September 3rd, 2026
Dear All,
My kids are downstairs watching the episode of “I Love Lucy” when they move to the country. Lacey just made them macaroni and cheese from scratch, as per usual. She’s a wonderful mother. I’m incredibly proud of her.
I used to watch that show. And almost every time I did, I was incredibly depressed. Lacey has intuited that before but now she can hear the truth. Every other time it been nearly impossible.
I used to watch “I Love Lucy” and feel despair. Because I hated my life. I wanted a wife and a family of my own. I wanted a life of my own, period. But, I honestly believed I was too diseased to ever be that fortunate. Being Jack Kennedy’s “best friend” was the best I thought I could do, without compromising my personal ethics. I devoted my life to him, because I wanted a purpose and a meaning as a person, as a man. Not because I truly ever loved him. Well, I tried to love him as a friend, but unsuccessfully.
No, that was my sense of honor. To be a decent man you’d never do that to a woman, certainly not any woman I’d ever want to marry. No, those sort of…dream girls, would definitely not deserve a “fag” for a husband. So I stayed far away from women who would tempt me to do something deplorable. And yes, I tried to seem gay, so as to warn people. So as to live.
Of course, it doesn’t make any sense to you. Or does it?
By the time I was in my 60’s I had given-up. I no longer was such an idealist. And, many a time I regretted not being married. I reasoned that idealism only gets you so far in life and sometimes, well, you just have to be willing to accept that life is cruel.
But up until then I really did try to be happy. I tried to fall in love with Jack many times. And each time I was disgusted by him, because he was a man, first and really entirely, but also because I was constantly hurt by him. He was a very abusive person. Why include that second part? The first reason is enough. Well, because I know you don’t believe I was straight. Not yet. And I want you to see that it was impossible, regardless. He was such a mean person. Really.
Anyway, I wasn’t happy. And every time I watched that show, “I Love Lucy” I’d actually feel like crying. Sometimes I did!
I often watched it alone. Drunk on beer. Wishing I had a wife myself. Some crazy dame.
Lacey loves that show. How ironic.
I wanted to be happy. I wanted to be in love Jack. I told myself I did. I told myself I was happy. But I wasn’t.
And as I aged I became a bitter, cruel…depressed jerk.
You know, part of what people can’t understand is why I’d have made an exception for Lacey. If I was so determined not to harm a woman. Maybe Dolly couldn’t believe a person could be so dedicated, sexually. But you can be! You can be faithful. You can choose to be faithful. You can choose to live the way I did, if you feel that you’d ruin a woman’s life if you married her. Many people were that disciplined back then. I guess people today would be surprised?
So why would I make an exception for Lacey? If I was so determined? Well, because she’s capable of loving me. And I’m extremely intelligent. And I can tell. I can tell she’s capable of loving me, deeply. Needing me, even. Truly needing me.
Remember that episode of “Mad Men” when Don Draper has the affair with his neighbor? And he has her say, “I want you, and nothing else will do.”? Yeah, that’s what I mean. And I think I find her genuinely irresistible.
People think I found Jack attractive and found Jack irresistible. I did not. I’m sorry. That’s his story. That was always his interpretation of what happened between us. That’s his family’s story. That’s not, however, what actually happened. At all.
I believed I was gay. He was gay, but deeply in denial about it.
We met and I had some idea he could be my boyfriend. It’s true! And that’s why people think I came on to him and told him I was attracted to him. But there’s the story, and the truth. And the truth is that I did not actually find him attractive. I simply wasn’t attracted to men. What I did think was that he was great fun! And, this is where Lacey starts laughing, part of the reason why he was such fun is because he was attracted TO ME. I repeat: He was attracted to me. Jack Kennedy was nice to me because he wanted something from me, sexually. John Fitzgerald Kennedy, U.S. President, was so much fun for me, Kirk LeMoyne Billings, to be around, because he found me attractive.
At the time I didn’t realize that Jack was being so nice to me because he wanted to use me, sexually. But that was why. And he was incredibly nice. Incredibly thoughtful. At first.
Actually as long as I “put out” he was at least fairly tolerable and he was one to keep me from being completely out of sorts because he knew it was a good long-term sexual solution. He knew how to keep likable people on staff.
No, I tried to “have a relationship” as people say, with Jack. That’s what happened. I didn’t physically come on to him. Because that’s not how I felt. I expected to enjoy it, and I experimented with homosexuality. But I wasn’t really interested in it. So I didn’t ever instigate anything physically between us.
Jack, however, did. Every time. Yes, every single time. I may have, to try to make a gay relationship. But it would have taken me time. Because I had no gay sexual desires. Jack wanted it, and he was aggressive. And I went along with it, because he wanted it and I wanted to be happy. And actually, because he was so aggressive and yet closeted I didn’t have to worry about my lack of real interest. I was always his best bet, because I didn’t have any real feelings. He could string me along and cheat and I didn’t care at all. More power to him! He could be entirely focused on his physical pleasure alone and I didn’t care. I preferred that, I discovered. Much preferred it. And he didn’t see anything wrong with that because he was an ignorant, stupid, arrogant narcissistic twat.
Yeah. He used me. And didn’t care, because it was a hundred years ago and I didn’t know any better. And I meant well.
Did I use him? Yeah. I did. I used him for social connections, money, travel. But it wasn’t like what you think. I wasn’t some jaded, heartless guy. I didn’t set out to use him in that way. What happened was he trapped me. Yes, he trapped me. His whole family did. And because I was sacred out of my mind that they’d harm my family, I decided to make the best of it and get as much as I could get. And that was fun and all up until about the early 1950’s. Because I did want a life of my own. And helping them was already getting old by then. You’d think it would have been the opposite, but I actually wasn’t as amused by the idea of him being US President as you’d think.
Look, his dad was Ambassador to Great Britain. Kick had married British aristocracy. Being U.S. President was a cinch, I felt. It was certainly exciting and impressive, but after all that other stuff? Who cares? And I wanted my own life.
I wanted to be something. I wanted to be impressive, for a change.
He’d taunt me about “getting pussy” often. Not just the few times he wrote it in a letter. He harassed me about that often. And it hurt. I did want a wife. I just was too principled to harm someone that way.
Yes, I was principled. You’d be surprised.
And after he died I wanted to die too. Because I felt like my life was a worthless piece of shit. I felt I was a worthless piece of useless shit.
See, my drinking problem started before he died. So did my depression. Historians miss that.
It got worse because I had nothing else to live for. But not because I was deeply in love with him. Because he’s all I had at that point. I had completely ruined my life.
Anyway, I was actually a straight man. I was an unusual person, but I was actually heterosexual.
And yes, Lacey is actually Tom Banks’s daughter. Her misery torments him, and he’s happy to be tormented.
And yes, she could have easily married Elliott Roosevelt or Joe Kennedy Junior. Or even Lou, or Harold or Micheal. If you look into it, all of those men make complete historical sense. Completely. But she’d have been my wife, unless I really destroyed myself.
Could I have stolen her from Joe? Yes! And ironically, that’s not what made anyone angry. People have been so focused on my supposed relationship with Jack, that they assume it’s a moot point. But it’s not!
Would Pat Wilson have been sneaky and desperate enough to use me? Yes.
And that’s where I’ll leave it for now. Because it makes my Lacey smile.
Lem
