Since it's just me here I've

found the back and stayed

there most of the time, in

rain and snow and the

no-moon nights, dodging the front

I used to put up like a yard

gussied and groomed, all

edged and flower-lined, my

bottled life.

"Eleanor, how fast can you type?" I'm greeted on Wednesday afternoon by that strange question coming from Harrison as he strides into the office.

"Um, relatively well," I answer him slowly because I'm not understanding the situation or why he just asked me that question.

"That's good enough. I was going to have an aide join me in a meeting but he had something come up, and I need somebody in there with me who can take notes," He answers me.

"Okay, I can type up notes," I confirm.

"Great. The meeting is in fifteen minutes so we'll just close up the office for a little while. I'll get you a laptop to work on," He hurries into his office to prepare for this meeting and I set up a message going out from the phone that says we're out of the office but to leave a voicemail so that I can get back to the caller as soon as possible.

"You don't have to speak up, or know what's going on. Just write down the general idea of what everybody is saying," Harrison tells me as we're walking down the hallway together. I've got the laptop that I'll be working on and Harrison is walking very quickly, so I'm thinking that he's flustered about this meeting. I've never seen him flustered before, it's a bit worrisome.

"Alright," I just go along with it and focus on keeping up with him in my three inch heels.

Once we get into the meeting room, I sit along the large table beside Harrison. There are a ton of other democratic senators in the room, some of them with assistants of their own to record notes. I can tell who's an assistant by the people who are getting out their laptops to record notes or maybe look up some on the spot facts maybe, if there's going to be any debating. In politics, I always assume that there will be debating.

Even among democrats, there is a lot of disagreement.

The woman at the front of the table starts speaking right at 1:30pm and everybody silences as the meeting starts. I don't write down the welcoming remarks.

"We are here to discuss Senator Wilder's legalized prostitution bill," She announces and I'm immediately a bit more interested in this conversation because of how close I am to the subject. I title my document with "Legalized Prostitution Bill" and wait for the conversation to start. "I am aware that some of you are still hesitant to vote for the bill, but we really need all of the support that we can get to gain some traction with this bill. Senator Wilder, I'll let you start us off."

Senator Wilder starts talking from across the table about why he thinks that this bill could be helpful, and why the other senators should vote for it. I'm proud of myself for being able to keep up with her by typing quickly and with barely any typos, which means that I'm not slowed down too much.

"My biggest concern, as I think is all of our biggest concern, is the spread of STDs and STIs," One senator speaks up after Wilder has finished his opening remarks for the bill.

"Sex workers are already doing this work. They're already spreading these infections and diseases," Harrison speaks up now. He's focusing, and just like Micah does, his brows are furrowing as he plays with his pen. "But if we were able to regulate the industry, and help these workers get the care that they need, we can legitimately care for these individuals."

"For me, other than the health threat, is the stigma," Somebody else comes to the attack of the bill. "My constituents would absolutely not go for this, and I have to speak for them."

"It's not-" I start to say something but then I remember that I'm not part of the conversation, I'm just here to take notes. However, I've already gotten everybody's attention and nobody is taking it away from me. I've just put my foot in my mouth and I don't know what to do. I look over to Harrison for help but he just nods at me, telling me that I should just go with whatever I was about to say. So, I just clear my throat and sit up a bit straighter, and I go for it. "It's not an easy stigma to break, but I think that it's worth the effort."

"What do you mean by that?" The senator who claimed that the stigma is too much asks me.

"I just mean that yeah, there is this stigma about prostitutes being dirty and immoral but that's only because that's what the government has told everybody, by making it illegal. It will definitely be an uphill battle to reduce that stigma, but it's worth it if it means protecting an entire population out there. There are about a million prostitutes in the United States. That's an entire community that's facing unnecessary diseases and violence because the government has decided that they are not worthy of protection. The message that you're sending to those million people is that 'we don't care about you, because we don't agree with you' and that's not really okay."

"You think that violence would go down if we passed this bill?" I'm surprised that they're taking me seriously when they can so clearly tell that I'm not a senator, and that I'm an assistant. I just go along with it though, because I have a lot of knowledge and a lot to say on this matter.

"Studies have shown that if prostitutes are protected under the law, violence goes down. There is a Dr. Cundiff at Northeastern who has claimed that rape would go down 25% in the sex industry, which is roughly 25,000 incidents. With regulation, protection, and eliminating pimps, the government can make it safe. And considering that the sex industry revenues a net $103 million just in D.C. alone, it's not going to cost the government much to implement. Of course, it can't be 100% safe, but not many professions can be. People work on oil rigs and there are fisherman out there. It is an adult citizen's right to choose what is best for them."

Harrison is smiling at me, so I hope that means that I'm doing okay and not talking too much about this.

"It's only illegal still because the government is too afraid to get their hands on it, because of the stigma. Prohibition has never worked though, and the safest way is through regulation. I've read the bill to the best of my ability, and it's not calling for a free for all orgy all across America. It calls to draw zones in communities where sex work can take place. So yeah, the stigma is going to be there until you all do something about it."

"I also have some interesting statistics where sex trafficking is involved," Somebody else takes the floor, which is probably a good thing because I could keep talking about this forever. It's not really my style of prostitution that needs to be considered here though. I know that I was lucky enough to become a high end escort. Because of the high class clientele that we work with, we rarely ever get caught. The police usually work with us, the government officials that we service will get us out of trouble.

However, the prostitutes that walk the streets or need to find clients online are the ones that need more protection. They don't have a Madame who makes sure that they're protected. They have pimps who abuse them and don't really care about their safety. I think that it's really cool that I get this opportunity to give them a bit of a voice.

I keep my mouth shut for the rest of the meeting and just take the notes like I'm supposed to. Once it's over, I head back to Harrison's office to get back to work.

As we're walking together, he starts talking, "You were really great in there, Eleanor. If I knew that you were so well versed, I would have asked you to come to meetings a long time ago."

"Well, I only know very specific details about this one issue, but not much else. I'm sorry if I overstepped by speaking up, I wasn't really thinking," I apologize, even though he just said that I did great, I feel like I should still say sorry for interrupting the meeting.

"Don't be sorry, it was really brave of you," He says. When we get back to his office, I return to my desk to listen to all of the voicemails that I have waiting for me and I have to prepare the notes that I made to send to Harrison. I just have to edit them to make sure that there aren't any typos and it all makes sense and is organized.

It's hard to make it all look nice in the moment, when I'm just trying to get everything recorded. I don't have very long until the end of the day because that meeting went so long, so I know that I need to work quickly. Luckily, there aren't that many voicemails for me to deal with.

I have about half an hour left of work left when I hear Harrison in his office ending a phone call and then he opens the door between our offices. "We need to celebrate."

"What are we celebrating?" I ask him curiously.

"In that meeting, we were trying to convince 10 senators to join the bill and as of now, nine of them have agreed to back it," He informs me with a wide grin. "You were very convincing in there, Eleanor."

"It probably wasn't because of what I said," I mutter modestly.

"You underestimate yourself. You're very convincing," He assures me. "We're celebrating. I'm calling in the team and we'll get some champagne going."

I look at the clock and see that it's edging closer to five o'clock. I have to be gone by then, or Micah might show up. I'm not sure how often he comes to his dad's office without being here to see me, so he might not even visit. I'm just paranoid about it, but I can't think of a real reason as to why I can't stay to have some champagne with Harrison and a few of his aides that start coming into the office.

When 5 o'clock finally hits, I shut down the computer just as Harrison is pouring everybody a glass of champagne. There are five of us total and they're all pretty excited.

"We owe today's victory all to Eleanor," Harrison tells the other three people. "She definitely surprised everybody today with some very compelling arguments. They didn't have a choice but to agree with her. The fight is still going to be very steeply uphill, but we got one step closer today. Good job to everybody, we had a good day."

Everybody starts cheering and I lean against the desk, sipping some of the champagne that was poured for me.

Just as I'm starting to calm down from the anxiety of running into Micah after hours, he walks through the door. I haven't seen him in just three days but when he turns the corner into the room, he takes my breath away. I turn to look down at my desk as if I think that if he doesn't see my face, he won't recognize me.

"Dad, Mom is waiting. We've got dinner plans," Micah reminds Harrison.

"Oh, that's right. Okay, I'm coming. We're celebrating Eleanor's win today for the bill. She showed up ten members of congress today. I'm not even sure I've been able to do that," Harrison explains to Micah. Even though I was mentioned, I can't lift my head up to look at Micah. "Do you want a drink before we go?"

"Mom is waiting," He says again, his voice quieter now than it was before. I suddenly feel like I'm suffocating in this room of now six people.

"Okay, you're right. Eleanor, why don't you come with us? Do you have dinner plans?" Harrison calls to me and because he's actually talking to me, I know that I have to look up at him.

"Oh, no thank you," I quickly respond. "I've got some pizza at home just screaming my name."

"Are you sure? We're headed to the Blue Duck Tavern, it's really good, and I'm paying," He offers again. I wonder how one person can be so oblivious to the tension on the room. I mean, he's a really nice man and a great boss but he can't possibly think that this is comfortable for either me or Micah.

"She just said that she doesn't want to go, Dad, let's go," Micah urges his dad toward the door of the office.

"Alright, I'm going. Have a goodnight, everybody. Let's hope for another good day tomorrow," Harrison grabs his things and heads to dinner with Micah. Once Micah is finally out of the room, I feel like I can finally breathe again.

Even though, after they leave the office, I can hear Micah saying, "You know that we broke up, why are you making it worse?"

The three other employees left in the room obviously heard it too, and they all turn to look at me. They knew that we were dating because they saw us sitting here in the office together a lot. I'm not sure if they knew that we broke up or not but they sure do now. And they're waiting for me to react to the situation but I'm not sure what reaction they want me to have.

I just put my half-empty champagne glass down on the desk and I start getting my things together to leave. They fade back into a conversation quickly, so I sneak out with just a quick goodnight so that I can head back home.