by John Maley
That night he and Rodney had dinner together. Rodney always insisted they ate together at the table if they were both at home. After dinner they opened a bottle of red wine. Matt gave Rodney the card with the four Diana stamps inside. Rodney swallowed nervously as he opened the card. He looked down at the card and gave a small, sweet sigh.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Matt. Rodney smiled. Matt looked at Rodney’s big blue eyes blinking back tears through a thick blond fringe and could’ve sworn it wasn’t Rodney who sat opposite him at all, but the sweet and radiant Diana herself.
Judy
One rainy Saturday afternoon a bunch of queens were having coffee in a booth in Delilah’s. As Joanie scuttled back and forth with various cappuccinos, espressos, doughnuts and fairy cakes, he found himself being drawn into their conversation. There were four queens: a gargantuan peroxide blond clutching a handbag, two bearded ladies with lumberjack shirts who were obviously a couple, and a wee skinny guy with thick-lens specs.
‘Why do queers love Judy Garland? I mean whit is it about Judy?’
The big blond bowed his head in thought.
‘It’s her joie de vivre. Her fuckin’ joie de vivre.’
The lumberjacks nodded politely.
‘It’s the whole torch song thing. All that tragedy and defiance in her voice.’
The specky guy scratched his chin.
‘For so many guys Judy was that significant other. Let’s face it. She was the one who knew. And a million star-struck queens knew.’
‘Knew whit?’
The blond peered over his coffee cup.
‘That if we could just get over that fuckin’ rainbow, skies really could be blue. Dreams really could come true.’
One of the lumberjacks ‘hmm mmed’ in agreement.
‘I used to go out with this bloke in his forties who used to style himself on Judy. He’d put on giant false eyelashes and sing Over The Rainbow to me.’
His boyfriend pursed his lips in disapproval. The blond rambled away as he rummaged in his handbag.
‘She wis camp as fuck. All that torch song diva stuff. Wee Judy givin’ it big licks and breakin’ everybody’s heart intae the bargain. Did you ever see that auld TV special she did wi’ Sammy Davis Junior and Dean Martin? The Man That Got Away!’
Joanie butted in as he collected the coffee cups and emptied the ashtray.
‘Judy had style. Pure style. But it wisnae put-on style. She had sincerity.’
He went back to the bar to get another fairy cake and make more cappuccinos. He had a habit of butting into customers’ conversations, private or not.
The specky guy lit a cigarette and took a deep drag.
‘Judy.’
He let the word drift like smoke. There was a pensive pause.
‘Judy. She sang her sweet little socks off. She rolled with the punches. She loved and lost. But it was in Judy’s voice that she spoke tae us fairies. The cadences. The cadences of her voice. The expressiveness.’
The blond eyed his big pan in a compact mirror.
‘I first saw The Wizard of Oz when I wis seven. My mammy had a pair of hideous red high heels. I put them on and clicked the heels. My da belted me wan.’
A lumberjack bubbled with enthusiasm now.
‘She wis so talented. I mean she came from that time in Hollywood when you had to be able to do everything. Sing, dance, act, the bloody lot. And she could.’
‘Showbiz personified.’
‘Judy was showbiz. Absolutely.’
‘Even at her pilled-up, boozed-up, fucked-up worst, she was the best.’
Joanie arrived with cappuccinos and fairy cake.
‘Her real name was Frances Gumm. Fanny Gumm. Disnae have the same ring does it?’
Joanie returned to his duties.
The bespectacled intellectual removed his glasses and began cleaning them methodically.
‘The Man That Got Away. Somewhere Over The Rainbow. Songs of longing and loss. Songs about being on the outside looking in. What was that one she sang to a photograph of Clark Gable – or was it Cary Grant ..? They’re writing songs of love, but not for me. Get it? Longing and loss. Exclusion and otherness. Judy – Judy stands at that border crossing between acceptance and rejection, exclusion and inclusion – because after all guys, we’re all clicking our ruby slippers and trying to get there.’
The blond Goliath licked his lips after demolishing another fairy cake.
‘Where? Get where?’
One of the lumberjacks wrung his hands, exasperated.
‘Over the rainbow, of course!’
‘It’s the emotion. We don’t get to express emotion. And here’s this torch singer bursting with emotion.’
The lumberjacks held hands.
‘All those grand emotions. Which is why, of course, queens adore opera.’
The blond grimaced as he picked fairy cake from a cavity.
‘I hate opera.’
Joanie wiped the table in the next booth.
‘Then of course there’s Liza.’
The group eyed each other suspiciously.
The thoughtful thick-lens took up the gauntlet thrown down by Joanie.
‘A chip off the old block. No doubt about it.’
There was a snort of indignation from the blond bombshell.
‘That freeloader.’
The lumberjacks sprang to Liza’s defence.
‘Didn’t you see Cabaret, petal?’
‘You don’t win a fuckin’ Oscar for nothin’.’
‘So she just inherited aw this talent?’
‘Watch the movie!’
‘Longing and loss. That wistful, plaintive, poignant gaze over the rainbow. Maybe this time, I’ll be lucky. Deny it at your peril.’
‘Lisa Minnelli!’
‘Liza!’
‘Liza or Lisa, the lassie’s no fit tae lick Judy’s ruby slippers.’
The egghead blinked behind his thick-lens specs and smiled wryly.
‘Liza. High-kicking, lung-bursting, show-stopping, fag-hagging Liza. To deny Liza is to deny thyself!’
The lumberjacks gathered their shopping bags, nodding now and then as the egghead meditated on the magic of Minnelli, the glory of Garland.
‘Maybe this time, they’ll write a song of love for us. Maybe this time, that man won’t get away. Maybe, if we could just get over that rainbow. Liza and Judy. Judy and Liza. One note from Judy, one kick from Liza, and closet doors all over the world burst wide open. That scene in Cabaret, Liza and Michael, Duchess of York. She knows the score. Liza knows he’s queer. A chip off the old block. That fabulous scene, she’s had an abortion, and her beautiful big Betty Boop eyes are blinking back tears. No, my darling, the torch was passed from Judy to Liza and burnt brighter than ever.’
Seeing the lumberjacks fidgeting, Joanie arrived with the bill. As the group divvied it up, Joanie threw in another gauntlet.
‘I tell you what, guys, that Bette Midler, the best in the fuckin’ business.’
The blond rolled his big blue eyes.
‘Oh don’t you start, Joanie doll. We’ll be here aw fuckin’ day!’
Catwoman
Morag stood at the edge of the crowd in the backroom at Delilah’s and watched Carol stride the stage, belting out Three Times A Lady. There was a lump in Morag’s throat. Maybe it was a hysterical Adam’s apple. Carol had always said Morag was the butch one. She felt a pain in her sinuses as tears threatened to spill from her eyes. She stifled a sob and took a deep breath. It was over between her and Carol.
Carol was Catwoman. She loved cats with a passion. She owned two – a black cat called Naomi and a tabby called Cindy. Her whole flat was covered in catty things. Cat tea towels, cat dishes, cat tablemats, cat pictures, cat ornaments, cat rugs. It was Cat City. Morag hated cats.
The cat sat on the mat. Morag recalled a mad primary schoolteacher who had, on her first day at school, made her chant all day, ‘The cat sat on the mat’. Even then she had hated cats. She didn’t come fro
m a family of animal-lovers (or people-lovers for that matter). Dogs she could understand. Dogs knew their names. They answered to them. They brought you the newspaper, your slippers. They were loyal. They were useful. They were guardians. But cats just sat around all day licking their arses. And what was all this about trays of cat pee and shit lying around in people’s houses? Dogs at least crapped outside and pissed against lampposts. What was so cute and cuddly about a box of piss and shit? But Carol would truck no criticism of cats.
‘Dogs bite people,’ she informed Morag.
‘Cats sit on babies’ faces.’
Carol said that was an old wives’ tale. Morag found that phrase sexist but there was just no reasoning with Carol. Women’s rights, queer rights, they meant nothing compared to animal rights. In the end it was Carol’s love of the feline species that drove them apart.
The first major row between Morag and Carol was when Morag caught Naomi licking her dinner plate. They had just enjoyed a romantic candlelit dinner, and Morag had torn herself away from the table to answer a call of nature. As she sat on the lavvy pan she thought of how perfect the evening had been. The gorgeous idea came to her that the night was not over yet. Her heart raced. But she would never forget that moment when she turned left off the hall and back into the kitchen. Naomi, the devilish black cat, was up on the table and licking her plate with a frightening nonchalance. Morag summoned a scream but could only gasp in horror. Worse still, she looked at Carol, but there was an expression of smug pride on her face. Morag lunged forward and pushed Naomi off the table. Carol exploded.
‘Don’t you dare hit that cat! Don’t you dare!’
She got up off her chair and gathered Naomi up in her arms, kissing and petting her.
‘She’s only an animal. Anyway, you’d finished your dinner.’
Morag was embarrassed and confused.
‘I just don’t think animals should eat off people’s plates.’
‘But that means she likes you.’
Carol looked at Morag like an irate adult trying to explain some basic truth of life to a naughty four-year-old. Naomi, that stinking black ball of fur, miaowed pathetically.
‘She forgives you.’
Carol peppered Naomi with kisses.
That night Morag and Carol made love for the first time. Carol was so beautiful and tender in bed, everything seemed to fit. There was a congruence, Morag decided. Physically, at any rate, they seemed to be right together. But there was a nagging doubt at the back of her mind. The incident with the cat had been petty and sickening. So Carol had two cats. That was something she’d just have to get used to.
The next morning Cindy and Naomi lay on the bed with them. Naomi rested on Morag’s feet like a bag of potatoes. The lazy bastard was obviously trying to break her ankles. Cindy crawled over Carol, licking and nuzzling her. Morag couldn’t disguise the contempt she felt for the cats. Carol eyed her suspiciously. Cindy buried her ugly, pointed face in Carol’s hair and Carol purred with satisfaction.
It was then that Morag’s fantasies of felinicide began. She would put rat poison in their cat food and stand back like Bette Davis in The Little Foxes whilst the cats staggered around the kitchen, gasping and choking. She would train a dog, a pit bull terrier, to rip them to pieces. She would grab them by the tails and bash their brainless little heads off the wall. Despite the enormous satisfaction Morag derived from these sick fantasies, she always felt guilty for indulging in them. After all, they were only animals. The root of the problem was Carol, who had projected all these feelings, emotions, personality traits, onto two dumb animals whose only purpose in life seemed to be to eat, shit, scratch, piss, purr and miaow. But Carol could tell their every emotion and thought, for crying out loud, by a wag of a tail, a certain pitch of miaow, a lick, a yawn and a stretch. Her interpretations of their every noise and movement were increasingly inventive, not to say bizarre. When Cindy licked Morag’s hand with her rough, repulsive, tongue, did that really mean it was time for bed? When Naomi dug her claws into Morag’s velvet skirt and pulled, did that really mean ‘welcome back Morag, have you had a nice day?’
Things got so bad Morag diagnosed Johnny Morrisitis. It was straight out of Animal Magic. Chris was a delirious dyke version of Dr Doolittle – she had long meandering conversations with two sleepy, indifferent moggies.
‘Cats have no personality.’
‘Yes they do, Morag. Every one is different. Each cat is as unique as a human fingerprint.’
‘You feed them. Of course they’ll stare at you and follow you around.’
‘I bonded with those cats immediately.’
‘Maybe they were hungry.’
Persuasion was useless. Carol was simply a Cat Person. They could do no wrong. Morag had watched aghast as Carol lovingly wiped up cat vomit from the kitchen floor or smiled shyly as she slowly (too fucking slowly) cleaned out the litter tray.
Naomi and Cindy were housecats. Housecats, mused Morag, were cats who were too lazy to drag their hairy over-fed hindquarters outside to crap or pee.
‘Cats are of low intelligence.’
‘They’re as smart as you or I.’
Carol would always translate for Naomi or Cindy. She wants you to stroke her. She wants you to turn the TV over. She’s seen a ghost (because cats are psychic). The only thing ‘she’ really wanted, felt Morag, was a swift kick up the little pink bumhole.
Everything else in the relationship seemed to be fine. Coaxed for a moment away from cat-speak, Carol could actually hold a conversation. Out on dates they had some great times together. Fun times. But even then, now and again, Carol would glance anxiously at her watch or chew her bottom lip, worried about how her precious cats were coping without her.
Morag knew that sooner or later the cats would come between them. That moment came all too soon. Morag had drunk nearly a whole bottle of wine one night and decided to phone for a Chinese carryout. In a weird repetition of their first meal together, Morag had abandoned her sweet and sour chicken for a powder room stop. On her return, she discovered both Naomi and Cindy up to their whiskers in the Chinese cuisine. In a drunken fury Morag metamorphosed into Bruce Lee and a flying kick with her right foot sent Naomi, Cindy and the sweet and sour chicken, boiled rice and prawn crackers, cascading around the room. The food landed on the walls and mantelpiece of Carol’s lounge. The startled cats ran round the room three times before landing with a yowl in Carol’s lap. A deathly silence ensued, a silence Carol finally broke.
‘Morag, I think we need to talk.’
They talked.
Carol did most of the talking. She didn’t like the way Morag treated Naomi and Cindy. If she had any respect for her at all, she had to accept that those cats were the most important thing in her life. They loved her, unconditionally. They were the most affectionate and giving creatures. They had always been there for her. They picked up her moods better than any woman ever had or will. They were Naomi and Cindy. Her beautiful cats. She could not tolerate them being abused or assaulted before her very eyes. Morag had to consider her position very carefully now. Either she, too, had to pledge her heart to Naomi and Cindy or Carol would have to ask her to go.
All this was delivered in a patronising monotone. Morag didn’t know whether to laugh, cry or throw up. Her position was untenable.
‘I think I’d better go.’
Back in her own flat Morag threw herself onto the bed and watched the room dissolve in tears. Perhaps she had been unnecessarily mean and cruel to the pussies. Perhaps she had been jealous of the easy, natural affection between Carol, Naomi and Cindy. Surely Carol was right, you had to respect the things dear to your lover. And those cats were so precious to Carol. Had Morag foolishly let her aversion to cats spoil a special, loving relationship? Gradually her thoughts hardened, crystallised. Those cats had been allowed to stink out Carol’s flat, puke and slobber over everything, scratch the wallpaper, tear the curtains and scavenge off her plate. Carol had spoken more to those cats than she e
ver had to Morag – she had shown them more affection, attention and respect. Morag steeled herself against regret. She had a strong urge to go over to Carol’s and throw herself at her mercy. But there was only one pussy she had enjoyed stroking in that flat, and it was not called Naomi or Cindy. It was a package deal: love me, love my pets. It was over.
Now, as Morag stood in Delilah’s two months later and watched Carol sing the Commodores hit, she could begin to put things in perspective. Just as Carol had projected various thoughts and feelings onto those cretinous cats, so she had projected emotions onto Carol that Carol herself did not own. In retrospect, Morag could see that Carol didn’t really love her at all. She loved simply herself, and those insufferable moggies. Carol had curled up in her lap for warmth, nothing more. Morag felt a tear trickle down her cheek as the crowd in Delilah’s applauded Carol’s vocal performance. Morag wished that she had never met her. She wished death-by-fur ball on those stupid, stinky cats. As she pushed her way through the bar, a young karaoke queen started bawling out ‘What’s New Pussycat?’ Morag fled into a taxi.
That night Morag dreamt Naomi and Cindy had crapped on her bedroom floor and Carol was holding her by the hair and forcing her face down onto the cat-poo. Rubbing her nose in it.
Straight-acting, Self-hating
Pat hated Delilah’s. He hated anything connected to homosexuality. He knew he wasn’t like them, the sad fucks who lisped and leapt around Delilah’s like fairies on speed. As for dykes – there was no such thing, only ugly birds who couldn’t get a man. He wasn’t quite sure how he had come to be counted amongst their number. Some monstrous accident of fate had marked him like Cain with a murderous desire to lie with his own sex. But he had fought it, oh, how he had fought it. He had stood in the changing room at his gym club and fought it, his terror acting like deadly gravity on his semi hard-on. He had fought for breath like a drowning man. He had dated and courted women, and claimed to love them and lain between their thighs and done his duty, though he longed so intensely for a man he thought his balls would burst. Still he fought.