by Tanya Boteju
Once inside, Gordon lost a bit of his bravado. He went back to his usual slouch and kept pushing his hair behind his ear, even though it was already tucked in nice and tight.
The Lava Lounge was a lot bigger than I’d expected, although I guess I didn’t have much to base my expectations on. A glittering bar ran the entire length of the room, and directly in front of it, beyond a vast dance floor, a long but shallow stage rose off the ground with tall, burnt-orange curtains serving as its backdrop. Everything from velvet couches to cramped two-person tables surrounded the dance floor, and a screen along one wall projected distorted images of molten lava. In contrast to the fiery imagery, the air conditioners pumped icy air into the near-empty space. Techno music pulsated from towering speakers around the room.
Despite my nervous stomach, a thrill rolled through my body. Nowhere like this existed in Bridgeton, and though I’d been to North Gate several times over the years with my parents, I’d never ventured into any place like this before.
We found a table near the back. I didn’t really want Gordon to drink any more, but I got us another couple of drinks anyway to keep us busy and to give me a little buzz too. We’d never hung out, after all, and maybe this was too big a jump into the unordinary for the two of us.
We stood at the table, awkwardly sipping our drinks, both of us trying to look around without seeming to. A few more folks trickled in, most noticeably a group of five or six younger women, all of whom were extremely attractive. I guess I shouldn’t have assumed they were gay from how they looked, but something about their comfortable footwear and variety of short, shaggy haircuts told me they might not be straight.
But really, what did I know?
One girl in particular caught my eye. Two very muscular-looking legs in tight, low-riding jeans and skate shoes rose up to a wide belt with a Wonder Woman buckle. Following after these was a sturdy torso with plentiful breasts and arms that looked like they’d have no trouble performing repeated push-ups on the bar—if, you know, that was your thing. And at the top of all these powerful parts, striking blue eyes and a pretty face framed by short, wavy blond hair. Wonder Woman was weaving through the bar like she owned the place, handing out cards of some sort.
“Woooo . . . Clark is checkin’ out the laadddiees!” Gordon jeered. The drinks were clearly doing their thing.
“Please don’t be an asshole.”
I was surprised to see his eyes drop to his beer. “Sor-RY.”
“I just really don’t want to draw any attention to us, okay? Let’s just watch the show and fade into the background.” I also really wanted to see Winnow, but I hadn’t told Gordon that.
Gordon just huffed and said, “Yeah, yeah.”
As the bar grew busier, I continued to scan the crowd, looking for signs of a beguiling geisha tattoo. Most women were in small groups or couples. Excluding the two girls making out on the dance floor, it was hard to tell whether the rest were gay, straight, or somewhere in between. I wondered how gay I looked. Ginny might have said “Very,” but I bet Deidre would say otherwise. I guess perspective was everything.
Gordon had barely said two words in the past thirty minutes. But he was definitely busy examining the crowd, just as I was. Every once in a while, I checked him out in my peripheral vision, and though mostly he looked horrified, once or twice I caught something else in his face—something like wonder or longing. It softened my heart for him a bit.
“Hey,” I said, and tapped his arm. “What d’ya think?”
But before he could answer, someone tapped my arm.
“Hey there, girly.”
It was Wonder Woman.
“Uh, hi.” Blink, blink.
She nodded to Gordon, who just stared. Quite the pair, the two of us.
“You look like someone who’s dying to try something new tonight.”
Well, that wasn’t completely untrue, but I dared not say that now. “Um . . .”
She shoved a card into my hand, yelling, “Just think about it!” and then wandered off to accost other folks.
I stared at the card. Across the top in bold gold writing it announced, ROYALTY FOR A NIGHT! Below that: AMATEUR DRAG NIGHT. TAKE THE STAGE AND EARN DRINKS AND ONE FREE DRAG TUTORIAL WITH DEE DEE LA BOUCHE!
Dee Dee La Bouche? That was Deidre!
Amateur drag night?
Stage?
Horror. Excitement. Panic. Paralysis.
“What’s it say?” Gordon asked, leaning over my shoulder.
“Uh, something about an amateur drag show? Tonight?”
He chugged some of his beer. “You gonna do it?”
No way. No . . . way.
Or . . . ?
As Gordon quickly lost interest and continued to scan the bar, I continued to stare at the card. Glitter and change. Glitter. And. Change. My drink fizzed in my other hand. My conversation with Devi and Boyd bubbled up too. Could I do drag? Devi had been making fun of me, but it had piqued my interest. And now this door swung out in front of me. Like an invitation. Like Winnow’s hand. Beckoning.
A drag king can’t be boring, right?
Right?
When I finally looked up, my eyes caught Wonder Woman, still floating through the crowd, still spreading her terror/thrill.
The next moment I found myself next to her, arm extended, hand gripping the card she’d given me. Blinking. Uncontrollably.
Her face spread into a colossal grin.
I lost my nerve.
She saw this and latched onto my arm.
“You’ll be great. Come on, I’ll explain everything backstage.”
“I—”
“I’m Luce, by the way. You are?”
“Uh, Nima. But I—”
“But nothing. Come on!” She looked back at me and beamed, still pulling me forward by the hand.
The reality of what I’d just done suddenly sent my rib cage exploding into a million pieces to slice sharp, jagged wounds into my heart and lungs, which caused blood and air to leak into my stomach, which was defiantly rejecting said blood and air. At the exact same moment, my brain seemed to obsess over the fingers that were linked with my own—strong, confident fingers that didn’t show any sign of letting go. I tried to let Luce’s confidence flow into my own body and push my feet forward.
The “backstage” area Luce dragged me into turned out to be a stairwell behind the stage. Two other people were already there. One of them clearly knew she’d be performing, because she was decked out in some serious platform shoes and a wig so heavy for her tiny frame I thought she’d topple over any second. The other appeared to be more or less in the same boat as me. As far as I could tell, she looked female, and as Luce pulled me into the stairwell, she was wiggling into one of those tuxedo T-shirts. She’d wrapped what looked like a tensor bandage around her bountiful chest. I tried not to look, but obviously failed.
Luce let go of my hand and dug through a duffel bag on the floor. She threw a few clothing items at my feet—a pair of aviator sunglasses, a pleather jacket, and some black pleather pants.
I guessed these were for me.
“Okay, try these on. There’re two other pairs of faux leather pants if you need to try another size.”
Of course there are. I didn’t think I’d actually spoken a full sentence to her yet. I tried now. “I’m . . . not sure . . . I’m ready for . . . this.” Success!
She raised her eyes from the pair of pants she held out in front of her. I think it was the first time she registered how terrified I looked.
Her face softened a bit, and a pitying smile curved her lips. She dropped the pants and came right up to me. I mean, right up to me. Her nose was approximately three inches from mine. Taking both of my hands in hers, she squeezed them firmly and said, “I’ll help you, don’t worry.”
I was still worried. But also flattered by the attention. I won’t say I’d forgotten about my whole goal for being here tonight, but I definitely lost track of it in that moment.
“First, let’s
get you into these clothes. Strip down.”
Sorry?
“Don’t be shy, girl. I’ve seen it all.”
I’ll bet you have. As if I was a robot controlled by voice command, I slowly removed my jeans. I’d made sure to wear decent underpants tonight, at least. Apparently, stripping down to my undies around attractive women was my thing, in addition to the whole vomiting thing, which I sincerely hoped wouldn’t be a thing that happened tonight.
She handed me the faux leather pants, and I struggled to pull them over my legs. “I think these may be a little too tight,” I said.
“Oh no, don’t worry. They’ll get there. And the tighter the better, baby!” Wink.
After some yanking and hopping and sucking gut, we managed to get the pants on and zipped. I’d just slipped my shoes back on when Luce grabbed me by the hips and shuffled me back against the wall. The bass from the music in the bar thumped through to my back.
Luce drew out three tubes of lipstick from her back pocket and inspected each. “Black.” She returned the other tubes to her pocket and uncapped the chosen stick.
“You seem like a full-beard kinda king to me.”
I noticed a flash of silver on her tongue when she spoke.
“And big-ass sideburns, too.”
My eyes must have been golf-ball-size.
She smiled—again, with more pity than humor, I thought. “Hey, just pretend it’s Halloween.” She hooked a finger over the waistline of my pleather pants.
I took a deep breath, unnerved by the charge her touch sent through my body. I had a hard time saying no to this girl. “Okay. Just . . . do whatever you think is best.”
Her smile grew and she immediately flew into action.
As Luce applied a stroke of the black lipstick down my cheek from the base of my sideburns, I felt like a kid at a carnival getting her face painted. But when she held the other side of my face in her hands and moved in so close that her stomach and legs were pressed against me, I definitely did not feel like a kid. I pressed my hands into the wall I was leaning against until my fingertips hurt. The makeup part might be utterly uncomfortable, but this other part was . . . pleasantly unsettling. I tried very hard to keep my body still but had trouble controlling my breath.
In between applications, Luce made a concerted effort to get to know me, which was nice, since I’m sure she was purely doing this as part of some job she had recruiting unsuspecting young gay folks into making fools of themselves onstage for the entertainment of other, more knowing gay folks. We covered the basics—school, jobs, upbringing, etc.—and then—
“You got a girlfriend?” she asked, out of the blue. She fine-tuned some aspect of my eyebrows with her pinkie finger. The other two “amateurs,” I just noticed, had wandered back out to the bar.
This was probably a pretty casual question to ask, but I guess I felt a little sensitive about the whole topic after Winnow and Ginny, because “No” flew from my mouth like I was spitting out something bitter.
She paused and moved her face back a bit. “Sounds like a story there.”
I bit my lip and shrugged.
“All right. Girl’s gotta have her secrets. I respect that.”
She continued working, finishing my eyebrows, then moving back to my cheeks to apply more black makeup to my ever-growing sideburns. The lipstick she used felt thick and gummy on my skin.
“Okay, now for the beard and mustache.” She leaned back, and her eyes darted around my face. “Stay still. Don’t laugh.”
Don’t worry.
She dotted the skin above my top lip. It tickled. I scrunched my nose.
“Don’t move, I said!”
“It’s tingly!”
“Grow some balls, princess!” She laughed at her own joke.
She was annoying and magnetic all at once.
By the time she finished, my armpits were damp and I really needed to scratch my nose. Luce placed her hands on my hips and leaned back again, surveying her work. She made a little head-bobbing motion. “You make a pretty good-looking dude, Nima.”
I shook my head at her. “Yeah, right.”
“No, really—you look good.” And then she kissed me. Like, on the mouth. Just like that. What. The. Hell.
Before I had a chance to fully register the abrupt feel of her mouth on mine, she said, “Come on,” and wiped around her face to make sure none of my makeup ended up on her. “Grab the jacket and sunglasses. Then let’s get you a good-luck drink!”
As Luce hauled me past the table where I’d left Gordon, I noticed with some concern that he was gone. Dear God of everything gay, I really hope he’s behaving himself.
Luce squeezed us between a throng of people at the bar—the place had really filled up while we’d been in the back. She obviously knew the very indifferent-looking bartender, because all she had to do to get his attention was give a short, sharp whistle, which he somehow heard over the pounding music and general din of the place. As Luce ordered us a couple of beers, she wrapped one arm around my waist and squeezed me in tight to her. Something mildly possessive about the gesture bugged me, but in this situation, I mostly just appreciated being looked after.
While we waited for our drinks, someone next to Luce began chatting her up, and not really knowing what to do with myself, I stared down at the steel bar top and tried to look cool and bored. Through the rings of water left by icy glasses and bottles, I could just make out a faint, ill-defined image of myself: a brown blob framed by several black splotches.
Sexy.
“All right, here we go,” Luce said as the bartender slid over two bottles of beer. She grabbed them and flashed another of her shiny smiles my way. “Follow me, sir.” Wink.
As we made our way to a table near the stage, the ever-growing crowd seemed to suck up all the air-conditioning. The jacket weighed heavy and hot on my shoulders, and the pants clung to my skin. We’d done nothing with my hair, so I was walking around with a ponytail and man-face while the aviators sat propped on top of my scalp. I couldn’t imagine I looked as svelte as Winnow’s George Michael or as comfortable as Luce seemed in her own skin. Luce’s whirlwind of energy had swept me up in its gusts, but now I felt myself tumbling back to the earth, and the sharp pains in my chest resumed their assault.
When we got to the table, I touched Luce on the arm. “Um, I’m . . . freaking out.”
She handed me my beer and replied, “Drink some of this.” Then she clinked my bottle with hers and began chugging. Remembering how well this had gone the last time, I hesitated for a moment. But picturing myself up on the stage, in this getup, in front of all these people, I tipped the bottle to my lips and tried to match her pace. I could only take a few sips before the fizz overwhelmed my throat, however.
Pausing after she’d downed about half the bottle, she said, “All right, listen. You get to choose your own song, and you only do a couple minutes of it. It’s basically karaoke but with lip-syncing. All you have to do is move around a bit. Trust me, after you’ve had a couple drinks, you’ll be groovy.” Wink.
Song. Karaoke. Lip-syncing. Moves. I swallowed a few more gulps.
“So? You up for it? Come on . . . you’ll be sooooo sad if you don’t do it.” She put her free hand on my waist and pulled me into her. “Trust me.” Then she kissed me. Again. Her lips were firm and full, like the rest of her.
You’ll be so sad if you don’t do it. You’re sad anyway, Nima. As her lips left mine, my mouth moved and words came out. “It has to be ‘Dancing in the Dark.’ ”
Luce laughed and kissed me hard again. “Attagirl. You got this!”
I didn’t know if I “got” anything, but I guess I was going for it.
While Luce went to tell the DJ my song choice and get us more drinks, I tried to run through the lyrics to “Dancing in the Dark” in my head. It was one of Dad’s favorite songs, and he’d play it all the time while he worked on cars. One of my best memories was of us shout-singing along to it while he tried to teach me how to
change the oil in our car. Mom came out onto the porch to laugh at us and we’d started singing to her, using a wrench and a dipstick as microphones.
If nothing else, at least I’d had a rehearsal.
“Hey, thanks for ditching me.”
I turned to see Gordon standing behind me, leaning against the stage. I noticed he had a beer in his hand too. His eyes were a little glassier than when I’d left him.
“Oh, hey. Yeah, well . . . I’m sure you missed me terribly.” I cocked my head at him.
“Not really,” he scoffed.
“Thanks, a-hole.” But I couldn’t help a half smile at what felt like a moderately nice moment between us.
“So, like, what? You’re supposed to be a dude in this shit?” He pointed at me with his bottle, spilling some of his beer.
“I guess.” I glanced down at my outfit.
He let out a fake-sounding laugh, but his expression held inklings of that other thing I kept seeing—longing or curiosity or both.
“Wanna get in on some amateur drag with me?” I tried another smile.
He stuck his finger down his throat in a fake barfing motion, took a swig of beer, then followed this classiness with, “Hope you don’t choke.”
I rolled my eyes. At least he was consistent. “Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind.”
At about ten thirty, I found myself standing “backstage” with the other two “drag performers” getting ready to “entertain.” All of this seemed to belong in air quotes—my life punctuated with irony and doubt.
When Luce had returned with our drinks, Gordon disappeared again—to “laugh at you from the back,” he’d said—and Luce had given me a few “drag tips” to put me at “ease” while we drank the rum and Cokes she’d brought us.
“Tip number one: choose some people in the audience to make eye contact with once in a while and throw them a wink or a smile or bounce your eyebrows at them, like this.” Her eyebrows bobbed up and down suggestively. “People love that stuff.”