Private Party

Private Party: The Indignities Book Two

Graeme Aitken

This book was first published by Clouds of Magellan in 2010.

This edition published by 20Ten Books in 2012.

Copyright © Graeme Aitken 2010

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

This is a work of fiction. The novel’s characters, incidents and dialogue are the product of the author’s imagination and are entirely fictional.

Aitken, Graeme, 1963–.

Private Party The Indignities Book 2

ISBN 9780987329325

Cover photograph by Shots by Gun

I’d like to thank Gordon Thompson of Clouds of Magellan for first publishing this novel and for his enthusiasm and insights. The manuscript was improved immensely by the editorial work he and Helen Bell contributed. I’d like to thank my agents—Mitchell Waters, Geraldine Cooke, and Fiona Inglis—for their work and feedback at various stages. A very big thank you to my friends Olivier Colette, Graeme Head, Craig Stevens and Peter Whitfeld for their reading of the manuscript and comments. Thank you to my day job employer Les McDonald for his flexibility in allowing me time off to write when I needed it.

There are a great number of friends who gave me encouragement, support and inspiration when I was working on this book and I’d like to thank them all heartily. They are José Rincon Castro, Megan Heyward, Sarah Breen, Klime Zilevski, Enriqué Torres, Rosanna Arciuli, Dean Baxter, Steven Thurlow, Keith Buss, Felipe Mejia, James George, Helen Ferry, Hebert Perdomo, Jorge Baron, Marcus Mabry, Eduardo Batres, Richard McIntyre, Claudio Back, and Edwin Beltran Jimenez.

Graeme Aitken, September 2012

Cover Design – Tane Cavu

Original Photography – Shots by Gun

‘The Indignities’ logo design – Gordon Thompson

‘The Indignities’ image – Colin Milligan

Author photograph – José Rincon Castro

Blake:
I forgot 2 take my pot plants with me. Have u been watering them? When can I collect them?

Stephen:
Sorry. They shrivelled up & died just like our love.

It was surprising the number of people who seemed to think I was well shot of Blake when I told them we’d broken up. My friends had nicknamed him ‘Bland’ and even my mother dismissed him with ‘he wasn’t really that special, was he?’. Initially I felt indignant and wounded—after all it was a slur upon my taste. But eventually I came to appreciate the effort my close friends and mother had made despite their reservations. It also made things a lot easier post-breakup when no one wanted to keep in touch with him. If anyone had insisted on maintaining a friendship with him, I would have found it aggravating.

More than a month passed before I finally confided the details of our break-up to Elisabeth, but to my surprise, she responded with great nonchalance. ‘So he’s run off with the neighbour? Oh well, these things happen,’ she remarked airily, ‘but they don’t necessarily last all that long. Don’t go doing anything dramatic, like putting the house up for sale.’

She invited me back to Wahroonga for dinner to be cheered up and insisted I stay the night. When I got out there, I expected to find her in sympathy mode, but instead she was in high spirits and didn’t even ask how I was getting on post-Blake. As soon as I was inside the door, she insisted upon opening a bottle of wine, though I tried to decline. I loathe it when my mother gets tiddly: her observations become extremely pointed and more often than not are aimed at me. ‘Nonsense,’ Elisabeth retorted. ‘Of course you’ll have a glass. You needn’t give me that look. I don’t intend to drink it all myself. Vic is joining us for dinner as well. I thought if anyone could offer some advice on rejection, he could.’

That remark was vintage Elisabeth and made me wonder if she’d already been into the wine before I arrived. I wasn’t particularly thrilled that Vic was joining us but resolved not to show it. I’d been trying to make more of an effort to be nice to Vic. He’d been a tremendous support to Elisabeth after Dad died. He’d helped make the funeral arrangements and stayed with her for weeks afterwards as company. I’d been impressed. When I thanked him for all he’d done to help, he waved it away. ‘I know what grief is like. I’ve been to countless funerals and then there was Michael of course.’

I must have looked blank as he elaborated. ‘You did meet him but you wouldn’t remember.’

That made me feel bad: as if gay men over a certain age were invisible to me, which was possibly true. ‘Show me his photo next time,’ I said quickly. ‘After all Vic, there have been quite a number of men in your life. You can’t expect me to remember them all.’

Vic laughed which made me realise how rare it was for us to share a joke together. He must have felt encouraged as he began to talk about Michael.

‘We were lovers back in the seventies for a few years, but when that ended, we went on to become best friends. These days, with the new treatments, you tend to think that people don’t die of AIDS anymore. But Michael died two years ago. It was a lingering death, nasty …’ Vic broke off for a few moments. ‘I helped him through it as best I could.’

‘I’m sorry. I can’t remember Elisabeth mentioning it to me,’ I said.

‘No, well I never confided in her much. I knew what she would think, even if she managed not to give voice to it, and I couldn’t have endured that.’

Vic didn’t need to elaborate. I knew what he meant. Elisabeth had some very old-fashioned ideas about some things. Despite the fact that she had a gay son, a gay best friend, was a member of P-Flag and did charity appearances for The AIDS Trust, nothing would erase her fundamental conviction that gay men who died of AIDS had somehow brought it on themselves. She’d been utterly opposed to me being with Ant and I’d regretted ever telling her that he was HIV positive. Every time she saw Ant, she’d seize him by the wrist, fix him with a terrible stare and grill him, ‘You are being careful, aren’t you?’

I told her to cut it out, but her expression became very grave and intense.

‘No, I won’t cut it out,’ she replied in her most measured voice, ‘because I want him to know that if anything happens to you, he’s responsible.’

Sometimes my mother could be a monster.

Elisabeth poured me a glass of wine and as I sat down on the couch, my eye fell upon a copy of ‘The Sydney Star Observer’, the local gay newspaper, sitting on the coffee table. My mother noticed. ‘Oh Stephen, the look on your face,’ she laughed. ‘I’m not experimenting. I’m not
that
merry a widow. Vic brought that over the last time he was here. His photo’s in there somewhere, not that it’s at all flattering. Nevertheless, he seemed immensely proud of it. But you know, I was rather glad he left it behind because I read it and it was very enlightening. You know I do try to understand you better and this life you lead.’

That convinced me that Elisabeth had already put away several wines before I’d arrived. Her conflicting feelings about homosexuality and her gay son always rose to the surface when she was drunk. First, she took another bitchy swipe at Vic; then she claimed to be trying to understand me better by reading ‘The Star Observer’, when in fact she would merely be taking note of all ‘the dubious establishments’ that advertised in its pages, tut-tutting and imagining that I spent my every waking hour there.

Elisabeth insisted that we toast. ‘Darling, I have something to celebrate,’ she confided with a smirk. ‘No doubt you thought I was all washed up and that I’d never work again, but no! Ann rang yesterday with a brilliant offer. They want me for one of the top shows on TV. Can you guess?’

But I was too furious and jealous to guess. Ann had offered Elisabeth a television role! What about me? I’d been out of work for more than a year and was becoming infamous for my Tommy advertisements. ‘Darling, go on, guess,’ Elisabeth pressed me.

‘Someone’s grandmother on ‘Sunnyside Street’,’ I suggested nastily.

‘Oh no, it’s a cut above that rubbish,’ Elisabeth replied, skewering me in return. ‘It’s ‘Celebrity Big Brother’, but not here darling, in the UK. Apparently, some of my old TV shows are on cable over there and I’m more popular than ever. Isn’t it exciting?’

I sighed. It was time to talk plainly. ‘Mother, you can’t be serious. You’d hate it. It’d be like being in goal. And you can count on being locked up with a bunch of people you can’t stand, who will press your buttons and ensure you create some unforgettable, unflattering scenes on prime time television.’

‘Yes, well I may have some trouble sticking to their silly rules, but as you say it is prime time television exposure. It’s also a trip to London, something that will raise my profile, and who knows what else it might lead to?’

‘Public humiliation and ridicule largely, and a very big blow to your ego if the public votes you out early.’

‘Oh Stephen, don’t be so negative.’

The doorbell rang and Elisabeth jumped to her feet to answer it. ‘That’ll be Vic. At least I can count on him to be supportive.’

While she was out of the room, I topped up my glass. Clearly, it was going to be a long and very trying night. Though I almost dropped the bottle in surprise when Vic bounded into the room, dressed in some unfortunate outfit, and yelling his head off. ‘Elisabeth is in the house. She’s in the house. Yo, yo, yo,’ Uncle Vic chanted, flinging his limbs about in some sort of demented dance.

Finally, it dawned on me that Uncle Vic had unleashed another of his ‘new looks’ upon the world. This time he’d adopted hip-hop. He had the baggy track pants, the gold chains and bling, a baseball cap worn backwards, while his antic contortions were presumably his dance moves. I had no hesitation in telling Vic exactly what I thought: ‘you look absolutely ridiculous’. As I said it, Elisabeth entered the room and reprimanded me, even though from the look on her face, I knew she concurred wholeheartedly. But Uncle Vic was unfazed. ‘I’ve always dressed young and moved with the times,’ he declared, ‘and these hip-hop fashions are perfect for me. Everything is so big and baggy, it hides a multitude of sins. Everyone tells me this look takes years off me.’

‘Yes, well the cap covers your bald spot,’ Elisabeth chimed in, giving me a look which said humour him. ‘And it’s much more flattering than some of those other get-ups you used to wear.’

Elisabeth was referring to the hipster jeans that rode halfway down his unsightly arse and revealed far too much aged buttock and not enough designer underwear. He’d also struggled to cultivate one of those ratty hairstyles that were slicked up into a peak on top of the head. On twenty-something boys, it looked cool; on balding, elderly men it simply looked like a comb-over had been given a terrible fright.

‘You know, I bought this outfit in Miami,’ Vic boasted. ‘Stephen, I must tell you all about my exploits there. You might find this hard to believe, but your Uncle Vic has been on the down low.’

I had no idea what he was going on about but Elisabeth did. ‘It was on “Oprah”,’ she informed me. ‘Black men who claim to be straight but have sex with men on the sly.’

Uncle Vic smirked. ‘Liddy get me a drink and I’ll tell Stephen all about it.’

It transpired that Vic had gone off in May to South Beach, Miami, a gay hot spot he’d visited several times before. He’d timed his trip to coincide with the Memorial Day long weekend, figuring there’d be lots of circuit parties to attend and drug-fucked twinks to prey upon. On arrival in South Beach, he noticed the large number of black guys hanging out on Ocean Drive and wandering the streets. But he just figured there was some sort of Black Gay Pride event going on and that he would have even bigger fun than he’d anticipated.

Once he’d checked into his hotel, he rushed straight down to the pool; though he was a little surprised to note that he was the only white person poolside. He purloined an empty sun bed, whipped off his board shorts to reveal his checkerboard thong, gleefully noting that it was greeted with a jealous murmur. Encouraged, he turned to the butch number in the chair next to his. ‘Hey doll, would you rub some cream on my back?’ he asked.

The guy turned to him, took off his sunglasses and fixed him with a threatening scowl. ‘Wha’d you say to me?’ he growled and then his eyebrows shot up in alarm. ‘And what da fuck you wearing man?’

It was then that Uncle Vic realised he had totally misread the situation. The guy was reading a car magazine. He wasn’t just butch; he was straight. Vic had stayed at this particular hotel twice before and it had been gay central, but something had happened—the clientele had changed
dramatically
. This was not a gay pool party with lots of fag hags. These were straight dudes seriously checking out the girls’ tits. Vic’s neighbour cleared his throat and began slamming his fist into the palm of his hand. He was waiting for an answer to his question. Uncle Vic tried to smile and adopted his butchest voice. ‘Sorry mate, it must be my accent. I’m an Aussie.’

The guy frowned, then broke into a grin. ‘Yeah? All the way from Australia man? You sure have a freaky accent.’

The guy introduced himself as Randall. He was from Atlanta and he explained that over Memorial Weekend, Miami hosted a four-day hip-hop party, an event which attracted over 200 000 people, predominantly blacks.

‘I have been here before,’ said Vic, ‘but this time is very different.’

‘Yeah, usually South Beach is crawling with faggots but they all took off to Fort Lauderdale for the weekend. Left us to party. Hey man, so you gonna check out Busta Rhymes tonight?’

Uncle Vic noted that although Randall had disparaged gays, he knew where they had gone. Was that a sign that he was on ‘the down low’? Uncle Vic had his suspicions. He grinned. ‘Sure, I’ll check out Busta.’

Vic went to the club with Randall, who admitted that he was ‘shy with women’ and liked having someone to hang with. Nor did he dance, unlike Uncle Vic, who hit the dance floor as soon as they arrived, imitating flawlessly what was going on around him—or so he thought. After quarter of an hour, Randall quietly advised him to give the dancing a rest. The two of them retired to the bar where Randall proceeded to get extremely drunk, very quickly. After a while, he suggested they go back to Uncle Vic’s room to smoke some weed. Uncle Vic knew this scenario all too well. They got back to his room. The weed never eventuated. Randall passed out on Uncle Vic’s bed, though his crotch did the exact opposite. Something reared up in his pants, as if begging to be broken loose. Vic obliged.

After he’d come, Randall sobered up remarkably quickly and made a swift exit. Uncle Vic decided there was a lot more to hip-hop weekend than met the eye. He had planned to check out of the hotel the next day and hot-foot it to Fort Lauderdale in pursuit of the muscle boys, but he knew in his heart that it would be no different to Sydney. The boys would treat him with grand indifference, unless they were really wasted or he piqued their interest by loitering at the urinal with his oversized dick on display. But his encounter with Randall had been challenging and intriguing. Vic’s curiosity was aroused: he wanted to see just how many other brothers ‘his milkshake could bring to the yard’. In the three days that followed, Vic was to discover that it could pull quite a number.

Elisabeth excused herself to check on dinner. ‘I can’t wait to go back next year. I’ve already got my hotel booked. But what about you? How are you getting on?’ Vic asked, finally changing the subject. ‘I hear your boyfriend broke up with you.’

I didn’t take kindly to the way he had phrased that.

‘And took up with Rick, that gorgeous personal trainer,’ Vic continued.

‘Yeah, well we’ll see how long that lasts,’ I snapped.

There was silence while Vic digested my reaction. ‘Perhaps it was time for a change,’ he suggested gently. ‘You may find you quite enjoy being single for a while. No doubt, a boy like you will be popular.’

I shrugged modestly.

‘Though I think you’ll find things on the gay scene very different these days,’ Vic cautioned.

‘Why’s that?’ I asked, not really interested in Vic’s perspective on gay Sydney which I was sure would not be at all relevant to me.