“Would you put that goddam thing down,” Cleveland says. “We have a bit of a crisis on our hands, my dear.” Frances gives him the look, finishes whatever she is pecking into her phone, and slips it into her waistband. He catches a glimmer of skin, bronzed and taught. Jesus, she is young, he thinks. Sometimes he wonders if all of them – Fox News, CNN, Politico, MSNBC, Limbaugh, Maddow, the Senate, the House, his own advisors standing right here in front of him – are right.

It’s like Woody told him, though: the only thing that matters is that they love one another. Everybody else be damned.

I am the President of the United States, he thinks. And the only person in the universe who understands what I’m going through is Woody Fucking Allen.

“Oh, a crisis,” Frances says. “But you’re so good at those, dear. So much practice.” She stomps out and Cleveland watches Carville’s assistant watch her ass bouncing back and forth in the yoga pants. She is young. She is young and that is the point. She is young and the daughter of his dearly departed friend Folsom and she used to be his ward and that is the reason Carville is here in the first place, why the whole communications staff, their assistants, and the special crisis communications people have been desperately flailing to control the 48 hour news cycle for the past 144 hours.

And in the middle of it all, this oasis: watching Carville’s assistant watching Frances’ ass. The look on the poor kid’s face. This is why Cleveland got into politics in the first place, Erie then Buffalo and now this. One man against another. One victor. Cleveland.

Here's a story that was originally published on Yankee Pot Roast. But they don't seem to be around anymore, so I'm posting it here, so it has a place to live.