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“I love stand-up too. Or at least I did until it came between me and the other things I always wanted.”
“Like what?”
“A family,” he says quietly. “I found a nice girl, we got married. She seemed supportive of my career, wanted to have a baby even though I was on the road half the year. But I did it so we could save up and not have to worry about taking care of our kids. We tried for a year to get pregnant.” He takes a moment like he still feels the sting of whatever happened next.
“And then one day, I got back early from an out-of-town gig. I wanted to surprise my wife so I went to Palermo and picked up a couple cannolis, the kind she likes with the cherry on top. Before I unlocked the door, something felt off. Like the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. And when I walked in, half of our things were gone. I thought probably someone broke in but there was no mess, no broken locks or windows.” He fidgets his thumb on the steering wheel, keeping his eyes on the road ahead. “I didn’t want to believe it but I knew what happened. When I called her, she said that she’d moved out, that she met someone else. Then, later she told me that she’d been on birth control pills almost the entire time we tried to get pregnant.”
“Oh my god.”
“Yeah, she said that she couldn’t possibly bring a baby into the world with an absent father and husband.”
“Damn, that’s cold,” I say.
“Yep. That was it. I blamed comedy. Comedy got in the way of my marriage.”
“You know that’s not your fault, right? Or comedy’s. She just wasn’t the right person. You know that?” I offer.
“Yeah,” he says, the word getting caught in his throat.
“Shit, man, you’re just as much a mess as me. How are you gonna help me land this audition?” I ask in jest.
“Because I’ve done it before, remember?”
