seen each other at dress rehearsal, where they’d had a chance to really talk.
There had been considerable comment on Victor’s footwear as well as on Andy’s entire costume. “These folks did a great job not spoilering the whole thing,” Victor said softly, as the closing performance was on stage. “Wow, did you see that lift? How did I miss that at dress? Holy fuck.”
“That Anya.” Andy was watching with enjoyment and respect. “She is fearless with Ricky. God I love that song. I love all these songs.”
“Want to dance them all with me again?” Victor was smiling. Andy was humming along with k.d. lang on ‘Surrender,’ and only gave him a sidelong smile and a nod. After the performance was over, Anya and Ricky took their bows. Rory called the rest of the Act II performers up on stage for the curtain call. There was another flurry of activity in the green room as people changed clothes and collected gear. Finally everyone was gone except Victor, Andy, and Dmitri.
“Hey there,” Andy said. “I would have said hi earlier but you were in the zone.”
Dmitri said, “Is good. Vince is here tonight, he tells me to take care with his wife.” Victor snorted. Dmitri had taught Vince almost everything he knew, as Vince would have been the first to admit. “Your back is good?”
“How did you know my back was messed up? Okay, right. Yes, it’s fine.
Andy had me in therapy the past ten days.”
“Jim will record tomorrow?”
Andy nodded. “We told him how the intro is set up, so I’m not sure where he’s placing the camera. But whatever.” He shrugged. They’d danced it through at home on video several times, though not in full costume.
Somebody tonight had surely taken the routine on a phone as soon as they saw what was going on. In fact, now that he thought about it, Dana or Patrick might have. He knew they were both here, and both of them knew what was happening.
“You looked,” Dmitri said, then paused. He touched Andy’s shoulder lightly. “Most beautiful I have seen you dance. Victor, excellent. You are very brave. I would not.” He seemed to shudder at the very idea.
Victor was charmed. “Thanks, Dmitri. That means a lot, coming from you. Is Patrick here tonight?”
Dmitri nodded. “I go now. You have security?”
Victor and Andy exchanged a glance; everybody seemed to be asking that. They wondered what it was like outside the club. “Yes. We won’t head out without bodyguards,” Andy said. “Say hi to the king for us.” Dmitri almost smiled. He nodded again, and went away.
They didn’t want to hang around too long. The club was open for another hour or more, and whatever was happening outside would probably still be happening then. Might even be worse. After a little dithering, Andy opened a FaceTime call with Rory. She answered right away. “Hi cherubim. Are you guys still at Chrome?”
“Yes we are. I see you’re still hiding in the green room.”
“We’re not sure what to do. We can ping our security guy to come and help make a path. Is that going to be enough?”
“Should be, especially if Terry helps. Outside looks like the fucking Oscars. There are news vans, paparazzi, and what looks like two busloads of tourist celebrity hounds. It’s a mess. What do you want to do?”
“What do you think, catnip. Go on out and deal with it? If we’ve got Terry and Julio and our guy? We can feed the beast for five minutes, our car could be right there.”
“That’s fine. Rory, did you get that?”
“Got it. I’ll ping the man in charge. Get your shit together.” She disconnected. They texted their driver, assembled themselves, and went out to the stage door. It opened a minute later and Terry did a ‘let’s go’ thing with his head. Sam and Tomás were there again, and with those three imposing men as well as their escort, they got upstairs without delay.
Outside, Julio and their driver were keeping a space clear in front of the door. There was a surge of reporters. Andy and Victor answered a few questions, declining to confirm or deny that they had performed at all, much less what they had done, or whether they would be back the following night.
Somebody finally asked Victor about ‘Countdown 3’ and he said, “I’m told we should be seeing the rough cut in early January. I’m looking forward to it.
Jonathan and Loretta and I had a great time making it.”
“When will it be released?”
“As far as I know, the plan is for a May release. You’d want to confirm that with the studio.”
“What are you doing till then?”
“Being married,” he said with a smile. “Andy and I have never had a whole lot of time to just be married. So that’s what we’re doing. And thanks everybody for coming out, but we need to get home now.” Their small phalanx of guards was still with them, so their path to the car was unimpeded.
Once the doors were closed they looked at each other and both said, “Whew.”
Then Victor said, “I was not expecting that.”
“You’re a movie star, I keep telling you.” Andy grinned at the snort from the front seat. “Also we did something tonight that’s going to be considered scandalous in some quarters, so.” He shrugged. “Hope it doesn’t fuck you up with the ‘Countdown’ people.”
“It’s not like they don’t know we’re married. That we dance together.
That you occasionally dance in drag.”
Andy was snickering. “That’s true. ‘Mein Herr’ went up a long time ago and they didn’t call Raquel to say hey, you know what, we decided not to do that whole boat captain thing. Tell Mr. Martin to take his fishnets and fuck off.” Definitely a laugh from the front seat. “Hey guys? Are we going to have you again tomorrow? Because you were great tonight. We really appreciate it.”
“We can request the duty tomorrow, sir. Happy to.”
“Awesome, thank you.”
After they got home, it was a quick
