Tales of the City 06 - Sure of You

then turned right on Sanchez and climbed another set of stairs to Twentieth Street. Harry knew the route by heart, so since there was no traffic at night, Michael gave him freedom to explore at will. If the dog got too far ahead, he would wait patiently in the green darkness until Michael trudged into view.
    When he reached Twentieth, a woman peeped from behind the curtains of her picture window. Recognizing him—or, more likely, Harry—she gave a chipper little wave. He waved back, realizing she was one of the Golden Girls, Thack’s name for a group of Lithuanian ladies who played gin al fresco at a house down on Sanchez.
    The moon hung fat and lemony over Twin Peaks when he reached the stairs leading down to Noe. He gazed at it contentedly, Harry by his side, until the beeper jolted him out of his reverie. Turning it off, he clipped the leash on Harry again and headed down the stairs toward home.

    “You know what?” said Thack.
    They were both—no, all three—in bed now, Thack snuggled against Michael’s back, Harry burrowed under the new Macy’s comforter, next to Michael’s left calf.
    “What?” asked Michael.
    “I’ve got a great idea for a trellis.”
    “O.K.”
    “We build it,” said Thack, “in the shape of a triangle. And we grow pink flowers on it.”
    “Cute.”
    “I like it.”
    “You would,” said Michael.
    “Really,” said Thack. “We wanted a trellis, and it would…you know, deliver a political message.”
    “Do you think our neighbors really need the message?”
    “Sure. Some of them. Anyway, it’s celebratory.”
    “Can’t we just get a gay flag, like everybody else?”
    “We could,” said Thack. “Like everybody else.” It really wasn’t worth debating. “O.K., fine.”
    “What? A flag or a pink triangle?”
    “The pink triangle. Or both, for that matter. Go crazy.”
    Thack chuckled wickedly. “Be careful. My first idea was to write ’Queer and Present Danger’ above the door.”
    He meant this, probably, so Michael kept his mouth shut.
    “That would piss off ol’ Loomis, wouldn’t it?”
    “Who’s ol’ Loomis?” asked Michael.
    “You know. The guy who bitched about our Douche Larouche sign.”
    “Oh, yeah.”
    “Where the fuck does he think he’s living, anyway? Homophobic old asshole!”
    Michael chuckled and reached behind him to pat Thack’s leg. “You’re such a Shiite.”
    “Well,” said his lover, “somebody’s gotta do it.”

The Designer Bride
    S MOLDERING, MARY ANN LEFT THE SET AND HEADED straight to her dressing room, barely acknowledging the associate producer who stumbled along beside her, pleading his case. “Ilsa and I both talked to her last week,” he said, “and she was a regular Chatty Cathy.”
    “Swell,” she replied curtly. She had all but withered and died out there, and somebody was going to pay for it.
    “If we’d had any idea…”
    “That’s your job, isn’t it? To have some idea? The woman couldn’t utter a complete sentence, Al. Forget sentence. I was lucky if I got ‘yes’ or ‘no’ out of her.”
    “I know…”
    “This is not television, Al. I don’t know what it is, but it’s not television.”
    “Well, at least the audience could empathize.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “Just that…it was understandable.”
    “Oh, really? How so?”
    “Well, I mean…the traumatic aspect.”
    “Al.” She sighed heavily, stopping at the door of her dressing room. “It doesn’t help much to know why, if she’s not communicating with us.”
    “I understand that.”
    “Surely somewhere out there there’s a woman who’s been sodomized by her father and is capable of composing a few coherent sentences on the subject.”
    “But she did when…”
    “I know. When you and Ilsa talked to her. Terrific. Too bad nobody else got to hear it.” She opened the door, then turned and looked at him. “I thought you said she was on Oprah.”
    “She was.”
    “Did she do that to Oprah?”
    He shook his head.
    “So what are you saying? It’s my fault?”
    “I’m not saying anything.”
    “Good answer,” she said, and closed the door on him.

    She was removing her makeup with broad, angry swipes when the phone rang. She hesitated a moment, then picked it up, thinking it might be Burke. She hoped to God he hadn’t seen the show. It was never too late for him to change his mind.
    “Yes?”
    “Mary Ann?” It was a woman’s voice, fluty and frivolous.
    “Who is this, please?”
    “It’s Prue,