Chapter 13
That night, Dr. Huron—whom I was now calling Edwin—and I were seated at a tiny secluded table at Helen’s Hot Note, a piano bar in the West Village that has been around for at least forty years.
Helen herself is an ebulliently tattered former chorus girl, now well into her nineties, but still showcasing her dancer’s legs in fishnets, with her upper body swathed in three window treatments’ worth of grimy pink satin and bunched netting glued with rhinestones, which often fall off as she circulates, schmoozing her customers to buy more liquor.
Aspiring performers drop by the Hot Note after midnight, to test material or just to stay in practice.
The regulars also include over-the-title Broadway stars, who’ll stay for hours, still riding the adrenaline blast of standing ovations from their hit shows; they’re shot even higher by the rowdy adoration of hardcore fans.
Through the dim lighting and high-decibel gossip (“Could Barbra still do the movie of Gypsy using AI?”) I saw Fleming Fairmont making his way toward a corner table.
While the Hot Note isn’t a specifically gay bar, it’s far too gender fluid for Fleming’s loyal Dixie voters, so his privacy was maintained by what he considered foolproof camouflage: a beret, a fisherman’s knit sweater, and not just dad jeans but granddad jeans, with their shapeless-yet-ironed fit.
Since he wasn’t in a boxy navy blue suit, Fleming imagined no one would recognize him, and he came off like a registered sex offender exhibiting his watercolors at a New England seaport gallery.
If the Tuxes came on too strong, we’d scare him off, so Reggie had devised a means of misleading and then ambushing him.
As Fleming ordered his customary Brandy Alexander, with a paper parasol and a plastic hibiscus, Helen, who’d been briefed on Reggie’s plan, was winding her way toward the small stage at one end of the packed room.
“Hey there, Hot Noters!” she brayed, climbing over the atmospheric coffee-can footlights and standing before a brick wall covered with framed, autographed photos of herself from decades past. “We’re cookin’ tonight!
I see some new faces, some old faces, some old faces with new cheekbones, and just a whole buncha talent!
Who’s gonna be brave and start us off? I’m lookin’ at… ”
Helen surveyed the crowd, flourishing her microphone like a divining rod, skimming past me and Edwin and then returning: “How about you two little lovebirds? Get up here, pronto!”
Edwin and I acted flustered and reluctant, but the room’s applause encouraged us and we made our way onto the stage.
“And what have we here? Is this a first date?”
Edwin and I sputtered, “Yes,” as I thought: That’s kind of true.
“Well, if music be the food of love, let’s chow down! What’re you two big handsome galoots gonna sing tonight? To fall madly in love by?”
“Maybe ‘Whole New World’ from Aladdin,” I ventured, while keeping an eye on Fleming, who couldn’t stop ogling Edwin.
I doubted that Fleming would recognize me from that night at the Constitutional Committee headquarters, when I’d been done up in my waiter drag.
I also wasn’t Edwin, who said, “Or we might try Sondheim’s ‘Not a Day Goes By’ from Merrily. Although it’s awfully sad.”
“A Brit!” Helen crowed. “Prince Charming’s in the house!”
“Or,” I zeroed in on what Marcus had told me was Fleming’s favorite tune, from hacking his ringtone, “what about ‘Where or When’?”
The title of this Rodgers and Hart perennial made the crowd sigh, and Fleming dab at his eyes with his napkin.
It’s a hauntingly romantic song, which Fleming had undoubtedly bleated alone in his boyhood bedroom while mooning over the photo of a high school quarterback in a yearbook—and had most recently whistled while watching Timothy’s OnlyFans.
“ ‘Where or When,’ ” Helen directed her steadfast piano player, a man close to her own age with the musical equivalent of a photographic memory.
He played the intro to the song, and Edwin sang it in a clear and honest voice, without a trained performer’s self-admiring theatrics.
As he was holding the microphone and singing just to me, I was flung back into my Tuxedo Society conundrum: Was this real affection, or an expedient ploy to ensnare Fleming?
As Edwin passed me the mic and I began the song’s first verse, I saw only Edwin, but I didn’t overdo things.
I’ve got a decent voice, which I trusted, and I let Edwin’s cocker spaniel?brown eyes inform the lyrics.
This was also an actor’s dilemma: Was I enticing Edwin?
Was my vulnerability unforced or professional?
Harmonizing on the chorus, our foreheads almost touched.
To avoid getting hopelessly swoony, I peered over Edwin’s shoulder.
Fleming was transfixed, mouthing the lyrics with us, so he didn’t notice that Timothy and Brock were now seated on either side of him, having slid soundlessly onto the banquette.
Singing releases something in me. When I’m playing a character, I’ll obey that person’s history and quirks.
But with music there’s a more directly emotional freedom and less crouching behind research.
For a moment I sympathized with Fleming: Had he ever permitted himself a relationship, or even a date with another guy, or were the Hot Note and watching Timothy’s videos his full inner life?
Would even a hint of openness prod a less staunchly right-wing perspective?
But politics rarely responds to even the most heartfelt ballad, preferring ugly anthems and mindless marches.
As the song ended, Helen led the crowd in an enthusiastic “KISS HIM! KISS HIM!” We did just that, and Edwin’s kiss was different from Luc’s, less showy than scientifically intent, seeking verifiable results.
Kissing can be even more expressive than singing: some guys are grindingly mechanical, but Edwin was tender.
What was happening? There’s a proven chemistry between English stars, all those Emmas and Ruperts, and less polite Americans.
Edwin and I would be our own Emily Blunt and John Krasinski, each accusing the other of having an accent.
As the kiss ended, the crowd’s good-natured hooting jolted me back to our mission.
Edwin touched my cheek, and I mentally began browsing for a cheap bureau at IKEA, with enough drawers for our combined stuff.
Brock and Timothy were hustling Fleming toward a more secluded location, so Edwin and I left the stage.
Reggie was waiting in the club’s thimble-sized, barely functional kitchen (the place mostly serves finger foods).
Brock and Timothy had Fleming with his back to the ancient refrigerator, as Edwin and I joined the action, and Reggie said, “Fleming, you repulsive rodent, you were holding out on us. Sure, you were on target about the Parnassus Group, but I’ll bet you’ve tracked all three jewels. ”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Fleming protested. “Unhand me!”
“She’s such a damsel,” said Brock.
“And you’re pals with Henrik Jenstromm, aren’t you?” said Reggie.
“He’s a dear friend. We met when he was speaking on funding international heritage sites at a G6 summit. I showed him photographs of my family’s fully restored plantation, to inquire whether it might qualify for the registry.”
“And Henrik is a world-class crypto-facist, isn’t he?” said Reggie. “Who believes that genetically superior leadership can control the ignorant masses. I’m quoting from one of his earlier essays in the Constitutional Committee newsletter, which he always forgets about.”
“We all evolve.”
“It’s true,” said Brock. “Fleming used to have a shred of dignity. But he’s moved past it.”
“I would find that insulting,” said Fleming. “If it weren’t for your eyelashes.”
“Hey,” said Timothy. “What about me? I sent you those used flip-flops.”
“Pardon me?”
“You asked me to autograph them, ‘To a fine legislator.’ ”
“Get real, asshole,” said Reggie. “Or I’ll have Timothy cut you off, and you’ll be banned from the Hot Note.”
For the first time, Fleming regarded Edwin and me, asking “Et tu, gentlemen? Your song was deeply moving. I believed in your love. Was it a sham?”
Edwin and I looked at each other—what were we willing to deny?
“Fleming,” said Reggie. “If you ever came out, or at least stopped getting gay teachers fired, I might let these guys answer that question. But you don’t deserve them.”
Edwin’s fingertips intertwined with mine, which made me momentarily forget about the Diadem and its hazards. Edwin was holding my hand. Was he renewing my Tux membership?
“How can we get to Jenstromm?” Reggie demanded. “What’s the best route?”
Fleming was surrounded, which as before, he found titillating.
He squirmed against the refrigerator, like a tropical, sarong-clad maiden being sacrificed to a sun god in a 1930s melodrama.
Fleming was a true masochist who enjoyed being debased by both Republican presidents and a kitchen filled with men.
He was also eyeing a nearby bowl of pork rinds, the greatest Southern aphrodisiac.
“Henrik is very private and willful,” said Fleming, whose pronouncements were always suspect. “He doesn’t believe the world appreciates his vision of an enhanced pecking order. He’s often been unfairly attacked as a white supremacist.”
“Unfairly?” said Reggie.
“He lives only for his work and his twin sons, whom he considers proof of his achievments in social engineering.”
“Jesus,” said Reggie. “He used his kids as science experiments?”