After midnight above Jefferson Theater the exquisite wickedness of Arthur Weinstein’s apartment became a home away from home for hell-bent nightlifers raced at full-tilt to utter abandonment. I ran the door and had to refuse several unlikely party-goers. Something was not right about them. They looked like cops and one couple were too friendly, offering me $50 to get in the door. I refused them and went upstairs to warn Arthur about a possible raid.

“Don’t worry , we’re covered by the 9th Precinct.”

Jimmy Fats sat with three ununiformed local cops.

A bottle of champagne on the table. They thought they owned the place. We never argued with them

“And the back door is open. Any sign of trouble, lock the door and get out of here. We’ll meet at the Ritz.”

I returned to the entrance and let in more people glomming my usual 10% from the entrance fees. I questioned one man. He looked like he had recently shaved a beard, but he mentioned a friend’s name and slipped me a $50. An hour passed without any troubles at the door or inside. Two stocky men approached me. I didn’t like their look.

“Sorry, this is a private party.” Friends and celebrities skated inside. Anyone else had to wait until I said go and they paid $20 for that privilege.

They said nothing and one of them grabbed the door before I could shut it.

“We know it’s a private party and it’s over.”
For a second I blocked his entry, thinking this was a hold-up, but someone behind him said, “Cool it, Fuckhead, we’re the police.”

“You have a search warrant?”

“Fuckhead, this is a raid.” The SWAT cops blocked my escape up the stairs. they were dying to throw me a beating. The The biggest cop thrusted a paper in my face. “Get out of the way.”

“How? Where?” I had surrendered to the moment. “Where you want me to move. Tell me.”

A female cop I had earlier refused entry spat in my face, “You remember us. Now you’re not so high and mighty, faggot.”

“I don’t remember you at all. I see a lot of people. I never look at the face. Only the eyes.” Hers were green.

“Fuck you, you move and I’ll shoot you.” She put her hand of her pistol.

“Like I said I’m not going anywhere, until someone says where.” The uniformed cops pig-piled against me. They had all probably been refused entry to a nightclub. No one wants them inside a club. An older cop in a suit pushed them away. “Chill it, he’s not any danger, are you?”

“None at all.” My uncle’s father had been a Boston homicide detective. I knew that if the police have you, they have you, and if they get shit, they will give more shit than you need in your life. It was time to hold your sand.”

“Good. Get upstairs,” he ordered the raiding party and told me, “You come with me.”

We climbed up the stairs and entering the apartment he grabbed the New Zealand busboy and handcuffed me to his wrist.

“I didn’t do nothing.”

“Everyone here has done something.” He stuck us on couch. SWAT cops were letting out guests and stopping any of the staff. There was no sign of Arthur, but his best friend, Scottie walked by me with Chuck Nanny, an artist. Somehow the ex-Studio 54 bartender had snuck under the cops’ radar. We exchanged less than a glance. His eyes said he had the money.

The plain-clothed officers were having people turn out their pockets. I stuffed my money. $700 in my sock. Cellophane packets were scattered on the floor. No one claimed ownership. I stuck my free hand into the couch. My fingers touched several packets. I stuffed them deep under the pillows. The rugby-playing busboy was worried about getting deported back to the Antipodes.

“Don’t worry, we’ll be fine. Just be patient. This is the weekend and we’re not the only after-hour club in the city. I’ll take care of you. Keep your mouth shut and just say ‘not guilty’ when you’re asked for your plea”

“Do you have a lawyer?”

No, but we’ll get arraigned after eight. That’s went the judges come in, unless we’re hauled in front of night court. Just say nothing.” I had no idea about the process only what I had heard from friends.

Uniformed offers sat more Jefferson employees on chairs; Conniver, the Australian model/waitress, Emma, my ex-, the coat check trans, and Hal Lucader, a gay model/bartender. Griffin Shea, a mouthy minor-league coke dealer from DC/DJ was roughly shoved next to me. Unlike the rest of them both his hands were cuffed before him. Undoubtably the DC brat had probably pulled his father being in the CIA on them. Arthur must have made it out the back door into the alley. I saw ‘Sal’, a 9th Precinct cop, escorted out of the apartment and I thought, “There goes his pension.”

The cops ransacked the apartment for drugs and money. I eyed an older officer and he came up to me, “What?”

“Excuse me, but that guy at the end isn’t us.” I nodded to Andrew, who had overstayed his visa. “Probably some NYU student scared about his permanent record.”

“Are you saying you work here?”

“No without getting read my rights, but I’m not saying anything you don’t already know.” My family came from cops and lawyers. “This kid is just a stupid busboy.”

“You don’t want to say anything about yourself, but snitch him out.”

“Just let him go.”

“In the morning, big shot.”

He walked away help his uniformed cops dragged Jimmy Fats from a back room. I later learned that the cops had beaten the NYFD bag man with baseball bats. I doubted he had said a word and shrugged to the busboy.

“I tried. Just remember say nothing, because you know nothing.”

A fat donut-eater came up to me and ordered, “Empty your pockets, big shot.”

I obeyed his threatening request and pulled out $43.

“That’s it?”

“I made a drop before the raid.”

He confiscated everyone else’s money and I asked, “Can we sign for that?”

“Sorry, I don’t have a pen, big shot.”

After he left, Griffin whispered with a cocaine wheeze, “I’m going to bolt.”

“Bolt?”

“I’m going to break for the marquee and climb out of here. I’ll get a cab and call my Dad. He’s CIA. He’ll deal with this. You in?”
Griffin had been recently dumped by Emma, the waitress, for a member of the Rockats and was way gone on blow. I tried to reel him back to Earth.

“Your chances of getting to the marquee are okay, but the climbing down the building manacled to someone else is nil. You’ll break your leg, then the police will beat the bejesus out of you.”

“Not if I make it.”

“I’m out.”

“Chicken shit.”

“Chicken shit? Go fuck yourself. Go now. Otherwise keep your hole shut.” I was angry at him, but more that I hadn’t seen the raid coming when it came. I could have shut the door and got out the back. Griffin did nothing and the cops told the men to stand. We were heading downtown to Central Booking.

The older cop told us, “You’re being charged with violation of State Liquor Laws. It’s a misdemeanor, not a felony, although if you have any legal problems, this could make them worse. Time line? You’ll be out of booking by noon at the latest.”
I groaned, knowing from previous arrests in Boston how long time can be in jail, but this wasn’t prison. It was a rainy Sunday morning and a cop joked that we were missing church. No one laughed and we were crowded into a large police van. Jimmy Fats sat on the sidewalk. His right leg was most certainly broken. His face was twisted in pain. I was the last in. Someone shouted my name. Across the street RW was hanging out his wondow. We were friends. I raised my fist and shouted, “Attica.”

“Shut up, big shot.” A cop shoved me into the van. The cops hated any supporter of the Attica Prison Uprising.

The cops brought down the we left a PBA attorney rescued Jimmy Fats. Their EMS wagon sped away to Bellevue.

The doors shut and we began the voyage downtown.

“Can we stop for pizza. None of us have eaten.”
<\p>”Pizza for us too.”

“Yes, I have $40.” The two bills had been in my back pocket.

“Okay.”

They stopped at St. Marks and got two pies. They weren’t hot. We didn’t care. I didn’t ask for the change. Griffin was going berserk.

“I want a lawyer. I want a telephone. I want him there when I get there. Fucking pigs.”

I leaned over to Griffin.

“If you say another word, I will beat the shit of you worse than any cop beating.” The longer the police were pissed at him, the longer they would be pissed at us.

“Oh, yeah, another thing, fuck your father and the CIA.” The previous year my sister-in-law, who worked for the Director, tried to get me a job at the Agency. They had rejected me.

The cops brought down Emma, Conniver, and Ellen, or at least I thought her name was Ellen, and put them in a newer and better wagon.

Hal leaned over to me. He was dressed like an Adam and the Ants pirate, which was all the rage in the UK.

“Please don’t let them separate us. I don’t want to be put in a cage with animals.”

“This isn’t prison. Just a holding pen.” The pretty boy was so pretty was lucky this wasn’t prison, otherwise he was some con’s stick pussy.”

“Say nothing and stick by me. The cops are more worried about illegal Haitians and Cubans than a beautiful boy.”

I spoke like I knew the score, but my only brush with the Law had been for a high speed chase in the VW Hatchback. This was all new. We ate the cold pizza on the way down the Bowery to the Tombs. We passed the whores on Delancey who shouted out encouragement. The cop driving asked, “You want some of that? We have time.”

“No, I value my life.” Something deadly was stalking gays and drag queens. My friend James Spicer had died of it two years ago. No one had a name for it.

We got to Central Booking and rejoined the women. As they processed us, the staff of a Harlem after-hour entered the room. I recognized the bartender. Buff laughed with amusement, “Looks like the party ended uptown and downtown.

“Puto, they ain’t downtown. We downtown,” said a Latino bouncer from Avenue d and 2nd. “The Midtown to us.”

And Flacco was right, but I countered, “Midtown begins at 14th Street, but on the other side of 14th Street from the Jefferson.”

“Hell, yeah.”

We were us and the pigs were them.

Forever.