Freak Show

by James St. James

  “Go away,” he cried. “Get away from me. I can’t do this. I can’t believe you . . . after I told you . . . And in front of all those people. . . .”

  “What do you mean?”

  “No, Billy! I gotta go. I can’t. . . .” And he grabbed his shoes and searched for his shirt, and never finished the sentence, he was out the door so fast and taking the steps five at a time.

  “Where are you going?” I screamed. “What are you doing?”

  Oh my God! I’m having an aneurysm! Yes! And a stroke! . . . BRAIN . . . POPPING! . . . MELTING! . . . TURNING TO FOAM! . . . Everything’s going black. This is it. I’m dying.

  “Flip! Come back here!” I screamed. “Goddamnit, you can’t do this to me!”

  But he kept on running.

  And like every great woman of tragedy, I frantically followed him out the door, pointlessly screamed his name from the patio, and furiously ripped my dress off. Then I fell to my knees, looked up at the stars, and screamed, “WHYYYYY?” as he peeled away in a cloud of dust.

  XXXV

  SATURDAY

  “Hi, this is Flip. Yo, I’m not here right now, but be cool and I’ll get back with you as soon as I can.”

  BEEP!

  “Hi, this is Billy. Listen, I wanted to apologize for the other night. I think we SHOULD just pretend it didn’t happen. I didn’t mean to upset or weird you out. I didn’t mean to. That’s really the last thing I wanted to do, you know, is upset you. Your friendship means a lot to me, Flip. It’s sort of all I have right now. I hope I wasn’t out of line. I just couldn’t take it if I did something stupid. Let’s just not make any final decisions yet. You’re the only friend I have. I don’t want to sound possessive or anything. I just want you to know how important you are and—”

  BEEP!

  “. . . That I miss you already.”

  Entr’acte

  I

  WAIT!

  WAIT!

  STOP!

  HOLD IT RIGHT THERE!

  Nobody read another page!

  You there! Hands off the book! Put your reading glasses on the ground where I can see them!

  We have a problem.

  I can’t go on!

  My conscience won’t let me.

  I’ve been living a lie. IT’S TRUE! Everything I’ve told you has been a lie. EVERYTHING! Well, not everything. Just the foundation. JUST THE FOUNDATION? Don’t you see, then? Don’t you get it? What I’m trying to tell you is this whole book has been based on a lie.

  What lie?

  What am I blithering on about?

  Remember back on page . . . ten . . . when I told you I had no idea why mother threw me out? That she just lost her mind for no reason and couldn’t deal with me, and I COULDN’T FIGURE IT OUT FOR THE LIFE OF ME?

  And then again, when I was in the coma and remembering bits and pieces about my life with Muv . . . but I couldn’t quite remember that last little part?

  Lies.

  All lies.

  Nothing but plop and twaddle.

  Horseshit and hooey.

  It was blatantly false. Patently untrue. Nothing but complete and utter nonsense.

  Yes, yes. I looked you straight in your collective eyes and just out-and-out lied. Lied like the dog I am. I’m such a sociopath sometimes. Bad Billy!

  I know EXACTLY what happened.

  I can give you a second-by-second account, in fact, of that afternoon, complete with flow charts and graphs and annotated footnotes and full bibliography. I could tap it out in goddamn Morse code if you’d like. Backward.

  My God, how could I ever forget something like that? It’s seared into my soul. My brand of shame. And yet in light of recent developments, it seems a minor thing to keep from you.

  You need to know the truth.

  You DESERVE to know the truth.

  When we last left the story, Muv had just lost her mind and started dressing like a deranged bag lady, remember?

  Okay—see, right off the bat I have a slight confession.

  Gosh, this is so mortifying.

  Yes, she was an eccentric dresser. And she certainly piled on the crap. But she never wore the cat as a stole. That was Elinor Glyn, a lady writer from the twenties, who invented the phrase “It Girl.” I must have gotten them confused.

  It could happen.

  And the Christmas lights in her hair? That would be me. I do it all the time, and it’s FABULOUS, not crazy at all.

  WHAT?

  IT WAS A DREAM! I WAS DREAMING! IN MY COMA! YOU WEREN’T WATCHING A DOCUMENTARY!

  There are no guarantees here, people.

  You pay your money, and you take your chances!

  But that’s it!

  That’s all the white lies!

  I swear!

  Everything from here on out is unequivocally, undeniably, 100 percent true. Polygraph-proof. May I spend an eternity in Evan-Picone casuals if I’m lying.

  You can trust me.

  HERE WE GO:

  You have to remember that growing up, I was mother’s own little “mini-Muv,” parroting her every outrage. Aping her every gesture. Trundling along behind her, echoing her thoughts, repeating her grander-than-thou pronouncements on life and how to live it.

  “Dar-LING!” she’d say.

  “Yes, dar-LING?” I’d reply.

  “EGOMET MIHI IGNOSCO,” she’d pronounce.

  And I’d translate: “I, myself, pardon myself!”

  “That’s Horace, darling! You, alone, have the power to forgive yourself! You have only to answer to yourself!”

  I didn’t understand then, but I do now.

  You’ll see.

  But of course, I wasn’t just mindlessly imitating her—monkey see, monkey do. I was learning, processing, absorbing it all—oh yes, I was quite the little sponge. Yes, yes, I was always busy editing, reformatting, and refiguring everything she said and did.

  Whenever I was alone, I would try on my own variations of her outfits. Tweak it a little. Take it down a notch. Or up the glam factor.

  Adding my own unique touches. Butt pads, sequined skullcaps, ears painted gold, clown noses. Bits of whimsy.

  I was finding my own style, my own individual way of expressing myself through clothes. The outfit might be Muv’s, but the look was pure Billy. I was big, bold, cutting-edge, like her. But cleaner lines. Simpler. Not as fussy.

  Behold, the birth of creation!

  The beginning of me.

  Billy in Bloom.

  But hush, now.

  Keep it quiet. Keep it mum. Keep it FROM mum, oh yes, by all means.

  Let’s not send out announcements just yet. Let’s not alert the media of my newfound penchant for drag.

  I couldn’t quite pinpoint why I was uneasy with her finding out. I just doubted she would be overjoyed.

  It wasn’t exactly a betrayal.

  It wasn’t really a rebellion.

  It couldn’t have been much of a shock.

  I just thought it was wise to lie low for the time being.

  I know it seems odd that I would worry about the reaction of a woman like Muv—an artist! Who’s educated! Worldly! A staunch nonconformist! Who looks down on the provincial rubes that cross our paths! And yet, a child knows. . . .

  I knew she’d been at the bottom of a bad cycle for a while—months!—so moody and erratic that I’d never seen her this bad. She seemed lost, paranoid, muddled, defensive. Prone to anger and hysteria, easily threatened, thinking everyone was out to get her.

  I was walking on eggshells, ANYWAY; I just knew she was not in a warm and fuzzy place for any major lifestyle shake-ups.

  And I was right.

  When she finally turned on me, it was such a major blowup over such a minor misunderstanding!

  It all went down over a dress—a silly, bias-cut Ungaro number of the floatiest beaded chiffon—that belonged to my mother.

  I was just trying it on while she was at the store. And for the love of corn, it wasn’t even REALLY a dress. More of
a shapeless shift. Why, one might even go so far as a LONG BLOUSE. Okay, that’s too far.

  You know how a few years ago, all those B-list starlets—like, oh, Lisa Rinna—always seemed to be photographed wearing those flirty-but-casual chiffon dress and jeans combos? And how in the beginning it brought just a funky whiff of anarchy to the red carpet? “I’ll conform to your dress code on top, but from the waist down, I’m a REBEL” is what it screamed.

  Well, I thought to myself, why shouldn’t men be allowed to enjoy the same quirky mashup of casual wear and elegance?

  So I tried on my mother’s Ungaro and wore it under a suit, a white satin tuxedo jacket of the sharpest order. True it was Muv’s, and nipped and fitted to a fare-thee-well, but it could totally pass as a man’s jacket. Totally. And the effect was UNBELIEVABLY FABULOUS! A WHOLE NEW LOOK! Why, I had single-handedly revolutionized the men’s suit.

  As I was admiring my cunning work, who should pop back in but Mother. She had left her purse.

  “I left . . . my . . .”

  And she never finished the sentence.

  Now, let me reiterate: I WAS NOT IN DRAG. I was tweaking the men’s fashion silhouette, which is an ALTOGETHER different thing.

  Okay—so I ditched the jacket. I confess.

  And the pants were really white tights.

  And, well, all right, I had a wig on, as well. And a little pink lipstick. Okay, maybe it was Scarlet Temptation. Who knows? It was just to pull the outfit together. BUT I WAS DEFINITELY NOT IN DRAG.

  But there I was, I suppose, in my mother’s stunning, showstopping, gold, beaded Ungaro number, and I was working it better than she ever could. So perhaps she was a little jealous. . . .

  There was a moment of total silence in which all the air was sucked out of the room.

  Nothing to do but:

  “Oh, hullo, dar-LING!” I said, and struck a pose. “Quel surprise, right?”

  (Hold pose, and smile desperately.)

  Just brazen it out.

  And:

  Silence.

  She said nothing.

  Her mouth open, O, but no sound came out.

  Not good. Not good.

  My smile started to crack. My ta-dah pose began twitching and jerking.

  Beads of sweat drip, drip, drip down my face.

  She looked at me. I looked at her.

  Then she darkened.

  Her whole posture changed.

  When she finally opened her mouth, she just ERUPTED in blood and thunder. Foam and fury. Her voice was a great and terrible trumpet blast, a mighty bellow, full of misplaced rage. It was the voice of a monster, a Leviathan, a mighty pissed off Tyrannosaurus rex.

  She took my cross-dressing as an act of betrayal, and completely blew her stack.

  She stopped making sense.

  She raved and ranted, and generally acted as if I were the enemy, that I had been out to destroy her from the beginning. According to Muv, I was the cause of everything wrong in her life. I was the very embodiment of chaos, the face of random violence. I was a walking earthquake, a living disease, an epidemic that needed to be quarantined.

  According to her, I steamrolled over lives, flattening everyone in my path. My greed was boundless, unending. I took and took with such great, grasping urgency, such gulping, gobbling hysteria, it was ugly and animal-like—embarrassing to witness. I was a razor-toothed succubus. A bloodthirsty jackal.

  In the History of Mothers and Sons, I stood alone in the Pantheon of Ungrateful Children. She would rather have raised a 9/11 terrorist, a death camp general, or a butcher of babies—they would have been less trouble.

  Which I thought was all a bit harsh. . . .

  “And THIS!” she screamed, her voice raw. “This latest stunt!” and she ripped the dress off my body and threw it to the floor.

  This was THE LAST GODDAMN STRAW! Did I understand?

  She kept on, her voice rising in pitch, her anger swelling, her reason slipping away:

  “Who do you think you are?” she bellowed.

  And: “Did you think you could get away with it?

  “Did you think you were above common decency? Respect?

  “Do you like breaking my heart?

  “Are you trying to humiliate me?

  “Well?

  “Why don’t you answer me?

  “HOW DARE YOU JUST STAND THERE AND LOOK SMUG?

  “Does this whole thing strike you as funny?”

  Silence.

  Dramatic tension as she built up to:

  “OUT!” (And I heard the blood rushing in my ears.)

  “I WANT YOU OUT!” (And my mouth went dry.)

  “I don’t even want to look at you! Just go! I don’t want to see you again.” (My bowels constricted.)

  She walked to the kitchen.

  “You have ten minutes.”

  I suddenly felt faint and collapsed, but only briefly. Instinct took over. A lightning quick assessment of the situation concluded that it was probably a wise idea to do as she said. Now wasn’t the time to argue or explain or apologize.

  Just go.

  I quickly, blindly, began shoving items into a garbage bag. Anything. Everything. No time to organize. THIS and THIS and THIS and DONE. I took one last look around, then got the hell out of Dodge.

  So there you have it.

  Not a pleasant tale, but there you are.

  That’s how I came to Fort Lauderdale.

  She called dad and said it was HIS turn to deal with me. That maybe he would be a better influence on me.

  And honestly, after all that I had been through, I actually looked forward to the quiet life with Dad. (Although I never would have admitted it at the time.)

  We now return to our regularly scheduled story.

  Where were we? Oh, yeah—barrel’s bottom, SCRAPE, SCRAPE.

  Flip had just abandoned me. And I was feeling lost and alone and teetering on the very brink of sanity myself.

  Now, without further ado, we rejoin our gender-squashing heroine’s plight, already in progress. . . .

  Part Three

  HERE COMES SUPERFREAK!

  I

  LIFE AFTER FLIP, DAY ONE

  I move about, free from myself, free from my thoughts. My movements are automatic—opening drawers, looking through cabinets. I am looking for something—I don’t know what it is, but I will recognize it when I see it. Until then I pause, maybe, and listen to my breath, then continue . . . under the rug, behind the bookshelf . . . I am shuffling and breathing, and listening and looking. Always looking. I am not myself these days. I am not myself, nor am I anybody else.

  Can’t you see? Don’t you get it? Without Flip, I’m just a shell, a hat stand all dressed up. Why, if I weren’t wearing these platforms and this sombrero, I wouldn’t exist at all. I’d dissolve. PLIP PLOP. Down the drain.

  Look here, I can cut myself and nothing happens. It’s just corn syrup and food coloring pouring from make-believe veins. It’s not even mine.

  I retire to the safety of my cupboard and continue slowly fading away.

  II

  DAY TWO

  There are days when even the cupboard is too roomy, too wide open. There are too many variables in there, too many chances for things to go wrong. You need something more secure. A better fit. On those days, when you just want a giant Ziploc sandwich bag to slide into, I find there’s only one practical thing to do:

  Lock yourself in the guest room and fold yourself into the sofa bed.

  Yes, only then can you discover the absolute bliss of total restriction. Only in your new hideaway heaven can you finally feel safe from the pain of the outside world.

  And if you never leave, you’ll be just fine.

  III

  DAY THREE

  And it’s time to admit defeat. Yessir. Time to throw in the towel.

  From deep within the bowels of your sofa bed, you come to a momentous decision: You’re not going back to that wicked place.

  Never, never, never.


  There’s no point. There’s no use. You can’t fight a school. You can’t battle a belief, a way of life, a deep-seated hatred. You can’t win. If a two-ton boulder is barreling toward you, you can either try to stop it and face an almost certain flattening, or step aside and live to tell the tale. And I’m sick of feeling like a goddamned Fruit Roll-Up.

  So that’s it. There you go. The bad guys have won.

  IV

  DAY FOUR

  Tides are turning. A new day is dawning.

  And you just might pull through, after all.

  Sure! You’ve been through hard times before. Your mother threw you away, like an old Choo! You’re no stranger to heartbreak.

  And worse things happen at sea!

  So what do you do? How do you cope?

  First of all: take it easy. Be gentle with yourself. Don’t rush back into the world just yet. You still have a long ways to go.

  Rule number one: nothing beats a big bowl of mashed potatoes when you’re feeling this depressed. Anything soft, in fact, will do. Chewing is for go-getters. Chewing is for people who have it together. You are not one of those people.

  I know, I know, you probably don’t have much of an appetite, anyway.

  But eat you must. You need to keep up your strength.

  I find it helps to picture yourself eating your lover’s body parts. Spaghetti? Take a mouthful of his arteries, dear. Tapioca? Those lumps are his eyeballs . . . let them float around in your mouth, then CHOMP! Grind them to a pulpy membrane! With a little imagination marinara sauce becomes his blood. That water bottle is full of the tears he’s shed now that you are gone.