Going in Style
After a few introductions Byrd, the club’s host, says into the mike, “Hit it!”
A couple more minutes pass as the murmuring crowd waits.
Jo-Jo and Billy the Kid had been the first of the performers to arrive earlier that night. Around 10:30 PM they skipped past the line forming outside and greeted the bouncers. Descending into Shelter’s cluttered basement, they passed a rack of employee time cards and a large painted plywood sign that read “Shelter open thru MAR ’98” and settled into the makeshift dressing room with its high ceilings, black walls spray painted with a few unintelligible phrases (“until your smile makes it right”), a couple of ragged couches, a cardboard box marked “old clothes,” and a sparkle-covered sign that reads “The Glitter Palace.”
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“I can tell when he goes to work,” Billy says. “He’s real quiet.”
“What time do we go on?” asks a young man named Angel.
