Regrets Only

by Sally Quinn

  When the motorcade finally arrived and they untangled themselves from the car, she dashed ahead to where the other reporters were standing to get a glimpse of the President and the Prime Minister greeting each other. When they had gone inside and left the press outside to wait, Des walked over to her. She could see the confused look on his face.

  “Don’t I deserve an explanation?” he asked.

  “For what?” She was trying not to show her anger.

  “For last night. We had plans. I get back to the hotel and get this cryptic note that you’re meeting Everett Dubois after the banquet. Okay. Fair enough. I’ve been around this track with you before, but I’m older and wiser and more secure, so I can handle it. But I expected you to give me a call when you got back to your room. I left a note in your box. What the hell is going on?”

  She started to say “Nothing.” Then she couldn’t help herself.

  “I was with Nick.” Her face was stony.

  “All night?” He looked stunned.

  “Yes.” There was no explanation, no apology in her voice.

  For a minute she thought he might cry. She saw the agony on his face and the profound hurt in his eyes. Then his jaw tightened and he matched her stony look.

  He started to walk away, then hesitated, then turned back to her, his own rage welling up in his voice.

  “Well, then, fuck you,” he said, and turned to walk away from her once again.

  * * *

  Sadie looked at the pile of bills on the small desk in her office off the West Hall and sighed. One of the most boring jobs of being First Lady was paying bills. Bills for living in the White House. The idea that the President should have to pay for all the meals on the second floor of the White House, plus small personal toiletries, was absurd. It would seem that the American people could foot that bill. It wasn’t as if the Greys couldn’t afford it. But there were First Families who didn’t have much money. And it upset her further that she had to pay for her own transportation in Air Force One. First-class fare plus one dollar. But there was no point in seething about it. That was the rule, and they above all were not the ones to try to change it. She pushed the pile of bills away from her as if that would solve the problem, then turned and looked out at Lafayette Square. She could see the various demonstrators out in front waving their placards and pacing up and down in front of the gate. They were such a familiar sight that she scarcely noticed them anymore. The bright red tulips were out in full bloom in the park, and the tiny pale green buds had begun to appear on the trees. It was unseasonably warm for April, and people were lying on the grass in the sun or sitting there eating their lunches. Sadie had an uncontrollable urge to run downstairs and outside, past the gate and out into the park.

  She wanted to take off her shoes and romp around, flop down on the grass, talk to people, walk down the street, window-shop, walk into a restaurant, eat lunch, see friends. The desire was so overwhelming that she lost her breath for a moment thinking about it. Nearly two years of being a prisoner was really getting to her. Some-times she thought, in the middle of some ceremony on the South Lawn, that she would just scream out loud, “Get me out of here.” She knew what it must feel like to be a hostage with a gun to your head telling the police at the door that there was nothing wrong. She had to smile and pretend she was happy and in love with her husband when she was an inmate. She was sure that four more years of this kind of life in a straitjacket and she would be truly nuts. The only thing that kept her going was the thought that she might write a decent book about it. There was no doubt that it would be a best-seller. She and Des had joked about the title. Something along the lines of Bananas: A First Lady Freaks Out had appealed to them. More and more, though, neither one of them was finding the situation very funny.

  Des had been in an odd mood when he returned from the Middle East in February. Sadie had tried to find out whether he had spent time with Allison. But he had cut her off so abruptly that she was afraid to probe.

  She pumped Jenny, but Jenny appeared not to know anything. The only thing she could figure was that they had had a falling-out over something to do with Everett. Des had been beating Allison out on the story at every turn, and Sadie had to admit it gave her a certain incentive to keep on leaking. In the time they had been back Allison had had several stories on the Rittman-Omani situation, trying to catch up to the Weekly stories. She had alluded once to the fact that certain Washington insiders felt that Everett might have been involved. Rosey had dug in his heels. He was besieged by his advisers to get rid of Everett, and for some reason he had decided to remain Mr. Loyal. Sadie could not persuade him, so she continued to pass on any little anti-Everett tidbits to Des.

  Whatever the problem with Allison, Sadie was not worried about her any longer. Des was more loving, more attentive than ever, almost to the point of frightening her. She knew that they were heading for a confrontation, for some kind of decision, and she didn’t want to think about it. He had a rather desperate air about him, something she had not seen before. Each time she saw him, she expected it to be the time when he would explode, demand that she leave Rosey or he would not see her anymore.

  “Hard at work, I see,” said Jenny, smiling, as she walked into Sadie’s office. “That stack is as high as it was last week when you resolutely announced you were not leaving here until you had paid them all.”

  “Jenny,” Sadie cried out, her voice almost a shriek, “I have got to get out of here. I can’t stand it another minute. I have got to get out of here. Get me out of here, Jenny. Please. Before I do something unthinkable.”

  “Excuse me for reminding you,” said Jenny, “but you are already doing something unthinkable. Every Monday, to be exact. I hate to think what you’ll come up with for an encore.”

  “You don’t understand,” said Sadie, a frantic note in her voice. “I have to get out. We’ve got to go somewhere. We’ve just got to get out of here instantly.”

  “Where do you want to go?”

  “I don’t care. Anywhere except Camp David. That place is giving me the willies too. It’s just a bigger prison. What about East Hampton? We could open up the house there. You could come with me. Rosey’s going to be on a campaign swing next weekend. Without me. He’d be delighted to have me go up there. Why don’t we go there? Nobody’s up there this time of year. We could walk on the beach and eat pizza from Sam’s.”

  “I smell a rat.”

  “No, you don’t, Jenny. I swear. I’ve just had it up to here with this place, and if I don’t get out soon I’m going to take off all my clothes and run down Pennsylvania Avenue. How about that for an encore?”

  “We’ll go. How about this afternoon? How fast can you pack?”

  Sadie burst out laughing. “You know what I like about you, Jenny? There are no flies on your head.”

  “And you know what I like about you? You know how to get what you want.”

  * * *

  Sadie loved East Hampton in the off season. The endless stretches of beautiful white beach were deserted. You could walk for miles and not see anybody. The house was right at the beach, behind the dunes, with a little hidden path through the privet hedge to a tiny cottage right on the beach at the top of the dune. Sadie could walk from her house to the cottage anytime in privacy, and she could sit on the little deck on the dune without anybody noticing. It was perfect. Des could stay in the cottage. He could pull his car into the parking lot by the Coast Guard station and then walk over the dune. Naturally, Sadie had not told Jenny the plan. She would never have approved. But once she got up there she wouldn’t have any choice. Des would just show up. She’d have only one Secret Service agent with her. Toby was the only one besides Jenny who knew. He had to. Rosey wanted her to take more agents with her to East Hampton, but she persuaded him that she really didn’t need anybody else.

  They would take the small military jet to the East Hampton airport, and they could stay a week. Then come back the same way. Des could spend several days in the cottage, a
nd they would have a chance to be alone outside their little EOB rooms for the first time. It would be heaven.

  The day she arrived the weather had changed from unseasonably warm to unseasonably cold, but the sun was shining and the sky and sea were sparkling. The caretaker had opened the house, and it was spanking-clean and warm and cozy with a big fire in the wood-burning stove in the kitchen. There were groceries in the icebox and flowers on the table, and Sadie wanted to sing and dance and cry, she was in such ecstasy to be out of chains and back into the real world. She and Jenny, with Toby not far behind, couldn’t wait to get out on the beach, and they walked for hours until it was past lunchtime and their noses were red from the wind.

  Later that night Sadie and Jenny sat in front of the fire and talked.

  “Des is coming up, isn’t he?”

  “How did you know?”

  “You already paid me the ultimate Southern compliment by telling me there were no flies on my head. How could I not know? You’re both human. It would have been a shock to me if he weren’t coming.”

  “I guess I should have told you.”

  “No, no. You did me a favor. Now I’m not responsible…. So when’s he arriving?”

  “Tomorrow morning.”

  They sat and stared at the fire for a while.

  “You know you’re going to have to make a decision, don’t you?”

  “I’m trying not to think about it.”

  “You have to. This particular excursion is especially dangerous. A few more of these and it’s bound to get out. I suspect you know that and you are unwittingly trying to be found out so that you will be forced to do something. At least, that’s what Rachel would say. But that is not the smartest thing to do. You’ve got to think this out, Sadie. It’s not fair to Rosey. Or to yourself, for that matter. Or Des. You can’t actually have focused in on what a tremendous scandal it would be and how hurtful to everyone, including the country. If you are even vaguely contemplating leaving Rosey, you have got to start planning it now. You can’t do it until after he’s elected, but then you really will have no choice. If you really can’t do it then, and I know it will be hard, you are going to have to break it off with Des. I am not being your malleable, cooperative press secretary now. I am telling you what has to be done. I have given this a lot of thought. And I have decided that if you don’t do one or the other by the election, then I will have to quit. Assuming, of course, that the shit hasn’t hit the fan before that.”

  Sadie felt her stomach fall out. She closed her eyes for a moment to make sure she had her bearings. Then she looked at Jenny closely. But Jenny wasn’t smiling. She meant it.

  “Oh, Jen,” she whispered. “Please don’t say that. Please. I couldn’t function without you. You’re my lifeline.”

  “I know that, Sadie. Which is why this has not been an easy decision for me. But I have made up my mind, and I know I have no choice. Neither do you, really. I love you a lot. And the only way I know how to make you realize the consequences of what you are doing is to give you an ultimatum. I hope you understand that.”

  Sadie nodded, blinking back the tears, and minutes later excused herself. She lay awake most of the night listening to the wind blow the branches of the cherry tree against the porch roof and the waves pound the beach. At dawn she fell asleep and dreamed about Des. Des was lying on the bed with her, holding her in his strong arms. She dreamed he was kissing her and stroking her, gently, tenderly, telling her he loved her. Even if it hadn’t been clear in her waking mind what she must do, she was now without doubts. There was no way that she could let this man go. She had never loved anyone this way, and she never would, or could. She would have to leave Rosey. She would tell Jenny today. But she didn’t want to wake up because the dream was so good.

  “I love you,” he was whispering to her. “I adore you. Please, stay with me.”

  She wanted it to be like this always, just the two of them. Alone. In a real bed. Together.

  “Des, I love you too,” she murmured back. And then he was kissing her again, this time less gently, and she was afraid he would wake her with his passion. Now he had his hand beneath the sheets and he had pulled up her nightgown and was caressing her abdomen, then her breasts.

  “Oh, God,” she said, “don’t stop, don’t stop.” Even though she knew if he didn’t stop she would awaken. He didn’t stop, he kept on and on, pulling her nightgown up around her neck and she could feel his body as he eased it on top of her and she could feel the heat of her skin as it tingled and she could feel his breath on her neck and she could feel him pounding away at her and she didn’t ever want to wake up and she could hear him cry out her name as he came and she could feel her own body flush all over and then she felt her body heave with shudders and she grasped his back with her hands and said, “I love you, I love you, I love you” over and over until she had quieted down and her body was still. Then she opened her eyes and it was Des. He was there. She was awake and he had been there all along. And then the tears came again, rolling down her cheeks, and she clung to him so tightly that he gasped and laughed. But his eyes were tearing too.

  “I need you, baby,” he said. “I’ve got to have you.”

  “You do,” she said, wiping her tears away with the edge of her sheet and closing her eyes again. “You do, forever.”

  * * *

  “If” had changed to “when.”

  “When we’re together,” he would say to her, “we’ll go to La Samanna for a vacation. It’s a fabulous resort in the Caribbean, the most romantic place I’ve ever been.”

  “When we’re together, we’ll spend weekends in the log cabin in West Virginia by the fire. We’ll walk in the woods, and I’ll make love to you on the rocks in the river.”

  “When we’re together, we’ll get a house in Georgetown and you can decorate it to your heart’s desire and make it cozy, and we’ll both have our offices there.”

  “When we’re together, we can sleep in the same bed and I’ll hold on to you all night long and never let you go.”

  “When? When will we be together?”

  “After the election. I’ll tell Rosey after the election.”

  They were walking arm in arm down the beach. It was late afternoon, and though the wind had subsided, it was still brisk. They were wearing heavy sweaters and windbreakers, and though the beach was deserted, Sadie was wearing a scarf and dark glasses which partially disguised her face. They hadn’t meant to be walking arm in arm. They had started off very carefully, walking apart. But once they had seen that there was no one on the beach, they had relaxed and started horsing around.

  He chased her part of the way until she tripped and fell into the dunes, and they lay in the tall dune grasses and kissed for a while, then picked themselves up and wrapped their arms around each other as they continued on down toward the Beach Club, a series of old lockers and showers on an open-air boardwalk.

  “You’ve got to tell him before then. You have to prepare him. It’s going to be hard on the poor bastard. You can’t just spring it on him like that. He’s got to get used to the idea, make plans, learn to deal with it. He’s got to have time to hate you before you leave him. Then it will be easier for both of you.”

  “You didn’t do that with Sonny.”

  He stiffened and pulled away slightly.

  “That was different. I wasn’t leaving her for another woman.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said, pulling closer. “I shouldn’t have brought her up. I know it was different.”

  Even now the mention of Allison’s name caused him pain. But it was pain he was going to have to either learn to live with or get over. He would not allow her to dominate his thoughts or ruin his life. She had hurt him terribly in Jerusalem, worse than he had ever thought he could be hurt by a woman, and he would never allow that to happen again. He would never allow himself to be so vulnerable again. He had pushed his love for Allison out of his mind as much as he could and determined to concentrate on his feelings for
Sadie. And he did love her. He loved her warmth and humor, her femininity, her sexiness, her willingness to please, her deference to him. There were things about her which Allison lacked. Sadie was a man’s woman. And he was a man who needed a woman. He loved Sadie, there was no question of that. He cared for her deeply. And Sadie loved him. But more than that, he needed her. He needed her to help him forget Allison.

  They walked in silence, his arm around her, but she could tell the mention of Sonny had changed his mood. She wanted to get him out of it.

  “Let’s go look at the Beach Club. I love old dilapidated boardwalks on deserted beaches,” she said, pulling him up the rickety gray wood steps.

  “Let’s play Hide and Seek. You close your eyes and I’ll hide. If you find me, you get a prize,” she said, giggling. She was in a zany mood, and she could tell by his expression that he had picked up her mood and was ready to play.

  She ran off down the maze of old wooden lockers.

  “Ready or not, here I come,” she heard him call, “if you’ll pardon the expression.” She was trying hard not to laugh as she stood squeezed inside the musty locker with cobwebs brushing her face. She could hear Des walking up and down the next row of lockers opening and closing doors at random. Then his footsteps got closer and closer to where she was. She could hear him standing nearly beside the door of her locker. Then, for some reason, he started moving off to the side. She heard him pull open a door and there was a startled shriek—not Des’s voice—and then he cried out, “My God!”

  Frantic, Sadie pushed open the door to her locker and saw Des, a few feet away, standing in front of one of the shower stalls, his hand on the door. He was staring speechless into the stall. Sadie rushed to where he was standing. Inside the shower stall, partially dressed, stood the very married Catholic Mayor of New York City with the wife of a well-known television correspondent. Sadie was so taken aback that it didn’t immediately occur to her that the two of them, once they had recovered from their own embarrassment, might notice the wife of the President of the United States. Of course they knew each other, all four of them. And so there they stood, in shock and embarrassment, until Des spoke.