The Brodsky Touch

by Lana Citron

  ‘Hello?’

  It was way too early to get up. It was blinkety-blink, five o’clock – in the afternoon. Way too early.

  Cripes, it was five o’clock in the afternoon. I had turned into a nocturnal being. My mobile was ringing, instinctively I’d reached for it.

  ‘Issy!’

  Voice recognition was giving me the ‘Geraldine’ reading. She said she wanted to meet me at Monster Mash on Forrest Road for tea.

  A COUPLE OF HOURS LATER …

  Pushing open the door to the café, I was expecting to find a woman in remission who would heap upon me accolades and high praise. Ah, how so often our expectations go unmet.

  ‘Issy?’

  Oh my …

  She was right in front of me, staring up at me. To all intents and purposes she was Geraldine, though at the same time she was not, and appeared as a version of her former self. I’m not talking headscarf, wig or bald head.

  The Geraldine of yore had a face of character, let’s say ‘well lived-in’. The change was almost too bizarre for words. How had cancer done this? Immediately it dawned. It hadn’t. I was wrong. Geraldine wasn’t prone to some life-threatening disease coursing through her bloodstream. The only illness she’d been struck by was age.

  Oh the pressures, the pressures of being a woman. The skin on her face had been pulled back to creaseless perfection, her forehead smoothed out, her eyes uplifted, mouth fish-lipped, teeth whitened. She looked like a freak.

  ‘I thought you were dying.’

  ‘Why would you think that?’

  ‘Cancer, chemotherapy, I thought …’

  Her lips moved slowly upwards. Smiling looked painful. I winced and wondered whether her skin, like a new pair of leather shoes, would ease out over time.

  ‘You look … you look so …’ The word in mind was outrageous as opposed to the blatant lie I gushed with excessive feeling, ‘so much younger.’

  Except Geraldine did not look younger in the slightest. She looked like a woman who had had major cosmetic surgery on her face.

  ‘Sit down, Issy.’ I slipped into the booth.

  ‘Lisa came clean. I know everything.’

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘I know what happened between you and her.’

  ‘Nothing happened.’

  She crossed her arms, was staring me down. ‘Come now, everyone’s saying you haven’t let Lisa out of your sight for the past three weeks.’

  I flatly denied any wrongdoing. She kept pressing me, was convinced I had seduced ‘her Lisa’, and deemed me wholly responsible for Lisa’s corruption. It always amazed me how most people were blind to their partner’s misdeeds. Time after time I’d witnessed it, the idea of infidelity being latent yet so abhorrent to the wronged party that when the penny dropped, when the alarm bell rang, when the neon sign lit up overhead, spelling it out in lurid, fluorescent capital letters, still they refused to believe it. Inevitably they would then seek to blame any thing or person other than their own partner. The partner would then be absolved from the equation, deemed incapable of initiating any transgression. The wicked temptress blamed and suitably punished. I’d seen it a million times before. Geraldine was hurting, thus it was only logical to point the finger in my direction and accuse me of moral corruption.

  ‘From the outset Lisa warned me not to award you a place in the show. Too late for that, but I’ve come to a decision.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘We’re dropping you.’

  ‘What? Geraldine, we got four stars in the Scotsman. I got a rave review! You can’t drop me from the show. You …’ my bottom lip began to quiver.

  ‘I’m the producer. I can do what I want.’

  ‘Please don’t drop me.’ I was gobsmacked.

  ‘You’ve really disappointed me, Issy.’

  I begged, pleaded, appealed to Geraldine to no avail. She wouldn’t budge. In the end I opted to go for broke, to spill the beans and tell the truth.

  ‘Geraldine, wise up, Lisa’s played you for a fool.’ I understood Geraldine’s steely calm gaze as an indication to proceed. ‘She’s using you.’ Her totally expressionless face stared back at me as if egging me on. ‘You’re her meal-ticket, a way for her to achieve her goals.’ Geraldine’s expression remained stoic. ‘Lisa’s lying. She’s been unfaithful to you and not just with me. Geraldine, I have evidence.’ All normal facial reactions were missing. ‘She’s a cheat, a thief, her material isn’t even particularly good. You’re making a big mistake.’

  I noticed tears seep out over Geraldine’s lids and skid down her cheeks. Damn, I’d been thrown by her new-look face, and now realised I’d gone overboard. Just because she couldn’t show her feelings didn’t mean she didn’t have any. The serviettes were the cheap non-absorbent kind. She dabbed at the edges of her eyes then, fingers to her temples, tried to scrunch them up as if to alleviate her inner torment.

  ‘Sorry, Geraldine.’

  A tiny wounded voice eked out of her mouth.

  ‘You’re finished in the comedy world, Issy Brodsky, and that’s a promise.’

  GOD DAMN IT ALL

  My first reaction was to track Lisa down and metaphorically kill her or at least try to work out why she’d dropped me in it. I found her packing her bags at the apartment, on her way to Geraldine’s hotel.

  ‘I’m out of the show,’ I proclaimed disbelievingly.

  Infuriatingly she ignored me.

  ‘Lisa, why did you say anything? Lisa? Answer me!’

  She, with the slyest of smiles, sneered across at me then venomously spat, ‘Lisa Armstrong, amusing though her set felt rushed. Rushed? Three minutes, Issy.’

  ‘But, you had no reason to confess to anything. I don’t understand.’

  ‘Really? Did you know Geraldine was too upset to attend the show last night ’cause someone told her I’d been misbehaving, someone tipped her off?’

  ‘It wasn’t me,’ I protested.

  ‘Hmm, let me see … Ah yes, your “friend”, Fiona.’

  ‘Fiona? What about Nell? Crispin? The Casting Agent?’

  ‘I doubt it. Come to think of it, for some reason Fiona’s never liked me.’

  ‘Fiona’s jealous of you. She’s in love with Geraldine,’ I explained.

  ‘Exactly, Issy. Fiona had to be getting this information from somewhere.’ Jesus Christ. I realised that Fiona must have said something. ‘It didn’t take a genius to work it out. Ha! Issy Brodsky, a private detective.’ She sniggered with glee while my mind whirred, grasping the fact that Fiona would have known she was going to land me in it. So that was why she was eager to close the case.

  ‘I never wanted you in the show, Issy. If Brillo Boy hadn’t pulled out …’

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘You were fourth in line and got lucky.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Why should I jeopardise everything I’ve worked hard to achieve for your success, Issy? You very nearly fucked everything up for me.’

  ‘Lisa, this is crazy.’

  ‘Issy, you’re a loser, so second rate. You’re a second-rate comic, detective, oh yeah, I nearly forgot, and mother.’

  You had to hand it to her, Lisa was very good at human reduction, slicing me down to size in one foul swipe. Finally it dawned on me: Lisa Slater, a manipulative operator if ever there was one, was jealous of me (of me!).

  ‘You don’t look so excellent now, Issy.’

  To be honest I didn’t feel so great. I felt as if I’d been played by both Lisa and Fiona, the innocent messenger shot down in their game of love. Teeth clenched in rage, I stormed off to hunt down Fiona and have it out with her. I cornered the three Honeys in the hotel lobby on their way to another show.

  My face was flushed with fury. I bellowed across at them, ‘Geraldine’s sacked me!’

  Completely taken unawares, Fiona feigned ignorance. ‘What did you do this time?’

  ‘What did I do? It’s what you did, Fiona. You grassed me up.’

  ‘
I didn’t.’

  ‘My own boss blew my cover. How could you shaft me?’

  ‘This is ridiculous, Issy.’

  ‘Fiona, I’m out of the show.’

  ‘Geraldine will come to her senses.’

  ‘What are you not getting? Geraldine is in love with Lisa, she’s not interested in you, and never will be.’

  Fiona laughed, she was laughing at me, right at me.

  ‘You are such a bitch.’

  ‘Easy, Issy.’ Trisha stepped in between Fiona and me.

  My, my, Issy but what big hands you’ve got.

  All the better to strangle you, Fiona.

  And what big arms you’ve got.

  All the better to crush you.

  And what big legs you’ve got.

  All the better to kick you to death.

  ‘Issy you’ve got it wrong,’ she stuttered, ‘you’re wrong. Look, if it wasn’t for me, you wouldn’t have got the part in the first place.’

  That did it, that was the tipping point, the final straw.

  ‘Turns out I won that part!’ I’ve never considered myself a violent person, but I went for her, fists flailing awkwardly. I scuffled my boss to the ground and would have beaten her to a pulp, only Trisha pulled me off.

  ‘Brodsky, you’re, you’re …’

  ‘What, Fiona?’ and such was my vehemence I finished the sentence for her. ‘Sacked? Big deal.’

  And then, well, then I found myself wrapped in Nadia’s arms sobbing my heart out. I couldn’t contain myself any longer, went to pieces in her hotel room.

  ‘Nads, why do these things always happen to me? Why?’

  Her voice was soothing and calming. ‘I don’t know, Issy.’

  MY SACKING?

  I don’t wish to talk about it. In the larger scheme of disasters I found myself faced with, it was but a niggling pimple on the tip of my nose aching to be squeezed yet not entirely ready.

  You can’t make me talk about it.

  At that point in my psyche I was numb, verging on catatonic.

  La la la, but I’ll tell you one thing, never ever trust a detective – they are full of deceit.

  At noon the next day Nadia and I walked over to the Caves to pick up my nurse’s uniform. It was odd to see the venue during daylight hours because, as our show was on so late, I never usually went there. I didn’t know any of the daylight-hour front-of-house crew and was very surprised when one approached me with a big bouquet of flowers.

  Nadia nudged me. ‘What did I tell you, Issy? Looks like they’ve realised what a mistake they’ve made.’

  ‘You’re one of the Titters aren’t you?’

  ‘Was,’ I snivelled.

  ‘Oh. Could you give this to Issy Brodsky?’

  ‘I am Issy,’ I replied, shocked to have received such a beautiful bunch.

  He looked at me like I had two heads. ‘I thought the girl with the blonde hair was Issy?’

  ‘You mean Lisa.’

  ‘But I always give her the bouquets.’

  ‘Yep, she’s the one with the secret admirers.’

  ‘You’re winding me up, right? You can’t be Issy Brodsky.’

  ‘I am she,’ though, believe me, there were times I wished I wasn’t.

  ‘But that would mean …’

  So warped was Lisa she’d even stolen my secret admirer. There must have been at least a dozen bunches sent over the course of the show. It slotted into place now. Lisa was always the first up at the Caves to sort out the comps and always vague regarding who her admirer was.

  ‘Can you believe this, Nadia? How vile is this woman? I mean, maybe this business isn’t for me, maybe this is a sign.’

  ‘Is there a note?’

  The note was cryptic: ‘Not long now, my love.’ Flummoxed as to their origin, it gave me a legitimate reason to call Scarface.

  ‘Hi, Issy,’ he droned, his voice flat as he answered the phone. ‘Things getting any better for you?’

  ‘Yes and no,’ I replied, ‘how about you?’

  ‘Fine. Perhaps I should tell you, I’m seeing someone.’

  ‘Oh, right. Congrats,’ I flinched. ‘I take it it’s not you who’s been sending me all those bouquets of flowers then.’

  ‘Eh, no.’

  ‘Great,’ I cheered. ‘I was hoping it wasn’t. Just had to double check. Bye.’ Bastard, I mumbled under my breath and then rang Max. He also denied sending anything, ‘No way, Mum,’ and then my mother reminded me they were due to arrive at the end of the week.

  How strange, I thought, to have such a dedicated admirer, but who could it be? My imagination went overboard on the most romantic of fantasies; by some weird twist of fate it would turn out to be Jan or perhaps even my number-one choice. Maybe my mother was right in advising me to quit my desperate search for Mr Right and let him find me.

  ‘Nads,’ I said, feeling the happiest I had in the past twenty-four hours, ‘this could be my silver lining. I mean, he’s clearly loaded. Maybe he’s famous and that’s why he hasn’t signed his name. I have a strong feeling about this one, he’s definitely coming to get me.’

  YES, HE WAS DEFINITELY COMING TO GET ME

  And then it struck, the realisation, my secret fan, unknown devotee, green-fingered enthusiast, jeez, but I could see the headlines, a dose of double duping for Double D undercover agent, Issy Brodsky …

  Click, click, like an osteopath at work, it suddenly fell into place. The thing I wasn’t to worry about. That minor nuisance I had relegated to the pending pile. The communication link Bambuss had been talking about.

  Eureka!

  The one-time gardener of Arthur Penn, or rather his alias, Darren.

  In retrospect, Lisa did me a favour leaving me blissfully unaware of the potential danger I was in. If I’d known, I certainly wouldn’t have stayed in Edinburgh. I would have freaked, as I then did, almost gagging on the fear.

  Bambuss was on the case in a flash, the tracing of the flower shop instigated, the card given over to forensics and himself flown up that very night. Before last orders he was down the Oxford Bar. All the staff from the Caves were interviewed, Lisa too. I would have pressed charges for flower theft, but Lisa gave a flawless performance. She claimed total innocence and blamed the front-of-house guy for assuming she was I. This, she attested, was reaffirmed, as none of the notes accompanying the bouquets, which of course she could not produce, had named me. She believed the bouquets were intended for her and offered her profuse apologies. Bambuss fell for it hook, line and sinker. I was disappointed, as I had hoped to use her theft as a bargaining tool to get myself reinstated and back on the show. In the end, though, I didn’t have to. Bambuss ordered my reinstatement, declaring me ‘Darrenbait’ for the rest of the run. Reluctantly Geraldine accepted this, with the proviso being I stay well clear of Lisa.

  That, I assured her, she didn’t have to worry about.

  What I did worry about, though, was the discovery that the flowers had been hand-delivered every day, at the same time, by the same man, which dictated that Darren had been following me for ages.

  ‘You mean …’

  ‘Yes,’ Bambuss decreed, suitably melodramatic in tone. ‘He’s here, probably has been since the beginning.’

  So there we were, three Honeys, one ex-Honey (me) and Bambuss sitting in a police interview room, drinking sweet tea and eating dry, day-old Danish pastries. The atmosphere was highly toxic, notwithstanding the fact that twenty-four hours earlier I’d lunged at Fiona.

  Bambuss was talking about working together as a team, striving for a common goal, nailing the bastard and ripping him apart. ‘Brodsky, think of all the people you’ve encountered since the show began. It’s highly probable you’ve met him and spoken to him.’

  All the people? Christ, I’d approached hundreds of the species on a daily basis trying to offload tickets as I traipsed the Royal Mile. I’d encountered more people over three weeks in Edinburgh than I had in the past ten years.

  ‘Think, Brodsky, as a d
etective would.’

  ‘Ex-detective,’ Fiona put in.

  Agh, such fond memories I had of that day job.

  THE DAY JOB

  The speed with which events unfolded left me panting. Fiona disappeared back to London in a huff, Trisha left me a marked envelope, then followed suit. It looked far too ominous and official to open immediately, so I stuffed it down into the nether regions of my bag. Nadia promised to stay glued to my side till something occurred and Bambuss instructed me to continue on as if nothing had happened.

  As if!

  So there we were, Nads and I back at Lemming Terrace. Following Lisa’s evacuation to the hotel, her room was now empty, though filthy. I took advantage. Quitting my solitary cell, and with scrubbing bucket in hand, I set to cleaning. It didn’t take long before I unearthed the ‘lost’ cards under the wardrobe, together with a dirty thong.

  Twelve cryptic messages, in BIC’s Biro blue. Nads had only just gotten round to reading The Da Vinci Code, so she was in her element, determined on deciphering the meanings. The least cryptic one was: In recognition of your first death. Here’s to the next.

  ‘Issy, he saw your death performance,’ gasped Nadia.

  ‘What an awful night that was,’ I glumly replied.

  ‘Well, remember anything strange, anyone unusual?’

  ‘Nads, I was out of my skull. You’d be better off asking Adrian.’

  Adrian and the Mingers were in recovery from some post-coital experience and tucking into a greasy Chinese. Their reaction to my sacking, reinstatement and role of psychopathic bait was one of bewildered incredulity. As regards Lisa, they kept saying, ‘We told you that Lisa was lethal. Everyone knows she’s a walking perversion, sure, she stole your best jokes. She kept putting you down all the time. We thought you were a right arsehole, Issy.’

  Wow, top that for a vote of confidence.

  At Nadia’s behest, Adrian, chomping through his chow mein, contemplated the night of my death. ‘You were all over the place that night, though you did talk to the bloke from across the road, you definitely spoke to him for a bit.’