I would angle for any kind of private aside when I could, desperate to see the friend with whom I had shared those nights in my house. Chris had stood there smiling with his camera in hand, waiting for me as I exited the side of the stage.

I amassed the little bulging chunks of plastic as if they were tender prophecies: steroid-fueled bodybuilders I could hold in my hands, just as I might one day hold the real thing in the flesh. They were patient and skilled at breaking down the movies into acts, turning blockbuster thrillers into bedtime stories. They've been mostly out of the spotlight for a few years (save for "Let's Have a Kiki," which goes blessedly unmentioned in this book), but this book still feels timely. My first haircuts were from a vampy woman outside the Phoenix suburbs by way of sleepy desert side roads. After we said our final goodbye from the stage, I trod up the stairs back to the dressing room where Chris took my arm and said, “David Bowie watched the show.

Candid and courageous, Shears's writing sings with the same powerful, spirited presence that he brings to his live performances. You could spot his distinct loping gait from across an airfield, hands greasy, the tattoos on his arms from boyhood blurred beyond recognition. By the time I was in second grade, I’d been placed in a separate advanced reading class taught by the school librarian. Especially during a scary time for gay people and seeing how that affected his coming out process and coming of age. First performing in the smoky gay nightclubs of New York, then finding massive success in the United Kingdom, Scissor Sisters would become revered by the LGBTQ community, sell out venues worldwide, and win multiple accolades with hits like “Take Your Mama” and “I Don’t Feel Like Dancin’,” as well as their cult-favorite cover of Pink Floyd’s “Comfortably Numb.

She refrained from harping on my obsession with her Jane Fonda workout videos and my daily screenings of Nine to Five, both bastions of comfort for me.

The crowd’s simmer had quickly turned into a boil from the top of the set, creating an energy so boisterous and electric, it almost felt devilish.

I was so scared that some hideous creature from hell would burst from behind the ruffle-neck maroon blouses and create total chaos. Shears was a one-man sexual revolution, dreaming big and tripping on the rush of conjuring his muse and realizing those dreams.I was surprised to find out that most of his influences are classic rock, punk, and electronic rather than pop music, only because Scissor Sisters were always marketed as so pop-heavy. My sisters would get their hair done at a beauty parlor that had a huge painting on its front window of a woman with giant, Medusa-like locks. The fifteen dollars a week he made gassing planes and starting propellers wasn’t half as valuable as the thirty minutes of flying lessons he’d get every Sunday. Whether it was some toy slime creature that didn’t secrete like it had in the commercial, or Michael Jackson not actually performing in Captain EO at Disneyland—it was just a 3-D movie of him that played all day long—the world was full of exaggerations.