Page 1 of Primary Season
Patrick Blanco wasnotsupposed to win the New Hampshire primary. The polls had him five points behind the leading candidate, Howard Sayers, and every national political pundit claimed Patrick didn’t have enough experience. No thirty-eight-year-old had ever dared a serious run for president, and Patrick hadn’t finished his first term as a senator from Ohio.
But that night, a bitterly-cold February fourth, the lower-third graphic crossing the breaking news screen on CNN changed just after 9:00 PM. With their eyes glued to the large TV, staffers and supporters cried out with joy. Patrick Blanco had just won New Hampshire—by two thousand votes.
We’d done it. We’d actually freaking done it.
No,he’ddone it.
“Oh, my god,” I said under my breath as I watched CNN’s election wall place New Hampshire under Patrick’s name. “Holy shit.”
“Can you believe this? Amazing.” Heather raised her wine glass and clinked it to mine. “A total dream.”
“I know. When are we going to wake up?”
“Never. This is really happening.” Heather beamed. “We’re going to South Carolina. South Carolina!”
“Yep.”
“No stopping us now.”
“Nope.”
Her eyebrow raised. “Come on, Alex. Let up for one night. We just won. Celebrate a little, okay?”
My stomach twisted, and I gave her a tight smile. Heather might not realize it, but our jobs would get drastically harder once we took this campaign to the Palmetto State. South Carolina could be a presidential dream killer, a place where contests turned nasty and secrets came to light. If we wanted to win there, we’d have to battle twice as hard as we did in New Hampshire.
Were we ready?
I swallowed some cheap white wine as my gaze roamed the room. It was almost at capacity, and I expected it to grow now that Patrick had defeated his three challengers: Howard Sayers, Tom Sutton, and Mark Grace. Patrick was a winner, and everyone in politics liked to be around a winner.
Everyone.
“Someone should check in on him,” I said to Heather after another swallow of wine. “Do we know if he figured out a victory speech?”
She shrugged. “At least he’s good at public speaking.”
Two weeks earlier, we’d come in third place in the Iowa caucus, and political analysts had laughed at Patrick’s insistence about hanging on for the next race. They said the junior senator from Ohio didn’t have enough experience, didn’t have enough money, and wasn’t equipped to tackle New Hampshire with three full-time staffers, five interns, and a handful of die-hard volunteers. Turned out, that was all we needed.
“I’ll go get him,” I told Heather. “He needs to get down here soon.”
Patrick hadn’t wanted to show up at the party too early. He wanted to make an entrance. At first, I’d argued against this strategy, but now it seemed like the perfect way to capitalize on the night. Patrick’s supporters wanted him, and every minute they waited seemed to heighten their anticipation.
Heather clinked her glass with mine once more before I wove through the loud, boisterous crowd. The watch party in the conference room of Burlington’s downtown Hilton had started three hours before, so many people were on their third or fourth drink of campaign-financed wine and beer. They toasted each other and chanted Patrick’s name, along with his slogan, “Dream big, dream bold.” Across the room from me, talent from the major TV networks and the twenty-four-hour cable outlets reported on the jubilation of our small campaign. Someone turned on the sound system and blasted 1980s rock music. This party would go on for hours—I could feel it.
I found the bank of elevators in the hallway and rode the middle one to the sixth floor of the hotel. Patrick stayed in room 631, and when I got there, I took a deep breath before I knocked twice. He opened the door a half second later, and the mixed scent of aftershave and musky cologne engulfed me. My stomach flipped.
Damn, he is gorgeous.
“They’re waiting for you downstairs,” I said. “You’re the man of the hour.”
“I told you it was a good idea to ‘make an entrance’.” Patrick grinned. “Has it been hard to hold back the crowd?”
“It’s getting tough. They don’t want to see staffers anymore. They want the real deal. The winner. And that’s you.”
He leaned one hand against the door and his gaze locked with mine. “Then I guess we’ll have to give them what they want, right?”
Patrick and I met six months before, right after he’d officially launched his national campaign. I’d been living with my roommate, Lisa, in a tiny apartment over a boutique in Arlington, Virginia; my post-graduate school job in Senator David Hughes’s office wasn’t working out, and I’d wanted something more exciting than a job as communications chief for the bland, vanilla, extremely religious senator from Oklahoma. Ohio’s own, Patrick Blanco, needed someone to light up his campaign at a time when the national media wouldn’t pay attention to him or his ideas. I pitched him one night over drinks and oysters at Old Ebbit Grill, and he called me two days later with a decent offer: communications director, Blanco for America. Since then, we’d danced the fine line between business and pleasure.
At least, in my mind, we had.
