1978: Safely landed at New Orleans Airport, Al and I jumped into an airport van and headed straight to the French Quarter. As the van door closed, Al started laughing. A friend of his from San Francisco was also in the van in full drag and sporting a bright red beard. Next to him sat a tall slender 40ish drag queen with a red bouffant. “Pleased, darlin, the name’s Ada, Ada Hearts here!” he said to me. I laughed and said “pleased to meet you ma’am.” Al said they both worked together at The Badlands on 18th Street in San Francisco.
In the next seat was a Texas couple, a man and his wife and they both seemed to be amused at this situation. The wife who had a similar hairstyle herself, said “Ada darlin, you need some refreshin’” and took out a comb, trying to reach over to help get her hair into shape. “Don’t you try your hairspray on me!” Ada replied indignantly. Ada wasn’t having none of this and let her know.
I looked at Al and said “This is the South?” “This is New Orleans,” he replied. I thought it better to watch out the window as the Superdome went by. Soon it was the ramp down past the cemeteries with the graves above ground that I’d never seen before and then over to Toulouse St and on to Bourbon. Luckily the Texas couple got dropped off at a guesthouse just inside the Quarter. We relaxed some.
Al began telling me more about our hosts Clyde and George, his old buddies from way back that had lived in San Francisco with him in the 60s. They had all hung around together, lived together, fucked around together. They had since moved back to New Orleans, now living in a big townhouse right on Bourbon.
The Quarter was like nothing I’d ever seen. Very old but with a vibrant energy. I was seeing an awful lot of color, exotic colors and people and events, constantly changing, divergent, like light striking a prism.
We soon pulled up to 1132 Bourbon Street and Clyde Webb and George South were sitting on the stoop drinking with a few other guys waiting for all their outta town guests to arrive. It was not yet noon in New Orleans and I hadn’t had anything to drink. George seemed a bit put out over all the guests, this Mardi Gras there would be 17 of us staying in his house.
Clyde was very beefy and hairy. Big forearms from construction and a thick dark moustache. George was blonde, thinner, good looking with a moustache. Clyde came from Shreveport. Clyde immediately was all over us. Clyde and Al were huggin and punching each other and then Al turned to me and said, “this is the one I was telling you about, Bobby Young.” Clyde looked me up and down and then grabbed my hand and shook it and said “Welcome to our home and New Orleans and Mardi Gras!” and slapped my back hard. Then he leaned in to Al and said “He’s a young one Al, and he’s got big hands on him, don’t he?” I was sure being sized up.
And so was Ada Hearts. She too was a guest although not greeted as well as I thought we were, I heard George say “not another San Francisco drag queen.” Then George
said “ya’ll c’mon in.” And that’s how we were all deposited on my first stoop in the French Quarter.
1132 Bourbon Street was deceptive as it was much larger than it looked from the street. It had an iron gate with a stoop below it and then two shuttered windows on
the front with shutters half opened. The second floor had a wrought iron railing on the gallery with 3 large windows that opened high enough to walk through, so you could walk out onto the gallery and overlook Bourbon. The house needed some repairs, it looked rundown, but so did a lot of the buildings in the Quarter. Once you walked inside, the history and the magic began.
We entered into a large hallway, with a curving staircase in front of us, to the right a very large high ceilinged double parlor. They had a couple dogs, one was an old fat
poodle with a very wide back on short stubby legs, kinda waddling thru the carpeted room. Ada Hearts said “why, you could put a cocktail tray on that dogs back and it
could just be self serve!” I almost bust out laughing.
Clyde intervened saying “Leave your things, ya’ll come get a drink,” and he hustled us out away from George thru the double parlor with high ceilings and huge dining room
table. Then through a set of double French doors and into a small galley kitchen.
The view I now saw was my deepest impression of New Orleans. We were led out to an old large private courtyard with a large blooming honeysuckle tree with lights in it,
smelling sweet and hanging over a raised up pond with water lillies in it and water trickling. The old slave quarters were to our left, where George and Clyde slept on the lower floor and the upstairs where Bobby Jones, who worked on the offshore oil rigs lived. High walls of brick covered in vines surrounded the rest of it. I was mesmerized.
Clyde got us some drinks and came over and started feeling me up—front and back. “This is a fine one you got here Al…..” he said, feeling my crotch and ass and legs. “Think this boy is gonna fit in just fine here.” He was taking his time. “Y’all tired from your trip?” Clyde winked. “I was gonna put you up at the top of the stairs. Bathroom’s across.” We sat a bit longer. I watched and listened to Clyde and Al and drank. This was a lot to take in. We had another stiff screwdriver and then he took us on up the stairway and to our bedroom. He said “I’ll be checking up on you guys in a little while and then we’ll all be ready to head up to Cafe Lafitte and show this boy around.”
The room had 3 beds in it, the windows faced the courtyard. Al and I dropped our bags took two beds and pushed em together. I used to like fucking around with Al and this would be fun.
We got out of clothes from the flight, laid down, and both passed out. I don’t know how long I got to sleep before I began having this very sensual dream, laying here in the high ceilinged room and I felt Al rubbing all over me, my legs, and balls and hard on and next I was getting this incredible blowjob and I started moaning some and it woke me up and by this time I was grabbing the sides of the bed. I looked over and saw Al next to me asleep and thought if Al is here then who’s down there? It was Clyde. That man was giving me the best blowjob I’d ever had and he got me off. Clyde loved to suck dick. Al didn’t even stir.
Clyde said “um hum…you’re quick”…and then jumped in the middle of me and Al, waking him up sayin’ “get up fucker, it’s Mardi Gras. Lets the 3 of us go hit the streets!”
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