Taffy was picked up by her bridesmaids—three giggling clown girls who spoke in such high-pitched voices that Jojo had to deal with a piercing headache for an hour after they left. Jojo and his wife took a separate car. They didn’t speak for most of the way there. It was almost like she knew there was something she should be mad at him for, she just didn’t know what it was yet.
Once the silence got to Jojo, he asked, “So where they going on the honeymoon?”
“The Bahamas.”
“What? Why?”
“That’s where Taffy wanted to go,” Gianna replied, while trying to get a wine stain out of her fluffy polka-dot dress.
“With all that sun? You know what that’ll do to her clown complexion? She’ll come back looking like a jack-o’-lantern.”
Gianna shrugged. “That’s what I said, but does she ever listen to me?”
“She should’ve gone to Vegas like a normal clown. My cousin Dinko could’ve set them up with a nice penthouse suite.” He snickered and shook his head. “The Bahamas? What an idiot…”
Gianna rolled her eyes at her husband. “Your daughter’s getting married today. Quit criticizing her decisions and just try to be happy for her for a change.”
Jojo wondered where the queen of criticism got the nerve telling him that.
When they got to the church, they saw that the circus tent was already set up for the reception. Earl Berryman and his crew of animal trainers were tending to the caged elephants and horses. The neighborhood clown children were gathered in the lot, pointing at the elephants and trying to feed them peanuts through the bars. There were hundreds of wedding balloons hovering over the tent, ready to be released at the end of the ceremony.
It was still a couple of hours before the ceremony so only the ushers and wedding party were there. Among the groomsmen was Vinnie Blue Nose, someone Jojo had to avoid. Jimmy had to have already told the clown everything about what went down at Pepper’s apartment. The last thing Jojo needed was to be confronted about it by that cocky prick.
Once they got inside the church, Jojo split from his wife and ducked into the men’s room. He had a whole minute of solitude until Reverend Jellybottom came in, slapping across the tiles with his floppy dress shoes. The big-bottomed clown went to the urinal next to him and stared him in the eyes as he relieved himself.
“It’s going to be a fine wedding, Brother Bozo. A fine wedding.”
Jojo couldn’t urinate with the clown staring at him, so he just stood there with his fly open as the reverend started a conversation.
“There’s nothing I like more than a clown wedding.”
Jojo didn’t know what else to say to the large clown, so he said, “Thanks for getting the choir together for this.”
Jellybottom smiled wide. “My pleasure, Brother Bozo. My pleasure.”
Jojo gave up on trying to urinate, zipped up his fly, and went to wash his hands. Before he could escape, the preacher stopped him.
“Hey, you were at my performance I gave over the summer, weren’t you? The one where Bobby Goldstein performed?”
Jojo couldn’t forget. The event was a disaster. “Yeah, I was there.”
The reverend zipped up his fly and turned to him, just staring for a minute, as if waiting for compliments.
“Well, what did you think?” the reverend asked. “Of my act, I mean.”
“Umm…” He’d hated every second of it, but didn’t want to hurt the guy’s feelings before performing the ceremony. “It was fine.”
Jojo tried to turn to leave, but the reverend grabbed him by the shoulder.
“So I was wondering if maybe you can help me out a little. I had this idea for making some comedy recordings called The Jokes of Jellybottom. I got the recording studio, the money for producing them, but I need distribution. That’s where you come in.”
The reverend just stared at him for a moment, waiting for an impressed look to cross Jojo’s face.
When he didn’t respond, the reverend asked, “So what do you say? Think we can go into business together?”
Jojo didn’t want to be having this discussion right now. He tried to make his expressions obvious to the preacher, but Jellybottom wasn’t picking up on it.
“Well, you know that’s illegal, don’t you, Reverend?” Jojo asked. “You sure you want to go down that path?”
Jellybottom laughed. “Ah, what’s the harm in spreading a little of the gift of laughter? Nothing in the Bible says comedy’s a sin.”
“Nothing in the Bible says that selling narcotics is a sin, either, but you don’t want to get caught doing something like that. Comedy’s a serious offense in this country these days.”
Jellybottom laughed. “Yeah, but when you got a gift like mine it’s a sin not to use it.”
Jojo couldn’t take it anymore. The big-bottomed clown was getting under his skin.
“Look, we’ll talk about it another time. It’s my daughter’s wedding. I’m not interested in doing business on my daughter’s wedding day.”
“Of course, of course…”
The reverend winked at him. Jojo had no idea what the wink was all about.
Jojo thought he was finally able to break free of the conversation when the reverend said something that killed Jojo’s patience.
“One last thing, do you think it would be okay if I told a few jokes during the ceremony? I got a few goods ones I just came up with.”
Then something snapped in Jojo. He couldn’t control himself.
The reverend continued, “I believe a ceremony should have a good balance of entertainment and inspiration. If I told a few of my hilarious humdingers—”
Jojo grabbed the preacher by the neck, shoved him against the wall, and yelled in his face, “If you even think about telling one of your shitty, idiotic jokes at my daughter’s wedding, I’ll shove your head so far up your fat ass…”
Then he realized what he was doing and let the reverend go.
“No problem.” Jellybottom nearly wet himself. “I don’t need to tell any jokes.”
“Reverend, wait…,” Jojo said, trying to apologize for his outburst.
The stress must’ve gotten to him. He didn’t know what he was doing.
The reverend ran for the door in tears. “I’ll never tell any jokes ever again!”
“I’m sorry,” Jojo said, but the reverend was already gone.
He washed his face and pressed his head against the mirror.
“You got to get ahold of yourself, jackass…”
He hoped he hadn’t upset the reverend too much. The last thing he wanted was to mess up the ceremony.
He looked up and saw his reflection shaking his head at him.
“Don’t you even start,” he said to the mirror.