Drag Queen in the Court of Death (7 page)

(excerpts)
October 4, 1964
....When I started having Evil Money dreams, I finally drew

up a budget like Dad made me do when I got into grade 9 and he raised my allowance. I hate to admit it, but it works! It's still depressing. And I'm so fucking sick of Kraft Dinner!

On the bright side, Dunn-Barton is going to help me with French. Monica says his first name is Michael. She heard him and his wife talking in the parking lot the other day. How can he have a wife? If he's not a fucking homo, neither am I! I swear I can feel him looking at me. He wants me. I know it! He blushes sometimes when I look at him, like I've caught him masturbating or something. I wish. God he's sexy!

Which is more than I can say for this new guy who arrived today. He's all apple-cheeked and round-eyed behind his glasses. He wears a suit and tie like a junior exec or something and he has bad asthma. Five minutes after sitting down in math class he started wheezing and gasping and had to leave. When I went outside to see how he was, he was smoking a joint out in the alley behind the garages. Some scam! At first I felt like a fool for feeling sorry for him, but he said grass helps asthma. Oh yeah! And at least he shared. As we smoked, he told me his family isn't rich. Both his parents are working so he can come here. He's had to miss so much school because of his breathing problems, so he's trying to catch up fast because his parents want him to go to college. Funny how we all try so hard to please our parents. But what do
we
want to do? How often does any parent ask?

Sometimes I think about what I miss most about the old place I used to call home. I guess, maybe, I miss Deb. I was surprised how good it was talking to her the other day when I called. And walking home with Harry, going the long way so we can score cigarettes and sodas from his uncle's variety store, then opening my front door to the smells of Mom's honey cake, curling around me like a big hug. I wonder if D-B likes honey cake? If he even knows what it is? I wonder how big he is under those expensive trousers. Yeah, sure. Like I'll ever get the chance to find out.

November 14, 1964...
...Everything is copasetic! I'm in love! I'm mad about M.A.D. And it's taken two months, one week, and two days

for me to know—I mean KNOW—he's mad for me too! Yesterday was Tuesday, and Dunn-Barton gave me a lift home with my science project. He's done this before a few times in bad weather and once when I had a lot of new text books to haul back, but this time he helped carry the stuff up to the third floor. Thank God I'd cleaned up my room on the weekend!

We put the project back together on my desk and then he sat on the bed to talk. I sat down beside him and the next thing I know I just feel us getting closer and closer. The air between us was charged like sparks jumping back and forth between two batteries! Suddenly I couldn't stop myself. I leaned over and kissed him, right on the mouth. And he kissed me back! I heard him moan, a small sound that slipped out of him without him even knowing and I just threw my arms around him and pulled him down on the bed. He was all over me. But when I tried to pull at his pants, he pushed me away and jumped off the bed like a scalded cat. He stuttered and stammered, his face red and his gorgeous eyes full of panic. He was afraid. Of me, of himself, of all the emotion swimming around in my small psychedelic room, pushing down on us from the slanted ceiling. Maybe he thinks I'll turn him in or something. I'd rather tear my skin off with red hot pincers, like that old saint in the book of martyrs Mary Margaret McGee showed me once in grade school. I tried to tell him how I feel about him, how I'd never want to hurt him, how I'd wait if he needed to think or whatever. I don't even know what all I said, but he kept backing away, gesturing in the air with his hands as if trying to keep me away.

I burst into tears. I couldn't help it. And that was the best thing I could have done, 'cause he took me in his arms and rocked back and forth in the middle of the room, him crooning over me like I was a wounded pigeon or something. And I hung on tight and breathed in the solid smell of him, memorizing the strength in his arms and the comforting sexy feel of him against me. But then he pulled away and practically ran out the door and down to his car.

I know he'll be back. He has to come back. If he doesn't, I'll just kill myself!
November 19, 1964
...I hate weekends now! I can't see Michael, can't look at him in class or catch a glimpse of him in the halls or watch him talking to someone in the parking lot. This is awful. For the first time since coming here I feel really alone. Scared he'll never come around. It's been hard before, sure, fucking damn hard, but not like this. Before, I felt like all I had to do was hang on and follow The Plan and it would be okay in the end. Now, I don't know anymore. I feel like I'm losing my way, alone in this foreign city where no one really knows who I am. Or gives a flying fuck.
All week Michael ignored me. He was very formal, not joking around in class or anything, like usual. Everyone noticed. Monica is asking questions. Then on Thursday, when we had our French tutoring session scheduled, I thought he was going to cancel out, but he didn't. He sat there across his big teacher desk and drilled me on verbs and tenses and vocabulary. He read out passages from
Maria Chapdelaine
and asked me questions. He made me go through one of those dopey oral question and answer conversation things that are so dumb. Like anyone really talks like that. Exactly an hour later, he gathered up his books and said he had to go.
By this time, there was no one left but the janitor. We don't have any sports or after-class activities and everyone gets the hell out of here as fast as they can. Why hang around this dump? I jumped up and followed him and grabbed for his arm just inside the door. He spun around and glared at me. It was scary.
"Don't touch me," he said, so quiet and intense the words just went right through me. "This can't happen. It's illegal."
"But—"
"I'm your teacher. I'm married. Get someone your own age."
He turned away and I jumped in front of him, desperate to stop him from walking away. "How old are you?" I said, like that mattered.
"Twenty-two, but that's hardly the point."
Twenty-two. "Only five years difference," I said. "That's nothing."
"Ronnie, you're not listening. I'm married. End of story. This conversation is over." And he walked down the hall, nearly ran down the stairs and out to his car.
I went into Lard Ass's room and looked out the window and watched him. He sat in his car for a long time, his forehead on the steering wheel. Then he burned rubber out of there with a squeal of tires and I was all alone.
God, how I hate the weekends! It was so bad I dropped down to Freemont's and smoked some weed while we watched
Gunsmoke
. It helped a little. I told Tucker all about Michael. He only grunted a few times and said "Whatever turns you on, man." Big help he is. But at least he always has a good supply of grass and sometimes mushrooms too. And he doesn't care enough to try to hurt me and Michael ... if there ever is a me and Michael....
...
November 21, 1964
...I had the nightmare again. This time I woke myself up by falling out of bed, and for a minute I didn't know where the fuck I was. It was hard to breathe. I was naked on all fours panting like a dog with my head hanging down. I couldn't move. Couldn't get away from the pain. I was so scared I was shaking all over. Uncle Bunny talked about deep breathing exercises after it happened, but I was too mad and grossed out to make it work. But last night I really tried and it helped. It really did. Then I put on my sneakers and went out and began to run though the dark warm streets and it felt great. It didn't smell like a big city or Main Street USA. I could feel the air on my scalp and the blood pumping though my whole body and it didn't matter that there was no one there running beside me. Maybe I'll start running every night, get a schedule or something. It might help me sleep.
Or maybe Uncle Bunny will appear at my door and then I can show him how fast I can really run! Oh sure. Like Dad says: You always have to pay the piper.
Michael could make the bad dreams go away. Oh please! Let Michael give me good warm dreams to fill up my head so there's no room for these fucking terrors! I'm so sick of this! I just want what everyone else wants, right? A little love? Someone to care? What the fuck's wrong with that?
...
November 29, 1964
...Monica found me. I hadn't been in school in days. I thought I had a bad cold, but it just got worse and worse and I was so tired I couldn't be bothered going downstairs to the kitchen to get anything to eat. I slept and went in and out of weird dreams. I hurt all over, and the coughing made it hard to breathe. Then one day there was Monica, forcing me to get dressed and into her car, and she took me to the doctor. Her doctor. She told him I was her cousin visiting from the US. He said I had pneumonia and gave me antibiotics. Then Monica brought me home and changed my bed and made me soup. Well, it was from a can but it tasted okay.
Next time I woke up it was getting dark outside and the rain sliced at the window and gleamed on the fire escape outside, making it look shiny and new. I think it was the next day, but I don't know. Someone was sitting on my bed, holding my hand. I thought I was hallucinating again, but it was Michael. For real.
"Don't die," he said.
"Stay," I said. "I won't die if you stay."
It sounds real corny writing it down, but not at the time.
Every day after school he comes over with homework and goes over the lessons with me. Of course, this doesn't really change anything. He's still married, still my teacher.
I never knew loving somebody could be this hard. It's like standing at the edge of the Grand Canyon, with the wind tearing at you all the time, and the deep darkness calling to you, wanting you to make one false step. Just one. And I could ruin his life. And maybe mine. But I want him so bad! Love makes you selfish, I guess. I don't care about his wife. About anyone. Just us. To see the light in his eyes when he looks at me. They seem to get larger and deeper as I look into them. But I don't want to be selfish. I want to be adult and mature—but then yesterday everything changed, just like that.
I was up and feeling much better, trying to fix up some bead curtains I picked up a while ago real cheap at some store on Queen Street. I had the Rolling Stones on loud on the stereo ("Can't get No Satisfaction"—yeah, I can relate to that!) so I didn't hear the knock on the door. When Michael came in, I was startled and I just fell into his arms. Literally. We stood like that for a long time, his arms around me, my head in his warm neck, the Stones pulsing all around us. I licked his sweet, salty skin and he laughed and we fell on the bed and....
I feel funny writing about it. It's so private, so different from anything I've ever experienced before. He's so tentative, gentle, and passionate, all at the same time. I don't think he's ever been with a guy before. Someday I'll ask him, but not now. Everything is too fragile now. God, don't let me ever hurt him! He's going to try to spend Saturday afternoon with me. So for now, life is good. After all I've done, do I dare to hope?
...
December 3, 1964
...I can't believe it! He's going to do it! He's leaving his wife after Christmas, and he's getting his own place. We can be together in 1965, but he won't let me move in till I graduate in June. If he can risk so much for me, I can wait! I can do anything now!
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I had been back in Toronto since August, 1989, and for ten months I had managed to avoid speaking more than a few strained words to my sister. So it was not surprising that I was struck almost speechless to hear her voice when the answering machine clicked in, so startled that I actually picked up the phone and said hello. Trish chatted on, apparently unaware that there was anything at all bizarre about the one-sided conversation. When she ran out of breath, there was dead air on the wire.

"Well, Trish," I said. "Nice of you to keep in touch like this."
"We're out of town a lot," she said. "We have the country house now, you know."
"A cottage isn't good enough for you?"
More dead air.
"Michael, I need to borrow Dad's presentation tray," she said.
So that was the reason for the call. "Why?"
"We're hosting the garden party for the Dharman Foundation this year, and—"
"But, Trish, you're rolling in silver trays!"
"I want that one."
"Ah. You want the name. The engraving. The 'presented by, in appreciation of' sort of thing." This was greeted by more dead air. I was enjoying myself. "Okay, so you want me to bring the tray early? Details, please. Day? Time?"
"Michael, it's not a party. It's business." Her voice was getting tight.
"Oh, so you don't want me, just the tray."
"This is
business
, Michael! The last thing we want is a stand-in for that monster who murdered some guy and kept his body in a box for thirty years!"
"I'm surprised you could bring yourself to even call me. How much did you have to drink to work up the courage?"
"Look, I'm not the one who disgraced the family, who was almost arrested and thrown in jail for ten years for buggering a minor."
"No, that was me. The one you want a favor from. Have I got that right?" I could hear her breathing hard on the other end.
"You know as well as I do that tray should have been mine. Dad promised me!"
"The tray, the sword, and the painting are the only things I got from the estate, Trish. You got almost everything. That isn't enough?"
"You got Granny's silver."
"Christ. That's got nothing to do with Dad."
"Look, I was here. Where the hell were you when he was so out of it he didn't know where he was most of the time? When we had to call the police to bring him back from the hospital where he kept going, thinking it was time to operate on patients who'd been dead for decades!"
"If someone had cared to let me know some of this at the time, I would have been here."
"So you say. But when were you
ever
here when you were needed? When I lost my baby? When Mom had her heart attack? When your father—"
"Did you call me? I always made sure you knew my number. You chose—" I stopped, distracted by the thumping of feet on the back stairs. Ryan burst into the room. "Shit." I felt a steady pulse beating at my temple.
"Look, if you don't want to lend us the tray, fine. As you pointed out, we do have others."
"Trish—" I glanced at Ryan, hopping from foot to foot in the doorway. Now all I wanted to do was get rid of Trish and her endless litany of complaint. "Fine. You can have it, but remember, I want it back."
"Of course. I'll let you know when someone can pick it up." She hung up with a clatter.
"Come in," I said to Ryan, arranging the piles of paper on my desk.
Ryan ambled in and flung himself into a chair. He leaned back against the cushions and stretched out his legs. Even then he wasn't still, and his taut body twitched with impatience. The tight, faded jeans set off his slim, lean build to perfection.
"Well, Ryan, how's it going?" I asked, switching on my answering machine again. I felt nervous. Keyed up from my encounter with Trish. Ryan brought something into the room I wasn't ready to deal with.
The boy jiggled one sneakered foot. "Okay, I guess." He studied the poster behind my head, advertising an exhibition of the Group of Seven at the National Gallery in Ottawa. "I was just wondering when I get a day off, like."
"Are you tired of being cooped up with an old man?"
"You're not old." He smiled but didn't meet my eye.
"Thanks. You've made my day."
"Seriously, any day you want is okay with me, Mike."
"It's Michael. Tell me, what would you do with a day off?"
"Hang out with my friends. Go to a movie. See what's happening."
"Sounds exciting."
He got to his feet abruptly. "Go ahead. Laugh. Doesn't matter to me." He paced over to the window and looked out, shifting from one foot to the other.
"So, you need money." I had meant to discuss this with him, but so far it hadn't come up. He seemed happy with the things I gave him: a small TV for his room, a portable CD player, a bicycle I had picked up at a garage sale.
He turned on a sweet, melting smile that gave me a tangible jolt. "I was thinking ... like maybe you could give me a bit of pocket money. I mean, instead of all that other stuff. I'll give it all back, if you want."
When I didn't say anything, the smile turned anxious, drifting into uncertainty at the corners. Lowering those wonderful hazel eyes, he said quietly, "That didn't sound very good, did it? It makes me look real ungrateful for you taking me in and all, and I'm not. Honest. It's just that I don't have any money, Michael. And I've been bustin' my ass around here. I mean, like, I've done everything you wanted, right?"
I couldn't help the laugh that exploded from me as he said this. He looked startled, and his face flushed with anger and the effort to hold it back. "I haven't been very demanding yet," I said. At that, he rolled his eyes to the ceiling and hit his forehead with his open palm.
"Jeeezus!" he exclaimed softly and folded into a chair.
The stillness stretched out in the sun-drenched air as I watched him, sprawled sideways, one hand over his eyes, his foot tapping out a private rhythm on the thick carpet. I felt a cloud of sadness drift over me, winding around my thoughts, and for the moment I was mortally sick of it all, seeing the endless repetitious patterns spinning out before me into my future. It was the same old story, choreographed in advance, fascinating in its infinite variations, but basically always the same. I was tired of games, of pretending there was nothing going on. I longed to be able to ask him what he was thinking about and to know he would tell me. I wished we could skip the next few stages and get to the good part, where words and actions start to mean something, if only in a limited way. I wanted to touch ... But neither one of us was ready for that. Maybe we never would be.
I cleared my throat. "Let's negotiate a fair fee over dinner in a restaurant," I suggested expansively. His reaction was not what I expected.
"Why can't we stay here?"
"But I thought you wanted to get out of the house."
Not with you, his look said. It was like a slap in the face. "I'm kinda tired."
"A minute ago, you were climbing the walls to get out. What happened?"
"I've been working my ass off around here! That yarddigging shit is hard work! I've got a right to be tired!" He jumped to his feet.
"Stop acting like a bloody prima donna!" I lashed out, losing my temper entirely. "I'm not a fool!"
"No! You're a lousy, skinflint miser, that's what you are! You won't even pay me a fair wage, and you said yourself I'm a good worker."
"You're also a good eater. Have you any idea of the amount of food you've gone through in less than a week? Not to mention the breakage."
"I said I'd pay for the fucking stuff, didn't I? But how am I supposed to do that if you won't give me any wages?"
I shook my head at him in wonder. "I've met some hustlers in my time, boy, but you take the prize. What do you think I am? A philanthropist?"
"I know what you are."
"Watch it."
By this time, we were glaring at each other. I had forgotten what had set off this whole thing, but I suspected it had little to do with what we were now shouting about. One more thing to lay at Trish's door. If she hadn't called and pushed all my buttons, would things have blown so out of proportion now?
Ryan looked close to tears. "You're crazy, Michael, you know that? I thought you were so nice, but you're just a crazy old skinflint pervert whose ex-lover was a murderer and whose own family won't have anything to do with him!"
That sobered me. It also made me cruel. "All right," I said. "Let's talk about family, since you brought up the subject. Specifically, your family. To be even more precise, your mother, who loves you so much she gave you that expensive gold bracelet you're always wearing, presumably before she kicked you out of the house. Do you really think anyone's going to believe that pathetic lie?"
"You bastard! So what if she didn't give it to me?"
"Did you steal it?"
"It was a present! Chris gave it to me!"
"And just what did you have to do for it?"
"You fucking bastard! She's my girlfriend!"
"Ryan—"
"Shut up! For Crissakes, shut your goddamned fucking mouth!" He glared at me, his eyes shiny with unshed tears.
I felt surprisingly cold and detached, with a heavy sadness at the pit of my stomach as I watched him fling himself at the stairs at a dead run. "I take it dinner's out," I called after him, wondering why the hell I said these things. To give him plenty of time to dry his unmanly tears, I sorted through the welter of notes and memos piled on my desk and separated them into their appropriate folders. I could hear him crashing around upstairs. Rock music blared defiantly from his room. The sudden silence ten minutes later was followed by a shattering slam. By the time I made it to the front hall, there was no sign of him but the door was vibrating indignantly.
I sat on the hall chair, my hands dangling between my knees, and wondered how it had all blown out of proportion so fast. What poison from my past had seeped into the atmosphere with that unexpected call from Trish to make me so coolly cruel? Ryan was right. I owed him something.
A knock on the door and I sprang from my perch with relief, ready to hand over the keys of the kingdom to make myself feel better. I flung open the door. "Look, I
overreacted, and I'm—"
Julie stood there, the morning sun lighting her hair on fire. She thrust the paper into my hands. "Hey, have you seen the front page? They've identified the mummy! Isn't that cool? God, I can't believe it! After all this time and everything. Hey, are you okay? You look kinda ... hinky."
"No, no. I'm fine. But I haven't read the paper yet. Who is he?"
"Some small-time gangster from New York. His name's Rey Montana, and he has a record. That's how come they had his prints on file. So it was the Mafia after all. Who knew, eh?"
"But—Let me see that."
"I'm running late, but I wanted to make sure you knew. Catch you later."
I took the paper back to the solarium and read it through. Julie had exaggerated. Not that the truth needed anything to make it more unbelievable than it was to me. Rey Montana had a record of minor break-ins and several arrests for soliciting and prostitution. He was last seen in New York at a party for his nephew on the third of April, 1965. His aunt had reported him missing several weeks later, but he had never been heard of again. Until now.
I stared into the tiny bit of garden still untouched by Ryan's spade, watching a morning dove dip and peck at the bird feeder. April 1965. I was still living in my fool's paradise. Still planning for Ronnie to move in with me after school was over in June, when he would be eighteen and I wouldn't be his teacher anymore. Was Ronnie already having second thoughts? When did he begin experimenting with drugs? He would disappear for days at a time, leaving me frantic with worry. When he came back, he clung to me and cried and promised never to leave. But he had already left. And now I knew why. Or part of the reason.
And now Ryan was gone too.
After a while, I got up and went to the cupboard under the stairs. I checked the shoulder bag that hung there and discovered, somewhat predictably, that I was eighty-five dollars poorer. There should be some kind of insurance against this sort of thing, I thought. I could see the ad in my mind: "Has a cute hustler ripped you off lately? Now fight back with CON-ALERT, a whole new concept in insurance to suit your modern alternative lifestyle." I was lucky there hadn't been more cash in my wallet. Anyway, Ryan wouldn't be hungry for a few days, and I had had some good work done around the house at a bargain rate. It could have been a lot worse. He could have broken my heart.
Like Ronnie.
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