S.E.C.R.E.T.: An Erotic Novel (26 page)

Matilda was admiring my pictures as I yammered on in the coach house about how exciting
it had been to hit the slopes again. I told her about the mini-moguls on Blackcomb
Mountain, where I spent my last day. Danica came over to us with coffees and cooed
over a photo Marcel had taken of Theo and me enjoying our fondue.

“He is keee-yoot,” she said, before ducking away and leaving Matilda and me alone.

When I had told her about Theo, she was delighted. She asked me how we met, what he
said, what I said. Then I told her about … what we did.

“Did you enjoy it?” she asked.

“Yes,” I said. “I’d do it again, maybe. With the right partner. Someone I could trust.”

“Cassie, I have something for you,” she said, opening a drawer in the desk and pulling
out a small wooden box.

She opened the box. The Step Eight charm looked dazzling against its black velvet
background.

“But, I thought Theo was just some random guy, not a participant.”

“It doesn’t matter if he was part of our society or not.”

“I don’t understand.”

“This Step is
Bravery
, which is different from courage because bravery requires you take risks without
overthinking things.
Bravery
says, ‘Go for it.’ So, whether or not Theo is part of S.E.C.R.E.T. is irrelevant.
You’ve earned this charm.”

I plucked the charm from the box, turned it over in my hand and then clicked it into
place on my bracelet. I gave my wrist a shake and admired the twinkling charms. So
was Theo a random stranger drawn to me naturally? Or was he involved in S.E.C.R.E.T?
I couldn’t figure it out. But perhaps Matilda was right: it didn’t matter.

“I’ll allow myself to believe I attracted Theo,” I said, “Though I still have my doubts.”

“Good, Cassie. No more being a wallflower. You, my dear, have blossomed.”

F
or the weeks leading up to Mardi Gras, the whole city of New Orleans takes on the
spirit of a bride making last-minute preparations for her big day. No matter that
the festivities take place this year, and next year, and every year, each Mardi Gras
feels like the last, best one.

When I first moved here, I was fascinated by the krewes, the groups, some ancient,
some modern, that put on the balls and built the floats for Mardi Gras parades. Mostly,
I wondered why you’d spend so much of your spare time sewing costumes and gluing sequins.
But after living here for a few years I began to understand the fatalistic nature
of the average New Orleanian. People in this city tend to live and love vividly for
today.

Even if I had wanted to join a krewe, many of the older ones—with names like Proteus,
Rex and Bacchus—were downright impossible to get into, unless your bloodline was that
of Bayou royalty. But nearing the end of my time with S.E.C.R.E.T., I began to feel
that strong tug to belong to
someone or something—which is, after all, the only antidote to loneliness. I was starting
to see that melancholy isn’t romantic. It’s just a prettier word for
depression
.

In the month before Mardi Gras, I couldn’t walk down a street in Marigny or Tremé,
let alone the French Quarter, without envying those sewing circles gathered on a porch,
hand-stitching sparkly costumes and securing sequins to elaborate masks or sky-high
feathered headdresses. Other nights, I’d take a run through the Warehouse District
and spot, through a crack in a door, spray-painters in masks putting the finishing
touches on a vivid float. My heart would skip a beat and I was able to let in a little
joy.

But there was one event that struck my heart with sheer, unadulterated terror: the
annual Les Filles de Frenchmen Revue, a Mardi Gras burlesque show featuring the women
who worked at the bars and restaurants in Marigny. It was considered a sexy way for
our neighborhood to celebrate, and every year Tracina, one of the lead organizers,
perfunctorily asked if I wanted to participate. Every year I said no. Unequivocally
no. Will allowed Les Filles to use the second floor of the Café to rehearse their
dances, never failing to mention that if twenty girls can stomp around upstairs without
falling through the ancient floorboards, surely twenty customers quietly sitting and
eating wouldn’t pose any danger either.

This year, not only did Tracina fail to ask me to participate, she also bowed out
of the revue herself, citing family obligations. Will told me her brother’s condition
was getting
more complicated to deal with as he hit adolescence, something I tried then to keep
in mind whenever I was on the cusp of criticizing her.

I was surprised when Will put the gears to me about joining Les Filles.

“Come on, Cassie. Who’s going to represent Café Rose at the Revue?”

“Dell. She has really nice legs,” I said, avoiding eye contact with him while wiping
down the coffee station.

“But—”

“No. That’s my final answer.” I dumped the tray of empty milk cartons into the trash
to punctuate my decision.

“Coward,” Will teased.

“I’ll have you know, Mr. Foret, that I’ve done a few things this year that would set
your teeth chattering. It just so happens that I know the limits of my courage. And
that means
not
shaking my tits at a crowd of drunk men.”

The night of the Revue, I was closing the Café for Tracina for the second time that
week. At eight o’clock sharp, while turning over the chairs to do the mopping, I heard
the dancers upstairs practicing one last time—a dozen graceful ponies set loose above
my head. I could hear each “Fille” perform her individual routine for the group to
raucous laughter, hooting and whistling. Those familiar feelings of loneliness and
inferiority returned to me then, along with the thought that I’d be ridiculed if I
ever attempted such a thing. At thirty-five, almost thirty-six, I’d be the oldest
dancer next to Steamboat Betty and Kit DeMarco. Kit was a
bartender from the Spotted Cat, who at forty-one could still pull off a blue pixie
hair-do and denim cutoffs. Steamboat Betty manned the antique cigarette booth at Snug
Harbor and performed every year wearing the same burlesque outfit she claimed to have
worn for thirty-six years in a row, never failing to boast that it still—sort of—fit
her. Plus, there was no way I could dance next to Angela Rejean, a statuesque Haitian
goddess who worked as a hostess at Maison and was a jazz singer on the side. Her body
was so perfect that it made being jealous kind of pointless.

After completing my shut-down duties, I headed upstairs to hand the keys to Kit, who
had offered to lock up after they were done. The review didn’t start until after 10
p.m. The girls would rehearse up until the last minute, and in the meantime, I wanted
to go home and shower off the day. I had hoped to see Will at the show, but earlier
in the day, when I asked him if he and Tracina were going to attend the event, he
had shrugged noncommittally.

At the top of the stairs, I stepped past a new girl, with blond corkscrew curls, sitting
cross-legged on the floor holding a hand-mirror. She was applying false eyelashes
with expert precision. I couldn’t tell if her hair was a wig or real, but it was mesmerizing.
A dozen more girls in various stages of undress were sitting or standing about, all
getting ready for the big night, coats piled on the old mattress Will kept on the
floor and sometimes slept on. Besides the mattress, the only other furniture up here
was a broken wooden chair, which I’d sometimes find Will straddling,
lost in thought, his chin resting on the back. The Café was a big empty space, perfect
for a temporary rehearsal room. We closed early, were only a few doors down from the
Blue Nile, which was hosting the event this year, and the bathroom upstairs was brand-new,
though still lacking a door. Several women, one topless, were craning around the bathroom
mirror, taking turns applying stage makeup. Curling irons and hair straighteners were
plugged in everywhere. Bright costumes, feather boas and masks added festivity to
the usually dull, gray room.

I found Kit, in a strapless bra and stockings, tapping out a dance sequence, her costume
hanging on the exposed brick wall like a piece of art. She had had it specially made,
a white lace bodice on a black satin backdrop, with scalloped pink trim around the
sweetheart-cut front-piece. The laces up the back were pink too. I reached out to
touch it, but shuddered when my fingers brushed the satin, memories of being blindfolded
returning to me in a hot rush. I could never pull off what Kit and the rest of the
girls were about to do in front of a room full of people—not without a blindfold.

“Hey, Cass. Make sure you thank Will for letting us stay after closing. I’ll get the
keys back to you at the Blue Nile,” she said, not missing a beat with her feet. “You’re
coming tonight, right?”

“I never miss it.”

“You should dance with us one year, Cassie,” yelled Angela from the cluster of girls
crowding the washroom.

I felt flattered by her attention, but said, “I’d make a total fool of myself.”

“You’re
supposed
to make a fool of yourself. That’s what makes it sexy,” she crooned.

The other women laughed and nodded while Kit gave me a little shake of her behind.
“Do dykes normally dress like this?” Kit asked me teasingly.

When she came out a couple of years ago, the only person who was surprised was Will.
“Typical hetero,” Tracina had said, rolling her eyes at him. “Just because she dresses
sexy, you think it’s all for male attention.”

Kit had begun dressing sexier after she came out and got a steady girlfriend. And
tonight she had drawn a mole by her mouth and was wearing false eyelashes and the
reddest shade of lipstick I’d ever seen. She’d grown the blue pixie cutout into a
longer, very attractive shag. Still, her exaggerated girlishness contrasted with her
trademark cowboy boots and the black terry-cloth sweatbands that she always wore around
both wrists.

“Maybe I’ll join you guys next year, Kit,” I said, kind of meaning it.

“Promise?”

“No.” I laughed.

I wished the girls luck and ducked down the stairs, but at the bottom, I realized
that I had forgotten to hand Kit the keys! As I turned to run back up, I smashed headlong
into Kit herself, who was heading down, probably having had the same realization.
Instead of bouncing off me, she completely
lost her footing and slid down the last five steps, landing butt first on the hard
tile floor. Luckily, I was wearing sneakers.

“Kit!”

“Jesus crap,” she groaned, rolling over onto her side.

“Are you okay?”

“I think I broke my ass!”

I clambered down the remaining steps to her. “Oh my God! I’m so sorry! Let me help
you!”

By then Angela, in four-inch stilettos, was making her way carefully down, a bright
pink boa draped over her shoulders and wrapped around her wrists.

Kit lay perfectly still. “Don’t move me, Ange. Oh. This isn’t good. It’s not my ass.
It’s my tailbone.”

“Oh dear!” Angela cried, crouching over her. “Can you sit up? Can you feel your legs?
Are you seeing double? Who am I? Who is the president? Should I call an ambulance?”

Without waiting for a reply, Angela made her unsteady way to the kitchen phone. I
watched Kit attempt to right herself, wince, and lay back down.

“Cassie,” she whispered.

I crawled closer. “What is it, Kit?”

“Cassie … this floor … is
really
dirty.”

“I know. I’m sorry,” I said. I was about to take her hand to console her, when I noticed
her fall had caused one of her wristbands to shift, exposing a portion of a shiny
gold bracelet—a S.E.C.R.E.T. bracelet! Covered in charms!

A look passed between us.

“What the—?”

“My ass is just fine, Cassie. And one more thing,” Kit whispered, crooking her finger
to bring me closer. I leaned towards her lipsticked mouth. “Do you … accept your final
Step?”

“Do I
what
? With
you
? I mean, you’re adorable and everything, Kit, but—”

A smile played across her lips as she sat up. “Relax, I’m not a participant. But I
have been asked to nudge you forward. You’re almost there, girl. Now’s not the time
to back down. Not when it’s about to get
really
fun!”

When we heard Angela returning from the kitchen, Kit collapsed back to the floor,
fake-groaning all over again.

“This is a problem,” Angela said, hands on her hips.

“I know. I mean, who will dance in my place?” Kit asked, an arm dramatically flung
over her eyes. “Who can we get on such short notice?”

“I don’t know,” said Angela.

Was she in on this too?

“I mean, who do we know who’s free tonight? And cute? And could
totally fit into my costume
?” Kit asked.

“Hard to say,” said Angela, never taking her mischievous eyes off me.

I’d known Kit for years, but I thought she’d
always
been like this: confident, dynamic, strong. To be in S.E.C.R.E.T., she must have
gone through a time of great fear and self-doubt. Yet she showed no sign of that now.
Then there was Angela, a stunning example of physical perfection if there ever was
one. Yet knowing what I knew about S.E.C.R.E.T
and how they pick participants, why was I still so surprised to find that when the
pink boa slipped off her arms, Angela was wearing a bracelet too?