Castle Danger--Woman on Ice

by Anthony Neil Smith

  That didn’t last, of course. He tried out a few roles in the theater department, but he was terrible at acting. Or, at least he was back then, the types of roles he auditioned for—Stanley in Streetcar, Jud in Oklahoma!—well, he wasn’t a good fit.

  (Trust me, he obviously became a much better actor later on.)

  Hans didn’t really “find himself” until he settled on economics as a major and wilderness sports as a lifestyle.

  Meanwhile, Andrew abided by the “Shit You Do To Be President” checklist.

  They got along like best buds, at least in public, but seemed miles apart on every issue in private, so the whispers whispered.

  Why did I care? About Hans, about the lady popsicle, about playing detective? Why was I putting myself out there tonight? Because of Gerard? Fuck no. Did you know I never even got a call from his widow? I left her a message, but she never got back to me. Just saying.

  Downtown is stretched along the lake, but only about four blocks thick on the hill. The stuff the tourists want — shops and restaurants and a casino and nice bars — are on Superior, Michigan, First Street. I was headed for Second, where the road was near enough impassable most of the time, plenty of orange cones out in the summer, not because they’re fixing it, but because they’re reminding you they never will.

  The buildings are abandoned, ruined, with old houses cut into student apartments, the wood rotting, falling, rust on the downspouts. Only three ways to get heat — radiators, space heaters, or bodies huddled together under quilts. So, really, there’s no better place for a gay bar. As for the lack of a sign, that wasn’t down to any shame or worry about bullies. They just wanted to keep the “allies” away. Pretenders not welcome. People like me.

  I parked a block away and started a slow walk on icy sidewalks. Out of uniform the keychain bottle of pepper spray in my coat pocket was my only weapon, and I’d forgotten how carrying a pistol kept that old-familiar claw from gripping my throat. So I cleared it, cleared it until my temples throbbed.

  A handful of guys stood outside, bundled up, smoking. I got some looks, of course I did. I wouldn’t call them “suspicious” or “peeling my layers off”, but … looks. New guy shows up, alone. I felt sure I was setting off some mild alarms. I nodded. “S’up?”

  Up three stone steps and finally I saw the sign, a block of wood above the door with the name engraved: Gitchi-Gami Gents Club. An “Open” sign on the door. Right behind it, a vestibule too small to turn around in, stone on one side and wood-paneling on the other. I touched the stone. So cold it burned.

  Inside, much warmer, much nicer. Long and narrow. I think they were going for a nautical theme via wood-panels, wood carvings of tall-masted boats, old-fashioned sailors, paintings of whales and fish and squid, a taxidermy northern pike alongside a stuffed walleye. Fishing nets. A yellowed, framed photo of the Edmund Fitzgerald, of course. An old hand-drawn map of the lake.

  Smash that up with hypnotic trance music, ambient blue-green lighting seeping out of every corner, and modernist steel barstools clashing with the scarred dark wood round tables and high-backed chairs scattered around the dance floor in the back — only tonight there were no dancers, not even a band. Just quiet conversations — more of those “looks”, a wave of them from left to right — and a couple of bored bartenders in a mostly empty club.

  And they had me pegged right away.

  The top dog was as tightly muscled as a pit bull, with flattop hair like that British cook on TV, on that “secret mission” show. But pure Northern Minnesota when he spoke.

  “What can I getcha, officer?”

  I let out my breath — didn’t know I was holding it — and slumped both elbows on the bar. “How’d you know?”

  “For serious? You’re really a cop?”

  “Lucky guess?”

  “I use that line on everyone. It was a Halloween joke at first.” He turned to his partner, an older guy, tall with a thick beard. “Hey, Jack, it’s a cop! I swear to god.”

  Jack waved him off and went back to his conversation with three college-age guys, two of them fatter than I expected.

  You have to give me a break. I was new to all this and still had certain “genre expectations”.

  The bartender said, “What’ll it be?”

  “Nordeast? On tap.”

  He winked and went off to draw the beer, while I took another look around. A couple who had been at a table off in the corner had gotten up to leave. A group of five in the back, laughing at something, still not loud enough to disturb the rest of us — me, the bartenders, and the three guys talking to the older barman. One of those guys stuck out for two reasons: one, his particularly stupid 80’s haircut, short all around with a long flop on top, smoothed carefully to the left and out over the forehead to shield his NASA-nerd glasses. Two, he was glancing at me every few seconds.

  He probably had something to hide and was feeling daggers in his gut, knowing I was a cop.

  Steady, boy, I’m not here for you. Wish I could tell him. It was hard enough for me to walk in here.

  The bartender set my beer in front of me. “Enjoy.”

  “So let me ask you.” I took a sip first. “You get a cop walk in here, and you’re not … uneasy about it?”

  A shrug. A frown. A pause. “Any reason I should be?”

  “No, no … I mean, why wouldn’t you be?”

  He gave me the up-and-down and said, “Looks to me like you’re trying to fit in. Looks like you want a beer and some company. Most cops who come in here make damn sure they don’t fit in, and they’re loud about it just in case we didn’t recognize the uniform. Oh, and they’ve got shields in their hands. Like, immediately. Like they got them out and ready on the street.”

  “I could be undercover.”

  A grin. “Then you suck at it. It took one fucking question, man.”

  I shook my head. It was funny enough, yeah. Of course cops come in here, as cops and as drinkers. Of course. I took another sip. I asked for the bartender’s name (Geoff) and told him mine. I asked what the other guys down the bar were talking about.

  “Horror flicks. Zombies right now.”

  “Don’t let me keep you.”

  “Not my thing. What’s your thing? What sort of cop are you?”

  “What sort?” I cleared my throat again. “Like, vice? Detective?”

  “Or sheriff’s deputy, highway patrol, local?”

  “Local. Just plain old local patrol.”

  “Hey, that’s more brave than me. Salute, man.” He lowered his voice. “I hope you’re not wearing your gun.”

  I shook my head enough. “No, no.”

  “Because, if you are—”

  “No, really, I’m not packing anything but pepper spray.”

  “Shit.” He held his hands apart. “Like this? Like those big ones?”

  “Just a keychain. I’m not looking for trouble. But, can I ask you something?”

  His expression changed — friendly to amused — and he flicked a quick look over his shoulder. Got a look in return from the older bartender and horror fans. Maybe the other guy just looked older, because he’d been around the block a few hundred times. On second inspection he was more like mid-thirties, but with a hard-lined face. And the 80’s caricature was still glancing, shy. I wondered if they’d been keeping one ear on us in case something like this happened.

  “Ask me something, like, cop ask, or want to pick me up after my shift ask?”

  I pulled out the photo of the dead snowmobiler, unfolded it, and laid it on the bar in front of him.

  He took a look, then picked it up, held it closer. “Snowmobiler?”

  “Yep.”

  “You were there?”

  “Yep.”

  Looked back at me. “Dead?”

  I nodded. “Very much so.”

  Now the horror fans had stopped talking, all three looking this way, and the older bartender headed over, looked at the pic over Geoff’s shoulder. Then at me, then back at the pic
.

  I cleared my throat again, damn it, and said, “I took it when we first got to the scene. Barely ten minutes later, she was gone. My partner, too. He went under and came up dead.” I reached across and thumped the back of the paper. “They never found her, though.”

  The older bartender — I never got his name — mumbled something into Geoff’s ear. I couldn’t make it out. Geoff nodded and said, one eye squinty, “You do realize this is a gay bar, right?”

  I sat up straight, slapped one palm on the bar. “Sure do.”

  He put the picture back on the bar, spun it under one finger. A corner clinked against my glass and soaked up some spillage. “So why ask us, then? What’s this got to do with us?”

  “Maybe it doesn’t.”

  “Maybe?”

  I kept quiet. One of our top secret police tactics.

  Geoff made a sad sound. “I think it’s about time you show me your shield.”

  “I don’t have it on me.”

  He grinned the way we all do when things go wrong. His hopes about me dashed. But he’s here every night, right? Place full of guys. Why me?

  He handed the picture back. “Thanks for coming in.”

  “Could you pass it around to the rest?”

  “No, let’s not do that.”

  The older bartender was standing straight behind him, had a good foot and a half on Geoff. “Has he paid for the beer yet?”

  “No.”

  The older bartender reached past Geoff, picked up my Nordeast, and poured it down the sink. He set the empty glass upside down beside it. Turned back towards me. Not a word.

  I picked up the picture, folded it, and slid it into my back pocket. “Thanks, I really appreciate it.”

  Geoff said, “You’re welcome.” He meant it about as much as I did.

  I got up and walked out. Sick to my back teeth.

  So that wasn’t the way to do it. I drove back to my apartment and got my shield and cop ID, still hoping I wouldn’t need to use it. Those guys … the point wasn’t whether they knew anything about the lady popsicle, but that I had fucked up. Three minutes in the door, I’m already paranoid, trying to fit in like those awful narcs on 21 Jump Street — the TV show, kids, not the fucking movie -, and in the end, they couldn’t trust me. Goddamn, I wasn’t up for this.

  But it’s not like I had any other pressing engagements that night, so fuck it, right?

  The second bar was in the shinier section of town, not far from the mall on Miller Hill, all the shopping centers and chain stores and fast-casual food joints. It was a shopping-center storefront with blackout tint on the windows, neon beer signs glowing through — Summit, Blue Moon, the Bud Light with a Viking on it, the Twins logo, the Minnesota Wild. If the place wasn’t called O’Dickey’s Irish Dance Club, with a mighty suggestive leprechaun on the sign, I would’ve thought it was a sports bar.

  And, shit, on walking in, it kinda was. Lots of TVs, large-screen, HD, muted, showing a variety of stuff, including sports, obviously. Some music videos. And what looked like a live feed from the dance floor, someone with a camera weaving through. Men dancing with men. Shirtless men. Lots of them in good shape, but let’s face it, more than I would’ve expected were, you know, average. Weight, height, looks. Average.

  Guys like me.

  But you also get more lumbersexuals in Duluth than anywhere else this side of Wisconsin. Lot of fitted flannel and well-shaped beards on the dance floor. The music was still of the electro-dance variety, but much more energetic than the last place, also more weird. I made out the line Dance with me, my porcelain prince, then turn around and let me smash your back doors in.

  No one cared when I came inside and just stood there to get a feel for the place, because there were more coming in behind me, some going out into the cold. Lots of haphazard industrial rugs layered on the ground, soaked from people tromping in snow. A big carpet blower beside it, cranked up to full-speed, but the thrum of the music covered every bit of ambient noise.

  Still, it was easier to get a drink here. I just had to stand on the foot-rail, lean over and shout. Loud. I took a Bent Paddle Cold-Press Black Ale this time — the names of beers are very important, you see. How many people do you know who walk into a bar and order “a beer”? Especially in Minnesota. This one was a chest warmer, even though I could tell I’d be drenched in sweat by the time I was done here. A hot box. Constant motion. Body heat. Fuck.

  I didn’t have a plan this time. Didn’t know who to ask. But I didn’t want to get kicked out, again. So I watched. I watched the crowd. I watched the live feed from the dance floor. It was right there, through the next door, and it looked to be standing room only, much like the front bar. I was crowded next to a group of three or four guys — couldn’t tell if they were coupled off or just friends or what, all shouting, bobbing and weaving to the rhythm. Every word lost on me.

  As for the one thing I had expected to find — men dressed as women — no luck. Not a single one.

  There were real women, more than I expected, mostly younger, dancing with weird glowing drinks in tall glasses. Even some cougars, MILFs, GILFs, you name it, and all about the dance. All about the heat, the dancing, wearing clothes they couldn’t get away with at home, sweat rolling down bare, flabby arms and fishnet pantyhose. But they were definitely women.

  Transwomen?

  I hadn’t even gotten that far yet.

  So, fuck it. Only one way to find out. I downed my beer — heavy, heavy beer — got out in the crowd and danced.

  There was a woman, tall and thick, with her hair dyed black. Mid-fifties, I would guess. Barelegged in a dress riding up as she struck a pose like a cowboy about to lasso a calf. I was the calf. She was handsome. But she was a woman. You could just tell. Everything about her. I fought through the crowd to her. She was taller than me, and she wrapped her arms around my neck, sashayed with me, took it down low.

  She was a woman.

  A manly woman, but a woman.

  These days, I think “a woman is a woman, trans or not,” but at the time I was only thinking about this woman, acting like she was horny as all fuck, grinding on me, mascara running, hands on my ass. Thinking “this is normal. This is good. I’m dancing with a woman. Not a man. This is okay.”

  When she was close enough to my ear, she shouted, “You okay with this? You uncomfortable?” Slurred to hell.

  I should’ve been. I wasn’t. I shook my head. She smelled good, whatever her soap and sweat mix was, it was easy on the nose, and she reminded me of high school teachers I had admired — and jerked off to — and women who worked at the library and women who worked at the place where I bought my car insurance.

  She slurred some more, “I could eat. You. Up. God, you fags are sexy.”

  I shouldn’t have been offended, but I kinda was. Did she say that to all the young boys? Or was it okay to call each other “fags”? Or was she a bull dyke? Did dykes have their own bars? That’s when I tried to tell if she had an Adam’s apple — her neck was too much of that “old lady neck” though — or whether she was wearing a wig, or had any stubble on her chin. I didn’t know, I really didn’t know.

  But then the song was over, and she let go and applauded. A couple of boys, one black one white, came over and told her she could throw down, at which point the older, shorter, thinner and blonder lady she was with gave her a hug and said, “Isn’t this great?”

  The woman laughed and lifted her arms, sweat rolling off like she’d just taken a shower, and whooped, then reached for me, bear-hugged me and said, “It’s heavenly!”

  And she was gone.

  The song faded, (a dog barking over an angry synth beat) the next one lifted (swimmy keyboard, then the whole room chanted “Boom, Boom, let’s bang this room!”), and the guy next to me shook my shoulder. I turned to him. He wore glasses, a curly brown mop, a Fu Manchu ‘stache, a button-up shirt and cargo pants. “You in?”

  I felt energy. I felt weird. I felt sick again, probably the heavy beer, o
r maybe because being propositioned by a gay guy messed with my long-held self-image of being nothing other than a straight guy. Still, this night, I had to fit in, no matter how uneasy I felt. “Yeah, man.”

  I’d never danced with a man before. The smell of his sweat, the hair on his face and arms, peeking out from his chest. It was a dare, get close, don’t touch, mirror each other — no, not mirror, but anticipate — while all along the beat moves you like you’re a marionette. Yeah, I’ll say it, I wasn’t me right then.

  Not yet. This was me role-playing. Lying. I couldn’t let my cover slip.

  The music, louder than ever. A woman singing — shouting — “WE-ARE-ABOUT-TO-LOSE-ALL-CON-TROL!” Again, syncopated: “WE-ARE-ABOUT-TO-LOSE-ALL-CON-TROL!”

  His hand on my waist, my arms in the air. Our faces closer, closer, inches. Eye to eye. Bass going Umph Umph Umph Umph Umph. I was feeling it in my teeth. This was how I was going to find what I wanted. Not showing off my photo. I had to feel what they were feeling. I had to understand. I couldn’t, could I? Not if I didn’t try. Even if I tried, I mean …

  … I thought about Whitney.

  … I thought about other girls I’d been with.

  … I thought about the porn.

  … I thought about the time my sister caught me when I was a teenager.

  I think I’d better fess up about that.

  6

  My sister caught me in a pair of her panties and a bra.

  She caught me with her lipstick smeared across my lips.

  My dad didn’t read dirty magazines. Of course my mom didn’t. But my sister did. And I’d found some. And some of them were … confusing. Girl-on-girl. Women fucking other women with strap-ons. Men fucking women in their asses, which was something I’d heard about but never seen.

  I stumbled on some naughty pictures on the early internet — see? There I go again. I didn’t stumble. I actively looked. One of my first searches ever, because I’d seen this girl at school, one grade lower than me, her family from India, and I was fascinated, getting hard in the middle of class, hoping she didn’t see me ogling her. Back home, I waited until everyone was out of the house, jumped on the computer and looked up naked photos of Indian girls. That was the first time I remember masturbating, for real, like, all the way. Then pictures of Indian men fucking Indian women, and more. And more. And I realized I needed to hide all this shit from my parents and my sister and learn how to cover my steps and, and, and … goddamn, I was scared. I didn’t want to get caught.