Election Night: Mr. Tapper's Poppers

From my perch at one end of a long curved bar, I watched another server go by, admiring the choice of uniform for the event. Each one wore little more than a corset, collar, and a tooled-leather pup mask — Versace, of course. The atmosphere in the room was somewhere between Gilded Age fever dream and Studio 54 at half past 2 in the morning. Opulence, excess, more than a hint of debauchery. CNN would settle for no less on Election Night.

I smoked my cigarette, and watched drag artist Katya Zamolodchikova, in a dazzling gown of crimson silk, regaling a star-struck Wolf Blitzer with tales from an ayurvedic ketamine workshop and croquet retreat she visited this summer with Trixie Mattel’s third favorite body double. Wolf laughed, Katya smirked, and their eyes lingered on one another. 

I was contentedly sipping my drink, soaking up the vibe, and letting the charged exchange between Wolf and Katya take my mind off the election map — inconveniently projected across the vaulted ceiling — when my host found me in the crowd.

“Jaina!” CNN anchor Jake Tapper waved and strode across the room. “I wasn’t sure you’d make it.”

“I’m a journalist, Jake,” I replied as we exchanged pecks on the cheek. “Of course I’m spending tonight in a newsroom.” He smelled like Dior Eau Sauvage and TV makeup. 

I took a drag on my cigarette and let him drink me in. I was wearing a low-cut dress in emerald green lace that showed off my ample curves and had a scandalously high slit up the side. My elbow-length opera gloves were a matching shade of green, chased in gilt brocade. 

He’d never say it, but we both knew CNN headquarters wasn’t my first choice for the evening. I’d gotten a peek at the guest list for Ina Garten’s get together and just couldn’t bring myself to face Jeffrey and whichever buxom femboy Yves Saint-Laurent’s ghost has seen fit to inhabit for the event, not both in a single night — not after Davos. I was done with recreational grave robbing, no matter how much I loved Ina. I shrugged off a shiver and gave Mr. Tapper a smile. 

“How are things out there?” I asked, gesturing with my cigarette toward the heavy oak double doors which led to the CNN studio, where blue and red pundits were on the verge of blows every time a new district was called for Kamala. Each time the cameras cut to a car commercial the producers had to come in and search them for improvised weapons. When I’d first arrived, I’d had to squeeze past Briana Keilar and John King holding down a thrashing Kayleigh McEnany while an unlucky PA unwound the piano wire garrote from her Fox News blonde coiffure. I couldn’t imagine things had gotten any better. 

“About the same,” he said with a wince. He swirled his neon green margarita and sighed. “It’s closer than it should be in all the wrong places.” 

“Just like Katya and Wolf,” I said softly, gesturing toward the pair with a conspiratorial smirk.

Jake leaned in to follow my line of sight and spotted them through the crowd of couture gowns and Italian suits. 

“He’s gonna get his heart broken, again,” Jake said, shaking his head. He took a long slurp from his frozen marg. “And I’m not picking up the pieces this time.” He crunched a piece of ice between his powerful molars.

“So, I’m not just here for this whole ‘end of democracy’ gag am I? I heard you have something to show me.” I said, sipping my sparkling lean out of a cut crystal coupe with the CNN logo etched on the stem. Codeine wasn’t my drug of choice, but it would do in a pinch. Especially tonight. 

Jake’s beaming smile chased the darkness from his expression, and he was back. 

“It was going to be a surprise,” he said in a mock-chiding voice. “But since you mentioned it…” He moved in closer, looking over his shoulder before producing a crystalline phial bound in intricate silver wire. It was no bigger than a perfume sampler bottle. Inside, a pale blue liquid seemed to effervesce, but it could’ve been a trick of the light. 

I tried not to let my surprise get the better of me. So it was true.

Jake Tapper’s homemade poppers had been something of a myth in the queerosphere, a white stag seen fleetingly through the trees, a unicorn dreamed on a warm summer’s day. But here they were. 

“We’re almost ready to go to market,” he said, clearly clocking the greed in my eyes. “Apothecaries in three states working overtime to fill the warehouses in Berlin, London, and New York.” 

“But?” I asked, peeling my gaze away from the hand-crafted bottle. 

“We need a review,” Jake tucked the phial back into his coat. I was sad to see it go. I just wanted to hold it, feel its cool glass against my palm. 

I moistened my lips and took a long sip of my drink, casting my gaze out over the party. Trying in vain to ground myself, to bring my mind back to the present. I wondered what the exclusive would cost me, and how dearly I’d be willing to pay.

In case it's at all unclear, this is fiction. Think of it as a glimpse into a mirror universe where a fictionalized version of me writes long-form print media features in a gauzy style inspired by those 70's, 80's New Yorker, Vanity Fair articles where a famous author basically just talks about how much blow they did and lists all the famous people they know.

Stay tuned for part two...