Page 57 of Disco Witches of Fire Island

“Ronnie, I need to ask you something. Did you bring me to this party to pimp me out to Ace what’s-his-name?”

Ronnie’s coke mania briefly paused as he forced a nervous laugh. He took another shaky gulp of his drink. “I’m gonna need a refresher.” He waved at a shirtless waiter. “Hey, Hercules!”

“Just tell me you didn’t,” Joe begged, feeling his anger melting rapidly into heartbreak.

“Oh, for Chrissake, Joey, I didn’t ‘pimp’ you. Yes, Trey asked me to bring someone attractive for Ace. How is flirting with some rich old queen gonna hurt? You do it all the time at your bar. And so what if maybe you let him kiss you or something? If you stopped playing the poor widow Pollyanna you wouldn’t need to worry about getting your fucking polo shirt dirty! Grow the fuck up—this is how this world works. It’s what you got inside your pocket orinside your pants. Every fucking man at this party, if he wasn’t born into money like Trey, had to sell his fucking ass one way or another to get here. You’re just pissed because I accomplished what I came out to Fire Island to do, and you didn’t.”

Joe looked out onto the ocean and the sky turning orange. A flock of seagulls swooped into the surf. Beachcombers gawked at the ritzy party to which they had not been invited. Joe was doing everything in his power to hold back what he really wanted to say. “You’re acting like such a dick, Ronnie. I’m just saying, this Trey thing isn’t what you think it is.”

“I don’t wanna hear it!” Ronnie shouted, the cocaine revving his voice an octave higher than usual. Party guests moved closer, excited to see a scene between the two young working-class hotties. “I did you a favor bringing you here. I tried to help you be something better than you are—meet people that could help you. But what’s the point? Look at yourself! You’re cute, sure, but you’re not all that.”

Seeing everyone listening, Joe’s face grew hot. He wanted nothing more than to be a million miles away. “What the hell happened to you, Ronnie?” he said, his voice low. “Doing coke? Hanging with shitheads like these? This island has changed you. You’ve always been a little full of it with all your bullshit affirmations, but you used to have some sort of integrity.”

“Bullshit affirmations, huh?” Ronnie’s voice grew louder. “You think this house is a bullshit affirmation? You think Trey is a bullshit affirmation? Maybe you should look at yourself, Joe. What do you have, with your negative thinking? You’re fucking miserable! You’re twenty-four, short, all alone, and working in the shittiest bar in all of Fire Island. Figures, the only person who ever considered dating you was fucking desperate and dying of AIDS.”

Every voice on the back deck fell silent, while Ronnie’s words ricocheted like bullets inside Joe’s brain. Or were they his own words?

He took a deep breath and pushed his face right up into Ronnie’s. “You’re a piece of shit.” He took sharp breaths in between his words to stop himself from crying. “Know what else I overheard? Seems your little rich boyfriend isn’t even single, and he plans todump your selfish, steroid-pumped, hotel-maid ass any day now. He calls you trash behind your back. They all do. So you’re not only a whore, Ronnie, you’re like theshittiestwhore on the whole island.”

Ronnie’s eyes darted to Trey and then back to Joe. “You’re just making that up because I finally told you the truth.” His voice cracked with a murky mix of anger and tears.

“Oh yeah?” Joe’s lip quivered. “Go ask Trey about someone named Bill down in DC. Go on, ask him.”

Ronnie’s face, already pale, went blank. He tightened the rubber band around his blond ponytail and with a cold, steady voice he said, “Get out of my party.”

30.Invasion Deflation

“The Great Darkness has reigned for one hundred thousand DJ sets and will reign for at least one hundred thousand more. Do not despair. Put on your dancing shoes and continue to work toward the Great Balance.”

—Disco Witch Manifesto #42

Before Joe knew it, the summer of ’89 was headed toward its muggy, monochromatic middle. It had been weeks since Ronnie had kicked him out of Trey Winkle’s party, and although he caught occasional glimpses of him working at the Flotel, they’d had no interaction whatsoever. Elena, meanwhile, had been just too busy to hang out, since she was always going to one of her AA meetings or spending time with Cleigh. Vince, heartbroken that Ronnie had ditched him for Trey, reverted to his old miserable self, summoning countless Irish synonyms for calling Joe a “lazy eejit.”

And then there was Fergal the ferryman. Every time Joe’d pass him on the dock, the ferryman not only averted his eyes, he acted like there was nothing but rotten fish in the space where Joe was walking. As for the Gladiator Man, Joe hadn’t seen him since that night he drunkenly stumbled after him down Fire Island Boulevard. It was as if he’d never existed. Or maybe he did, and he just was avoiding Joe. Without any friends around or mysterious obsessions, Joe spent most of his free time alone in the hot, stuffy attic, listening toLove Songs 1, looking at his one photo of Elliot, andruminating over the mess he had made. The only bright spot in that part of the summer was how Howie and Lenny were getting all excited about something called the Invasion.

The history of the Fourth of July “Invasion” (the second high holy day in Howie’s calendar) was burned into most Fire Island old timers’ heads. As legend had it, back in the summer of 1976, during the nation’s bicentennial, some of the funky denizens of Cherry Grove, including one dressed in drag, ventured over to Fire Island Pines to eat at a restaurant. The restaurant staff refused to serve the man in drag, since the Pines was much more conservative than the free-spirited Cherry Grove. Infuriated, the rejected Grove patrons decided to take action. On the Fourth of July they gathered their friends, all dressed in the most lurid and flamboyant drag; rented a water taxi; and, like good patriotic libertines,invadedthe Pines. Everyone had a blast, including the snooty Pines homos. From that day forward, every July Fourth, a boatload of drag queens—in the hundreds—recreated the invasion of the Pines.

Joe was hopeful that year’s Invasion might bring the possibility of new customers to Asylum Harbor, new friends for him, and the possibility he’d run into the Gladiator Man again or any cute fellow who might wake him from his stupor.

Unfortunately, none of that happened. The Fourth of July came and went, and like most invasions it left a disaster in its wake. Instead of discarded weapons and dead bodies, Asylum Harbor was strewn with lost nylon wigs, feather boas, false eyelashes, and so many Lee Press-Ons that the floor crackled beneath Joe’s feet. There were no new friends, no new regular customers, and Joe’s record as “the best-looking bartender to never hook up on Fire Island” was on track for a Guinness World Record. While the day of the invasion brought the biggest crowd yet into the bar, the following week saw a return to the sparse pre-Invasion levels.

Adding to Joe’s misery, one of the Graveyard Girls spilled the beans to Vince that Trey had given Ronnie an eighteen-karat gold, tricolor Tiffany ring. Vince went mental, demanding that Joe join him in a thorough and complete housecleaning of the bar to get rid of all the bad energy of the first half of the summer.

“We may be the most unpopular bar in Fire Island Pines,” Vince announced with his arms full of industrial cleaning supplies, “but feck it, we’re gonna be the cleanest.”

At least being angry at Vince felt better than being depressed. Joe dove into the work with a vengeance. Soon, Asylum Harbor’s stink of stale beer and vomit was overlayed with the scent of lemony wood polish and the sweat of one exhausted Armenian American bartender.

“All done.” Joe flopped onto a stool and dropped his head on the counter while Vince inspected his work.

“You call that wood shiny?” Vince snarled. “Feckin’ hell! My Aunt Siobhan could polish a bar better than you. And she didn’t have any hands! Do it again, ya lazy lug!”

“I’ve had it!” Joe threw his rag at Vince—though it sadly curved and landed at least six feet off its mark. “It’s not my fault that Ronnie isn’t banging you anymore. Clean the fucking bar yourself.”

Vince’s icy eyes glared at Joe. “For one thing, you ungrateful sod, it was I who was doing the banging. And two, what gives you the idea I give three roasted fucks about that two-faced, disloyal, gold-digging, bastard best friend of yours?”

Hearing Vince refer to Ronnie as his best friend felt like a punch to Joe’s solar plexus. “You know damn well Ronnie and I aren’t best friends anymore. We aren’t even mediocre friends. And besides, you two agreed at the beginning not to be boyfriends.”

“That’s not true!” Vince’s voice nearly squeaked in protest. “I mean, okay, maybe we said something of the sort. But still, how could a lad be all lovey-dovey one day, saying shite like ‘Vince, darlin’, I’ve never felt so comfortable with somebody in my life,’ and then, not a week later, he’s off playing the Leona Helmsley of homos with some rich poof. The worst part is, he didn’t even tell me himself. I had to hear it on the street.”

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