I feel lucky. Panicked still, but lucky that out of all the universes or futures or whatever, I landed in this one.
From a chair in a corner, Jessalynn unpacks a briefcase, laying items out in a neat array on a table, continuing where they left off. “I don’t know why Harry thinks that ball cap and sunglasses combo as he exits yourprivateentrance and then ducks into a taxi a block away is going to fool anybody. As if I don’t have the height, weight, build, complexion, and penis size of every man you’ve ever been with memorized in case I need to lawyer up over a broken NDA.”
While there’s lots to unpack in that worrisome statement, I go for the lowest hanging fruit. “Harry?” Adonis couldn’t have been the Harry who dumped me outside the club before CeeCee’s wedding, right? Though, I’m sort of seeing the resemblance despite multiple features that have been plumped, set, and injected during the intervening years.
“Yes, Harry Stokes. The man who ran out of here.” I’m having a hard time imagining what could’ve brought us back into each other’s orbit. “The man who’s directing your special, thanks to you and your need to prove everyone wrong by being the bigger person.” They freeze, drop their head, and then pick it back up like a robot rebooting. “Sorry. You know I love your moxie. It’s what sells out shows and pays my bills. It’s just been a rough morning. The venue booker pushed back our viewing, which means we could’ve taken the interview with BuzzBang. Then, I was trying to call you, but you weren’t answering your phone because you were BuzzBanging Harry, so I’m a little tense at the moment. My knots have knots have knots.”
I stand there in bumbling silence, realizing that Jessie has become my manager just as we always talked about. It dawns on me that I’m inhabiting the future we envisioned. I’m stupefied by this. The intentions I set with those crystals miraculously came true.
Jessalynn continues. “Look, I’ll drop it right after this, but why Harry, huh? Were Lance and Marc and Jean-Luc not available? Because it’s a bad look for you to be hooking up with someone on the artistic team.”
“Wait, sorry, so Harry and I aren’t.…” I let the question trail off, trying not to alert them of my state of utter what’s-going-on-dom.
“Together?” they ask, sounding incredulous. “I should hope not.”
I nod. “Right, because we weren’t a good match.”
“No! Not that. Who gives a shit about that?” I come over to sit, and they smack me in the arm like I’m a younger brother who’s misbehaving, which makes me think about CeeCee and the fight and the wedding. I should call her too, but where is my damn phone?
“You shouldn’t be with Harry because you’re Nolan Baker, famously single, anti-love comedian. Do you know how bad you being in a relationship would be for the brand we’ve worked so hard to cultivate? Cynics are our target demographic and our lifeblood. If you started drinking the romance Kool-Aid, we’d lose our fan base, our sponsorships, everything.” Their eyes grow deadly serious. “So, tell me. I know it gets lonely at the top, but are you and Harry more than—or thinking about becoming more than—BuzzBang Buddies?”
I didn’t even know Harry was Harry until a couple minutes ago. “No.” I don’t know if that’s true. It just seems to be what they need to hear, so I’m happy to give them that.
“Fantastic. Now,” they say, eyes sparkling, a smile manifesting where a stern frown was before. “Look what just came in.” They gesture to the table at three different poster mock-ups. They’re all a slight variation of the same image. I—the me from the mirror, not the mefrom yesterday—stand wearing a full suit and no socks in the center of a mess of cut up roses, greeting cards, and cutesy stuffed animals. In my right hand, I hold up a heart that is dripping fake blood down my forearm. The title is script and oozing:30 Times Two.
“I don’t get it, Jessie.” I’m pointing at the title.
They give me a disgusted look. “First of all, no one has called me Jessie in a good five years. Second of all, you were in the Netflix pitch meeting when we conceptualized it. It’s supposed to be ironic because it’s a sixty-minute special, so thirty-minutes time two. Plus, you’re thirty and it’s 2030.”
Holy. Fucking. Shit. If Jessie—Jessalynn—is to be believed, I’ve missed seven years.
“Okay, something weird is going on.” My chest grows tighter.
“I’ll say,” they actually say, pressing the back of their hand to my forehead. “What did you take last night?”
“Nothing!” I shout, finally breaking. “I went to bed twenty-three, and now I’m thirty and living here and doing whatever this is.” I flail my arms in the general direction of the posters, which are mostly cool but also a tad concerning. That prop heart looks slightly too realistic for comfort. “I have no idea how any of this happened.”
Jessalynn stares at me for a long time, seemingly searching for something in my expression. At first their gaze is serious, and then it cracks. “I would love to be the test audience for another one of your character-based bits, but now is not the moment. Now is the moment to select a poster for the special so we can get in the waiting car downstairs and go to the theater.”
“Theater?” I’m incredulous, winded, and lost. I want everybody to slow down and for someone to explain this to me with preschool-level simplicity. “Didn’t you hear what I just said?”
They roll out their neck. “Yes, and I know you love a bit. It’s what the fans adore about you. It’s what I adore about you. But anotherthing I adore about you is your pickiness when it comes to promotional materials, so please, pick one or pick none, but at least give me something to send back to the team.”
Realizing that protesting is futile, I shuffle numbly back into my seat and inspect the posters again. Even though this is all mystifying, I have to admit that I look like a goddamn superstar in these. All hot and funny and in on it. I may have missed all the work it took to get here, but through some stroke of sheer luck and will (and maybe those damn disappearing crystals), I ended up in an echelon of comedians I only ever fantasized about.
For a minute, I let that sink in. It would be amazing if it weren’t crisis-inducing.
“That one.” I point to the middle option where I’m brooding but smirking. Approachable yet above it all.
“Excellent. You’re a gem. Now, please put on something presentable. We’re going to be late to the theater.”
“The theater?” I ask again as we move back inside.
They click their tongue at me, shoving me in the direction of my gargantuan closet. “Yes, the theater. I don’t send you itineraries every morning for my health, you know.”
When I think about what happened when I shirked my last itinerary, I follow their instructions.
“This is the Brooklyn Academy of Music,” I utter, awed, as I’m rushed out of the back of the car. Sunbeams streak over a glass awning that slopes overhead, while a red sign with vertical text races up the front exterior.
