139

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drunken trip to the Riviera doesn’t exactly fall into
that category.

“Once a year I stir myself. On Halloween. I call
up one of the gay joints, tell them who I am. Not
that they remember me. But they reserve me a table.
I save up the money. I sit there all by myself and
have a couple of drinks. That’s it. The kids go slid-
ing by and look at me as though I were Franken-
stein.

“I want to tell them not to waste their time. Not to
be the fool I was. Being queer is tough enough. One
night a week on the town is plenty. But I can see
they’re just the way I was. They gotta hang around

B the bar until the last dog is hung. They have to

make it. They have to bring home a piece of tail. If
they don’t, they’re failures. What damned fools!
What godamed fools.”

“Christ, why did you have to remind me?”

I started to say I was sorry.

“Don’t apologize. Maybe it’s good your mother
blabbed a little. Maybe if you write something like
this story, some dizzy queen will get the message.
Believe you me, if this old ass had another wiggle in
it and someone around who’d use it I’d be the hap-
piest old queen in the world.

“But I wouldn’t want to go back to those old days