Who Dat Whodunnit (6 page)

“That’s right, Frank—it passed in 2004.” Father Dan sighed. “The year the right clung to power by campaigning against the rights of gays and lesbians nationwide.”

“And there’s no chance of it being repealed any time soon, not with all the ignorant bigots in this state,” Mom went on. “No, she’s just trying to raise some more money for PAM. I mean, really, that’s what this is all about—raising money. Peggy MacGillicudy has turned this into her job.” She spat the word “job.” “She’s gotten all the Louisiana bigots to speak—although for some reason I can’t fathom, the governor isn’t going to be there. I can’t believe he’d pass up a chance to bash the queers, but there you go. And guess who the star speaker of the day is?” Her eyes glinted.

I closed my eyes, remembering her with a wet cloth pressed against her bleeding nose in Papa Bradley’s hallway. “Tara Bourgeois, of course.”

“Tara Bourgeois, our very own homegrown homophobe.” Mom took the pipe off the coffee table and took another hit. “You know her book is being released this week—she’s going to be on all the big talk shows, and of course, they’re going to be selling her book at the rally—she’s donating all the proceeds to PAM.” PAM stood for
Protecting American Marriage
—but not from divorce or adultery or any of the real threats to marriage. Nope, they were protecting it from the insidious danger of the homosexual. “I really do hope I broke her fucking nose.”

“Violence is never the answer, Cecile,” Father Dan said with a frown. “And where exactly did you run into Tara Bourgeois?”

Mom scowled and proceeded to fill him in on everything that happened at Papa Bradley’s house.

While they were distracted—Father Dan occasionally making “oh dear” noises—I whispered to Frank, “What exactly did Enid say to you?”

His eyes narrowed and his face flushed with anger. The nerve started twitching in his jaw again. “She told me Jared was bringing Tara. Before I had a chance to even say anything, she went on a tirade about how terrible it was the way the gays treated her, and picked on her, trying to keep her from exercising her First Amendment rights, and how she had a right to her opinion, and the gays of all people should know what it was like to be silenced and treated badly.”

My jaw dropped. I was so stunned I couldn’t say anything.

“I couldn’t believe what I was hearing,” Frank went on when I remained silent, “and at first I thought she was yanking my chain, you know? But she wasn’t kidding, Scotty. She was serious, deadly serious. And she kept saying ‘the gays, you people’—things like that. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.” His jaw set. “I know she’s your aunt, but I don’t want that homophobic bitch to ever set foot in our house again. No offense, but I don’t put up with that kind of hateful bullshit from my
own
family, I sure as hell am not going to from her.”

I nodded—because I still couldn’t speak. My mind was reeling.

Surely she had to have been teasing him. Enid was one of the first Bradleys to be cool with my being gay—some of them, I reminded myself, still weren’t—and while we hadn’t been close in years, I couldn’t believe she could have changed
that
much. She used to go to gay bars
with
me, and had a great time. She used to lecture me for not being more active in the gay rights struggle. She’d volunteered for the NO/AIDS Task Force for years, delivering food to AIDS patients so ill they couldn’t get out of the house.

How could she possibly defend a homophobic bigot like Tara Bourgeois?

To Frank?

To be completely honest, she’d only started getting on my nerves as I grew older—and came to understand her better. As my sister Rain once said, “a little Enid goes a long way.” She could be fun to be around, with her childish enthusiasm and little-girl mannerisms—and she could be really funny. But what I’d always seen as her selflessness actually came with a price tag attached. If you didn’t do exactly what she wanted you to when she wanted you to, all the little things she’d done for you in the past got thrown back in your face as an example of her moral superiority and your own failures as a human being.

And another part of her immaturity was a mentality Storm described once as “I can say anything about anyone any time no matter how awful, but if anyone teases me or is the least bit critical of me, well, YOU ARE THE MOST HORRIBLE PERSON THAT EVER LIVED!” I’d seen this behavior a few times—and it was directed at me once.

After that experience of uncontrollable hysteria with tears alternating with a blinding, venomous rage—I’d kept her at a distance for a long time.

But Frank really liked her. Whenever she needed his help, Frank was there in a split second, literally dropping everything to rush to her assistance. He liked her, laughed at her jokes, and was always available when she needed someone to have lunch with or go see a movie with. It worried me a little, but she always seemed to be on her best behavior with him.

Until now.

Shock slowly began to give way to anger.
How dare she?
I thought. If Enid had been right there in front of me at that moment I would have cheerfully strangled her. I leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. “No worries, Frank,” I said. “As far as I’m concerned, she no longer exists.”

The relief on his face made my heart hurt just a little. “Are you sure? I mean, she’s your aunt—”

I cut him off. “You’re my family, Frank.”

“I love you.” He put his hand on my leg.

I kissed his cheek again but told myself dear old Enid was going to get it from me with both barrels the next time she was unlucky enough to see me.

“You two are coming to the rally, right?” Mom said, bringing me back into the conversation.

When she’d first mentioned it, I’d started thinking of excuses not to go. But now I was angry, and I wanted to do something about it.

“What time do we need to be there?” I asked, and grinned to myself as Mom spluttered a bit before answering. Obviously, she’d expected an argument.

“Meet here at eight in the morning.” Father Dan smiled at Frank and me. “We need to strategize our plan of attack.”

“Dear, remind me to leave eggs out so they’ll be nice and rotten for Saturday.” Mom patted Dad’s leg. “Miss Bourgeois is in for a nice surprise.”

I smothered a laugh. Mom’s aim was perfect. If she had a clear shot, Tara was going to get a rotten egg square in the face.

“Such a pity,” Father Dan said, shaking his head. “I went to high school with her mother, you know. Marilou was such a nice girl, with a big heart. If only—” He broke off.

“People change, Dan,” Mom replied with a sigh. “More wine?”

Isn’t that the truth? I thought angrily.

I was going to make Enid sorry she’d ever opened her mouth.

Ten of Wands

One who is carrying an oppressive load

I woke up around eight thirty the next morning with a mild hangover.

It wasn’t the worst one I’d ever had—I didn’t feel like death would be a welcome release. I was just slightly nauseous, with a mild headache. Frank was dead to the world beside me, sleeping on his side with his back to me. His body heat was great.

The apartment felt like a refrigerator. We’d turned the heat off when we’d staggered home—the apartment had been stuffy and dry, and we both sleep better in the cold.

There’s
nothing
better than snuggling underneath a pile of blankets.

It was raining. I could see that out the bedroom window when I turned away from Frank. I moaned to myself. It was another typically gray, cold, and drizzly January day in New Orleans—perfect for staying in a warm bed buried under blankets. I closed my eyes and tried to go back to sleep, to no avail, so I decided I might as well get out of bed and face the day.

I reached down to the floor and grabbed my sweatpants, pulling them on while still beneath the warm blankets. Frank grumbled and turned over onto his stomach, but didn’t wake up. I sat up and slid my house shoes on, cursing as I realized there wasn’t a sweatshirt in arm’s reach. I wrapped my arms around myself and managed to make it to the dresser without making a sound. I threw on some sweats while my teeth chattered. I brushed my teeth and swallowed some aspirin before heading into the kitchen to make coffee and toss a bagel into the toaster.

I dialed our office number—we maintained a small office for the detective agency about a block away on Frenchmen Street—and checked the voicemail. No new messages. I grinned.
Still no need to leave the house today
,
I thought as I walked into the big room that served as our dining room and living room.

I could smell the coffee brewing as I sat down to check my e-mail in the little alcove we used as a home office. The aspirin started kicking in, but my stomach was still a little queasy. I didn’t think I’d been that drunk, but wine has a bad habit of sneaking up on you. At some point, I’d completely lost track of how many bottles had been opened. All I knew for sure was my glass had never been empty for long. Come to think of it, I couldn’t remember much of the stumble—er,
walk
home from Mom and Dad’s. I vaguely remembered Storm and Marguerite showing up—they’d been a little sloppy themselves. There was also a lot of spirited discussion—Storm felt the protest of the PAM rally was a mistake. “Asking for trouble” was how he put it, which of course put Mom into debate mode. Dad and Father Dan joined in while the rest of us listened and gulped down more wine.

My bagel popped up in the toaster as the home page for my e-mail account opened. I started to get up when I caught a headline out of the corner of my eye that stopped me in my tracks.

A
NTI
-G
AY
M
ARRIAGE
A
DVOCATE
S
EX
S
CANDAL
!

And right next to the headline was an
extremely
unflattering photograph of Tara.

I started laughing and dashed into the kitchen with a very light step, my hangover completely forgotten. I quickly poured myself a cup of coffee and smeared cream cheese on the bagel. I took a big bite and managed to not spill the coffee as I hurried back to the computer, sliding into the seat and grinning at Tara’s face. Her hair wasn’t blond in the picture, it was a darker brown, and she was scowling at the camera. She didn’t have on much makeup, and the lighting was incredibly unflattering. Her mouth was open.
Her teeth hadn’t been capped yet, either
,
I smirked,
and she probably hadn’t gotten the boob upgrade, either.

Almost immediately, I felt ashamed of my reaction.

Okay, she may be a small-minded mean-spirited homophobe, I reminded myself, but she’s still a human being, and you should never enjoy the pain and humiliation of other human beings. That makes you no better than she is.

I closed my eyes and apologized in a quick prayer.

“Of course, that doesn’t mean I can’t read about it,” I said under my breath. It
was
news, after all.

How many times had some high-and-mighty person who presumed to sit in judgment on their fellow humans taken such a fall and been exposed as the worst kind of hypocrite? There was the homophobic senator arrested for soliciting a cop for sex in the airport bathroom, the family values senator exposed for going to prostitutes regularly, and that homophobic televangelist who’d snorted crystal meth with male prostitutes before satisfying his lusts.

I clicked on the link and started reading. In spite of my better inclinations, I could feel my grin growing with every sentence.

Like Mom always said, the ones who preach the loudest have the nastiest secrets.

NEW ORLEANS, LA. Tara Bourgeois, the former Miss Louisiana who made headlines all over the country with her on-stage comments against same-sex marriage at the Miss United States pageant, and later claimed she lost her state crown due to a “gay conspiracy” against her, has appeared in at least one, and maybe more, private sex tapes.

A former boyfriend, Joe Billette, released one of the tapes to the press today, and claims there are “plenty more.”

“I think it’s just plain wrong that Tara has set herself up as this person of high moral character, lecturing everyone else about what is and isn’t godly, when the truth is she’s the last person who should be making judgments about other people’s behavior and conduct,” Mr. Billette said in a statement released to the press along with the tape. “She’s portrayed herself in the media regularly over the past year as a good Christian who uses the Bible to make all of her important life decisions. As evidenced by her behavior in this tape, she is the worst kind of hypocrite. I couldn’t allow the release of her book—in which she portrays herself as a ‘warrior for Christ’—to pass without exposing her true character.”

An unidentified source confirms that Billette and Bourgeois dated casually while she was preparing for the Miss United States pageant.

Bourgeois did not return calls requesting for comment.

Since the Miss United States pageant, Bourgeois has made a name for herself as a speaker at conservative events and rallies against same-sex marriage. She signed a six-figure deal to be the spokesperson for Protect American Marriage (PAM), an organization involved in fighting the legalization of same-sex marriage.