by Vanda
“Who’s Gladys Bentley?” I asked.
“She’s a Negro male impersonator,” Juliana answered.
“But couldn’t she get arrested?”
“She does. Often.” Juliana said.
“A lot less these days,” Shirl added. “Al, she’s a top-notch blues singer. She was famous through the twenties and thirties in Harlem. She was only a kid singing at rent parties when she started. Juliana joined us in the clubs in thirty-two. She was a baby, only sixteen. Remember, Gladys at Harry Hansberry’s Clam House? She was backed up by a chorus of female impersonators. What a time! There was Ma Rainey, Ethel Waters, Bessie Smith we heard them all, and did we have fun. Oh and the women. Hey, Juliana? How many different women were you with each week?”
“I’m not talking,” she said with a wink in her eye.
“Juliana slept with white girls, colored girls, Caribbean girls, Spanish girls. I couldn’t keep track of them all. And talk about blue lyrics? Spivy can’t even think as blue as Gladys’s lyrics.”
“She could get pretty raw,” Juliana agreed.
“And remember how she changed all the pronouns in the songs to ‘her’ and ‘ she’? She didn’t care who knew she loved women. Julie, there are gay clubs popping up all over LA and San Francisco. Gladys is the headliner right now at Mona’s. She’s performing for straight audiences.”
“Yes, and I bet they all have a laughing good time making fun of the freak.”
“It’d be a way for you to get a foothold,” Shirl continued. “You could do what you love, and get a following that might—”
“No. I couldn’t.”
“I could make a few calls, and—”
“Do what, Shirl? Sing blue songs in some bar? Be the queerest queer in the queerest pond? Allow myself to be held up to ridicule by my peers, by the business I love? I’m a professional!”
“And so is Gladys. It’s a club, not a bar. And please don’t use the word queer like that. It’s insulting.”
“Is it, Shirl? Well, try this. No one gives a damn about fags and bull daggers. All my talent, everything I want, squandered on a club like that? For what? So that the press can humiliate me? And when Richard sues for divorce on the basis of my criminality, and mental disease, and takes everything I own, what will I do then?”
“Well, when you put it that way ….” She took a long drag on her cigarette.
“I’m sorry, Shirl. I know I’m disappointing you. I don’t want to, but I keep doing it. Try to understand. I have a responsibility to my mother. How do you think she would feel if she knew I …. I couldn’t. I didn’t plan on this war, but I’m getting dangerously close to forty, and I don’t have time to—”
“Julie, you’re only twenty-seven years old.”
“Thirty, then. Who will want me then?”
“I will,” I said.
“You’re sweet, honey, but that’s not what I meant.”
“I know. I think I know what’s wrong with your act.”
“You do?” Juliana hid a grin behind her hand.
“Well, will you listen to Miss Broadway?” Shirl said, also trying not to laugh.
“Just because you had a lucky thought last week, doesn’t mean—”
“You’re not using all your natural attributes. You’re a sexy woman, but you don’t use that to your fullest.”
“Should I do a striptease on stage?”
“That wouldn’t work. You have to be sexy but out of reach. Like last week at your place. Those women wanted you bad, but they knew they couldn’t have you. You left them panting and you knew it. You did the same thing to Johnny.”
“Did I?”
“You know you did.”
“I was entertaining my friends, so I was being a little silly.”
“You were being yourself. That’s what you need to do on stage. Only, you need to stay away from the women, and drive the men wild. You need to flirt with the men in the audience. Just like you did with the women and Johnny last week. Make them feel like they might have a chance with you. Then retreat so that you’re always out of reach. Roses! One time you used roses in your act. You need to do that again, but make them a big part of it. Like a signature. I think that’s what I heard them call it at the Canteen. And, and …” I felt on fire with ideas, and I could see by their faces they were really listening to me. “Use the roses to flirt. They’ll highlight your femininity. Touch men’s faces with them. And the guys in your act are too swishy. Dancing with swishy guys kills the fantasy. It’s safe, and you don’t wanna be safe. In your real life, you like sex that’s a little dangerous and public, so—”
“Al! That’s private.”
“I got carried away.”
“You think she’s telling me something I didn’t already know?” Shirl said.
“I’m making a point here,” I went on. “You want to get that same sexual danger into your act. Besides getting more masculine guys for your act, you need to dance with some of the men in your audience. Men have money and power. If you excite them, they’ll give you whatever you want. You already know that. I’ve watched you flirt with men and women off stage. It’s natural to you. Now you need to do it on stage.”
The waiter placed our drinks in front of us.
“Al,” Juliana said. “How are you getting these ideas?”
“I don’t know. Maybe from being around musicians at the Canteen. Who cares where they’re coming from? They’re good ideas and you know it.”
She looked at Shirl. “Shirl, what do you think?”
“I think the kid’s got something.”
“I’ll run your ideas past Johnny and Richard and see what they say.”
“Why do you have to do that? Why can’t you just try it? Those two haven’t done you much good.”
“They’re professionals. But I will speak to them.”
The audience started chanting, “Spivy! Spivy!” and banging silverware on their tables. The program said we were waiting for Madame Spivy to sing from her repertoire of sophisticated songs, but the show was overdue by an hour and a half.
Spivy’s voice rose above the chatter and yells, addressing our waiter, “Oh, tell that fairy to keep playing that damn piano. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”
The audience went stone quiet. Walter playing “As Time Goes By” was the only sound. He finished with great flourish, stood, and, with head held high, he marched down the side aisle, past Madame Spivy and out the door.
Spivy jumped up. “Hey! You have a show to do.” Walter was gone.
Everyone stared at Spivy. “I have no time for artistic temperaments.” She headed toward the front. “We just happen to have a brilliant pianist right in our audience. Juliana?”
“No,” Juliana whispered, keeping her head down. “Tell me this isn’t happening. ”
All around us voices called out, “Juliana! Juliana!”
Most of them probably just wanted Spivy to do her act. But some did know Juliana and were specifically calling for her.
“You’d better stand,” Shirl said.
“I’m nobody’s accompanist.”
“Then use it to your advantage,” Shirl said.
Juliana stood.
Spivy marched like a bull toward her and slapped her on the back. “That’s my girl.”
Juliana smiled and whispered, “I will only play if I get to sing something after your act.”
“Nobody sings after me.”
“All right, then I’ll be off.”
“One number. That’s all.”
“Announce it. Now.”
“Why now?”
“Because I want to be sure everyone knows about our deal.”
“I am a woman of my word.”
“Good evening, Madame Spivy.”
“All right.” She waved her hands. “Folks. Juliana has graciously consented to accompany me tonight. And after my repertoire of songs, she will sing one song.”
Spivy walked to the front. Juliana threw her shoulders back looking d
ignified despite how awful I knew she had to feel. Spivy, with no great fanfare, handed Juliana her music, and pointed the way to the piano alcove where Juliana was covered by shadow. Spivy sat at a piano that was out in the open. A bright spotlight came up shining around her making it even more difficult to see Juliana.
Shirl told me that although Spivy played the piano and accompanied herself while she sang, she always had a second backup piano ’cause she wasn’t very good.
That night Spivy began singing about a male cat who prowled around at night looking for lady cats until his owner got him fixed, and he became a pansy cat.
Spivy sang for about fifty minutes, and it was obvious from the clapping that they loved her. I worried that Juliana would never capture a loyal Spivy crowd, so when Juliana emerged from the shadows to force Spivy to make good on her deal I was scared. Juliana’s songs were completely different from Spivy’s.
Juliana took her place at the piano under the spotlight while Spivy stood at the bar. As Juliana played the introduction, she said, “The song I’m going to sing was written by a woman some of you boys might know. A friend of mine. Ruth Wallis.”
A cheer went up at the bar. “A wonderful singer-songwriter who doesn’t get enough credit.” Then she started singing a bouncy song about a woman who marries a gay boy, and at the wedding, the boy obviously prefers the best man to her. Everyone howled with laughter and stomped their feet in time to the music, especially the gay boys at the bar. By the time Juliana finished, the audience was on its feet clapping for more.
Spivy slipped off her stool and headed toward Juliana like she was going to yank her off the stage. Juliana looked straight at Spivy and said, “You’re such a wonderful audience that I’d love to sing another one.”
Spivy sat down on a bar stool burying her scowl in a glass of beer while Juliana began the introduction to another song.
I leaned over to Shirl, “Did you know Juliana knew these kinds of songs?”
“Juliana is always a surprise.”
She played a spirited opening, and I bounced along to the rhythm. When she sang the words, “You’ve gotta have boobs,” I almost fell out of my chair. The audience laughed, but Shirl was probably laughing the hardest.
I felt like it was me up there, and I wanted to hide under the table. Juliana didn’t let people talk like that in front of her, and now, she was up there with a hundred people listening to her sing words like “boobs” and “balls.”
All the time she was singing, she was shaking hers around. Sometimes she’d stop playing, sing a cappella and grab hold of them. Part of me was too embarrassed to look at her up there, but there was this other part, and that part was getting really excited and couldn’t stop watching her.
The audience loved her, but at the end she took her bow and hurried back to our table.
Shirl popped up to greet her. “You were terrific. You could’ve kept them going all night.”
“No, I couldn’t,” Juliana said. “Those are the only two blue songs I know. Thank God I went to Ruth’s show last week. Richard and I will have to take Ruth and her husband out to dinner when Richard gets home.”
Juliana looked over at me. “So?” she asked as if what I thought was important to her.
My feelings were too mixed up for me to say anything sincere, so I only half looked at her. “You were good.”
“Is that what you really want to say?”
“Yeah.”
“I’ve got to get out of here,” she told Shirl.
“But we still haven’t drunk up our $2.25 each minimum.”
“Oh, for Pete’s sake, Shirl, here’s our share.” She threw some bills on the table. “Give my love to Mercy if she ever gets here. I’ll give you a call tomorrow. Come on.” She nodded at me.
As we passed by Spivy’s table in the back, Juliana slowed down. “Good evening, Madame Spivy,” she said. “We’ll have to do it again sometime.”
Spivy didn’t look up, but Miss Bankhead threw her a kiss. “You were delicious, dahling. ”
Juliana and I didn’t speak during the whole cab ride back to her place. I’d never seen her be that kind of sexual on stage. I’d told her to be more flirtatious and even a little seductive, but this, tonight, was boldly sexual. Not at all what I meant.
As soon as we got inside the apartment, she poured us both a brandy and took hers over to the couch. I stood at the window sipping mine.
She kicked off her shoes and stared up at the ceiling. “Were you ashamed of me tonight?”
“No. I was … ashamed of me.” I took a sip of my brandy.
She sat up straight. “Whatever for?”
“I knew you were suffering up there, having to do those kinds of songs, but a big part of me felt—well, it kinda got me—well excited when you said that word.”
A big grin creased her face. “Get over here.” She put her glass on the coffee table and gathered me into her arms, my most favorite place to be. “So you like it when I say risqué words, huh? You bad girl. Boobs.”
A rush of excitement charged through my body. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. It’s just between us. So let me see them.”
“What?”
“Your boobs.” She started unbuttoning me. “And then later,” she whispered. “We’ll get to your pussy.” She pressed her body on top of mine and kissed me.
Chapter Forty-Nine
“But Juliana, you can’t go now. Christmas is just three days away.”
“So?” She threw a pair of slippers into her suitcase.
“I thought we were going to spend Christmas together.”
“I never said that.” She walked away and headed down the hall to the bedroom; I followed.
“Still, I thought —”
“Since when did I become responsible for your thoughts?” She studied a few pairs of shoes, deciding.
“Okay, you’re not, but still …. Where ya going?”
“Away.” She went back to her suitcase in the parlor, me close at her heels.
“But where away, and why now? Do you have a job somewhere? ’Cause if you do I could understand, but still I’d like to know.”
She went back to the bedroom and pulled a few dresses from their hangers.
“You’re going away with Andy. You’re going on her yacht, and you’re going to sail around that island; I forget which one. You are, aren’t you?”
She threw the armload of dresses down onto the bed. “I am not accustomed to having my actions scrutinized, so stop doing it.” She gathered the dresses back into her arms and returned to her suitcase.
“But, but, I have these feelings. These deep-down inside feelings. Feelings I’ve never …. Feelings about you that—”
“Don’t!” She stopped her packing and faced me. “I don’t want to hear it.” She went back to her suitcase. “Those kinds of feelings pass. There’s no point in discussing them. Now, let’s see what else do I need to …? Ah, yes, bathing suit.” She jaunted into her bedroom next to the parlor.
“Juliana, please !” I cried out like a cat that just got hit by a truck .
“Stop shouting. What do you want?”
I could hardly breathe. “Uh, uh, nothing, nothing.” I walked jaggedly toward the door; my feet got caught up in each other, and I almost knocked myself over. Everything was a blur. What to do, what to do? My life was ending somehow. I had to—had to … what? “Go. Have to go.” Everything was spinning as I pushed myself past the archway into the hall.
“Stop. Don’t go,” she said, as I stood in the hallway ready to fall down the steps. “You can’t go like that.”
I walked back inside, still dazed like there was no blood in my head.
Juliana sat on the edge of the couch. “Look, Al, my freedom is very important to me. I need to go where I need to go when I need to go there. I didn’t think it would matter so much to you.”
“Not matter to me?”
“You have your own friends, your own life.”
“But
, Juliana, you’re the most—”
“Don’t finish that. You want some tea? I bought some Lipton.” She rose from her seat.
“Are you still mad at me?”
She sighed. “I’m not mad at you. I just don’t want you to depend on me. I can’t take that.”
“I’m not. I’ve got a job, and my career that isn’t going anywhere, and my work at the Canteen.”
“Don’t you forget that. And start dating again. It’s been five months since you broke it off with Henry.”
“Date? It’s ’cause of you that Henry and I—”
“I made a pitcher of eggnog for the holiday.” She walked into the kitchenette. “You want some?”
“Yeah.”
“You want rum in it?” she called, her head in the icebox.
“Sure. I’ve never tried that before.”
“Put on the radio. I’ll be right there.”
Juliana finished packing, and then we had eggnog with rum on her couch while we listened to Rosemary Clooney sing Christmas carols on the radio. “I’m having a quiet little get-together on New Year’s Eve. A few special women friends, smaller than what I had last week. Would you like to come?”
“Could I?”
“I think I just invited you.”
“Being with you makes me so happy. I want everyone to know. I think I’m gonna tell Aggie about you.”
“No. Don’t do that.”
“Why? She’s my best friend. She thinks you’re a man.”
“Good. She should.”
“A divorced man.”
Juliana laughed. “So detailed. ”
“You don’t know Aggie. We’ve been friends since first grade. We’ve been through a lot together. Especially lately. She understands a lot more about life than she used to. I could tell her about you. I know she’d understand.”
“Don’t tell her, Al.”
“But—”
“Don’t tell her.”
“Jule, I—I think I’m in love with you.”
“Please don’t say that.”
“But it’s true. I didn’t feel this way with Henry or even Danny, and I think it’s the way you’re sposed to feel when you’re really in love so—”
