City of Night

by John Rechy

  I mentioned her to Pete, and he says: “Great, man, she sounds like a swinging nympho—lets make it with her together sometime!”

  Like the rest of us on that street—who played the male role with other men—Pete was touchy about one subject: his masculinity. In Bickford’s one afternoon, a goodlooking masculine youngman walked in, looked at us, walked out again hurriedly. “That cat’s queer,” Pete says, glaring at him. “1 used to see him and I thought he was hustling, and one day he tried to put the make on me in the flix. It bugged me, him thinking I was queer or something. I told him fuck off, I wasnt gonna make it for free.” He was moodily silent for a long while, and then he said almost belligerently. “Whatever a guy does with other guys, if he does it for money, that dont make him queer. Youre still straight. It’s when you start doing it for free, with other young guys, that you start growing wings.”. . .

  And because this is such a big thing in That life, youll hear untrue stories from almost everyone whos paid someone about the person hes paid. It’s a kind of petty vindication, to put down the hustler’s masculinity—whether correctly or not—at the same time that they seek it out.

  Standing on the street, Pete would always come on about the young girls that would breeze by like flowers, the wind lapping at their skirts coyly. . . .

  I found out Pete can be vengeful. I saw him in Bryant Park and he was fuming. The manager of a moviehouse one block away had refused to let him in. (I had seen the manager—a skinny, tall, nervous, gaunt, pale-faced man. The theater is one of the gayest in New York. Late at night men stand leaning along the stairways, waiting.) “Hes a queer,” Pete said angrily, “he dont give a fuck what goes on so long as it dont go on for money—thats why he wouldnt let me in.” Later, Pete tells everyone the place is crawling with plainclothes vice squad, ready to raid it: Stay Awayl And the theater balcony was almost empty for weeks.

  He also told me that another hustler had taken a score from right under his nose in the park, and Pete went around telling people the other hustler had the clap. . . . “Make it anyway you can,” he said when he finished telling me that, “and when you cant make it, get even.”

  He knew almost everyone on the street who paid. He would point them out to me. “See that blond pale kid? He pimps for this old guy: real swank pad, too. And, man, what a weirdo that old guy is. Dig: he pays by the hour, and talks, talks, talks!—hes a teacher or something—laid up in bed from an accident. I used to fall asleep—I’d wear sunglasses—and he never knew the difference, just kept on talking. . . .”

  At least once I regretted not listening to Pete’s advice.

  “See that one over there?” he said, pointing to a harmless-looking middle-aged man in a raincoat. “Stay away from him, spote, hes psycho.”

  But remembering what he had told everyone about the theater whose manager wouldnt let him in, and remembering what he’d done to the hustler whod taken his score in the park, 1 figured this may be some kind of revenge on the man for whatever reason. The man looked entirely harmless, and I went with him.

  After we had made a very ordinary scene—and I still hadnt got any money from him—his composure changed suddenly into savage rage. Before I knew it, he had pulled a knife on me. I dashed out, down the creaking steps. Like a demon—his shadow flung grotesquely down the stairs—he stands at the landing shouting:

  “God! Damn! You! God damn all of you!”

  3

  I also learned not always to trust Pete.

  One sharply cold windy Sunday afternoon—the clouds sweeping the newyork sky like sheets—I saw him coming toward me where I was standing. “You wanna score?” he says. “See that old cat over there?” He pointed to a small mousy man a few feet away. “He wants us both to come over to his house. Hes only good for five,” he explained, adding quickly when he saw me hesitating: “but most of the time hell lay more if he digs you. . . . Cummon, man,” he coaxed me. “Lets go with him. It’s a draggy day anyhow. And anyway, we get to eat there real good.” He adds, smiling secretly. “And we dont have to do much. Oh, hes Special!” Remembering the man I had walked around Times Square with, wearing a jacket and cap, I began to laugh. “Not that,” Pete says, “we wont be walking around Times Square in leather.”

  Without going to him, Pete motions yes to the man, who goes down the steps, into the subway. Pete and I follow. I was walking fast, to catch up with the man. “Cool it,” Pete explains. “I know where we get off.” Without glancing back, the man gets in one of the cars, and we got in another. “He doesnt want anyone to see him leaving with guys,” Pete said. I had been through this before: Unlike the black-dressed Al, who walked you around for an hour through Times Square, some scores dont want to be seen leaving the street with a younger man. “He lives in—hold on—Queens!” Pete laughed. “And dig this, spote: I think he teaches at Queens College. They even got a school now,” he says, shaking his head.

  We got off at Queens Plaza, and followed the man to a large apartment house. We waited at the corner for a few minutes, and then we walked into the lobby. It’s a moderate-priced apartment house, very quiet, softly lighted. We reached the second floor, and along the hallway, a door was open slightly. There stood the little man beaming at us sweetly. He had taken off his coat, and he was wearing a gayly colored apron now.

  “Hello, hello, hello!” he chirped merrily. “Im so glad you boys could come. I was hardly expecting—”

  Pete whispered to me (I couldnt see how the man could help but hear him, but possibly neither cared): “Play it Cool and go along with it” At times Pete seemed to have an enormous tolerance for the quirks of the people he knew: a tolerance which could instantly turn into intolerance when he felt he’d been had.

  “Itll be just a few minutes, boys,” the old man announced, “and then we’ll have a Lovely dinner. You boys must be famished, and I just happen to have some Very Nice Steaks. Now,” he says, and his voice trembles slightly, “you boys get—uh—Comfortable.” He stood watching us intently. I glanced at Pete, and he had begun to unbutton his shirt.

  “Do what I do,” he told me, but I was strangely embarrassed suddenly, because by then Pete was taking off all his clothes. “Come on, man,” he says to me, annoyed. “You wanna score or dont you?” (Again, I knew the man, his gaze nailed on us, could hear him, and 1 realized conclusively this didnt matter.) “This cat’s pretty swinging people if he digs you,” Pete goes on, “and we can come back and have ‘dinner.’” He laughed again. “Come on.”

  I finally did. Pete sat on the couch, glancing at a comic book. He was completely unembarrassed. I sat on a chair looking at a magazine. The man returned to the kitchen, humming gayly. “It’ll be just a few more minutes, now boys—” He turned at the door and looks fondly at Pete. “Petey-boy,” he said, “I do believe youve been gaining a few pounds—you should have more salads, less starches. . . . You boys dont know how to care for yourselves, but well fix that. . . . And you, my boy—” turning now to me like a doting mother “—you could stand a bit more weight—just a few more pounds, not much—and we’ll fix that too.” He disappeared into the kitchen, and I could hear dishes rattle.

  I glanced up abruptly, and Pete is looking at me over the comic book. He smiles broadly.

  Soon, the meal was served, on a small, carefully set table in the dining room. We were summoned by a tinkling little bell which the man jingled. I had never eaten like this before, and I start to put my pants on. Pete said no, emphatically, reminding me we’re in the presence of “cool people” and I should play along. We sat at the table—just Pete and myself, facing each other. The man flutters in and out of the kitchen like a butterfly, returning, serving us lovingly, rearranging the silver, the glasses—standing back to see that they were Just Right There was no place for him. He brought a chair and set it away from the table. He sat there, staring raptly as we ate. Completely unself-consciously Pete ate his food. I dropped my fork a couple of times, and the man rushed into the kitchen to get me a clean one. Finally we
had finished, and the man places a cake before us, gives us a large portion. “And there’s ice cream!” he announced joyously. “Vanilla?” he asked. Pete said, “Chocolate.” I took vanilla. “All boys love cake and ice cream,” the man said knowingly, and by then I was enjoying it. I even ate more cake.

  “Now a nice rest,” the man said. His voice shook slightly, as when he asked us to get “Comfortable.” We went into the bedroom, where there were twin beds. Pete lay in one, I lay in the other. The man came in with a chair, which he stations between the two beds. “Now take a long rest,” he said. Pete is looking at me steadily, as if to remind me to play along; winks—then pretends to fall asleep immediately. He even snored a couple of times. I lay in bed, my eyes supposedly closed, but I was glancing at the man: He sat on the chair, his chin propped on his hands: staring fixedly from one to the other; occasionally his face would brighten up benevolently like a mother watching over her adored children. . . .

  After about 15 minutes, he “woke” us, and we sat in the bedroom, on one bed, Pete and I, and played checkers, while the man watched us with the fascinated attention of a child enjoying a cartoon. Pete couldnt play checkers, and we sat there merely moving them back and forth.

  “We’ll have to go now, Mom,” Pete said finally. I looked at him startled. Had he called him “Mom”? Pete nods at me, indicating I must do the same. I couldnt bring myself to call him “Mom.” The old man looked at me with a hurt look.

  “Well have to go now, Mom,” Pete repeated. He gives me an exasperated look.

  “Oh, must you?” the man said. “Im so sorry you cant stay longer.” He removed the apron, rubbed his hands on it, folded it neatly, and he went into the kitchen. Pete follows, him. I can hear voices. Then Pete returns, hands me $5.00. “You fucked up, spote,” he told me, shaking his head. “You didnt call him Mom. Just five bucks. When hes real happy, he lays ten.” He shook his head regretfully. “But we can come again, and if youre cool we’ll score more. Why—didnya—call—him—Mom?”

  A week later, alone, I ran into the same man. This time he knew me and he came and talked to me. “Do you have a young friend whod like to come up and have dinner with us?” he asked me. “I havent seen Petey-boy here today,” he said, glancing around for him. “If you find another nice youngman, we’ll have a lovely dinner, and youll each be $10.00 richer.” “Ten?” I said. “Why, child,” he said somewhat indignantly, “I always give ten.” From my expression, he understood what had happened. “That Pete!” he said, and I thought he was going to stamp his foot. “Hes done it to me again. Why, I bet he only gave you five.” I felt embarrassed to admit I’d been taken, and I said, no, he’d given me ten. “Well, Im relieved!” the man said. “Hes done that before, you know—gives his young friend only five, and keeps fifteen. But what can I do? It embarrasses me so, when Ive first met a youngman, to give him the money. I dont really know what to do.” Then he smiles Tolerantly. “But Petey is a lovely youngman—only—only—” He frowns slightly. “—only I wish he wouldnt call me Mom.”

  When I saw Pete again, one night in Bryant Park, I mentioned the money to him. He looked at his feet, pretending—I was sure he was pretending—embarrassment “You gotta learn not to trust no one too much,” he mumbled. Then he reached for his wallet, brought out three dollars. “Thats all I got now,” he said, sighing (“What Am I Going To Do Now?!”). “Here, take em,” he said. I did, and he stared at me in surprise. “Youre learning, spote,” he said.

  A few days later I got even with him.

  I told him I knew a girl who wanted to be a stripper. I had met her not too long ago in the lobby of an apartment house I had just scored in. Her name was Flip, and she asked me to come up with her—just like that She shows me sexy pictures of herself, turning me on. She was very pretty, very young. To the groaning sounds of “Night Train” she began to do a strip—then stopped coquettishly; tells me poutingly shes sorry, she cant go all the way: “You see, zoll—” (Thats how she said doll.) “—little Flip’s got the mean rag on.” Suddenly I realized without doubt that Flip was a man. She was the first dragqueen I had ever been with. I didnt let her know I had found out, and she went ahead and did what she told me she liked anyway. . . . When it was over, she says: “If you know any other cute zolls, tell them about me. Im always Ready, zoll.”

  When I told Pete about Flip (leaving out that she was actually a dragqueen), she too sounded like a nympho to him. “I gotta meet that chick,” he told me—and later, I took him to her apartment. “We’ll all three make it together,” he said enthusiastically, “it’s Sexier that way.” And although he kept insisting as we stood outside Flip’s door that I should stay, I said I had something else to do.

  “Just ring the bell,” I told him. “She wont even ask who you are. She’ll just let you in.”

  I waited on the steps until I saw him ring the bell. The door opened. I heard Flip squeal: “Ooo, you are a zoll!”

  That night I expected perversely to see an indignant Pete. But when I saw him, he said: “Man!—what a great Lay that chick is!” . . .

  I felt very smug—and very surprised.

  4

  Then, one day—in the midst of that cold bitter winter, when the snow cut across the streets like an icy knife and the wind shrieked like something from Hell—one day, the memory of my Mother—accentuated by the long painfully written three-times-a-week letters without punctuation asking when I would be Back, asking me to promise not to get into trouble—that memory seized me with a racking violence—and I decided to put down Times Square again—a pattern of guilt which would recur periodically. I got a job, with a Foundation dedicated to Spreading The Greatness of The American Way of Life. And I kept away from The Streets. At night I would stay home or go to the movies—but not on 42nd Street or The Others. But—again—that job lasted only briefly, and impulsively, I quit The cold air outside struck me like my lost freedom, regained. That very night I was back on Times Square.

  “Where you been, spote?” Pete said. “I thought you got busted or something, I looked around for you. Dont split like that again, hear?” For the first time since I had known him, we shook hands.

  After that, I saw him more and more often. Sometimes—having scored—we would meet afterwards and sit in the automat at 42nd and Park Avenue (this appealed to him as Classier). He told me he was staying in the room which the black-dressed Al rented to keep his motorcycle clothes in. “He dont dig anyone staying there,” Pete told me, “but I finally conned him into letting me.”

  Yet, although I saw Pete at least once a day now, there was still the urgency, on both our parts, to split abruptly—to get away from each other.

  Occasionally, we would go see “Mom.” And the initial embarrassment I had felt was completely gone: It was always the same scene, the man never touched either of us, he merely sat staring. Once he even took a picture of us at the table.

  By now Pete had learned how to play checkers. And one afternoon, strangely—as Pete and I sat on the bed playing checkers for much longer than we ever had before, as if there had been no third party, no “performance,” actually enjoying it—with startling suddenness “Mom” abandoned his role as watcher, as doting mother, and nervously, claiming A Huge Headache, he asked us to leave. He folded the board hurriedly and abruptly dumped the checkers into their box.

  As we left, he almost slammed the door.

  “What bugged him?” Pete asked; then, shrugging, dismissing it, “I guess he did have a bad headache—shes kinda weird, anyway. . . . Fuck-im.”

  We didnt go back.

  5

  Now the nights began to warm up. It’s that magnificent interlude in New York between winter and spring, when you feel the warmth stirring, and you remember that the dreadful naked trees will inevitably sprout tiny green buds, soon. Everyone rushes into the parks, the streets—and you even forget that, very soon, summer will come scorchingly, dropping from the sky like a blanket of steam. . . .

  “I dont feel like fuckin
around today,” Pete told me one afternoon. He seemed pensive. “Lets just make the flix, spote—and forget all about trying to score.”

  We saw a double feature—one, a French movie about Lesbians in a girls’ school. When we got outside, it was dark, the sky beaded wondrously with spring stars. “You really believe two chicks could dig each other that tough?” Pete asked me. I answer, “Sure.” I was wondering what had prompted such amazing, for him, naïveté. “It sure seems strange,” he went on. “Dig: I can see guys making it with each other—sure—for money—but—. . . Well, it sure seems strange, just digging each other like that—and those two chicks, man, they were both beautiful.” We were standing outside. Even the lights on the signs seemed livelier in the warm air.

  I didnt have any place to go, but I said, “Later,” to Pete. This is how it had always been before. “No, wait,” he says, “dont split—unless you got something to do.” “Nothing,” I said. “Lets stick together,” he said. “I just dont feel like fuckin around tonight,” he said moodily.