Oliver's diary

19Sep

Pryce Asked Who I Was

The hotpot's in the fridge. I haven't opened it. I keep opening the door and looking at the Tupperware like it's about to do something. She made it Friday morni…

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18Sep

The Title Sticks Now

The man at the bottom of the stairs had the same shape as the canal-path one and I knew before he opened his mouth. Something about how he stood. Waited. The ki…

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17Sep

The tweet outlasts the joke

Forty thousand people I will never meet now have a still of my face doing the bit about the worst minute of my life. Pryce's mate called it a bravery arc. A bra…

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16Sep

What the bit cost

The phone stayed face down all day. I'm proud of that and also I'm a coward. Imogen from Soho Theatre. I keep saying her name in my head to see if it sounds rea…

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15Sep

Tuesday, before Pryce

The panic attack page landed. I said the words out loud in the back room of a pub near Old Street and the room didn't go polite. Someone near the back said fuck…

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14Sep

Dev read the page

Dev read the page. That's the bit I'll keep picking at. The Moleskine flew out of my back pocket on the landing at the top of the stairs, and it landed open to…

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13Sep

mum knows now, somehow

Fi told her. That's the sentence that's been sitting behind my ribs since about eleven this morning. I phoned my sister and said you weren't supposed to, and sh…

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12Sep

The red light stayed on

The thing I keep seeing is the red light. Not the man's face, not what he did with the phone after. Just the dot, steady, pointed at me from the second row like…

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11Sep

the spines heard it first

I closed the back room door at Cecil Court at half twelve and told the bookshop it was lunch. I sat on the carpet between the poetry and the cookery and I wrote…

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10Sep

lean personal

Lean personal. Helen's email has been sitting in me since seven this morning, two sentences, the second one four words, and I keep turning it over like a coin I…

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9Sep

The clip has legs

The clip has legs. That's the thing I keep turning over. Millions of people, fine, whatever, but a bloke in a big jacket on a towpath knows my face. He smelled…

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8Sep

The wave held without me

The kettle line landed. I felt it leave my mouth, and by the time the wave came back I had already moved on to the next bit, as if I had trained myself out of b…

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7Sep

Cold Open, Small Room

I can hold a room, then somebody better at rooms walks in and turns mine into a cupboard. Marcus Pryce barely said anything. One sentence about the Radox bit, a…

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6Sep

Lights off, notebook open

Mum phoned yesterday. She's been asked to chair the Stretford luncheon club entertainment subcommittee and now she wants to book me for the Christmas slot. My m…

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5Sep

OLIVER BREMN has a fan

A seven-year-old in a yellow coat walked into the shop and handed me a flyer for her cat's birthday party. Crayon stars. A cat in a party hat. My name misspelle…

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4Sep

The Grip, The Pint

The neck thing. That's what I keep coming back to. Pryce crossed the room, hand out like he was going for the shoulder, and then it wasn't the shoulder — it was…

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3Sep

Six flyers in Stretford

Tom Hardman. Two inches taller, or maybe I shrunk. Manchester Uni halls — so he did the version of life I was supposed to do, the one where you go and you pass…

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2Sep

gaffer on the chin

I had gaffer tape on my chin. The whole five minutes. The Northern line bit, the callback I'd workshopped, the polite laugh I'd been hoping for — all delivered…

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1Sep

Bravest, right.

Marcus Pryce put it up at ten in the morning and I read it four times before I put the phone face-down on the duvet. Bravest thing I've seen this year. Tagged t…

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31Aug

The chest didn't do the thing

The mum bit held. I need to say that first because it's the only sentence I've been able to write since I walked out of the venue. Not hit — held. There's a dif…

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30Aug

The costume is off

The costume is off. That's the thing she took — not the secret, the suit. The panic in Leeds, the way my chest folds before I walk on. That was mine to carry. N…

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29Aug

The Car Park Lad

The flyer wouldn't come off clean. I knew it before I pulled — that tape had been up there since the first preview and it decided to take part of me with it. Th…

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28Aug

The Frog and Bucket boy

She said it twice and I still don't know which one I needed more. Pryce had his arm round my shoulder calling me the real thing while mum stood two feet away in…

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27Aug

The hoodie stays

She was in my hoodie tonight and I said the words about my mum out loud for the first time. The real ones. The ones I've been carrying around like contraband, t…

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26Aug

I Booked Her In

I hate that the tear went into the steak jus. It makes the whole thing feel embarrassingly literal, like my body finally got bored of waiting for me to say the…

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25Aug

The room saw it first

The room saw it before I did. Halfway through the Leeds middle and my brain just leaves. Like someone pulled a plug. I stand there, mic in hand, eyes wide, and…

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24Aug

Mum read it twice

Mum read it twice. That's the one I keep circling. Not the podcast, not the anonymous quote — mum read the sentence twice at breakfast and asked if it was about…

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23Aug

Hands in the cold air

Holborn's done it. He's told the room what I told the mirror and the curtain and three years of pretending I don't shake before doors. Watch his hands. Three wo…

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22Aug

before she finished the sentence

I said yes before Sandra finished the sentence. Three weeks ago she moved me to six o'clock and I sat in the courtyard pretending to be on a call so nobody woul…

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21Aug

We're walking, apparently

The woman in the café called me "the Pleasance lad." Not my name, the bit's name. And her daughter loved the car park thing. I sat there with my tea going cold…

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