Dead Man Dancing

Twenty-Three

‘Well, that explains the scarf,’ Paul said when I told him about Laurie.

‘It does?’

‘Adam’s apple,’ he said, touching his throat. ‘Women have them, too, but they’re far less prominent. Laurie wore the scarf to hide it.’

‘Right,’ I said, feeling stupid. I took a few deep breaths. ‘OK,’ I continued. ‘Adam’s apples, I get. But how on earth did she hide… you know?’

‘Her sexual organs?’

‘Exactly.’

‘Well, the testicles could be tucked up into the body where they originally came from, I suppose. Whenever they get cold, they tend to migrate northward anyway.’

‘They do?’ In spite of sex education classes in high school and decades of marriage, this fact was news to me. ‘And the penis?’

‘Having little experience wearing ladies’ underpants, I really haven’t a clue.’

‘That’s reassuring, darling, but not particularly helpful.’

‘That’s why God invented the Internet.’

Logging on to the Internet in our basement office a few minutes later, I discovered that what Paul told me about the testicles was true; they could easily be persuaded to disappear within the body. As for what ‘transwomen’ did with their inconvenient penises, well, let’s just say that I now know one hundred and two uses for duct tape.

I also learned about breast augmentation, facial feminization surgery, tracheal shaves, androgen blockers, and laser hair removal, not only on the face, but on the chest and arms as well.

Ouch!

I clicked around a bit after that to read about sexual reassignment surgery, but when I landed on a south-east Asian site featuring colorful before and after photos, I decided Too Much Information, and switched the computer off.

‘I still can’t believe it,’ I told Paul that night over dinner. ‘Laurie is feminine in almost every possible way. We were comparing fingernail polish, for heaven’s sake!’

‘She’s had a lot of practice, Hannah. She’s been passing for, what did you say, two years?’

‘Three.’ I served myself some green beans. ‘I’m still flabbergasted. If you put ninety-nine women and Laurie in a room and told me to pick out the one who’s a guy, I never would have picked her, not in a million years. The teller at the BB &T drive-through, maybe, or that woman who makes the sandwiches at the snack bar in Dahlgren, but not Laurie.’ I plopped some mashed potatoes on my plate and garnished them generously with butter. ‘Truth or consequences. You danced with Laurie. Didn’t you pick up any vibes?’

Paul blushed. ‘Not even a hint.’ He chewed thoughtfully on a piece of his tuna steak. ‘Are you sure Melanie’s being truthful?’

‘Why on earth would she lie?’

Paul shrugged. ‘Jealousy?’

‘Of what? Besides, Melanie told me she confronted Laurie, and that Laurie admitted it.’ I shook my head. ‘No, it’s probably true.’

We ate in silence for a while until with a contented, well-fed sigh, Paul laid down his fork and leaned back in his chair. ‘Frankly, I admire the hell out of her. Imagine all she’s endured just to get this far. And after the surgery, it’ll be too late to change her mind.’

I thought about what I’d learned about SRS from the Internet and said, ‘Pretty drastic, and needless to say, irreversible.’

Paul rose from his chair and started to clear away the dishes. ‘Melanie’s probably one of those fruitcakes who believes all it takes to be ‘cured’ is constant prayer and a hefty dose of theologically-based reprogramming.’

Carrying the wine glasses, I followed my husband into the kitchen. ‘How could Melanie possibly understand? Melanie wasn’t born a man in a woman’s body.’ While Paul rinsed the plates, I tipped the wine glasses over pegs in the dishwasher. ‘Why would anyone go through all that heartache, soul-searching, counseling, pain and considerable expense involved in a permanent sex change if they didn’t deeply believe that they were born into the wrong body?’

‘Did you notice,’ I said after the dishwasher began surging away, ‘how we keep referring to Laurie as “she”? Even Melanie didn’t use male pronouns when she was talking to me about Laurie.’

Paul smiled. ‘I would say that Laurie’s made a success of being female, wouldn’t you?’

‘Completely.’

‘Then I wouldn’t worry about her.’

‘But I do. I really like Laurie and Tom. And I hope Melanie’s big mouth doesn’t make trouble for them.’

Paul gave the kitchen counter a final swipe with a damp sponge and tossed it into the sink. ‘You said she told Jay Giannotti?’

I nodded.

‘And he didn’t do anything with the information?’

‘Not that I know of.’

Paul gathered me into his arms. ‘Hannah, you worry too much. Give it a rest.’ He kissed the top of my head.

So I stopped worrying.

For a whole minute.

‘I wonder what Laurie’s name was before it was Laurie?’ Next to my nose, his shirt smelled freshly of Tide.

‘Hannah!’

I looked up. ‘Lawrence? Laurent? Luke? Leonardo?’

‘Laurie can be a boy’s name, too,’ Paul reminded me as he released me and headed in the direction of the living room. ‘Remember Little Women?’

‘Oh, right.’ I was addressing his broad, navy T-shirt-covered back. ‘The boy next door. The one who marries Amy when Jo jilts him.’

I was still mulling over names – a totally pointless exercise – when Paul and I settled down in the living room to watch a new episode of Law and Order.

He pointed the remote at the screen and began clicking through the channels, searching for the station in hi-def. ‘You know what, Hannah?’ he said as the screen pulsed with quick-cut images and the familiar theme began to play.

‘What?’

‘Male or female, Laurie Wainwright is prettier than most, and a damn fine dancer.’

The next day I called ahead, and since Jay was still in the hospital, I decided to visit. I doubted that the subject of Laurie’s gender would come up, but if it did, I planned to mine the opportunity. If Jay planned to use the information Melanie had provided to make trouble for Laurie, at least I could be a good citizen and give the girl a head’s up.

When I got to Jay’s room I found Kay standing by the bed, picking food off an insulated, compartmentalized plate with her fingers. ‘How about a green bean, Jay? It’s overdone, just the way you like it.’

Jay was propped up on three pillows, looking terrible. His eyes were dull and sunken, jittery in their sockets. His luxurious eyebrows had thinned, giving him an oddly surprised expression. In spite of the tan, his face looked ashen.

I knocked lightly on the door frame. ‘May I come in?’

Kay turned away from the food tray and said, ‘Hi, Hannah. We’re just having lunch.’

From the amount of food left on his plate, it didn’t look like Jay was having much to do with lunch. I entered the room, and set a gaily-wrapped box of candy on the foot of the bed. ‘Maybe this will do for dessert?’

Jay winced, then smiled wanly. ‘Thanks, Hannah. Maybe later.’

‘You were out of it last time I visited.’ I managed to dredge up a smile. ‘I’d come by to tell you how much I enjoyed your paso doble.’

Jay raised a hand, waved it feebly, then let it fall on to the covers. ‘I really screwed it up big-time, didn’t I?’ He turned his head, trying to catch his wife’s eye. ‘I keep telling Kay I’m too old for this, but she doesn’t listen.’

‘Old, schmold! You guys were great. And the choreography you arranged for Hutch and Melanie knocked everyone’s eyes out.’ I patted Jay’s hand, and was surprised when he winced again, and jerked it away.

Kay shot me a warning glance. ‘His skin’s really sensitive.’

‘Sorry. I didn’t know.’

Jay managed a feeble grin. ‘Seems I’m always causing trouble.’ He turned his head on the pillow. ‘Kay, could you pour me some ginger ale, please?’

While Kay filled a plastic glass with ice, popped open a can of ginger ale and began to pour, I filled them both in on the party a few nights previously. ‘And did you hear that Tom and Laurie won several firsts at the Sweetheart Ball? They were over the moon.’

Jay nodded and replied with obvious effort. ‘Tom called to tell us. I’m pleased, very pleased. They’re hard workers, and super serious about dance. I’m referring them to Paul Pellicoro and Eleny Fotinos in Manhattan. I’ve done about all I can for them here.’

‘Pellicoro? Is that the guy who taught Al Pacino to tango in Scent of a Woman?’

Kay answered for her husband. ‘Right. You may have seen them interviewed on TV.’ She popped a flexible straw into the ginger ale and held it for Jay while he took a sip, then another, then another. Swallowing seemed to be a problem. Jay held up a hand, and Kay moved the ginger ale away.

‘And while we’re talking about talent, do you think your future brother-in-law will give up the law for dance?’ Jay asked me.

I grinned. ‘I doubt it. Ten years out, and he’s still paying off his student loans. But he’s gung-ho, full-steam-ahead for the Shall We Dance? competition.’ I explained as well as I could about the arrangements Hutch was making so that his firm could function for the months they’d be without him.

Kay held out the glass. ‘More ginger ale?’

‘No thanks, sweetheart. I think I’ll take a nap now.’ He exhaled slowly and closed his eyes.

‘I’ve tired you out, Jay. I’m sorry.’ I started buttoning my coat and headed toward the door.

Kay set the ginger ale down on the bedside table, leaned over her husband, adjusted his pillows, and smoothed a long, lank lock of hair out of his eyes. Suddenly she gasped, withdrawing her hand as if she’d received an electric shock.

‘Kay!’ I whispered. ‘What’s wrong?’

Kay turned to me, her eyes wide and frightened, like an animal caught in the headlights. Tears welled up, spilling over on to her cheeks. Silently, she held out her hand. In it lay a hank of her husband’s handsome, blue-black hair.

‘He’s losing his hair?’ I glanced at the pillow where Jay’s head rested and noticed other strands that had separated from his head when he moved it. It can happen suddenly, just like that, with chemo. One night you’ve got hair, the next morning you’re standing in the shower and it’s falling out in clumps, swirling around the drain at your feet.

But Jay wasn’t on chemo.

As I stood there looking from Jay’s littered pillow to Kay’s ravaged face, I remembered something I’d read in an Agatha Christie novel written late in her career and not one of her best – The Pale Horse. Mark Easterbrook, the writer-hero realizes that somebody’s been poisoned with thallium. ‘But one thing always happens sooner or later,’ he says. ‘The hair falls out.’

I took Kay by the shoulders, soothing her, trying to calm her down, although under the circumstances saying, ‘There, there, it’s going to be all right,’ seemed pretty hollow.

At least she’d stopped shivering. ‘Kay, have the doctors tested Jay for heavy metal poisoning? Arsenic? Or thallium?’

‘I don’t know,’ she bawled, clutching the lock of her husband’s hair to her bosom with both hands.

I located Jay’s call button on the end of a cord clipped to the bed rail, and punched it repeatedly. ‘When the nurse comes, you have to tell her about the hair.’

Kay sucked in her lips and nodded silently, but I wasn’t sure my words were getting through.

‘Honey?’ It was Jay calling to his wife from the bed. ‘What’s wrong?’

She rushed to his bedside. ‘Oh, Jay! Your beautiful hair is falling out. Hannah thinks it could be heavy metal poisoning.’

With some effort, Jay raised a hand and rubbed it across his brow and over his temple, coming away holding a few strands of hair. ‘I’ll be damned.’ Under the circumstances, he was surprisingly calm.

A nurse appeared in the door. ‘How can I help?’

Kay stared, and pointed to me.

I told the nurse what I suspected.

The nurse, young, freshly-uniformed and scrubbed, considered me with cool, green intelligent eyes. ‘Of course. I’ll call the doctor right away.’

‘Heavy metal?’ Jay asked after the nurse had left. ‘Isn’t that how they murdered that Russian guy?’

At the mention of murder, Kay gasped.

‘For heaven’s sake, Kay. Who the hell would want to murder me?’ Jay turned back to me. ‘Thallium, wasn’t it?’

‘Alexander Litvinenko? They thought so at first, but it turned out to be polonium-210. Much more toxic,’ I hastily added, although from what I remembered of the newspaper accounts at the time, thallium poisoning could be pretty deadly, too, especially if you didn’t diagnose it in time.

‘Ha! Seems I’ve been poisoned by spies!’

As sick as he was, the man hadn’t lost his sense of humor.