How Long Has This Been Going On (20 page)

It is late autumn, 1953. Dwight Eisenhower is the president, peace negotiations on Korea are completed, and Joe McCarthy is yet one year ahead of his downfall. The gay history meter is running, and we're looking for signs of life. Let us drop in on our several friends, and meet some new ones.

Oh
damn,
Derek Archer was thinking as he put the phone down for the seventh time that evening. Johnny's still out.

Everything's gone to total
hell,
and Derek has run out of cigarettes because now that he has no servants he has to do it all himself and over the seven years of his contract he had accommodated himself to having forgotten the timing and logistics of laying in supplies.

Derek is desperate to talk to someone. He even called Tommy, that greedy little slug, but Tommy couldn't talk because "this big producer's assistant from... Columbia, I think?... but, anyway, so he's going to take his girl friend and me out dancing and I got to get ready."

I built my house of straw, Derek thought as he hung up. Damn Johnny to pieces! He doesn't work tonight, and he
told
me he wasn't seeing anyone.

The phone rang.

We're suave, Derek told himself. Collected. Sophisticated. Think: Ronald Colman.

"Derek, it's Jerrett Troy."

"Johnny, how fine to hear your voice. Hang on while I light up."

"Derek, don't sly me, because the tale's all over town."

"Twenty years old and such a know-it-all. The tale?"

"They canceled you, didn't they?"

"Well, of course, if you... It's... it's all over—"

"Want to come see me?"

"Oh, hell. They got me, didn't they? The
tale's
over the
town.
Well, it'll take me a bit. The chauffeur's really gone, finally. I've still got the car, but I can't quite master the gears and I bump into things every now and again."

"Never mind, Derek. I'll come to you."

"How?"

"I bought a used Studebaker. It's wonderful. I never realized what definition it gives your life to have your own wheels."

"Come quickly? And, do you think, could you
possibly
pick me up some cigarettes?"

"Now, there's the tone I like in you. That's the real Derek, a scared guy with feelings. How I respect you this way. You have no idea."

"Don't talk nonsense."

"I've got a tale for you, too. Some big news for me about New York. Though mine isn't industry gossip, unfortunately."

"Is it really...
Everyone
knows?"

"If I do, who doesn't? I'm not exactly a Hollywood insider."

"Well, they'll never hire me again, will they?" asked Derek, his voice breaking. "I'll have to live on that...
ridiculous
investment in that scabrous little
pizza parlor!"

"Stay put. I'm on my way."

Griffith Park is the Planet Moon. It's the beyond and it's weightless. Lean over its edge, look down, that's the rest of the world parked way below. You, you're flying.

Up here is do what you like. Now, I like to fool the freeks. Get them to feel they know this Walt Disney boy in the spotless white T and the jeans so fresh they squeak. Friendly is the style, for I withhold not manna from them. I squeeze their shoulder or rub their back while they make their representations. Yeah, this friendly boy. Freek eyes go all sunny because they got an
easy
one this time. Sure, Pop. I'll be easy. See, I like to go Surprise! with the knife. Just the few seconds there when I flourish it and they note it, before anything else in the world happens, puts the two of us on the higher plane. I don't know how Pop is doing, but I get hard then, in anticipation of delight. It's a lovely moment. Transfixing, is what it is. But you have to do them quick, or the moment grows tawdry. Cloying. You grab that freek hair and yank back to expose the throat and slice across there straight and clean. I find it advisable to turn them slightly to the side and to cut from far to near. Otherwise they mess on you. Boy, I like the freek noise they make while I'm walking off, a jack-in-the-box springing naked on the Planet Moon and wailing.

"Come on, Lois, it was bound to happen!" said Larken, getting a bit annoyed. "Don't be so sensitive."

"He's a cheat, isn't he?"

The Kid, she means.

Larken shrugged. "He got a good offer and he took it."

"How am I supposed to keep this place together? Aren't we talking about a whole world here? This little world that we..." Lois made a defeated gesture. "What about loyalty?"

"Maybe it's a sign," said Elaine.

"Of what?'

"Don't bite my eyes out, but maybe Johnny goes and an era is over and everybody finds something else to be."

"Bullheap!"

"I knew she'd be understanding about it," Elaine told Larken.

They were in Thriller Jill's on a Sunday morning, waiting for the first auditioner to arrive: to replace the Kid. Word had gone out along the underground circuits of communication about this handsome, virile young man doing comedy and song in drag, and the Kid had gone on accepting so many out-of-town dates—San Francisco again, Las Vegas, Houston, Chicago, and now, apparently, New York—that Lois had told him to choose between a steady job at Jill's or freedom forever. The Kid took freedom, as the Kid congenitally must, and now Jill's had to find a new act. Larken, Lois felt, was just the man to help her do it.

"While we're at it," she said, "can we get rid of Jo-Jo and Desmond, too?"

"Why would you want to?" Larken replied. "Sure, Jo-Jo's a little bland, and Desmond is the worst pianist west of the Mississippi. But they're familiar figures by now. Welcoming, relaxing. Look, what have your customers spent all day doing? Placating the joes and hiding from them, right? Then they come here, to be among their own kind. The people they're used to and can trust, okay?"

"I can see that," Elaine put in.

"They want fuck," said Lois. "That's why they come."

"Lois," Elaine countered, "how many of them actually pair off each night?"

"Who cares a bushel?"

"I've been with you here till the wee hours time and again. And I can't say that all that many people go out as a couple."

"So what?"

"So that's not why Thriller Jill's is here," said Larken. "That's a side effect. The real reason is so we can take it easy and be what we are."

A noise at the door, and all three turned to find that the first auditioner had arrived: a measly-looking middle-aged man in a toupee.

"Oh, brother," said Lois.

The ad had asked for a "male singer, Broadway, swing, and Your Hit Parade. Youth, looks, and charm a must."

"My accompanist had to fill in as emergency shortstop in a father-son softball game," said the auditioner. "But if someone can handle 'Walking My Baby Back Home' in B-flat, we'll be all set."

Lois was looking at him as if sighting her first roach. "You don't know that number from
Oklahoma!,"
she asked, "'Sappho Will Say We're in Love'?"

The auditioner looked confused. "Not in B-flat," he finally said.

"'Youth, looks, and charm a must,'" Elaine quoted gently. "I placed the ad myself, I'm afraid."

"Yes. Ah. Though I was hoping you'd consider the looks and charm of the more seasoned artiste." He pulled some paper out of a briefcase. "As my resume will attest, I was in the original revival touring company of
Nina Rosa.
Sigmund Romberg's masterpiece?"

Lois started toward him in battle trim, so Elaine quickly interposed herself. "Youth is essential for this job. A young man is the star of Thriller Jill's, and it seems that nothing ever will change that."

"I could throw the Kid into a cement mixer," said Lois. "Happily, I mean."

"It's evolution, Lois," said Larken. "Roll with the wave."

The auditioner stood staring at them for a moment, then snapped to. "Yes. Well. I appreciate your attention," he said politely, leaving his resume on a table. "Just in case," he explained, backing out.

"There you have it," said Lois. "Thriller Jill's is over."

"Lois, it's ten twenty-two in the morning," said Elaine. "Who knows who will appear?"

Who appeared was, fundamentally, one buffoon after another. One of these was a near miss, a lively (or maybe nervous), strapping (if overly boyish) baritone who apparently sang nothing but operetta rousers.

Because he opened with "The Riff Song," and when Lois asked for something else, the guy—Hudson Something—sang "Your Land and My Land."

"Didn't we just hear that?" asked Lois, when he had finished. "Let's try something different."

So Hudson launched into "My Sword and I," and Lois stopped him after maybe fifteen seconds.

"Look," she said. "Something soft and tender?"

"How about a ballad?" said Larken, from the piano.

"Oh," said Hudson. And he sang the first ten seconds of "Every Lover Must Meet His Fate," from Victor Herbert's
Sweethearts,
whereupon Lois explained,
"Out!"

"No, wait a minute," said Larken, jumping up. "I'm Larken and you've got a very nice voice, but you... you're kind of military. Do you know 'Lover, Come Back to Me' or 'Indian Love Call'?"

Lois cried out, "How about something from the Siegfried Romberg masterpiece
Nina Rosa?"

"I'm sorry," said Hudson, stepping off the stage and marching out. "I'm not what you want."

"It's doom," Lois remarked to Elaine, as Larken ran after Hudson. "You see this?"

"We could pack it in, you know," Elaine replied. "Move on. Some new place we would love."

Larken was on the sidewalk by the time he caught up with Hudson.

"Don't be angry," Larken told him. "It's just that your repertory—"

"They always say that."

"Hudson, are you—forgive me for saying this, but I just broke up with my boy friend, so I'm acutely aware of... well, of the possibilities when someone kind of crosses my path and everything, so... I'm sorry, what was your last name?"

"Smelki."

"You don't want to change that?"

"Thank you for listening to me," said Hudson, turning away.

"Wait, Hudson!"

Hudson turned back.

"I mean... Don't get mad if you don't like this, all right? But I... Did you catch that last thing about my boy friend?"

"It's not my business."

"I know I'm way out of line here," said Larken. "But you're not unlike my boy friend, at least physically. And I...
Smelki?"

"You want to date me, is that it?"

Suddenly self-protective, Larken hesitated.

"No, you do, don't you?" Hudson went on. "You're not one of the world's outstanding accompanists, but you're nice-looking and you thought—"

"I like your voice, to tell the truth," said Larken. "And I like you."

"If you like my voice, how come I don't get the job?"

"How come you only sing marches?"

Hudson looked surprised. "I sing... the operetta greats. It didn't do Nelson Eddy any harm."

"Nelson sang a love song every now and then. Or maybe it's your name."

"Is 'Nelson Eddy' such a great name?" "Consider what it was when he started."

"Nelson Eddy was born with that name," said Hudson, with immense confidence.

"He was born Eddy and
then
named Nelson, yes. So the legend tells. But in the Metro vaults are documents proving that Nelson had changed his first name."

"From what?"

"Miriam."

Hudson didn't laugh.

"I'm not getting anywhere," said Larken. "Right?"

Hudson shifted his posture a bit, looked here and there. "You want to have dinner sometime?" he said.

"Yes."

Hudson kept looking around, and he said, "I don't handle auditions well. I'm the only one who thinks I'm great." Then he put his hand on Larken's arm and sort of smiled.

Larken exhaled. "You know, I really did like your voice."

"Thank you."

They did the usual exchange of the phone numbers, and Larken rambled back into the bar like a mooncalf to find Lois and Elaine talking to a young woman.

"I sing everything," she was telling them. "Old, new. Waltz, Latin. Hot, sweet. Torch, cheer-me-up. I'm a catalogue of song."

"Larken," said Elaine.

"Don't we only run male singers?"

"Yes, I saw the ad," the woman said. "But what do you want, gender or talent? I'm talent. Couldn't you at least hear me? I mean, what else is happening here, V-J Day?"

Lois nodded at Larken, Larken went to the piano, and the young woman sang. Slim, straight brown hair with Colleen Moore bangs, big eyes, full-bosomed, tight-waisted, great legs, weirdly cute face.

And she could sing. She could
really
sing.

She gave them a jazzy "Cuddle Up a Little Closer" and a comically frantic "Who?" and a magnificent "Bill," and Larken shot up from the keyboard and said, "Hire her."

Freeks run wild on the Planet Moon: I soothe them. They find my smile gratifying, my touch heartening. It is a rare thing in their lives, for they are obscene freeks, angry, anxious fat wavering losers you wouldn't throw your garbage out in. No one misses them when I put forth my hand and they are cut. Sometimes the newspapers sing a little song, but there it ends, and all are glad. I maketh the storm calm.

On the Planet Moon, I am one of a kind. I am the birthday boy at a party given by uncles. Yeah. I see other twenty-year-olds sometimes, right-looking fellows, and I wonder why they're here. Could they be cutters, like me, with all my reign and dominion? Here's this guy strolling along, full and tall like me, really put together. I like to follow a man like that and see what he's up to. He's walking around. Every time he passes under a lamplight you see how straight and strong he is. You would almost never cut a guy like that. Then he bumps into this other young fellow and they go into a surprise and laugh, because it seems they know each other.

"Jake!" said Frank.

"Hey, the boss," says Jake.

"Funny, right?"

"It's... different."

"How often," Frank muses, "do you run into someone you know here?"