by Sara Celi
Around four forty-five we stopped at a large truck stop just off I-75 to get some gasoline. The complex also featured a mini-mart, showers for truckers, a Starbucks, and a small diner, so I seized the opportunity to meet with a few more potential voters. Kathryn followed me into the dining room, her attention on her phone. She’d been distant and quiet for most of the day, but once we walked up to the first table of people, she perked up and fixed a plastic smile on her beautiful face.
“How are you?” I asked a table of four as I shook their hands. Two men with leathery faces sipped coffee from off-white mugs, and the plump woman next to one of them looked like she might have been his wife. A young boy no older than ten sat across from her. “I hope you all are having a good day today. Wonderful day for early November. Great weather we’re having.”
The table deferred their answer to the man wearing a white baseball cap, who also appeared to be the oldest of the group. He sipped his coffee, grinned, and shrugged one shoulder before he answered. “You’re right. But can I ask what this is about?”
I laughed, hoping to ease the tension I carried in my neck. It had been a very long day, but I needed to perform for just a few more hours. Soon, it would be Election Day, and this would all be over. I might have failed, but I’d welcome the release, like a building pressure valve.
“I don’t know if you all have been following local politics or not, but my name is Landon Marsh, and I’m running for senator of this great state,” I said, beginning my well-practiced pitch to voters I couldn’t be sure had a side in the election. “Tomorrow, I’d like your vote, mainly because I think Washington is broken. I know most of the politicians out there these days say that. They use DC as a whipping boy, make all kinds of promises, and never deliver. They forget about us in the heartland. Well, folks, I’m here to say—”
“Stop right there.” The man in the white ball cap held up his hand. He moved in his seat and looked past me at something, then turned his attention to me again. “You said you’re running for senator, right? Against Patrick Blanco?”
“Correct. And I—”
“My god,” the man said, and his attention moved past me again. “That’s interesting.”
I turned to see what had him so distracted, and what I saw made my jaw drop. A large TV hung in the corner of the diner, the kind permanently fixed on twenty-four-hour news channels and often on mute. That day, the screen showed FOX News. And a large breaking news headline scrolled across the bottom.
“Fox News Alert: Senator Patrick Blanco Found Snorting Cocaine in Bombshell Photos Obtained by US Magazine. Senator Blanco has not made a formal comment.”
“Oh, my god,” I said. “Holy shit.”
Landon’s face had turned red, and he frowned at me as we walked back to the car a few minutes later. His shoulders hunched, and he shoved his hands in his pockets. “You did this, didn’t you?” he muttered. “You did. I know it.”
“I didn’t.” I hurried to keep up with him, but he picked up speed with each stride across the lot. “I didn’t do anything.”
“Stop lying, Kathryn.” He halted his steps about two feet away from the car and spun back to me. “No one else had those photos. You showed me them at the hotel the other night. And what? You leaked them to the media? Uploaded them somewhere that you know people would notice? Called one of your tabloid photographer friends?”
“No, I… Plenty of people had those photos. It’s not hard to make another set, I promise. We—Seth—obtained them from another source. It’s not like they weren’t out there.”
“I don’t care, Kathryn.” He moved closer to me. “I know you’re lying. I can sense it. So stop. Now.”
I gulped and struggled to find the right reply. Nothing fit.
“Jesus Christ.” Landon let out a hard, heavy breath. “This isn’t how I wanted to win. It simply isn’t. This is unethical and this is wrong.”
“I told you we had to play dirty to win,” I whispered. “That’s what Patrick did last night at the debate.”
“I don’t care what Patrick did. He’s not me. I don’t do things the way he does.” Landon’s jaw hardened and he looked away from me for a second, as if he wanted to gather his thoughts. “What do you think this is, Kathryn?”
“This is what you have to do to win, Landon. This is politics.”
“Not my kind.” He shook his head a few times, then stepped backward and away from me again. “When we get back to the hotel, that’s it. This is over. I don’t— I don’t want you anywhere near my campaign. This isn’t how I wanted to win. This isn’t fair. And I won’t stand for it.”
“You have to understand. I was just trying to help… I thought…”
“So you did do it. You did leak the photos.” He sighed. “I knew it. It’s over, Kathryn. Now.”
“Be reasonable. Hardball is part of the game.”
“Jesus.” He blinked at me a few times. “I don’t know what I was thinking. I honestly don’t know. I was doing fine until you showed up. I didn’t need you to be a part of this campaign, but I’ll admit, I liked the fact that you were so interested in me. In what was going on here. I wanted… I wanted to believe we could get this done.” He narrowed his eyes. “But this isn’t what I wanted. At all.”
I don’t think I’d ever drunk as much wine as I did that night in the hotel room. I drank until I couldn’t stand up, and I passed out sometime between two and three AM. When I woke up on Election Day, it was already the afternoon. In a stupor, I watched the TV returns, all of which predicted a solid win for Howard Sayers and retention of the Senate and congressional power for the Democrats.
I cried off and on while watching the TV. Here I was in the Hilton, desperate and alone. And worse, I’d lost the one thing I wanted the most. Not power. Not a chance to rise up through the ranks of the DC social elite. Not an increase in wealth and influence for the Van der Loon family.
Landon Marsh. I’d lost Landon Marsh. I drank another glass of wine and fell asleep again.
When I woke up, the clock read seven forty-five. A whole day lost. I found the remote on the floor by the bed and turned on the TV. CNN had already begun Election Night coverage, and a team of hired pundits sat around a half-circle desk discussing the presidential race. With polls closed in several states already, Howard Sayers had a small but commanding lead.
“Stand by for a Key Race Alert in the presidential race,” said Winston Blitz, a bearded and already hoarse main anchor for the channel. “With new numbers coming in from Ohio, CNN can now make a projection…” He paused and music blared before the screen faded to a full screen graphic featuring the state of Ohio, and a large photo of Sayers’s face. “Seventy-five percent of the precincts are now reporting, and CNN projects Howard Sayers will win the state of Ohio, giving him that state’s twenty electoral votes.”
Interesting.
I got up from the bed and stumbled into the bathroom vestibule where I washed off what remained of my makeup and began to fix my hair. Dark circles rimmed my eyes, my cheeks appeared sallow, and my skin looked drier than ever. As the electoral conversation on the TV continued, I opened up a jar of moisturizer and slapped large gobs of it on my face. What was I going to do next? What would I tell my father and Seth? What had I been chasing for this whole year? Who had I become? I wasn’t sure I liked what I saw in the mirror.
And then I heard it.
“Speaking of Ohio, CNN is now ready to make another projection, this time regarding the tightly watched Senate race there,” said Winston Blitz in his trademark monotone voice. “As you know, Patrick Blanco is running for re-election, and he’s been challenged by Landon Marsh, a Cincinnati lawyer turned state congressman.”
I put down the jar of moisturizer and rushed back into the main part of the hotel room.
Winston paused as the graphics changed once again on the screen, switching from a chronicle of the presidential race to the statewide Senate one. “CNN can now make a projection… In a major upset, Landon Marsh has d
efeated Patrick Blanco and is now the new junior senator from Ohio.”
Stunned, I fell backward onto the room’s king-sized bed. Landon won. He’d eked it out. Despite everything, he’d done it. A Cincinnati boy was going to the Senate again. I picked up the remote and flipped to the local CBS station.
“Yes, that’s right, Paula and Ken, we’re here at Horse and Barrel, and the celebration has just begun for Landon Marsh supporters in downtown Cincinnati,” said a brunette field reporter wearing too much eye makeup and a wide grin. Behind her, a huge crowd laughed and clinked beers together as they celebrated the win in what looked like a large bar with wood panels and big barrels of bourbon. “When they called the race for Landon Marsh a few moments ago, the whole place went wild, his supporters really selling this as a win for the common man in Ohio. You know, it’s remarkable how much excitement they say they are feeling about someone who has really staked his political capital on being a voice for working families in this state, regardless of their political party.”
Right about then, I stopped thinking rationally. In fact, I stopped thinking altogether. Instead, I jumped off the bed, changed into my best black skirt and cashmere sweater, pulled on my camel-colored cape, and was out the door as fast as possible. I knew what I had to do, and where I needed to be. I owed Landon an apology and a congratulations over a well-fought, well-managed campaign. I wouldn’t leave town until he heard it from me.
“How far away is the Horse and Barrel bar?” I asked the concierge in the hotel lobby.
“Not far.” She produced a slick brochure of downtown Cincinnati with a map on the back. She circled a spot and handed it to me with a smile. “Just a few blocks. You’ll be there in about five minutes.”
She was right.
Landon stood near the front of the room, congratulating a small circle of supporters when I came through the front door of the bar. When he saw me, his face fell. He walked over, grabbed my elbow, and propelled me outside to the street. A few people called after him, but he ignored it all.
“Good grief.” He glanced back at the crowd. “Do you think you should be here?”
“I’m sorry,” I said.
Landon frowned. I took it as an opening.
“That’s what I came here to say. I screwed up. I made a huge mistake. I wasn’t— I lost my mind. I shouldn’t have given those photos to the press. You’re right. I betrayed you. I betrayed what we stood for. I screwed up.” I pulled my arm out of his grip and laid a hand on his bicep. “I didn’t want to leave town without saying that much. I hope that’s… I don’t know if it will make a difference. I just needed to say it.”
“This wasn’t how I wanted to win.” He crossed his arms and narrowed his eyes. “I wanted to win the right way. I wanted to— this isn’t how I pictured that it would happen.”
“I know,” I said, feeling disgusted with myself and with what I’d done. He was right to hate me, and I knew that. I deserved it. I was a jerk. It wasn’t acceptable. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know anything until I knew you. You’re the best thing that ever happened to me.”
His eyes widened. “The best thing to ever happen to you?”
I smiled. “Absolutely. And I wanted to tell you that before I left town, too.” I stepped closer to him. “You didn’t have to let me in; you didn’t have to take my version of ‘help.’ I know that, and that’s why I’m grateful that you did. You made me see things I didn’t expect.”
He glanced back at the entrance to the bar. “You know, I have a lot of people inside waiting on me, and I don’t want to leave them hanging, so, goodnight.”
He pivoted on his foot and I knew the moment was almost over. Landon would stalk back inside and probably out of my life forever. I couldn’t let that happen. I wouldn’t.
“Landon, wait.” My hand caught his arm, and he turned back to me. “I was a bad person. I did more harm than good.” I took a deep breath. “But please…will you give me another chance?”
“Another chance?”
“Let me prove to you that I won’t make a mistake like that again,” I said. “You don’t have to. You’re the man of the hour…the victor. You worked hard and you won. You have everything ahead of you. But I… I’d love to be there beside you.”
“Hmm. Let me think about that.” Landon tried to hide a smile. “And what do I get in return?”
“A whole lot of adventure.” My hands found the lapels of his jacket. “What do you think? You want to at least let me try?”
The smile widened across his face. “You know I will, Kathryn. You’re the best thing that ever happened to me, too.”
His lips found mine and he wrapped his arms around me. There, on the sidewalk of a busy street in a city that I hardly knew, I was home. I was complete. I was everything I had ever wanted to be and nothing that I expected.
And it was the best feeling I’d ever had.
THE END
Amazon Top 100 and Barnes & Noble Bestselling Author, Sara Celi, has lived all over the United States. She calls the Greater Cincinnati area home.
Sara has spent more than a decade working in journalism and broadcasting, with jobs both on-air and off-air at TV stations in Louisiana, Ohio, and Oklahoma. Her work has appeared in numerous online publications, magazines and newspapers, and she is a contributing author to Chicken Soup for the Soul: The Power of Positive. Since the release of her debut novel, The Undesirable, in 2013, she has authored several other works, including Hollywood Nights, Natural Love, Prince Charming, and The Palms.
Sara graduated cum laude from Western Kentucky University in 2004.
In her spare time, she likes to read, shop, write, travel, run long distances, and volunteer her time to local charities.
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