Day 5 - Only Laugh - Chapter 5 (1,319 words)

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ONLY LAUGH WHEN IT HURTS

By Wayne Webb

CHAPTER 5

“You've gone viral.”

Three little words everyone trying to get attention wants to hear. Tony is thrilled by them, engaged and aroused by them.

Viral.

Where numbers mean everything the more meaningless they become. The official video of him from the comedy club had been uploaded while he was unconscious and viewed a few thousand times by people in the city, but then it hit the news and was picked up by international feeds. Something in it clicked with people, and then it was officially viral.

It was easy to conceive of a few thousand hits, easy to see that's spreading to the telling of friends and word of mouth.

Millions, how is it that Millions of people watched me?

By the time he woke up he was making money. His video had been watched, commented on, remixed and mashed up and redistributed. The original, which included a zoomed in close up in high definition of the spreading wound in his side, was the key and the biggest hit. It was monetized and picking up thousands of dollars in revenue.

His manager had let it slip to the press that Tony was in a coma, and then even more people wanted to see the comic “dying on stage”. A small number of tribute videos appeared and people who had been in the audience were making replies and commentary tracks from their perspective and adding to the legend.

“Viral.” Tony was shaking his head and smiling.

The restraints were indeed gone when he was awake, but when he slept they put them back on as he was injuring himself in his sleep. Exactly why this was nobody knew, not even Tony himself. When he was asleep he was as good as dead, out completely with no recollection of his dreams or thoughts, just a black wall that rose up when he woke. His arms and legs were thrashing about in his sleep and grasping at his side and this tore at the wound. The restraints were there to help him heal in the night, his body fought them constantly.

Jane was worried about him naturally and was trying to play down the success of the video and his 'act' when she could, but she was a lone voice in the room and no one was listening to her at all. There was a certain cache in dating a truly famous person and she too was getting attention now which she did like to an extent, but still beyond that her thoughts turned darker. She worried about Tony's state of mind, if he was hurting himself in his sleep, and hurting himself in his waking hours was making him money then would he ever heal? Would he ever want to? She could not bring herself to ask him the questions. What if those questions, which so far no one had asked, were only in her head? Would she want to put them into Tony's? She felt bad that pain and blood were making him a new person, could she in all conscience hand him the reins to make it worse.

So she said nothing and gently tried to steer the conversation away from what opportunity they took next and tried to proffer time to heal as a good next step.

“You are at 5 million and rising, and it's been less than two weeks since you popped your stitches on stage.” His agent was flicking through pages of offers and data that was being supplied to him faster than he could manage.

While Tony was out and the video was uploaded, the attention started pouring in. He and the club manager agreed on terms for the video advertising and a share of profits, most of which went to Tony, but they could both see the future in it for them if they got in at the ground level. Bookings at the comedy club were bigger than ever, rivalling the nights during the comedy festival events. The spot on the stage where Tony had dripped blood down had been painted in red, a few splashed dots more permanently etched on the stage. Comics would stand by it, reference it in their acts and make jokes about it. When he woke up he had gone from the comic dying on stage to the comic who wouldn't die.

Reality had little to do with perception.

A number of offers were instantaneously rejected, movie deals and exploitation projects. Things that would have gotten them all a certain amount of money immediately but could have easily killed the edge appeal and diluted the alternative brand of the bleeding comic. Interviews with big news magazine programs came with some money as they competed to be the first to “get” the comic. They were all turned down by Tony, despite the urging of his agent.

There were two very good reasons for this in his mind.

Firstly he wanted to get back on stage, perform and hear the laughs. A serious interview would not help in that, it may even raise his sympathy and empathy levels, neither of which would help people laugh. Understanding a joke and how it's made can be the death of it. Especially when the ending is a surprise.

Secondly and much more importantly, he had no idea what to say. He could not tell anyone why this was happening or why people were attracted to this bizarre and yet funny act of a man in pain and bleeding while telling jokes. He was as clueless as the world was and the idea of shrugging his shoulders to the tens of millions worldwide would be as pointless a thing as he could do. Better to leave some mystery even if there was none to be found.

So people had started filling in their own versions of the meaning behind it all. Pundits and commentators were alternately praising the shock comedy and the raw truth of it, and then the other side were disgusted and appalled by humanity's fixation on the pain of others.

Schadenfreude was the word being attached to him now, joy in the pain of others. Not quite the right definition but once again the reality and the perception were not always great bedfellows when it came to the public at large.

When Tony was alone though, sitting in the few minutes a day with no one else around he'd go to the bathroom and pick at the scab in his side. Slow the process and weaken the wound. His assistant John, hired in the heat of attention and money and offers, would enable his behaviour and keep his secrets. He brought a very small but very sharp knife and keep it in his briefcase, Tony would use it to slice at a stitch and to slowly make an incision in the wound. Only a millimetre or less and never in the same place, but enough to keep the wound alive.

The doctor suspected but said nothing. He was not healing and the jagged tears were mysteriously getting longer. A small incision followed by some lateral twisting in the privacy of the bathroom and then the wound, constantly being cleaned and redressed to avoid infection would stay.

He didn't think much about it at all.

He needed it for a short while, not forever, but for a short while. He had the worlds attention now, and they would see him for who he was, see past the wound and the blood and the pain. He just need them to look at him a little longer, get used to the person, the attitude and the act. Then the detail, the hook and the reasons would change. That’s how fame worked, famous for one thing fades very quickly, but famous for more than they think you are capable of?

That's a star being born.

I need to get back on stage.