane Katrina was coming, and it would not be pretty.
In April, however, my life turned upside down. It was a Friday night, and the twins were with us, having come over from College Park. Charlie was between races, and he was at the house in Hereford.
The girls were now juniors, and had selected majors. Molly had told us she wanted engineering, and had settled on mechanical engineering, which was my father's field. Holly had bounced around a bit on the science side, first going with physics, then over to chemistry (like I had once been in another lifetime), and then switching back to physics. Molly was planning on staying at College Park for a fifth year and getting a masters degree, but Holly would be moving on to get a doctorate somewhere else. We were both pretty proud of them. They weren't straight A students anymore, but still had GPAs that put them on the Dean's List and probably had them graduating with some sort of honors.
Regardless, the phone rang in the Residence and a Secret Service agent announced that we had a visitor, Buckman Tusk. "Send him on up!", I told him. Bucky and the Tusks were on the list of approved 'whenever' guests. To Marilyn, sitting next to me in her lounger, I said, "Bucky's here. I wonder what he's up to." She simply gave me a curious look.
There was a knock on the door a moment later, and I stood and opened it. I could see one of the agents standing post, and Bucky was at the door, so I let him in. "Well, look what the cat dragged in! How you doing, Bucky?" Bucky was wearing riding leathers and carrying a helmet, so he must have ridden his bike down.
"Good, Uncle Carl, real good. How are you and Aunt Marilyn?"
"I'm doing fine. Come on in. You can ask Marilyn herself." I pointed him towards the living room.
"Hi, Bucky come on in.", my wife called out. She waved at him from her chair.
Stormy climbed off the two-person lounger where she had been laying next to Marilyn, and padded over. She stood on her hind legs and Bucky braced as she put her paws on his shoulders and licked his face. Big damn dog! After a moment he pushed her down. "Down, you mutt! You really are a monster!", he laughed. Stormy gave a pleasant woof, and nudged his legs, and then went back and jumped into my chair.
"What's up, Bucky? Charlie's back in Hereford. If you rode down here to see him, you two got your signals crossed.", I told him.
"No, I'm here to see Molly.", he answered, a funny look on his face.
Holly, who had just wandered in, said, "Hi, Bucky! I'll go tell her you're here."
I shrugged. "I thought she was going out on a date tonight."
Bucky gave me a really odd look at that. "I know. That's why I'm here."
I just stood stock still for a bit. "You are?"
"We're going out, Uncle Carl. Didn't you know that?"
"Huh?!" I could just feel myself standing there and staring stupidly at him.
Marilyn added, "Carling, close your mouth before the flies go in."
"You knew about this?", I asked her.
"Carl, everyone knows about it.", she answered, rolling her eyes.
Molly came out of her room and she was wearing riding leathers and carrying a helmet of her own. She said, "Hi, Bucky!", and then stood on her tip-toes and kissed Bucky! On the lips! I stood there with my jaw flapping but no sounds coming out. After the kiss, my youngest daughter said, "Don't wait up for us, we'll probably be late."
Holly had been watching and grinning at me from the side. "Make sure you use protection!", she called out as they left.
That woke me up! "Holly!"
"Well, Dad, we wouldn't want any repeat of past family history.", she teased.
"HOLLY!"
She sat down in my lounger with Stormy. "Daddy's angry. You'll protect me, right, Stormy?" She got a loud WOOF from the mutt as she rubbed her belly.
I turned to my wife. "How long has this been going on?"
"What, dear?"
"This! Molly! And Bucky!?", I demanded.
"I don't know. Since last year?", she asked Holly.
Our eldest daughter replied, "Since she went out with Charlie and Bucky last summer on that race tour in August."
"I thought that was an unpaid internship."
Holly smirked. "Maybe Molly got paid a different way."
"HOLLY!", I thundered.
Holly just laughed, and Marilyn said, "Holly, you're not helping."
"Dad, don't you remember her sitting on his lap at the Christmas party we had? And at the Inauguration?"
"They said there weren't enough seats.", I answered lamely. Had they really been dating for almost a year without telling me?
"Daddy, for a guy who is almost as smart as me and Molly, you're awfully dumb.", she replied.
"So, are you seeing anybody I need to know about?", I asked her.
"No, I just sleep around."
"HOLLY!"
"Maybe I could help with the gays and lesbians if I started dating girls, too, Dad."
"OUT!"
Marilyn laughed and pointed out of the room. "You're really not helping!"
Holly just laughed and scrambled out of her seat, with Stormy romping behind her. They went back to her room. I turned to my wife. "You knew?"
"Everybody knows! Where have you been?"
"I don't know. Running the free world?", I responded.
She snorted. "I think Holly is right! You can be pretty dumb."
"Marilyn! It's wrong! He's like our second son. It's like ... like ... incest!"
"Oh, please!"
"Well, he's certainly much too old! He's six years older than she is!", I argued.
From Holly's room sang out, "I told her that he was already way past his sexual prime!"
Marilyn laughed again and I yelled, "HOLLY!" I sank down onto my chair again. "Shit! When did this start?"
"Last year, when they set up their racing team. Bucky hadn't seen the girls for a few years. Guess what, they grew up! They weren't the little girls who used to bug him and Charlie anymore.", she explained.