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AGENDAS
by
Trevor Hambric

     Sometimes, when I'm at my harried worst, I have no idea what city I'm in, barely a clue who I'm supposed to be interviewing. But today is better. Today, as I sit in the lobby restaurant, preparing for my interview with James B. Winston, I catch the eye of a passing gentleman and think, maybe I even look pretty.

     The previous stop on this interview tour ended just as I was about to ask Mr. Winston how this career of his began.

     But we're not in Sioux Falls now. Now we're in downtown Albany, at the Crowne Plaza, heavy spring rains pounding the sidewalk outside our window.

     Winston greets me with a smile and an innocent hug, but he's looking tired as I start the recorder. Seven cities in ten nights has me worn out. I can only imagine what it's done to the man holding the whole enterprise on his shoulders.

     "So, the last time we talked, you had just discovered that you had this... talent."

     He stares at me a minute, a wan smile forming, and gives a little nod.

     "When I was nine, my brother Evan was diagnosed with epilepsy. He had three gran mal seizures that summer. In late August, we were swimming in a pond behind our house. He had another big seizure, and I had to drag him ashore, do my best with what little CPR I knew. My efforts helped some--he was conscious and breathing OK--but something more happened, too. When I pulled him to his knees--he was still coughing up water--this awful wave of nausea washed over me, like when you're on a violent dip on a roller coaster. But it was much more than that."

     He sighs. Puts his hands up as if he's got something significant to say but can't find the words.

     "I knew before I took my hands off him that something had changed."

     "How did you know, exactly?"

     He smiles. He's obviously heard this question before. "It wasn't something that could be measured, if that's what you're asking."

     "I understand, but how did you--"

     "I knew."

     I've never been entirely comfortable doing these stories. "Befriending" a man and then tearing the legs out from under him carries the mild stink of dishonesty. Especially now. Especially knowing what this assignment is about. But I don't suppose Mr. Winston harbors any illusions about why I'm here.

     The only sense I can make of it is that he believes he can charm me. And that, in the haze of his seduction, I'll be convinced. He has charmed countless other audiences, after all.

     I'm also confused by the history of stories--or, more properly, the lack of history of stories--attacking the man.

     A Nexis search dug up plenty of long distance hit pieces. Anger at the concept of James Winston, but not a single response to who the man really is.

     Considering how long he's been doing this, I expected to find much more.

     At the MooseHead Arena in Concord. A woman in a wheelchair, soft and round and teary-eyed, head slumped dramatically toward her chest, gets wheeled up to the stage. James crouches, catcher-style, in front of her. Puts a hand tenderly on her knee.

     "This is not the life that God meant for you." He turns off his mic and leans in to whisper something to the woman.

     When he's done, she turns to him with surprise. And I'd swear there's an embittered flash in her eyes before the tears start to flow. The mic is on again, and he's speaking.

     "As of this second, let your life be right." He puts a steadying hand on the wheelchair. "Now stand up and walk off this stage. And don't ever allow yourself this horrible confinement again."

     There's a palpable tension throughout the hall as she struggles to her feet.

     She stares at the ground, too far away, then back up at him, the father-savior. With a flourish, James shoves the wheelchair. It glides across the stage and crashes down into the first row. People scatter to avoid the miracle.

     When I awake the following morning, I'm beyond road-weary. I sit in a corner of the hotel diner, sipping tea and waiting for James.

     My first question comes out before he's even had a chance to warm his seat.

     "Do you understand how the skeptics might view that show last night?"

     I fully expect him to correct me, to tell me there's no 'show' in what he's doing. But he doesn't bother.

     "I suppose I could hazard a guess."

     "And it doesn't upset you?"

     "I have ownership of my behavior, Anne. I have none over what people make of it."

     For once, I find no response. And for a moment, he lets the thought hover there, refusing to pick up the slack in conversation. "If someone incorrectly believes she's sick, and I convince her otherwise, haven't I healed her?"

     In the general disorientation of my morning, I feel ham-fisted and unsure. "Can I be honest with you, James?"

     "I assumed you had been all along."

     "This sounds like just so much wordplay to me."

     "It's not wordplay to me. And I'm guessing it's not to that woman, either."

     "What did you say to her when the mic was off?"

     A little exhalation escapes him, a near laugh. "I turned the mic off for a reason."

     "What was the gist of it, then?"

     He gives that assured nod. "The woman has a life to live. And it's time she started living it."

     By the end of the first Albany show, he's sweating profusely, mopping his brow constantly to fend off the flood.

     There's a sort of elevation of the crowd, a frantic euphoria that I can't fully understand, but whose power I can't entirely deny, either.

     A middle-aged red-headed woman in the front row gives him a beatific stare, her face wet with sweat and tears.

     Not five minutes ago, she was helping her cancer-riddled daughter up the steps to the stage. The impossibly pale young woman--a loosely connected bunch of protruding collar and wrist bones--is no pretender.

     But she manages, after a tender, room-silenced hands-on by James, to shuffle off the stage under her own power, looking both euphoric and confused.

     When the show has finally ended, James reaches the wings and immediately sags, as if the stage lights were the only thing keeping him inflated. He's glassy-eyed and distant as he moves past without a glance.

     He's headed for a small room near the back of the arena--they've even taped a 'Recovery' sign on the door--and will remain there, alone, for the next hour.

     What he actually does in that room, I have no idea. I asked his manager if I could join him one time--not to talk, but simply to observe. She laughed.

     As the crowd disperses, I try to catch up with the cancer-stricken woman and her mother, but the roadies unfurl theater-like tape barriers faster than I can move, holding me up just long enough that I lose the ladies in the crowd.

     When I ask James' producer for some contact info, she tells me that the women, like everyone else in the audience, have a right to their privacy.

     "But they're going to be on TV," I say.

     "Their names won't." Her stance tightens, exasperated with her insistent but slow-learning student. "Prying skepticism isn't what they need right now."

     In a moment of pique, I let my frustration get the better of me. "You're a true believer, aren't you, Peg?"

     She gives me the smile I've seen so often from his staff, the patient, we-make-allowances smile. "Yes, Anne. I often find reality convincing."

     Near Atlanta now. A nameless local diner. It's 90 degrees and nearly 100 percent humidity. I'm sweating through my suit.

     "Why do you suppose there's been so little of substance written about you over the years?"

     James seems oblivious to the heat. "There's very little of substance written about anybody over the years."

     I nearly laugh at this. It's a fine, disarming move of his--he's not looking for a fight with the world.

     "But you understand that it's worse in your case, right?"

     He gives a little head move that I can't decipher. "Opinion is easy. Changing lifelong beliefs is tough. Admitting your mistakes even tougher."

     "So, you believe journalists incapable of having their minds changed?"

     "Journalists don't want their minds changed."

     "What do you think of me, then?" I know it's a risk. He has every right to say, but I don't think of you. And part of me--the part that doesn't believe someone could be quite this gracious--wishes he would.

     "You came from Vanity Fair." It's said with a quiet finality.

     "Then why agree to this if you're convinced I'm here to do a hatchet job?"

     His Blackberry vibrates on the table in front of him, does a little dance and nears the edge. But his eyes never leave mine. "Believe it or not, no matter what you say, your story will drive people to me."

     Without looking away, or even blinking, it seems, he grabs his phone and stills its dance. "Sick and dying people are desperate. They are willing to have their beliefs challenged. Disbelievers won't be changed." He takes a bite of his tired-looking Denver omelet. "You go ahead and write your story. The people who matter will come."

     We're in Orlando, I think. Or maybe Tampa. And I'm too tired for an interview that I have to do anyway.

     Our conversation starts all wrong as James dismisses my warm-up question--How did you feel about the show last night?--with a non-committal shrug.

     He stares at me uncomfortably. Eying me like a cop awaiting a confession.

     "Something wrong?"

     "How long are we going to continue this little charade?"

     "I'm not sure what you--"

     "You have a question to ask, I think." There's no anger in his tone. Only an insistent, gentle curiosity. "Am I wrong?"

     With surprising tenderness, he reaches across the table and puts my hand in his. His fingers explore my wrist, searching for a pulse.

     "You're shaking, Annie."

     Suddenly, I feel tears welling. And I realize that I am, indeed, shaking.

     He moves his chair close to me, puts an arm around and pulls me to him, my head resting on his shoulder. We stay that way for what feels like a very long time.

     Finally, he whispers, "You have cancer." It's both statement and question.

     After a frozen, terrified moment, I nod. A movement he can only feel.

     "Has it spread?"

     It's all I can do to force a barely-audible, "Yes."

     Backing away just long enough to look at me, he says, "Is this why the magazine sent you?"

     It's another surprising question. And I feel nearly as guilty as I do scared. "I'm sorry."

     He's rocking me slowly, in tiny moves. "How long were you going to wait?"

     I hate my tears. Journalists don't cry. Not in front of their targets in the lobby of a Hilton Hotel. "Is it real, James?" I wipe my cheek with a bare hand. "Tell me if it's real."

     There's a long sigh. "I'm sitting right here, Anne. God's offer won't get much more direct than this."

     "I have a little boy without a father."

     "No one's asking you to apologize."

     "They would, if they knew."

     "Ask me what you've come to ask."

     I'm quietly sobbing now. And his body is shaking with mine, through our touch. "Help me."

     I feel his breathing change. Heavy, slow exhalations coming as he pulls me a little tighter. And I know, even before he's taken his hands off me, that something has changed.

     I know, even as I sit, and breathe, and cry.

     I know.

© 2008 Trevor Hambric

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