The Washingtonienne by Jessica Cutler Read Free Book Online Page A

his job, his marriage, all the things he loathed about Washington.
    I got the feeling that Fred had nobody else to talk to. What he really wanted was someone who would listen to him. (And get him off on a regular basis, but that seemed incidental now.)
    I asked him why he lived in Washington if he hated it here so much. It was my effort to participate in the “conversation,” which was fast becoming an hour-long monologue.
    Fred smiled at me and said, “When the president offers you a job, you don’t say no.”
    I looked at him dubiously. He wasn’t kidding.
    “You know
the president
?” I asked incredulously. “You’re, like,
friends
with him?”
    I didn’t know if I was more impressed with Fred or with myself. I was just one degree away from POTUS! Damn Washington was a small town.
    “That’s how I got such a cushy job,” he explained. “Not everybody gets to take these long lunches whenever they want to.”
    I looked at the clock. We had been here just over an hour, not counting our travel time.
    He stood up and put his suit back on. Reaching into his jacket, he pulled out a sealed envelope.
    “This is for you,” he said.
    The money.
    I thanked him as I tucked the envelope away in my handbag. The sight of it made me very uncomfortable for some reason. I supposed I knew that there was something inherently wrong with accepting an envelope full of cash. But then again, what made this any different from letting Fred buy me lunch? Either way, he had to pay. “Because I’m worth it,” as L’Oreal would say.
    As soon as Fred left the apartment, I tore the envelope open and counted the money inside.
    Four hundred dollars. For an hour of my time.
    What a country.
    Why four hundred dollars? I would never know. We never discussed money, and I never asked any questions; I just accepted the envelopes and said, “Thank you,” like the polite, well-bred girl that I was.
    THAT NIGHT, I GOT another phone call from my sister.
    “Did the check bounce?” I asked her.
    “Yes, but that’s not why I’m calling,” she sniffled into the phone.
    I could tell that Lee had been crying.
    “I can send another check,” I offered, “and I promise that it won’t bounce this time.”
    “Listen to me!” she said. “Mom and Dad are getting a divorce.”
    I was totally blindsided. My parents always seemed to have a very comfortable partnership, the kind I wanted for myself someday. Now it seemed as if they had been living a lie.
    “Where is this coming from?” I asked incredulously. “What happened?”
    “I don’t know,” Lee sobbed. “Neither of them wanted to talk about it. Dad just called, asking me if I wanted my stuff shipped to the sorority house. Hasn’t he called you yet?”
    “No, I haven’t heard from either of them,” I said, wondering why they had left me out of the loop. “Why is Dad sending all your stuff to campus?”
    “He’s putting the house up for sale! Why else would he be cleaning it out?”
    “He’s selling the house?
I can’t believe this is happening! Where is Mom supposed to go?”
    “What about us, Jackie? We’re, like,
homeless
! Where will we go? What will we do?”
    “I’ll figure something out. In the meantime, I’ll send you some money.”
    I got off the phone and cut Lee a check. She was right: We really were homeless. We couldn’t just go home to our parents if life ever got too rough. No more safety net—it was all up to me.
    Next, I wrote out a check to April. She was very pleased to know that I could make my half of the rent. At first, I didn’t tell her where the money came from, nor did she seem interested in knowing. Money was money, after all. She probably just assumed that I was getting help from my parents, like everyone else who interned on the Hill. It was too embarrassing to admit that I had a “going rate.” It was like walking around every day with a price tag hanging from your dress.

Chapter 9
    F red offered me his “financial assistance” about two