Death by Pantyhose Read Free Page B

hunch his name wasn't really Dave.
Mainly because the butterball lady kept pointing to his baklava and shrieking, "Watch out,
Vladimir! Crumbs in the keyboard! Crumbs in
the keyboard!"
     
    Crazy Dave AKA Vladimir led me outside. The
place bore an uncanny resemblance to a parking
lot in downtown Kabul. Not that I've ever actually been to downtown Kabul. I'm just guessing.
    After looking at the wrecks-I-mean, previously owned vehicles-in my price range, I finally settled on a decrepit VW Beetle so old I
almost expected it to have a "Hitler for Fuhrer"
bumper sticker.
    It was a stick shift and it had been years since
I'd driven a shift, but I figured it would all come
rushing back to me in no time. True, the car was
painted a bilious green, and the fenders looked
like they'd just lost a battle with an angry SUV.
But Crazy Dave assured me my little VW would
purr like a kitten.
    Yeah, right. A kitten with asthma. Huge plumes
of exhaust billowed out from the car the minute
I turned on the ignition.
    The less said about the ride home, the better.
Sad to say, the art of driving a shift did not come
rushing back to me. I popped the clutch and
ground the gears the whole way home, bucking
and lurching like a drunk on a mechanical bull.
    When I finally shuddered to a stop in front of
my apartment, I discovered that the locks were
broken. Oh, well. Not a problem.
    Nobody in their right mind was going to steal
this clunker.
     

Chapter 4
    -Irozac!" I wailed as I walked in the front
door. "A horrible man stole my Corolla
and stuck me with a lunch bill for two steak
sandwiches and a tiramisu."
    Her eyes wide with concern, the little darling
leapt off the pile of freshly washed laundry
she'd been napping on and came bounding to
my side, rubbing my ankles in that comforting
way she has when I'm down in the dumps.
    Okay, she didn't move a muscle. She just
yawned a yawn the size of the Grand Canyon
and shot me a look that said, Steak sandwiches,
eh? Any leftovers?
    What can I say? Lassie, she's not.
    I would've killed for a glass of chardonnay
and/or a box of Oreos to calm my frazzled
nerves, but I showed remarkable restraint and
got down to the business at hand. (Mainly because I was all out of chardonnay and Oreos.)
    I simply had to line up a job. I called my
steady clients, but nobody had any work for me. I called my former clients (even the crazymakers
I'd vowed I'd never work for again) and suffered
through a series of dispiriting rejections. When
my ear was numb from all those phone calls, I
answered some online ads for jobs I knew I'd
never get.
     
    Exhausted, I plopped down on the sofa, trying
to think of what else I could do. And then I remembered the nutcase who'd called me earlier
that morning. The pantyhose-tossing comic. The
last thing I wanted to do was write jokes for a
woman whose punch line was a pair of underwear, but I had no choice. I was a desperado. I retrieved her number from my answering machine,
then took a deep breath and made the call.
    She picked up on the first ring. Why did I get
the feeling this was a woman hovering over her
phone, happy to hear from anyone, even a telemarketer?
    "Dorcas MacKenzie," an eager voice came on
the line. "Funnywoman Extraordinaire."
    Not exactly Little Miss Modesty, was she?
    "Hi," I said, trying to inject some enthusiasm
into my voice. "This is Jaine Austen, returning
your call."
    "Oh, right! I'm so glad you called. Like I said
on my message, I have an absolutely hysterical
comedy act; it just needs to be tweaked here and
there. Have you had any experience writing
comedy?"
    "Yes. In fact, I've had some sitcom experience.
    Which was no lie. Some time back, I'd written
a script for a sitcom that unfortunately never
saw the light of day, due to a murder that took place during the taping of my show. It was a
thrill-packed chapter in my life that should
have taught me that working in show biz can
be dangerous to your