Tats Too (34 page)

“I didn’t know there were tit rules,” I say.

“Of course there are. But I don’t have time to explain them all to you right now.” She nods to Rachel and orders, “Introduce them. We’ll see what the girls have to say.”

Rachel heads for the door. “Wait,” I say, grabbing her by the elbow. “Don’t we need drag queen names?”

“Did you hear anything I just said?” Lulu spits, putting her fists on her hips.

I take a couple of steps backward, trying to give myself some reflex time.

Lulu gestures both hands symmetrically up and down her body, referring to herself in the third person, “Lulu is grand marshall of the Gay Pride Parade not because she’s a drag queen. But because she is a woman, a lesbian and the epitome of flawlessness. She is not a drag queen. She is everything that drag queens adore and revere.”

“So, what you’re saying is that you’re like a drag queen
queen.”

She squints one eye at me. “Yes.”

I offer up, “But I’m in drag. So, I want a drag name.”

Lulu looks up at Vivian and asks, “Is she always this way?”

“No. Sometimes she’s worse.”

Rachel comes to my rescue with “Okay, quick way to get drag queen names. Your first name is the name of the first pet you ever had. Your last name is the name of the street you grew up on.”

We all think for a moment.

Vivian pipes up with a giggle and says, “That makes me Weenie Jones.”

I laugh. “Weenie Jones…Weenie?”

“He was a wiener dog. Gimme a break, I was three. What’s your name?”

“Choo-choo Walnut,” I respond in my most dignified tone.

“Choo-choo?” she laughs.

“Hey, I liked trains.”

“Fer chrissakes,” Lulu mutters. “Okay, Rachel, introduce them. Throw them to the sharks.”

Rachel takes three steps to the bedroom door, opens it, then quickly shuts it and says, “Should I use their new drag queen names?”

“No!” we all three shout at once.

Rachel flings open the door and the tangle of voices in the living room hush. She assumes her master of ceremonies stance and in a ringmaster’s vibrato announces, “And, now, without further ado, introducing…the irresistible, the tempestuous, the flawless—the hostess with the mostest: Lu…lu!”

Vivian sallies forth into the din of expectant, tentative applause. She freezes, stretches out her arms, one held above her head like an inverted C and the other at her side like an upside down question mark. She tilts her chin high, daring anybody to not openly admire the womanly perfection that is her.

The biggest Liza and a Cher grab Vivian under her elbows and lift her to the top of the coffee table, Ann-Margret style.

“Ooooohhhhh,” the crowd inhales.

“Aaaaaahhhh,” the crowd exhales.

Rachel moves under Vivian and booms, “Ladies! Introducing… the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll, the Hillbilly Cat, The Memphis Flash…
(I swear I can hear a drumroll) Elvis the Pelvis!”

I wish I had a microphone with a cord to whip about, but I make do with a hairbrush. I don’t just enter the living room, I splash into the living room. I pose left with brush held high. I jump right for another pose. I jump onto the coffee table, land on my knees with arms outstretched to my adoring fans just below the footlights.

Nobody breathes.

And just when I figure I’ve never been more embarrassed in my life, the room rips into applause. They hoot and holler and fan themselves.

I stand up next to Vivian and give my adoring public a few pelvic thrusts.

They scream and beg for more.

Vivian and I laugh and wrap our arms around each other. We stand still and allow all the drag queens to pet and fondle us.

I’m just shoving Tina’s hands away from a little too much overt petting when the front door crashes open and Mikey and her Lick of lesbians pour into the living room.

Mikey, Anything, Cat and Scratch, Toxic and Shock, and about a dozen other bikers I’ve never met fan out along the far wall. (Poke is conspicuously missing.)

The drag queens turn to the bikers. Both sides face off like the Earps and the Clantons at the O.K. Corral. It’s Lulu who saves the day by pushing her way through the queens and boldly approaching Mikey.

Mikey eyeballs Lulu’s attributes and smiles sloppily. “Hey, Tits.”

“I’m her sister,” Lulu says, and regal queen that she is, extends her hand to Mikey who stares at it dumbfounded for a whole thirty seconds, then surprises everybody by gently lifting the hand to her lips and kissing it.

All the drag queens applaud. Lulu turns to her Flame, shushes them with a raised hand, and says simply, “Our butches are here! Ladies, show them a proper welcoming!”

All the queens flitter and flutter around Mikey and her gang like moths near a lightbulb. They pet, paw and fawn over the bikers until each and every one of them is glowing red and
wearing big, toothy smiles from all the attention.

***

So, I look like Rachel as Elvis and Rachel’s dressed as me. (One of the drag queens loaned her a dreadlocks wig.) Lulu looks like Vivian and Vivian is dressed as Lulu. If all this sounds complicated and confusing, that’s because it is.

It’s a crazy plan. The old
Parent Trap
switcheroo again. But it’s so crazy it just might work. The Mafia and FBI are supposed to see Rachel and Lulu, think it’s us and be led on a wild goose chase. This will free up me and Vivian (after our grand marshalling duties) to get to the coffin factory, find the diamond and get the hell out of the country.

Foolproof.

But not as easy as it sounds. Especially when you’re standing on a giant tinfoil Charmin rose petal float riding down the middle of the drag in Las Vegas. I’m doing the Elvis pelvis-shaking thing, but that has more to do with the bumps in the road than any skill on my part. “Blue Suede Shoes” is blaring from the speaker system and my lip curl is getting more sincere by the block.

Vivian has the easy part. She’s just standing up high on the float behind me like the Statue of Liberty, holding a phallic-looking gold scepter and doing the “twist a lightbulb” wave.

I’ve learned two important things in the past hour or so. #1—Polyester is itchy. It’ll also chafe your tender parts if you don’t wear underwear. #2—Jesus loves a parade. He even has his own float. He’s right in front of us, sans the old rugged cross, throwing fish and loaves to the masses lining the streets.

Okay, not really. He’s really tossing little packages of condoms.

Our float is surrounded by its very own secret service personnel: Dykes on bikes. Mikey’s riding in front of us, right next to the decoy me and Viv (Rachel and Lulu) and the rest of the gang is circling their wagons around us. That way any bad guys (Mafia or Feebies) catch on to our charade, they have to punch their way through our protective layer first.

Lulu is an organizational genius. She figured out this whole plan in less time than it takes Fred to yell “Yabba Dabba Do!” She even came up with our secret word “rhubarb.” I think rhubarb is an excellent word because it’s one you don’t just say everyday in normal conversation and it’s so weird that it sticks out like a sore thumb.

Oh, shit. I see the Goodfellas. They’re up on the right, standing on the sidewalk scanning the parade and the crowd.

I cup my hands around my mouth and yell, “Rhubarb!”

Okay, nobody heard me yell the secret word because the music drowned me out and the music is being drowned out by all the Harley engines.

I try it one more time, “Rhubarb!”

No luck.

Good word, but we hadn’t figured on not being able to hear it over all the ruckus.

I do the only thing I can do. I twirl my mic and cord like I’m Indiana Jones, crack the whip and boink Lulu in back of her helmet.

She grabs her helmet and turns in the seat to look at me. I use my eyes to point up ahead and to the right. She twists back around and peers over Rachel’s right shoulder.

When she spots the Goodfellas, she lowers her face shield and hand signals Mikey. Good, she’s got it under control and we’re all set to enter phase B of plan A.

Phase B is simple. Rachel and Lulu are supposed to lower their helmet shields, obscuring their faces, let the Mafia get a good long whiff of them, then peel off from the parade route. The Goodfellas will chase them out of Vegas, leaving us free to chase down the damned elusive Devil’s Diamond.

I turn my back to the right side of the street, just so the Mafia won’t see me before they see our decoys.

Oh, crap!

It’s the Feebies. Dillon and Festus are on the left side of the street!

“Rhubarb!” I scream again.

They still can’t hear me.

“Rhubarb!” I screech as loud as I can.

Shit.

I drag the mic and cord back toward me, but, dammit…it gets hung up on something. I wrap the cord tight around both
my wrists and pull hard…but, dammit…it’s stuck fast…

Oh, crap, it’s stuck on a float wheel. Oh, crap, it’s pulling me. Oh crap oh shit oh my God it’s wrapped around my wrists and dragging me off the float. I’m losing this tug-of-war and fast.

I do something that feels like a forward dive ending in a somersault before I can get the damn cord off my wrists. I end up on my ass on the pavement with my Elvis wig in my lap and me staring straight up into Dillon’s surprised face.

I jump up and try to scramble back on top of the float. Vivian has left her high perch and she grabs my dreads and pulls me by my roots back onto the float.

The first thing I do is sneeze all over both me and Vivian. Too many rose petals up my nose, I guess.

“Goddammit, Lee, that’s gross,” Vivian says, dabbing her face of my snot spray.

I sneeze again.

A hand wraps around my blue suede boot. I look down. It’s Dillon. She’s running alongside the float and clawing at me.

Thinking quick, Vivian uses her scepter as a club, bashing Dillon upside the head.

Dillon stumbles and falls to her knees. Toxic brakes her motorcycle, skids and narrowly misses putting a Harley tire track down the middle of Dillon’s ass.

Vivian and I run to the other side of the float just in time to see Rachel and Lulu rev their engine, flip off the Goodfellas and make a screeching right turn. The Mafia takes off after them.

At least that part of the plan is working.

Oh, Good Lord. Who built this float? I should’ve known that a bunch of drag queens, sorry, a Flame of drag queens, would be more interested in form than function. The weight of both Vivian and me on only one side rocks the float like a fishing boat on a windy lake.

I dive for the middle in an attempt to redistribute the weight—

—but I’m not quite quick enough.

The float creaks and groans and—

—flips topsy turvy over onto its right side, catapulting Vivian and me both high into the air. I swear there’s moment in mid-air where Vivian and I are flying side-by-side like Superman and Lois Lane and I look at her and she looks at me and we both mouth “Oh, shit” at exactly the same time.

Then everything is black and I’m on the bottom of the ocean sitting on my butt. I hold my breath, flap my feet and dogpaddle up toward the surface. I see a distorted face coming at me, blowing bubbles out his nose. It’s George Burns from Heaven and he opens his mouth and says something through the water that sounds like “Blbblpht blubblempth.” I shake my head at him, indicating that I don’t understand and he swims in closer, saying it again, “Blp Bringing in the blp Sheaves.”

“Bringing in the Sheaves?”

Oh! That song wasn’t “Bringing in the Cheese,” it was “Bringing in the Sheaves”!

I look back to George, but he’s disappeared. The Winkle Sisters are in his place. Their buns are loosened and their long, gray hair floats through the water like pretty silver algae. They tilt their heads right, then left and then open their respective mouths and say, “Stay away from the light. Follow the pig.”