BUCK UP, THE First Lady thinks, and with the lights in her office still off, she strides over and picks up the receiver.
“Yes?”
From the crackle and snap of static, she instantly recognizes the call is coming from Air Force One, and the communications officer flying up there somewhere says, “Please hold for the President.”
Grace leans against the edge of her desk.
Waits.
She’s amazed at how calm she is.
“Grace?” comes the voice that used to excite her, intrigue her, and now, for the last years, often disappoints her.
“Yes,” she says, not wanting to say anything more.
More cracks and pops of static. Let him go first, let him set the tone.
“Grace, I don’t know what to say, I mean, I’m so sorry about—”
“Shut up, Harry,” she says. “Save it for your girl, whoever she is.…And who is she?”
“She’s uh, well, we can talk about it when I get back—”
She interrupts him. “Talk? What shall we talk about? Is she the first? Is she? Or is she one in a long line of eager young ladies looking to service the President of the United States?”
“Yes,” he snaps back. “She’s the first. And the only one. And she’s not just—”
“Oh, spare me, Harry, how she’s much more than just a mistress or a woman you’ve cheated with,” she says. “Don’t tell me that this secret, sordid business of yours was so special, so romantic. Are you proud of yourself? Are you? You’ve managed to humiliate me, make a mockery of our marriage, and you’ve also given voters something else to think about when they vote in four weeks. When they get into that voting booth, what are they going to see? The honorable Harrison Tucker, President of the United States, or a cheating husband?”
“Grace, please, I hope we can—”
She talks right over him. “Hope?” she asks, voice rising. “Here’s what you should hope, fool. You better hope that the American voters are stupider than you think, that they’ll ignore the blatant…idiocy of sinking your chances a month away from Election Day. That they won’t sign on with that yogurt-and-granola-loving governor and kick your sorry butt out of the Oval Office. And to drag me down with this…drama of yours. Harry, I won’t have it. I’ve put up with enough from you over the years, from Columbus to DC, and you know the sacrifices I’ve made…what I’ve given up.”
Her voice chokes, finally, and she bites her lower lip to prevent a sob from coming out. And she doesn’t dare tell him what else is on her mind, that all the good work she’s done as First Lady in the past four years—to rescue the most helpless and vulnerable in this nation, fighting for them even when he and his bastard chief of staff wouldn’t—will now be ignored for the gossip-filled stories to come.
The tears are now rolling right along. Harrison has hurt her, but she doubts he knows just how deeply.
Through the static on the phone—coming from Air Force One’s extensive telephone encryption system—her husband’s voice comes through, soothing and apologetic.
“Grace, please…I made a mistake. A serious mistake. No excuse, it’s all on me…but please…can we discuss this, work through this—”
Now his voice isn’t that of a loving and contrite husband. It’s the voice of a practiced politician trying to make a deal.
It’s too much.
She interrupts him one last time. “When are you getting to Andrews?”
“In…less than two hours.”
“And you want to talk it over after you land?”
“Grace, please. Can we do that?”
The First Lady takes a deep breath. “I don’t want to talk to you now, or then, or ever.”
And she slams the phone down.