Innocent Spouse (39 page)

The final day and night, Sunday, July 12, 2009, Nathans was packed like it was New Year’s Eve. Earlier that morning, in the wee hours, someone had driven a Ducati motorcycle into the bar, parked it, posed
on it, and put the pictures on Facebook. Many of the barstools had walked out in the hands of souvenir hunters, along with all the menus. It was that kind of last day. Local television crews and newspaper and Web reporters were part of the throng that filled the bar. Spencer and I sat at the round table in the back dining room with his girlfriend, Courtney Prillaman, her parents, Martha, and a dear old friend and fellow widow, Sally Hosta. We sipped martinis and dug into our last baskets of chips and plates of pasta. I turned the music up loud, like the old days, when Howard would be the life of the after-hours party, whirling around with his sleeves rolled up, a mischievous grin lighting up his face. His was only one of the ghosts dancing in the back room that night, preparing to say good-bye.

Jon Moss and his girlfriend kept an eye on everyone, though not without savoring the moment. Jon and I were the only ones there who knew the remarkable series of events—and the hurdles crossed—that had got us to this night. I could see the relief in his eyes, too. The police came by but not to bother us. They presented me with an honorary Metropolitan Police badge. They looked at the crowd and said, “Have at it.” Three bartenders hustled to slap fresh cocktails into the many outstretched hands, pouring down the inventory, eventually making drinks out of whatever was left on the shelves. For old times’ sake, a few men defied the no-smoking law and lit up cigars. The jukebox was up as loud as it could go, but its hours were numbered. The rental company arrived before closing and pulled it off the wall. With and without music, couples danced in the middle of the barroom, at least as best they could in the crush. Several members of the staff circled around me with a tray of drinks and asked me to do a shot with them. “C’mon, Carol.” It would be my last drink at Nathans. On its final night, Nathans was as it had been on its best nights—the most crowded, loudest, and wildest party in town.

Nathans wouldn’t close until two o’clock Monday morning, but at midnight, like Cinderella, I headed for the door. With a few friends in tow, I walked from Nathans’ front door out into the pleasant summer night. When the light turned green I crossed the iconic Washington intersection of Wisconsin and M, looked back, then turned and walked up the hill toward home.

T
HE
N
ATHANS BUILDING
remained for sale but empty throughout the summer, fall, and winter of 2009 and into the spring of 2010. It wasn’t a good time to put the building on the market. With the country suffering under the worst recession since the Great Depression, commercial real estate prices were following the economy down. The Halkias family kept dropping the price until finally they took it off the market altogether and looked for a new rental tenant. It was still empty in early 2011 but the spot was leased to reopen as an ice cream parlor franchise from New York.

Over lunch one day I said to Brendan Sullivan, “I need that building to reopen as something new. I’m eager for it. When I walk by now all I see is the wounded ruin that was Nathans. I want something in there that wipes out that memory.” He understood. That’s why soon after closing, when the city rudely took my only asset, the valuable liquor license, and arbitrarily gave it to the landlords, without even allowing us a hearing, we opted not to pursue it in court. Enough. It was the equivalent of having $100,000 pulled from my hands, but that’s a measure of how much I wanted to move on. Debt was awful, but it was better than going back into the muck. The landlords wanted the license as a means to lure an occupant for the building.

“We’ll go to court if you want,” Brendan said. “We’ll go with guns drawn and we’ll win.” Any court action would tie up the building for months, maybe years. He knew that and I knew that, but we also knew that any kind of court case would involve months of filings and motions and depositions. I didn’t want that. For me or for anyone. I wanted Nathans to slip quietly beneath the waves and to rest in peace at the bottom of the sea.

For the first time that I could remember, I was utterly without
a safety net. No job, no paycheck, no health insurance, and with a $500,000 mortgage on our house. Most of the mortgage money went to getting me out of Nathans, and the rest was used to pay tuition, buy food, and keep the lights on while I figured out the future.
The Q&A Café
relocated to the Georgetown Ritz Carlton Hotel, where I cut back to a once-a-month schedule. The new venue was a pleasure, and the loyal “lunch bunch,” at least most of them, followed me there. The show continued to air every Friday evening on D.C. cable. The guests in my first year included the comedian and actress Alexandra Wentworth, journalist Gwen Ifill, director Oliver Stone, and the notorious White House gate-crashers Michaele and Tareq Salahi.

My New York Social Diary column got me out of the house to all kinds of events, small and large, exclusive or not, rubbing elbows with the power elite or the “drones” who really run the capital. I had one black cocktail dress and one black evening dress. I wore one or the other to every opening, dinner, or event I covered. No one noticed. I knew they wouldn’t. My editors let me write about Washington as I saw it: how it really works, who the people are, and what goes on behind the headlines and the network news. It warmed my heart the first time I was introduced to someone as “Carol, who writes a column about Washington,” and not as “the owner of Nathans.”

Spencer and I settled into a new routine. He liked having Nathans out of our daily lives, even if it meant living on a very strict budget. We had the mortgage money and my income from the New York Social Diary and
The Q&A Café
, which meant not much. Like a married couple we squabbled about finances, but he got a job and worked every weekend and on days when he didn’t have school. He got accepted at the college of his choice, which made us both proud. When he and Courtney broke up it made me sad, but there was nothing I could do. I thought, Well, I guess I’m going to have to get used to this. He’s his own man with his own life.

My stress level dropped dramatically. I felt vaguely similar to what I imagined a person who’d come out of prison would feel like. Even my shrink noticed: how eagerly I needed to reconnect with simple pleasures; how I learned it was possible to have a completely good day, with no bad news; that I didn’t need to be afraid. At first I felt I still
had to stop at Nathans every day, or go to the bank, or call Jon Moss, but that faded. With each day I moved away from the nightmare and opened my mind and spirit to what might come next. I yearned for a job where I would be in charge and able to work hard, but also see tangible, positive results.

In the end, I knew that Sheldon Cohen had been totally right when he told me, over lunch after winning innocent spouse, that I should just give the government the keys and walk away from Nathans for good. I still rue that I ignored his advice, and it’s why I never argued with Brendan Sullivan.

S
EVERAL MONTHS AFTER
Nathans closed I took down and opened the box of photos I’d packed up and sealed soon after Howard died. At first I slowly pulled out one picture at a time, examining each one quite closely, but after an hour I had dozens of them spread all over a large table, and eventually I was surrounded by a near mountain of photos that spanned twenty years of my life. There Howard was, frozen in time, and there I was, a relic of another era, riding on her magic carpet. The photos show me as cute, pretty, sometimes glamorous; always smartly dressed; laughing, smiling, in love. What they don’t show is how clueless I was, which I see now quite clearly but thankfully without rancor or sadness. I thought to myself, Well, ignorance is bliss. I’d rather have knowledge and power.

In photo after photo, Spencer is the happiest little boy, having a good time with his happy parents. I look at him and see huge reserves of joy and wonder if that’s what carried him through our bumpy journey, hoping the supply hasn’t been run dry. Peccadilloes aside, he has a strong center. He’s out of the nest now and will have to fly on his own.

And Howard? I look at the photos, and I don’t see the man I thought I knew, but I also don’t see a stranger. I’ve cut through the lies, and I know the man now. I know the real person. He’s not a mystery to me. I see the truth behind the façade.

Add to this batch of photos all the family pictures from the last many years since Howard died, and it adds up to more than three decades of my life. They say pictures don’t lie, but I wonder. These
pictures don’t tell the whole story. What they can’t show, but what I know as sure as I know the ground I stand on, is that for twenty years I lived in a dream, followed by another ten years of nightmare. But the dream gave me a son, and without him I couldn’t have survived the nightmare. Thanks to each other and our friends, we got through it.

E
VERY WRITER WITH
a story to tell harbors the fantasy that an agent and publisher will feel the same way too. For me, that agent was Laney Katz Becker with the Markson Thoma Agency in New York. In more ways than can be adequately expressed, she made this book happen. I wish every author an advocate like Laney.

A dream came true when Suzanne O’Neill at Crown picked up the book. She is a young woman with an old soul. With Suzanne and the remarkable team at Crown, I was again in the hands of caring experts. I’m especially grateful to the fine work of copy editor Michelle Daniel and the helpfulness and good eye of Anna Thompson.

Writing a memoir, by its nature, leads an author into the boggy ground of one’s own life. By the third draft the story can get lost in a bit of a warren. At that point William McPherson, a writer’s editor, helped me to see what did and didn’t need to be there. Thank you, Bill, for your sharp eye.

What my son and I went through over thirteen years was often tough going, but we survived due to the care and attention of so many. Lawyers don’t usually get thanked at the top, but special and enduring gratitude go to Sheldon Cohen and Miriam Fisher; Brendan Sullivan, Stephen Sorensen, Victoria Radd Rollins—you got me freedom. You are why young people should want to be lawyers. Also at Williams and Connolly, thank you to Bob Shaughnessy and the very able Rhonda Meadows. A special thank-you to Nelson Deckelbaum and David Deckelbaum, and to Gary Leiber. The doctors at the Washington Hospital Center, particularly Michael Hockstein and Peter Levit, are among my heroes. Even as Howard’s luck ran out, Michael and Peter continued to try everything to save him. Harry Shearer and Judith Owen—thank you for always being there.

I’m sorry Vito Zappala didn’t live to see this book. He would have been pleased.

There’s a special place in my heart for the dozens of people who listened to me, danced with me, dined with me, drank with me, counseled me, who
gave me breaks, kept me in mind, who tossed me a bone, and gave me friendship. Among them: Ellen Charles, Sally Hosta, Myra Moffett and Jean Perin; also, Marlene Adler, Nancy Bagley, Michelle and David Baldacci, Marilyn Benoit, Sonya Bernhardt, Clarissa Bonde, Peter Branch, Trish and Mark Malloch Brown, Ned Brown, Janet Bruce, Alan Bubes, Nancy Taylor Bubes, Buffy Cafritz, Paula Carreiro, Frances Chastang, Gay Cioffi, Carl Cannon, Arthur Carlson, Murray Clark, Leslie Cockburn, Lisa Crawford, Francesca Craig, David Patrick Columbia, Deniz Caycik, Barry Deutschman, Bill Donohue, Marc Duber, Dennis Dunbar, Henry von Eichel, Colleen Evans, Jack Evans, Michael Farrell, Izette Folger, Yolande Fox, Joaquin Gonzalez, Erica Hart, Helen Hagerty, Pam Halstead, Ronald Hector, Jeffrey Hirsch, Jane Stanton Hitchcock, Nicholas von Hoffman, the Hubbards (all of them), Deb Johns, Eda Joyce, Vernon Jordan, Britt Kahn, Katherine Kallinis, Rick Kaplan, Michael Kelly, Kitty Kelley, Stuart and Fran Kenworthy, David Hume Kennerly, Louwaunz “Chie Chie” Koger; Martha, Vijay, Zal, and Sonia Kumar; Sarah Marshall, Sophie LaMontagne, Michael Landrum, Anthony Lanier, Susan LaSalla, Rusty and Mimsy Lindner, Susan Magrino, Adam Mahr, Jim Marshall, Chris Matthews, Tom Mazzarelli, Patrice and Herb Miller, Toby Moffett, Lance Morrow, Patrick O’Connell, Melissa Overmyer, George Ozturk, Christopher de Paola, J. Randolph Parks, Carolyn Peachy, Rachel Pearson, Michael Petite, Jeff Pfeiffle, Leezee Porter, Beverly Potter, Elizabeth Powell, Jeff Powell, James Ramey, Joseph Reamer, Christine Rizzo, Narcisco Rodriquez, David S. Ross, Robert K. Ross, Edmee Sandoval, Ellen Sanford, Aubrey Sarvis, Cristophe Schatteman, Sahm and Doug Sefton, Matt Silverstein, Michael Stiglitz, Beverly and John Fox Sullivan, Albert and Tina Small, my L.A. pen pal Bob Smith, James O. Spellman, Fred Thimm, Jonathan Tisch, Mariella Trager, Paul Wahlberg, Elyse Weiner, Elsa Walsh, Bob Woodward, George and Frederica Valanos, Pierre Vimont, Doug Zimmerman, and the good people of Washington.

To the hundreds of people who worked at Nathans and its thousands upon thousands of customers, keep the happy memories; they are Nathans best legacy.

Jon Moss, thank you. I could not have made it to and through the end without you.

Howard, wherever you are, no one else may get this, but I know you understand.

Now, we move on.