My friend Richard is teaching school in Saudi Arabia. He says it sucks, but he’s coining good money. He asked if I want to join him.

If all else fails, “Why not?”

Saudi Arabia is closer to Thailand than New York.

He sent an old joke yesterday.

A man is in bed with his Thai girlfriend.

After great sex, she spends the next hour just stroking his dangly bit, something she had lovingly done on many other post-coital occasions.

Rather enjoying it, he turns and asks her: ‘Why do you love doing that ?’

She replies: ‘Because I really miss mine…’

Erk!

Ladyboy slipped under the radar.

It’s so easy to be fooled especially when your lust blinds the shrouds of deception.

Years ago I worked at a bar in New York. The name was the Milk Bar. The decor was an imitation of the Malchek Milk Bar in CLOCKWORK ORANGE. White Lucite and gelled light. The crowd cut across the layers of New York. The good, the bad, and the in-between. One of the customers was a narcotic detective. He led raids in Brooklyn. Whenever he walked into the bar, people walked out.”

“Friends and colleagues.” Rob would shrug off their departure. “I’m not here for work. I’m here to have a good time.”

He was only 24.

Good times at the Milk Bar meant something else than Disney rides and one night I see Rob drinking with Dove, a lanky brunette in a slinky Azzadine sheath. An hour later they’re holding hands and shortly thereafter both of them are kissing with an audience. I knew Dove as Dave. He was more beautiful as a woman than he had been as a man. Dove fooled most of her prey. She liked her men straight. When Dove visited the ladies room to powder her nose I sidled next to him.

“So what you think?” His face shined with an eager redness. Few women could match Dove’s passion.

Normally I would have let Rob find out for himself about Dove’s sexuality, but he had become more a friend and my job as a doorman necessitated a little violence from time to time. Having a cop in your pocket was a good card to hold.

“Dove’s great, if you like guys.”

“Guy?” Rob choked on his beer.

“Dove’s been a girl for a couple of years. Beautiful and sexy, but a guy no less.” I was worried about Dove’s reaction to my snitching her out. She could be very mean.

“A guy?” Rob looked around the bar, as if he were trying to spot a familiar face. The crowd consisted of perps, dealers, politicians, models, musicians, diplomats, actors, and starlets. None of them were saints. He swigged his beer. “I can deal with that.”

“You can?” I thought my warning would steer him to clearer water.

“Dove’s the best looking woman I’ve seen in years. Man or woman. And she wants me.”

“Then you have my blessing.”

The two of them left within the hour. No one noticed their departure. Dove showed up the next day with a smile and Rob’s watch.

“He gave it to me.”

“Really?” I almost believed her. It was a cheap watch.

“Really.” Dove waited that night for Rob to show up. He never did. Dove went home alone. He was twice the woman I will ever be.