Chapter 12 – Leo Tinley/April Fools

I looked about me in great amusement. I suppose those around me—the folks from Pulaski Square, including, to my further amusement, two tables of the square's widows and spinsters, having a great time—thought I was in such good spirits because the Club Copa was packed to the gills with high rollers who were spending lavishly on this special Muriel Roberts' support night. I was happy about that, of course—we'd take in far more than the $40,000 I'd estimated—but I was amused because they hadn't had any idea it had been me.

I had just come down off the stage from an April Fools set followed by a complete cleanup back into Leo. When asked where I'd been, I'd said I'd been in the box office, counting receipts with the manager, and gave them all a big smile and a thumbs up.

"You missed possibly the best act so far," Donna Davis told me. "A drag queen named April Fools. She's the hit of the night so far." Others around the tables wagged their heads in agreement.

I just smiled and clucked my tongue in disappointment over what they thought I'd missed.

I sat and luxuriated in the happiness being exuded around me. Most were watching what was going on on stage—with a rapt attention and wide-open eyes that heightened my amusement. This didn't include Tracy Patten and Kathy Kimbel. They both looked radiant and completely occupied with each other. If I didn't have Kathy's former "other," Mark, in my bed now, I would have been scratching my head at the musical chairs going on in Pulaski Square—not that I minded them a bit. It helped make our community vibrant—and interesting. If we be fools, I thought, then fools had the answer to the pleasures of life.

Fools we all were, for sure. We'd been fools last week, and as we'd realigned in our couplings and dalliances, as we constantly did, we probably were still fools. And we'd probably be fools in the future as well. But we were alive. And the alignments I saw as I surveyed the nearby tables were much more natural, appeared much more satisfying, than those I'd observed as recently as two weeks ago.

And, speaking of fools, I saw that Emily Goodwin was looking at the program booklet for tonight's performances and then looked up and gave me a smile. It wasn't that Emily was any bigger fool than the rest of us, but that she'd only now seen the theme for tonight—"The Fools of April." Of course I'd picked it out myself—to go with my stage name—but this pretty much was the theme we went with for this month every year. All of our song titles had "April" or "Fools" in them: "April Love," "Why Do Fools Fall in Love," "April Showers," and, of course, "April Fools."

I saw her lean over and whisper something to Terrence Rowland, who was sitting beside her, and they both laughed. Who would have known it, those two dragons from opposite sides of Pulaski Square not only talking to each other now, but laughing with each other. What a miracle an emergency need in the square had wrought.

I tuned into what they were saying to each other.

"I must say you look quite presentable this evening, Miss Emily," Terrence said.

"Thank you, Mr. Rowland. And thank you to for sending all those flowers. I suppose you thought I wouldn't find out they were from you."

Not the least of the melting of their relationship was that Emily wasn't reacting in any way to the fact that Terrence had his arm around a smiling Jaivon and was holding him close, almost in a choke hold, as if he was concerned the young man would evaporate into thin air if he allowed him to breathe.

Keep that hold on him, old man, I thought. In fifteen years, if you've been good to him and he's still with you, he'll be changing your diapers and blowing your nose for you and keeping you out of a nursing home. Of course, you'll probably still be fucking him then. My laugh caused all around me to look at me, smile broadly, and share in my happiness.

I tuned into the couple at the other side of me, Caleb Freeman and Donna Davis, who I had once thought was just a ditzy blonde. I was not to think that after what I now overheard.

"I'll be leaving the square soon, Caleb," she said. "I have a job to go to in New York—a syndicated cartoon strip. Political satire. Several agencies there said they loved my work."

"I'll miss you," Caleb said.

"You don't have to miss me, you know. There are many first-rate cabinetmakers in New York. You're wasting yourself in the square's flower beds here. You have the credentials from SCAD, and I've seen your work. Hell, one of yours was sold the other night for $20,000. You could come with me."

"You know I couldn't be tied down to one woman, Donna. If I could with anyone, it would be with you. But—"

"I wouldn't expect you to change. Just to be there for me too."

They kissed and the mystery, at least in my own mind, was solved of who had contributed that exquisite cherry secretary at the auction dinner. Later, when I told Terrence that Caleb had both made and donated the secretary, He roared with laughter and said he wondered if Emily had bought it as a replacement bed warmer. I reminded myself to ask him about that someday.

I turned my face to Martin Lewis and Olive Odom. They only had eyes for each other. I had no idea what had happened there, and when—and how the transformation in Olive had come about—but I certainly approved. Martin had relaxed and had actually been cordial to me this evening.

I approved even more when I realized I was looking at them at an angle that permitted me to see that she was rubbing his cock through the material of his trousers below the surface of the table. I had no doubt that what he was whispering in her ear wasn't something a harried innkeeper would have said to an uptight librarian two weeks ago.

Another laugh was followed by another round of grins. Everyone was enjoying this immensely—but none more than I was.

And it was good that these people were so steeped in happiness and in their separate pairings tonight. Muriel Roberts' surgery was scheduled for tomorrow. Perhaps much of what I saw in this room tonight was an escapist nervousness about what tomorrow would bring. But whatever it was, I knew that the people of Pulaski Square would face it together—either in celebration or in grief.

Even Muriel's husband, Buddy, returned from Memphis, was being permitted to lose himself in another world tonight. He was up on stage, backing the singers with the band, lost in the sweet music of his Betsy. This was his first night of a permanent gig here. Yet another one of Emily Goodwin's secrets—along with everything else about this effort she had pumped her money into. Emily owned this club, a legacy of her family's business. Buddy hadn't needed to go to Memphis. If Emily had only known of their plight, she would have given him a well-paid job right here in this club or one of the others she owned across the Savannah entertainment district. If she'd only known many months ago.

I shook my head at the irony of that, fighting to return to the euphoria of the evening I was enjoying, when Kathy made me laugh again.

"Where the fuck is Mark?" she asked in a loud voice to the room in general. "He went to the gent's an hour ago. Did he fall in?"

"So you want him now?" Donna Davis blurted out.

That everyone laughed at that told me just how comfortable the residents of Pulaski Square were with each other.

"I'm sure he'll be back soon," I said when I could control my own laugh.

And I was sure he would return soon. And when he did, I would hold him as close to me as Terrence was holding Jaivon—and for much the same reason.

The reason he wasn't here, though, was that he was up there on the stage, the "dolly" on the left of the background singers, the beauty in the blue strapless evening gown and the long white kid gloves—lip-synching harmonies to "Fools Rush In."

And no one but me and Terrence Rowland had an inkling that it was Mark.