What is it that I can do to make this young woman laugh? Hell, what is it I can do just to make her relax enough to uncross her arms?
She sat there staring at me. It felt like an eternity up there, trotting out 4 minutes of material about my mother. It wasn’t the best, but it had worked before. A few laughs here and there, enough to revise it, throw some parts out, try to add some in.
But it wasn’t working. Not on Rhiamon (not her real name but it fits). Whatever I had done to somehow suck out every single bit of bile from her and none of the laughter? That was working. It’s not what I wanted, but it was what I was going to get.