The Bad Comic

by Sara Lufrano

“I thought they only ate meat.” I looked out at the crowd. I could only see their legs and torsos. Drinks were being lifted to mouths I couldn't see. I gave them time to laugh. Gave them a little more time.

“Booo!” Some guy said and followed it up with his own chuckle. Fuck that guy. Fuck that guy to death.

“Boo you too, sir. Boo you too.” I smiled and looked down at the front of the stage. I lowered the mic stand and pulled it back up to the same height. I laughed trying to wipe the slate clean.

“So I was telling a friend of mine about a conversation I was having with my mom….”

I sat at the bar, my beer was half finished and warm. Other comics from the night were talking with each other, laughing and trying to out-do one another even though no one was watching them.

“You have to stop telling that joke,” the bartender, Todd, said to me after setting down a tray of clean glasses.

“It's funny—”

“It isn't.” He pointed a glass at me.

“It's funny to mess up those two words. Every situation where you would use connoisseur is too fancy for carnivore to fit in. It's funny.”

“Explaining it more does not make it funny. I shouldn't have to tell you that. No one has laughed yet.”

Todd is usually a nice guy. I didn't know why he was being such a dick. “Thanks for the advice.” I gulped my beer down, put down fifteen bucks, and started walking out.

“Great set, Steph!” said Eduardo, another comic that was in the circle jerk. He had a stupid handlebar mustache and greasy looking hair that he combed back.

“Go fuck yourself,” I said with an exaggerated smile.

The group of them laughed and I fake laughed while I flipped them off as I left the bar.

The next day while I was waiting for my coffee to brew Rhett walked in. I didn't normally see Rhett but I loved seeing Rhett. He's out of our Portland office but is originally from Tennessee. You couldn't tell from how he talked though.

“Good morning,” he said grabbing a mug.

“Morning.”

It wasn't a secret that I liked him. Everyone thought he was attractive but no one asked him out because I talked about him so much. I should have been reported to HR for sure. He had to know I liked him, if he didn't he was an idiot. But he kept talking to me so I didn't care.

“How long are you in town?” I pulled my coffee off of the single-serve machine so he could start his.

“Until Saturday.”

“Weird to be here on a weekend day.”

He didn't start his coffee and I got nervous for him. What if someone else came in and took his spot in line to make coffee?

“I want to stick around and actually see the city a little. I still haven't been to the Space Needle.”

His cup was so empty. There were only a few of the good coffee pods left. The majority were light and smooth. No one liked light and smooth. “Are you going to start your coffee?”

He looked into his cup and chuckled. “Yeah.” He finally started his coffee.

We were silent.

Did I just mess that up? I pushed him to make coffee but he was talking before. What was he saying? The coffee dripped out.

He watched it. He was a strong looking man, wide shoulders, big hands. He smiled at everything and he had deep laugh lines to show it. He was smart and nice to everyone in the office.

We went out once. Not “we,” Rhett and I, but we as in the office. A Wednesday night, cocktails at a bar up the street until last call. We only talked as a group. I couldn't bring myself to have a one-on-one conversation with him. I can't explain why I feel like I do around him but I just want so badly to be with him. I usually know when he's coming into town and those days leading up to then are filled with fantasies of us strolling hand in hand down the street and him sweeping me off my feet and telling me he loves me.

I love you too, I said in my head.

Why though? I didn't know. I just knew.

“You were saying you want to go to the Space Needle?”

He looked at me and smiled wider, “Yeah. I see it every time I come here but I've never been over there.”

“It's cool. You'll like it.”

“You think so?” He leaned against the counter and crossed his arms against his chest.

I couldn't look at his face for very long. I knew if I did he'd be able to read my mind. “Probably.” I looked past him. “I've got a lot to get out today. I'll see you around.”

“Bye.”

He said bye. Were we not going to see each other today? Were we not going to see each other all week? He said he was here until Saturday.

I got to my office and settled in for a day of worry and work. Contracts don't contract themselves. Can I use that line somewhere? I wrote it down just in case.

“Hey, you!” Colleen, my friend and receptionist, leaned in the door. “How was your set?”

“Hey. It was like usual.”

She glided in and stood at the end of my desk. “Bad crowd is all.” She bit her bottom lip trying to suppress a grin.

“What?” I asked.

“Um, the love of your life is here.”

“I know.” Oh god….

“Invite him out!”

“I don't have time. I've got an open mic every night.”

“Ask him to go out after or before! Or for breakfast, or lunch!”

I had no answer for her. Truth is I didn't want to ask him out. If he said no he would probably stop talking to me and I don't ever want that. If he said yes, I would probably fuck that up by not being able to control my voice or something, spitting all over him, spontaneously combusting. No thanks, I'll stick to the dream world I have us both living in.

She waved away the air. “Or whatever. I know you're busy. Eat lunch with me today, around noon.”

“Sure, I'll see you in the kitchen.”

I picked at the skin around my fingernails waiting for my name to be called. It was a different bar but I still did what Todd said. Dropped the carnivore joke. I felt something wet on my hand. Shit, I was bleeding. I picked at my fingers too much, a nervous habit and I was always nervous. I sucked as much of the blood off and put pressure on it. I sighed, carnivore.

“Stephanie Thomas, everyone. Let's keep it going!” The MC clapped and I moved between the tables. There were more empty seats than people. It was late.

We shook hands and he smiled at me, quickly disappearing into the darkness.

I faced the lights. It took a few seconds to be able to fully open my eyes.

I adjusted the mic stand even though it didn't need it. I saw that my finger left blood on the stainless steel. Oh god, that's so gross. What about the next person? They're going to put their hand on that. Wipe it off now or try to when I leave? Fuck. They're all waiting.

“My favorite type of crowd is an empty one, followed closely by a drunk one.” I heard people stirring and putting their drinks back on the tables.

“Has anyone ever mixed up connoisseur with carnivore? Someone could be pouring a glass of expensive, nice wine and telling the fancy looking crowd ‘This is our aged Pinot Noir from 1908 and a true connoisseur's delight.' And I'd pop my head in and ask, don't they only eat meat?”

No one laughed. Why the fuck did that come out of my mouth?

“Good thing no one is here to laugh.” I looked down at the front of the stage and tried laughing.

“No one is laughing,” someone in the crowd, said. Not even loudly.

“Yeah, I know. It isn't funny. I don't know why I said it. I don't know why I say a lot of things.” I looked up. Just do the new joke. Do the new one.

“But you mother fuckers could try a little. It's not easy. All of this. Trying to make you assholes laugh. You bunch of dick bags.”

Someone chuckled but it didn't matter.

“Fuck you guys. It's late as shit. Don't you pieces of shit have better things to be doing with your time?”

There was no noise except me. The red light came on.

“Everyone in this room might as well kill themselves if you're trying to get entertainment from me. And if you don't like even trying to laugh you're fucking worthle—”

The mic was cut off. I stared at the red light. The MC dashed on stage and took the mic stand. It's got blood on it, I thought.

“Get the fuck off the stage,” he said to me.

I nodded and stepped down and then walked out.

I got a few blocks away before my heart got too heavy to walk and my throat closed too tightly to breathe. I leaned against a brick building and tears fell without control.

“Steph!”

No, no, no! No one is supposed to know me right now.

“Stephanie,” Rhett said. He waved at me as I locked my wet eyes on him.

“No, no.” I picked myself up and started walking away.

“Hey, wait!” He jogged up to me as I walked faster. “Stop.” He grabbed my wrist.

I placed my free hand over my eyes and cried. Heavy, big, shoulder-jerking tears. Why was I doing this? Why was he out here? Why did I say all those things to those people?

“What are you doing?” I said between sobs. I couldn't control my voice, I cracked and stumbled over my words, “Why are you here?”

“I was in that bar and I watched you go up there.”

I thought I was strong, I thought I had thick skin, I thought I could stand on stage and get booed and heckled but I knew for a fact I couldn't handle this.

The man of my dreams watching me tell people to kill themselves and getting the mic ripped from my hands. And now he's watching me melt away from my own tears.

“Why were you there?”

“Colleen told me you'd be there and I thought it would be fun to watch.”

I cried harder, surprisingly. Maybe it would have worked. Colleen was a good friend. If everything went well he might have realized that I was amazing and would want to get to know me better. I knew that I just needed a foot in the door with him, and this could have been it. I could have shown him how good we would be together.

“I have to go.” I didn't want to go from him. It would have been wonderful to press myself against his chest and cry while he held me.

“I made an ass out of myself and I need to leave now.” My voice was small for fear of breaking down again in the middle of my resolve to leave him.

He let go of my wrist and I walked away.

I laid low the next day at work. When Colleen finally walked into my office she had a big, bright smile on her face that fell after I told her what happened.

“I'm so sorry that I told him to go there.” She was sorry, I could tell. Her eyes had tears in them. Her empathy knew no bounds.

“I shouldn't have said what I said. Knowing he was in the audience would have stopped me from saying all that, but it isn't your fault.”

She choked up, “But what you do is so hard.”

I tried to smile at her to show her I was fine. “It's not that hard. I'm…” I'm just not funny, “I'm just trying too hard I suppose.”

I'm not funny. I am a bad comic.

We hugged and she dried her eyes. I told her that any other night he and I would be madly in love and it would have been because of her and she perked back up.

Most of the day I sat in my office not working and replaying what I said over and over again. How Rhett grabbed my wrist and wouldn't let me go. How much I cried.

I opened emails when they came in but didn't respond. Nothing was pressing. Should I go home early? Should I stay later so people think nothing is up and that I'm working really hard? I had sets planned out a different clubs every night but I decided I wouldn't go anymore.

“Steph.”

What the fuck? Rhett was standing in my door.

“Yeah.” My chest was just as heavy as it was the night before as I looked at him.

“I emailed you this morning about that counter contract.”

I looked at my inbox. “I didn't see any emails about it.”

He scrolled through his phone and gave me the time and title of the email. Shit ass. There it was.

“I can get to this now,” I said to him.

“I need it today.”

“I said I'll get it.”

I opened it up. Mother fucking 30 pages of redlines and strikethroughs.

“I need it today.”

“I heard you, Rhett. If you just left I could start work on it.”

He tilted his head. “Don't take last night out on me.”

I stared at my screen, unable to stop my eyes from filling with tears. “That wasn't my intention. I will get this to you as soon as I can.”

He nodded and left. I got up and closed my door. I cried for the first few minutes looking through all the changes that were made to my original contract. Why the fuck can't anyone just accept what I give them and sign the fucking thing?

An hour later someone knocked on my door. Had to be Rhett. No one else needed to see me.

“Yep,” I said.

He came in.

“I'm not going to finish this today.” I had to tell him before he asked. “It's my fault I missed this. I can email the client and let them know that it's my fault they won't get it today. I'm sorry for missing this and potentially losing the client.”

“It's okay,” he said.

What the shit? It's okay? “What about needing it today?” I asked.

“I shouldn't have told the client I would have it back to them same day. I don't know what else you had planned today, or what type of night you had.”

He knew the night I had, I thought bitterly.

He smiled at me while saying sorry with his eyes.

“Are you going out tonight?” he asked.

“No.” Never again, not ever will I go out again.

He walked out and leaned against the doorframe. “If you change your mind send me an email or something. I'm going out in Belltown.”

I nodded. He smiled again and patted the wall.

It had been a few months. I sat at the bar, a warm beer in front of me, listening to the other comics doing their set and talking with Todd in between.

I hadn't been on stage since my freak out. I didn't go out with Rhett that night. I got him his contract the next day, though. I guess he went to the Space Needle and then he left. He hadn't been in the office since.

I hadn't written a joke or tried to. I had nothing. I was taking my new place in life knowing that I wasn't as funny as I thought I was.

My phone lit up with an email notification from Rhett. The little bit that could fit in a notice read, “Coming back on the 23^rd. What are you…”

I drank the beer in front of me in a few gulps and ordered another.

A guy pulled the seat out next to me and Todd got his order. I glanced over and the guy was looking at me. I nodded my head.

“Hey,” he said and cheered me when his beer was in his hand.

I cheered him back.

“You look familiar,” he said.

He was a regular dude, nothing about him stood out so I didn't remember where we could have met. Probably ten years older than me, dark hair, dark eyes, he had teeth—seemingly all of them—all of his limbs were attached. Why did he know me?

“I don't know where from,” I said.

“You do stand up.”

I used to do stand up.

“You were funny. I feel like every time I'm here you comics are here doing your thing.”

“You sure it was me?”

He took a drink. “Pretty sure. Haven't seen you recently though.”

I didn't know what to say to him. I knew I didn't have to say anything to him but most important I didn't know what to think. It was just one person saying this. Who the hell was he? I was fine thinking that I wasn't good and that I gave it a good try. More than other people who only talk about doing what they like. I actually tried it. I did it.

“Why haven't you been up there?” he asked.

“Cause I'm bad at it.”

“Oh?” he started and shifted towards me. “You weren't bad. You just need practice.”

“I've been doing it for almost a year.”

He laughed at that. “Maybe just a little bit more practice.”

I stood in the back, worrying about my new jokes. I picked at the skin around my fingernails.

I heard my name and made my way to the stage. I shook hands with the MC and took the mic off the stand.

I looked out, headless bodies tapping their feet in anticipation. I can be funny, I can be funny, I can be funny.

“So I like to read romance novels. Not real romance novels, I read those free ones from the Apple books app that anyone can publish. All full of typos and shit. My advice is that everyone—men and women—need to read at least one romance novel. Guys, it gives you a chance to see what ladies are thinking, and ladies,” I leaned my arm on the top of the mic stand pointing my finger to all the ladies, “it makes you understand that no one will ever live up to your expectations.”

The crowd laughed. My god, a real laugh. Had this been the first time ever? I looked out at the crowd and smiled, chuckled to myself a little. They laughed at one of my jokes. I can be funny.

“But guys, not only will you understand what ladies are thinking, you should take at least one move from the book and use it. Use it every chance you get.”

I thought about emailing Rhett after finishing this set.