CeeCee’s insistence that I start in on a real career has been trailing me all week like a piece of toilet paper from a Port-a-Potty that I can’t get unstuck from my shoe.
“Down in front!” a belligerent man at table twenty spit-shouts in my direction. No wonder I have a bad back at my young age. Half my job is ducking out of the way of confrontational audience members.
When I dare look over, the man’s much-younger date is laughing like he’s all the comedy she needs. Taylor up onstage—bless her heart—has been reduced to background noise on somebody else’s expensive night out.
One day, I’m going to be the kind of comedian you can’t keep your eyes off.
If only I could snap my fingers and makeone dayinto today.
I squat down lower, shoes squelching in an unidentifiable puddle,wishing I had a pair of toxic-waste gloves to handle these crumby plates caked with queso. I bring them into the back, through the unwieldy swinging doors, and go to town in the slop sink with a fireman-grade hose. Right beneath the slosh of the spray I hear Declan, my coworker, shout: “Nobody panic, but Clive Bergman is here!”
My heart does a pratfall inside my chest. “What did you just say?” I ask, turning without thinking and jettisoning a geyser of water clear across the kitchen. Declan, in a blur of long hair, jumps out of the way before I baptize him in tap. “Sorry!”
“Watch where you’re aiming that thing,” Marco, one of the line cooks, hollers from his station, sidestepping the spillage on the way to the fryer.
I nod before bouncing my attention back to Declan, who has begrudgingly gone to get a mop. “Did you say Clive Bergman?” Clive-fucking-Bergman is a big deal in the scene right now. He’s a late-night fixture at the Broadway Laugh Box—thecrown jewel of New York clubs, the place I’ve been dying to get an audition.
“Yeah,” Declan clarifies, kindly cleaning up my mess. “Apparently his cousin has a spot in the open mic tonight. Clive’s mentoring him. Damn, those rookies on the bill don’t even know they’re being handed an opportunity on a silver platter.”
“Or a death sentence,” Jessie, the nonbinary bartender who gets more tips than anyone in this joint for their flirty service and creative drink specials, says right before receiving major death stares. “What? Bomb in front of a headliner and you’re basically dropping your pants and taking a dump onstage.”
“Call it performance art and maybe you can get booked at the MOMA,” says Marco with a laugh, underscored by the Tater Tots rising from the frizzling oil vat.
Jessie comes over to me, picks up a dish, and starts helping. “Don’t choke tonight.”
Jessie’s worked here almost as long as I have, and from the outside, we don’t look like the type to become fast friends. Their style is street-chic: buzz cut, a myriad of piercings, the ever-expanding pin collection that covers their dark-wash denim jacket, and a shaved slit through one eyebrow. My style is whatever’s clean. And yet, this place, this job, has bonded us.
Jessie isn’t a comedian but does want to break into the industry on the business side, and they know that even though I’ve graduated from open mics to more paid, pro stuff here, I use the open mics as a chance to work out new material. Take big swings I wouldn’t in front of bookers.
“I don’t have a slot,” I say. “I have dinner plans.”
“Okay. Simple solution. Cancel them.”
“I can’t. They’re with Harry.”
Their blank stare speaks volumes before they splash me with soapy water from the sink. “Context!”
“The guy I’ve been…seeingfor the past three months.” Though I supposethe guy I’ve been in an arrangement with for the past three monthswould be more accurate.
“You’re seeing someone? And that someone is not your gorgeous, redheaded, sweetheart-of-a-roommate Drew?”
I unclench the hose and point it in their direction. “You are the only person I told about my feelings for him—while I was high, mind you—and I’d appreciate it if you stopped blabbering that all over the city!”
“Eight-point-four million people live in this city, and every single one of them could tell you love him just by the way you look at him.” Even Jessie, a staunch singleton who openly mocks lovebirds, gives me a pointed look.
“You would be clambering for a plus-one to your sister’s wedding too if your ninety-year-old grandfather had put out a personalad in his nursing home’s weekly bulletin asking if any of the residents had single, gay grandsons for me.”
“That could be the premise for a pretty sick reality show,” Jessie says, drifting off into a brainstorm the way they do when any potential business tangent catches their attention. “Eh, maybe not. Too messy. But you should use that in your set. It would kill.”
“I would if I had a set to kill tonight. The slots on the website book up in advance.” I wish I had a crystal ball to have seen this coming. As much as I want to make good on my promise to Harry, I only agreed to dinner because he agreed to be my date to CeeCee’s wedding despite our relationship consisting mostly of sex and small talk.
“What am I always telling you?” Jessie scolds. “You’re talented, Nolan, but when it comes to managing your career, you’re seriously farsighted. You’re not going to get where you want to go in the future without making good use of the here and now.”
I return to sulking and soaking the dishes. “Good thing I’ll have you as a manager when I make it big and I won’t need to worry about any of that. You’ll handle it all, and I’ll just be responsible for the jokes.”
“You better not be joking aboutthat. That’s my dream job.” They gaze off wistfully. “While I wish we were in that era already, we’re not. We’re here scrubbing dishes, which means you need to be getting as much stage time as possible, especially stage time in front of Clive-fucking-Bergman.”
“Don’t you think I know that? I’m stuck between a rock and a hard place here.”
