Ten Dead Comedians

by Fred Van Lente

  Janet blinked when she closed the ring again.

  “Okay, maybe you’re right. Maybe it isn’t just semantics and I did kill them all. Oh, well. C’mon, let’s go outside.”

  “Why did you want to kill all those people? What did they ever do to you?”

  “Outside,” Janet said.

  “I’m not going anywhere with you!” Meredith shouted.

  Janet sighed. “Typical Millennial.”

  She produced a revolver from the back of her waistband.

  “Sometimes it’s not all about you, you know!” She waved the gun in Meredith’s direction. “Do you wanna walk outside or do you wanna be carried outside? ’Cause I’ll accommodate you either way.”

  Meredith threw out her arms. “What is your obsession with me going outside?”

  A third person spoke:

  “Because he doesn’t want to shoot you here, where your DNA would get mixed up with all this other shit. That would mess up his whole plan to get away with this.”

  Janet turned to the doorway and the source of the voice and said:

  “I thought you were dead.”

  IV

  Dante Dupree stepped into the room from outside, holding Meredith’s shotgun level at Janet.

  Janet did not raise her own weapon, other than to throw up her hands. “You said he fell down the elevator shaft!” she said to Meredith. “That’s the only reason I came out! Goddamn it, this screws up the whole thing.”

  Dante said, “And you’re going to—what? You’re going to disappear her out in the middle of the ocean, right? Weigh her body down and sink it so it’s never found. And if anyone ever finds this, and her fake confession ‘speech’ on her laptop, they spend all their time looking for her and not for you?”

  Janet grinned broadly. “You two clever sons-of-guns. You put one over on me! How’d you do it?”

  “You first.”

  “Never explain a joke. Then it stops being funny. You should know that, Dante.”

  “True. But I don’t mind explaining other people’s jokes. Take that shit off first.”

  “What shit?”

  “What shit?” Meredith said. “Why did Janet kill all those people?”

  “She didn’t,” Dante said. “Janet’s been dead for at least a week, maybe two. Take the shit off, man.”

  “Man?”

  “Ugh, you’re no fun anymore,” Janet said, and with her free hand she pulled the plastic collar around her neck and the bandages off her face. Much of the heavy foundation she was wearing came off with it.

  “Oh my God,” Meredith said.

  Janet then pulled off her wig, revealing the graying widow’s peak underneath. Next she swapped out the tinted eyeglass frames for a more iconic pair of Coke-bottle glasses.

  “Oh my God,” Meredith said. “Dustin?”

  Dustin Walker gestured at his bosom. “Can I keep the tits?”

  “Keep the tits, lose the gun,” Dante said, shotgun still level.

  “Okay, okay, take it easy, man,” Walker said. He set the pistol aside on a nearby chair wedged between fallen tables.

  “That’s better,” Dante said. “You got tripped up by Janet’s trunk. When you threw it off the dock, it stuck on one of the pylons; it didn’t fall in.”

  Walker made a face. “Aw, shit. Really?”

  “So I was able to feel the inside when I tried to pull it back onto the dock, how cold and clammy it was.”

  Meredith frowned. “And that’s…significant?”

  Dante said, “No, not until Janet’s body turned up. When I pulled her out of the pool, I felt how cold she was. But that didn’t make any damn sense if she’d just been killed a minute or so before. And her body already had discoloration and rigor mortis way, way, way further along than somebody just a few seconds dead would ever show.

  “It wasn’t until I found the shotgun trip wire in the bushes that I realized what was going on:

  “There hadn’t been anybody here for a week. Walker started out in L.A., where he killed Janet Kahn and took her place after her surgery. He put the body in this huge trunk that was, what, refrigerated somehow? He temporarily shut down the elevator so we had to leave our bags down by the dock.

  “Then, in the couple hours we were getting settled and farting around the house, he got busy. He turned the elevator back on, went down to the dock, and made a mess of the bags. But really he was reclaiming Janet’s body. He brought it back up poolside, where he hid it in one of those containers where they keep the extra chair cushions.

  “In the process, I’m going to guess he also grabbed Billy the Contractor’s photo off the wall—it’s the only explanation, that it’s the only headshot he grabbed before a murder. It was pretty reasonable to think none of us would notice it was gone until after Billy was killed. And since you planned to kill him first, that made it a pretty good bet, am I right?”

  Walker smiled and made the “keep going” gesture, rolling a finger.

  “He tricked Ruby into separating from the rest of the group—you were with her at the time, so I’m guessing, what, automated text messages set to send at a certain interval from the computer we found in your bedroom? Or some other computer you’ve got hidden somewhere? You probably have one of those apps that controls your desktop from your phone, so as long as you have it set up right, you can send texts remotely at the press of a button? With Ruby gone, he was able to convince you two to split up,” Dante said to Meredith.

  “That was your idea,” she said.

  “Duh,” Walker said, and he rolled his eyes.

  “He goes to the pool patio, takes out Janet’s body, sits it in the chair, and shoots her with the shotgun, blowing her face off—which helps hide that even under all that makeup your face and Janet’s didn’t quite align, particularly with her new Botox job—and knocking her and the chair she’s sitting in into the pool. We all come running, and he slips away here, to the club, where he hangs out while knocking us all off. It’s the perfect hiding place because it’d already been searched and nobody was found. Although it wouldn’t surprise me if he’s got another hiding place around here somewhere. Somewhere you can monitor the feed from the cameras—though I bet you got that ability on your phone, too—so you can move freely about the island, always where we’re not, setting up traps and removing and replacing photos and whatnot.”

  “You’d be riiiiiiight,” Dustin sing-songed with a grin.

  “Because that was Dave’s-Not-Here whom Steve and I found hanging at the end of the rope, wasn’t it, Dusty? There are a couple personal photos of him in his little hutch you had built for him back there. You two look a lot alike…I bet that’s why you hired him.”

  “You two do look alike!” Meredith gasped. “Thank God. I thought I was being so racist for thinking that.”

  “I bet if we went back and looked at the GoPro video real close, we could even see the harness you’re wearing under your shirt when you ‘hanged’ yourself. Then you haul yourself back up with Dave’s-Not-Here’s help and—surprise!—he takes your place in the clothes you were wearing in the video. Except he doesn’t get the benefit of a harness. How am I doing so far?”

  “I’m really, really into it,” Walker said.

  Dante said, “I figured all that out pretty quickly, not long after we found the real Janet’s body. But now that you were in the wind, I didn’t know how best to lure your ass out into the open. I also wasn’t a hundred percent sure you didn’t have anyone working with you among the group. So I kept my mouth shut until I decided the only way to get you out would be if all of us, or most of us, were dead.

  “So I pulled the same trick as you and faked my death. Damn, son, you think I didn’t see your hacky death-by-booze schtick a mile away? I am a trained alcoholic, I can act fake-drunk with the best of ’em, drink enough to fool the cameras while pouring the rest of it down the sink. What was that all about—you were gonna get me so blasted I popped off so one of the others had to kill me, or were you gonna do me in
once I was too shit-faced to defend myself?”

  Dustin just laughed. “I was adopting a wait-and-see attitude. I had contingencies for everything. Gags all over the island you never found. Fifteen ways to kill each one of you. That’s why I came here embedded with you, dressed like Janet. To read the room. Did Zoe bring her dog or not? Did TJ come armed? The first rule of improv is, be prepared.”

  “Makes two of us, asshole. I wrote a couple notes to Meredith telling her to play along while we were arguing in her room. I made sure I knew where the camera was in her bedroom so TJ couldn’t see. The first one said ‘THEY’RE WATCHING, PLAY ALONG.’ The other was ‘GET SHOTGUN GO TO ELEVATOR.’ I knew to play out our little drama just beyond the range of the camera, so wherever you were watching, you could hear but not see when I pointed for Meredith to shoot the shotgun in the air. I hid in the trees until I saw you slink out of the main house heading for the cabana, and here we are.”

  “That’s incredible,” Meredith said.

  “Thanks, doll,” Walker said.

  “Not you, you plonk, him. Dante, were you always a black Sherlock Holmes?”

  “Girl, please. Grandma could write the pants off that hack Doyle.”

  “Your grandma?”

  “Yeah, Ephesia J. Dupree? She wrote the Miss Maples series of urban mysteries. Her most famous one is Miss Maples Gets All Up in Your Business.”

  “I’ve never heard of them, I’m sorry.”

  “Yeah, you usually had to buy them off dudes with tables on the sidewalk in Brooklyn,” Dante said. “But they were best sellers, and Grandma had me proofread every single one.”

  Walker said, “In his act, Dante made it sound like he grew up in the Gowanus Towers, but really he grew up in the brownstones across the street, with the hedge-fund managers and the corporate shysters.”

  Dante scowled. “And I never said otherwise! I ran with all those tough kids; they were my damn neighbors! Are you still on about this ‘crimes against stand-up’ bullshit? Because if you really planned to kill me because you don’t think I’m black enough, or TJ for his laugh track or Orange Baby Man for being a phony New Age messiah, or some other vigilante Comedy Batman nonsense, I’m going to blow your head off just on principle alone.”

  “You made me a punchline,” Walker said, the mirth gone from his face.

  Dante blinked. “Huh?”

  “All of you, in all of your acts, as soon as it became a quick laugh, an obvious laugh, you made me a punchline. I inspired you. You all said so. But as soon as it was convenient you forgot me, you made me into your jokes. You just went for the easy applause line. Dicks, sex, relationships, airlines, farts, Asians, driving. And Dustin Walker. You made me the lowest common denominator. An automatic laugh line. Me. I didn’t deserve that. That was a crime against comedy.”

  “Christ, Walker, I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. But even if I did—you’re gonna tell me you’re just like everybody else? You laugh along when it’s the other guy being made fun of, but the minute you’re on the receiving end of a gag, or your tribe is, then all of a sudden you get offended? Those are just jokes, man. How can you not know that?”

  “How can you not know there’s no such thing as ‘just jokes,’ Dante?” Spit flew from Walker’s lips. “All jokes are little truths. And your truth is that you think I’m nothing. It’s not even worth remembering when you’ve insulted me or, like Gordo and Ollie, stolen from me. That’s how little you think of me, you just said so yourself. Well, what do you think now?”

  “I think you’re a fucking lunatic now,” Dante said. “Is that what you were going for?”

  Meredith tried to blink tears from her eyes. “I never…I never insulted you, Dustin. Never. How can you say that?”

  Walker’s eyes flickered at the ground. “I know, baby. But—you know. Collateral damage.”

  “What?”

  “I’m not proud of it or anything.”

  “Is that supposed to make me feel better?!”

  Walker said, “When I met you, at the clinic, before they diagnosed your problems as neurological, I was so flattered that you were starstruck. Someone as young and as beautiful and…exotic as you. I really liked you, I did. And I tried to help you. But you’re just not funny. I mean, it’s bad enough no one understands what you say. But even when they do…Some people are funny. Some people are not funny. You, Meredith, are not funny.”

  Meredith threw up her arms. “You mean I’ve been sleeping with you this whole time for nothing?”

  Walker blinked. “You said…you said you loved me.”

  “No!” Meredith screamed. “I was just using you for my career! I mean, look at you! You are so, so, so old!”

  Dante raised the shotgun. “This got really sad, really fast. Dusty, you had some exit strategy for getting off this goddamn island, and you’re gonna tell me what it is.”

  Walker made a show of thinking about it.

  “No,” he said.

  “Sorry,” Dante said, “let me rephrase that. Either you tell me, or I’m going to shoot you in the motherfucking face.”

  “No,” Walker said.

  “Bitch, don’t think I have any other reason to keep you alive!”

  “Makes two of us,” Walker said, and he lunged for the pistol on the chair next to him.

  Dante fired the shotgun. The blast made Meredith’s ears ring again.

  Walker spun around and fell face-first to the floor.

  Dante lowered the weapon, breathing hard.

  He looked at Meredith. She looked at him.

  “What now?” she said.

  “Beats the hell out of me,” he said. “If we had Google, we could Google instructions for making a raft. Then we could go drown.”

  “Bitch!” he yelled at Walker’s still form. “Crazy-ass punk-ass bitch. Can’t take a joke. Who blows all his money faking his own death and killing whoever made fun of him on stage? What a waste of a cat-movie fortune.”

  “Did you really make fun of him in your act?”

  “Hell should I know? I’m a comedian; I make fun of everybody. That’s my damn job.”

  He looked past Meredith’s shoulder.

  And pushed her away from him.

  He popped open the empty shotgun and fumbled the box of shells out of his jeans pocket.

  Meredith turned just in time to see a grinning Dustin Walker, leveling the revolver at Dante.

  “You should see the looks on your faces,” Walker said.

  He shot Dante twice in the chest.

  V

  Dante kicked convulsively on the gore-spattered floor, drawing grotesque blood angels on the tiles with his spasms. Dustin Walker walked over clutching the revolver, his smile gone, and picked up the small box Dante had dropped at his feet. He spiked it on the dying man’s chest like a wide receiver in the end zone.

  “Blanks, baby! Yeah!” he roared down on his victim. “How dumb you think I am? Why would I give any one of you any advantage for any reason! Now Meredith—I’m sorry, honey, this is all over, but you have one last duty to perform as my assistant. I’m afraid we’re going out to the middle of the ocean. You are going to stay there, while I am going to the mainland, where I’ve got a new identity already set up. You’ve seen how good a mimic I am. Well, now I’m going to become a completely different person, a comedian with a brand-new act, free of the stink of failure surrounding Dustin Walker. And with all these talentless hacks no longer clogging up the booking schedule, I’ll have much less competition. So come now, what are we waiting for?”

  Meredith flailed around for anything resembling a weapon. Her hands closed around the cool metal of the mic stand.

  As Dustin turned toward her, she brought it down on his head as hard as she could. It must have already been weakened by the explosion because it snapped in half across Walker’s skull.

  Still, he staggered and cried out an unintelligible curse. He raised the pistol to her stomach.

  Instinctually, she lunged forward with
the other half of the mic stand, hoping to push him away.

  But her ankle caught on the base of a table lying in her way and she stumbled forward.

  The jagged end of the mic stand pushed Walker back with her and he fell on his back, and she on top of him.

  The weight of her body pushed the sharp end of the metal pole all the way through his chest.

  Walker flailed his arms, gasping like a fish caught on land, and within seconds the light went out of his eyes. His face died before the rest of him did. Meredith saw, horribly, the moment his life extinguished, and, one by one, his other body parts got the message: his feet came to rest, his arms drooped to his sides, his head fell back to the floor, and even his mouth closed.

  She tried to get to her feet but her knee said hell no, not after all that, and so she crawled painfully over to Dante, whose chest was still moving. She cradled his head in her arms and said: “How do you feel?”

  Dante croaked, “Like I got punched real hard by Superman and he forgot to take his fists out.”

  “What do you need? What—what can I do?”

  “What I could really use,” Dante whispered, staring wide-eyed at the ceiling, “is a drink.”

  VI

  Meredith sat with Dante until morning, his breath slow but steady, never slackening below its current nadir. She pressed the discarded pieces of Walker’s Janet outfit over his bullet wounds, which finally stopped bleeding.

  Not long after dawn, the way she smelled and the stickiness of her skin from the dried blood caking it became unbearable, so she went back to the main house and drew a hot bath in her room and lay in it and soaked.

  She fell asleep.

  A sound awoke her sometime later, she had no idea how long. She sat up so fast she splashed half the water out of the bath.

  She snatched Walker’s revolver off the floor and pointed it at the doorway and the window, though nothing moved but the bobbing palms outside.

  VII

  All her clothes were in her luggage, which had been thrown out to sea. Blood had soaked her outfit through to her underwear, which were spackled reddish-brown. They were her only pair, but she couldn’t bear to put them on again.