Flash Fiction Friday #24

To learn what this Flash Fiction Friday stuff is about or why I am writing this strange little snippet of a story, go here. (P.S. I think I really like this one!)

His name was Randolph and that’s exactly what I called him, awkward mouthful though it was. His name was only shortened to Randy with his boyfriends, in an inside joke, ass pinching, wink wink fashion. As in, I’d like you to meet my new boyfriend, Randy, wink wink, pinch pinch. Only Randolph and I knew how many new love-of-his-lives had shared the joke but the humor never seemed to diminish for him.

I’d met him at a Midnight Movie and I’m pretty sure it was Rocky Horror. The Mayan theater showed so many, though, all cult classics that I can’t be sure. Priscilla Queen of the Desert, To Wong Foo, Mystery Science Theater 3000. Wonderfully fun films, must sees. But I would have gone to the theater for the theater itself, no matter the movie. The restored proscenium arch with its South American style faces and totems (hence the Mayan name), the overly plush red curtains beside. The concession stand sold lattes and excellent herbal teas and chocolate covered almonds or bon bons instead of Whoppers and Jujubes.

We went to the Sound of Music Sing-along once. Randolph dressed as Maria the Nun and I as Maria in the dowdy dress with guitar case. The case was filled with spiked soda and cherries to snack on. I’m am sixteen going on seventeen, we belted out, and hoped that this time Fritz would not blow the whistle on them, breaking Liesl’s heart.

Julie Andrews, James Dean, Judy Garland. He would always have to stop for these names. Paging through old movie posters at junk shops. Picking up the newly-made-to-look old collectibles such as lunch boxes and cigarette tins with their famous profiles. We frequented a little vintage store called Flossy McGrew’s that sold rhinestone cat eye glasses and Laverne and Shirley sweaters and I remember asking him what it was about Judy Garland.

“Is it the way she looks? Beauty or is it her voice? I love the voice.”

He fingered through a milk carton full of old records, humming. “It’s really hard to put your finger on fabulousness.” I always thought you could tell just how feminine a gay man was by how many a’s were in the word fabulous. “It’s definitely not about perfection. Judy’s decline is part of the glory of her. Tragic figure and all. Some of it is nostalgia for the time period, I know. Most of it is just wanting to be Judy, that it would be a thrill to walk in those shoes, sit in front of that camera and sing I’ll wear the finest bonnet in the Easter Parade…” He did have a decent voice.

“But what about Liza? I never understood that one at all.”

“Being fabulous can be hereditary.”

“I wonder what your mother is like then.”

Randolph exhaled sharply through his nose as a scoff to that.

Wizard of Oz was one of Randolph’s all time favorite movies. I say ‘one of’ because his passions were violent but changeable.

“Night falls over the Land of OZ. There are ten thousand stories in the Emerald City, this is one,” he would say, and then regale me and whoever else was drawn to his charisma with Oz trivia. Like the urban legend about a crew member hanging himself and his swinging silhouette being visible during the Enchanted Forest scene. “Which is really the shadow of a big bird that was right there in the scene a moment earlier, flying away. I’ll show you sometime.” Or how Garland spread rumors about the Munchkins having drunken orgies and the original Tin Man’s almost fatal reaction to the aluminum powder make-up. Randolph had also experimented heavily with the Pink Oz a.k.a. The Dark Side of the Rainbow theory about using Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon as a soundtrack for the film. Naturally, this coincided with the time of his life where he was experimenting heavily with marijuana.

I can’t remember how many times we watched that movie. It seemed to be his pacifier or baby blanket, a safety object and a self-soothing tool, reserved for the most emotional times of Randolph’s life. Randolph’s, not mine, because Randolph was ultimately the bigger character. The scene-stealer if you will. The inheritor of the fabulous.

Once at his apartment, we watched it so late that the sun was about to come up. We had been out at a rave. I know, because I remember his candy pink fingernail polish matching my candy pink, pageboy wig. We were eating Fat Jack’s subs to sober up and watching Wizard of Oz to commemorate the big break up with a boyfriend who was “the be all and end all, I swear.”

“You know what it is about this movie?” he asked, his eyes glazed but clear of red.

“Huh?”

“It’s that life can be so crazy with tornados, disorienting and shocking color shifts, and there’s evil in the world, symbolized by the witches. No one is perfect and everybody is lacking something, looking for answers and quick, easy fixes. And in the end, it’s all inside of them all along. It’s that easy to be happy and it’s all within your own power. Wouldn’t that be nice?”

“Who says it’s not really that way?”

“Come on, babe.” He scoffed out through his nose.

“Well, if we’re taking the movie literally, though, you wake up from all that, wind up back on the farm, back in boring old black and white, and the only excitement or adventure in your life was just a fantasy and a dream that no one will ever believe. Dorothy probably wound up marrying, pumping out kids and churning butter with big, red, calloused hands.”

Randolph looked hard at me. “Well, we are not taking it literally.”

I think that was the moment, the turning of my tide wherein I was one of his favorite friends. I say ‘one of’ because his passions were violent but changeable. That gay man/female friend dynamic had shifted away from the edifying yet safe flirting, the mutual ego stroking, flattery and bolstering. We were friends for a long time after that but the warmth of his gaze, that spotlight of charismatic attention had shifted. It was as if I woke up the next morning, trying to explain that, yes, I did have pink hair (pink hair!) and, yes, you were there. You were there.