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Military attaché Colonel McVeigh and Ambassador Lockhart stood side by side and everyone could tell they hated doing so.
It’d all started even before Colonel McVeigh got assigned to the American embassy in Paris. Ambassador Lockhart fought tooth and nail not to have a Republican military attaché in Paris, citing it was a bad look for an embassy in Europe, least of all a man with the last name of McVeigh. So when Colonel McVeigh got on a plane, and one day strutted into her office, drawling how much he hated Paris, Ambassador Lockhart took it rather personally.
Colonel McVeigh, for his part, didn’t do any better. His crooked smile was ever present whenever Ambassador Lockhart brought up a new endorsement for women’s causes, told about his gun-loving ways to anyone and everyone that would hear of it, and had the gall to gift her a Sarah Palin biography at the Christmas function held at the Ambassador’s residence.
The fact that they were head over heels for each other didn’t exactly help. The fact that both ignored it just made it worse.
And so, on that 4th of July, when Colonel McVeigh and Ambassador Lockhart stood side by side at the embassy entrance and cordially greeted the guests, she ignored how dashing he looked in his formal uniform and he pretended her black velvet, body-hugging dress didn’t make his cock twitch. Instead, she told herself how absurd his decorated chest appeared and what it symbolized, while he told himself how ridiculous her black gown looked, worn in protest of Roe v. Wade and what it represented. When the greetings came to an end, she forced a smile and he presented a curt nod before abruptly walking away.
As the evening dragged on, Ambassador Lockhart lost the count of champagne flutes she grabbed from the trays. She watched Colonel McVeigh with a sly smile as he flirted with younger women of the diplomatic community with a bottle of beer in his hand that seemed to be the fixture of the damned man. She knew he was the heartthrob of the female crowd but she’d be damned if she admitted it bothered her.
As the evening dragged on, Colonel McVeigh lost the count of beer bottles he grabbed from the trays. He watched Ambassador Lockhart with an unreadable face as she flirted with the older men of the diplomatic community with a champagne flute in her hand that seemed to be the fixture of the damned woman. He knew she was the heartthrob of the male crowd but he’d be damned if he admitted it bothered him.
When the sun gave way to moonlight, Ambassador Lockhart stood in the middle of the crowd and started giving a polite but no less passionate speech about the meaning of the day. She spoke of independence, the values the United States of America was built on, and what it stood for. Colonel McVeigh stood close by and listened to her speak like he’d done many times before. But this time, he found himself slowly losing the words and only hearing her voice instead. After a while, he stopped hearing anything at all, his attention fixed on the woman as the black velvet clung to her, shifting fluidly with each of her movements. The fabric guided his eyes along every curve, finally resting on her neck, her crimson lips, and her vivid blue eyes.
Colonel McVeigh had always loved the 4th of July. As a young boy, it was the fireworks that captured his heart. His small hometown didn’t offer much in the way of grand displays, but the 4th of July was one exception, a rare spectacle that brought everyone together. As the years chased one another, the day found McVeigh in his hometown then at the barracks across the country. He watched the fireworks every year, reminiscing about the sacrifices, the struggles, and the unyielding spirit of the country he adored. This Independence Day found him in a foreign land, with a woman and feelings that felt just as foreign. For the first time in his fifty-five years of life, he found himself not looking at the fireworks but at the woman before his eyes, his beloved colors dancing on her black velvet dress.
The Colonel took a moment to glance around, noticing the crowd completely absorbed in the dazzling spectacle above. Wordlessly, he reached for her hand. If the Ambassador was surprised, she didn’t let it show. She offered her hand to him with a composed grace, as though this was a gesture they had shared countless times before. She allowed him to lead her away from the crowd, guiding her into a secluded corner of the residence gardens. When they finally stood face to face, away from the prying eyes, he suddenly realized he had no idea what he was doing.
The Ambassador watched him with patient eyes, giving him the time he needed to muster up whatever courage he could find. When no courage came to light, she regarded him with a mix of confusion and perhaps a hint of defeat, opening her mouth as if to say something. Just as she found the words to politely dismiss them from the situation, she felt his lips press against hers. They stood in the garden, consumed by the moment, unable to distinguish whether the loud voices came from the sky or from the hearts. When they finally pulled apart, neither able to meet the other's gaze, they both looked down at the ground in silence.
The seconds stretched between them, and if you had asked either of them at that moment, neither would have been able to say that more Independence Days would chase after them. But they would. A few would catch them in Paris, then a few in Norway, Italy, and eventually France again. Colonel McVeigh, now retired, would fill his wife’s flute with chablis while Ambassador McVeigh, now retired, would tease her husband about the beer bottle glued to his hand. They would sit on the porch of their Southern France home, a stark contrast to the Ambassador’s residence in Paris where they had spent their first year of marriage, yet perfectly theirs. The old Colonel would still set off a few firecrackers, despite his wife’s protests about them harming the birds and contributing to global warming, while the old Ambassador would pretend not to notice that her husband spent the whole time watching the firecrackers dance in her eyes rather than the sky. They would still share a kiss after the firecrackers, in remembrance of their first kiss, but this time, the Colonel would find the courage to tell his wife he loved her, and she would smile, replying with the same words in return.