Part 1

The rain on Sunset Boulevard has a way of washing away the glitter, leaving behind only the grime and the grey. My name is Steve, and if you’re reading this, I’m likely already gone. Or maybe, I’m just one of the shadows now, lingering near the corner of the old Comedy Store, watching the world spin on without me.

It’s 1979. I’m standing on the roof of the Continental Hyatt House hotel, fourteen stories above the street. The wind up here is colder than you’d expect for Los Angeles. It cuts right through my jacket, the one I’ve been wearing since I got back from the jungle. Down below, the cars look like toys, and the people are just ants scurrying toward the next party, the next drink, the next distraction. They don’t look up. No one ever looks up until it’s too late.

I wasn’t always this ghost on a ledge. Before the silence took over, I had a voice. I had a purpose. I was a soldier, proud and strong, serving a country I thought would always have my back. But Hollywood is a lot like a war zone; it chews you up and spits you out, and it doesn’t care about your rank or your ribbons once the show is over.

When I came back to the States, I thought the hard part was over. I thought I’d trade the sound of mortars for applause, or at least a handshake. I tried to make a life here. I tried to find work, to laugh, to be part of the “scene.” But the noise in my head… it drowns out the punchlines. The society I fought for started to feel like a private club I was blackballed from.

We went on “strike,” didn’t we? Not just the comedians down the street demanding fair pay, but us veterans. We went on a silent strike against a system that forgot us. We stood in line at the VA, we applied for jobs that never called back, and we screamed in empty rooms. I watched guys like me—talented, brave men—get turned away at the door of the American Dream. They told us we were too damaged, too intense, too much of a liability.

So here I am. Despondent. Broke. Tired of fighting a war that ended years ago for everyone else but never ended for me. The letter in my pocket is short. It doesn’t explain the nightmares or the shivering cold of the jungle. It just says, “My name is Steve. I used to serve here.” It’s my resignation letter from a world that fired me without cause.

My heart is pounding, not out of fear, but out of a strange, twisted relief. I look down at the parking lot next door. It’s empty right now. A blank canvas. I wonder if my landing will finally make a sound loud enough for them to hear. I wonder if, after the impact, I’ll finally be able to sleep without seeing the faces of the men I lost.

Part 2

The silence of the jungle and the noise of the comedy club weren’t all that different. They were both chaotic, unpredictable, and you never knew when you were going to die—either literally, or on stage.

I came back from the war in ’72. They gave me a medal, a pat on the back, and a one-way ticket to a country that didn’t know what to do with me. I didn’t know what to do with myself, either. The adrenaline was still pumping through my veins, a restless energy that kept my hands shaking and my eyes darting to the exits. I found my way to Los Angeles, drawn like a moth to the neon flame of the Sunset Strip. I thought, maybe if I could make people laugh, I could stop the screaming in my own head.

I found a home at the Comedy Store. It was the old Ciro’s nightclub, a place that smelled of stale beer, cigarettes, and desperation. It was perfect. We were a platoon of misfits there. Guys like me, broken in different ways, trying to turn our trauma into punchlines. We weren’t getting paid—not really. We were working for “exposure,” that mythical currency that landlords don’t accept. But we had a brotherhood. We sat in the back of the room, critiquing sets, sharing cheap whiskey, and pretending we were going to be stars.

For a while, it worked. The stage was my new battlefield. I’d go up there, grab the mic like a weapon, and fire off jokes about the absurdity of life, the government, the war. When the audience laughed, it was a release, a temporary cease-fire in the war raging inside my skull. I felt seen. I felt useful.

But then, the atmosphere changed. The management—let’s call them “The Brass”—started tightening the screws. The club was making money hand over fist. The lines wrapped around the block. Tourists from Iowa and businessmen from New York were paying top dollar to see us bleed on stage. But we were still starving. I was living in a shoebox apartment that smelled of mildew, eating canned beans, while the owners drove luxury cars and wore diamonds.

It started as a whisper in the locker room, then a rumble in the parking lot. A strike. We were going to organize. We were going to demand to be paid for our labor. It felt righteous. It felt like the missions we ran overseas—us against the world, fighting for our survival. I was all in. I had been trained to hold the line, to never leave a man behind. I thought this was just another tour of duty.

We picketed outside the club on Sunset. I marched with my sign, chanting, feeling that surge of camaraderie I hadn’t felt since my unit disbanded. “No Pay, No Jokes!” we shouted. Cars honked. People stared. For a moment, I felt powerful. I wasn’t just Steve the struggling vet; I was Steve the revolutionary.

But Hollywood isn’t the military. In the military, there’s a code. In Hollywood, there are only sharks. The strike dragged on. The unity began to fracture. Some guys crossed the picket line, desperate for stage time. The owners played dirty. They didn’t just ignore us; they declared war. And I, being one of the loudest voices, being the guy who didn’t know how to back down because I’d been trained to push forward until the objective was secured—I became a target.

When the strike finally ended, there was a settlement. A compromise. But not for everyone. The leaders, the instigators, the “troublemakers”—we were marked. I walked up to the club the night they reopened, my notebook full of new material, my heart ready to get back to work.

The bouncer, a guy I used to share cigarettes with, wouldn’t look me in the eye. He put a heavy hand on my chest.

“Not you, Steve,” he mumbled, looking at the pavement. “What do you mean, not me?” I asked, a cold dread settling in my stomach. “You’re out, man. Banned. Management says you’re never going up on that stage again.”

I stood there on the sidewalk, the neon lights of the Comedy Store reflecting in the puddles. Banned. Blackballed. Exiled. It wasn’t just a job loss. It was an eviction from my family. The only place where I made sense, the only place where the war didn’t hurt, was gone.

I tried to fight it. I called people. I begged. I yelled. But the doors were locked. The phone lines were dead. I watched from the shadows across the street as new guys—kids who had never seen a jungle, never held a dying friend—walked into my club, took my time slot, and lived my life.

The rejection festered. It mixed with the old PTSD, creating a toxic sludge in my brain. I stopped sleeping. The nightmares came back, vivid and violent. I’d wake up sweating, reaching for a rifle that wasn’t there. The city of Angels turned into a prison. I was a soldier without a war, a comedian without a mic, a man without a purpose.

I started walking the Strip at night, a ghost before I was even dead. I watched the glitter and the glam, the Ferraris and the furs, and I realized something terrifying: I didn’t exist to these people. I was just background noise. Static.

The hopelessness wasn’t a sudden wave; it was a rising tide. It started at my ankles and slowly moved up to my neck, choking me. I had survived mortar fire and ambushes, but I couldn’t survive the silence of an empty room and a ringing phone that no one would answer. The betrayal cut deeper than any shrapnel. I had fought for my country, and they ignored me. I had fought for my rights as a worker, and they erased me.

June 1st, 1979. The date is burned into what’s left of my consciousness. I woke up that morning and realized I was tired. Not the kind of tired a nap fixes. It was a soul-deep exhaustion. I looked around my apartment—the peeling paint, the stack of rejection letters, the uniform hanging in the closet like a costume for a play that closed years ago.

I sat down and wrote the note. I didn’t want to write a manifesto. I didn’t have the energy to explain the politics of the comedy strike or the geopolitics of the war. I just wanted them to know I was here. That I mattered.

“My name is Steve Lubeckin. I used to work at the Comedy Store.”

That was it. My identity. My rank. My serial number in this civilian world.

I put the pen down. I put on my jacket. I walked out the door, leaving it unlocked. I wouldn’t be coming back.

Part 3

The walk to the Continental Hyatt House was short, but it felt like the longest patrol of my life. The Sunset Strip was waking up, the twilight settling over the city like a bruise. I passed tourists laughing, couples holding hands, bums digging through trash cans. I felt an invisible barrier between me and them. They were in the world of the living; I was already transitioning.

I entered the hotel lobby. The air conditioning hit me, cold and sterile. It smelled of expensive perfume and floor wax. No one stopped me. Why would they? I looked like just another guy, maybe a roadie for a band, maybe a lost tourist. I blended in. That was the tragedy of my life—I was invisible when I wanted to be seen, and seen only when I was being punished.

I pressed the button for the elevator. The arrow lit up. Going up.

Inside the metal box, I watched the numbers climb. 1… 2… 5… 10… My ears popped. With every floor, the weight of the world below seemed to get heavier, pulling at my boots, begging me to stay. But the pull of the sky was stronger. The elevator dinged at the 14th floor. The doors slid open.

I found the access to the roof. It wasn’t hard. In those days, security was a joke. I stepped out into the evening air. The wind was fierce up here, whipping my hair, stinging my eyes. The noise of the city was distant, a low hum like a swarm of bees.

I walked to the edge.

My heart wasn’t racing. It was beating slow, steady, a funeral drum. I looked down. The Comedy Store was right there, directly below. I could see the parking lot where I used to smoke before sets. I could see the back door where we’d sneak in girls. I could see the ghost of my past self down there, laughing, hopeful, alive.

It wasn’t a decision made in panic. It was a tactical retreat. I had assessed the situation, evaluated the enemy (my own mind, the industry, the world), and realized the position was untenable. There was no reinforcement coming. No medevac. I was pinned down, and I was out of ammo.

I stood on the ledge. The city lights were blurring through the tears I didn’t know I was crying. I thought about my buddies in the platoon—the ones who didn’t make it back. I wondered if they were waiting for me. I thought about the jokes I never got to tell. I thought about the “Brass” inside the club, counting their money, drinking their champagne, oblivious to the soldier on the roof next door.

“You won’t let me on your stage?” I whispered to the wind. “Fine. Then I’ll make the parking lot my stage. I’ll make you look at me one last time.”

It was a protest. A final, desperate act of defiance. If I couldn’t be a star, I would be a scar. A scar on the face of the Sunset Strip that would never fully heal.

I closed my eyes. I took a deep breath, tasting the smog and the ocean salt. I let go of the railing. I let go of the anger. I let go of the pain.

I stepped forward.

The fall was fast. They say your life flashes before your eyes, but for me, it was just a rush of wind and a sudden clarity. For three seconds, I was flying. No strike. No war. No rejection. Just gravity, embracing me like an old friend.

The impact was sudden. Violent. Darkness.

But then… not darkness.

I was standing in the parking lot. I looked down. My body was there, broken, twisted. People were running out of the club. Screaming. Sirens wailed in the distance. I saw the bouncer, the one who banned me, running over, his face pale. I saw the comics coming out, shock registering in their eyes.

“Steve?” one of them whispered, looking at the broken form on the asphalt.

I tried to answer. “I’m here,” I said. “I’m right here.”

But no sound came out. They couldn’t hear me. They couldn’t see me standing right next to them. I was dead.

And yet, I was more awake than I had been in years.

I watched them cover my body. I watched the police take the note from my pocket. I watched the ambulance drive away. But I didn’t go with it. I couldn’t. I was tethered to this place. The Comedy Store wasn’t just a building; it was my unfinished business. It was my purgatory.

The lights of the club flickered. A cold wind swept through the parking lot, even though the air was still. I looked at the back door of the club. It was open.

“I used to work at the Comedy Store,” I thought.

And now, I realized with a grim smile, I was going to be the night shift manager. Forever.

Part 4

Death, it turns out, is just a different kind of waiting room.

The 80s rolled in with a wave of cocaine and excess. The Comedy Store became the center of the universe. Sam Kinison, Roseanne Barr, Robin Williams—they all came through. And I was there to welcome them.

I moved into the basement. It seemed fitting. That’s where the mobsters used to do their dirty work, and that’s where the comics waited to go on stage. It was dark, damp, and full of energy.

I became a legend, though not the kind I wanted to be. I became the “Ghost of the Store.”

I started small. Just letting them know I was watching. A comic would be alone in the showroom, rehearsing, and I’d stack the chairs on the tables behind his back. He’d turn around, see the chairs defying gravity, and run out screaming. I found it hilarious. Finally, I was getting the reaction I wanted.

I’d mess with the lights. I’d hide the microphones. I’d blow cold air down the necks of the managers who treated the staff like dirt. I was the union rep of the afterlife, enforcing a code of respect that the living seemed to have forgotten.

But the anger was still there. It ebbed and flowed. Sometimes, when the club was quiet, I’d feel that old despair, the feeling of the roof ledge under my boots.

Then came Sam. Sam Kinison. A former preacher who screamed his jokes like he was trying to tear a hole in the sky. He had the same rage I had. He understood the war.

One night, Sam was on stage, killing it. The crowd was roaring. But the air grew heavy. I moved through the room, swirling the cigarette smoke, making the temperature drop ten degrees. The hecklers shut up. The waitresses froze.

Sam stopped his set. He looked right at the spot where I was hovering, invisible to everyone else.

“It’s him,” the audience whispered. The rumor of Steve Lubeckin had spread.

Sam didn’t back down. He looked into the void and screamed. “All right! You’re starting to piss me off! You want to play? Come on out! Let everyone know you’re here!”

I felt a surge of power. He was challenging me. He was acknowledging me. He wasn’t afraid.

I cut the main breaker. Boom.

Total darkness. The entire club went black. The silence was absolute for a split second, then the screams started. Panic. Chaos. I stood on the stage next to Sam in the dark, and I laughed. For the first time since Vietnam, I felt a genuine, deep belly laugh.

When the lights came back on, Sam looked shaken. He knew. He knew it wasn’t a trick. We had a moment there, the Screaming Comedian and the Dead Soldier. A nod of respect.

Sam died a few years later. Car crash. I heard he talked to the air before he passed, asking “Why?” and then saying “Okay.” Maybe he saw something. Maybe he saw me. Or maybe he saw the others—the mob victims, the broken souls that Hollywood collects like trading cards.

Years have passed. The Sunset Strip has changed. The Hyatt is a sleek hotel now, the “Riot House” days long gone. The Comedy Store is still there, a black building with names painted on the outside. My name isn’t painted there. But the people who work there know.

They leave a glass of whiskey out for me sometimes. They say “Goodnight, Steve” when they lock up.

I’m still here. I’m the shadow in the corner of your eye. I’m the cold draft in the hallway. I’m the reason the mic stand falls over for no reason.

I realized something in the decades of haunting this place. My suicide didn’t fix the system. The machine kept grinding. But my story became a warning. A jagged piece of history that forced people to look at the cracks in the façade.

I am the soldier who never came home. I am the comic who never got the laugh. I am the tragedy beneath the comedy mask.

So, if you’re ever on Sunset Boulevard, look up at the roof of the hotel. Don’t jump. Just look. And then look down at the Store. Listen closely. beneath the laughter, beneath the applause, you might hear a faint, spectral voice saying the only line that ever really mattered:

“My name is Steve. And I’m still serving.”