Nat King Cole was roasting his chestnuts on an open fire, and it was beginning to look a lot like Christmas in the Rathbottom apartment. Rupert decided he’d been very fortunate, with much to be grateful for this year, so he was really going “to do” Christmas.
“One more brandy,” he said to himself, “and I may even do Santa! Ho ho ho!” After all, once a drag queen, always a drag queen, and Rupert was the Queen Mother of all drag queens: six feet two inches, 220 pounds of bald-headed pulchritude. Rupert couldn’t wait for Santa to climb down his chimney and stretch his stocking.
Minerva and Devina, Rupert’s two one-eyed pussies, were under the kitchen table finishing up a generous saucer of spiked eggnog, while Rupert was busy decorating his gingerbread men. Every year he made two dozen, giving them Joan Crawford lips and outrageous costumes, like the ones he wore in the drag show at the Dirty Girl Club where he worked. This year he even used little sugar drops for pearl necklaces and earrings. Everyone in the building loved them, especially Mrs. Katz in 401. She always ate hers the same way, by licking the dress off first; Rupert wondered about that.
“OK, girls,” Rupert said to Minerva and Devina, “time to go get the tree.” Both cats sat staring at him, their eyes crossed. Finally Devina burped and rolled over backwards. Minerva, though tilted, managed to stay up a while longer.
“You girls need to learn how to hold your liquor,” Rupert laughed, scooping them up, one bag of bones under each arm, then gently depositing them at the foot of his bed.
“Sleep tight, my little pussies,” he said, closing the bedroom door.
A light snow was falling as Rupert opened his red polka-dot umbrella, the one with the blinking-light handle. He always used it at night, just in case he was being followed. He wore his faux zebra raincoat and his Dolly Parton wig; he just felt blond tonight.
The Christmas tree lot was two blocks over on 41st Street, sandwiched between a Little Tavern hamburger shop and the Roxy Plaza Burlesque Theatre.
As Rupert approached the theatre, a man rushed out of the stage entrance and grabbed his arm.
“Where the hell have you been?” he said, smacking two hundred-dollar bills into Rupert’s hand. “I called two hours ago! You’re on in thirty minutes. Betty the Bulldozer caught a chest cold last night when one of her pasties fell off in the middle of her number.”
Rupert opened his mouth but nothing came out. He was too busy looking at the hundred-dollar bills in his hand. Before he knew it, he was whisked into a small dressing room, open umbrella and all.
“Jeez! You’re a big one,” the man sputtered. “Find something in here to wear. And do us both a favour: go heavy on the makeup. Oh yeah, what’s your name?”
“Rupert — ah. Ruperta Rosenbaum!”
“Well tonight you’re Ruperta Rosen. I’ve got enough bombs around here already.”
The door closed and Rupert stood in front of the mirror. “Oh shit! What have I gotten myself into?” He sighed.
“Enough money to have a real Christmas with a turkey,” he answered himself, as he pulled out a green fishnet leotard with an open-mouthed sequined snake winding around the leg up to the crotch. “If I can stuff a turkey, then I can stuff my ass into this,” he laughed, locking the dressing room door. “Snake it on, Ruperta!”
Twenty minutes later he stood in the wings watching the act ahead of him. It was Glenda the Goat Girl, a plump redhead with a white goat that undressed her by nibbling at her costume until she was nude except for three tin cans.
“And now, ladies and gentlemen, a gigantic surprise,” the master of ceremonies proclaimed, pointing toward Rupert. “Performing for the first time on our stage, Ruperta the Snake Girl!”
A spotlight hit the edge of the stage, and the sound of a snake charmer’s flute drifted up from the orchestra pit. Rupert swallowed hard, opened his Joan Crawford lips as far as he could, and slinked out into the spotlight, doing an oriental routine he had used before at the Dirty Girl Club.
Everything was going fine until he did a low backward bend to the audience, touching his toes. Suddenly the music stopped and there was dead silence, except for a small voice from backstage.
“Glenda’s goat ate the ass out of your costume. Ever considered using a depilatory?”
When Rupert reached behind, it felt like the Holland Tunnel on a foggy day. The trip out of the theatre was quicker than the one in. When he hit the street, he was still wearing the assless leotard under his zebra raincoat, and his wig was on backwards. But thanks to fate, he was two hundred dollars richer!
Red and green lights were strung along the Christmas tree lot, and the scent of fresh-cut pine smelled wonderful to Rupert. He felt a slight chill, but it was not from the cold — it was from the excitement of standing in the snow surrounded by the magic of Christmas! He wanted to cry, but realized that if he did, he would probably look like the Bride of Frankenstein.
It took half an hour and cost him twenty dollars, but he finally found the perfect tree. The trunk was a little crooked, but sometimes that was a decided benefit. Rupert smiled, uselessly trying to keep his mind out of the gutter.
He had picked up the tree and was about to leave when a wad of bird shit suddenly splattered onto his forehead, threatening to envelop his Joan Crawford lips.
“Oh, Murgatroyd! What happened?” Rupert exclaimed, sticking his fingers into the gooey mess.
“It’s those friggin’ pigeons,” replied the tree vendor, handing him a paper towel. “You’ve just been fertilized by the fickle finger of fate. It’s supposed to be very good luck, especially on Christmas Eve.”
Rupert decided not to argue with fate. After all, he was two hundred dollars richer and a fat turkey was waiting for him at the supermarket on the way home. It was a major job getting the turkey, a bag of groceries and the Christmas tree up the stairs to his apartment. He stuck the turkey on top of the tree and dragged everything up at once. He was out of breath and leaning on his front door with the turkey in his arms when old Mrs. Schuler passed by. “It’s drafty in this hall — you should put some clothes on that baby,” she snapped.
Both pussies were still zonked out when he opened the bedroom door. One of them had farted, and it smelled like clabbered eggnog and anchovy pizza, reminding Rupert not to have that combination again for a while.
It was a little after eleven when Rupert finally put the silver star atop the tree and plugged in the lights. Christmas was everywhere in the small apartment, with the soothing aromas of roasting turkey and fresh pine needles.
Rupert stretched out on the sofa in his flannel nightgown and matching granny cap, a glass of brandy in hand. Nat King Cole was still roasting his chestnuts, and Minerva and Devina were curled up beside Rupert on the sofa, probably dreaming about the fat gizzard in the oven.
Rupert was just dozing off when he heard a tapping on the windowpane. It might have been the late hour or the brandy, but he could have sworn he saw a pigeon sitting on the snowy ledge outside, and that before she flew off, she winked at him.
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