Election day in the Kootenays, and The Owner's Son, he's up and at-em like, well, like an aspiring politician.
I've kept my mouth shut, wished him well, what choice do I have? I work there.
In the morning, visiting his parents, I catch him making a bee line for the car, ask him his chances, he's pretty cock-sure in his $20 suit, he thinks a second and tells me:
"It'll either be real close and I'll win by a narrow margin...or..."
"or?" I prompt him -
"Or it'll be a landslide".
They've planned a little celebration after the election, his wife has been busy baking and there are well wishers coming and going all day.
The pub, it's dead.
As the night goes on there are calls, there's more calls, it's more about routing calls to the family than it is about business. The votes are being counted, being counted...
The next day the results are in. He's lost. Lost by a humiliating margin - of 1000 voters, the incumbent beat him by over 300 votes. And there's no shame in losing, only in not trying, and he certainly tried, put on the miles, had easily 10 times the signage, 100 times the signage, the pamphlets, this isn't a loss, this is a complete and utter rejection, and he disappears. This was less about what he could offer than what he could take, and he didn't prepare for this, people saw through him, and it's for him - financially, a catastrophe, socially he's a pariah, and the status, respect and acceptance he imagined the role of politician offered him - well, it's gone.
And now it's back to serving all the people who so loudly said they'd vote for him, then didn't, but he's gonna lie low until the New Year.
During the last 3 weeks at the pub I didn't see him once - vanished to lick his wounds, off the face of the earth.
I'm leaving at the right time...