Primary Season

by Celi, Sara

  Governor Sayers and I stood twenty feet apart from each other on the stage, each of us flanked by a semicircle of American and South Carolinian flags. Behind us, a large board of slick graphics rotated between red, white, and blue, all of them designed just for the myriad of TV cameras in the media pool and across the auditorium hall. The moderators sat before us at a small table; beyond them and the bright stage lights, stretched the audience.

  In the middle of answering a question about moral values, Howard Sayers turned to me. “I agree with most voters in this state—-what a man does in his personal life is almost as important as what he does when in public service. You don’t seem to understand that.”

  A small rumble traveled through the crowd. The debate hadn’t been very exciting, and they seemed intrigued by the change in atmosphere that came with Sayers’s words.

  “My opponent surrounds himself with women. He can’t keep himself in check.” Howard’s scratchy voice rose. “He has one beautiful woman by his side, but just this week, we heard about another more scandalous affair. A young college student who says she’s carrying his child. A college student, folks. A woman he slept with, then discarded as if—”

  “Governor Sayers,” I rebutted in a stern but respectful tone. “You are way out of line. What you’ve said is unfounded, and unsubstantiated.”

  “I hardly think so. We’re not just talking about abuse of power. If you’ve slept with her, who else have you slept with? The voters have a right to know what they’re getting, and it starts with understanding that you’re a womanizer who—”

  “Governor Sayers.” Darla Martin interrupted him before I could. “Governor Sayers, the paternity of Ms. Parker’s child, and those accusations have not been—”

  “What? Proven? Ms. Martin, from where I stand, that woman is a victim. She gave herself over to a cruel system, and she should be believed. How could she have known a man like this would betray her?”

  I stared at Howard Sayers as the words fell out of his mouth. He was good, very good, and worst of all, he knew it. But I was better.

  I smiled at the South Carolinians, remembering that I needed to keep in control and play to them, not to him. What I said next might alter the race. “Amanda Parker is someone I only briefly met in a reception line after I gave a speech to the graduates of her school. We had maybe ten seconds together.” My small smile turned to a wide grin. “And while I’m good, I hate to say that I’m not that good.”

  The crowd laughed. They were with me. Thank god.

  “The child she is carrying is not mine. I’ve said that before. Unfortunately, I believe Ms. Parker has been given some bad advice. She’s been led astray. In a way, you’re right. She is a victim, but not one victimized by me. My record is spotless. You’ll find that I have been faithful to every woman that I’ve ever dated. I have a wonderful relationship with a fantastic woman.” I gestured to Kathryn, seated in the center of the front row. She smiled on cue as the gallery applauded. “And for that, I am forever grateful.”

  The claps grew and Darla turned to Howard. “Governor Sayers?”

  “Well, I—” He struggled for a breath, and I knew my words had done more than just a scratch. “I’m sure the next few weeks will reveal a lot about my opponent, the nature of this race, and much more. We haven’t heard the last of this, I promise.”

  “Very well, then,” Darla said at a fast clip, clearly ready to move on with her questions. She raised her pen and gestured to me. “Turning now to foreign policy. Senator Blanco, the looming threat of ISIS and the ongoing threat of lone-wolf attacks…”

  The rest of that debate faded into a mess of soft edges and blurred lines. I heard her question, and answered it with something the audience seemed to find satisfactory, but even as I stayed on my A-game, I couldn’t get Alex out of my mind. And Kathryn. And the mess I’d made of my personal life.

  Damn it all to hell.

  Leave it to me to get mixed up with a woman I could actually find myself caring for, and right as the things that I’d had years to achieve started to materialize. Leave it to me to meet her on the job. And leave it to me to let my past screw it up.

  I needed to fix things. Immediately.

  Patrick won the debate. Everyone said so—the national media, social media, the newspapers, and the snap polling of voters taken just after the debate. He won. He slayed Howard Sayers with his charm, honesty, good looks, knowledge of the issues, and grace under pressure.

  It wasn’t even close. I woke up to two hundred emails, and they all said the same thing. Patrick Blanco had a real chance to win South Carolina. And from there, anything could happen. Anything.

  Feeling satisfied and encouraged, I took my bags down to the bus and returned to the hotel lobby. I grabbed a cup of coffee from the station located by the front desk and sank into the hard leather couch located on the far side of the room.

  I was early. Chipper. Ready for anything.

  I was also twenty minutes ahead of schedule, so I passed the time by responding to the information and interview requests from the Myrtle Beach newspaper, TV stations, and talk radio stations. Our schedule had us headed there for an afternoon rally on the ocean-side boardwalk. Along with a few political bloggers, we could expect a decent-sized media presence, and our campaign had issued about 300 new e-tickets overnight.

  I had just sent off my fifth reply when the elevator doors opened and out strode Doug. When his attention caught mine, his pasty face turned paler. He shoved his hands in his too-loose black slacks and slunk over to me.

  “What’s wrong?” I closed my laptop and placed it on the couch next to me. Doug sat down on the wide wooden ottoman that featured a vase full of fake reeds and flowers. He raked a hand through his hair.

  “You haven’t seen it?”

  “Seen what?”

  “Jesus Christ.” He looked away for a beat, then back at me. “You don’t have a Google Alert set up for this kind of thing?”

  “What kind of thing?”

  Doug cleared his throat, yanked his phone out of his pocket, unlocked it, and pulled up the Safari screen. He turned it toward me without a word. He didn’t need to say anything.

  “Oh, my god.” I grabbed the phone and scrolled up and down the screen, willing what I saw to go away.

  It didn’t.

  For the second time in two weeks, Daily Mail had an exclusive about Patrick Blanco. A big one. A ten photo one, to be exact, and the tabloid didn’t have to put many words with the images. The pictures spoke for themselves. “Cozy on the Campaign Trail? A Little Southern Comfort?” screamed the headline.

  All ten photos featured Patrick and me. Behind the lobby column. Speaking “intently.” Looking at each other “longingly.” “Secretly meeting.” To back it up, Daily Mail quoted one or two anonymous sources who confirmed “sparks had been flying” between the two of us “for some time—the worst-kept secret in the Blanco campaign.” Then the publication wondered, “How will Kathryn feel about this betrayal?” A third anonymous source claimed she was “heartbroken to have been cheated on by Patrick.”

  “This can’t—” I struggled to say something. “I didn’t…” My throat closed up and my tongue felt thick. I swallowed, but it didn’t help. And I wondered for moment if I might faint.

  “This is bad, Alex. Really bad.” Doug narrowed his eyes. “Is this even true?”

  I struggled for an answer.

  “Holy fuck.” Doug groaned. “It is, isn’t it? How long has this been going on?”

  “What? Nothing is going on. Nothing.”

  Deny, deny, deny. Always a good option. Deny first, then insist the tabloid had it wrong. This was Daily Mail, after all, not The New York Times. Daily Mail had about as much credibility as the town gossip on her second martini. Their journalists made mistakes all the time.

  Didn’t they?

  “Someone manipulated those photos.” I handed him back the phone. “They’re trying to make something out of nothing.”

  D
oug stood up, shoved his hands in his back pockets, and paced around the atrium. When he wandered back, his face had tightened. “I’m not going to ask you about your personal life. That’s not my business. But what is my business is this campaign we’ve been working so hard on for the last few months. And I can’t believe you and Patrick would jeopardize this.” He sighed. “It’s reckless.”

  I started to answer him, planning to insist this wasn’t what it seemed, but the elevator dinged open at that moment. Patrick, Kathryn, and Heather all filed out, each one looking glummer and more upset than the last. When they reached us, Kathryn spoke first.

  “This is a betrayal,” she said, aiming her words at me, though she kept her voice lowered as if she was trying not to yell. “An absolute betrayal.”

  “I don’t see how,” I said. “It’s not like you two are in a real relationship, so I’m not really sure why this bothers you so much.”

  The words just tumbled out of my mouth, but I didn’t care who heard me. I wasn’t going to take the brunt of this, no matter what she wanted to pin on me. Doug’s eyes widened and Heather gasped.

  “You little bitch,” Kathryn snarled under her breath after sweeping her gaze around the lobby. “You think you can—you have no idea who you’re dealing with. Believe me.”

  “Kathryn, stop it,” Patrick said. “That’s unnecessary.” He scanned the room. “Let’s move this to the business center, okay? We all need to talk. Now.”

  The five of us agreed and made our way to the small room between the front desk and the bank of elevators. It contained a few particle board desks, some computers, a fax machine, an ancient copier, and a bank of phones. We dumped our luggage near the doorway and gathered in a semicircle.

  “This is a setback,” Patrick began. “A major one.”

  “Is it true?” Heather asked. “Are you all fucking?”

  “Jesus.” I sighed. “That’s not how I’d put it.” I glanced over at Patrick, wondering how he’d describe things. “We’re—”

  “We were discussing something important, and the photos caught us in an intense conversation,” Patrick insisted. “That’s all. There is nothing going on between Alex and me. She’s fantastic at her job, but that’s it.” As he spoke, he made eye contact with everyone in the half circle, everyone except me. “The article is wrong.”

  When everything started between me and Patrick, I hadn’t expected that I’d grow to care about him so much, or that I’d want more than he’d be willing to give me. I had just wanted him—his body, his attention, his presence, his encouragement. I didn’t think much about the consequences his eventual repudiation of me would have on my feelings.

  But here we were. He was loudly denying that he’d ever cared about me—that we’d ever had anything going on at all. And he was doing it to save himself.

  “We’ll issue a full denial,” he said. “I’ll make a statement this afternoon in Myrtle Beach. Once again, this will go away. We’ve been here before. We can make this happen.”

  “Even so,” I added. “I’m resigning from the campaign.”

  It’s hard to describe how strange my apartment felt when I opened the door to it twelve and a half hours later. Julie, my roommate, wasn’t home from work yet, and the deafening silence made me shudder. How much had my life changed in the span of one day? Just twenty-four hours before, I’d been a level-headed, impressive, driven, focused manager of a campaign, a woman who had everything going for her. At long last, I was going to be someone in DC, not just a person on the outside looking in, never a part of the inner circle. Running Patrick Blanco’s PR team would do that and more. Hell, if I played it right, I might even wind up as his press secretary once Patrick made it into the Oval Office.

  But now, none of that was in my future. None of it.

  Instead, I was the harlot in a national sex scandal, the “other woman” of a man who seemed to have everything he ever wanted. I was a slut, a tart, a manipulator who used her position to get close to her boss, a shrew with no morals who put sex above all else. I’d read all this and more all over the Internet as I waited in the Columbia airport for my hastily booked flight home. As I sat in one of the fake leather seats in the terminal, I broke the cardinal rule of public relations—I read the comments on the articles written about my relationship with Patrick as the news began to spread across the country. I searched my name on Facebook, I found myself trending on Twitter. I scrolled up and down the screen of my phone, digesting it all.

  No, the words weren’t kind.

  Fame had never been something that I’d chased, but now I had it. For better or for worse. The words, the accusations, and the pain of the last week stuck to me like tar. My career was over. I’d probably never live this down. In fact, I wouldn’t put it past the media to bring it up whenever they talked about Patrick.

  I tossed my bags in my bedroom, wandered into the kitchen, found a bottle of pinot noir in the cupboard, opened it, and poured myself a large glass. I was halfway through it before the bitter wine blunted the pain, and realization washed through me that I literally had no options left in my playbook. I’d have to go back to Omaha sooner than I thought.

  Fuck.

  I poured myself another glass. By the time Julie, my roommate, came home, I’d drunk two more.

  “Oh god, this is worse than I thought,” she said.

  “I don’t give a damn.” I shouted at her from across the room because I couldn’t have stood up, even if I’d tired. “It’s not like…you know how these things…”

  “Doesn’t South Carolina vote tomorrow?” Julie dropped her briefcase by the door and put her hands on her hips. “Shouldn’t you be there? Alex, I—”

  “Isss fiiiiine.” I’d been passing the time with a Netflix marathon of Gossip Girl. I was a third of the way into my second bottle, and the alcohol had made things blurry and soft, which also meant I had trouble forming words. “They don’t need me. Besides…no problem. I’m fine.”

  “No, you’re not.” Julie hung her trench coat on the hook by the door and rushed over to me. She placed a hand on my forehead. “Good. You’re not sick. Just drunk.”

  “Don’t say that,” I managed. “I’m not drunk.”

  “God knows I would be.” Julie jerked her head in the direction of the doorway. “At least the media haven’t found out where you live.” She sighed. “Not yet.”

  “They don’t…they don’t care ‘bout me.” I turned on the couch until I had a view of the ceiling tiles. “They care about him. And Kathryn Van der Schorn.”

  “Van der Loon.”

  “Whatever.” I waved a sluggish hand at my room. “They want…I want— I want more. I want—”

  “Good god, you are smashed.” Julie glanced at the TV, then back at me. “Oh, yes. Gossip Girl. Want some company?”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  Without even asking, she poured me another glass of that second bottle.

  Seated next to me in the black Denali as we drove to the Myrtle Beach VFW hall on Primary Election Day, Doug shook his head and locked his phone. “It’s not good,” he said. “Not what we want to see at all. The last poll out of Charleston has you tied with Sayers. Tied. That’s within the margin of error, and he has the momentum, not you.”

  “It’s one poll.”

  “Five-Thirty-Eight also has your chance of winning this thing at 35 percent.”

  I nodded, taking in this information. “We’ll have to meet as many people as we can today, talk to as many voters as possible. Tell people to get to the polls. It’s only seven. We’ve got a long day ahead. We can do this.”

  Doug and Heather exchanged a look. Even though I only saw the back of their heads, I could guess the expressions on their faces. They weren’t encouraged. They weren’t optimistic. Not even close.

  “Good grief,” Kathryn muttered under her breath. “Bloody freaking hell.”

  “This week has been a disaster,” Doug admitted.

  “We’ll be fine,” I said, but the wor
ds didn’t sound convincing, even to me. “This isn’t something we can’t overcome. We all know the polls in this state are all over the place. Can’t be trusted. The voters haven’t had their say.”

  The driver parked the Denali in front of the hall and I unlocked my seatbelt. “Come on, team. We’ve had a few setbacks this week, but let’s go out there and win this one.”

  I opened the door, gestured to the rest of them, and got out, a plastic smile on my face. We had five stops scheduled for that day, and a luncheon at a local school district to talk about education funding. I’d be damned if I was going to let the last few tumultuous days get the best of me, or them. We’d come too far and worked too hard to just give up at the end of the line.

  By the end of the night, though, even I couldn’t lie to myself any more. Whatever momentum I’d thought we had during the last week, whatever chances I thought we had in the bag were over. Epically, deeply, tragically over. More than that, I’d lost the one person I actually cared about—Alex.

  Doug confirmed my suspicion that we’d lose South Carolina with one texted photo of a semi-full conference room off the hotel bar, a room that the staff had set up as the site of the “Patrick Blanco Victory Party.” Minutes after the polls closed, that party had maybe fifteen people. Seconds after I saw that photo on my phone, CNN showed a wide-view live shot of Howard Sayers’s victory party at a restaurant in Spartanburg. It already had one hundred people.

  “We lost,” I told Kathryn, even though South Carolina only had 2 percent of the precincts reporting. “We’re finished.”

  “Don’t say that,” she said, but her voice broke. I wondered if she was disappointed in me, herself, or both. “We don’t know for sure.”

  “We know,” I said. “We know.”

  A half hour later, as I sat on the bed drinking a bourbon laced with Diet Coke, CNN, FOX News, and MSNBC all called the race for Howard Sayers. Seconds later, CNN cut to a shot from Spartanburg, and a goddamn net full of balloons dropped on top of Sayers and his family. I had lost. Lost.