Greg Herren - Murder in the Rue Ursulines

“Freddy’s ex-wife, Glynis Parrish. The TV star?” She rolled her eyes. “Honestly, Chanse, are you sure you’re gay? It’s pretty sad when a straight woman knows more about movie stars then a gay man. I bet I could stop any other gay man on the street and he could tell you everything there is to know about Glynis and Freddy’s divorce.”

I laughed. “Well, I wouldn’t take the bet.”

“Anyway, Glynis is in town making a movie-how weird is that?” She shook her head. “I’m waiting for that bitch Coralie to ask me to interview her next…although come to think of it, she probably will want me to interview Glynis to go along with the piece about Frillian. I’m sure she could give a rat’s ass about Project Rebuild, the bitch.” She rubbed her eyes. “WHY on God’s green earth they gave her the city editor job I will never understand. She must have slept with someone” She swallowed a mouthful of potato. “Anyway…yeah. But you’re probably sick to death of me bitching about the paper.”

“I never get tired of listening to you bitch.” I gave her a winning smile.

“And guess who else is in town?” Paige rolled her eyes. “Jillian’s mother, Shirley Harris.” She peered at me. “You do know who she is, don’t you?”

“Yeah. She did a bunch of musicals in the fifties and sixties, right?”

Paige started laughing. “Well, you got the gay musical gene at the very least.” She shook her head. “She actually called the paper, wanting to be interviewed…”

“I bet Coralie was all over that.” So Jillian had been right on that score.

“Yeah, right-that’s what I thought too.” Paige moaned. “And they put her through to me -which reminds me, I need to kill the dumb bitch at the switchboard-so I put her on hold, called Coralie, and said, ‘Hey, I got a star on the line who wants to be interviewed, should I set it up?’ and I literally thought she was going to have to change her panties-and then I told her who it was.”

“She wasn’t interested?”

“I should say not.” Paige sat up straight, and did a dead-on imitation of Coralie. “Oh, no, Paige, we couldn’t possibly do an interview with Shirley Harris. Don’t you know anything? Jillian and her mother are not on speaking terms. If we do an interview with her, we’d never get Jillian to talk to us, and that’s the fish we want to fry.”

“She called Jillian a fish?”

“And you wonder why I want to quit?” Paige sighed. “I felt sorry for Shirley, to tell you the truth. I mean, I could tell she’d been drinking-she was slurring her words, you know-and to have to go back to her and tell her that we weren’t interested…poor thing.” She rubbed her eyes. “I couldn’t do it. So I agreed to meet her. Tomorrow, at her hotel.”

“Where is she staying?” I hoped my interest seemed friendly rather than curious.

“She’s registered at the Ritz-Carlton under-get this-the name Sally Bowles.”

The name seemed familiar. “Sally Bowles?”

She groaned. “Liza played her in Cabaret. I swear, you’re going to lose your gay card if you keep this up.”

“You think Coralie will run the piece once you write it?”

She snorted. “Yeah, right. Good one.” She pushed her plate away with a groan. “I’m going to need an hour on the elliptical machine to get rid of this meal tomorrow. Something else to look forward to.” She exhaled and leaned back in her chair. “So, what’s going on with you? How was your carnival? Sorry I missed you yesterday in the Quarter-I dragged Ryan down to the Fruit Loop, but we couldn’t find you.” She laughed. “Ryan was pretty popular with the gay boys.”

“He’s a good-looking guy.” Ryan was the older brother of our friend Blaine Tujague. He and Paige had gone on a date once before, when he was freshly divorced, and Paige had had one of the most miserable experiences of her long and storied history of dating tragedies, although I forget the details. I wasn’t exactly sure how she’d managed to hook up with Ryan again-there was some vague story about running into him at a party and they’d hit it off the second time around. She even liked his kids, which was saying a lot, as kids usually made her uncomfortable. They’d been dating for several months now, which was a record for Paige. She never said much about Ryan’s ex-wife, and I delicately never brought her up. I had met the ex-wife once, before the divorce, at a party Blaine and his partner had thrown in their across the park from my house -and had disliked her immediately. “What did you guys wear for costumes?”

“I went as Eleanor of Aquitaine, and Ryan went as my court jester.” She gave me a sly wink. “Just black and white tights, black and white boots, and we used body paint on his torso.”

I whistled. “No wonder he was so popular.”

“Well, we’re never doing that again. It took forever to put on, and it was even more of a pain to take it off.” She laughed. “And there was no way I was letting him ruin my sheets.”

I held up my hand. “Sorry. Way too much information.”

“Give me a break.” She rolled her eyes. “After all the times I’ve had to listen to your adventures, you’re going all squeamish on me now?” She raised an eyebrow. “And I’ve never really given you the gory details.” She pursed her lips. “A lady never tells.” She burst into laughter, which I joined in.

“So, are you and Ryan getting serious now? Wedding bells around the corner. I can see you now, all covered in white polyester, with a crown of white lilies…”

She tossed her napkin at me. “Oh, for God’s sake, shut the fuck up.”

“Hitting a little close to home?”

She shrugged. “We’re just having a good time, taking things slow. I don’t have a lot of experience with relationships, and he’s a good guy. I don’t want to rush things. If it’s meant to be, it’ll evolve. But I do like him, Chanse. I like him a lot. It kind of scares me.”

“Yeah, I know what you mean.” I reached over and took her hand. “There should be a manual or something.

She burst out laughing. “You won’t even read your cell phone manual.”

“Bitch.” We both laughed.

“So, did you have fun over Carnival?”

“Yeah, I really did. It’s nice-“ I cut myself off. I was about to say it’s nice to have fun again, but I was afraid I would jinx things. Stupid; that was the kind of thing my mother used to always say when I was a kid. I’d have to remember to bring that up with my therapist. I took a deep breath. “It’s nice to have fun again.” There, I’d said it. Let the universe do its worst.

“Yeah.” She scratched her nose. “I know what you mean.” She looked around the half-empty dining room. “You know, I can barely remember what it was like before anymore. Isn’t that weird?”

“No, not really.” I thought for a moment. “It seems like, oh, I don’t know… sometimes when I think back about Paul and me-this is going to sound crazy, I know, so don’t roll your eyes at me-it seems almost like it was a dream, like it all happened to someone else, or that it happened a million years ago.”

“Kind of like the flood marked the end of an era.” She nodded. “I know. Sometimes I think that way too. My therapist-“ she stopped herself and blushed.

“You’re seeing a therapist?” I hadn’t known that, and it kind of surprised me that she hadn’t told me.

“Oh, yeah. I started when I came back from my trip with the book done.” She nodded her head, her messy hair bouncing. “I knew I couldn’t handle it all on my own, and it wasn’t like I could dump everything on my friends, because they had their own shit to deal with. So I started seeing someone. It’s helped some, and she’s given me some really good things to think about, things I need to work on.” She started playing with her tea glass. “You’re still seeing yours, right? How’s that going?”