prompt: mint, title: nothing up his sleeve in "the next big thing" flash fiction

“About your coworker who busks as Elvis?” I asked, to change our subject from myself and my bottomless personal failings. “My friend Tony.” Frank corrected knowingly, “What about him?”

“Did you ever hear of the stand-up Andy Kaufman?” “Yeah,” he forked at salad greens, “I loved Taxi. Theme song reminded me of the hymns to peaceful twilights back home, quiet hours when if you are awake, you’re alone.” He shoveled questionable iceberg-lettuce into his face. “Why?”

“I mean,” I walked eggshells, “Kaufman had a comic persona he shared called Tony Clifton. He did one of the few genuinely-flattering Elvis impressions, I guess Presley himself appreciated it. There were ten thousand rumors that, hell, both Kaufman and Elvis faked their deaths, either to escape the horrors of super-stardom or to mint the greatest prank in the annals of crankery.”

“So?” Frank chewed thoughtfully. “So, you never put it all together?” He finished his mouthful and swallowed before he smiled a little. “Course I did. The idea has crossed my mind. But why would it matter?” “Why would,” I reigned my incredulousness in, down to conspiratorial tones, “why would that matter? The most elaborate long-con hoax in arts history, hiding in plain sight, under the grotesque shadows of the Louis Vuitton shop in The Hollywood and Highland Mall?”

“I mean, aren’t you curious?”

“What matters,” Frank said softly, “is who Tony is to me. How I know him, how I actually know him. As one of the few co-workers I’ve had on The Walk I can genuinely call my friend. A weird insightful old man I can talk to about being vegetarian or dealing with the rudest of tourist rubes. If he was Andy. If he was Bob Zmuda,” “Warren Zivotofsky.” I could not help but interject. “Or Elvis himself,” Frank continued, “the names mean nothing to me. Tony’s who I actually know.”

“That’s all that matters.”

“It’s not failure that breaks people’s hearts allowing them to see through The Curse, Mike. Gods know, there’s ten million repeat failures floating around this town, blind to the magic. It’s facing down how you can’t know your culture’s heroes until you actually know them as people. What’s the buzz-words? Parasocial Relationship? When you find out that you can never know a person through press releases. Never.” “That moguls and mega-stars can be rapists and frauds.” I softly agreed. “Or somehow worse yet,” he stared me straight in my eyes, no fork or mug to shield me, “just frail, fickle damaged folks like everyone else, caught in the lotus-eater vortex built to drive all but the strongest minds starkraving goddamn mad. Like you, it could have happened to you.”

“It could’ve.” I have no idea if I said it with relief or with regret. I still don’t know what I meant, even as I type this now. “Tony’s Tony and he’s my friend,” Frank concluded, “which is so much more important than if he used to be famous. Least, that’s how it is for me.”