Diary of a Blues Goddess (13 page)

That night, over margaritas, Dominique gave us all cucumber masks—including Jack. She painted my nails a fire-engine red. She also got two dozen mauve roses from Terrence but was holding firm on not seeing him. I think she also guessed about Jack and me, but for a change she kept her big mouth shut—probably because she knew it would kill Maggie if she found out, too.

"Margaritas and Mayhem" was our name for violent action movies washed down with margaritas and takeout that we sometimes planned for Mondays. Georgia's Saints got the occasional convention gig on Mondays, but few people marry during the week, so we were often free.

When Maggie had arrived, despite sitting down on the couch practically in Jack's lap, he remained oblivious to her. I spent the night feeling guilty and drinking enough margaritas to slow down the Terminator, which was our flick of choice.

"Let's go out," Dominique said after the movie. Every time she broke up with Terrence, once she got over her initial crying jag, she liked to go out seven nights a week.

"Where?" Maggie brightened.

"What about House of Blues?" Dominique suggested.

"Great. I'll call Tony and see if he wants to meet us there." I was anxious for any reason to avoid being alone with Jack.

I ran upstairs to my room and called Tony's cell phone. He answered on the first ring.

"Wanna go to House of Blues?" I asked him. I knew he liked smaller, intimate clubs, but Dominique favored loud, boisterous places with crowds. The better to make a scene.

"Who's going?"

"Me, Dominique, Jack, Maggie."

"Sure. Meet you there." He hung up.

Typical Tony. Say it in as few words as possible. He was an enigma to me. Something about him was wounded, but he had a way about him, like a tiger in a cage, that made me afraid to ask him what it was.

I opened my closet door and tried to figure out what to change into, when Jack knocked on my door.

"Come in."

He made a beeline for me and kissed me. "I've wanted to do that all night. I just wanted to hold your hand during the movie. Touch you."

"Jack—" I tried to keep the panic out of my voice "—I told you… this is something
very
new for us, and I don't want the whole world knowing until we're sure this is right. And you may think it is right, but I'm not so positive. Not to mention—you're on the rebound."

"Fine… "He backed away from me."I'll be discreet. But you can't blame me for sneaking in a kiss now and then."

"Go get dressed. I'll meet you downstairs."

My head swimming with margaritas, we all climbed into Jack's Buick—Maggie in the front seat—and set out for the House of Blues. As soon as we arrived, found a place to park—easier said than done in New Orleans, like any city I guess—and entered the club, I scoped the crowd for Tony. He spotted us first—not hard to miss a six-foot-something drag queen.

We scored a table and settled in to hear a local acoustic band. They weren't bad, sort of a rock/blues feel, with an excellent guitarist and a lead male vocalist reminiscent of Bob Dylan, scraggly long hair, droopy eyes and all. In between sets, blues standards blared out. Tony asked me to dance and spun me out on the floor.

"Can I ask you something?"

"Sure," I said over the music.

"What's keepin' you here? Your grandmother? Dominique?"

"What do you mean?"

"Georgie… you're wasting your bloody time with the band. I am, too. I play in between blues gigs, but I really need to be shovin' off."

"You can't 'shove off.' Who else would I go to jazz clubs with?"

"Georgie… I can't take another N'Sync song. I can't bloody take it every weekend. So what's holding you here?"

"I don't know. I think I'd like to pretend it's Nan. But it's really being afraid of finding out I'm not good enough to make it."

"Come off of it. You are good enough, and you know that."

"It's also not the easiest thing in the world to look at four guys who count on you, who you vacation with, eat together with, practice with, and spend more time with than anyone else on earth and say, 'Guess what? I'm ditching you all to follow a pipe dream.'"

"What about your da?"

"What about him?"

"Well… he was this great bluesman. Don't you think he'd want you to go for it?"

"His opinion doesn't much matter, Tony. He's long gone."

"But what if you found him? What if you could ask him?"

"Tony… for all I know, he's dead."

"You'd know if he was."

"How?"

"You'd feel it."

He didn't say anything else, just danced close to me. He was right, of course. About needing to find out once and for all whether I had it or not… and needing to stop hiding behind the band. And Nan. I knew she'd be the first person to push me out the door. I leaned my head on his shoulder. Then I spotted trouble clear across the club.

"Oh shit!" I stopped dancing.

"What?"

"Dominique is handing out condoms to those bikers over there. When she and Terrence are broken up, she has a suicide wish, I swear it."

Tony, Jack and I dashed over to the bar to corral Dominique who was on her Safe Sex Soapbox. Give her a few margaritas and she'll dig through her purse and hand out rubbers to anyone. Even senior citizens. Some people find her endearing. Some sure as hell do not.

"Dominique… come on," Jack urged.

"I'm just talking to my new friends," she slurred.

"We're sorry," I looked at the stone-faced guy she had been lecturing. He had a huge salt-and-pepper mustache and biceps the size of my thighs. "She's had a little too much to drink."

"I have not!" she insisted.

"Keep a leash on her then," the biker said to us.

"Hey… " Tony got up in the guy's face. "That's no way to speak about a lady."

The guy with the mustache stared down Tony, but I think he saw the same tiger-in-a-cage look I did. "I didn't mean anything by it."

"Back the fuck off."

The guy threw his hands up and turned around to get another drink at the bar. We all backed away, all the while Dominique was blabbing, "We all need to practice safe sex. We all need to love each other but practice safe sex."

"Shut up!" Jack urged her. "One of these days you'll get us all killed."

We paid our bill, left the bar and poured Dominique into the car.

Tony leaned in to say good-night to her. Standing up, he shut her door, then kissed me on the cheek. "Don't forget what I said."

"I won't." I climbed in with Maggie and Jack in the front seat, and we shut the car door and headed off down the street. Dominique serenaded us with the first four songs of her act, stretched out across the back seat, her huge platform shoes up on window. We dropped off Maggie, who of course leaned over to kiss Jack, and then headed to the Heartbreak Hotel.

I dragged Dominique upstairs.

"I need to take off my makeup," she whined. "It's not good to sleep in it."

Turning to Jack, I said, "Let me get her to sleep. I'll see you in the morning."

He sighed. "I hear you. Good luck and good night…"

"'Night, Dominique."

"'Night, Jack."

I struggled to get Dominique into her room and shut the door. Taking cold cream out of a jar, I smeared it all over her face. "You owe me one, girlfriend," she whispered.

"No. Seems you owe me one. You could have been killed back there. Save the safe-sex speeches for guys who don't drive Harleys."

"Yes. But Jack was getting pissed at Tony. And frankly, I just got you out of having to deal with him."

"You're less drunk than I thought you were," I snapped, and smeared an extra big glob of cold cream across her nose.

"Honey, I can hold
my
liquor."

"You bitch!" I squealed.

"Honey… Jack isn't the one for you. Casanova Jones is. Don't be fucking this all up."

"Dominique," I said through gritted teeth. "I haven't even met him for a damn cocktail yet."

"Don't get snappy with me, just 'cause I know what's best for you."

"All right, Miss Know-it-all, if you know what's best for me, do you think I should leave the band permanently? Look for a jazz gig?"

Dominique sat up. "Pass me a tissue. I can't think with all this cold cream on my face."

I handed her the box.

"Honey," she sighed. "I'd love to hold on to you forever… But remember when I left for New York?"

I nodded. Though, of course, Dominique hadn't left for New York. Damon had.

"I'll be lost without you," I had wailed.

Damon shrugged, sticking his hands deeper down into his pockets.

"I'm suffocating in this city, Georgia. I know I'm gay. But I don't know what that means."

"It means you like men. What kind of a statement is that?"

He wore a loose pair of Levi's and a crisp white oxford, a pair of penny loafers. His father had thrown him out of the house, but Damon still ironed everything as if it was going to be inspected. Every crease was so sharp, they looked as if you'd cut your finger on them. His only rebellion was a single earring in his right ear. Small. A tiny rhinestone stud that I'd bought him—the piercing was courtesy of me, too.

"Georgia, except for knowing I'm gay, I don't know what that means for me. Am I going to live 'out'? Am I going to go crawling back to my father… ? I miss my mother. I miss my sister. Of course, they hide behind him. They won't dare go against him."

"So why can't you just stay here with Nan and me?"

"Because it's something I have to figure out alone. As a… gay man. I need to go to New York City. Rob is there."

Rob was Damon's first and only lover. When Rob left for NYU, they'd split up but remained friends.

"What will you do?"

"Get a job. Take some courses. Get laid. A lot." He grinned. "Figure it all out. Every time I drive through town, Georgia, I find myself gripping the steering wheel to keep from driving home to see my sister. I feel like running in there and telling them, 'I was only kidding! Can't you all take a joke?' But I can't do that. It's not a joke."

"Just promise me New York won't change you."

"Cross my heart." He had winked at me.

Two years later, he came back as a drag queen.

"I'd miss you." I looked at Dominique.

"Of course, candy lips. I'd miss you, too."

"I'll muddle through this all."

"You always do. With a little kick in the ass from me."

I kissed her on the forehead. "You know, when you came back, you were just a
little
different. What if we hadn't been able to stay friends?"

"Georgia, a little thing like phony tits on a man wouldn't stand in the way of real friendship. If you leave… we'll all go on. And when you come back, we'll just open our arms and welcome you home. That's how it works."

I stood. "You still have cold cream on your chin." She reached up with a tissue. "What a woman does for beauty… Now go to bed."

Alone in my room, I put on a blues album. Softly. Nan was right. The blues make you crave someone to love.