Like People in History

by Felice Picano

  One of those remained unaltered: we'd been promised a musicale involving synchronized swimmers later on. The other pool was decked over with a dance floor. From its ten-foot diving board hung a DJ's booth.

  In front of arid surrounding both pools was the "Mocambo Nightclub," architectural motif of the night. This consisted of dozens of thirty-foot palm trees set in vast terra-cotta tubs, interspersed with deco-style cafe tables and chairs (and booths) on several levels, parts of it covered by the flimsiest thatching: all of it as genuinely "exotic" as Trader Vic's.

  Before we could even reach the tables, we had to thread a flagstone path down through foliage and the "receiving line"—i.e., the hosts, the party's producers, the property owners and/or their representatives, and several women of a certain age, all attended by the inevitable Eddie Rosenberg, a.k.a, Rosatic, Doorperson Supreme of all gay parties in the city, garbed tonight in a shiny snake-green tuxedo with silver edging, and spats, his thinning hair slicked down and his upper lip sporting a small, obviously fake mustache—his intention to resemble Bugsy Siegel or some similarly ruthless Hebraic gangster being undermined from the start by Eddie's puppylike delight in parties, costumes, and pretty people.

  Horace and I had been greeted along the line, the Count had just recognized my disguise (and told me I looked "Ravishing! Worthy of being ravished in or out of a dress!"), his designer had just assured me I might "Freshen up later on. Several rooms have been put aside in both houses," when I heard Eddie's low, insistent voice to one side explaining, "Loguidice. The current model, indeed icon, indeed God of the Manhattan gay scene. And with him one... Alistair Dodge," to which his female companion appended, "I know him. Recently divorced from one of the San Francisco Spearingtons!"

  "Is that you, Rog?" Eddie asked. "Who would have guessed? You should dress up more often." He introduced me to one of the two women of a certain age (her hair was "champagne" blond despite the thirties gown), evidently a reporter; her name was familiar. "I know you," she warned Horace, and then explained to Eddie, "Horace Brecker the Third! Also of San Francisco."

  We'd just made it past them, down a few flagstones, when I heard

  Eddie excuse himself and rush up to me. "That's ------ ------ herself! from the Times Society Pages. Thanks to you and Matt and your tony escorts, she's absolutely convinced the party's a hit. It's sure to get a full page in Sunday's edition."

  I was just about to remonstrate with Eddie when I heard "Look here please!" and we all turned to flashing light bulbs from a photographer.

  "Stop them!" I told Eddie. "Horace isn't even—"

  "Photos are okay," Horace interrupted. "I've seen those old biddies before," he added, nodding toward the receiving line. "They make this party bona fide."

  I thanked him and turned to find Alistair to tell him how wonderful Horace was being, but neither Matt nor Alistair was anywhere in sight.

  Brecker had gotten us away from the pesky photographer and was brushing against my ear again, asking what kind of drink I wanted.

  The bar—an imitation of the one in the Hollywood nightclub—had been constructed against one side of the designer's house. It was a huge, semicircular affair, the back screen woven through with birds of paradise and monkey faces on coconut shells. Brecker settled me in a high-backed fan-palm stool and ordered drinks from one of the three cute young bodybuilder barkeeps, who wore Samoan sarongs and garlands of fresh flowers around their heads.

  When the drinks arrived, Brecker moved up his bar stool so he half surrounded me, and murmured into my ear, "Now I want to hear who everyone is. You promised, remember?"

  His voice seemed awfully vibrato. I wondered if I was hearing that because of the music, half baffled by trees, or the MDA, or what?

  At first I didn't recognize anyone. Then, as I concentrated and as people left the dance floor and wandered closer, I began to. Unsurprisingly, Horace had only heard of a few of the most famous Pines denizens, so I was forced to explain who everyone was. "That's La Putassa, a famous transvestite. She models for Bendel's. I once visited her apartment. A railroad flat, very long, narrow rooms, all with mirrored closets. Each closet filled with expensive women's clothing. That's Bill Whitehead and his lover, Tony. Bill's an editor at Dutton. Edited Edmund White's latest book. Those three are Jerry Rosenbaum, Stan Redfern, and A1 Cavuoto. They rent the Shakespeare House, that place on Crown Walk that looks like the Globe Theater, where the Star Wars party was thrown last summer. Jerry's a stockbroker, Stan's in publishing—isn't he handsome? Al's a doll too. He's an actor. Modeled for Playgirl. There's Mel Cheren—co-owner and A&R man of West End Records, one of the hottest disco producers in town—with his partner in Paradise Garage, Michael Brodsky. That's Dr. Downs—Larry Downs to be precise—with his current fling, Michael Fesco, owner and operator of Flamingo, the gay hot spot in town during the winter. Besides being extremely hot and sexy, Dr. Downs has recently developed a new treatment for amoebiasis. There's his partner, Larry Lavorgna. Haven't seen his ultra-cute ex-lover Scott Façon yet. There's mucho gossip that Scott is to be seen walking his black Great Dane nude on the beach early mornings with a certain gay novelist. Speaking of writers, there's George Whitmore—great profile, no? And his pal, playwright Victor Bumbalo. Near them 'Max' Ferro and 'Mickey' Grumley, lovers for decades: supposedly they discovered Adantis somewhere in the Caribbean and wrote it up. Ed White and his beau Chris Cox should be near. That group always hangs out together. Those guys with the muscles are Jack Brusca, the artist, and his lover, the exquisite Rafael. Jack's been in Brazil to do an enormous monument for a government complex. With them in the housedress, scarlet wedgies, and cinnamon fright wig is Jack's housemate, Frank Diaz. Does that black eagle in flight on Frank's bicep look familiar? Mapplethorpe photographed it. Besides being the hottest Puerto Rican in the city and the most desirable of lovers, Frank's the number-two person in the New York State Council for the Arts, after Kitty Carlisle Hart. There's John Curry, the Olympic gold medal winner for figure skating, and Bob Currie, the designer who recently redid the entire Takashimaya department store in Tokyo, and those two we call the dancing professors, George Stambolian and Dennis Spinninger—they could go on all night...."

  And so on. As I spoke, I stopped to watch and figure out who others were. Some were a cinch. My dance buddy, Jeffrey Roth, and his pal Josh Gonzalez had done themselves up not as movie stars but as soda-fountain waitresses right out of a Garland-Rooney "Hey-kids-let's-put-on-a-musical" movie: pastel-yellow tunics with bubble-gum-pink piping and contrasting pink swirly skirts with canary trim; prewar wigs with high rolls in front and extra-long pageboys in back, topped by hamburger-take-out-box hats; half-falling white socks; embroidered names over their falsies ("Madge" and "Gabby"); faces cosmetized with five-and-dime eyelashes and lipstick so scarlet it resembled dried blood. Not to be outdone by any potential rivals, Josh and Jeff had found white lace-up roller skates, and they skidded and chased each other across the decks, sending into mad angles yet never quite tipping over the period Coke trays, with glued-on plastic fudge sundaes, they carried.

  As stylish, if more recognizable, were my own housemates, Luis and

  Patrick, the former a sliding, sequined Dolores Del Rio, the latter stressing rather than hiding his height and rawboned thinness to be Marjorie Main as Ma Kettle. Alistair's pals had also arrived. Bebe's girth had been turned into Maty Boland's Countess from Tie Women, complete with tiara, "diamond" choker, too-tight black satin evening gown, and white fur; while Enrico had opted for the Paulette Goddard role, in a Nevada divorce-ranch outfit complete with pony-skin boots, vest, and porkpie hat.

  Other characters from the quasi-eponymous film were present: from Virginia Grey's perfume salesgirl, to the upstairs maid, to the big-mouthed blond manicurist, to the aging downstairs cook—even the ghastly sentimental little girl. There were Shearers, Crawfords, Fontaines, Roz Russells, plus Joan Bennetts, Lana Turners, Ruby Keelers, Olivia de Havillands, Vivien Leighs, Bette Davises, Fay Wrays, and Mary Astors galore, natu
rally. My favorites were the character roles: the gawky queens who made stabs at being child stars like Shirley Temple or Jane Withers, even the young Liz Taylor from National Velvet, and the far from attractive guys who dressed as Judy Canova, in farm girl overalls, with half-dollar freckles smeared on their faces. I enjoyed the ethnics too: Cubanos who'd gone out for Lupe Velez or Anna May Wong or even leopard-skinned Jane out of the Tarzan movies. Horace and I adored the four guys from one house (the Ogre, wouldn't you know!) who'd come dressed in sensible suits, fox-headed fur stoles, and wild hats, as Hedda Hopper, Louella Parsons, and Perle Mesta, followed by a moaning, diaphanous Bridey Murphy. I kept wishing our Frisco buddy Calvin Ritchie were there doing his Butterfly McQueen act. But Alistair's pal Shillito almost compensated: he was a knock-kneed Lady Archaeologist, complete with water canteen, rock pick, and magnifying glass, accompanied by an unknown companion, a raggedy, altogether convincing mummy, who, when pinched, giggled in such glassy glissandos it could only be that tangerine-carving demon Barry Wu.

  "This sounds familiar," Horace said of the music, disco till then. "A rhumba? I'll dance that."

  We stood up—a little shakily in my case—to rhumba. Naturally so did every queen in the place wearing anything even halfway Latin. At one point, I counted three Carmen Mirandas on the dance floor. "Fake fruit everywhere!" Horace yelled into my ear, and I thought, Not as fake as you think! But Richie Rivera had taken over in the DJ's booth, and he'd decided to give us a complete etude on Latin-Afro blends.

  It was an hour before I managed to pull a semi-stunned Brecker off the dance floor and back to the big bar, by this time absolutely packed. There was no doubt now that the party was a hit. Everyone who was anyone was there. Even the Broadway celebrities and movie stars had arrived and appeared to enjoy mixing in almost seamlessly with so many other "stars."

  The more he'd danced, the more Horace had loosened up. His bow tie had come undipped and lay dangling from one edge of his shirt, now open several buttons down. His cummerbund had come undone, and been hastily tucked in at the ends. His perfect hair had been whirled into a mess of honey curls. His face was flushed, riant, unembarrassed, young.

  Perhaps it was the MDA I was on, perhaps merely the night itself and the excitement of the party, perhaps it was everything together, but the way that Horace's hands began to rove over the pale-blue shot-silk of my shoulders and back as he handed me my drink suddenly felt awfully erotic to me. I slid out of his reach as prudently as I could. A few minutes later, when the sky lit up above us, as the giant kliegs crossed high in the air to pick out of the night three parachutists clad in silver lame, floating down onto the rapidly clearing dance floor, Horace's hands seemed to roam even more insistently. I looked at him and was surprised to note there that slightly deflated look men's faces always seem to get when their penises are erect. I looked down. Sure enough!

  I thought, Naw! Can't be! He's so excited he forgot who he's with.

  I excused myself to freshen up.

  "Aww!" Horace playfully refused to let me go. When I pulled away, he pleaded, "Remember you're supposed to take care of me tonight."

  Meaning what, exactly? I wondered, making my getaway.

  "If you were thinking at all of trying to get into the johns here, forget it!" Mark Glasgow said.

  I'd just entered the designer's house. Despite his deadpan Thelma Ritter delivery, Mark was done up glamorously, à la Roz Russell in His Girl Friday—or was it Celeste Holm in All About Eve?—in a svelte forest-green dinner suit with ecru suede trim and patches, a close-fitting

  Robin Hood hat sporting die most astonishing feathers, and over half his face a jet veil loosely woven to resemble a spider's web.

  "Crowded?" I asked.

  "Honey, there's more crinoline in this building than there was at the Goldwyn Studios in '37 and '38 together!" He made a moue, which spotlighted a natural mole on his cheek, and before I could comment, he bitchily added, "I did just see your loverboy and some Shanghai Lily stepping inside Froggie's maison. Why not try there?"

  "Hope you don't get too much insect life caught in that veil!"

  "Twat!" he spat out as he spun around to leave. I couldn't help but notice that Mark's perfect buns had been silkily enclosed, amazingly highlighted by his outfit as he swung off sexily toward the bar.

  A few minutes later, I was inside the Count's house, entering a bedroom set up for heavily costumed guests. A slim Jean Harlow and a high-shouldered Crawford with eyebrows like caterpillars were checking each other's hemlines against a line of floor-to-ceiling mirrors, while at the vanity, a hairy-chested, dark-skinned guy with full mustache in some sort of Toulouse-Lautrec danseuse getup was liberally applying pancake makeup. "Whadda ya think?" he asked me.

  Not all the concealer in America, I thought. "Divine! The can?"

  "Occupied!" he said, then back to the mirror, "Hell! Another damn imperfection! I give up!" He arranged the dangerously tilting croquem-bouche upon his short dark hair, then reached into his matching satin drawstring purse for a vial of coke, which he sniffed deeply and offered around. "Hey, Myrtle!" He slapped the lav door. "We got a lady in a hurry out here!" He stood up as the two others left the room, then he suddenly bent down to peer even more closely at his big, sweating face in the mirror. "They'll never believe me when I tell them I was beautiful."

  "You can't be certain." I pretended to commiserate.

  He exited. The lav door opened, revealing Alistair: the next to the last person in the universe I wanted to see.

  "Cuzzikins!" he cooed. "I'm having the be-est time!"

  I dashed past him, lifting the skirt and just managing to get my dick out of those black silk panties to whizz what felt like the Deluge. Outside I could hear Alistair ask, "How's Horace treating you?"

  "In a sec," I shouted. Pissed out at last, I rearranged the illusion back together again and exited. Alistair and I were alone in the big bedroom. He, at the vanity, made space for me on the bench in front of the triple mirrors.

  "I hate these. My profile's so vulpine," I said.

  "Nonsense! We all need a touch-up," Alistair said. Then, "Well?"

  "Actually Horace is a bit more demonstrative than—" A thought suddenly struck me. "Is he on something?"

  Alistair shrugged. "How should I know?"

  "Has he used MDA before?"

  "Why? He's not being difficult, is he?"

  I stared at our images in the mirror. Whoever had thought up this party would have been completely fulfilled at this moment—we might have come straight out of the movie.

  "Because," Alistair went on primly, "if he is being difficult, you tell me!"

  His tone suggested that Alistair had planned for Horace to be stoned on MDA and out of control. With me forced to handle him. Why? I decided to take the long way 'round that question. "Honey," I cooed, "has Horace slept with a guy?"

  "One would think not. I honestly don't know." Alistair carefully picked at his mascara, convincing me that he did know, and the answer was definitely no. "Still, given how he leaped at this party, and his excitement seeing us dressed, how he cajoled you into being his date tonight... Let me do that, dear." Alistair took away my lipstick. "You'll never learn to put on lipstick if you live to be eighty.... It all does rather add up, doesn't it?"

  "Surely, you don't expect me to deflower him just so you have future blackmail material."

  "Stop fidgeting, will you! As you very well know, Cuz, I never blackmail. I do however believe that a well-placed 'anecdote' can be as effective as a sword thrust. And neater. However, you seem, to have a far bigger problem tonight than dear Horace. Stay still, will you? I'm referring, of course, to the contretemps he and I happened to walk in on tonight. Not that I'm in the least surprised. See, Cuz, you literally paint the outline of the lip then fill it in. Just like with crayons and coloring books... You remember a short while ago, when I said what a wonderful job I thought you'd done with Matthew? Of course you do, and I'll not take back a jot: I still think so. Only... I didn'
t know then what

  I know now. Now the upper lip! We both know I'm speaking of Matthew's marvelous gift. He knows and I know and we all know how ghastly; you feel about not being able to help him as much as you'd like to. But it's not only his talent I'm talking about, it's this whole American gay image business you've trapped him into—"

  "I trapped him into?"

  "Close your mouth or I'll get it on your teeth. Not you directly, of course. But you helped certainly. Being so successful! What choice did poor Matt have but to try to emulate you in the only way he knew how?"

  "That's not the way it happened!"

  "Of course, you don't see it. You're so tied up with your magazine and all. And it is important. I'm not putting it down, Cuz. It's just that what's good for you, growth potential for you, is where Matthew can't expand, can't grow. Face it, Rog, you've done all you can for Matthew. You're holding him back. It's not anyone's fault that he has more potential than any of us dreamed. It simply is. You know it. I know it. He knows it!"

  I did know it, of course. I had known it increasingly of late, known it earlier this evening as one of the unspoken truths that lay behind our confrontation. Now, speeding and blinking on MDA, I knew it again, this time with an emotional certainty, a finality that... Now Alistair was confirming it.

  "Let's see." Alistair held my face, then turned it to the mirror. "So natural! So! What do you think?"

  "About what?"

  "You see how well he fits in with even the most scattered remnants of my little entourage, peripheral as they are. I think, well, to be brutally frank, dear, I think Matthew's reached the stage where all he needs is a final polish."

  For a second our eyes found each other in those three mirrors, mine dark, nearly black with fear and drugs, his lighter, clearer, so much more lucid, and I wondered if our gaze seemed so ambiguous, so incomplete, because the mirrors were so new, so unused to reflecting back.

  "...the final polish that living abroad almost naturally gives one," Alistair completed his thought.