One night in Bangkok and the world's your oyster
The bars are temples but the pearls ain't free
You'll find a god in every golden cloister
And if you're lucky then the god's a she
I can feel an angel sliding up to me
Sky Diamond (star, Sky Diamond Superstar): It was time for a new chapter. Reinventing myself had become second nature to me. You tend to do that in the dance world. Each routine became a character that I threw myself into. Like a little movie. It was exciting. So, three things happened that steered me in a new direction. Desire, Ash Holland and another man, Henry Rule. My life was going to change and this is how it happened.
Ash and Henry stepped into range around the same time. It was right after I'd started dancing at Desire. Speaking of movies, it was almost as if somebody had cast the two as good guy, bad guy, Ash being the bad guy. I was too infatuated to recognize the signs. He was so good looking.
He was bartending at the time at the State Bar, a very cool place located near the Dallas on Parry. One night, several of the State Bar people came to Desire. They looked like beautiful characters from Hollywood or somewhere. Zack knew Ash and a couple of the others. I was smitten the instant I laid eyes on him and asked Zack who he was.
“You don't want to get mixed up with that, Sky. Steer clear," he responded.
"Why?" I couldn't see it. Too busy trying to take him all in. He was gorgeous, but not strictly pretty-boy hot. He had that fierceness a girl likes. At the time, I didn't notice the beginnings of a skin condition, the kind that comes from late nights and drug use. He had a soft mouth that was capable of a sneer. I liked that. Thick hair with a natural wave and growing out color he'd streaked blonde. Like I said, it was hot. He had very broad shoulders and I figured him to be around 23, the magic age for me. I hit it right on the money.
He was a real lady killer, Ash. Big brown eyes like a calf and long dark lashes. And, he had eyes for me, too. We hooked up that night, me ignoring my friend Zack's warnings completely. There was no messing around. We both wanted sex with each other and went to his apartment in Dallas. He lived in a cool four-plex at the time between Lakewood and Lower Greenville. The place had a mystique and I was drawn into it.
It was homelike, where he lived. Big trees out front, oak and several others I couldn't name. I thought how nice it would be to sit outside there on a warm spring day. Maybe later we'd do that, Ash and I. The inside was what you'd expect from a young Dallas single guy. He didn't have to try hard with those looks. A sofa, chair, kind of a mess. The requisite stereo system.
He loved the Cure, Ash did and would often refer to his hero, Robert Smith. He knew every member of the band almost intimately. Boris, Simon, Port, But, that first night, he put on Sade. I don't know if he did it for me or what, but it did the trick. I was lost to him and open for anything. Sex with Ash was incredible. He had a perfect body and was uncircumcised. Huge and absolutely lovely. My ass was completely red from doing it all over the floor until we finally made it to the bedroom. I knew he'd probably fucked a thousand girls in there, but I didn't care. This was the best lovemaking I'd ever had. Certainly better than Skitz.
"You are magnificent," he said. I had to believe him, because he was so intensely believable. And, he couldn't keep his hands off me. They were everywhere. On my breasts, between my thighs, on my ass. Rubbing and caressing me like he couldn't get enough. Nobody's that good of an actor, but I wasn't checking up on it either. I was there for the party.
Sky Diamond (star, Sky Diamond Superstar): It was right when I met Ash that Henry came into my life. Henry Rule was not a titty bar kind of guy, so it was strange I should meet him in that setting, at Desire. He was English and of the upper cut, unlike Puddin' and Mike from the Dollhouse who were working class from Manchester. Henry oozed culture. He was a painter whose work had been featured in museums and on album covers. The most famous of note was the David Bowie recording Low. The colors were orange and as glorious as David himself.
Henry wore his brown hair long, casually brushing against his famous work shirt collar. He was probably about forty when I met him, debonair and confident with clear gray eyes. He was the type of person at home in a castle or a pub. In fact, after we became close, he told me once should we be in England and meet in a bar, it wouldn't be like it was here in Dallas. He'd look at me from afar and couldn't or wouldn't join me publicly. Things were different over there. I didn't understand at the time. And, it didn't bother me. In my own way, I was as bold and self-assured as he was.
He was married to money, but and had an art studio in Oak Lawn. He wanted to paint me and I was cool with it. We'd meet there in the afternoons where I'd pose. He had me squat for the series of photographs much like the one used on this book cover. He took tons of them, wanting to get my eyes just right. He loved my eyes. He said there was something between terror and kindness in there and it was almost impossible to catch.
He gave me things. A black leather Engish motorcycle jacket that fit me like a dream. A bottle of perfume. He liked me in Elixir, the Clinique scent. Some jewelry. A bracelet that I lost. It still pains me to think about it, so beautiful, silver with a tiny charm. Wouldn't you know, a butterfly with what looked like an 's.' A butterfly like my old friend, Papillon.
Henry Rule (English artist and designer): Sky. The one that got away. Had things been different...who's to say. Was I in love with her? Probably as close as one might get to the word. She was extraordinary. You'd never know she came from such a horrible place. Truly, a real life Breakfast at Tiffany's. Only, even more special and bizarre. Set in the strange backdrop of Dallas in the 80's. No other town capitalized the decade better than Dallas at that time. It was an insane bevy of excess on every level.
You know I took the photograph of her that reigned on every cab and bus in town. It was mine. My homage to her. To Sky Diamond. She was so gorgeous. Not in the classic sense, but all in her own style. She was wearing her hair short at the time. A faux hawk sheared short on the sides with that thick blonde cut, wild and untamed. Her coiffure was an extension of herself and nobody else was doing it. She was certainly a stand out, Sky was.
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