Page 3 of My Own Kind of Person

“Thanks very much! My name is Sean O’Brien.”

I fumble to get the mic into the stand and I step down and walk to the back of the dark room.

An old lady turns in her chair. “Great job.”

“Thank you!”

The host, a retired firefighter named Bobby Bingo, takes the stage. He has thinning hair and wears a T-shirt with a bald eagle clutching a fire helmet. All his jokes are about the length of his hose.

“Give it up for Sean. For someone with such skinny arms, that kid has big balls.” This gets a lot of laughs. “Monthly showcase is next week. Top up-and-coming comics. Catch them here before they get big and have to be careful what they say.”

The house lights come up. The performers greet friends with handshake-claps and half-hugs. At the center table, my best friend Tony carefully removes his phone from the little tripod he used to film me. Beside him my other best friend Andi takes out a stick of gum and folds it into their mouth. You need to bring two paying guests to get onstage, and Tony and Andi dropped everything the second I asked.

I wasn’t planning on coming tonight at all, but when the rest of the night with Christy didn’t go as I dreamed it would, or reasonably hoped it would, or feared it possibly could, I felt so ashamed that I couldn’t stay in my bedroom. I couldn’t stay within a ten-mile radius. There was still time to make it to the open mic, so I begged Tony and Andi to attend as a not-yet-belated birthday present.

I’d rather not think about it, but suffice to say that instead of losing my virginity I had a minor, casual, extremely severe panic attack.

For some comics, getting onstage is a way to speak the truth and process what’s happening in their lives. They turn their tragedy into comedy in real time. I’m the opposite. I don’t want to process how spectacularly I just failed to have sex. I don’t want to ever tell anyone about it. And there is no feeling like making a room of strangers laugh. An hour ago I was a complete failure. Now I can do anything.

I take out my phone to send Christy a quick message, but my breath catches and my thumbs stop. Maybe I can’t do anything.

The old lady points at me as she passes. “You remind me of my son when he was a kid.”

“Aw. That’s—”

A bald guy with giant arms walks so close that I have to step aside. The girl following him touches my arm and whispers, “You were hilarious.”

“Thanks,” I whisper back.

Feeling the buzz of being well-liked, I run over and sit next to Tony. Andi’s gone, probably outside avoiding people.

Tony holds up a finger to tell me to wait. He’s uploading the video to various safety-deposit boxes. He’s my de facto manager and is very serious about having at least three backups of everything in case of an emergency followed by an emergency. I’ve known Antonino Zitolo III for over ten years and he’s still a chubby Italian kid with standard-issue glasses and spiky brown hair, though the almost-mustache is new. He always wears a green shirt with a green jacket and green shoes. It’s not a fashion statement. He just really likes green.

He puts his phone away. “Your best set yet.”

The server drops the check—three sodas and three orders of French fries—and Tony puts a debit card down for all of it.

“Thank you, man,” I say.

“No doubt.”

He gets a monthly stipend from his parents because they desperately want him to have a social life, but this is still very kind. One time, his family brought me to Disney World and didn’t ask me to pay for a thing.

Bobby Bingo leans on the bar jiggling a glass of seltzer. The two comics next to him hold beer bottles. Looking at the three of them gives me the same fear of being too soft that made me text Christy I was ready to have sex. That didn’t work out but maybe I can be a Regular Guy Who Doesn’t Worry About Things as long as I’m wearing clothes.

“I’m gonna do it,” I say.

Tony’s voice deepens. “Is it time?”

“If I want to perform for more than ten people, I gotta get in that showcase. Guys who started at this open mic after me and get less laughs are already in the showcase, and the only reason I can see is that they hang out with Bobby Bingo.”

“You know how to hang out.”

“I hang out!”

“I believe in you, Sean O’Brien.”

“I’ll give you the signal if I need reinforcements.”