"Theodore," Brian sprawled out, "do you remember that we have a night club and not a fucking music hall?"

         My lip corner and eye began to twitch. To hide it, I fell down and started to convulse.

         "Brian, it's Valentine's Day. And Shanda Leer is a golden standard of drag romance." As for convulsions, I was just kidding. "Also, the DJ will mix everything together, and we will cater to several generations of fags."

         "If you are talking about generations of fags, alive and dead," Brian continued, "the dead ones are not going to pay us."

         By all means, Darren with his tender Gershwin masterpieces and observance of half-century tradition of fags' attempts to eclipse Marilyn Monroe was a little out of date. But the day before he was so ecstatic about the chance to perform that I decided to stick up for him no matter what. In the end, for a couple of times in a century benevolence can defeat pragmatism.

         It was pleasant to imagine Benevolence and Pragmatism as two youthful athletes fighting in a pool of jelly. But apparently we underestimated the scale of Darren's creativity. By the time I sorted out Kinnetic's current business and arrived to Babylon, Shanda Leer had already picked up a group of dancers and, with a helping hand of Emmett the Fairy of Magic Management, had taken care of background music, scenery, costumes and makeup. Are not the two of them geniuses? How to concoct a show in two days, is known only to those who can make five ball gowns of a piece of newspaper, a tin can and a pair of handkerchiefs.

         "Bravo! This is brilliant!" A one-man standing ovation does not look pitiful if you are the one who is paying for the show.

         "A director of a very small and very poor theater has no choice but to make do with a little," answered Darren modestly. "One more thing only: we will need pigeons. We will order them on the show day."

         "Whatever you need!" I liked the rehearsal so much that I was ready to join the corps de ballet, if anyone asked me. Fortunately, nobody did.

         I handed out service contracts to the performers to sign. One of the contracts came back to me with a sticker on which a phone number was written. I dialed the number immediately to look whose cell would ring. It was the dance group front man, and I, without losing any time, brought him to my place.

***

         "Mister Schmidt, you are sucking so amazingly!" the dancer told me when he was climbing out of my car.

         "Mister Schmidt, you are fucking so amazingly!" the dancer told me, trying to catch his breath.

         "Mister Schmidt, you are fucking and sucking so amazingly! What a wonder!" the dancer told me when he was spread-eagled on my sheets.

         Every time I asked him to call me Ted. And that 'wonder' word totally perplexed me.

         "Mister Schmidt, you have been sucking and fucking so amazingly for four hours in a row already!" the dancer said, when he was crawling to the bathroom. "I am dumbstruck!"

         "What are you dumbstruck by, Isaiah?"

         "Well…at your age…"

         I decided not to fuck a dancer ever again and called a taxi for him. It was three hours into the St Valentine's Day, and I fell asleep, art-worn.

***

         Having finished office chores by lunchtime, I headed for Babylon. On the doorstep of the club I realized that the yesterday's story was not over for me. That Isaiah guy turned out to be the first person I met. He was waiting for me in a snowdrift, ignoring the final run-through.

         "Mr. Schmidt," he whispered histrionically with an intonation of a person choked by sobs. "Why are you doing this to me?"

         "Doing what?" I hiccupped and got wide-eyed.

         "I mean nothing for you, right? Yesterday you… I thought… How could you?" he whimpered and, damn, ran away down the snowy street.

         I ran after him for a while, then got tired and cold and returned to the club. Darren popped up to me. And I do not know for what sins I was being punished, but he was hysterical as well. Make up did not allow him to sob, but his voice was quivering and breaking. Firstly, Isaiah went off radar as early as in the morning, and everybody was failing to get in touch with him. I dialed his number and heard: "The mobile phone is switched off or outside the coverage area." Secondly, the car with the costumes got stuck somewhere in the snows of Pittsburgh. We agreed that I will find Isaiah, while Emmett and Drew Boyd will recover the car from the snow.

         And there I was, running around Liberty Avenue in the snowstorm and exclaiming: "Isaiah! Isaiah!" I was looking as a complete idiot as one can be. I left a thousand of messages on his phone with promises of fame, recognition, buttfuck of his life, lawsuit for contract breach and fervent osculation right into… As soon as I finished this message, Isaiah turned up at last. He was wringing his hands, leaning ornately against a lamppost. With a languishing look at me, he struck a particularly exquisite pose and burst into tears elegantly, covering his face by his hands. I hugged him, covered him with my coat and lead him to the club. Isaiah was claiming his love, sniffling and smearing his face with mascara.

         Emmett brought the costumes and threw them on the table. My friend was furious: they fell out with Drew Boyd. Well, at least the spectacle was rescued. Darren put on one of his adorable gowns, sniffling Isaiah brushed up his makeup, and the rehearsal took place at last.

         At eleven o'clock people started to assemble at the club. Poor folks, if only they knew what would come next, they would run away into the snow of February faster that Isaiah did.

         As for him, he disappeared again.

         The dancers were almost demented; Emmett was feeding Darren Xanax. In the end my heroic best friend took up to save everybody again. We compiled a costume for him out of fronts Isaiah dropped, made him up and let him go onstage. Certainly, his solo Latina had little to do with the overall choreography of the group. On the bright side, Isaiah was short and sinewy, and in his attire Emmett could just stand onstage with his ass to the audience to make everybody absolutely satisfied with the dance.

         With the first chords of the music, beautiful Shanda Leer went onstage. DJ had made a good job: soft sunny retro was sounding fan-fucking-tastic in modern arrangement. Emmett was wiggling his ass and looking really hot. The folks seemed to like the show, and I relaxed a little. But the time for pigeon scene came. With jaw-dropping grace Darren waved his hands, a technician opened the cage behind his back, the pigeons rocketed upwards…and… We kinda had not thought that moment over when we were planning the spot.

         Bewildered birds started to flutter under the ceiling of the club and then - what else they were to do? - began to shit on the audience.

         It was a catastrophe. We did not have a single idea how to put the pigeons into the cage. Did we have to run through the crowd of clubbers and usher the birds to the street with a mop? I closed my eyes and started multiplying three-digit numbers. A snafu came about, and all we could do was making the show go on.

         In a break, I decided to take a breath and have some water. And what did I see? Right at the bar counter the huge drag-queen we ditched the other night was making a show of her own. Isaiah was helping her. I do not know how to describe the scene to make everyone feel as sick as I did at the moment. The fact is, the drag-queen lifted up her skirt, and Isaiah, with smacking sounds punctuated by sobs… Lord, there is nothing I can do, that was really going on… well, Isaiah was sucking her off. Yeah, right at the bar counter. I called a security guy, but the queen made a bored mug and said at the top of her professionally trained voice: "Honey, keep out, we are celebrating St Valentine's Day."

         I decided that it, just like the pigeons, could not be helped. All the more so, as Darren went onstage again and continued his show. At least a part of shit-specked spectators tore themselves out of the pericounter performance and returned to Shanda Leer. She was so charmingly fragile in her blue gown, sequined scarf and shoes - a true china statuette. She was limping worse and worse, though. And in the end Shanda broke down and started to fall. As in slow motion, Darren's leg faltered, he threw up his hands to catch balance, grasped the curtain - and fell down with it. At the last moment one of the dancers caught him and brought out of the heap of velvet and muslin.

         And then, amongst all that Apocalypse, something precious happened on the pigeon-shitted drape. Darren looked at the dancer. The latter asked: "Are you all right?" And the next moment their lips met in a kiss. The spectators made a furious ovation. And the dancer carried Shanda to a dressing room.

***

         I thought Brian would be livid. But when we, the creative and technical staff, dragged the curtain off the stage and returned to the hall, he was hooting with laughter like probably never before.