Amid an unending political inferno, should we take a break? Not a real one, of course, for anyone reading this is already too far in, but we can avert our eyes, at least for three minutes, from the direct Trump sun and contemplate instead the Mike Pence moon. It’s quiet, waxing and waning, giving off a soft, reflected light. We can’t know the thoughts of the man in the Pence moon unless we go, Michael-Wolff-style, into his head. If any time permits such an exercise, it’s now. You’re Mike Pence. And here’s what you’re feeling these days.

Primarily, you feel relief. The Wolff book is driving the chief, i.e. Donald Trump, POTUS, crazy, but you came out fine. You didn’t dish, and neither did your staff. Wolff called you a “point of calm” and said you were “almost absurdly happy” to be Trump’s veep. Sure, he got back at you with phrases like “convenient meekness” and “extreme submissiveness,” and the Bannonites also called you a “non-event.” But so what? Oh no—insults from Wolff and the Bannonites! The boss loves those guys. Amid your sarcasm, you remember that sarcasm isn’t your style. You resolve to be better than that.

Wolff’s book was a gift for another reason. You’re still trying to contain the damage from The New York Times article last August suggesting you were running a shadow campaign for 2020. They might as well have pasted a “Purge me” sign on your back. Now you have to overcompensate to cover your rear. You hope the boss heard your full-throated attack on Wolff’s book when you were interviewed by Dana Loesch, along with the line about how “before the next seven years is out, we’re going to make America great again.” Get that, boss—seven years?

What made the Times piece so unfair is that you’ve always known that job one for you, no matter how much it hurts, is loyalty. It’s also jobs two and three. Job four is to lie low, which is a subset of jobs one through three. You do not grant interviews, unless it’s to the safest of outlets and for the most specific of purposes. You’re happy to discuss taxes or health care, for about five minutes, or you’ll chat with Tea Party types. You know that if you ever want the boss’s job, you have to persuade his deplorables that you’re committed to carrying forward his vision and agenda. You’ve got the big donors and lots of Tea Partiers and evangelicals already in your corner. But the rest—you need those. They didn’t want Trump to pick you.

It’s not that the loyalty is always easy. With such a strange boss, you and Karen both pray and wrestle daily with the question of what God wants from you. You’re a devout Christian, and you care about marriage vows. The chief isn’t, and doesn’t. When the Access Hollywood tape emerged, you almost jumped ship (rumor was you even plotted to replace him), and you told the chief to pray over it, and you like to think, despite everything, that he did so. Now there’s this story about an affair and a payoff to a pornographic actress during the chief’s third marriage, and that offends you. He even ribs you for your beliefs, regularly. But you still feel you’re right to stick by him. The Old Testament is full of rascals favored by God. Remember Jacob?