Idaho Code Read online

  Chapter 7

  At three-thirty, Tipper called, waking me out of a sound sleep.

  “What are you doing in bed?” he demanded. “The sun doesn’t set for another six hours. You’ve got no excuse for lying in bed in the middle of the afternoon like an old lady. Unless, of course, you’ve got a fancy woman under your quilt. As I doubt that you do, up, up, up!”

  “Christ on a cracker, Tip. Have you no mercy?”

  He laughed. “Not for the lazy, sweetheart. Siesta time is over. I’m calling to invite you to a little pick-up game of softball. We’re playing the Folksong Army, and you’re pitching.”

  “I can’t,” I protested. “I’m expecting a phone call between seven and eight.”

  “Seven? It’s not even four o’clock yet. You’ve got plenty of time. Don’t argue with me, Bil—you’ve been blowing me off for weeks. Get your ass over here, and I’ll make sure you’re home by seven. Who’s supposed to call you, anyway? Is it,” he gasped, “a girl?”

  I ignored the question. “I’ll be there in half an hour. We’re going to lose, you know. The Folksong Army is invincible.”

  “Oh ye of little faith. Don’t forget your spikes.”

  I hung up the phone and gave myself a couple of sharp whacks on the forehead with the palm of my hand. It didn’t help. I took two aspirin. Fifteen minutes later, I’d located my shoes and glove, put on my Mariners cap, and was headed out the door. No one was in the living room, and no one seemed to be stirring anywhere else in the house. Emma had probably joined Hugh in his nap. As I headed down the driveway, I saw the curtains twitch in Sam’s bedroom. I walked as quickly as I could without breaking into an all-out run. The last thing I wanted to do was give him a ride into town.

  The pattern with my brother was always the same. Whenever he was released, it was always on the condition that he stay away from his underage loser friends. In custody it was all “Of course, I’ll stay home. I’ll stay out of trouble. I’ll stay away from Francie.” Once he was out, that quickly changed to “Drive me to town or I’ll fucking hitchhike.” I wasn’t taking him to town, not this time, and I didn’t feel like fighting with him about it.

  Once I was safely in the truck and on my way, I began to relax. A game might be just what I needed. Softball was the state-sanctioned religion at Fort Sister, a.k.a. Tipper’s house. Captain Schwartz, Tipper’s mother, ran her home as a kind of artists’ colony-cum-lesbian boot camp. Fort Sister wasn’t its real name—it was actually called Blood Moon Women’s Haven. That was the official title in the brochures, anyway.

  Idaho has always been a magnet for people like Captain Schwartz and my mother, a haven for the individualist, the true libertarian, and the crackpot. My mother was an Idaho native, born and bred, but even if she hadn’t been, she was a pioneer hippie who had back-to-the-land fantasies about peace and justice and living au naturel. Tipper’s mother was another kind of Idaho oddity, a lesbian survivalist. She’d spent ten years in the Army before being swept up by the women’s movement. Captain Schwartz liked women and she liked guns, and after her experience as a lesbian in the military, she didn’t trust the government. Fort Sister had plenty of artists in residence. It also had an arsenal, a bomb shelter, and a library of books with titles like The Anarchist’s Cook Book and How to Survive A Nuclear Winter.

  Crackpot or not, I often wished I could be more like Captain Schwartz. Sometimes I wished I were more like my mother. They both knew what they wanted, and they acted without hesitation. What did I want? True love and a quiet life? A little safe excitement? Out at Fort Sister, the women paired up, broke up, changed partners, and everyone stayed friends. I wondered how the hell they did it. A. J. and I had been together for two years. Then she discovered the joys of adultery. I didn’t want to be her friend. I wanted her to drop dead.

  When I arrived at the entrance to Fort Sister, Tipper was straddling the front gate, swinging it back and forth across the long driveway. The house was a mile in from the road, far from casual view. He waved a beer bottle at me and hopped down, bowing low before opening the gate so I could drive through. I stopped just inside. He closed the gate behind me and padlocked it before hopping into the passenger seat.

  “Long time, no see,” he said, his voice heavy with sarcasm.

  “Don’t start now. I’ve had a long two days.” I glanced over his outfit, giving it a thorough appraisal. “Tipper, old bean, you look fetching in that black mini-skirt, but you can’t really play softball in it. How would you slide into home?”

  “Very carefully.” He smoothed his skirt down over the top of his legs, which—like the rest of him—were long, tanned, and muscular. “I ordered it from the Victoria’s Secret catalog. Do you like it?”

  The Captain had given birth to Tipper at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. They moved to Idaho when he was ten. That was thirteen years ago, but he still had a pronounced drawl. He was good-looking, quite masculine when he wasn’t dressed like Cher. He’d also been out forever, at least since junior high school. The one thing he seemed to have inherited from his mother, aside from her height, was an iron will. He’d be himself come hell or high water.

  I reached over and flipped up the edge of his skirt. “Pink bloomers, that’s a nice touch. You know, Tipper, I think you’ve got the longest legs in town.”

  “And the hairiest. Go ahead and say it.”

  “My mother raised me better than that. I never insult a lady. Besides, if you want to look like one of the Captain’s hirsute paying guests, that’s your business. I can’t believe she lets you get sexist exploitation like the Victoria’s Secret catalog out here.”

  “Well, she does. And Frederick’s of Hollywood, too. Mama doesn’t cramp my style.”

  “How sexist and hypocritical. Just because you’re a boy, you get to wear lingerie.”

  “Ha! You don’t know subversion of the patriarchy when it walks up and bites you.”

  I laughed. “So, what’s up with the padlock? You don’t usually lock the gate during the day.”

  “I know. And fat lot of good it does anyway since anyone could just walk around it and up through the woods on either side. It’s Mother—she’s insisting that we take every precaution. Some tramp wandered onto the property Thursday before last and scared the hell out of Cedar Tree. She didn’t like his looks. Imagine wearing a black turtleneck in August. She said he was sweating like a pig.”

  I stopped the truck.

  “Honey, what’s wrong? Did you run over a rabbit?”

  “A black turtleneck?”

  Tipper nodded.

  “Well, maybe it’s a coincidence, but . . .” I described the man in Sam’s cell and gave Tipper a blow-by-blow account of our dealings with the DA and the sheriff’s department.

  “Sounds like our tramp,” he agreed. “If you’ll pardon my saying so, I think someone’s put a root on your family. Sam’s had nothing but bad luck these last few months.”

  “It’s okay. I don’t believe he gave the guy anything.”

  “Hmm,” he replied noncommittally. “Other than that, how have you been?”

  “Okay. I saw A. J. yesterday.”

  “Did you tell her to hop on her broomstick and fly back to Seattle?”

  “I didn’t get the chance. Emma put on one of her more stellar performances, chasing Francie Stokes halfway up Main Street. It was humiliating.”

  “You poor thing,” he clucked sympathetically.

  “It’s all right. Who cares about A. J., anyway? So, what did your vagrant want?”

  “I can’t help you with that,” he said. “You’ll have to ask Cedar Tree.”

  “Cedar Tree? I’m assuming that’s not the name she was born with.”

  “No. She was née Beatrice Ann Jackson, at least according to her driver’s license. She’s our newest resident painter. She paints giant, psychedelic vulvas. Her latest is bright purple with big grapevines growing out of it. She calls it Pain’s Vineyard.”

  “Does she ever sell any of them?”
/>   He cringed. “Oh god, I hope not. It was twenty-three years ago, so I wouldn’t swear to it, but I think I passed through the model for Pain’s Vineyard on my way into this world.”

  “No way! Your mother . . .”

  “Posed.”

  We pulled up in front of the house. Fort Sister was actually an old hunting lodge, built in the nineteen-thirties by a railroad magnate. A good trout stream ran through the property, and there were still plenty of deer, elk, and bear around and about. A hotel chain bought the place in the fifties, hoping to turn it into a resort. They built four log-cabin guesthouses and then promptly went bankrupt. The buildings were falling apart when Captain Schwartz came along, and they continued to fall apart for some time after. She didn’t complete restoration of the main house until a couple of years ago. Most of the women had bedrooms on the first floor though a few of the real die-hards preferred to stay in the log cabins—cabins being a generous term for what were in fact dirt-floor hovels.

  Although he’d been living in Seattle since we graduated from high school, Tipper still claimed the entire second floor for himself. All three bedrooms, the sitting room, and a bathroom. “I cannot,” he said, “be expected to share intimate accommodations with women who name themselves after garden plants and pagan deities.”

  Most of the women at Fort Sister were semi-permanent residents. Some had been there for as long as I could remember. Still, every couple of years, someone left and a new woman took her place, usually someone fleeing a Midwestern metropolis like Detroit or Columbus.

  Tipper held the front door open for me. I curtsied and, not looking where I was going, ran smack into Captain Schwartz. It was like hitting a brick wall. Tipper’s mother was one hundred and seventy-five pounds of number-ten butch, six feet tall with a tight gray flat-top. I loved her. When I was a teenager, she’d taught me how to shoot, how to box, and how to play softball. She was my role model.

  “Oh,” I said, jumping back. “I’m sorry.”

  I found myself swept up in a big bear hug.

  “Bil!” she cried. “How are you? I hear you’re playing for the Radical Faeries today. How’s that pitching arm?” She gave it a good squeeze, and I did my best not to cry ouch.

  “It’s fine, Captain, and I’m fine as well. Who’ve you got pitching for the Folksong Army?”

  “We’ve got a new one,” she smiled. “Jane. She used to pitch for the University of Michigan. Arm like a Howitzer.”

  “Well, that’ll be fun,” I lied. Michigan my eye. I’d give Howitzer Jane a taste of Idaho she wouldn’t soon forget.

  Tipper grabbed my hand. “Excuse us, Mommie dearest. We’ve got to get our spikes on and discuss strategy. Meet you on the battlefield in ten.” When we were halfway up the stairs, he whispered, “The Radical Faeries are hiding out in my bedroom. Cedar Tree was chanting her menstrual mantra when I came out to meet you, and they fled in terror.”

  “Wimps or just jealous?” I paused on the landing outside of Tipper’s door. “Wait a second. If they’re all Radical Faeries, wouldn’t that give them quite a lot in common with this Cedar Tree woman? The Faeries are pagans, right?”

  “No, or rather yes and no. Cedar Tree isn’t the same kind of pagan as the Radical Faeries. She’s what’s called a solitary practitioner.”

  “What does that mean?

  “It means that she should get out more. She’s a witch without a coven. As for the rest of your question, they’re not actually Radical Faeries. Well, one of them is, Suzy. Although maybe he’s Episcopalian. Anyway, the rest are just odds and ends here to help fight Proposition One. Mama has been calling them ‘the Faeries’ as a kind of shorthand. She was calling them ‘the boys,’ but Anne—you remember her, the Ph.D. in women’s studies? Well, Anne noticed all of a sudden that Alan and Brian are black. She also noticed that my mother has a thick Southern accent.”

  “So I guess ‘boys’ was out.”

  “Was it ever. The Folksong Army got together in a huge processing circle and interrogated their own racism.”

  “Must have been fun.”

  “You don’t know the half of it.”

  “I’ve been meaning to ask you something,” I said. “Is it or is it not bad manners to call a drag queen he? You just called Suzy he, and I always call you he, even when you’re dressed as a she.”

  Tipper pursed his lips, thinking. “As a general rule, I suppose it is bad manners, but Suzy isn’t your typical drag queen. He’s like me, only more so. I do the sweet transvestite thing. Suzy wants everyone to know he’s a man, particularly when he’s in lipstick and high heels. He’s a kind of gender-fuck kamikaze. The Folksong Army don’t know what to make of him. Several are convinced that drag is inherently misogynist, but drag that isn’t trying to fool anyone, what’s that? There have been processing circles about Suzy, I can tell you.”

  I laughed. “You know, I’d never have made it as a lesbian in the seventies. They’d have booted me out of the collective.”

  “Bullshit,” he replied, his hand now on the doorknob to his bedroom. “I can just see you all earnest and bespectacled, covered in flannel. The wo-myn would have wet themselves. Now, close your eyes in case someone’s lounging around in the altogether.”

  Considering his taste in clothing, Tipper’s room was surprisingly conservative. The walls were the pale green of Granny Smith apples, with white trim and white wainscoting. Several watercolors, most painted by Tipper himself, were hung asymmetrically around the room. The only clue that the room belonged to a gay man and not Martha Stewart was the autographed eight-by-ten glossy of Harvey Fierstein on the bedside table.

  The Faeries were lounging around, all right, but all were fully clothed. I was introduced to Tom and Brian, who were on the bed reading magazines, to Jeff and Alan, who were playing chess on the floor, and, finally, to Suzy, who sat perched on top of a stereo speaker, his knees hugged close to his chest. Judy Garland was playing at maximum volume.

  “Must you be so obvious?” Tipper asked, striding across the floor and hitting the stop button on the CD player. “You’d think Betty Buckley had never been born.”

  Tom sighed and heaved himself off the bed. “We needed a little fix. The big one from Detroit has been playing women’s music festival crap all day. Filling up and spilling over. I was afraid Suzy would have a stroke.” He turned to me and grinned. “Hi, Bil, I’m glad you could make it. Tipper has us terrified about this softball game.”

  “And rightly so,” Tipper snapped. “I don’t like to lose.” He pointed an accusing finger at Suzy. “You are inappropriately attired. Where are your spikes?”

  Suzy uncrossed his legs and waved a bare foot at us. “My spikes, Tipper, are in Seattle where I left them. I didn’t know they’d be required.”

  Tipper sighed. “I told you before we came here that softball equals free room and board. You were obviously not listening. Lucky for you, I’ve got a spare pair in the closet.” He eyed Suzy’s feet suspiciously. “Can you squeeze those boats into a size ten?”

  “A tight fit,” Suzy replied, “but I don’t expect we’ll need to call the foot-binder.”

  I modestly averted my gaze while Tipper dropped his mini-skirt and pulled on a pair of blue jeans. Then we all waited impatiently for Suzy to finish lacing up.

  We trooped down the stairs and out through the kitchen. Fifty yards from the back door stood the Fort Sister softball diamond, complete with dugouts and floodlights. Before the house was even fully livable, the Captain and Tipper built the diamond. It was regulation size and immaculately groomed.

  The Folksong Army was first up to bat.

  “Age before beauty,” Tipper observed.

  “Pearls before swine,” his mother replied.

  Brian took first base, Suzy second, and Tipper third. Tom covered right field, and Jeff took left and center. Alan, who at six foot five was the largest of the Faeries, was catcher. We hoped that his size might deter the more aggressive Army players in their rush to home plate.

&
nbsp; The infamous Cedar Tree stepped up to bat. She was a short but substantial woman in a tie-dyed sweatsuit. She was also left-handed, which threw me a bit as I wasn’t warmed up. She scored a base hit off my second pitch.

  “Shake it off, honey!” Tipper called.

  Jane, the Michigan Howitzer, was next. She was a tall, good-looking woman of about thirty, well built and confident. She took a wide stance at the plate, feet exactly parallel with her broad shoulders. I fingered the brim of my cap and blew softly on my fingertips. Then, heaven smiled upon me. I delivered three perfect pitches, and the Howitzer swung at—and missed—all of them.

  The Captain gave a loud whistle from the dugout.

  “Yer out!” Alan yelled.

  “Whoo, girls, catch that breeze,” Suzy called. He stood on second base and swished his hips from side to side.

  The bases were loaded when the Captain stepped up to the plate. I motioned for the outfield to move way back. It didn’t matter. She connected with my first pitch and knocked it over the fence.

  By the bottom of the fifth inning, we were down two runs. I stood at the plate, waiting for Howitzer Jane to do her stuff. A telephone rang. The sound was muffled, and at first I thought it was coming from the house. Jane paused on the mound.

  “Is someone going to answer that phone?”

  “Just pitch,” I said. “I’m ready.” I was very ready. The bases were loaded, and Jane was beginning to tire. Alan had scored a triple off her in the fourth inning.

  “I can’t concentrate with that damn ringing,” Jane objected.

  “For Christ’s sake, Tipper,” Suzy said, “answer the phone. Your tit’s calling.”

  Tipper sighed heavily, reached into his brassiere, and pulled out a cell phone.

  “You’re worse than my mother,” I yelled.

  He blew me a kiss. “Schwartz residence, Tipper speaking. Oh, yes ma’am. She’s here.”

  He walked over to the plate and handed me the phone. Jane gave me a disgusted look and sat down on the pitcher’s mound.

  “Who is it?” I hissed.

  “Your mother,” he whispered.