Un-true blue

Note: In the original version of this story, the sexuality of the storyteller is different. I wrote this piece when I was in college, and not out yet. I didn’t have the strength to write my original idea, as my sexuality would have come into question. After my fears became irrelevant, I changed the ending in 1999 to my original intent.


“Who said I lied, because I never, I never, who said I lied because I never…”
-The Smiths, “Stop me if you’ve heard this before.”

“A man can tell a thousand lies, I’ve learned my lessons well…”
-Madonna, “Live to tell.”


1988 – “So it’s really over.

I hate to say ‘I toldyaso,’ but I knew it was coming. I just can’t believe it happened so fast. 28 glorious months down the tube. Sean must be devastated. She probably asked too much of him, like not to beat up (A) Her, (B) Photographers, (C) Her family and the smaller pets, or (D) All of the above. Jesus! What did she expect? I still can’t believe it’s over. I read all the details in the Enquirer, so the marriage is definitely splitsville.

Yeah, as a matter of fact, I do know Madonna.

Even though we grew up in the same lower-middle class neighborhood in Detroit, neither of us kept our accents. Madonna Louise Ciccone, daughter of Fred and Chester Ciccone, was born in 1958. Madonna’s mother Chester had a real complex about her name, and several years after Madonna’s birth changed it to Bill. The teasing stopped.

A beautiful girl considered homely by the whole neighborhood, Madonna could always be seen prancing around our building to music no one else heard. A future sign of stardom, perhaps? Maybe, or it might have been the fact that the Ciccone’s belonged to Detroit’s only sect for whirling Dervishes. Including Madonna, there were only five members. Being the youngest in the sect, Madonna soon became know as ‘Squirt Whirler.’ I remember how hard it was for her classmates to say ‘Red Rover, Red Rover, send Squirt Whirler right over,’ during recess. Those “urrr” sounds can be so draining on small children.

Yeah, I knew Madonna. She was raised by wolves.

I didn’t mention that before? Yeah, see, my family and hers went camping one weekend. I think Madonna was three. On this particular trip, we decided to camp near the U.S./Canadian border during that time of much diplomatic hostility between the two countries. Tension was high, and we thought for sure there’d be a war. In retrospect, it probably wasn’t the wisest thing to do, but my father and Madonna’s mother Bill liked to live dangerously.

Did I tell you they had an affair? Yeah, my dad ran off with Madonna’s mom, so technically, I’m Madonna’s half-brother, but we’re not that close. So to make a long story short, we’re cooking pasta (Madonna’s favorite) on dad’s Weber grill and Madonna wanders off into the forest toward the hostile Canadian border. Well, Madonna’s parents were so choked up about the whole deal they decide to look for her before they had dessert. So we organized a search party, looked for at least a good half-hour, gave up, and went home.

Madonna’s parents took about two weeks to adjust to her disappearance. They told my parents that sure, losing a child was terrible, but they were young and could have more kids. You know, when God hands you a lemon, make eggs. No, not eggs. I was just checking to see if you were paying attention. Of course they made lemonade. They did have more children, but none had the bright personality of Madonna. In fact, none of the other Ciccone children had personalities at all. They’re all accountants.

The one I felt bad for was Madonna. I mean, she was all of three years old, all alone, and probably (if she was even alive) in Canada! God! Do they even have indoor plumbing there?

Madonna was found wandering around, muttering about ice cream, by a pro-American family of Canadian Presbyterians. They raised her for about two years and would have kept her, but they happened to pass by her house one day on a visit to Detroit, after the tensions had ceased. “This is my house.” She said, and they let her out of the car. Madonna’s parents acted like nothing had happened. They enrolled her in school the very next day.

Madonna, though, had changed. She kept talking about the other family and her ‘brother’ Jimmy, who was a savant. She told me a savant was someone who was gifted with some rare ability, but who was also ‘Developmentally Disabled.’ She told me that Jimmy had Down’s Syndrome, but could play any song he heard, note for note, on the piano. She told me Jimmy never had a lesson in his life, and couldn’t read music, but that didn’t stop him from playing anything from Mozart to the Beatles on her ‘new family’s’ Steinway. The experience of living with Jimmy touched her deeply. Later, she wrote about those times in the song ‘Like a Virgin.’

I didn’t see Madonna much after that time. We kind of went our separate ways. I was busy with sports and drama, and she threw herself into work with her Dervish youth group. Being the only member, it wasn’t hard work, but it kept her busy.

Then we went to different high schools and never saw each other. The next thing I know, she’s one the American charts at #22 with a bullet, singing ‘Holiday,’ paving the way for the Madonna-mania that’s still sweeping the country. I always knew she’d be a star. I knew she’d be a BIG star, at that.

She came to see me once, Madonna did. ‘True Blue’ had just topped the six million mark, when this bright red stretch-limo pulls up outside my house. Personally, I think her first album is her finest work. Her lyrics are inspired although, at the time she was actually illiterate, but that’s not important.

Well, Madonna’s driving, and she’s got on a red chauffeur’s hat that matches her bright red lipstick, and she honks the horn and says, ‘Hop in!’ So I did, and we drove around the block a couple of times and she hands me a ‘True Blue’ tape and says, ‘This True Blue’s for you! That rhymes; get it?’ I thanked her for the tape and had her drop me off at my house.

I didn’t want to take too much of her time, since ‘Wheel of Fortune’ was on. Vanna White isn’t half as good looking as Madonna, and she can’t sing, but I watch anyway. So she drives off, and only then do I realize that she didn’t autograph the tape. She probably thought sine we’re so close I wouldn’t want one, but it would have been a nice gesture.

And now this: Her career is skyrocketing while her marriage crumbles. Nero fiddled while Rome burnt, I guess. Maybe I’ll give her a call just to make sure she’s getting along all right…” A pause. He surveys his companion. He lights a cigarette. A long, fluid drag, and then, “So…would you like to come back to my apartment?”

In a tone devoid of any kindness, he says, “I’d rather not know you or fuck you.” He then put out his cigarette, quickly paid the bartender, and left. Then the man was, again, alone at the bar. He took a drag from his own cigarette, stared at the water droplets forming on the side of his mug, and nothing more was said.

Because he had heard many versions of the story before, the bartender said nothing, also.