The Serial Comic
By Mac Alan
Fiction
Published by Lunar Prose Books
Lunarprose@gmail.com
In E-Book Form
At Smashwords
Copyright 2011 Mac Alan
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
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*****
CHAPTER ONE
Special Delivery
I sometimes conceded to a harsh reality that the defining moment in a man’s lifetime always hovered in a daydream just beyond his grasp. Such an idea cannot be thought upon as anything more than a bleak observation, which generally infected the minds of middle-aged men. However, in spite of this perception, I’ve also envisioned a dream promising unlimited recognition from those whom I deemed decidedly inferior to me. Even during my most deliberate recollections, the infinite channels within my brain yearned to be navigated by this sole illusion.
As I remembered the details, I always stood upon a stage directly beneath a pool of light that seemed more resplendent than the Sun. Before long, dollops of cold sweat speckled my scalp and etched across my brow. Eventually, this perspiration dribbled into my eyes, blurring the audience from my sense of awareness. Although I at first couldn’t perceive the precise temperament of those who came to observe me, I distinguished an unmistakable and refreshing sound delivering me closer to them all.
An intoxicating melody ascended between the shadows and echoed on all sides of the auditorium. It started as nothing more discernible than a faint titter, then gradually transformed into a series of random chuckles spreading thinly across the confines. Within minutes, however, a skittish clamor flitted throughout the entire room. Then, a tepid sensation rippled beneath my flesh, causing my muscles to tremble. My lips became parched as my tongue flicked anxiously across dried portions of my palate. Just as I sensed my body quaking with anticipatory pleasure, a chorus of unreserved noise erupted into a pitch of mirth that chimed sweeter than a musical orchestration. For one brief, tantalizing moment, using merely words and cadence of speech, I had delivered my allegiant followers to the edge of ecstasy.
Perhaps no other emotion circulating within the human conscience compared to this rapture shared between strangers. In truth, an ability to laugh represented a supreme equalizer among all individuals, and uniquely defined us from any other species. After all, other than man, what creature derived pleasure from his own folly? We alone dabbled into this realm of blissful thought. Therefore, in a blunt manner of speaking, the comic reigned supreme in his chosen craft. In comedy, the laughter was always more vital than applause. It truly marked a point of harmony among those who listened, and nothing served to fulfill a comedian’s expectations more so than this instinctual meter of the soul.
Regrettably, I knew my dream couldn’t endure forever. As it was with most ideas contrived for one’s vanity, this particular one surged through the provinces of my imagination like quicksilver through a thermometer. In the end, I was left to feel the remnants of stale sweat clinging to my limbs, but no trace of acceptance or recognition accompanied this inconvenience. Similar to so many others that muddled through their years in obscurity, I opened my eyes to the mundane realities that suffocated dreams. Once detached from my fantasy, I was forced to wander aimlessly through the stark avenues of my existence.
My father named me Lawrence Breese forty-five years ago. I remember my youth quite well, particularly when recounting the reprehensible deeds of the man who fathered me. By all accounts, Harvey Breese was a miscreant, whose primary function in life was to ensure his only son’s anguish. As a young boy, I often debated the reasons why Harvey took such a perverse delight in dismantling his only son’s disposition. It was one thing to despise another human being, but quite another to adopt a vested interest in that individual’s personal destruction. The fact that my existence was undeniably linked to this coward’s sperm only heightened the absurdity of his quest. Perhaps he blamed me for my mother’s death. After all, she died in misery while wriggling me into this filth-laden habitat.
I sometimes wondered what my mother would have been like if she had survived my breeched birth. Before I discovered Harvey’s atrocious nature, I asked him several times to share stories about her, or maybe even provide a photograph so that I had a chance to internalize her in my memory. When I was very young, I went to her gravesite alongside Harvey a few times, but he rarely had anything to say about her. In time, I learned that he disliked speaking about my mother. I didn’t even know her name until I reached the age of five, and that only whetted my desire to learn more details about her. Sadly, my quest ceased as a result of several beatings Harvey inflicted upon me for inquiring about his deceased wife.
Mercifully, Harvey stopped breathing before he completely sabotaged my life. I didn’t care to know what motivated this butcher of dreams, but shortly following my fifteenth birthday I asked him why he felt it was necessary to belittle me on a regular basis.
“You never really cared about me,” I complained, halfheartedly.
“Maybe because you’re a sniveling pussy.” he retorted, while swooshing a mouthful of booze between his rancid lips.
“What have I ever done to make you treat me so poorly?”
“You think too much of yourself,” he sneered. Harvey always calculated the disappointment in my expression. Although I never intended to reveal how insecure I was in this man’s company, he sniffed out my frailties like a bloodhound on a fresh kill.
“You’ve always noticed my faults,” I continued, perhaps imposing my own degree of pain with such a realization. “Would it kill you to say something positive about me once in awhile?”
Harvey snickered impishly before remarking, “I don’t understand you kids nowadays. You ask a man for the truth, and then you get pissed off when he gives it to you. I think we’ve reared a whole generation of slackers. Let me give you a piece of advice, Larry. Stop thinking that you matter more than you do. The world will move along just as it does now whether you’re here or gone.”
I supposed Harvey professed some warped wisdom with his perspective, but I wasn’t prepared to forgive him for his defects. Fortunately, he didn’t live too much longer after that conversation. After he suddenly died, a part of my soul felt renewed. It made me content to know that I’d never have to listen to this man’s acidic analogies again.
Essentially, Harvey’s death enabled me to be resourceful, not only in the way I lived, but also in the manner in which I thought. Like most teens teetering on the fringes of authority, I challenged everyone who tried to console or reform me. I spent the later part of my youth being volleyed between a few foster homes, before realizing that I was better suited for isolation. Since my father had bequeathed me virtually nothing but debt and sorrow, I had no opportunity to formally educate myself beyond high school. This, of course, was where my inventiveness played an essential role.
Although attending a conventional college was not an option for me, every public library I ever encountered was entirely free to visit. Additionally, many of the books introduced at universities were available here for no charge. I simply immersed myself in these resources, and spent the next two years poring over anything that was deemed indispensable to a scholarly mind.
I fully prescribed to the notion that a man’s contributions to this world wouldn’t be remembered unless he familiarized himself with those already esteemed for their past accomplishments. With this motivation rooted in mind, I delved into the philosophical teachings of Plato, Aristotle, and Virgil. Literary pioneers also engaged me, including the idealized romanticism of Shelley, Byron, and Wordsworth, followed by such enlightened satirists as Pope, Dryden, and Swift.
Ultimately, I digested more academics during this time than most people absorbed in their whole lives. But for all the inherent worth of what I studied, nothing ever mattered more to me than the comedic icons of the twentieth century. I have since concluded that my independent research inadvertently readied me to embrace the foundation of my existence. I only required a single inspiration to convince me that it was possible to change the course of humanity through the conveyance of a punch line.
Five years following Harvey’s death, I settled in a humble, urban community about fifteen miles north of downtown Manhattan. This location was part of a long-term strategy. In case I ever decided to pursue my dream of becoming a renowned comedian, I wanted to reside close to where I might indulge such an opportunity. Until my present age, however, I hadn’t yet taken the stage for the critique of a live audience. Some classified me as an underachiever whose perpetual curse stemmed from a deep-rooted belief that I had somehow floundered in my bid for success.
Without self-confidence, a man ultimately failed to realize his potential in life. In this way, I was like so many others plodding through the streets in search of some cheap level of satisfaction. Unlike my peers, however, I had always known what made me most content. I just didn’t yet know how to make it a reality. And so I elected to hide from the rest in the world behind an occupation that promised no glory or fame. I accepted a job at a local post office many years ago. Initially, I wasn’t even considered worthy enough to actually deliver the mail. I spent years in a dingy, foul-smelling mailroom, working robotically beside others who lost sight of their passions long ago. They were a pathetic crew indeed, whose only goal—or so it seemed—was to attain a route of their own someday so that they could be adorned with the prestigious title of “mail carrier.”
For three years I sorted piles of dirty envelopes into plastic bins, enduring the ridicule of those who at least earned the passage to escape the confines of the cluttered mailroom. After my initiation concluded, the postmaster offered me a chance to be a little bit more vital than a decipherer of zip codes. At last, I was granted a coveted route. The crumbs had finally been rationed to the mouse, and I gobbled them up like any malnourished rodent. It sickened me to know that most of my cohorts had no aspirations beyond a paycheck and pension. They were content to live out the rest of their tedious lives waiting for the crumbs to flutter within range of their deprived fingertips. An original thought never filtered through their minds. They had traded their souls for the comfort of routine. Thusly, this hapless band of mice had no one to blame for their grief and anonymity but themselves. Despite my station among their ranks, I never really thought of myself as one of them.
I don’t wish to suggest that I wholly despised the people who surrounded me. In many respects, they had become my audience while I debated on which stage to perform upon. A couple of them were even worth mentioning as my friends. Most particularly, I acknowledged a man named Charlie Mailer, who worked dutifully beside me. I took an immediate preference to his company. Maybe his surname amused me more than anything else. What were the odds that a poor sap with the name of “Mailer” would one day obtain the occupation linked to his heritage?
For some, I supposed the mark of mediocrity was a form of predestination. After all, the majority of us were born with such limitations without ever realizing it. I believed that the “Charlie Mailers” of the world clogged the boroughs and boulevards across the landscape. I occasionally wondered if the Charlie I had come to know would one day recognize that his most fruitful years had been squandered and devoid of any remnants of adventure. Unfortunately, for most, this revelation often came too late and typically after the pronouncement of a life-changing circumstance.
According to Charlie, he aspired to be a chef at a five-star restaurant in the city. His only dilemma was that he pursued this dream much in the same lackadaisical manner in which I did my own. For a man similar to me in age, the years had been much harsher on Charlie’s frame. He was considerably rounder than he was taller, and he moved like a slug half-buried in wet sand. In truth, there wasn’t anything remotely remarkable about a middle-aged mail carrier with a potbelly and poor eyesight.
Charlie was an unwilling bachelor for his entire life, and lived alone in a house left to him by his deceased parents. But the worst element of my friend’s lethargy was the identical source that plagued almost everyone I encountered. He essentially became oblivious to his own futility. It required a voice much more persuasive than mine to convince him otherwise. So, as any loyal friend might have acted, I maintained my acquaintance with this fellow by simply ignoring his inadequacies. Charlie no doubt reciprocated the courtesy I extended to him.
Recently, Charlie became a recipient of some rather unsettling news from his doctor. For a man such as Charlie, who endured a monotonous existence, it seemed painfully ironic that he’d been delivered a diagnosis as dreadful as it was commonplace. Cancer retreated to few boundaries and assaulted the masses with a ferocity that rendered most of us utterly helpless.
If an upside to such dire knowledge existed, the doctors contended that Charlie’s cancer hadn’t yet metastasized beyond his colon. Apparently, with the aide of chemical treatments designed to eradicate such tumors, Charlie’s fate remained in limbo. In the process, pounds evaporated from his blubbery frame as if his weight was comprised of nothing more than water. Although he lost all of his body hair, in a strange, unforeseeable way, he never looked better even during his healthiest hours.
In the past, I rarely considered myself emotionally indebted to any man, but the present circumstances demanded that I be somewhat gracious toward Charlie. After all, if not for his keen insight into the laws of attraction, I might have never had become acquainted with my current girlfriend. Until three years ago, Molly Grant was just another mail clerk with a flat chest and stifled dreams. Since Charlie befriended her initially, I assumed she shared a similar level of apathy. But despite the lackluster nature of her job, Molly generated a spark seldom distinguishable in my other co-workers.
Molly’s outward appearance generated no great commotion from those who knew her best. She had pale, freckled skin, and the patented Irish-red hair that couldn’t be duplicated from any dye. Yet whenever I glanced into her honey-colored eyes, I felt intrigued and somehow pacified by her genuine countenance. As I mentioned, she wasn’t flawless in her physical stature or social graces, but I discovered that such imperfections proved appealing to my senses.
When describing Molly to those who didn’t know her, I pointed out that she was neither the wallflower nor the blossom in the garden of women cultivated by me. Honestly, I gazed upon her as one admired a rosebud. She certainly had potential to display unparalleled beauty. Of course I didn’t encourage her to mature too quickly, otherwise she would have undoubtedly found a new keeper to tend to her undecorated petals.
Following our first year of exclusive dating, I asked Molly to share an apartment with me. I didn’t extend the woman any promises beyond this invitation, but she eventually anticipated a deeper level of commitment. As I already explained, Molly’s simple, unassuming demeanor had enticed me, but it was those same qualities that compelled her to try and secure a marriage proposal before her thirty-first birthday. I attempted to persuade Molly that I was in no position, financial or otherwise, to entertain the fancies of a wife. But lately I felt that a continuation of our status as a couple was hinged on my ability to express fidelity toward her through conventional terms.
Unlike me, Molly seemed to have the second half of her life inked out as if she had drafted a blueprint for perpetual bliss. She wanted to embrace the whole white-picket fence dream: two kids, a suburban spread, and all the trimmings that looked so appealing to the plain-minded folks I’ve spent most of my life detesting.
On more than one occasion over the past year I said to her, “Molly, you know that I haven’t accomplished my goals yet. I just need a little more time before making any major decisions.”
“How much time?” she asked impatiently.
“Hey, give me a break. Do you think I want to live in this crummy apartment forever?” I countered. “But I just don’t want to jump into anything without thinking about the ramifications. Can I have six months to think about it?”
To a woman whose biological clock ticked like a malfunctioning time bomb, a half of year seemed like an unreasonable period of procrastination. I bargained with her on this point for weeks at a time, but Molly’s persistence never waned. Her argument, of course, was affixed to her Catholic upbringing, which she apparently tarnished by fornicating with me on a regular basis. Lately, our disagreement on this matter was never far removed from either of our thoughts.
“I explained my position to you before,” I repeated to Molly as part of what I estimated to be a daily routine. “I need to establish my act before we settle down.”
“And how do you propose to do that, Larry? You’ll never be the entertainer you want to become if you don’t get out there in public and prove whether or not you got what it takes.”
“My material isn’t ready yet,” I insisted. “I need more time to refine it.”
“How do I know that you’re doing anything productive at all? You never even let me read anything in your damn journal.”
“You know how funny I can be about my unfinished work,” I said, refusing to yield on this point.
“That’s just it,” she retorted. “I truly don’t know how funny you are about anything. You keep telling me that you dream of being a famous stand-up, but you rarely share any of your jokes with me.”
“I will, Molly, when the time is right.”
“You’re running out of time, Larry, both with me and this imaginary quest of yours. My god, you’re forty-five-years old. I don’t know how much longer I can handle living with a man who’s so damn secretive.”
“Would you rather have me attempt something you know that I’m not ready to undertake? Do you need to see me fail before you’ll believe what I say?”
Molly never answered the question directly, and I presumed this omission was intended to incubate my delicate ego. Admittedly, it might have been easier to part ways with her at this stage, but we hadn’t yet advanced our opinions to a destructive tier. When it seemed as though we’d approach a level where nothing could have been reconciled, she’d slide her panties down the length of her fawn-like legs. Molly might have been a traditional girl, but that distinction should never be confused with someone who declined a passionate session of intercourse. In this way, few could match the height of carnality that she sometimes revealed.
Afterwards, with the progression of our lust assuaged, we’d often collapse our sweat-soaked bodies on the bed sheets and permitted our pounding heartbeats to subside. While lying in the room’s darkness, I relished the smell of Molly’s skin after we fucked. Her scent was unmistakable and always the same. It was as if I had just plucked fresh strawberries and squirted the ripened juice all over her naked body. She smelled so delectable, with this sweet aroma surging from every crevice in her skin. I wanted to hold and taste the most redolent portions of her flesh. The lure of this intoxicating potion made it impossible for me to release her from my arms.
Soon thereafter, the flavor of strawberries faded from the room’s confines. I, however, suspected that Molly would continue to badger me for more than what I was prepared to provide. Why did she stay with me? Maybe another man never loved her quite so ardently as I did, but I presumed she wrestled with her own insecurities as well, many of which overshadowed mine in comparison.
Because of such suspicions, I became reluctant to openly display intimacy. Logically, the more information Molly learned about me increased the likelihood of her using such knowledge against me at a later date. I simply couldn’t risk it. At this present juncture in my life, I finally sensed stardom beckoning, luring me closer to what I was ultimately born to achieve.
The dream came back to me often, and I was never immune to its impact. My heart thumped like a jackhammer as I envisioned my audience howling with an almost primal spell of delight. To survey such lighted faces was akin to an orgasmic release. I couldn’t fail my followers in these seconds; each punch line had to be funnier than the last. Yet I never worried. In the realm of my thoughts everything flowed effortlessly, even the improvisations upon the material I so laboriously perfected.
My audience would never know how long I toiled to create such rapture. But within my mind I measured each spoken syllable as if I’d never be permitted a second chance to correct a mistake. Did my posture suggest the confidence of my delivery? Did my voice command respect? Their glorious laughter told me all I needed to comprehend. Let the light fall upon me, encircling my body in a halo of golden power. I am alone on this stage, isolated from this wicked world’s woes. For just a few minutes in time, we were all unshackled from the ugliness pervading in the streets outside.
Instantaneously, the dream drifted from my mind. And when I peeled my eyes open and stared at my lover’s silhouette lying beside me in the blackness, a scent of saturated strawberries pacified the immeasurable layers of darkness lying dormant within my soul.
CHAPTER TWO
The Invalid Comic
Charlie Mailer returned to work at the post office after enduring a second round of chemotherapy. Remarkably, this fellow looked shockingly spry for a bloke who spent the better portion of the past six weeks vomiting stomach bile into a bedpan. What no one could have predicted, however, was how undaunted Charlie’s spirit remained throughout this insidious ordeal.
I never rated Charlie as a particularly courageous chap, but his obstinate desire to conquer his ailment deserved a nod of recognition. Perhaps if he confronted every challenge in his life with such unparalleled gusto, his quest for a significant existence would have amounted to more than just another squandered dream. Was Charlie Mailer truly capable of defeating such a pernicious disease? Only the passage of time offered an answer to this problem now.
If the ingredients to a successful man included endurance, then I would have fully supported my friend in his bid to become a world-class chef. On this day, however, Charlie’s only established recipe consisted of sorting mail and issuing postage. Until his health improved, he had been reassigned to undertake such trivial office duties. Upon seeing me for the first time in weeks, he resumed with our Monday morning banter as if a day hadn’t passed without his absence.
Because of my reputation as a self-proclaimed comic, people at work routinely presumed that I always had a joke ready to pull out of my ass as if I was constipated with blithe humor. Charlie might have been the most egregious offender of the bunch. And now, mostly due to sympathy, I felt compelled to appease his daily requests. Fortunately, Charlie was easily amused and usually stimulated by what Harvey Johnson once referred to as the lowest form of humor—the pun.
“Go ahead,” Charlie goaded me in a voice perforated with pleasure. “What joke do you got for me today, Larry?”
“You’re not really feeling up for that stuff now,” I remarked, trying to convince the buffoon to treat the tone of our discourse more delicately for at least another day or so. Normally, my lack of enthusiasm would have been sufficient to deflect Charlie’s persistence. But the man’s illness had apparently thickened his skin to a density where it was nearly impenetrable, and so he refused to relent.
“You asked for it,” I finally said, while briefly skimming the repertoire of material bobbling like flotsam within my brain. In a second or two, I had a perfectly innocuous antidote for Charlie’s craving.
“A koala bear walked into a bar and sat down,” I started. “A bartender came over to the bear and said, ‘What’s the matter, man? You look kind of sad.’ ‘Yeah,’ the Koala replied. ‘I just got fired from my job.’ The bartender then shook his head pitifully and said, ‘Ah, sorry to hear that, man. What reason did they give you—downsizing?’ ‘Nah,’ the bear answered. ‘They said I was over-Koala-fied.’”
“You’re still the same Larry Breese,” Charlie chuckled, almost revealing a sigh of relief in the process. “Thank god everyone around here doesn’t treat me like I’m a leper. But I was hoping for one of your dirtier jokes, if you know what I mean.”
An unimaginative man always required assistance with his lewdness, and in this way I fully comprehended Charlie’s request. In this case, however, I elected to keep my humor remarkably tame, while still giving him something objectionable to ponder.
“Okay,” I remarked, pausing briefly to recall the joke in mind. “Ready for this riddle—what’s really big, fat and hairy and loves to pop a cherry?”
“Ha, Ha,” Charlie bubbled with perversion, “you tell me.”
“A grizzly bear eating a sundae.”
“Funny stuff,” Charlie chuckled. “How about another?”
“Okay, but just a quick one. What did the beaver say to the armadillo?”
“What?”
“‘Nice Brazilian.’”
Charlie smiled approvingly before saying, “Now that’s the kind of comedy that makes me think everything is going to be A-OK, Larry.”
I guess I couldn’t blame the fellow for bidding for a bit of normalcy in his upturned world. After all, no one truly knew how he was going to react after being delivered such grim news. All in all, Charlie handled the Reaper’s sickle better than the majority of folks I’ve encountered under similar circumstances. If it meant reciting a joke or two every so often to keep a smile bent into his expression, then I’d be gracious enough to do my part. But my gregarious nature didn’t often stray far beyond Charlie’s ears. Other than Molly, I viewed the rest of my co-workers as merely acquaintances.
Admittedly, I hadn’t engaged in a sustained conversation with most of them since I graduated to the prestigious confines of a delivery truck. Of course there were always a few nuisances circulating the perimeters like buzzards scanning for carrion. To escape their input in even the most trivial affairs was like trying to fend off influenza in a room laden with those already infected.
Without comparison, my postmaster, Mr. Fredricks, epitomized everything I abhorred about people as they aged. He was a priggish bastard most of the time, who generally had no right to feel as essential as he so often did. But his most agitating habit hinged to his inability to utter a statement without somehow complaining about his incessantly declining health. Never mind the fact that Fredricks hadn’t missed a day of work due to illness in almost twenty years. Moreover, I rarely perceived the trace of a sniffle in his mannerisms. Yet, as clandestine as the symptoms of his various ailments seemed to be, the prick couldn’t suppress an urge to dispense his illusionary anguish to all those within earshot.
Mercifully, Charlie’s diagnosis filched much of the attention away from Fredricks for the time being, but it didn’t persuade my boss from clutching at his lower back and wincing in pain every time he picked up anything heavier than his permanent marker. To his credit, Charlie tolerated Fredricks’s obnoxiousness better than anyone else. In fact, my friend wasn’t even miffed when Fredricks neglected to visit or phone him at the hospital before his surgery.
Charlie’s outlook on life couldn’t be classified as anything less than curiously optimistic. I’m almost convinced that my friend had a direct hand at weaving the silver lining around all those clouds that kept raining piss down upon the rest of us. The irony of his disposition, of course, resided in the fact that he had every right to feel uncertain about his future. Nevertheless, it wasn’t far removed from my thoughts that the sickest chap among us was also unquestionably the most pleasant individual to ever harness a mailbag across his shoulder.
The cynical part of my soul wanted to shake some logic into Charlie’s skull. After all, no one could have possibly been so willfully upbeat after enduring such a tribulation. Although I detected no valid reason for Charlie’s impervious spell of enthusiasm, I never gathered quite enough courage to relay my opinion to him on this matter. Perhaps it was nobler of me to spew forth a pun or two to soothe my friend’s concealed anguish.
Before I departed the office on this morning, Charlie picked me out of a gaggle of restless carriers. I presumed he required another ill-timed joke to assist him through the drudgery of his work. Instead, he waved a packet of mail at me that was knotted together with twine.
“Hey,” he announced. “The mail at this address keeps coming back to us on your route. But a lot of this stuff is marked return to sender, so I’m assuming the guy didn’t want it for some reason.”
“So if it’s junk, Charlie, why bother tossing it my way? Obviously, if the recipient wanted it, he wouldn’t have returned it us.”
Before I finished stating my logic, I reluctantly took the short stack of mail from Charlie’s once-pudgy fingers. After glancing at the printed address on the majority of envelopes, I realized the printed name, Ralph Bailey, had been crossed over with black ink. The other markings on each envelope were handwritten, consisting of one initial, which read P., and a last name scribed as ‘Palsy.’ I uttered this name aloud as if it had a significance that I was just beginning to recollect. After some further dissection, I realized the printed surname on each piece of mail had ushered in a memory hibernating within my mind.
“Palsy,” I read aloud again. “Why does that name sound so familiar to me?”
Charlie shrugged his shoulders, which wasn’t an uncommon reflex for a fellow who hadn’t bothered to internalize his own phone number.
“Maybe he’s just an old customer and he moved away,” Charlie suggested apathetically.
I checked the address repeatedly. Ridgeway Drive was recognizable because I delivered mail there, but not directly to the house number indicated on the envelopes. I must have encountered this name at another time, perhaps even at a location not assigned to my daily route. My eyes refocused on the initials again, and suddenly my concentration was rewarded with a lucid thought.
“I do know this name, Charlie,” I announced, while shuffling the mail feverishly between my fingers. I then held up the envelopes for Charlie to inspect. “You see the handwriting,” I remarked. “The name P. Palsy is written on each one of these.”
“Yeah, so what?”
“Well, this fellow’s alias might be Paul Palsy.”
Charlie peered at me as if I was about to sock him with another punch line. After a few seconds he huffed, “So? Who the heck is Paul Palsy?”
“He’s someone I once admired,” I replied introspectively, while still entertaining a remote possibility that this indeed was the man in question. “He used Palsy as a stage name,” I clarified. “I guess his real name is crossed out on the envelopes, but not very many people could verify that.”
“Shoot,” Charlie chortled. “His second choice didn’t bring him much fame. I never heard of anyone named Paul Palsy. Is he a singer or something?”
Instead of responding to Charlie’s question immediately, I paused to reflect upon an entertainer whom I hadn’t fathomed was still alive, yet alone living within proximity of my own residence. The mere possibility of Paul Palsy being a potential customer on my route caused my face to freeze with a sense of trepidation and awe. For a few seconds, I couldn’t form the syllables on my tongue to answer my friend.
“He isn’t a singer,” I finally muttered. “Actually, I can’t believe he’s still alive—I mean if it’s the man I’m thinking, this is simply remarkable news.”
“Hey, maybe the chemo has made me a bit loopy, but I’m not following you, Larry. Who is this Palsy fellow anyway?”
“He was a comedian,” I said, practically mumbling the words in disbelief. At this point, a bit of elaboration was called for on my part. “But he wasn’t just a regular stand-up. Palsy was perhaps the greatest underground comic to ever tour the eastern circuit.”
“Well, if he’s underground,” Charlie quipped, “Then maybe he’s really dead already.”
“I see my humor is rubbing off on you in a particularly awful way,” I declared, but Charlie’s joke had more veracity to it than he presently realized.
“You know,” Charlie then offered pragmatically. “Even if this is the guy you’re thinking of, there’s a good chance he doesn’t want to be recognized. After all, he is returning his mail.”
“Or someone else at the residence is doing it for him,” I countered.
“I didn’t think of that.”
My intent was to now neutralize all expectations so that I didn’t stumble upon too much disappointment if my suspicion turned out to be erroneous. “I don’t see a point in making anymore out of this than necessary until I find out who really lives at this address on Ridgeway.”
I then stuffed the mail in a tray that I intended to carry out to my truck. My immediate inclination was to lodge this scenario in the back of my mind until conducting a more thorough investigation. Despite my attempt to appear indifferent to the present circumstances, my hands began to shake uncontrollably as I took hold of the tray.
“This thing has really got you worked up,” said Charlie. “Just relax. After all, even if it is this Palsy guy, he’s just another comedian, right?”
As much as I wanted to concur with Charlie, I couldn’t let such a blatant understatement go unchallenged. I needed to rectify my friend’s ignorance before he spoke so naively again. After all, to suggest that Paul Palsy was just another comedian was tantamount to saying that Shakespeare was just another writer.
“Palsy was the most brilliant entertainer never to make it big commercially,” I said with a bit of moxie. “There’s no predicting how famous he might have become if he ever truly wanted a taste of worldwide fame.”
Perhaps it was grossly unfair of me to expect Charlie to comprehend the complexities of such a creative persona. As I stated earlier, my friend lived a rather conventional lifestyle. He possessed no knack to appreciate the raw, unfiltered monologues of comedy’s last and mostly forgotten treasure. I simply didn’t have the patience to educate Charlie on the finer details of Palsy’s contributions to the realm of stand-up comedy.
Although I was merely a teenager when Palsy first appeared on the scene, I imagined that being in his presence was as close to spiritual nirvana as anyone could have possibly achieved. He was as uncanny as he was uncommonly spectacular. For those who remembered him best, Paul Palsy, the Invalid Comic, never climbed higher on the prongs of fame than he did in the summertime thirty years ago. There wasn’t a comedian within a two hundred mile radius of New York City who hadn’t made a feeble attempt to imitate his craft. In just a short span of three months, Palsy exploded in the city’s seedy underground circuit like a stick of dynamite. The ghostly syllables of his raunchy, uncensored humor still reverberated across the stages where he once performed.
I sometimes marveled at what Palsy was able to attain without the assistance of mainstream communications. No newsprint, radio, or television broadcast dared to tread into the arena of filth in which he thrived. He was a voice perpetually encapsulated in the smoky darkness of pool halls and partially condemned shanties. Society wasn’t quite prepared for his twisted insight into mankind’s pursuits and perversities. Any social code prescribed for the apparently civilized had no place in Palsy’s realm of thought. He pissed on the puritanical tirades of our time, and was rumored to have made the most sinister of sinners blush like a band of choirboys.
However resistant an audience might have initially reacted during one of Palsy’s performances, it didn’t take long to lure them from their comfort zones. This comedian ignited some taboo temperament burrowed in the blackest regions of their subliminal thoughts. The laughter generated from a single show defied the sounds that one typically associated with joy. Moreover, these guttural intonations seemed almost animalistic, perhaps even less than what one classified as human. Few feigned amusement within range of his words. It tainted the perceptions of everyone who fell under his uninhibited spell.
Despite such accolades, the most remarkable facet of Palsy’s presence among the footlights was that he managed to attain such an apex of excellence while hunkered in the confining space of a wheelchair. I was informed that the Invalid Comic had merited his stage name due primarily to a devastating injury incurred in Vietnam. As a marine in the late 60’s, a then imprudent private by the name of Ralph Bailey stepped haphazardly onto a land mine. This sole miscalculation cost a once valiant solider both his legs at the knee in a single, agonizing flash. He was rendered a cripple for the rest of his days.
A lesser man would have collapsed like a cheap house of cards in a windstorm. But Palsy had never set out to fail at anything, or at least I imagined him to possess such fortitude. Some suggested that Palsy’s cynicism over this injury fueled his intensity, thereby securing a place for himself among his disenchanted followers. But I attributed my mentor’s endurance to an unflappable account of the foolishness pervading within all provinces of mankind’s motivations.
Palsy performed comedy during an age where political correctness had no more substance or passion than the idiots who devised it. His candid commentaries on our repugnant dispositions instilled an unnatural shiver in those who recognized themselves in the threadwork of his monologues. But no matter what the final consensus determined in regard to the Invalid Comic, few had the audacity to deny the veracity of his words. Palsy transformed into an overnight sensation more rapidly than an ocean’s tides devoured a sandy beach in the midst of a hurricane.
When it seemed as though Palsy’s popularity had the potential to torch an evening sky like a nova devouring itself, he simply vanished from the glare of watchful eyes. Despite urgent pleas from Palsy’s fanatical followers, the lustful fire fizzled swiftly and his magic turned to nothing more but flecks of golden dust along a broken street of dreams. He disappeared from the circuit as hastily as he arrived. Undoubtedly, his premature departure from the ranks of comedy left a gapping wound in the hearts of those who worshipped his offerings so obediently.
Over the following years, Palsy’s reputation faded among the masses of more selective audiences. Since no official recordings of his material existed, people soon forgot the comic genius. Admittedly, had it not been for a few bootlegged tapes that I had discovered among my old friend’s possessions, I would have been deprived of this legend’s influence alongside most of society. The recordings were of a substandard quality, and barely audible at this current date. But even with such an obvious disadvantage, the brilliance of Palsy’s delivery never failed to overshadow the glitches in primitive technology.
I currently stored the only known copies of these tapes in a vault within my home, and considered it as vital to my existence as blood tapering through my veins. Up until this hour, I hadn’t yet shared the content of Palsy’s performance with anyone. I don’t think I’d ever be able to forgive myself for letting others partake in the secrets I clung to most avariciously.
Throughout the remainder of the day, I completed my rounds at a frenzied pace. I had purposely rearranged my route so that I’d finish in proximity to 48 Ridgeway Drive. But when arriving in front of the sidewalk at the unkempt, brick edifice, I suddenly realized that I wasn’t yet ready to greet the sole man who intimidated me more than anyone else. Why was I so frightened by this prospect? Perhaps I simply feared the reality of greeting a man whose image I had deliberately prefabricated within my mind. A distinct possibility of disappointment loomed. What if he turned out to be less than the man I so ignorantly imagined?
For this reason, I found it impossible to pursue the issue. Maybe I just needed an impartial opinion before venturing forward. In situations such as these, I barely relied on my own instinct for guidance. My dear Molly proved particularly objective in such matters of judgment. At the very least, delaying my visitation provided additional time for me to mull over precisely what I intended to discuss with Palsy.
Molly typically arrived at our apartment prior to me, and this evening was no exception. I wasn’t the kind of man who expected to saunter into the house and find a hot meal waiting for me on the kitchen table. But it provided a sense of security whenever Molly had the initiative to dote on me. In this case, she ordered a pizza. Since I had a couple of beers stashed in the fridge from the previous weekend, the combination seemed simply appetizing. Molly permitted me to eat dinner in solitude as she paged through a volume of literature.
Lately, Molly began to dabble periodically into the cannon of British literature. This examination of the classics, I presumed, spawned from my girlfriend’s recent enlightenment in regard to her namesake. Apparently, Molly’s mother, a former English teacher, named her daughter after a character from James Joyce’s Ulysses. I didn’t know if Molly’s sudden enthusiasm for reading would have lasted longer than most hobbies she attached herself to, but I found her affectations mildly amusing. After all, not many guys down at the post office knew that Molly perused novels of literary merit on a regular basis. The fact that she worked alongside a group of illiterate sods made it particularly comical in my mind.
With my dinner promptly ingested, followed by two cans of beer, I had enough false courage sloshing around in my belly to present my thoughts to Molly. Honestly, I couldn’t initially remember if I had ever mentioned Palsy’s name to her in the past.
“You know, I was sorting through some my customers’ mail today,” I started. My concentration immediately drifted to her preoccupations. Molly placed the book down on an adjacent dressing table, only to substitute her evident boredom with a hairbrush. I then watched her face in a mirror’s reflection as she brushed her tangled tresses.
“I’m listening,” she replied, dispassionately.
“There’s a fellow on my route that you might remember me mentioning before.”
“I’m still listening.”
“Okay—did you ever hear of a guy by the name of Paul Palsy?”
Molly stopped dragging the bristles through her hair and pivoted slightly toward me. She seemed to be waiting for a punch line as her eyebrows knotted.
“This isn’t a joke, right?”
“No,” I responded innocently. “This is a legitimate person, actually, a once-famous comedian.”
“Did you say his name was Palsy?”
“That’s right.”
“Is that his real name?”
“No, it’s a stage name. He’s an invalid.”
Molly resumed her hair-brushing more vigorously, but I couldn’t ignore a trace of disapproval distorting her expression.
“I never heard of the guy before,” she finally huffed. “But I think it’s disrespectful for any person to call himself by such a name, don’t you?”
“That was his gimmick, Molly,” I countered in defense of a man whom I never even met. “He was crippled and used that disability to satirize his own condition.”
“Well, I still don’t think it’s funny to joke about disabled people, even if you happen to be one yourself.”
Obviously, Molly was more inclined to provide me with a lecture on morality than listening to any point I tried to convey. Still, in a bid to fend off an argument, I opted to clarify my position.
“Anyway,” I continued, “Palsy was one of the most controversial comics who ever lived. For the longest time, I presumed he was dead.”
“As I said before, Larry, I never heard of the guy.”
“Not too many people knew him outside the arena of comedy. I myself discovered him quite by accident. I’m surprised I never spoke his name aloud to you before.”
“If you ever did, I don’t remember,” Molly responded, but she still offered no sustained eye contact with me.
“I was thinking about going to see this fellow,” I muttered.
“So what’s the big deal?”
“Well, it’s a good possibility that Palsy faked his own death years ago to avoid people like me. He’s like the Salinger of stand-up comics—a genuine recluse.”
“I’m not sure what you want me to say,” said Molly. “If you think this guy will talk to you, what do you got to lose? On the other hand, if you do speak to him, what do you expect to gain?”
Molly always had a way of analyzing something complex and making it sound simplistic. Her last statement compelled me to scrutinize my feelings at a personal level. In all truth, what did I truly hope to understand from a comic who supposedly hadn’t performed publicly in over thirty years? After another moment of contemplation, the answer became clearer to me.
I eventually edged further into the bedroom where Molly beautified her features for my gratification. Gradually, I positioned myself behind her, tracing my fingers methodically through strands of crimson hair. I then delicately placed my hands on her bare shoulders. She wore only a black bra and slinky panties of the same shade, and her skin smelled with a hint of fresh lavender. The muscles in her neck tensed briefly as I massaged her skin. After a few seconds of administering this manipulation, she eased her head backwards and pressed it against my torso. I imagined her silky hair rubbing against my cock as it stiffened in my jeans.
“Maybe Palsy can help me,” I said, while admiring the smooth, warm sensation of her flesh beneath my grasp.
“In what way?” she sighed, obviously pleasantly distracted by this demonstration of affection.
“Well, I figured he might be able fix some rough spots in my routine, maybe even give me a little encouragement.”
In the manner in which Molly now turned her head, I sensed that she felt my hard shaft throbbing against her neck. It suddenly occurred to me that she hadn’t sucked me off in a number of weeks.
“I might be able to give you some encouragement too,” she said coyly. Before I uttered anything else, Molly turned in her chair so that her eyes faced the button on my blue jeans. By now, a mischievous glint swelled into both her pupils. At the same time, I attempted to convince myself that I inadvertently stumbled upon a living legend. “Palsy might be the precise inspiration I need to finally get on the stage.”
Molly ignored my comment at first. Instead, she concentrated on the protrusion in my trousers. She softly traced her fingers across the girth of my cock, seemingly to arouse me further as I waited for her to unfasten my pants.
“I’m not sure who this guy is,” she uttered softly, “but if you think he can help you get over your stage fright, then I say it’s worth the effort to speak to him.”
I suddenly became distracted by Molly’s last statement. “What do you mean ‘stage fright’?” I remarked. She glanced up at me while petting my cock more ardently, but I sensed that she already regretted the selection of her words.
“I didn’t mean it in a negative way, Larry,” she retracted. I continued to permit her to play with my dick, but the friction of her touch began to have the opposite of its intended effect.
“I wouldn’t refer to my reluctance to perform as any kind of fright,” I indicated. “It’s more of a matter of preparation.”
Molly rolled her eyes in frustration even before I had a chance to fully clarify my position. “If you say so,” she huffed. Her arms then instantly dropped to both sides. “Do you really want to get into this discussion again?”
“Well, that depends, Molly. I do want to be very clear on how you feel about my choices.”
“You mean you don’t know yet?”
“I’m not afraid,” I said sternly. When I enunciated these words, I placed my fingers gently beneath her chin. She didn’t attempt to avert my eyes when I proceeded. “You know, my father used to think I was scared, too, but I’ve conditioned myself to forget about most of the fucked up things he said to me while I was growing up.”
After I released Molly’s face, her eyes immediately cast to the floor. She appeared unusually sullen and not so surprisingly disinterested in my partially engorged member.
“I’m sorry,” she murmured, almost as if I had scolded her. “I didn’t mean to make you feel shitty.”
“I am fine now,” I declared. I still permitted the strands of her silky hair to taper through my fingers. “I know you’d never intentionally hurt me, Molly. I’ve always felt safe with you.”
At this point, I attempted to guide Molly’s head back in the general area of my cock. I wanted her to unbutton my jeans, and then, using only her mouth, take my pulsating erection deep in the back of her throat. But Molly already had her fill of me for this evening. My insistence on her adhering to the correct perceptions of my character no doubt cost me a fine blowjob. Despite this disappointment, I couldn’t be deemed as a coward in any method or action.
Molly elected to retire to bed prematurely tonight, but I stayed awake to observe the Moon. All things considered, my reoccurring dream was quite pleasant, perhaps inspiring chills as I anticipated the inevitable laughter. It all seemed increasingly tangible to me now. A flicker of energy sparked my imagination with a deeper level of desire. The only element absent from my senses now was the ripened essence of strawberries permeating the room’s shadowy confines.
CHAPTER THREE
Wheelchair in Waiting
Regardless of my most intrepid efforts, I required another four days of contemplation before acquiring the temerity to approach Palsy’s residence again. My hesitation was instigated purely on the notion of presenting myself in the most assertive manner possible. Surely, a comedian the caliber of Palsy wouldn’t have extended me a second opportunity to persuade his hospitality.
If 48 Ridgeway Drive truly was Palsy’s current address, he certainly couldn’t have been overly sensitive to the aesthetics of his environment. I always recognized that this neighborhood suffered from general neglect, which I assumed was a consequence of housing an excessive amount of renters in the vicinity. But no conceivable excuse pardoned the overwhelming filth pervading in the region I now surveyed. I fully expected to uncover a crushed beer can or two strewn randomly against the sewer drains, or maybe a few trash bags piled curbside that had mysteriously avoided collection. Nothing, however, prepared my senses for the stench of fetid garbage lingering in the yard outside of Palsy’s dilapidated abode.
To refer to this structure as a home bordered on an exaggeration of standards. The dwelling provided a roof, four identifiable walls, and perhaps indoor plumbing. But nothing in the way of creature comforts seemed evident here. Although it was early summer, not a single flower bloomed on the property. Furthermore, the landscape contained no source of vegetation whatsoever. Not even a loathsome weed had the proper nourishment to squeeze its spiky stalk through the apparently contaminated soil. Instead, an assortment of tread-less tires and rusted engine parts of unknown origin were scattered across the premises as if a misguided bomb had detonated.
Occasionally, a feral cat or two skulked along the neighborhood’s perimeter, no doubt snuffing out the piles of rotting rubbish with no particular preference. The air itself reeked of burnt rubber, and some other noxious fumes that undoubtedly served as deterrents to covertly thin this region of its ailing inhabitants.
I managed to contain my disgust long enough to reach the house’s front stoop. While hunched in the shadow of this rickety residence, I questioned the state of mind of its primary occupant. A part of me secretly wished that Palsy cared significantly more about his personal image than what I surmised by an exterior inspection of his home. Evidently, whatever had been the source of this comic’s motivations for the last thirty years didn’t include securing praise from any unsolicited visitors.
After a few minutes of waiting unsuccessfully for someone to respond to my repetitive rapping on the front door, I presumed the house was vacant. At first, a persistent twittering of an unseen bird distracted my full attention, but then I detected another disturbance within the residence that defied precise identification. It originated from behind the door. Initially, I found this noise to be only mildly unsettling, perhaps akin to a door swaying on its neglected hinge. But as I maintained my position, the racket became increasingly intolerable to my ears.
This squeaking sound irritated my senses in the same manner as a jagged nail being dragged across a sheet of slate. I cringed and mechanically cupped my hands across both ears. Trying to muffle my agony with such a rudimentary defense seemed undeniably foolhardy, but I wasn’t yet prepared to retreat from the porch. I had ventured too far to potentially turn away from my mentor now. But just when I assumed that this racket would impel me toward the threshold of insanity, it subsided. I then welcomed a more agreeable sound as the door’s deadbolt snapped and the barrier between us gradually opened and gave way to the musty innards of this urban tomb.
I am not entirely certain what or whom I expected to encounter. After all, any figure conceived within one’s imagination proved to be an imperfect representation at best. It wasn’t unreasonable to become disenchanted when comparing such illusions to reality. Since I envisioned Palsy solely by his vocal intonations, I foresaw him as a powerful presence, whose single disability was being resentfully confined to a wheelchair. But the ravages of time had shredded this man’s disposition beyond any trace of redemption. As my eyes lowered upon the man hunkered awkwardly before me in this doorway, I suspected he hadn’t initiated contact with another living soul in years.
The invalid’s flesh lined itself with the markings of a man who lingered in a polluted existence. Plum-colored sores and other splotchy lesions peppered his bald skull and neck. He made a futile attempt to conceal some of the warts clustered on his forehead by wrapping a red bandanna over the top of his head. Pallid skin sagged over his eyelids, giving him the countenance of someone perpetually fatigued. His mouth, blistered with ornaments of decay, seemed as if it had been singed by fire. Eyes, denser than the concrete platform I now stood upon, leered dispassionately into mine. An almost imperceptible depth lurked here, daring me to decipher anything that resembled even the crudest indication of human emotion.
To worsen the man’s apparent maladies, he appeared jaundiced; the white of his eyes resembled the color of egg yokes. Additionally, a ghastly stench of stale urine and cut-rate booze augmented the unconditional negligence that I had acquainted myself with. Without exaggeration, he was the crustiest codger I ever had the misfortune to gaze upon. Had he not presumably been a comedian whom I worshipped as some might cling to their gods, I wouldn’t have uttered a syllable to encourage any sensible discourse from him now.
Whatever ill opinion I attached to this fellow, I’m confident he experienced equal disdain for my unannounced company. No initial words transferred between us. I presumed he wanted to assess my mannerisms before offering me a proper greeting, although his ultimate objective remained as unclear as his wheelchair’s tarnished, metal frame. Such prolonged silence afforded me with a few moments to proceed with my examination of his character.
I noticed his torso was exceedingly emaciated, and his hands twitched convulsively upon the handles on each side of his chair. He wore a tattered olive-colored flap jacket, which I assumed was a relic from his duties in the military. I couldn’t be certain on this point, however, because the garment’s sleeves were cleaved at each shoulder, and any indication of decorative recognition was removed from the fabric’s stitching. Additionally, two or three blankets covered his lap, no doubt designed to camouflage the absence of his lower extremities.