ness. Don't anybody waste her time. I mean, it's so ungay it's fantastic. I don't mean it's hot. It's just that nobody is interested. You can't even get a look out of anybody. Your old mother could tell. And especially when Wally finally came back to the motel room. I mean, he was dead for all practical puposes, and Pearl, I do mean for all practical puposes. Your old mother was furious.

Then Wally started in on women. Me and my big mouth. Cause it was all my fault. He had said I was the only gay guy he was seeing, and somehow I knew that was true, so one night when we were real tight I just came out and asked him what he did in between the times he saw me. I mean, he was healthy as hell, and the question had been bothering me. He just calmly said that once in a while he liked a woman in his own particular way. And I sure wish I'd kept my big mouth shut cause that was even worse than the gambling.

Now, I've got nothing against women. Everyone to his own taste. But it just isn't my cup of tea, if you'll pardon the expression.

Mary, but I thought he'd drive me nuts. He carried on like Billy Graham trying to convert me, asking to bring over a girl friend. I must have said no a thousand times. And then he started in on lesbians. Me and my big mouth again, cause he knew I knew some dikes as I'd talked about them. It turned out that all his life he'd been wanting a dike. Now, real dikes don't go for men, and over and over I told Wally that. I mean, there are all sorts of straight women, but a dike's a dike. You monkey with a dike and you're liable to get your head bashed in. I told him over and over. I knew somebody that made that mistake. He had just come out and nobody had told her nothing, and she went to this drunken party that also had girls, and they took her to the hospital for six stitches on her head. They put out that it was from a beer bottle.

Well, little by little things began being not so good between Wally and me. He was beginning to irritate me, especially with the women angle, and I think he knew it, but I guess he couldn't help it cause like he said he lived with his mother and couldn't take his women there. So he kept working on me. It got so bad I'd say I was busy when he phoned. Then he got to just appearing without phoning. Well, you know how it is if you're my age. Nobody is loaded with steadies unless you're chicken. Besides, I've always been a pushover for carriage trade, it's so flattering. So I'd let him in. But then one night I looks out past the chain and there's Wally with a girl. Now, I was brought out back home by an old auntie everybody called Kitty, and if there's one thing I'd wish for a chicken about to come out is that she's brought out by an auntie. I've seen these chickens come out by themselves and wham, there they are in the arms of Tilly or rolled and beat up by hustlers on their second trick. Nobody's told them. nothing. Well, anyway, Kitty taught me plenty, and one thing she taught me, she said, don't ever tell anybody your mother's dead. You make her live to 100 if you have to, and whenever you get in a mess you somehow mention your mother cause it's the one thing most people respect. She sure knew what she was talking about. I don't know how many messes I've gotten out of that way. So when I saw Wally and this girl I just said my mother had come to visit me. They flew off like I'd mentioned the plague. And after that whenever Wally phoned or just appeared I just said my mother was still with me. Pretty soon he quit.

After that I didn't hear from Wally any more. And neither did Jerry. Of course, Jerry's marriage to his sewer trick didn't last till the water got hot. So we got back to normal, trading tricks and sometimes cruising together. Then all of a sudden the town gets hot, like it does every now and then, and when that

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