Therefore, due to New Yorkers’ careless and reckless umbrella use, even if one thinks they may not need an umbrella in the rain---they do. For self-defense. So when you combine these selfish bastards with a few snowflakes and an icy sidewalk---well, you can just imagine the stress and anxiety The Umbrella People cause to other New York dwellers like myself who do the right thing in the snow and put on a hat.
So you can imagine the stress of my morning commute, which also included Shoeless Joe---who somehow managed to make it thru the morning slush without the least amount of damaging frostbite. How does he do it? He must have magic feet.
And then Timmy showed up.
“Dorrie!” he said as he jumped up and jingled. “I’m on my lunch break, and I just have to talk to you.”
“Oh…what now?” I dreaded.
“Dorrie…” he got down on his knees and grabbed my hands. “I love you! I’ve never felt anything like this in my entire life. Won’t you please just give me a chance?”
I’d never even had a straight man pursue me with this much ardor. What was going on here?
“Timmy, get up. You’re getting your tights dirty.”
“Dorrie, please. Just go out with me one time. Just once and I’ll never ask again. I swear.”
I swear to god, I looked around for a hidden camera. But even if there was a camera, the stupid joke always keeps going till you fall for it.
“Okay,” I sighed.
“Oh Dorrie! You’ve made me so happy!” he said as he jumped up and down tingling his jingle bells. “When? Where are we going? Oh---I guess I should plan that. Or you! Whoever. I totally don’t care. I mean, I do, but…” Then he suddenly composed himself. “We’ll go wherever you want to go, my dear.”
15
That evening, after accepting the delivery of two large boxes for Alex, I made my way downtown to a place called Cock---the newest gay dance club in Manhattan. There was no name on the front. Just a picture of a giant rooster above the club doors.
“Where are we going?” Timmy asked when he saw the rooster. “Is this a fried chicken place? I shouldn’t eat fried food. I just lost my Thanksgiving weight.”
The bouncer stamped Timmy’s hand with a big black stamp that said “NO”---indicating that he was underage and wouldn’t be served liquor.
He didn’t even bother to card me.
Two seconds later, we were smack dab in the middle of a bar full of gay men in various stages of undress drinking and dancing to Christmas music that was even gayer than buttless chaps. Timmy took one look around and grabbed my hand. Not only grabbed it, but clutched it tight and wouldn’t let go.
“Oh, there are my friends!” I yelled over the music and waved to Shannon and Hajji with my free hand as I pulled Timmy over to their table.
“Timmy, these are my friends, Shannon and Hajji. This is Timmy. My date tonight,” I said knowingly.
“Heigh-dee ho, fellas!” Timmy introduced himself. I caught Shannon and Hajji giving each other that couple look to co-ordinate their first impression.
“Timmy, why don’t you get us some drinks? Here,” I pulled a twenty out of my bag. “Take this.”
“No, no, no,” he said as he shook his head and pushed my dirty money away. “It’s my treat. What can I bring you?”
“He’s nineteen,” I whispered to Shannon.
“He looks more like twelve,” Shannon replied.
“I’ll take a club soda with lime,” I said and he scurried off to the big boy’s bar.
Shannon immediately leaned in, “Definitely gay.”
“Are you sure?”
“Gay as the day is long,” Hajji asked.
“So what’s going on? Does he not know?”
“Oh, he knows,” Hajji stated as he took a sip of his martini. “I knew when I was eight.”
“I knew when I passed thru my mother’s vagina and went, ‘Oh no. Not for me.’” Shannon added in for good measure.
“How is it that you guys knew you were gay before I knew there wasn’t a Santa Claus?”
“You didn’t figure that out till you were nine?”
“Try ten.”
“That’s sad, Dorrie,” Shannon said as he kept an eye on Timmy at the bar.
“If he’s gay, why is he fixated on me?”
“Well, he’s not looking for a beard. He’s too fem to even try that. And you’re too…” Shannon stopped dead in his tracks.
“Old?”
“Sophisticated,” Hajji helped him out.
“Would it hurt his career?” Shannon asked. “What does he do?”
“He’s an elf at Macy’s. But he wants to be a model.”
They looked at each other and then practically screamed.
“Gay!”
“Oh my god! So gay!”
“Gay, gay, and gay!”
“Okay, peanut gallery---what do I do now?” I asked.
“You’ve got to break up with him,” Hajji insisted.
“Hajji’s right,” Shannon agreed. “He’ll come out eventually.”
“Oh yeah? That’s what you said about my cat.”
“Oh my god. That cat!” Shannon began to laugh as he leaned in to tell Hajji. “We lived together for three years and I never saw that cat once! We used to joke that Dorrie just said she had a cat so we wouldn’t know she was eating cat food.”
Just then, Timmy showed up with my club soda.
“Hi.
