Brenda Monk Is Funny (30 page)

Brenda was still laughing as she made the coffee.

August, King’s Cross railway station, and Brenda was finally here, awaiting her platform for the train to Edinburgh. It was almost exactly a year since she had last stood on this very spot half-drunk, out of control, barely knowing what she was doing as she boarded the train to go and see a boyfriend who had not invited her, so little in her life that this had been genuinely the best and most exciting thing she could think to do with herself. This time was so different it felt as if it was happening in an alternative universe – yes, in fact it was an alternative universe, and one of Brenda’s own making. She had created this reality. This sparkling, fresh, exciting reality, full of potential and throbbing with life force.

Her platform was announced and Brenda pulled her small suitcase to her carriage, found her seat and arranged herself for the journey. At the other end of the line was the competition final. She felt heavy with an awareness of its significance, but also glad of the length of time she would have to sit here and reflect a little. She didn’t think she had sat in one place for so long since she gave up her job eight months earlier. As they moved off, Brenda settled back into the rhythm of the train, steady and rocking and let her mind wander.

June and July had passed quickly and though the weather had been hot, it had made no difference to Brenda. She had been inside the whole time, sleeping all morning, pacing, writing, practising all afternoon, gigging at night or at least going to watch gigs if she couldn’t get on herself. She begged stage time wherever and whenever she could. Rossly had been vaguely on the scene, but Brenda had kept him at arm’s-length, she simply didn’t have the mental energy for any kind of relationship with anything other than comedy. As the grey, graffitied walls slid past, Brenda thought of all the help and advice Rossly had given her since they met the previous October – so unexpected, and the sweeter for it.

The drinks trolley had begun its progress through the train, and though Brenda would have loved a G&T, she knew her wallet couldn’t support it and bought a lemonade and a packet of nuts instead that would have to do for lunch. She was too wound up to eat properly anyway, and hadn’t had a real meal for nearly a week. July had been her final month of having enough money to cover her bills and she had formulated a plan for the short term at least. At the last minute, on July 31st, she had withdrawn the final £200 which would keep body and soul together in cash terms for the month of August, even as her bills went unpaid one by one. Texts from her dad asking if she was OK were answered positively, regardless of the situation and she knew there was no point worrying him – the money he had given her was all he had to offer. She was totally on her own now. She could sell her car when she got back if she really didn’t have anything to eat but she couldn’t imagine getting more than a hundred quid for it. In twenty-four hours from now, her direct debits would start defaulting in turn and she effectively no longer had a bank account. After August, she would have to start looking for somewhere new to live as her current flat was completely unaffordable. She was literally living on her wits from now on.

As to more pressing matters of accommodation, Fenella had saved her arse. She and, somewhat terrifyingly, Josephine were sharing a place for the whole Festival with a couple of other comedians that Fenella had stayed with before. So she knew from previous years that the flat they had booked had a small cupboard in the hall and when cleared of the various things stored inside it would just about house a single mattress with a single person on it. Brenda was to stay in it free of charge and this would be her Edinburgh home for the week she intended to spend there. She was incredibly grateful. Rossly had offered to share his flat, his
bed
, with her for nothing but she had known immediately that this would be a terrible idea. She had to be a comedian at the Edinburgh Festival this year and a comedian only. Definitely not a girlfriend on any level, however informal and ‘free’ the arrangement might be.

As England raced by, whole counties breezing past, high clouds making shadows on the golden fields, Brenda thought back to the shimmering elation she had felt during and after the semi-final gig. But it had eluded her since that night. If she could recreate that for the final there would be no stopping her. Even if she never found it again she understood she would spend her life trying – anyone who ever experienced it would feel the same. There was no going back now. Even if she didn’t win the competition she knew this was her for life. This was what she would do, this was what she would try to be successful at. The money was secondary. If she lost the final and had to get a job in September, so be it. She would still gig. She’d be knackered and have no time for anything else, but it would be worth it. Comedy had become Brenda – she couldn’t imagine a Brenda Monk without it.

Brenda’s reverie was broken by the buzz of her phone announcing an email. Laura, wanting to tell her that she and Susie had been seeing a counsellor and as a result had booked a weekend in Barcelona, a city Susie had always longed to see.

‘It’s going OK, for now I think. I’m trying to deal with new things and Susie seems better. More patient at least. Who knows what will happen. Relationships are hard, but we’ve made some progress. Good luck in Ed. See you when you get back? Lx ps what’s going on with Pete?!’

Brenda felt instant relief, though she knew it was selfishly motivated as she had been scared of taking time away from gigging to go down and be with Laura in the event of a break up. She would have gone, of that there was no question, but the prospect of being away from the comedy clubs had given her vivid nightmares about forgetting all her material and even her own name.

As for Pete, well, she hadn’t heard from him since the morning after that night in the hotel in Birmingham. It had been too painful to have even the most casual contact especially, it seemed, for him. He had driven her home and then driven away and that was that. Brenda’s night with Rossly had confused her more than anything and she wanted to back away from any romantic entanglements altogether – it all felt too much to confront. She wished she could combine the two men into one perfect being but it was a childish fantasy, so for now she would have neither. Brenda idly wondered what such a creature would be like – a long-haired, strong-backed paragon of goodness with a dirty mouth, an innate understanding of the comedy world and great taste in furniture. Perhaps he existed, but Brenda felt relieved she hadn’t encountered him yet, she’d never get anything done…

Brenda didn’t attempt to reach Pete at all, for she knew what would happen if she did. They would end up back in bed with nothing resolved and there was no way that would help anything. She knew he knew it too, and she knew that was why he did not attempt to reach her either. And though she missed him, sometimes with a hard painful aching, she couldn’t mess him around again – he was too good for that. He was an occasional daydream now, a version of some other life. Simultaneous to this, she felt excited to be in Edinburgh at the same time as Rossly, free and single, and able to stay up all night doing whatever with whomever she chose. And if that person was Rossly, then that was no problem at all. But she was mostly – no not mostly, wholly, yes, wholly here for the comedy and she kept this at the front of her mind. It was too important to fuck it up now over something, or someone, stupid.

Walking once again up the wide, tarmacked slope that led out of the station and into the fickle Edinburgh sunshine, the smell of yeast filled her nostrils and she felt excited. She looked down at her phone and found the email from Fenella with the address of her accommodation. It was on a street she was familiar with that ran behind George Square and she set off on the twenty minute walk feeling springy and invincible. All this couldn’t quite remove one worry though, and that was the prospect of sharing a house with Josephine for a week. Fenella had assured her that it was water under the bridge. Perhaps Josephine had genuinely forgiven her. Perhaps she could simply manage to avoid her for the whole week.

Brenda found the building she was looking for, and pressed the button that was adjacent to the name of the unknown Edinburgh resident who had let their flat and fled the city for the month of August.

Fenella answered.

‘Yes?’

‘It’s Brenda.’

‘Oh yes it fucking well is. Come on up. Fourth floor, lots of stairs.’

The door buzzed, the catch released and Brenda pushed it open. Inside was a dark concrete staircase with a dour front door on every floor that gave no indication of the luxury that lay behind each one. Brenda reached the fourth floor and was panting. She made a resolve to get fitter, though she knew she wouldn’t carry it out.

Fenella was waiting for her.

‘I’ll have thighs like fucking nut crackers by the end of the month,’ she shouted gleefully and hugged Brenda tight. ‘Good to see you. Come on, I’ll show you your cupboard.’

Six feet along the wall from the entrance was a door in the wall, and when Brenda opened it there was a narrow space with an inflatable single mattress on it and a pillow, purchased by Fenella. Brenda had brought a sleeping bag but nothing else would fit in her bag and she had resigned herself to the prospect of sleeping on a hard floor.

‘You can pay me back when you’re famous,’ Fenella said.

Brenda felt overwhelmed with gratitude.

‘The rest of the flat’s fucking marvellous, if that’s any consolation. You’ll only be sleeping in here and you’ll have your eyes closed then…’

Brenda threw her bag into the cupboard, secretly delighted to have her own space at all, and allowed Fenella to show her round. It was one of those beautiful Edinburgh flats – big airy rooms, wooden floors, huge windows and a generous kitchen with a dining table for six in it. This was how you lived up here when you were selling out night after night, Brenda thought to herself, glancing with renewed admiration at Fenella. She wanted this, she wanted this for herself. It was a sign of success, of hard graft paying off, and even to share a tiny part of it was a thrill.

Fenella seemed full of the joys of the Festival and as last year’s Award winner the pressure was off and she could simply enjoy performing her new hour-long show, status assured and unassailable. It was a good thing Jonathan had kept his word and not come this year – the sight of Queen Fenella the First striding around her city might have finally forced him to break his cool in public, something he took great care never to do.

Fenella was in the kitchen when Brenda came out of the bathroom, having washed her face and cleaned her teeth.

‘So, I thought we could see Rossly’s show and then head out after that?’

‘No, no way. I can’t do that. I can’t.’

‘Oh come on, it’ll take your mind off it.’

‘Not even the second the coming of Jesus Christ could take my mind off it, Fenella. No. I’m staying in. Trust me, I will be in full effect after it’s done. I’m here for a week.’

Brenda had made a promise to herself that she would not turn up to the final tired, hungover or generally off her game. and Fenella could see the sense in it so she left Brenda in the enormous living room – the living room of someone with an income so far in excess of most of the flat’s current occupants that it felt a little cruel – and went out into the free-radical charged Edinburgh night.

Brenda sat with her notebooks, a bottle of wine and a delivery of Indian food from a place she had found on a menu in a drawer, and tried to assemble her set for the following night. She knew where the tentpoles were – the jokes that would support the whole structure, the jokes she could rely on to get a laugh at regular intervals. So she placed those in a running order first, spaced down the page with gaps to be filled in with personal favourites and other material that wasn’t necessarily hysterically funny but leant shape and flow to the whole thing. She scribbled between the words in capital letters – ‘
Catholic; Kids; Wanking; Nancy; Shrek; Austen; Pope; Hole
’ – and this unintelligible scrawl was as important as the tentpoles. New comedians often made the mistake of excluding them, worried that they should be maximising laughs at all times. But Brenda had learnt the value of giving tiny rests to the audience – just the odd reflection or observation or linking sentence that wouldn’t crack everyone up, but would inform the next joke, making it funnier and more satisfying somehow. It took a bit of nerve and some experience to include these moments, but Brenda knew it made the difference.

Brenda was packing it all up around half past midnight, when the front door slammed. A moment later Josephine was before her.

Brenda froze, as if caught in the act of something awful, though she was doing nothing wrong. Josephine stood very still in the doorway.

‘Fenella said I could stay—’

‘Yeah, I know,’ Josephine said, cutting her off. Brenda nodded, not knowing what to say and certainly not wanting to say the wrong thing. She would like to live to see the final, whatever happened.

‘The joke’s working well.’

Brenda was baffled for a moment and then realised she meant the Terrible Mess gag.

‘Good, I’m glad to hear it.’

‘Maybe we can hang out a bit.’

‘Yeah, maybe.’

‘Well, good night then.’

‘Night.’

Josephine hovered for a moment.

Brenda looked back at her notebook, trying to smooth the awkwardness.

‘I’m glad you dumped him,’ Josephine said quietly.

‘I don’t know if I dumped him exactly – he just wandered off and I didn’t bother to follow…’

‘Yeah, well, as good as. Have you heard what he’s doing?’

‘Yeah.’

‘I Googled it.’

‘Me too.’

‘That costume…’

And suddenly Josephine was silently laughing.

‘The beret?’

‘Yeah.’

Brenda felt herself start to dissolve too.

‘What the hell was that?’

‘Some storyline about him pretending to be French so he could fuck a dumb American.’

They were both now laughing, eyes watering, wheezing and shuddering.