Chapter 13 Frankie
FRANKIE
Shit.
Shit shit shit.
Fuck.
I look over at Sam, who keeps rearranging himself in his seat, trying to get comfortable.
We’re in the orchestra box, house left. The opening act comic is about to take the stage, and, hopefully, fifteen minutes from now, Sam’s father will not pick up the mic and stand in the spotlight looking like he’s got a spare mic hiding in his jeans.
“You excited to see your dad work?”
“I guess. Yeah. Can I take off my shoes?”
There’s no one else in this box with us. “Sure. I don’t see why not.”
He starts to lean forward so he can pull off his shoes but then says to himself, “Oh yeah.” He sits up straight, pulls two pieces of cheese and crackers from the front pocket of his pants, and then places them very carefully on the arm of the chair.
“You can have some,” he tells me, wiping his fingers on his pants and then pulling off his Vans and letting them drop to the floor.
“Thanks, buddy.” I am so fond of this little dude, but I’m not touching his pocket snacks.
I pull a couple of wet wipes from my purse. When he’s sitting cross-legged, he nods, confirming that he has finally achieved the perfect sitting position for a live comedy show featuring his father. I hand him one of the wipes as he’s reaching for the cheese.
“Thank you. Do my feet smell?”
I sniff the air. “They smell really Gouda.”
He doesn’t laugh, and I realize it’s because he doesn’t know the names of all the cheeses. I’m just so glad his dad wasn’t around to see him not laugh at me.
“What if I need to go to the bathroom when my dad is talking on the stage?”
“Just let me know, and I’ll take you to the ladies’ room.”
He wrinkles his nose. “Will there be ladies in there?”
“Well, I ain’t no lady. But I’ll be in there with you.”
He blinks at me, considering this. “Okay.”
I finally realize my phone has been vibrating in my pocket and I need to put it in my purse.
And then I see that it’s a notification from my mum and dad and remember that they’re here.
They’re fucking here in the theater, and they’re going to want to talk to Owen after the show.
I had forgotten for a few minutes because I was so busy internally screaming about making out with my nemesis that I forgot to continue internally screaming about a potentially worse situation.
I mean, the kissing part was great. Stellar, really. It’s the person I was kissing who was terrible. I mean, it’s not like he’s a terrible person, but it’s terrible that I kissed him and it’s worse that it was such a hot kiss.
I take that back—he is a terrible, awful person for being such a good kisser.
Shit, I need to respond to my parents’ texts.
MUM: Frances. We can see you there in the box. Stop ignoring us.
DAD: Hey there, peanut. Just know that we are not angry with you for lying to us regarding your whereabouts and forgoing an opportunity to visit with your loving parents who only want the best for you.
We have no intention of informing this handsome comedian that he once adorned the walls of your bedroom.
Unless you don’t text us back immediately. Then we’ll have to.
MUM: Don’t listen to your dad, Frankie Jean. We’ll be telling him no matter what. Oh and I have some very funny new joke ideas for you, darling!
ME: Why do you hate me?
DAD: Ahhh, there she is. Welcome back to Tampa, hon.
MUM: You look like you just rolled out of bed…
I comb my fingers through my hair as I scan the audience.
I can’t believe Owen Brodie sold out this theater three years after playing that comedy club here and I’m still doing open mics and—oh yeah, I’m his son’s nanny.
I spot my mum and dad in the fourth row, center.
I spot them because they’re both standing and waving at me, grinning like two devils who are going to humiliate their only daughter in about an hour and a half.
I put my hands together in prayer and plead with my face.
Please don’t ruin my life. Haven’t I already ruined it enough myself?
Donna Hogan blows me a kiss, and my dad winks at me.
They sit back down and ignore me.
This is not good.
ME: I will do anything you ask, just please don’t tell Owen anything.
No response.
I look down at my parents. My dad pats at his jacket pocket, indicating that his phone is in there and he won’t be texting me back.
My mother pulls something out of her purse, and I watch in horror as she unfolds it.
She then holds it up so I can see it. It’s one of the magazine pictures of Owen that I had on my bedroom wall when I was fourteen.
She probably found it in my closet when she was turning my old room into an exercise/craft room.
I mentally and emotionally ripped all of them up, but I didn’t have the heart to literally throw any of them away or destroy them.
She makes the international gesture for “signature” at me.
I’m pretty sure they’re just messing with me.
I give her the double thumbs-up.
They wouldn’t do that to me.
“Hey, is that lady holding up a picture of my dad?”
“No, I don’t think so. I don’t know who that is. Oh, look! The opening act’s coming on. Look at the stage!” I put my hands on the sides of Sam’s face to turn his head away from the picture of his dad that my mum is holding.
They’re definitely just messing with me.
Fifteen minutes later, and I’m still positive that this is true. My parents wouldn’t humiliate me with Owen just because I didn’t tell them I’m in town overnight this one time. I’m the asshole in this family, not them.
Owen Brodie saunters onstage, without any evidence of boner.
I mean, he probably bangs women to the Rocky theme before every show, for all I know.
His hair is just a bit mussed up, and he’s wearing his glasses.
He looks so cute I want to throw things at him.
And run my fingers through his hair again before slapping him.
He takes the microphone off the stand, waits for the applause to die down just a little, and then launches into it.
“Thanks for coming, everyone. So good to be back in Tampa. A lot’s happened since I was last here.
You’ve gained a legendary quarterback and won a Super Bowl…
” He waits for the easy applause and cheers to die down before continuing.
“I’ve learned that gator jokes are not funny and gotten divorced.
So we’re both doing great. My seven-year-old son is actually here tonight.
He doesn’t think I’m funny, and he’s absolutely right.
I won’t point him out to you because he doesn’t like being pointed at or stared at, and he also doesn’t like it when I tell him jokes, which is too bad because I’m going to tell a bunch of jokes that I already know he hates.
Starting now. This is the first post-divorce joke I told him…
Hey, Sam—that’s his name—what’s black and white and pink all over?
… Your Animaniacs T-shirt that I just washed with your new Spider-Man pajamas. ”
People laugh because he’s being all humble and relaxed and cute.
Even Sam is laughing. I record this for Owen on my phone. The sound of his son laughing along with around a thousand strangers.
He’s not doing the stupid “Hi, I’m handsome” jokes anymore. He’s just handsome.
I don’t know why that makes me even angrier, but I stop recording and text the voice memo to Owen’s phone. Not as a comedian who’s funnier than he is but as a nanny who doesn’t care if he’s funny or handsome or not—she just needs a paycheck.
“I’ve got a document on my laptop called Fart Jokes for Sam because you would think that comedian fart jokes smell the funniest, but it turns out mine just stink. Don’t they, Sam?”
He’s doing an entire bit on jokes that bombed with his son, and it’s cute and he’s killing.
I’m happy for him. I am. The tightness in my chest means I’m happy for him. Just like the tightness in my clitoris means I’m glad I’m wearing jeans instead of a skirt tonight.
“You okay in there, buddy?”
I don’t want to be that person who rushes a child to finish using the toilet just because he’s picked the actual worst time in the history of my life to have to go to the bathroom, but he’s been in that stall for five minutes and I need to get out there to head my parents off at the pass.
There’s a line of about ten women waiting for three stalls. They’re all smiling and talking about how funny and hot Owen Brodie is. I can’t listen to it. Not because I don’t want to hear it but because I’m realizing that Owen Brodie’s son is groaning because he has the cheese poops.
“There isn’t enough toilet paper in here,” he grunts.
“Okay, hang on.” I pull a handful of Kleenex from my purse. As a certified babysitter, I am literally prepared for this shit. I hold my breath, crouch down in front of Sam’s stall, reach my hand out to him under the door, and wait for him to take the Kleenex from me.
“I can’t reach.”
I bend down a little lower so I can hold it up a little higher.
“I still can’t.”
I crouch down on my knees and smush my face up against the stall door until I feel the Kleenex leave my hands, and then I jump up, step back, and inhale again.
“You okay now? We gotta go, buddy.”
“I don’t think I should leave the toilet.”
“There’s a toilet where your dad is. We’ll just run over there, and you can hop back on.” I don’t want to say backstage because then people will figure out this is Owen’s son and want to talk to him and it will take even longer to get back there.
I hear the toilet flush, praise the digestive lords, whip out a couple of antibacterial wet wipes, and get ready to sprint.
Sam comes out of the stall. I wipe his hands for him, take one of them in mine, and haul him out of the ladies’ room, through the lobby, to the entrance of the backstage area. It takes somewhere between nine seconds and forever.
And I’m too fucking late.
When we get to Sam’s dressing room, the door is open and my parents are in there. They’re both laughing. Not evil bwahahahaha we just ruined our only daughter’s life kind of laughs, but delighted, adoring laughter. Like they’re laughing about how funny his show was, maybe.
Maybe I’m still the only asshole in this family, I’m thinking, as I let go of Sam’s hand and catch my breath and see that…Owen is at his dresser, writing on the old magazine ad of him with a Sharpie. While smirking.
“Hey, Frances,” he says, not even looking over at me.
He signs his name with an obnoxious flourish, turns to face me, and carefully holds the torn-out page to me.
Like a peace offering. But with a smirk.
Which means he thinks he has something on me.
He doesn’t. What he doesn’t know is that I don’t like him anymore. So none of this means anything.
I don’t look at what he wrote. I just fold up the piece of paper and slip it into my back pocket. I totally ignore the flicker of disappointment across his smirky face when he realizes I’m not going to read what he wrote.
But he gets over it quickly enough when he realizes Sam is in the room. The way he watches his son, hesitantly trying to read whether or not he enjoyed the performance, isn’t adorable at all.
I go over to my parents to hug them, even though they are terrible, horrible people.
“Hey, buddy,” Owen says to Sam. “You stay awake for the whole show?”
“Yeah. It was fun.”
“Yeah? You had a good time?”
“Yeah. I had cheese poops after, but I laughed at some of the jokes. It was good.”
“I’m so glad, Sam. Thanks for coming.” He holds up his fist for Sam to fist bump him.
I am in no way moved by this tiny father-son moment.
“You need to use the bathroom in here?”
“Nah, I’m okay.”
“So this is the famous son, Sam,” my dad says. “I got a question for you. What does a ninja fart sound like?”
Sam shrugs.
“Nothin’.”
Sam just stares at him for a couple of seconds.
“Ninja fahts are silent but deadly,” my mum adds by way of explanation, but also the way she says fahts is hilarious.
Sam laughs. Hard. He loves ninjas. I’ve only known him for a short while, but I already know all of the things he likes: ninjas, cheese, naps, documentaries about wild animals killing each other, Spider-Man, and me. And maybe his dad, a little bit.
I’m thinking about how much more he likes me than his dad, how little I like his dad.
I’m thinking about how I don’t even care what his dad wrote on that print ad and how I will definitely never kiss that smug asshole again, when I catch the look on Sam’s face and know from the very still way he’s standing that he just laughed so hard he sharted.
And suddenly, nothing matters more than the fact that it is my job to calmly lead Sam to the bathroom without causing him any embarrassment and then ask his father to get a change of undies from the suitcase that’s in the rental car.
I bet we’ll all be ready to joke about it by tomorrow.
What’s yellow and black and white and blue and brown all over?
Sam’s Minion underpants after he sharted.