This story offers a world through the lens of six queer people over twelve hours, six years apart… 1947 and 1953, the beginning and height of the Lavender Scare, respectively. It’s 1953, Washington D.C., and Mary Novak, a White female, a Department of Defense employee, has been named as a homosexual. Her home has been raided, she has been separated from her family, and she is being forced to resign. At the helm is McLeod’s miscellaneous “M” unit, who interrogates Mary to her breaking point.
Twelve hours earlier… Mary, the linchpin, driven by justice, doles out cake while her husband Conrad Novak, a White male, once inspired by wisdom, now by privilege, films the celebration of their son Ward’s 6th Birthday. Ward dances with Bess Herson, the warrior of their family, an Iroquois female who voluntarily “passes” for White, driven by courage. Ward squeezes a smile out of Terrance Brandt, a spy of the family, a Black male driven by temperance to protect his alias at all costs.
Eight hours before it happens… Ponyboy, the observer, sees life through a unique lens and takes photographs from the family’s alley. Also on the stakeout is M Unit Officer Sam Kelly, a White male – his badge is a protective cloak, his binoculars a sniper. When Sam sees an interracial couple approaching the Georgetown row house, he lets out a whistle – like a loon – calling for Pony. Terrance recognizes the eery sound! And Sam is just as shocked to spot Terrance – a ghost from his past – who happens to live next door to Mary.
In 1947, Terrance was arrested for being gay by Sam, then a young cop who just wanted to fit in. Terrance repaid the favor by humiliating Sam, rejecting what the clumsy cop craved most. The hypocrisy of how Sam moved through the world unscathed as a gay man in uniform provoked Terrance to change his identity. Making it difficult to be tracked down… until tonight’s happy accident.
Pony keeps his eyes on the prize, staking Mary’s apartment instead of Terence’s. On loan from the Metro DC Police Department, Pony, who passes for cisgender, carries the secret of being transgender. Pony’s wife got him in this unit using her Uncle McLeod’s influence. But even Pony is baffled by how they move with ease through three separate apartments as he spies from outside the row house. The family sneaks through closets connecting the apartments. It’s about as ideal a setup as they could create for two interracial gay couples. Outside appearing normal, inside feeling normal.
Sam uses a new pawn in the interrogation and threatens Mary by making her son a ward of the state. Filled with rage, her only option to beat a polygraph is silence. Then it happens. Mary relieves herself. Literally.When Pony realizes the truth that Mary and Bess are a couple and Novak and Terrance are queer too – this family’s fate lies in the hands of their new secret ally.
