WASHINGTON — IT is Inauguration Day, Jan. 20, 2017.

Donald Trump searches his drawer for a note from Barack Obama, something on heavy cream stationery with the White House insignia, maybe reiterating the Obama doctrine, “Don’t do stupid stuff.”

But there is nothing there.

That puts Trump in a huff. How dare Obama depart without leaving the customary handwritten good-luck missive?

He grabs his phone and tweets: “SAD!! No note from my predecessor. No Class Obama.”

The tweet doesn’t go through. Must be something about the White House secure communications, he thinks. He’ll figure it out later. Right now, he needs to savor the moment.

“I did it. My way. They said I was a dangerous, insane traitor, a threat to national security, a Siberian candidate in cahoots with Pooty-Poot. That spook for Hillary, Michael Morell, the ex-C.I.A. chief who dished up the flawed intelligence that helped get us into the Iraq war — which I opposed from the beginning, even if I said the opposite — called me ‘an unwitting agent of the Russian Federation.’