BLOODBATH

by James St. James

  “No, really, guys—it’s going to be fun. Open bar from ten till eleven! PLEASE? Please come …”

  Hoping to sidestep a commitment, I quickly changed the subject.

  “My, that’s some jacket you have there.” The jacket was awful. Goat fur. Or dead dog. And waist length! Simply GENIUS. So IN-YOUR-FACE. Hookers would use this jacket to blow their noses on. And it was a balmy 102 degrees in the ladies’ room. Why hadn’t he checked it with coat check? Or the ASPCA? “Yep, that’s SOME look, there.”

  “You like it?” He petted the matted fur fondly, and then it dawned on me: poor dear—he wasn’t being camp! He must have thought he looked chic … or moneyed! He was parading around like a mangy little monkey because he was proud of this look. This was clearly a boy going nowhere—fast.

  “It was a Christmas present from Keoki. Try it on! Here! Go ahead! Really, it’ll look great on you!”

  Oh My God. Should I?

  I could see Musto’s attention span waning—any minute he might bolt. Three minutes of his time, and an original epigram to take home, was all he gave to any one person. Anything more exhausted him. Michael Alig had already used up his allotted time.

  BUT THAT COAT WAS SUCH A GIGGLE! Even he wanted to try it on.

  I was wearing leopard spandex and six-inch spikes. It would match hysterically. I slipped it on.

  “Heavy Metal Housewife from Yonkers!” Musto announced, and everybody clapped. I vamped a bit, and Michael was in heaven: HIS coat on MY back … with a Musto quote to boot!

  Oh, it was such an ill coat!

  I looked positively perverse—just like Divine, only young and thin and with a pretty face.

  I couldn’t take it off. I struck a few more poses, until—

  … out of the corner of my eye …

  I saw an angry mass of manliness RUSH into the room and,

  —before I knew it—

  I was THROWN against the wall.

  It was Keoki, red-faced and rabid.

  “Take it off! Now! Take it off or I’ll kick the crap out of you!”

  Then he turned to Michael: “How dare you, Michael Alig—let him wear your Christmas present? And James St. James, OF ALL PEOPLE! How could you? Is this how you treat my gift? You just ruined my present!”

  It was a full-blown, “all eyes on me” temper tantrum.

  Musto, whose Warholian fear of confrontation instantly propelled him halfway across the club, left me to deal with this cut-rate Ricky Ricardo.

  “But. I. He—” was all I could sputter.

  Michael was absolutely mortified by this poorly timed and wildly distorted display of Latino bravado. Keoki had clearly ruined his moment—a truly fabulous moment of real social bonding. He had probably been hoping against hope that it would end up in Musto’s column. But that dream was dashed. Musto was gone, I was angry, and it was most likely neither of us would come to his Blue Party! What started off ten minutes ago as one cozy stepup, was now disastrously three steps down the still rigid social ladder.

  I grabbed my lunchbox and tried to pull off a huffy exit: “I guess the It Boy must have been VERY CLOSE to that dog when it was still alive!”

  Oh, that Keoki! Here I was doing Michael a favor by transforming his flea-bitten old rag into a postmodern coat of irony.

  I was more determined than ever to keep my distance from those freaks. Disagreeable troublemakers, that’s what they were. I predicted then that they’d both be gone and forgotten in six months’ time. Those types never lasted.

  Our little war escalated quickly until one night …

  Ah yes. I remember it well …

  The opening night of the Tunnel … and it was going to be FABULOUS! This might single-handedly bring back nightlife as we knew it!

  I still had my old-lady bubble hairdo—and my dear, I spent the entire day in the beauty salon: starting with a wash and mousse, setting it with rollers, under the drier, then back-comb, hairspray, tease, hairspray, curling iron, hairspray—IT TOOK HOURS.

  By the time I was through, it was enormous! Über bubble!

  I was Super Society Woman!

  And my dress!

  It was Gaultier—green and blue satin, with giant Russian lettering, in velvet, across the chest and arms.

  Too chic!

  Remember that season? Fall ’86 I think, and all that Soviet madness? We wore Russian logos and listened to Sigue Sigue Sputnik. Oh, and we all quoted Karl Marx and went to those Yakov Smirnoff concerts (or was that just me?). Anyway, Communist chic was all the rage.

  So, in a word, I was stunning.

  And!

  It was a club opening! A special occasion! Put on your most festive party hat! You couldn’t wait to see the same people you saw every night, IN A WHOLE NEW SETTING!

  It was almost too much fun!!

  But there was a glitch.

  A fly in the ointment.

  Musto and I had agreed to present a Nightlife Award at Area. Michael Alig was doing something called “The Glammies,” in which he would recognize and honor those in the scene for their contributions (GIRL OF THE MOMENT! HOTTEST GOGO BOY! BIGGEST SLUT!).

  We never would have agreed to do this on tonight of all nights, but we had agreed long before we knew of the conflict. Who knew it would fall on the night of the BIGGEST PARTY OF THE YEAR?

  And Dianne was coming with Raquel Welch—they were friends now!—That Dianne was such a meteor!

  At least Michael was putting us on the budget and we were going to get fifty dollars apiece!

  Fifty dollars just to show up at a nightclub!

  What an innovation!

  It worked, because there we were, at Area—AREA! Of all places! Area was already over. Very “last month.” You could smell the decay.

  There I was, pretty as a picture. All gussied up—new heels (patent leather, with little bows on the heel! FABULOUS! SQUEAL!).

  The hairdo of life …

  And the most fabulous dress I have ever owned!

  Sitting with Michael Alig—MICHAEL ALIG!—at Area—AREA!—when the entire civilized world was across town. “If I miss Dianne and Rockie, I’ll just die! Oh and Andy will be there! And Liza!”

  Cut to this dreary wake.

  Oh, it was too much! Fifty dollars or no fifty dollars, let’s get this show on the road! Hup to it!

  Well, Michael had to milk our presence for all it was worth and parade us around to the managers to show what a good crowd he pulled in.

  GOOD CROWD? It was the four of us and a few crickets!

  Finally the awards started—I was wound up so tight—I don’t remember anything about it, except I was in an awful mood.

  My turn. I got on stage. Someone handed me the category.

  “Best DJ.”

  Oh dear.

  “And the nominees are …” and I read a list of the crème de la crème—the most fabulous DJs in the city (NONE OF WHOM WERE THERE)—and Keoki (who WAS SEATED NEXT TO THE STAGE).

  “And the winner is …”

  No. Please. No. Even Michael would not stoop this low!

  “OH MY GOD!” I shrieked, “IT’S THE ‘IT BOY’!”

  Keoki, who couldn’t mix two songs to save his life; Keoki, who nobody knew, who was three months on the scene—Keoki won against the tops, the most talented, the A-listers.

  Wouldn’t you know?

  “Where’s the It Boy? Somebody get the goddamn It Boy, so we can get our money and get the hell out of here and go to the Tunnel, PLEASE!”

  And I began to stomp off stage.

  Well, I went too far. From my grand old age now, and the wisdom I’ve accumulated, yes, even I concede—I went too far.

  I was rude and I ruined Michael’s party and embarrassed him in front of the managers he was trying so hard to impress.

  But don’t cry for Michael and Keoki.

  Listen to what happened next, and I think you’ll agree that, well, I got my comeuppance (and then some!), and the punishment far exceeded the crime.

  Ke
oki and two of his goons bum’s-rushed the stage, picked me up, and threw me—THREW ME!—

  Like I was an old tissue!

  Like I wasn’t a delicate porcelain doll!

  They threw me into the fountain.

  And everybody laughed.

  They laughed at me.

  Me!

  The celebutante!

  And when I sputtered and crawled out of the water—

  My four-hour hairdo was … was … a mop! A bunch of henna’ed noodles!

  And my panty hose were bagging around my ankles!

  And my pretty new dress was ruined.

  I looked like … a soggy old sea hag!

  It was the worst night of my life!

  I’m getting all choked up again, just telling you about it.

  I went to the opening of the Tunnel, anyway, and everybody was very sweet when I cornered them and vented and sobbed and generally called so much attention to myself that I was actually pretty fabulous.

  But, oh!, that Keoki!

  I was so mad at him!

  I was so mad, I … broke down and got him a drink and we had a really long, complicated conversation about … my lip gloss.

  And thus, in my darkest hour, out of cruelty came kindness. We bonded that night and became friends—through thick and thin—and that friendship has endured ten tumultuous years.

  Sure, I was still in love with him, but now we were friends as well.

  And it was because I spent so much time with Keoki that a thaw in my attitude toward Michael was inevitable.

  But let’s peel the onion here. Psychologically, I think I chose to fall in love with Keoki as an excuse. That way I could set up my friendship with Michael, and still think of him as an adversary.

  I didn’t have to admit to myself that I might really like him.

  I was free to resent him.

  So I floated into their lives and it felt right and comfortable.

  The old crowd was appalled with me: “There goes Troll St. Troll! Looks like he found a new bandwagon to hop on to!” “Like a barnacle in heat, that one!”

  After all the ranting and raving about my dislike for Michael—and my contempt for his silly little parties—I guess I did look hypocritical.

  But there I was: in a little fake fur number, doing the ropes at the Tunnel basement. A “club kid,” of all things!

  That’s all six months down the road, though.

  In the meantime, Michael’s star was on the rise. Warhol died and suddenly, “going Downtown” lost its cachet. The thrill-seekers moved on. Downtown turned into a frail and weak shadow of its former self. It maybe could have limped along bravely for another couple of years. Or maybe not. At any rate, that’s when Musto, who was perhaps having yet another bad hair day and feeling peevish, effectively killed the scene with his February 1987 Village Voice cover story: “The Death of Downtown.”

  Instantly the fun was over.

  My celebutante days were gone. Anybody connected with the old scene was considered outdated.

  Enter, the club kids.

  Now, damnit, let me say this about that: I do not want to chronicle the history of the club kid movement. I have neither the desire nor the wherewithal to accomplish that. I leave it to the professionals.

  Rather, I want to paint you a watercolor of my relationship with Michael—a sweeping impressionistic view of the dynamics of our relationship, and how a little thing like murder could forever alter the balance of power.

  I really don’t think people actually care about the nuts and bolts of nightclubbing politics, or the ever-changing cast of club kids.

  Nobody really wants to hear the incredible true life stories of Jenny Go-Getter and Really Denise.

  And I am NOT going to spend hours and pages describing in mind-numbing detail each wacky new look.

  Suffice it to say: there was a group of people called the Club Kids that Michael created in his own image, and they all had funny names that he usually chose for them like—oh—“Oliver Twisted” and “Julius Teazer”…

  And they—you know—oh, I don’t know—shoved strawberries up their nose and ran around swinging an alarm clock above their head—and called it “a look.”

  Yes, the looks were pretty lame in the beginning—just cheap homemade costumes. I used to feel like my mother on Halloween: “And what do we have here? A scary monster, a cowboy, and a pretty fairy princess! Here’s a hit of ecstasy, run along now.”

  Their sense of style got better as the years went on, but you could always spot a club kid in the wild if there was something glued to his or her face: sequins? feathers? lug-nuts? a Virginia ham? Yup. That’s a club kid.

  I’m not kidding.

  They usually had a shelf life of six months; then they’d move back to Iowa, and become Queen of their little scenes there and forever look back on those six months as “the craziest time of my life.”

  So there.

  That’s it. The History of the Club Kids.

  Enough said.

  Allow me to continue with Michael’s surprising rise up the ranks.

  Now we all know that nature abhors a vacuum, so when the clubs were empty, Michael rushed in to fill the void.

  And his parties were … OK … actually fun. Even “Blue.”

  I was loathe to admit it, but he had a certain energy that was undeniable.

  And when, after the opening night, the Tunnel failed to draw a crowd, its creative director, Rudolf, threw his hands in the air. He had tried his damnedest to book A-list parties (Mamie Van Doren! Cornelia Guest!), but nobody wanted to go to big flashy nightclubs anymore.

  It was all about the intimate. The private. It was all about a club called Nell’s, where you sat on an overstuffed sofa with a bottle of claret and discussed your prostate.

  Michael had been pestering Rudolf forever to let him do something at the Tunnel, and it was sort of: “What the hell, let’s give it a whirl.”

  They had nothing to lose.

  “OK Michael, you can have the basement for your little friends, and you can have the run of it. It’s all yours.”

  And Rudolf gave him a blank check. Free reign. Go crazy! Knock yourself out!

  Rudolf had a typically Teutonic sense of humor. It was a nihilistic, neo-expressionist, German-type of thing. He saw humor in … you know, things like vivisection and gum disease. The sicker and sadder things got, the more inspired Rudolf became. He was perverse and decadent in a legendary sort of way. And he had a very laissez-faire attitude toward, oh, rules and morals and things. “If it feels good, do it.”

  Truly, Michael had found a mentor worthy of his mettle.

  If Michael wanted a crazy old homeless man to do the door, Rudolf would smile and say he had his checkbook ready.

  When Michael wanted to auction off, say, circus midgets or streetwalkers—well, that sounded like fun to Rudolf!

  “Let’s serve cat food as hors d’ouevres.”

  “Have at it!”

  Nothing was too shocking.

  The Tunnel basement operated on the Chaos Theory. Insanity prevailed. There were peanut races, three-legged drag queen races, and many, many toasts made with the ever-present ecstasy punch. And the drug dealers who supplied the ecstasy were instantly acknowledged as “superstars,” and became much coveted guests at all the best parties.

  Michael hired all the local loons.

  There was Ffloyd, the Human Money Tree: the music would suddenly stop and Ffloyd would run through the room, naked, with a hundred one-dollar bills taped to his body. He ran in one door and out the other. A free-for-all ensued and whatever you grabbed was yours to keep.

  That idea proved so popular, it morphed into the $1,000 Drop. Michael would stand on a table and toss a thousand dollar bills to an often violent mob. Of course, he usually pocketed $990 and passed the remaining ten on to tip-challenged friends. But two hundred blue-faced freaks still screamed and cried and clawed and climbed to get to Michael; why, you would have thought the New Kids on the Block w
ere masturbating on stage, the way everybody carried on.

  And above it all, Michael stood and drank in the attention, smiling like the cat that ate the canary.

  I remember once, Michael had a pool party and bought lots of little kiddie pools and filled them up with water, and after the ecstasy kicked in, everybody got naked.

  And Michael—buoyed by all the attention, and so carried away by his own spunk—broke the main water pipes and flooded the basement until it really was like a pool: a giant, filthy, germ-ridden cesspool filled with hundreds of naked drug addicts.

  Now if THAT isn’t fun—I don’t know what is!

  I think Michael was given a stern reprimand for that one. He promised never to do it again. He didn’t have to, because next week Lady Hennessey Brown promised to set her pussy on fire and lactate on the audience.

  There was always something bigger and better on the horizon.

  There was the “Celebrity Club,” a weekly event hosted by three newcomers that Michael had imported from Atlanta: Larry Tee, Lahoma, and a shy, retiring wallflower named RuPaul. They were trashy and flashy and dressed in the most amazing vintage ’70s outfits—when that was still a radical concept.

  Each week a different “Nightclubbing Legend” (read: Old School) was named Celebrity of the Week.

  It was Michael’s way of getting the old guard to come to his parties, albeit one at a time.

  By honoring someone like Michael Musto, he was showing the old guard who had previously snubbed him, how fabulous he was doing without them. I think he secretly hoped they would start crying and apologize and become club kid converts on the spot.

  That never happened as far as I know.

  Instead he usually ended up gushing over them for an hour or so, fawning over them to an impossible degree—and then savagely humiliating them near the end of the night.

  He might pull off your wig, or pinch you really hard—leaving bloody welts—or he might destroy your outfit, or pee on your leg, or get on the microphone and tell the crowd you had AIDS.

  Needless to say, very few “celebrities” returned for an encore.

  The summer of ’87 galloped by, and I’ll be damned if an authentic subculture hadn’t taken root and blossomed in the Tunnel basement. That was when Michael’s star really began to rise, and his creations, the club kids, took to the stage for their first appearance.