28

THERE’S A MOLE IN SHEEP’S CLOTHING?

It wasn’t until after Monday’s show and subsequent planning meetings, that it occurred to Cady to tackle some of the many tasks she had let slide last week, what with all the inner turmoil. She began sorting through the slim stack of mail now, much of it duplicates of things already lurking in her email. Even though she had Metroed to the office, suitcase in tow, directly after her weekend fight with Jackson, she certainly hadn’t done anything resembling work that day. She’d had plenty else to keep her busy like reading through the list on her computer confirming that she had addressed several of her talking points with Jackson. (Even if she had failed to deliver the various zingers she had worked so hard to craft.)

When she finally called Jay, he had extended the invitation instantly: “We are presently accepting emotionally wounded refugees,” he had said kindly. She insisted on buying him dinner as a thank-you, and when he dictated that they order in and watch movies instead, it was like he’d read her mind. She knew Sky would be returning the following week, so she would have to figure out somewhere else to stay then, but for the time being, she was grateful for the couch.

Inbox cleared, desk in order, she finally got to that poster tube that had been hanging around. She popped open the top, slid out a rolled poster and found a note on Preamble stationery.

Cady,

You may or may not remember (probably not actually) dropping by Preamble the other night. Just a note to say that these words helped me when my world exploded. Independence can be a good thing. Pursue your happiness. The founding fathers had it right.

Yours, Parker.

PS: Okay, ulterior motive here: you still have my only tuxedo jacket. Not that I need it anytime soon. But it lives here at the bar, on the coatrack in my office. It’s like a pet or a plant that I’m just used to having around. Thanks.

The jacket. She had forgotten all about it, but could picture it now, crumpled in the corner of the closet. She would have to go back to the apartment for it when Jackson was out. It was already too late today, she couldn’t risk it, but she could leave work early tomorrow on a rescue mission.

She unrolled the poster: the Declaration of Independence, the kind they sold in so many of the museum gift shops, but with the words “pursuit of happiness” circled grandly in silver spray-paint. The same words she had seen as graffiti on the wall of Preamble. She grabbed a roll of tape from her desk, balanced on a chair and stuck it up on her office wall right above the TV so she would look at it all the time.

* * *

With your blessing, I shall leak this today. Conventions are over, this can dominate the news cycle, the email greeted Madison first thing that morning. It’s go time.

I trust you. Let’s go for it, Madison typed back as she hopped on the elliptical machine in the mirrored gym of their Upper East Side town house. I’m ready to do my part. It’ll be tough but I can get it done in time. She felt a little queasy, but she needed to put on her game face now. Like any fire baton twirler worth her weight in lighter fluid, Madison believed strongly in the mantra Go Big Or Go Home. Or, as it had been declared by one of her key donors the night she had crashed the Arnold fund-raiser: great risk brings the potential for history-making rewards. She also believed she might as well get paid handsomely for something she was already planning to do for free, challenging as it would be.

As she finished her five miles on the machine, CNN already had it. The banner on the screen read: Anti-Goodfellow Super PAC: $7 million and Counting.

She turned up the volume to hear Grant Foxhall. “There’s been plenty of talk surrounding the notion of an anti-Goodfellow movement, with little evidence of an organized effort,” the handsome anchor began. “Until now. Suddenly nonbelievers have put their money where their mouths are. A Super PAC called Up To No Goodfellow has surfaced claiming to already have accumulated $7 millon to invest in preventing Hank Goodfellow from becoming the next commander in chief. The group claims on its newly launched website, it may use donations to ‘support Goodfellow’s opponents, fund attack ads or find new and novel ways to chip away at the grossly underqualified candidate.’ It also boasts a mole inside the Goodfellow camp. In coming weeks we’ll be anxious to see if this has any impact on the candidate’s so far steady poll numbers.”

Madison felt the guilt seep into her skin like a chemical peel gone bad, and switched channels to escape it. A sudden flurry of activity came from upstairs: conversation, stomping, something shattered, phones ringing. Members of the Machine, no doubt hearing the same news. She froze in place, turned down the volume: Hank’s voice, muffled by the distance but also ranting and raving. “There’s a goddamn mole in here? Who is it? Who’s the goddamn mole?”

“That’s the problem, sir, we don’t know,” someone said, probably Mike.

“So you mean to tell me there is a mole in sheep’s clothing?” Hank said. He always had trouble with metaphors.

“Um, yes,” Mike said.

“All these years I’ve never dealt with more lyin’ cheatin’ lowlifes,” he said, and she could just picture him shaking his head. “I’ve gotta know who I can trust. I am all about trust. You know that. I know that. I need the American people to know that.”

Deep in her heart, Madison knew she was doing the right thing, but it did not feel good. Kind of like the time she had tried the Master Cleanse, but much, much worse. Hank was a good man. But she knew him better than he knew himself these days. And he refused to listen to her when she told him this might not be the right business venture for him. All she had to do was think of their son, Henry, that call he’d made to her back in the beginning of the year. “What’s going on with Dad, Mom? Why does he sound so hyped up all the time? He talks about invading countries and stuff, but I kind of feel like he doesn’t understand what’s happening in the world sometimes,” Henry had said in a whisper, as though speaking this way was treason. “We’ve been studying a lot of this in class, US foreign policy through the years, and it’s heavy, complicated stuff. Does he know what he’s talking about?”

She couldn’t lie to Henry and had told him simply, “I don’t know, sweetheart.” But she did know that this could be bad for business in the long run. This could threaten to destroy all he had built for himself. The company, the sports teams, these were what mattered to him. The rest had just been a power trip. In the oil world and the sports arena, Hank had been in his domain and branded himself a charming-Southern-playboy-with-an-occasional-wild-streak turned family man. He had never paid much mind to politics. Sure, his associates would make the offhand suggestion a few times a year when strong quarterly reports would come in for the company: “What haven’t you conquered yet, Hank? Are you gonna run for president one day?” It had clearly gotten to his head, as can happen when you’re a person who is generally successful at everything you try, as Hank was. So she had taken a deep breath and said to their beloved boy, who was so much wiser than either of them, “The next few months may look a little...odd...for our family, but I’ll sort this out for us all. Have the kids at school been giving you any trouble about this?”

Henry had hesitated just enough, then, “It’s okay. A couple of them are assholes—”

“Language, sweetheart.”

“But, whatever. Those guys are like that with everyone about something, so it’s no big thing,” he continued. “And everyone else is pretty cool, the guys on the team and all, they know it’s not me up there.”

She was instantly grateful that Henry was not only a smart, levelheaded young man with solid friends to count on, but also a gifted lacrosse player, who was already being recruited by the Ivies. Talent could protect and insulate you against the world in some ways, she had always thought. She had long wished to have some skill that truly commanded respect. Beauty was the polar opposite, but you work with what you’ve got.

“Keep studying and playing hard, sweetie, okay? This will get settled, sooner or later,” she’d said, wishing she could be more comforting. When he was about to hang up, she stopped him. “Henry. You know, sometimes people need to be saved from themselves and sometimes the only way to do that, and to reach them, is by hitting them over the head with things, sort of.”

“Okay, Mom” was all he had said.

Madison took the elevator upstairs to avoid running into the Machine. The plan with her donors had been to let him get the nomination, then talk him out of it, leaving the field wide-open for Arnold to win the election. By then it would be too late for Hank’s party to put up a replacement candidate with any hope of winning, and Madison knew no one much cared for the likely choice, Hank’s VP pick. Even that, Hank had gotten wrong. A political lightweight state senator who had once been a baseball player. He should’ve picked the girl.

Figuring out when to strike would not be easy. Madison had barely had any alone time with Hank in weeks. She peeled off her gym clothes—from her own line developed for that chain a few years ago, now discontinued. They didn’t wick away the sweat as much as she had hoped but had been a good price point and she still took pride in wearing them nonetheless—and stepped into the shower, hoping to wash away this feeling of dread.

* * *

Dear Motherfucker,

As a mom, it seems hard to get positive reinforcement or confirmation that you’re not completely fucking up. Do you ever feel like the day is somehow often a series of fails no matter what you do?

Asking for a Friend

Dear Friend,

Please, the last time I got any kind of positive job performance review was during labor when my doc told me I was a good pusher and asked how much yoga I’d done during my pregnancy. I’m expecting again, ask me how much yoga I’m doing now—None. (Though I am wearing yoga pants every day.) I receive this question in some form every week, and yes, as a mom, the days are manic depressive with highs and lows—your kid ate a vegetable: score!; your kid took off all their clothes and ran out into the front yard: fail!—but as long as you’re giving them love, then everyone’s winning. When I’m feeling down, I steal extra hugs, I squeeze their plump, pinchable thighs, kiss their chubby cheeks and I feel better. And a glass of wine after bedtime doesn’t hurt. By the way, let me tell you what no one else will: you’re doing great, keep up the good work, Mama.

Reagan finished her column during the twins’ nap time (rereading it she was reminded yet again of how much she had changed since they’d come into her life, how they had softened her edges, how she hadn’t understood how delicious babies were until she’d had them), and then she did the unthinkable: she sat down for a few minutes, put her swollen feet up and turned on the TV. She flipped between the news networks and stopped at MSNBC: footage from the requisite trip to DC’s own Ben’s Chili Bowl. John Arnold stood smiling as he ordered at the counter of the famous eatery, then, sleeves rolled up, he dug into what the general viewing audience might call a messy chili dog—but what she knew to be the Original Chili Half-Smoke—and gave a thumbs-up for the camera. Over his left shoulder in the background, Ted stood in profile, tapping away on his phone. The nostalgia washed over her, and she had an idea. It didn’t look like it was a live shot, but she wanted to try anyway.

Unearthing her phone from between sofa cushions, amid a treasure trove of spilled Cheerios, she texted Ted: Having a craving, are you still on U Street???

The craving wasn’t so much for chili as it was for their first date, those early, fizzy days and months and years of their relationship when they used to swing by the famous spot tipsy, always their last stop during a night out.

Two minutes later she received a photo of what appeared to be the inside of the fridge at the Arnold campaign headquarters with a Ben’s Chili Bowl take-out bag front and center: already on it... he wrote.

it’s a curry. She had always been confident.

cinnamon. He never really purported to have any idea.

She laughed out loud. He was in a good mood today. She wrote back: yuzu?

This had been their ongoing debate on their very first date: trying to guess the secret ingredients in Ben’s Chili. As that night had worn on, and the drinks had flowed, and they had fallen for each other (she still remembered being transfixed by that stunning contrast of his jet-black hair and brows against his ice-blue eyes), the suggestions had become more outlandish. It became a long-running inside joke in the years since then. It made her smile now to think back.

She was already asleep when he got home, but she enjoyed her own Original Chili Half-Smoke for breakfast.