by Sally Quinn
They had fallen in love that day, drinking wine, basking in the autumn sunlight that streamed into the empty restaurant, watching the colored leaves swirl past the window.
On the way back to Washington, Des had abruptly pulled off the winding road to a deserted spot overlooking the falls, and they had made passionate love in the car.
It wasn’t until much later, after Rosey was in the White House, that she and Des had resumed their affair. She would always remember that lunch as the most magical day of her life.
Des. God she had loved him. Enough to have told Rosey she was leaving him for Des. Then she had gotten pregnant and sent Des away with no explanation. She had hurt him badly. Why shouldn’t he do the same?
A knock at the door broke her reverie. It was her housekeeper, Asuncion, with a letter that had been hand delivered. It was really the only way, these days, that anything got through to her.
It wasn’t until she saw the Weekly logo that she lost her breath. She stared at the envelope in her hand as though inside there might be either a horrible poisonous snake or a beautiful piece of jewelry. Which would it be? Dare she open it?
She got up and paced the floor several times. She put the envelope down, went into her dressing room and combed her hair, put on lipstick. No matter whether it was acceptance or rejection, she had to look her best. She went downstairs to the kitchen to get a mug of tea. Soothing tea. Inspired, she added a touch of brandy to it. It was cool enough outside to justify. She went back upstairs to her study and stared once more at the menacing envelope. This was ridiculous. This was like being back at Smith and not opening your grades. This was like being a struggling young career girl in New York and not opening your bills. She grabbed the letter with resolve. Viper or jewel, so be it. She ripped it open.
“My dearest Sadiebelle,” it began.
She took a deep breath, walked over to the sofa by the fireplace, sank into the pillows and took a large swig of tea.
I know it’s been three weeks and I know what you must have been going through. It hasn’t been much fun for me either.
This thing has hit me like a bombshell. I feel devastated.
Yes, I had planned to marry Allison. We hadn’t set a date but we had talked about sometime around Christmas.
Sadie couldn’t help her excitement over his tenses. I had planned, not I plan.
But that [he continued] was before I knew about Willie.
Willie changes everything.
It would be a heartless and difficult thing for me to do now, to marry Allison. Dearest Sadie, I don’t see how I can offer myself to you either. I don’t believe you would want a husband who was in love with someone else.
He had said it. Finally. He didn’t love her. She felt momentarily nauseated. She swallowed hard and kept reading.
I’ve been wrestling night and day with the fact that Allison probably wouldn’t want me either if she knew I was the father of your child, of the President’s child. I’ve already caused her so much pain. Somehow I don’t see how I can avoid causing her more.
Christ, I’ve ruined so many lives, even potentially the life of my son, our child. I wish to God I knew how to resolve this situation without hurting anyone, but for the life of me I don’t see how. It’s an unbelievable quandary for me.
I can’t do my duty toward Willie without causing him and you to be heaped with scorn and without losing Allison. I can’t help but ask myself who am I to have assumed this vital role in three different lives almost casually. I’ve come to realize, in the last few weeks, after considerable soul searching, that that’s one of the things I do in life. I do things too casually without thinking of the consequences.
But there it is. A rather fatal flaw in my character.
I don’t know what to do, Sadie. I don’t see how I can turn my back on the child I know I would love, on you whom I have loved, and on the woman I do love. I just can’t see my way out. I can’t run away. I don’t know what to do.
Des
“I know what they think, Sadie. I just look stupid. They think I’m common as pig’s tracks. Well, I’m gonna tell you somethin’, honey. They can just take their ole Washington establishment and shove it up where the sun don’t shine, ‘cause I don’t give a plug nickel about any of ‘em. And I’ll tell you somethin’ else. They’re all gonna kiss my ass for the next two years anyhow, so it doesn’t matter. My husband is the President of the U-nited States of America. Ha!”
Blanche Osgood lit up a cigarette, took a long slow drag, blew out the smoke in perfectly symmetrical rings, and picked a piece of tobacco off her tongue. She crossed her legs and settled back smugly into the folds of the sofa in the family sitting room of the White House.
Sadie took a sip of her Coke and smiled in spite of herself.
“What’re you smilin’ about, Sadie?”
“I’m smiling because you make me laugh, Blanche. I’m smiling because you’re right. And I’m smiling in spite of myself because that’s exactly the same attitude I had when I first came to Washington as the Vice President’s wife. I was going to be myself, do my own thing, the hell with all of them. I actually did try to live that way. But you know what, my friend. It doesn’t work. They always get you in the end.”
“They didn’t get you.”
“Oh, yes they did.”
“How?”
“Slowly. Subtly. There’s an undercurrent of derision for anything that you do that is not part of their habits, their mores. You’re the outsider and you have to go through a series of initiation rites to be one of them, to be part of their culture. It’s almost like a religion. I did it though. I’m one of them now. I learned their language and their rituals. Mostly I learned their taboos. I did that early on. If I hadn’t, I would have been destroyed. It is a deadly game, Blanche. For all your bravado you can be devastated by them. You’re only one person, and even if you have the power, if your husband has the power, you can’t win against them. You can’t lick them, so you have no choice but to join them. Some people don’t join them. And they leave without a trace. Without a footprint. It’s as if they’ve never even been here. The establishment—and that includes the journalists as well—always prevails.”
“Sweet Jesus, Sadie. You make it sound so serious. We’re talkin’ about a bunch of horses’ asses here, not the court of Louis the Fourteenth. Lordy, listen to this gal talk. You’d think I was educated or somethin’.”
Sadie smiled again.
“Blanche, give me a cigarette, will you?”
“I thought you didn’t smoke.”
“I started again after… I just started again.”
Sadie shivered though the heat was turned up full blast against the November chill. Blanche liked it warm. Why did she suddenly feel cold? She pulled her shawl tightly around her shoulders and tucked her feet up underneath her on the chair, glad she had decided to wear pants.
She looked around the large sitting area, what was the end of the great hall, really, and out the Palladian window toward the West Wing. How many times had she sat there and wished she could get out of her prison as First Lady, get out of her marriage with Rosey and marry Des? She had gotten her wish. She was free of everything she thought she hated about the White House and all she could think of was how much she envied Blanche.
Poor tacky Blanche. Poor platinum-blond Blanche. Poor white trash Blanche. She was First Lady and Sadie was not.
Sadie had hesitated at first when Blanche invited her over for lunch. It hadn’t been the first invitation to the White House. The Osgoods had made an effort but she had put them off, saying that it was too painful, which was the truth. This time, when Blanche asked her for lunch, the obligatory once-a-week invitation, she had decided to go. She had never had much use for Blanche when Rosey was President. In fact, she had been actively critical of her to close friends. She had tried to persuade Rosey not to pull Osgood out of the Senate and appoint him Vice President when Roger Kimball had his stroke. Freddy had only been in Washington a few ye
ars and Blanche had never really even made the move. Her budding career as a country music singer and songwriter in Nashville had kept her back in their home state most of the time. She had gotten some initial publicity when Freddy was first elected to the Senate from Tennessee, but she had no real profile in Washington and was rarely seen. When Osgood became Vice President, she kept pretty much the same schedule, coming to Washington only for command performances. Every time she did come she said something outrageous that got her in trouble. Rosey had even had to speak to Freddy about it several times. Sadie felt a certain sympathy for Blanche, having had similar problems herself when she first came to Washington.
By the time Freddy became Vice President, however, Sadie had taken on the protective coloration of an insider and she was totally uninterested in helping Blanche out. She had her own problems. Not the least was her affair with Des. If it didn’t actually take up most of her time, it certainly took up most of her emotional energy.
Now Sadie was alone, lonely, and, if the truth be known, bored. She needed something to keep her occupied, keep her mind off her pain and her boredom. Blanche looked to be a worthy project. From the moment she had set foot in the White House in July it had been a disaster. She had had to leave her beloved Nashville and move to Washington, which was bad enough. But moving into the goldfish bowl that was the White House was more than she had bargained for. She had become the laughingstock of Washington with her hair, her clothes, her music, her friends, and her big mouth.
Her all-too-frequent, from Sadie’s point of view, comments in the press reflected an outward sanguinity and toughness. Yet Sadie gathered from the persistent luncheon invitations that Blanche was in trouble and needed help.
Freddy was visibly anguished over his bride’s inability to adjust, and Blanche, who had only married him a short time before he was elected to the Senate, was thrown into the most horrible position of having to be something she had never put in for. As Sadie well knew, the White House was not the ideal place to work on one’s marriage. Whatever problems they had were going to have to be dealt with in public unless Blanche could find a confidante and mentor to guide her through the treacherous shoals of Washington’s political and social life. Sadie appeared to have been anointed.
In fact, though Blanche didn’t know it, it had been Freddy’s call that had finally prompted Sadie to come to the White House. There had been an urgency to Freddy’s voice that surprised her.
“I know it’s hard, Sadie,” he had said, “and it’s probably the last thing on earth you have a mind to do. But honey, Blanche needs help real bad. She’s just goddamn miserable up here locked in this gilded cage. My little songbird needs her freedom. Frankly, if she doesn’t get it, I’m afraid there’s going to be all hell to pay somewhere along the line. Unless she learns some Washington manners… I don’t need to tell you, Sadie, that everybody’s makin’ fun of her. She’s trying to put on a brave face but it’s eatin’ her up inside. It isn’t making my life any easier either, I’ll tell you that. Sadie, I’m askin’ you to see Blanche, talk to her, have lunch with her, be her friend. She doesn’t have a single friend in this goddamn town. She’s not going to change all that much, but at least she can learn what’s acceptable and what’s not. Blanche is not a stupid woman. I wouldn’t’ve married somebody stupid. They ain’ no flies on her head. But she can’t know what she doesn’t know. You’ve got to tell her. Will you do that for me, Sadie? I’ll be eternally grateful. And please, for Christ’s sweet sake, do not tell her I called you. I’m in enough hot water already.”
A servant had appeared and announced lunch, which Sadie and Blanche were to eat in the family dining room. Blanche deferred to Sadie, letting her lead the way as though Sadie were still First Lady and Blanche the humble guest.
The waiter served a cheese soufflé and Sadie’s face lit up.
“Oh, my favorite thing for lunch.”
“Well, I just tell them, when we entertain, to do it the way you liked to do it, serve what you liked to serve. It seems to make them happy and then I don’t have to get mad at the raised eyebrows, which is what happens when I try to suggest something.”
Blanche had lost some of her veneer of confidence in the short time that Sadie had been there. Sadie found herself warming to this blowsy, improbable-looking woman who seemed so forlorn and out of place.
“They all think you were perfect, you know.”
There was pain mixed with envy and admiration in her voice as she looked up shyly at Sadie, then took a mouthful of the perfect soufflé. Sadie’s perfect soufflé.
“Oh Blanche, if only you could know how unperfect I felt most of the time. Nobody in this job ever feels as if they know what they’re doing. Nobody can ever please everybody. There’s always somebody who thinks you’re a disaster.”
“Nobody ever thought that about you. You’re beautiful and smart and well educated and you’ve got taste and class. Lady, you got class comin’ out your ears. I’m just a tacky ole country singer. What do I know?”
“Blanche, you’ve got a career. You’re a well-known singer. You’ve made your own records. You have your own life and your own identity. That’s more than I ever had. I envy you that.”
“Not anymore I don’t. I don’t have nuthin’. It surprises me that that’s what you think of me. I can’t imagine somebody like you envying me.”
“Now look. You’ve got to get out of this frame of mind. You just can’t allow yourself to sink into this black hole or you’ll never get out of it.”
Blanche’s eyes welled up as the salad was served. The perfect green salad with Sadie’s vinaigrette.
After lunch they both reached simultaneously for a cigarette and nearly knocked over a glass. Blanche held out the pack for Sadie, then took one herself. Sadie picked up the white matches embossed in gold with The President’s House, lit Blanche’s cigarette, then her own. She put the matches down and began to finger them, turning them around and around in her hands.
It had been at this table more than three years earlier that she had lit up a cigarette in front of Rosey. She knew he hated her smoking and she had done it to provoke a fight. She had wanted to provoke a fight that Sunday morning, because she had decided to tell her husband she was leaving him for Des. She had been trying to get up her courage when she looked at the matches with The President’s House stamped on them and she had suddenly become enraged. She could remember even now her anger at the idea that it was indeed The President’s House. Not her house, not the First Lady’s House, not even the First Family’s House. Just the President. Where did that leave her? Out of there with Des, that’s where. It had been those silly matches that had propelled her, finally, to tell her husband about her love affair, to inform him that she was leaving him and His House for a home of her own with the man she loved.
That was such a long time ago. Yet she could still remember the fear she felt when Rosey said nothing. The loneliness she felt when he left the room and stayed away for the rest of the day. The sorrow she felt when he came to her that night and cried. The pity she felt when he begged her to stay. And the despair she had felt later when she learned she was pregnant and didn’t know who the father was.
She had had no choice then but to stay. It would have been a scandal if she had left. And Rosey had threatened not to run again if she left him for Des. So she had had to tell Des she would not go with him. She had taken the coward’s way out, refusing to answer his phone calls, refusing to see him. She had let him know at the convention. He had written her a two-word note, “Regrets Only,” and sent it up to her on the platform through a Secret Service agent just as Rosey accepted the nomination. She had responded to him, turning toward him in the Weekly box below and shaking her head no. She had never seen him again. She had watched him on the Sunday morning news show when she could, when Rosey wasn’t around. When she could steal a moment or two.
Then she had had his baby. Beautiful, curly black-haired, blue-eyed little mick, Willie. Her angel. Their love
child.
Rosey was ecstatic. He always acted as though this was the child of their love. Until the day he died.
A pack of matches brought it all back.
* * *
By four that afternoon both Sadie and Blanche were drunk.
They had moved into the bedroom and Blanche’s dressing room to go through her closet. Sadie had agreed to advise Blanche on entertaining, clothes, and other important matters including finding a “project.”
Blanche was in a very good mood by this time. She had put on some CD’s of her friends singing country music hits and was singing along with them. She had a deep, soulful, quite powerful voice, almost a gospel voice, that resonated through the family quarters as she sang.
Sadie had sat down on the sofa for a rest and to pour herself another glass of white wine. She hadn’t counted on missing the White House or Rosey as much as she had that afternoon. She had stayed away because she knew it might be hard and because she had had no real interest in Blanche. This was really anguish. Everywhere she looked were reminders of their four years in the White House, the good times and the bad. The worst part was that it was still her house. Everything was exactly as she had left it. Not an ashtray out of place. The beautiful, soft chintz in the bedroom, the flowered prints, the throws and pillows. All her little touches. The bed where she and Rosey had spent their first terrified night, the night after Roger Kimball had his stroke and Rosey was sworn in as President. The bed where she had made such infrequent love to her husband and where she had lain awake at night longing for Desmond Shaw. The bed where Rosey had cried the night she told him about Des. The same bed where she lay weeping the night Rosey died. The bed Willie pounced on the next morning looking for his daddy.
How ungrateful she had been then for all she had. A wonderful husband who adored her, fabulous children. She was the First Lady, with an opportunity to really make a difference and to change things. And what had she done with it? Nothing but mope and whine and feel sorry for herself. What an awful person she had been. Shallow and frivolous and self-involved. Now that it was too late she saw it. How sad that she had had so much and not taken advantage of it. She could see Blanche falling into the same self-pitying trap that beset so many First Ladies. Blanche needed to be taken out of herself. To see how much she could do, what opportunities were available to her. To see how this could be a joyous and fulfilling time of her life. If Sadie had done nothing truly worthwhile as First Lady, she might have a second chance if she could help Blanche.