Chapter 2: The First Lady’s Judgment

When we arrived in D.C., we were called in to meet the First Lady.

Union Station was a blur of marble and echoing announcements, but the White House was something else—a place that made even the boldest kids swallow hard. We were ushered through security, palms sweating, and led down a hall that smelled faintly of lemon polish. The First Lady waited in a sitting room, her posture as crisp as the starched curtains.

She took one look at us, frowned, and asked, “How old are these two girls?”

Her words cut clean—Southern politeness wrapped around steel. Those pearls? Pure armor. The room felt colder, like someone had cranked the A/C just for us.

The man who brought us was the President’s chief of staff. He smiled nervously, bowing his head even lower.

He looked like he’d rather be handling a nuclear crisis. “Ma’am, the general’s second daughter and the eldest daughter of the Young family are both twelve, ma’am. The President says they’re as bright as a pair of diamonds—surely they’ll win your favor.”

The First Lady just snorted.

It wasn’t subtle. I felt my toes curl in my sneakers. I remembered Natalie’s warning in the car: “She’s got a poker face. Don’t try to charm her. Just survive.”

My heart jackhammered in my chest. I remembered what the younger daughter told me before we walked in.

“If she wants to, she can make or break your life here,” Natalie had whispered. “She’s not blood, but her word is law in this house.”

The First Lady and the President aren’t even related by blood. She must have been forced to take in the two of us troublemakers, and she probably already had a headache.

Natalie had explained how the First Lady married into the family years ago. Everyone in D.C. knew their relationship was complicated—lots of quiet dinners and separate vacations. We were just another headache on her to-do list.

If she’s annoyed, she could make our lives miserable.

The threat was real; in D.C., it didn’t take much to find yourself friendless, overlooked, and “accidentally” left out of every important event.

I kept my head down, not daring to say a word.

Natalie pressed her foot gently on mine, a silent reminder: don’t make eye contact, don’t smile too much. I focused on the pattern in the carpet and prayed she wouldn’t send us packing on the spot.

Luckily, the First Lady didn’t send us packing.

She let out a sigh heavy enough to rattle the silver picture frames. It was the kind of sound my grandma made after reading the Sunday paper’s bad news.

She rubbed her forehead. “There are senators’ kids and other VIPs at the academy. Let these girls go study there for now.”

She sounded exhausted, but her decision was final. The room seemed to exhale with her.

Her assistants moved fast.

Clipboards out, phones buzzing, the staff whisked us off to get uniforms and class schedules. Someone shoved a welcome packet in my hands with a campus map, the official crest printed in gold. It was all a whirlwind—no time for questions or second thoughts.