Fault Line Page 6

  The manager motioned tor Mike, then told me I was next. I jumped up and down, prepped my tape recorder, took some deep breaths. I went to the ladies’ room, tried to make sense out of my hair. The index cards peeked out from my bag—BE HERE NOW. ARE YOU HERE OR SOMEWHERE ELSE?

  I was here, at the Comedy Store, earning my first fee for performing. It was only fifty dollars—it didn’t even dent how much Mom had spent, especially when you added in all the drinks—but for me, it marked the difference between amateur and semi-professional.

  I watched the end of Mike’s energetic set—a high-tech surfer dude in Silicon Valley—and was impressed. When he left the stage, I congratulated him. ,

  He pointed to my bag. “You want me to watch that?”

  In my haste, I had forgotten that Abby wouldn’t be here with me for our usual bag-watching. I handed it to him as the manager introduced me.

  “Ladies and gentlemen—all the way from San Francisco—Becky Martin.”

  I did my getting-your-license set—the elderly driving instructor with a bladder the size of a raisin who made me pull over every two blocks so he could pee; the marching-band music he insisted on playing that made me feel as if we were driving in a surreal parade. I got a few laughs on the joke about studying for the photo test, but it still needed work. When I did the bit about how stupid it was to need a driver’s license to buy beer when you can’t drink and drive, one woman in the front row actually yelped.

  All in all, a solid set. Our table in the back applauded like crazy.

  “I owe you one,” I told my mother back at my seat. “Big time.”

  Mike made his way to our table with my bag.

  “You were so relaxed up there,” he said. “Really good.”

  I told him I loved his bit about the microchip in the surfboard.

  Mike suggested moving even more tables together and having his family and friends join us. Before long, we took up the entire back of the room, cheering the comics on the back end of the bill. I scanned our group, a hodgepodge of people with nothing in common but laughter. When Mike’s uncle Jack took a photo, he had to use the wide angle to get us all in.

  “Would you mind sending me a copy?” my mom asked Mike. “This really is a night to remember.”

  She gave him our address and e-mails. Outside on the sidewalk, the sixteen of us hugged good-bye like old friends. Mike said he’d call if he ever made it up to San Francisco.

  When I got Kip on the phone, the words burst from me like an avalanche, describing every detail of the night.

  “You got on?”

  “Aren’t you happy for me?” I asked.”I finally got paid!”

  “Of course, I’m happy. I just wish I was there too.”

  “That makes two of us.”

  “You let some guy you didn’t know hold your stuff? Suppose he went through your wallet and wrote down your address or your credit card number?”

  “He has my address. He’s sending us the group picture.”

  “You gave some strange guy your address? Are you nuts?”

  “My mother gave it to him!”

  Silence. “So your mother likes this guy … .”

  Why was Kip getting this upset? “He was just some guy. He was nobody.” Maybe if I switched the subject. “My mom was amazing. And Abby was more excited than I was.”

  “You already talked to Abby? Jeez, am I the last person to find out anything around here?”

  My mother started the car; I told Kip I’d call him tomorrow. But he called me back several times. When we returned to the hotel, I closed the bathroom door and sat on the edge of the tub to continue our conversation.

  “I can’t believe you had one of the best nights of your life and I wasn’t there.”

  “It would have been a much better night if you were here, believe me.”

  “This guy Mike—I don’t have to worry about him, right?”

  “You have nothing to worry about. I assure you.” Of course, I had something to worry about—my mother now stood in the bathroom doorway.

  “Hang up that phone right now and shut the power off. That’s enough for one day.”

  I waited for her to leave before I hung up.

  I climbed into my bed expecting the inevitable. She didn’t let me down.

  “You are too young to be so involved with one person. He is suffocating you.”

  “No he’s not.”

  “You better take it down a few notches, Beck. I mean it.”

  I shut off the light without answering her.

  Mom obviously didn’t understand. For her, this was all about keeping me under wraps, not wanting her little girl to leave the nest. I was eighteen next month; how long did she think she could control me? I made a mental note to keep my phone off when I was with her, talk to Kip from school or in my room, speak about him less. I just had to work around her.

  Back in San Francisco the next afternoon, I asked my mother to drop me at Kip’s so I could get my laptop. She said she would wait for me in the car.

  “Just drop me off. I’ll be home in an hour,” I pleaded.

  “Sorry, honey. You’ve got ten minutes.”

  I slammed the door and ran up the stairs two at a time. Kip would be furious when he found out I couldn’t stay.

  He pulled me into the apartment and kissed me nonstop. This was the longest we’d been apart, and I couldn’t get enough of him. We knocked the vase with the bamboo stalks all over the floor, then ended up on top of them like two rain-forest animals.

  I hated to interrupt him with the news. “My mother’s downstairs.”

  “What?”

  I got up and smoothed myself off.

  “You’re kidding me, right?” he said.

  “Unfortunately not.”

  He picked up a piece of bamboo and tickled my chin. “But I missed you.”

  “I missed you too. Desperately.”

  “There’s so much to talk about.” He continued to tickle me with the bamboo. “Like how often you visit the Phish fan sites. Or the IMDb.”

  I pulled away from him and laughed. “Did you open my History file? Even my mom’s never checked the Web sites I go to.”

  “And all those chatty e-mails …”

  I stopped laughing. “You read my e-mails?”

  “Wouldn’t you read mine if you had my computer?”

  I asked him how he got my password.

  Oh, like you haven’t checked your e-mail here enough times. But why didn’t you mention us when people asked what was new?”

  The bamboo began to annoy me. I pushed it away from my face. “What are you talking about?”

  “When Harley5 asked what was new, you talked about school.”

  “That’s my old English teacher who moved to Hartford. Why would I tell her about us?”

  “Oh, like I’m not important?”

  “Of course you are.”

  “Did you tell that guy in L.A. about us?”

  “We were too busy watching everyone’s sets! Why are you acting like this?”

  “First, you break your promise about going to clubs without me, then you give your address to some guy … .”

  Five minutes ago, we were great. How did things turn around so quickly?

  Kip handed me my laptop and told me he’d call me later. I felt like a kid in grammar school being punished by the principal.

  “So you’re not coming over?” I asked.

  He didn’t look at me. “I don’t think so.”

  He led me out of the apartment and shut the door.

  I knocked several times. “Kip! What’s wrong? What’d I do?”

  He didn’t answer. When I heard a car honk outside, I knew it was my mother. “Kip!” One more knock. Two, three.

  “Kip!” My knuckles ached.

  At the next honk, I headed back downstairs. With each stair, I willed myself not to cry.

  “All set?” my mom asked.

  “Yeah.”

  She pulled into the traffic. “Your
father said Christopher discovered the encyclopedia. Spent the whole night talking about aardvarks and aquaducts. We’re all in trouble now.”

  I smiled even though my insides were collapsing. All evening, I pretended to listen while my mother talked about the campus, the comedy club, the nice people we had met. Blah, blah, blah. Later, I spent the night listening for the phone. It didn’t ring. Whenever I called Kip, I got the machine. It took five phone calls and six e-mails before I began to feel desperate and pathetic. (Which in itself is desperate and pathetic.)

  The next day, school was a fog. I hit the redial button so often on my cell, I practically wore the letters off. When Kip finally called late that afternoon, the wave of relief was so physical, I felt as if I had just thrown down a thousand-pound barbell.

  “Are we okay?” I asked.

  “I don’t know, are we?”

  I thought about how much I loved him, how I couldn’t imagine not having him in my life.

  “We’re fine,” I said.

  “Good.”

  We made plans to meet later.

  I stared at the ceiling of my room. Kip was sensitive; even the littlest things meant so much to him. I’d have to be more considerate, think of what the effects might be before I spoke. The relationship was such a good one, it was worth the work.

  2/10

  NOTES TO SELF:

  “I put in a lot of time studying for the part of my licence that matters most—the photo. I mean, that little sucker follows you around for years, right? So the day of the shoot, I am prepared— three changes of wardrobe, plus props, makeup, bottled water. I’m expecting a guy with three assistants to be framing his hands around my face, telling me to make love to the camera. Instead I get a bifocaled bureaucrat with cream cheese on his tic telling me to stand behind the white line. Is it too much to ask for a little glamour at the DMV?” Nailed it—finally.

  Take the photo Mike sent off the fridge. Why ask for trouble with Kip?

  Tell Abby to stop making a big deal about my debut at the Comedy Store. Kip feels bad enough.

  Be careful with e-mails in case Kip gets the bright idea of checking them remotely. I should hide this notebook too.

  I’m almost 18—bring it on.

  From the Paper Towel Dialogues of Kip Costello

  I kind of feel bad about all the grief I’ve been giving Becky lately. Between her new jeans, that trip to L.A., and reading those e-mails—her face just kind of collapsed in disappointment each time. Maybe I should’t be so hard on her … . No, no—I have to be.

  I mean, what happens if she bops up and down the coast in her Hight new jeans and finds someone better? Then what do I do? I hate feeling this needy—such a wuss. I like having a girlfriend, but I don’t like how it makes me feel half the time. I hate keeping her on such a tight leash, but I have to know where I stand.

  Mike e-mailed me several times over the next month, mostly to share news of upcoming auditions and shows between here and L.A. I deleted them as soon as I could, in case Kip got the urge to check my messages.

  But even with the more frequent comments about my appearance or my friends, my relationship with Kip seemed as necessary to me as flossing. I checked in with him several times a day and couldn’t imagine not running the minute details of my life by him. His advice was always well thought-out, but most important, he didn’t feel burdened by the litany of my daily events. In fact, he got annoyed if I didn’t tell him everything.

  Kip had four gigs up north that he’d scheduled before we met. Because it was the weekend of my birthday, he suggested I accompany him up to Mendocino. His theory was that I was now eighteen and my mother couldn’t stop me.

  Boy, was he wrong.

  Kip’s reaction to my mother’s emphatic NO was typical of his growing annoyance with my friends and family. “Why did you ask her? You should have just told her,” he said. “She doesn’t care about you as much as I do—I’m the one looking out for you.”

  But a small part of me didn’t mind being forced to stay in the city without him—the part of me that desperately missed my best friend.

  Abby slept over for the weekend, bringing a full itinerary. First off, we threw Christopher a bone. Since he could never come to the clubs, he always begged us to put on special shows for him. We relented, letting him emcee our sets in the family room. He even lassoed Delilah into singing. Her version of “Hollywood Swinging” was one for the books.

  For my birthday, Abby treated me to dinner at the Indian restaurant near the Zen Center. We ate saag paneer and reminisced about some of our (her) old pranks. My favorite: when Abby pretended to lose a contact (she doesn’t wear them) during freshman assembly. The two of us had three rows of teachers and students crawling around the floor for fifteen minutes while we both yelled, “Careful not to step on it!”

  We made so much noise yakking over dinner that the people at the next table actually moved.

  Back at my house, Abby handed me a box wrapped with the Sunday comics.

  Inside was a bean-bag frog.

  “This is so not funny,” I said. “Besides, this isn’t a Leap Year. I’m only four and a half.”

  “I thought you and Christopher looked like twins.” She handed me another smaller box.

  I unwrapped the tissue paper and took out three strings of wooden beads.

  “They’re meditation beads. One hundred and eight on each strand. You count them off like a rosary.”

  “They’re beautiful.” I slipped them over my head. “If I just wear them and don’t meditate, do I get bad karma or something?”

  “Not any more than usual.”

  We spent the rest of the night listening to music and thinking up jokes for the voice balloons that threatened to overtake my movie-poster wall. The next morning we did Zen community service; I’d missed the last two weeks and was anxious to make up the time.

  I was also behind in sending out audition tapes; luckily Abby was in need of some additional tapes too. It was nice to be back in the old routine: brainstorming in my basement, punching up jokes, and videotaping ourselves to weed out annoying mannerisms.

  “After you take the mike off the stand, move it to the side so it’s not sitting in the middle of the stage like a coatrack,” Abby suggested.

  I told her to stop saying “like” and “totally” so much during her set.

  We taped ourselves in four different outfits, then Abby changed into some of the vintage dresses I had snagged from the thrift store.

  We plugged the videocamera into the VCR to transfer the tapes to VHS. Neither Abby nor I was particularly technical by nature, especially me, but because of the many tapes we’d made over the years, we knew enough to get by. We watched ourselves a few times, laughing at our misses as much as our hits. We worked all afternoon and evening—editing, typing letters, addressing envelopes. We were ready.

  I handed Abby the bowl of popcorn I’d scorched in the microwave. Idea for a set—how I didn’t inherit Dad’s gourmet gene.

  “This is the best,” Abby said.

  “What are you talking about? It’s barely edible.”

  “No, the popcorn is horrible, as usual. This”—she pointed to the two of us on the couch—“this is the best.”

  I had to agree with her; I missed us too.

  “So, things are good, right? With Kip?”

  “Really good.”

  “Great.” She picked through the burnt kernels. “It’s too bad you guys never do anything with Jacob and me. I gave up asking if you two want to get together.”

  What could I tell her—that Kip thought I didn’t pay enough attention to him when Abby was around? That he found Jacob annoying? I felt bad enough when I realized

  Jacob was in town this weekend; unlike me, Abby didn’t need her boyfriend to be away to hang out with her best friend.

  She put down the bowl of popcorn and stood on our makeshift stage. “Guess what we haven’t done yet?”

  I could feel the smile spread across my face. Be
st Friend Ritual #41—heckle practice. One of my favorites.

  I tossed a handful of popcorn at her. “You suck!”

  “Hey, buddy, newsflash—you’re at a comedy club, not the movies.”

  “No kidding. I was expecting Julia Roberts and got you.”

  “I’ve heard Julia’s stand-up; trust me, you’re better off with me up here.”

  As usual, we started out tame and ended up using so many curse words Rick would have banned us from the club for a month.

  I couldn’t remember the last time Abby and I had laughed so hard.

  Kip returned from the road at seven on Sunday; I was at his house by seven-ten.

  He told me about crashing at his brother’s friend’s house and getting a standing ovation at his home club back in Napa. He said he couldn’t wait to take me to Mendocino. I told him about Abby and me making tapes to send out and showed him the beads she’d given me.

  “Ahhh,” he said. “But today’s not really your birthday, is it, Ms. February Twenty-ninth?”

  He jumped up from the bed, then handed me a box in the hand-painted wrapping paper I had admired at the frame store last time I was there. I pulled out the gilded nine-by-twelve frame and looked at the collage inside. It was a photo of me onstage at Rick’s, one of my promo shots. But instead of the usually half-empty audience, the seats were filled with pictures of comedy’s heaviest hitters. Dave Attell, Janeane Garofalo, Chris Rock, Whoopi Goldberg, and Jim Carrey sat in the audience laughing and applauding while I performed. The image was something I never would have come up with in even the most ambitious of dreams.

  “Where did you get these photos?”

  “Magazines, the Internet, all over.” He pointed to the corner of the frame. “I especially like the heavenly section.”

  “Lenny Bruce, Sam Kinison, Phil Hartman … How long did this take you to do?”

  He shrugged.

  I squeezed his hand. “I don’t think anyone’s ever made me a present except for the painted macaroni necklaces Christopher used to do in preschool.”