"Well, this is where you came in, back at that pool again, the one I always wanted. It's dawn now and they must have photographed me a thousand times. Then they got a couple of pruning hooks from the garden and fished me out... ever so gently.

Funny, how gentle people get with you once you're dead."

- Sunset Blvd.

. .
 

because you’re not afraid to kiss the dirt

(and consequently dare to climb the sky)

- e.e. cummings

It’s not going to be a very good show tonight.

She sits in her office, tapping her foot in time with the ticking clock, reading again – fourth time, fifth time – the draft for tonight’s show. It’s a familiar retread – a cold open mocking Republicans and George Bush and religion and the right. There’s something about the Pope and pedophiles and Republican Congressmen with a penchant for young men as well. It’s not crass, but it’s not funny either. There’s a skit about Charlie Sheen that might as well be five years old and the Pussycat Dolls are their musical guest.

It’s television, so that makes this some kind of cycle of boom and bust, rise and fall, made all the more glamorous with too bright stage lights and smiles that don’t do anything but lie. It’s tragic in a bad stage make-up, anachronistic setting, Liz Taylor kind of way.

She reads it again and hates that the only thing she can think of is a man out of a job, a man named Wes.

It’s not going to be a very good show tonight.

She wears Dolce and Gabbana to the morning meeting and sits at the table, ovular, presidential, and she wears black and she holds a Bic pen in the air, chin tilted, like a dollar store scepter.

The meeting adjourns and she stays, still, in her chair, elbows on the table. Jack stays behind as well and he stares at the data laid out in front of him before he speaks.

He tells her not to screw up. He tells her this a lot, sometimes with a shadow of a smirk, sometimes with cold threat lingering behind it. Sometimes he’ll say it without conviction and she thinks there’s a self-destructive streak there that really is just hoping for them to fail.

He tells her not to screw up.

In retrospect, she’ll laugh about this: drunk but not driving and almost amused by the fact he’s technically half as responsible as she that they’ve been fed to the lions of the media circus.

They met at a party two years ago. It was an after party or an after the after-party affair or maybe just a party, but she was there, tight dress and straight hair and the company was the same and the names dropped were nothing new or vaguely interesting and she drank too many martinis (gin, not vodka) and ate too many olives, and buzzed head and stomachache she was ready to call a cab and simultaneously call it an evening.

She met him in the coat checkroom. The attendant was gone but the coats all hung there, and she couldn’t remember which was hers (same company same names same coats), and there was a man, rigid, arms crossed, angry, leaning against the wall, creases around his eyes, yelling into his cell phone. He apparently didn’t give a fuck and wants the goddamned mess cleaned up now and don’t bother calling him back with anymore of your lame-ass excuses for your incompetence, is that clear?

Hanging another coat back up that wasn’t her own she knew he was Jack Rudolph and knew the exact dollar amount he was worth, and it was like a twisted parody of Holly Golightly – black dress, diamonds and carefully coiffed hair and come-hither expression – but a girl really does need to know these things. Rifling through the coat rack, she didn’t wear a fur coat that night, because, really, it’s L.A., and her black pumps pinch her toes and she had realized, slow haze, there was no sound but silence.

She spun around, blue eyes bright, and there’s Jack Rudolph, cell phone in hand, leaning in the corner, watching her and she smiled and she knew it was wan and fake and drunk.

"I’m Jordan McDeere," and she was pretty sure most people say ‘hi’ first, an "I’ve heard such good things about you" (which would be a lie) or throw in some mundane line about the weather or the party or the salmon puffs.

He had smirked and not smiled and he came off as something smug. "I know." It was all he said and his gaze didn’t waver and she didn’t think she liked this, but even drunk, she’s Jordan McDeere and she has this image as strong and confident and able to hold her own in the boy’s club to cultivate. She kept smiling. "And I’m Jack Rudolph," he offered in the kind of haughty tone that said if you live in this town you know who I am and this introduction is strictly a formality.

"I know," she mimicked and was inexplicably pleased when she didn’t receive a smile in return. They stood in a strained silence, and she thought it was funny because they were little more than strangers and tension shouldn’t come from people you don’t know.

"I can’t find my coat," she said, finally.

He arched an eyebrow and she was still smiling and he grabbed the first coat there, a hideous gold brocade number, and held it up for her inspection.

"This it?" And the eyebrow was still arched and his voice was still as self-important as before, and a faltering smile from her and an amused ‘no’ and the coat was back on the rack.

(She finds her coat after he leaves, tall, tanned blonde on his arm and a lingering glance she’d call interest if she was brave – and maybe honest – as he walks away.)

She doesn’t think of him again, until, two years later, her assistant walks into her office, pink message slip in hand and tells her Jack Rudolph of NBS wants to meet her for lunch. He also asks, if it’s possible, for you to keep track of your coat this time.

She accepts.

She wears Chanel to work and pearls hang low along the crisp neckline. She fights with Jack and thinks the word ‘clockwork’ and the rest roll their eyes and Danny tells them to get a room already and Jack laughs like he might just be picturing it.

Someone proposes a show that might as well be called Desperate Housewives: The Golden Girls Years. Someone else has the great idea to serialize a show chronicling the aftermath of a car crash on Dupont Circle in Washington, D.C. and how everyone (and he really likes to emphasize the word ‘everyone’) is changed because of it – complete with flashbacks! Someone wants to do a reality TV series on beauty pageants and another would rather have a dating show for the blind or the deaf, or maybe just the dumb.

She passes on them all.

On Studio 60 they make fun of Tom Cruise because he’s an easy target. They mock Anna Nicole Smith because she doesn’t understand she’s being ridiculed. They take cheap shots at Brad and Angelina and their United Colors of Benetton brood because everyone else does and always gets away with it.

Matt yells at her for making him dumb down his schtick. Jack yells at her because her tough love approach to the viewing audience is causing them to lose too many sponsors, creating too many holes in their already sinking ship.

She yells at herself because she foolishly thought this would be something kind of easy.

Everyone insinuates he only hired her because he wants to fuck her. She deflects the innuendo with good ratings and funny phrases like "critical darling" and "comeback kids."

There’s supposed to be an after-party, because success or failure, there’s always the champagne flute and there’s always the dancing and there’s always the celebrating.

She holds the fax in her hand and exhales long and slow. She folds the paper neatly, a tiny little square and slips it in her purse and passes the waiter and his tray of drinks and stands at the top of the stairs.

She looks like a ballerina, full skirt, tight bun, ramrod posture. She looks like a ballerina and she’s pretty sure she’s close to spinning out of control.

She goes down, one step at a time.

She wears a Hugo Boss pantsuit that makes her look taller than she really is. Hair in a tight bun that makes her head ache she gets out of attending a meeting with Jack twice before she’s run out of evasions and excuses that work.

She knows what they’ll talk of. She knows that Ryan and her past and the network’s future will all be a part of the conversation and they’re already a consistent part of her thoughts and she has no desire to vocalize them, too.

He makes a dig at her and a dig at the fact behind the pretty, perky smile she’s been to places she’d rather lie about then acknowledge as true. It’s embarrassing and he knows it, and maybe that makes it worse. She sighs and slams the portfolio shut before her.

"What? You and your wife never ventured out into the red light district?" The saccharine drips, cold and sickly sweet, sarcastic.

"You’re hilarious." Dry humor, and she thinks that’s the trouble. And things that dry and wooden tend to catch fire and she’s not sure where she’s going with that thought in mind and drops it with the meaningless banter.

"I know. I take a lot of pride in that." She smiles bright and his face is blank and she keeps baiting him because it’s what you do when you’re on the defensive end of a conversation. You turn the tables and you don’t shut up. She didn’t get into an Ivy League school or to the top of the chain on brains alone. "Now that we mention it, why don’t they try to dig up the dirt on you? I mean, you’re an asshole; no one likes you. I’m sure there are reporters, hell, co-workers out there just itching to send you to an early professional grave. And besides, no one, even you, can be this utterly dull."

"Thanks. But, doll," (she imagines he says ‘bitch’ the same way and gets some weird joy out of him turning terms of endearment into terms of harassment and that shouldn’t be a charming quality in a man) "be it as it may, I’m just not the kind of man with dalliances and indiscretions in his past. That kind of man doesn’t become chairman of a network."

"No. They become the president instead."

"I rest my case."

"So, you’ve really got nothing?" There’s a beat filled with mock disappointment and she thinks she’ll never be able to imagine this man in anything other than a business suit. "God, no wonder you’re so…prickly." He arches an eyebrow at her word choice but doesn’t say a word. "You need a little adventure."

She knows she should have stopped talking a long way back, but it’s too far gone by now. He face is strangely lax and he looks away and then returns her gaze, stone cold and maybe something else but she doesn’t think of things like that (she doesn’t think of things like that with intention and meaning but sometimes it happens because he’s Jack and she’s Jordan and she’s coming to believe that might just actually mean something –)

"I believe that’s what I have you here for."

It’s supposed to be a joke, or some kind of witty, sharp retort, but it falls flat, it’s missing the sting and they just kind of stare at each other. She feels that she should look away, her chest feels tight and she’s suddenly nervous, but she holds the eye contact because she will never (neverevernever) be the one to back down first.

"Right," she says softly. "Because I’m spunky."

And there’s another beat and she can hear Shelly and Kayla outside the office and they’re talking and it’s just the low rumble of conversation and a fax machine is whining and a telephone is ringing and a clock is ticking somewhere.

He stands suddenly, a cluck of the tongue and she thinks that’s a cue the subject has been changed and whatever – this is – has passed.

"The honeymoon’s over, Gidget," he announces as he paces and she winces involuntarily at the nickname.

"What is that supposed to even mean?"

"It means your little entr’acte grace period has ended and now Terre Haute and Little Pine Bluff are the least of your worries. You’ve got slipping ratings, stale jokes, disgruntled sponsors and an even more disgruntled ex-husband who’s airing your dirty laundry for the public, piece by tawdry piece."

This is just plain irritating and she rises from her desk chair with as much poise as her ire will allow.

"Is that how your marriage works, Jack? First the honeymoon, and then the fallout?"

"Funny, but based on your marital track record you’re not exactly the number one candidate for the defense of marriage platform. It’s all a little too stones and glass houses."

She doesn’t say anything, just stands there, still, hip cocked, hand there, chin raised, defiant. "I’m not laughing, Jack."

"Good thing I’m not writing for our shows then, right?" He pauses and she waits. "I’m going to put this bluntly, Jordan. Friday’s show sucked. It wasn’t funny, the numbers dropped off somewhere before the halfway mark. You’ve got columns in the Times and the Post questioning our staying power and you’ve got –"

"I know. I can read, too. You coming here and reiterating every scrap of bad news lobbed our way since Friday really isn’t helping."

He looks at her incredulously, some caricature of shock and it’d be amusing if it wasn’t pointed at her. "You think I’m trying to be helpful? I’m not here to hold your hand, darling. I’m here to kick your ass in gear and make sure the job gets done."

"And it will."

"Did you meet with the lawyers?" She doesn’t like his way of arguing and even less so his style of questioning. He changes subjects without warning and there’s a knot settling low in her stomach with thoughts of lawyers and courtrooms and bad arguments and bad paperwork in her head.

"Yes," she answers, succinctly.

"You tell them everything?"

"Yes."

"What, no sparking rejoinder to go along with that?"

"Humiliation can have that effect on a person."

They’re both quiet and she feels like she’s given him too much. She’s sure of it when he speaks again.

"It’s going to be that bad?" he asks.

She smiles. "Jackie Collins couldn’t make this shit up."

She was born and raised in Newport and everyone believed she’d grow up to be rich but not necessarily successful, because it’s possible to be one without the other (just ask Marylyn Rudolph) and she always carried the bad habit of hitching her wagon to stars that never stayed in the sky for long.

She went to Stanford and got B’s and C’s and that’s really kind of average, but in the end it doesn’t matter. She’s still here and she still is president (she’s still a woman with an okay rack and a better smile and the kind of charm that makes grown men want to leave their wives even though they never do).

There were five interviews and she won them over in the first. She won them over, save for Jack, Jack who looked at her the way a displeased patron would at a cocktail waitress, pissed because she gave him a beer when he wanted something classy like a martini or scotch on the rocks. All five interviews, he sat there with his lips pursed – sour man – and her answers would make the other chuckle warmly and appreciatively, but consistently fall flat with him.

She knows a challenge when she sees one, and for the longest time she’ll wonder why the hell Jack Rudolph requested her for this job while he always looks at her like she’s done something wrong.

(The first time she met Ryan she ended up throwing her drink in his face and he called her a bitch. They laugh about it later and they fight some more and somewhere amidst the fighting and the fucking they had made their way down the aisle to the altar. Somewhere amidst the fighting and the fucking he ruined her life and she learned to say words like alimony and irreconcilable differences without flinching or wondering what had gone so horribly wrong.)

They’re a bad sitcom situation in syndication.

She should have seen it coming or heard the laugh track gearing up for the big guffaw, but instead, distracted with numbers and possibly mismanaged decisions, she barrels around the corner, head down, and she guesses callous men with facts and figures for emotions can get distracted too, because, head-on collision, they meet – papers scattered in the air, lukewarm coffee dripping down her chest.

He gets his balance with a hand on the windowed wall behind her head, crushing her against him, coffee-stained chest flush with his, a cracked coffee mug rolling against her foot. She can smell aftershave and skin and coffee and his other hand is on her waist, his thigh between her legs, skirt bunched awkwardly, and damp blouse and rattled nerves – it’s not even noon yet too early for thoughts like this – it’s all taking too long for the ground to level out and it’s all too strangely erotic. She blames the proximity and the antagonism and the lack of sleep and she thinks – she fucking knows – he must feel it too: a tic in his jaw and a quick breath and he’s pulling away from her and shouting at Shelly to get him a new cup of coffee. And maybe a mop.

She pushes her hair out of her eyes, picks up a few loose papers, and straightening up, he’s watching her – familiar glint and cold appraisal, edged with something else, something she’d rather not name, something that should feel wrong. She stands, back straight, hard nipples, white sweater, soaked in his coffee. She stands and she waits and finally he speaks and all is supposed to be the same and all is supposed to be familiar.

"You’re lucky that wasn’t a fresh cup. And you’re lucky we didn’t hire you for your grace."

He says the word ‘grace’ like most would say ‘fuck’ or ‘cunt’ or that rough ‘yes’ before sex, and it’s wrong, it’s so wrong (he’s her boss he’s her boss with a wedding band he’s her boss) but, Jesus, she’d be lying if she said she wouldn’t say anything but ‘yes’ in return – same tone, same sentiment.

He goes to pass her and he brushes her shoulder as he stops, too close, and tells her she should probably get a new shirt and he looks at her eyes instead of her chest and she’d call him a gentleman but there’s too much lechery in that face to let the words slip by.

"Yeah, I’ll do that," she says and it’s too quiet, too intimate, and he’d be smiling if he wasn’t leering (it’s not really leering but when she calls it that that makes him repugnant and wrong and girls don’t want boys that leer girls don’t want that) and he walks away like it doesn’t matter.

She picks up another fax off the ground. Coffee-stained and illegible she’ll have to print another one.

She knows his story and it’s typical and it’s boring. Born on the East Coast and raised in the dormitories of prep schools. Went to Harvard or maybe Yale and took the right economics courses and got the grade and eventually the seven-figure paycheck familial lineage had more than enough to say for.

His wife was a Rockette. Radio City and all that jazz, and some people when they say speak of her it’s in a tone that sets her on the same level as a stripper and others like she was Martha Stewart in high heels, without the court record and jail time. Jordan doesn’t know her but she knows she doesn’t like her and it’s judgmental and should be shameful, but really no woman should be that tan and that wrinkle-free or have legs still fit for a finale kick line.

She wears polka dots and feels almost juvenile and Matt didn’t break anything today (except for maybe Harriet’s heart, or it might be the other way around) and Danny needs to get some sleep and the news has been quiet and she thinks they call this thing – she shuts down her computer and turns off the lights and the walk to the parking garage is uneventful and quick – the calm before the storm.

"Jordan?"

She darts up quickly, hitting her head on the desk above her, and drops the pen she was crouching down to pick up in the first place.

"Yeah?" she asks, hand on the desk as she pulls herself up, other hand rubbing the back of her head. "Shelly?"

The woman stands there for a second, not amused, stack of papers cradled to her chest like always. Jordan’s heart is kind of hammering, because she knows, she just knows this can’t be anything good and she’s pretty sure she wants to crawl back under the desk and just wait, wait and have Shelly spill whatever horribly toxic news she is carrying on someone else.

"What is it?"

"Ryan Mulroney has agreed to guest on the Howard Stern show."

Yeah, she thinks. The bottom pretty much dropped out on this one.

"Are you serious?" she asks and it’s stupid because she knows that she is because Shelly doesn’t joke and Shelly doesn’t laugh and if she ever did she wouldn’t do it about this: her ex-husband having a nice sit-down chat with Howard Stern about his skank of an ex-wife who just so happens to be heading up one of the big four networks.

It was bad when she found out he wrote a book. It was bad when she saw her DUI picture flashing before her as she surfed the channels. It was bad when she heard he was pimping the book and their story on Geraldo. This, this is a hell of a lot worse.

"What now?" she asks Shelly.

"There’s going to have to be a press conference."

She was afraid that might be the case.

She wears Versace and thinks she looks too severe for a nonchalant press conference. Jack catches her in the hall and says something along the lines of ‘keep it together’ and she said something back, something quick and witty, if she was lucky, and kept moving. And now, backstage, hands clasped, the nerves mixed with black coffee leave her feeling sick and she swallows hard as she steps out in front of the waiting reporters.

Her fingers tremble and she clenches them into a fist, nails digging into her palms, standing tall and smiling behind the podium.

It all starts before she’s ready, before she has her footing, and she thinks this can’t be a good sign at all. So she smiles and they take pictures and a reporter is asking her questions about the network and how she thinks the upcoming Wednesday night line-up will fare against ABC and CSI or whatever else happens to be on that isn’t affiliated with NBS. It’s an easy question compared to what will come and she gets that as the next reporter – cheap suit, bad hair, garish lipstick, utter cliché – asks her the next question.

"Ms. McDeere, are Mulroney’s allegations regarding past drug use and other indiscretions credible, and if not, will you be suing him for slander?"

She swallows and smiles because smiling is what you do when public humiliation is the order of the day.

"They’re true. Next question."

"I’m sorry, just a follow-up. Was NBS aware of your…history when they hired you?"

Her smile turns into something almost cruel, but not really, because she’s Jordan McDeere and for whatever reason, that’s the same thing as being perky and happy and always expecting a sunshiny day.

"No, they weren’t. Yes, you?"

"So, Jack Rudolph had no prior knowledge of your history of substance abuse or sexual promiscuity?"

The question feels funny and she doesn’t get why. It’s almost the same as the one asked before, and maybe it’s wrong because there’s a name and a face attached to this instead of just some ambiguous boardroom of men that run the network. They are asking her if Jack Rudolph knew about this, if he knew about her, and the answer is yes, but not to the drugs or the sex. The answer is yes because Jack knows about her and he knew about her and she can’t get his self-congratulatory smirk out of her mind.

"There is no history of substance abuse for him to know about." Her voice doesn’t shake, and she’s proud, and it’s all about the small victories, right? It’s about the small victories because she can do this, she can do this and –

"But Mulroney attests – "

It’s really hot in here, she decides, as she interrupts the reporter and really, she doesn’t give a fuck as to what her ex-husband had to say about what she did ten years ago. It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter.

"I know what he said, but experimentation and substance abuse – it’s like apples and oranges. Next question."

"What impact do you think this will have on the future of NBS?"

This is fucking ridiculous. She sighs because there are so many other things she could be telling them about, all the new series and the new actors associated with the network, the fact they’re making an unexpected killing in the Tuesday night market, but no. No.

"None. I don’t think it really matters what I did ten years ago when I had zero association with NBS. I think I’m here to run a television network and it doesn’t matter if I ever tried drugs or who I was married to or who I may or may not have screwed around with."

Her voice is getting that edge to it, almost shrill, and she looks to the side, but Shelly isn’t there, so it must not be time to end this yet, and it’s too hot in here, she thinks. It is too damn hot and she knows her cheeks must be flushed and she can feel the sweat beading down her spine, along her neck and she tightens her grip on the podium before her, white-knuckled, and, Jesus, she it is too hot and the lights are too bright and this is all so goddamn stupid and –

"But Ms. McDeere – "

"Look, if you want to ask me why our ratings suck, what next fall’s line-up will be or what the hell I was thinking when I hired Albie and Tripp, go for it. But this – none of this fucking matters!"

Mouth gaping open, she thinks she just cracked.

The flashbulbs pop.

She leaves the press conference blindly, eyes unfocused, head down watching the ground as she walks quickly, Shelly by her side, muttering under her breath things Jordan doesn’t want to hear.

She finds the nearest ladies room and throws the door open and is disappointed when it doesn’t slam behind her and she, herself, has to physically shut the door.

She turns on the sink and the water is ice cold. She wets her face, breathing deeply, and she might be murmuring under her breath ‘it’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay.’

She stays in the bathroom, avoiding the mirror, clutching the sink, head down. The water still runs.

She is in her office for exactly forty-eight seconds before the door opens and slams. She counted.

"What the fuck was that?"

She has seen Jack angry. She’s seen him pissed off and irritated over bad ratings and slight slip-ups and everything else a rational man would take in stride and not blow his top over. Jack is different. Jack has a fuse that explodes the second you light it and she cringes inwardly at the fight that’s about to go off between the two of them.

"I – I don’t know. I just – " she hedges, but he just keeps talking, he talks like he hasn’t heard her or doesn’t care to hear it.

"Jesus Christ, what the fuck was that? You’re all over the goddamned news cursing out a roomful of reporters. What the fuck were you thinking?"

"I wasn’t! Okay! I’m president of a network, not the freaking United States! Why does it matter what I did or who I did a decade ago? I’m in charge of the fall line-up and keeping our shit on the air – not nuclear secrets or international peace treaties."

He advances forward and she lets him. "It matters because we have an image to protect here. It matters because now it looks like I hired some sex-crazed former junkie with an endless supply of skeletons just waiting to burst out of the closet."

She thinks she lost her mind somewhere between the press conference, the bathroom and here. She thinks she lost her mind because she’s stuck on the fact he called her sex-crazed and the way he said it (like he wanted to fuck her like he thinks about fucking her that sex-crazed is how he wants her and he hates her because of it).

"Sex-crazed?" She laughs. "So that’s what this is about? You’re pissed about the fact I once frequented sex clubs? You and I both know the publicity being reaped from this and our rating nor our sponsors are going anywhere." She should stop here and she knows it but she’s angry and it’s the kind of the same as being high because first you act and later you’ll think and realize what a goddamned mess you’ve created.

"You just can’t get over the sex, can you?" She says it softly and there’s a shift here – she’s on the offense and he on the defense. "What, does it make you hard thinking about me getting off watching other people fuck? Or hell, having people watch me?"

"Go to hell, Jordan." He doesn’t flinch and if it’s possible, it makes her angrier, makes her feel even more disappointed.

"Been too long since you were properly fucked?" And she’s all doe eyes and mock concern, but her heart is pounding and this is beyond inappropriate and he never takes his eyes off her, he never looks away.

"Shut the fuck up." She smiles because the conviction isn’t there but the danger is and he knows it and when he swallows, hard, she watches his Adam’s apple bob.

They’re too close already, but she’s angry, she’s angry and positively humming with it and pissing him off and feeding his ire is strangely almost satisfying. She inches another step closer, head cocked to the side, insult poised on her tongue, when his hand clamps down hard on her wrist. She freezes, her pulse leaping and his thumb right there, clamping down, he must feel it. "You better know what the hell you’re doing, Jordan," and, Jesus, he practically growls it, and it’s like a small victory in a string of pathetic failures, and she smiles, mad and mischievous and itching for a fight and takes that last step forward and presses her hips against his own.

He’s slightly hard already and it kind of surprises her and the retort dies on her lips as his hands immediately grip her hipbones, sharp, pressing her into him, grinding, and she exhales a shaky breath instead. He groans (and, fuck, she could get used to that she could get used to this ending arguments with sex and then it won’t matter who’s right or who’s wrong) and he kisses her and she kisses him back, all gnashing teeth and angry mouths, her fingers digging into his forearms.

They do this like they’ve thought about it before and she wonders dimly if she should be embarrassed. It’s missing the awkward fumble it should possess and is instead just the frenzied motion of hands over and under clothing and hips pushing against the other, instinct guiding, momentum pushing them back and back, against the desk. She’s panting, open-mouthed, against his lips.

He lifts her effortlessly, her ass hitting the edge of the desk funny and it hurts but it doesn’t matter (she bites his bottom lip and he grunts and pushes her farther on the desk and something falls, something breaks but he’s got a hand splayed across her hip and another cupping a breast and it doesn’t matter she wasn’t lying in that press conference none of this matters).

He pushes her black skirt up, anxious hands, skidding up the length of her thigh and she exhales hard, the breath fanning across his jaw. Her fingers shake and struggle with his belt and her panties are around his knees, her panties are at her knees and he’s so fucking impatient he leaves them there and starts fingering her beneath her skirt – two fingers and too soon and too fast. She pants the word ‘fuck’ like it actually means something and her hips buck up against him and the belt is finally loose and - "Christ, Jordan" - she has his cock in her hands and her panties are on the floor and his hands cradling her ass.

He thrusts in and stops on a harsh breath and a stifled moan and says her name like a warning and she could laugh (if she could breathe), she could really start laughing now because this is her office and his cock inside her and this is her career and his marriage they are probably ruining, mid-morning, half-clothed and fluorescent lights. She says his name and it sounds like the punch-line to a bad joke, all breathy and on the crest of a hysterical laugh (desperate desperate take it for what it is and take it in).

He says her name again and this time it makes her tremble, head back, eyes closed, because he’s moving now and it’s all friction and fury and force and old paperwork crinkling under her sweaty palms, and he says her name like he hates her, like he hates her and he wants her, and fuck, maybe he does – it doesn’t matter, she doesn’t care – her fingers clutching his pale blue dress shirt and she’s already about to come.

Fifteen minutes later and an awkward silence interrupted by rustling clothing and slowing breathing and he leaves her office without a word, save for "meeting at eleven; don’t be late."

He leaves and she rearranges her desk and tries not to think and she’s on the television on the opposite side of the room using words her mother would scold her for – too unladylike, Jordan.

She needs to get out of here.

She walks down the hall, thighs sticky and wet (they didn’t even use a condom they didn’t use a condom and she’s wet and it’s wrong and how could they be so fucking stupid?). She walks and she prays her gait isn’t off, prays her lips aren’t as swollen as they feel. Passing Shelly and stammering out a distracted ‘hello’ she prays she really didn’t just fuck her boss.

Shelly stops her. Ryan Mulroney has requested a meeting.

She locks herself in the bathroom for fifteen minutes.

It’s okay it’s okay it’s okay.

It’s five o’clock and if this was a normal job she’d be stuck in traffic and on her way home. Instead she’s in her office, reviewing proposals and okaying this and vetoing that.

He doesn’t knock, he just comes in – and that’s so like him it’s so like him to assume he can do what he wants because his name is Jack Rudolph and that’s supposed to mean something – and his face is empty and she almost hates him for that.

He hands her something and she doesn’t really care what it is and sets it down on her desk, everything too neat for her own taste but she won’t think of all the ways she (they) could mess it back up again.

He looks like he’s biting the inside of his cheek and there’s an ounce of gratitude on her part because he knows how awkward this is too.

"Are we going to talk about this." He doesn’t phrase it as a question and is instead a really proper sounding command.

"I was angry," she offers and hopes that’s enough for him and he’ll let it go.

He doesn’t.

"Do you jump all the men that piss you off?"

"I didn’t jump you. And to answer your question, no, I don’t." And this is so fucking awkward and she lets her mouth run away before her head can catch up, and really, she’d rather put a stop to this – the awkwardness, the other would never happen again – and get this conversation out of the way now. "And look, while we’re at it, you don’t have to give me the whole ‘let’s just be friends’ or ‘boss and employee’ or whatever the correct terminology is called for in this kind of situation. I was angry, and so were you, and it happened once and it’ll never happen again – and well, I mean, you’re married, and I’m a mess. Let’s just stick to fucking up the network and not each other’s lives, okay?"

His face softens a little and it’s unexpected and he says "alright."

They both remain silent and she sits at her desk, pen clutched tightly in her grasp and he stands above her, hands in his pockets.

"You’re meeting with your husband?" And it takes her a second to recover because she didn’t see that coming.

"Ex, and yes. At eleven. Shelly will be there, and, well, the lawyers, too. It’ll be a charming chance to catch up."

He nods. And then he’s gone.

They act like they hate each other, and she thinks, well, maybe they do, but that still doesn’t explain the crumpled papers in the trash can, from her desk or the fact she can’t get her shirt to lay like it did this morning or her hair to flatten, or well, a lot of things. She just knows that smart women aren’t supposed to fuck men they hate and smart women are especially not supposed to fuck men they work for.

Smart women aren’t supposed to repeat past mistakes and find themselves going at it toe-to-toe with men who will bring them nothing but court hearings and heavy consciences.

The meeting doesn’t go well.

She’s not going to think about it.

(She’s not going to think about her penchant for failures or the fact they like to resurface when everything else is rosy and pretty and they way it should be she’s not going to think about it.)

She’s not going to think about it except for the fact it’s the only thing on her mind.

She wears Valentino and stands alone; she stands sad and alone and silhouetted by the lights outside, all dark shades and shadows and there should be a trench coat and there should be intrigue and this feels like it should be life and death and not just personal embarrassment and television stations.

She’s tired.

"Jordan?"

Jack stands in the open door, the light of the hallway lending him a strange glow against the darkened room.

"Tell Shelly to get the news division on the line," and her voice sounds dead, sounds expressionless, and, hell, she feels the same. "Tell her an anonymous source has just leaked insider details regarding the meeting between NBS network president Jordan McDeere and former husband Ryan Mulroney. Tell her Mulroney attempted to extort an undisclosed figure from the National Broadcasting System in exchange for the suppression of the publication of his tell-all memoir. The book hits the presses Tuesday. I want this on the news circuit tonight."

"Jordan…"

"Tell Shelly."

"Jordan. Do you really think –"

"Tell Shelly or I’ll do it for you."

"I get that you’re the pissed-off prom queen who just had her crown revoked, but I’m still your goddamned boss and it is me, and me alone who makes the demands around here. Is that clear?"

"Absolutely," she whispers. "Now, please, pretty please, give Shelly the fucking sound-bite and help me salvage what’s left of my career."

He comes back later and she’s still there, standing by the windows, standing in the dark. He says something but she doesn’t listen and she just keeps staring outside, arms wrapped tight around herself.

She asks him what he wants and he doesn’t answer.

The door closes and she hears the lock slip in place. His footfalls are quiet in the room, louder than the hum of the air-conditioning and the others still working behind the walls.

He stops just shy behind her (she can feel him) and he doesn’t speak. He doesn’t say anything, not her name or ‘sorry’ or some kind of an explanation as to why he’s here. His hands lightly hold her hips and he pulls her back against him.

She doesn’t understand why he’s doing this. He’s everything but charitable and comforting or kind.

Before all this they never touched. They don’t touch, like it’s some unspoken rule. Hands never brush across each other in the exchanging of memos and faxes and schedules. He never grabs her by the elbow or propels her forward, walking and talking, hand on the small of her back. And she gets it now as his hands, too hot, graze up and down her side, under her shirt, settling on her hips. They’d never be able to stop.

She doesn’t ask him what he wants and her hands settle over his and she just lets herself fall into him a little more.

He pushes her proper black skirt up, up past her inappropriate black panties and she thinks he’s breathing just as hard as she is and she sways and she gasps as he steadies her with a hand on her bare upper thigh.

They fuck against the window, lights of LA glowing below them, lights in the office off. It’s all blue and black, bruised and hurt, and she remembers sitting in here in the daylight and white, promising herself, promising him this would never happen again.

It’s just been that kind of day, she decides, pressing her forehead against the glass. It’s just been the kind of day made for disappointment.

They’ve set a dangerous precedent. A show gets pulled, the ratings dip, they get some bad press, the world is kind of ending and she finds herself in his office, or he in hers, heated argument turned into a fast, silent fuck

She thinks this is stupid, that it’s ridiculously silly and dangerous of them. He’s fingering her off while growling in her ear network stats that explain why he’s right and she’s wrong and he can’t possibly think that she’s listening because his thumb is moving there and his fingers are speeding up and she thinks the breathy little gasps smothered against his neck are more than enough to show where her mind is at the moment.

She’s pretty sure responsible adults aren’t supposed to behave like this.

The network throws a party – the network throws a party in a hotel ballroom and she thinks this is a bad idea but she can’t put her finger on why.

She wears an Escada frock and her hair hangs past her shoulders. She’d look elegant if her shoulders weren’t so tense and her posture so strained. She has a failing network on her hands and an ex-husband who has turned her into the laughingstock of the industry, and (the cherry on top) she’s fucking her boss, with no clear intention of stopping anytime soon. He doesn’t seem to plan on stopping it either, and maybe that makes it harder.

(He doesn’t make any sense because he walks like he’s the paradigm of propriety while he fucks her in his office with his assistant on the phone on the other side of the door. He doesn’t make sense because there are moments where he’ll yell at her and tell her every way and reason she’s wrong but his eyes lie because the hatred isn’t there and she’s twenty-five again and, fuck, this can’t end well.)

She leaves the party and sits in the lobby because the music is too loud and it gives her a headache (or it might have been the covert sips of champagne) and sitting there, overstuffed armchair, she recognizes the place from two years ago. She laughs, staring at her hands in her lap. Looking up, he’s standing there, natural in a tux with his hands deep in his pockets.

She scoffs at him. " ‘Look at him, a rhinestone in the rough.’"

"Chill, Dorothy Parker." An empty smile on his face and a second or two passes before he flashes the room key clasped in his hand. She gets the point.

She follows him into the elevator – he doesn’t have to say a word when did it get to this point – heart hammering, hand clutching the low neckline of her dress.

The doors close and climb a floor before he jams the emergency button and they grind to a halt. The back of his neck under her fingers and her spine arched almost elegantly and she wonders what kind of mistake they’re making as he slides her panties to the side.

They don’t bother turning on the lights. He closes the door with her pressed tightly against him, and it’s all push and pull and some weird kind of equal footing gone awry that ends with the two of them collapsed on the bed, one stiletto heel by the door and the other at the foot of the bed, his bow tie in her hands, the buttons slick under her fingers.

When he finally enters her she’s more than ready (there was the elevator and night of champagne and a professional rapport that devolved into this and there’s his wife and there’s her ex-husband and there’s a network they’re supposed to save and she shouldn’t think it but she does and maybe he’s supposed to save her and she, the same and they failed they failed they’re failing) and his chest is warm under her fingers and his back yielding under her blunt nails. She bites her lip and refuses to moan and any sound from him is buried along her jawline, angry kisses that better not bruise.

It’s too slow. It’s too silent. There is no Kayla and there is no Shelly and there isn’t anybody who could walk in on them now. She’s naked underneath him, and it’s strange because they’re always in suits and always professional and she should be angry because that’s how they do this – angry and unthinking and they fuck and they don’t love (never that word never) and it’s too quiet and all she hears is him.

He kisses soft along her collarbone and she’d call it out of character, save for the fact his hands grip her hips painfully tight, each fingertip bruising into the skin and she bucks up involuntarily against him as he nips at her neck.

He pants her name and there’s more emotion there than should be and she looks up at him (it’s too much it’s too much) and she comes hard, and he doesn’t stop, he doesn’t stop staring at her, watching her face, he doesn’t stop thrusting into her.

She thinks she hates him as he comes. She thinks she hates him and he comes and he fingers her off, muttering everything into her ear she never should have to hear and she hates him and she can’t take anymore, she can’t take it.

She collapses against him and neither of them moves. It’s still too quiet.

She wears nothing and they lay in the bed together, comforter pushed to the floor, sheets tangled and caught in their legs. Head on the pillow, she sighs.

"What are we doing, Jack?"

She has never seen the inside of his bedroom. She’s never seen the inside of his house. She knows what she’d find there and it’s a woman called his wife and this really shouldn’t be bothering her so much. 

(She's never seen the inside of him and she thinks and knows that's the real problem here because he gets to understand her and she's left without a clue.)

He levels her with a look that says he’s choosing not to take this seriously and will be glib instead of honest because these are the things one doesn’t talk about, naked, with a lover.

"I thought health class was mandatory in high schools. But if you need me to, I imagine I could explain, and hell, if you’re up for it, maybe even demonstrate."

She sits up, legs hanging over the side of the bed, sheet clutched to her chest. She sits up but she doesn’t leave – not yet.

Monday brings a meeting and that’s really nothing new. She expects the same – a recap of the week before – but her entrance to the room brings a round of unexpected nerves and a sea of curious, accusatory faces before her.

When she sits an envelope is dropped before her.

"What is this?" she asks. They tell her to open it.

She pulls the first picture out and stops short. Looking up it’s Jack’s face she sees first.

"Where did these come from?" she grits out, struggling to hold on to some authority, just a hint of integrity.

"Security camera. Apparently the guard on duty knew who you two were. Got paid a pretty penny for it, too."

She nods, blankly, and pulls the rest of the photos out of the envelope.

The footage is horrifying; the candid shots a low-budget kind of voyeuristic porn. It’s an elevator, all mirrored walls – fuck, she remembers this she remembers this because it was two, maybe three, nights ago – and it might be the Hilton, it might the Marriott, it might not really matter. Her dress is black and proper and his suit is clean and impeccable. They could be the portrait of a successful, sophisticated couple. They could be, save for the succession of photos that play out like a bad flipbook – mouths meeting, her leg around his hip, he pushing her against the wall of the elevator, the hand up her dress, the hand in his pants. Deep breath and she knows this is bad, but it might be the expressions on both their faces that makes it all the worse. It’s all pure lust and pure power and something kind of like possession. She keeps her head down, manila envelope in one hand, photos in the other and she knows her cheeks are flushing pink, she knows her hands are shaking, noticeably so, and she knows they’re watching her and waiting.

A quick clear of the throat, a toss of her hair over her shoulder and she raises her head, meeting their gazes squarely and almost sort of confidently.

"Well, I guess it could have been worse," she quips.

No one smiles and Jack looks toward the door, his expression unreadable.

"And how exactly might that be, Ms. McDeere?"

"For starters, we could have been naked."

She calls Martha. She calls Martha and she answers on the third ring, all half-attention and the hammering of a computer keyboard.

"Yeah, Martha, what?"

"It’s Jordan."

The typing stops and she says hello.

"You want to get a drink?"

Martha’s never been one to say no to booze and bonding.

She pulls up to the bar, steps out of the cab and pays the driver, sends a tip his way – don’t ever dive into show biz with your eyes still open and your fingers still crossed.

Martha walks over, down the sidewalk, and Jordan stops her just outside the bar. "Just so you know, this is all off the record."

"I figured as much."

"So, you lost your job?" Martha asks her before she has a chance to speak and she guesses that the failure must be pretty clearly written across her face.

"Not yet. But tomorrow they’ll fire me. They’ll fire me and he’ll still work there." She realizes her error and swallows down the first sip of her second martini.

"He?" Jordan doesn’t say a word and Martha laughs, all aghast, hand over her mouth. "Dear God, you fucked Jack Rudolph, didn’t you?"

Jordan says something like ‘guilty’ or some other equally lame line that’s been so overused there’s no way it can be funny and just sounds sad instead. She doesn’t ask how she knew; she doesn’t really care to know.

"And now you’re going to lose your job because the wrong people found out."

"Is there a such thing as the right person to find this kind of thing out?"

"Probably not. So, what are you going to do now? Write your own tell-all memoir? Turn some tricks out on the streets?"

"You’re too funny." She plays with the olive on the side of her drink. "I could always sell the story to Lifetime. And either I’ll come across as the maneater that steals husbands from wives and fucks them guilty and they’ll cast Sharon Stone, Jr. and everyone will learn to hate me. Or they’ll pretend we were madly in love and the big, bad town of Hollywood tried to keep us down."

Martha looks at her with a look that could only be defined by the word ‘pity.’ "Are you in love with him?"

"Wouldn’t that be nice." She downs the rest of her drink. "The story drops tomorrow." Martha only nods, the journalist in her taking quiet notes in her head. Jordan’s not a fool (she’s not a fool contrary to the evidence and the photos and everything a man named Jack Rudolph could tell you).

"I’ll have another," she tells the bartender.

The story breaks: "Affair Rocks NBS" the headlines read. The story breaks and they say things like "sordid past" and "unconventional" when they talk about her. They say "company man" and "ruthless" when they speak of him. She sounds like an old Hollywood hooker and he sounds like the heir to the network throne.

On The View they call her a slut. Oprah thinks it’s a real shame what women will do to keep their jobs. The studio audience agrees with her, you whore.

They summon her before noon and she knows the ax is about to fall. Hard.

She wears Givenchy because she’s supposed to be a lady and looking the part can only help. She tries to hide the anxiety with deep breaths but can’t seem to stop biting her bottom lip.

They wait for the meeting. They – Jordan and Jack and Shelly – stand there silently, the look on Shelly’s face saying more than enough and Jacks grim posture and crossed arms speaking for him. Jordan sighs and looks away, arms akimbo, watching down the hall.

"What have you two done…" Shelly mutters.

Jordan jerks her head toward her. "I was 35," she whispers, ghost of a smile. "I slept with a slug."

Jack lets out a bark of a laugh and walks into the conference room.

Jordan McDeere – savior of NBS, renegade hotshot – is unemployed. Jack Rudolph still has the placard with the title of chairman and the nice corner office and the even nicer salary. She loves it when she’s right.

She packs up her office and she’s almost finished, and then comes the rap on her open door and he never knocks and really, she’s done here, she’s fired, there’s no reason for him to start now.

"Jordan…" he starts and for the first time – the first time since the yelling and the fucking and the fallout – she has no idea what he’s about to say. She doesn’t like it.

"Jack. Can we please not do the part where we say everything we wanted to but didn’t, all right before we say good-bye?"

(She’s such a liar, and not even a good one at that, because she wants, she wants so badly to know why, why he did this, why they did this, why he wanted her and why he let it go this far. She wants to know what she means to him and she wants him to say it, say it all and maybe, just maybe that will make this all better, because, yeah, she’s Jordan McDeere, and yeah, she’s supposed to be a hardass but over the course of a month or two her entire world has fallen apart – again – and she knows he won’t be the one to pick it up for her, but, God, sometimes it’s nice to pretend.)

"Yeah."

He doesn’t say he’s sorry and he doesn’t say see ya, kid or kiss her and say that he loves her. It makes her smile up at him. He seems to get it and smiles back.

"Keep them laughing, Jack," she says, and it’s almost her usual coy self and he almost buys it. She walks out the door, tells a random assistant to send the boxes down to her car. She walks out the door, head held high, her office empty.

He doesn’t follow her. She smiles, because, well, it’s a far sight prettier than crying. 

. .

It would end like this, she imagines: her on the overpriced white couch with a bottle of red and all of the day’s newspapers spread before her. It would end with her watching her own television network and watching Studio 60 on a Friday night from her home as opposed to the set.  

Matt and Danny finally took her up on her offer to use her as the bait the comedy feeds off of, and it’s another regret to add to the list, because this, it’s beyond embarrassing.

Jeannie is supposed to be her, and watching the girl’s insipid smile and almost manic perkiness she decides that the only thing they share in common is the first initial of their first names.

She shuts off the TV just as Jeannie straddles the straight-laced boss, tie clenched in a fist, his hands on her ass and this never happened, not like this.

There’s a low hum and then the screen is black. She drinks wine and remembers why she prefers scotch, or whiskey, or vodka, or anything that’s strong and burns on the way down.

She turns off the TV and the screen is black and it’s not going to be a very good show tonight.

She wonders what the starting pay at FOX is like. 


. .

"Ducking for apples – change one letter and it’s the story of my life."

- Dorothy Parker


. .

fin.

. ..