W e took the IRT to Sheridan Square and crossed Seventh Avenue. Village Cigars, the triangular red and white store on the corner across from us was still there selling cigarettes, cigars, pipes, candy. Although I never went inside when I lived in this neighborhood, I liked seeing it there. It was like a lighthouse announcing, “You’re home.” But today as I walked beside Deb, I thought, “What show can I put up, that’ll make money, so we don’t have to sell The Haven” I crossed the street unconscious of lights and traffic. I promised Max I’d come up with something. I made it sound like a shoo-in. Bluffing. But there must be some grand lifesaving… I was blank. Don’t worry—worry kills creative ideas—it’ll come.
I don’t know why I didn’t just put Deb on the subway at Times Square and go back to the Mt. Olympus. I doubt she needed my protection. She just climbed up the side of a building. It was Max. Forbidding her to come to the club? Gay girls who knew their place? What was that about? Sure, she was dressed strange—kinda butch-like, but he went to extremes calling her dangerous. She was just a kid. What could she do to our clubs? Now, I was the being naïve. She might not mean to, but she could bring us down by talking to the wrong person. Especially now with the mob breathing down our throats. What did I know about her? Nothing. Max was right. That made me madder. I walked faster, my fists pumping at my side. I wanted to scream at … I don’t know. Everything. And that gun?
“Hey, wait up,” Deb yelled, running to catch up with me. You don’t even know where you’re going. Why so fast?”
I slowed down. “Sorry.”
“My apartment is up this street. Christopher,” she said, as we passed. “Do you know the Village?”
“I used to live here.”
“Word from the bird?”
“What?”
“Oh, I forgot. You’re from another planet. It means, honest, like Girl Scout’s honor.”
“Then, yes, word from the bird. Over on Milligan Place.”
“Cool.”
“It was.” I had a quick flash of Aggie jumping on the bed to avoid a rat with me chasing the thing with a baseball bat. “Milligan was the only set of apartments that had steam heat back then; all the other apartments around here were still using coal.”
“You must be really old,” Deb said.
“Yes. Very.”
“That’s okay. I like older women.”
I couldn’t think of a thing to say to that.
We passed one beaten up brownstone after another. Laundry hung from fire escapes. The August sun was bright and hot. We walked by a couple of little Negro kids who had opened the fire hydrant and was playing in the water spray. We stepped around the spray trying not to get wet, but with the heat I think I would’ve loved to run through that hydrant of spraying water with them. What a bore to always have to pose as a grown-up. I envied Deb her pants.
Two teenage boys in blue jeans and pompadours with DA’s walked toward us, one of them, the blonde, held a transistor radio to his ear, moving to a beat only he could hear. The dark-haired one stopped in front of us, blocking our way. The blonde kid hurried to join him. The dark haired one whistled, looking me up and down, “Classy chassis, dolly.”
“Drop dead, creep,” Deb said.
“Deb!” I tried to walk around him, —"If you’ll excuse us.”— but he stood in my way.
“Cut it out, Stan,” the blonde said. “That ain’t no dolly. She’s gotta be as old as your Mama. Now, let’s go. I promised my mother…”
“You’re mother?” Deb laughed. “Yeah, go home to your Mommy.”
“Deb,” I whispered signaling her to stop needling them. “Excuse me,” I said to the dark-haired kid, trying to step around him. He hit my shoulder hard, pushing me back.
“Hey, Larry!” Stan said to his friend who stood biting his fingernails. “I think we got ourselves a coupla dykes. That what you two are, ain’t ya? Muff-suckin’ queers?”
“Hey!” My anger jumped to the edge. “You don’t get to speak to me that way. I haven’t done anything to you. And like your friend said, I’m old enough to be your Mama. Show me some respect. Now, get outta our way, you—you juvenile delinquents.”
Deb looked at me, shocked. “Al?”
I tried to move past Stan again, but this time he pushed both his hands against my shoulders and almost knocked me over. “You don’t go till I say so, queer. You the girl, huh?” He stuck his face in mine. “And you the boy?” He said to Deb, laughing.
“Stan,” Larry said, “Let’s go. My mother’s waiting for me and she’ll kill me if…”
“She gonna give you a spanking?” Deb said, sticking her tongue out at him.
“Deb, that’s enough!” I tried again to get past them.
Stan shoved both of us. “You listen to your old grandma friend like a good boy.” He slapped Deb in the face.
“Hey!” I yelled. “Quit that.”
“Make me!” He slapped her again.
“Stop! Stop!” Deb cried, covering her face.
I threw the shoulder strap of my alligator purse over my head to secure it and grabbed Deb away from him. Tears poured down her face. “Don’t hurt me, don’t hurt me.”
I put my arm around her. “Come on Deb, we’re going now and we’re not lettin’ these twerps stop us.” I saw an opening while Stan was consulting with Larry and I ran hanging on to Deb’s wrist and pulling her down the street.
“Hey, you pinko commie dyke,” Stan yelled from behind me. “We’re not finished with you yet. Hey, Larry, get over here. Help me, will ya?”
“I’m goin’ home,” Larry yelled.
“Dammit, Larry are you gonna keep weepin’ ‘bout your Mommy when this queer insulted you?”
“Where’s your place?” I asked Deb.
“Up there. We’re almost… Are they following us?”
“Yeah, we are!” Both Stan and Larry yelled from behind us.
“Hurry, Al, run faster! Don’t let go of me.”
“I got ya.”
Stan caught up with me. I could smell his sweat. I pushed my legs faster, faster. I could barely catch my breath, but I had to keep going. Deb slipped from my grasp. I backed up to get her. Stan grabbed the collar of my blouse. I felt his sweaty fingers against the back of my neck and thought I would vomit.
“I can’t, I can’t keep…,” Deb was crying on the sidewalk. With Stan still hanging onto my collar I reached down and pulled her by her arm. I started running with her, but Stan kept pulling me back by the collar. The top button was choking me so bad I couldn’t breathe. I had to let go of Deb. He dragged me, gasping for breath toward a brownstone and pushed me down onto the porch, holding me there. The edge of the step pushed into my back and scraped my one hand that was stuck under my body. He got on top of me, and I twisted around under his weight. I balled up my free hand and punched him hard in his cheek.
Deb ran over and banged on his back with her fists. “Get off her. Get off!”
A fury came over him and he tore open my blouse, buttons flew every which way. He looked like he wanted to do more but wasn’t sure what or how.
“Hey, cut that out! Leave her alone,” a little Negro boy playing by the fire hydrant yelled. “I’m gonna tell my Moms!” He ran off calling, “Momma! Momma!”
Stan jumped up. “Hey! Get back here you little nigger brat,” Stan yelled, throwing a rock at the kid.
I jumped up and ran toward Deb.
“Who needs you, you stupid faggot girl?” Stan yelled at me.
“Here, Al, here!” Deb called from a couple buildings down. As I landed on the steps next to Deb, I heard Larry saying, “They’re nothin’ but a couple of dirty lezzies, Stan. Dullsville. I gotta go.”
We rushed through the door of Deb’s apartment building scared those guys would dash in behind us. It was shadowy and cool inside with doors upon doors lining either side of the wide hallway. Deb led the way to a set of steps. I turned to be sure those guys weren’t hiding in some shadow. My hand hurt. I looked at my knuckles. They were scratched and scraped and spotted with blood and when I opened my fingers all the way they ached. Still, I basked in my silent moment of pride. I hit something. I’d never hit anyone before in my life. I liked hitting that guy. I liked it a lot. But I hadn’t stopped him. A girl’s punch, what’s that?
Deb and I dashed up the stairs. As we neared the top, Deb thrust her hands in each of her four pockets, two in front, two in back desperately looking for the key. She found it, dropped it, picked it up, dropped it. My eyes searched through the shadows that crawled over the walls for those guys, hoping not to see them.
“Hurry! Hurry!” I yelled, what if they come up here?”
Deb picked up the key again and shoved it into the keyhole; we ran through her door as if something were still chasing us. We stopped short in front of a bed, breathing. Deb closed the door behind us. Breathing got easier.
The room was small with one twin bed in the center. No bedspread. Only a blanket hastily thrown over a white sheet. A heavy oakwood dresser was pushed against the wall next to the curtainless window that was badly in need of washing. A lace doily ran over the top of the dresser with a hotplate sitting to the side. No pictures of family anywhere. A few dust bunnies scurried across the floor. She seemed too young to be all on her own. I wondered where her family was. “Wasn’t that fun?” Deb announced, bouncing onto her bed.
“Fun?” I yelled. “No! That was not fun!” I pulled my purse from my shoulder and threw it to the floor. “Why didn’t I hit them with that useless thing, instead of my hand.” I kicked it across the floor. “I’m a damn mess!” I looked down at my torn open blouse. “Don’t you realize we coulda been killed?”
“No, I don’t think they would’ve done that. Do you?”
“If it hadn’t been for that Negro kid playing out front, there’s no telling what they woulda done. Jeeze, they won’t even let us walk down the darn streets. How do you stand it?” I picked up my purse.
“Do you really think that Negro kid saved us?”
“Well, he sure didn’t hurt.”
“You like Negro kids?”
“I’m especially fond of that one. Why such a strange question?”
“No reason.” She hopped up onto her bed. “Have a seat.” She patted the spot beside her.
There was no other place to sit. Not one chair in her apartment. And there was the issue of the blouse. “Uh, Deb. My blouse? I can’t go on the subway like this.”
“Oh, sure.” Deb bounced off the bed and skipped over to the dresser to pull out a couple of tee shirts. “I don’t really have much.” She rummaged through her top drawer. “And there’s not really anything left from my femme days because I never had any femme days. This is all I have? Which do you like best?”
She held up two tee-shirts, one with a big decal of Donald Duck and the other with the face of Elmer Fudd.
0h, jeepers, what a choice.
“I guess I’ll go with Donald Duck,” I said.
“My favorite!”
“Oh. If it’s your favorite, I can wear Elmer Fudd.”
“No, I want you to wear my favorite. Here.” She handed me the Donald Duck tee shirt and stood holding onto her bedpost as if waiting for a show.
“Uh, is there somewhere I could change?”
“Right here.” She had this goofy expression on her face.
“A little privacy? This door…?” I pulled. “The bathroom?”
“Oh. Okay. If you want. But we are both girls.”
I closed the door thinking, no we’re not . Not the way you mean it.
I took off my blouse, threw it in Deb’s trash and pulled the tee shirt over my head. It was much too big for me, but it would have to do. I looked in the medicine cabinet mirror that hung over the sink. Donald Duck sitting in the middle of my chest looked as ridiculous as I… Why do they hate us so much? Why does just our presence turn them into monsters? We weren’t doing anything. Just walking down, a darn street. I folded both hands into fists. The one that was scraped from being forced against the stoop hurt; I opened that fist and a few blood drops bubbled onto my two fingers. The other hand, the one that had hit him, was starting to turn purple around the knuckles. They both hurt, but each hurt different. I almost got manhandled by some overgrown child and now I’m wearing a potato sack with a big ugly picture of Donald Duck and …! I started to laugh. I laughed at the ridiculousness of it all. I laughed and laughed until tears flooded my face. Deb knocked on the door. “You all right in there?”
I sucked in my breath. “Yeah. Be right out.”
I reached into my purse for a comb and gave my hair some cursory attention. Not much more I could do. It had gone flat. That meant sleeping on curlers that night. Oh, how I hated curlers. I turned on the faucet and splashed some water over my eyes and dried them with the towel that hung crookedly over the shower rod where the shower curtain should’ve been.
I felt the sting of my knuckles and stared at the skin the porch cement had ripped up. I opened the medicine chest to see if Deb had any Mercurochrome. Her medicine cabinet was packed with stuff. It had to be in there. Everyone had Mercurochrome so I’d expect even Deb …“Bingo! Mercurochrome.”
I took out the familiar bottle, painted the red stuff over my knuckles, and returned it to the shelf. Purse in hand, I opened the bathroom door.
“Hi,” Deb said, backing away. I was sure she’d been listening at the door. Listening for what I couldn’t imagine.
“Hey! It looks good on you. Sit. Tell me about you.” She hopped onto the bed and patted the space beside her.
“I can’t stay long.” I opted to sit on the end of the bed, so she didn’t think I was interested. “I don’t know anything about you ,” I said. “You already know quite a lot about me. Oh, I hope you don’t mind; I used a little of your mercurochrome on my knuckles.”
“Be my guest. I know a lot about you. Like what?”
“You know I had a special friend. You know where I work. You’ve even met my boss.”
“I could’ve done without that ‘pleasure.’ He’s against my cause.”
“What’s your cause?”
“Equal rights for homosexuals.”
I laughed. “I think you’re one of the few fighting for that one. You’re going to get pretty lonely.”
She slid off her bed—You’re wrong.”—and sat on the floor where my feet dangled. “You wanna make out and then I’ll tell you why you’re wrong?”
“No. I really should be going. I have work to do. I’ll wash your tee shirt and bring it back to you. Thanks for lending it to me.”
“I think you’re the ginchiest,” she said, looking up at me. “Have you ever made out with a woman?”
“You know I have. I told you I had a special friend.”
“That doesn’t mean you—did things. Not all girls do, but you did, huh?”
“I better go.” I went toward the door.
“Did I do something wrong?” She followed me and stood so close I could hardly move.
I stepped back. “No. You didn’t do anything wrong. I’ll see you tonight at the Bagatelle, won’t I? Freddie-Faye invited me to go there tonight. I’ve never been to the Bagatelle. Is it nice?”
“It’s okay. It’s ours.”
“I’ll see you tonight, then. Uh, Deb…?”
“Yeah?”
“The thing that happened today. With those boys. Has that happened to you before?”
“Of course. Not as bad as today maybe. A lot less in the Village. It’s more common in other parts of the city. But sure, stuff like that happens. You learn to live with it.”
“I don’t want to learn to live with it! They have no right…!”
“I know. Join my cause so they know it, too.