He feels his eyelids getting heavier and his foot stops tapping whatever song by Finger Eleven popped into his head. Lying fully clothed in the middle of the hotel bed with his arms folded across his chest, he must look like a corpse. If he died in this position, it would be very easy to just toss him in a coffin and throw him into the ground. As he drifts to sleep, he wonders what his tombstone would read. He’d like maybe “I’ll be here all week.”
His cell phone rings and pulls him back from a dream he was having that he has already forgotten. Sometimes he dreams he is onstage and unprepared. He never dreams he is naked, although he does often dream he’s in his underwear or whatever he fell asleep wearing. That’s when he usually wakes up the middle of the room, standing in front of the mirror and holding an imaginary microphone. This time he’s still lying in coffin position on the bed. His phone is to his ear before he’s even awake.
“Sam?” he says.
“Who?” Rodney is on the other end.
Damn it, Spence thinks.
“Nothing,” he says. “What’s up?”
“You in Nebraska?” Rodney asks.
“Key West, remember?” Spence says and puts his feet on the floor. He looks at the clock. He’s been asleep for only forty-five minutes. It feels like days.
“Very funny, asshole,” Rodney says. “You in the hotel or what?”
“Yeah”—Spence rubs his eyes—“I’m all checked in at the lovely Starlight Motel, truck stop, and delicatessen.”
“Sounds scenic.”
“Come visit. You’ll never leave.”
“I’m sure.”
“What’s the bad news?”
“Why do you always say that?” Rodney asks.
“Because that’s the only time you call me.”
“That’s not true.”
Spence scratches the back of his head and sighs. “Then what’s the good news?”
“Actually, it is kinda bad news,” Rodney says.
“See?”
“It’s not that bad.”
“What is it?”
“The college won’t do twelve hundred,” Rodney says.
“Aw, cripes,” Spence says, and puts his feet on the floor, “are you kidding me?”
“Sorry,” Rodney says, “I tried.”
“You’re telling me this now?”
“I just found out about it myself,” Rodney says, which is most likely a lie. This is probably what Emma was alluding to earlier. Rodney probably knew weeks ago. Spence knows what happened. Waiting until this late to tell him assures Rodney that he takes the gig and that Rodney gets his cut.
“So how much am I getting?” he asks Rodney.
“A grand.”
“Is that before or after your commission?”
“Before,” Rodney says. “So you’ll net eight hundred total.”
“What? That’s twenty percent. You get fifteen percent.”
“For clubs. I get twenty for colleges, remember?”
He doesn’t remember, but he says yes anyway. It’s an argument that’d he’d lose, and he doesn’t have the patience to deal with it right now.
“I thought the twelve hundred was a done deal,” he says.
“I thought so, too,” Rodney says. “It’s still good money.”
“Whatever.”
“It is.”
“It was great money.”
“It’s still not bad.”
“If you say so.”
“You gonna take it or not?”
“You know I’m going to take it,” Spence says. “I’m already here. You knew I was going to take it weeks ago when you first found this out.”
“You’re being paranoid,” Rodney says. “I just found out myself. Why would I not want to make you as much money as possible when I’m making a cut of it?”
“Yeah.”
“Yeah,” Rodney says. “So take the cash and be happy. They love you there, and you should be glad to have it.”
“I am,” Spence says. “When do I get paid?”
“As soon as I get the check, I’ll cut one for you,” Rodney says.
“Fine,” Spence says. “Any news on Cleveland?”
“What about Cleveland?” Rodney asks.
Spence is back at the school before seven forty-five and finds Emma waiting with a huge smile on her face. There are two hundred college students waiting to see the show, which is always a good sign. Comedy clubs are hit or miss, but the colleges always have a great turnout for their shows. They are almost always free for the students and early enough in the evening where there’s plenty of time left to drink or study or masturbate or do any of the things college kids do on a Thursday night.
“Ready to knock ’em dead?” Emma asks him as he stands behind the curtain in the makeshift showroom. It’s actually a section of the cafeteria that has been converted into a comedy club for one night only. This is exactly how a lot of colleges do their shows—risers in the middle of a room with black curtains all around them. The bigger schools have the comedians perform in a theater, while the smaller ones have people telling jokes next to a soda fountain.
“I’m ready,” he says and takes the wireless microphone that she hands him. He wants to ask her what the hell happened to the pay raise he was expecting, but he smiles instead. He likes her and doesn’t want the money situation to sour it. He would have taken the gig regardless of the pay increase, and it’s Rodney who screwed up the deal. He’s sure of it.
“Go to it,” Emma says and gestures toward what is supposed to be a stage for the next hour. At some schools, there is someone to introduce him or music to play. At Doane, the lights go down and he walks into a single spotlight. It’s simple, but it’s enough. The freshmen are silent the instant he steps out.
“And that’s why I only date Asian women.” The opening bit hits right away, and he knows it’s going to be a good show. He smiles and takes them where he wants them to go.
The new material works just as well in front of the eighteen-year-olds as it did in front of the roomful of drunks in Toledo. He’s two for two, which tells him that the new bits will become a permanent part of the act. Once is never enough to know whether or not a new routine is going to always work. It could just be a fluke—one great crowd that is willing to laugh at anything. If the bits work twice and in front of everything from teens to senior citizens, it’s probably safe.
He wonders if maybe he’s been going about this all wrong. Maybe the cleaner material is what he should’ve been writing all along. It’s not that people don’t like the dirty jokes; he’s been killing with that same material for years. But he thinks maybe people like him more when he’s keeping the humor light. For years he wrote what he thought was funny. Then he wrote what he thought audiences would like. This is the first time in a while he thinks he found a combination of the two.
He likes the feeling that he now has material that he can do for both club audiences and college crowds alike. He’s always had to have two different acts. One for the middle-aged drinkers and one for the horny teenagers. Having one set he can do everywhere seems like a great idea.
He never minded clean comedy, but he never cared for clean comedians themselves. Clean comics are always smug. They think they write on a higher playing field. Someone a long time ago decided that adults speaking like adults to other adults is somehow childish. When he was a kid, the word fuck was reserved for adults. Now he’s an adult and people are telling him it’s a word for children. Grown adults who use the word poop are telling him that it’s somehow classier than saying shit. He thinks they’re full of both.
“Thank you, good night,” he says and leaves the stage to a nice, healthy applause. College audiences tend to applaud nicely but don’t have the rowdiness of a roomful of drinkers. It’s good enough. He’s rocked another crowd at Doane and ensured himself another gig for next year. In the end, that’s all that matters.
He steps off the makeshift stage and hands the microphone back to Emma. She smiles like a
pumpkin and yells into the microphone as if she’s at a pep rally.
“Keep it going for him!” she screams. The applause response stays about the same. At least they are consistent.
Spence waves one last time to the crowd and steps around the corner to what is supposed to be considered “backstage.” There, Emma greets him and hugs him so tightly he feels as if she cracked his ribs.
“That was wonderful,” she says, beaming. “Just wonderful!”
“Thanks.” Spence almost blushes. He’s never seen her this receptive.
“I love the new jokes you did,” Emma tells him and claps her hands together.
“Yeah, I’ve been trying different stuff.”
“Well, it’s great.”
“I’m glad you liked it,” he says. “Can we do it again next year?”
“Of course,” she says. “We always love having you. You know that.”
She holds up her index finger and disappears for a minute. A few students walk up to him and shake his hand. A few more tell him that he was “amazing.” One of them has him sign a handmade poster that she has pulled off one of the walls. Signing autographs is still one of the best parts of the job. It always makes him feel like he’s a celebrity even when he knows he isn’t one.
“Here you go.” Emma reappears with an envelope in her hand. She hands it to him and points to a few students nearby to start disassembling the stage. They waste no time. In twenty minutes, there will be no evidence he was even there.
“What’s this?” Spence asks, holding up the envelope. He hopes it’s a bonus. Miracles are known to happen.
“That’s your check,” she says.
“Oh? You’re not mailing it to Rodney?”
“No, I thought you knew that,” she tells him. “That’s what I was going to tell you earlier. The school made out the check to you by mistake. So instead of having them reprint another one, I figured you’d be okay with just cashing it yourself and sending your agent his share.”
“No problem,” Spence says. This sort of thing happens from time to time. In fact, he prefers it. He knows it’s quicker for him to send Rodney his two hundred bucks than it is to wait for Rodney to get around to sending him eight hundred.
“You sure?” Emma asks. She’s way too nice to be in charge of booking entertainers.
“Absolutely,” Spence says. “This works just fine.”
He opens the envelope and looks at the check. Immediately, he feels the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.
Fifteen hundred dollars.
Printed in black ink, made out to him from Doane College in Nebraska, is a check for fifteen hundred dollars. Spence feels his blood starting to boil the second he reads the numbers. Just a few hours earlier, Rodney told him that the pay would be eight hundred bucks after two hundred for commission. Now he’s holding a check for almost twice that amount.
“Is this amount correct?” he asks Emma, wondering if he really got that bonus after all.
“I hope so,” Emma says and looks at the check. “Yep, looks right. Fifteen hundred. That’s what your agent told us you wanted.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Yep, he said your price came up and we agreed to it. We always love having you here. I told him you were worth it.”
“Oh, I was just making sure,” Spence says. “I never handle the money stuff. I let him do that.”
“That’s a good idea,” Emma says. “Let some other guy deal with the money. You deal with the funny!”
She laughs and puts a soft hand on his shoulder as if she’s exhausted. Maybe the constant laughing is finally taking a toll on her heart. Spence reaches up and pats the hand she put on his shoulder.
“Well, I love being here.” He smiles. “Thanks for having me.”
“Anytime,” Emma says and goes back to overseeing the dismantling of the stage. A student walks over and hands him a bottle of water. He thanks the kid and continues shaking hands and thanking people for coming to the show. After thirty more minutes, he says good-bye to Emma and walks out to the parking lot.
Don’t think about this, he tells himself. You’ll never get to sleep tonight if you do. This will keep you up all night.
But he can’t help it. He has a million numbers adding up in his head. He’s asking all sorts of questions and answering them at the same time. He thinks about picking up the phone and calling his agent right then and there. Rodney probably sleeps in that office. He’s probably there right now, sitting next to the phone. This is probably the best time to reach him.
Almost as if he willed it to happen, Spence feels his cell phone vibrate in his pocket and he answers it without even looking to see who it is.
“Yeah?” he says, putting the check in his pocket and fumbling for his car keys.
“Hey,” a familiar voice comes over the phone and it takes Spence a second to realize it’s Beth.
“Oh,” he says slowly, “hey.”
“Don’t sound so thrilled to hear from me or anything,” she says. It must be after ten where she is, which makes the phone call even weirder. Beth is almost always asleep before eleven and never calls this late.
“Just surprised,” Spence says. “What’s up? Everything okay?”
“Yeah,” Beth says, although she doesn’t sound convincing. Evan is likely standing a few feet away, which would make most people uneasy. “Everything is fine.”
“Great. So . . . what’s up?”
“You’re still getting mail here.”
“Aw, hell,” he says. “Sorry about that. I honestly forgot to change my address.”
“S’okay,” Beth says. “I just wanted to make sure you knew. Needed to see what the deal was.”
“I’ll change it tomorrow, I promise.”
“No, it’s okay. Don’t worry about it.”
“Then I’ll do it soon. Really.”
“It’s okay,” Beth says. “I can wait. It’s not a big deal, really.”
“What about Evan?” Spence asks. “He going to lose his mind?”
“It’s fine. I said don’t worry about it.”
“Alright,” Spence says. “Thanks for that.” A few seconds pass, and it feels like an eternity. When the silence is enough, Spence clears his throat. “So I’ve got stuff I’m doing, so . . .”
“Yeah, that’s cool,” Beth says. “I’ll talk to you later.”
“Okay. Thanks again.”
“Are you coming through here again anytime soon?” she asks just as he was about to hang up the phone.
“I dunno,” he says, “maybe. Depends upon how angry I get at Rodney.”
“What happened this time?”
“Nothing,” he lies. “Just saying.”
“Okay, well let me know,” Beth says.
“You got it,” Spence assures her and, seconds later, hangs up the phone. He knows something is wrong with Beth, but he doesn’t know that he cares enough to stay on the phone and ask what it is. He imagines Evan on the other end, fuming and throwing his mail into the fireplace. He doesn’t remotely look forward to going back there again, especially not for more worthless mail. He also knows it’s only a matter of time before Beth and Evan give him the “great news” that they’re having kids or buying a mansion.
When he hangs up the phone and looks down at it, a text message from Sam is waiting:
Hope you had a great night. Miss you.
A nice breeze blows past him, and he stands for a minute, leaning against his car. Before he picks up the phone to call Sam, he pulls the envelope out of his pocket and looks at the paycheck one more time. Fifteen hundred dollars.
Fuck you, Rodney.
13
The weather is perfect in Syracuse, and Spence is feeling perfectly fine as he pulls into the parking lot at the Funny Farm Comedy Club. He’s only a stone’s throw away from the airport and wonders if he should have just flown here and left his car in Nebraska. But the two days of driving aren’t so bad when he recalls just how nice the weather was. The surprising
ly cool summer feels just right. It’s one thing he loves about being this far north.
He’s still angry about Rodney screwing him over, but Spence finds himself surprisingly stress-free today. Since his plan is to keep it all to himself, the money from the Doane College gig was nice enough for him to relax a bit. The Funny Farm is actually paying him pretty well, too. The fact that they’ve put him up in a nice hotel is just gravy. It takes him a few steps away from firing Rodney, which has been his plan B for the past two days. When he sees his name in lights on the marquee outside the club, he grants Rodney yet another stay of execution.
Must be that time of year, he thinks to himself.
It seems that it’s always right around now that he considers firing Rodney. A last-minute cancellation here, a questionable commission there. One disagreement leads to a fight, which leads to a day or two of both of them not answering each other’s calls. Eventually, a new gig comes along that convinces Spence to stick it out. And, as much as Rodney pretends he is just another in a long line of comics he represents, Spence knows he brings in more money than most of the guys on the roster. He’s the only one living in his car. He says yes to every gig.
It feels almost like a marriage that is trying hard not to fall apart. For all the clubs he hates or gigs that turn out to be awful, Spence knows there will be weeks of great shows. There are times when the pay is good. And, unlike a lot of comedians he knows, Spence has his calendar booked solid for months. Firing Rodney would mean those dates would instantly disappear. The bad gigs would go away, and the good ones would be gone with them. Just like with his ex-wife, Spence would be replaced by some other guy.
“Look who it is,” a familiar voice calls to Spence as he steps into the lobby of the club. He turns to see Ashley standing behind the box office, just underneath a sign that reads NOW SHOWING. Ashley has been managing the Funny Farm for at least four years. Easily in her forties, she’s still trying hard to be the sex kitten. She talks like a sailor and smokes like one, too. Her voice sounds like gravel in a washing machine. She and Spence have been close to having sex several times, but fate and clear thinking have always intervened.
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