Brian Quinn: A New Man

Chapter 19

It was the last day of challenge filming for Impractical Jokers and Brian was suddenly feeling melancholy. He had known this was their last season, he had plans for his beer company, but it still wasn't easy to walk away from the last twelve years. He also knew that he and Sal both already had losses for the episode so he needed to make sure not to lose. They had been given the green light for three options as the last punishment and none of them sounded like anything he wanted to do.

He had been in a good mood the last few days, mostly because of Jacki. He had missed her a lot over the last month. It would have been easy to be mad, and stay mad, but he understood what she wanted and why she chose to leave. But he wasn't going to give up on her. When she didn't ever say whether or not she was coming back to New York he went ahead and booked a flight to L.A. and one to her hometown, just in case.

He was able to focus during the challenge and ended up realizing that the other guys weren't refusing anything. No one seemed to want to be the last loser. When Brian got to his turn he figured he would be okay. But then the boys threw him under the bus. They told him to strip in front of an older lady in the restaurant. He started to unbutton his shirt but he couldn't make himself follow through. And he knew exactly what that meant. When he got back to the other guys they were all smiles.

"So Q is our finale loser!"

Now Joe was talking right to a camera and Brian just shook his head.

"And that means one thing!" Sal said.

"Its time take that-" Murr piped up.

"BUS TO TAMPA!" They all yelled.

"Q is going to be chained to the wall as he goes from New York to Tampa. That's pretty much it."

Just as Brian had suspected, he would be the one to do this punishment. He got in his Jeep, along with a camera guy and Casey Jost, and drove to the Greyhound station in Times Square.

"So Brian how do you feel about doing the Bus to Tampa punishment?"

It was certainly inconvenient for him since he was hoping to surprise Jacki.

"Well. I'm annoyed. And we had three different punishments approved for this finale episode. And now I know why."

He turned off of 7th Street and was soon in front the greyhound bus station. He saw the rest of the guys and the crew unloading from vans. Joe and Sal made Brian give up his phone and wallet while Murr bought a ticket.

Joe spoke to the camera first.

"Ok we're here at the Port Authority terminal for Q's punishment! Have fun, bud!"

"Can I at least use the bathroom first?" Brian asked, knowing he wouldn't get a chance for the next 33 hours.

The guys agreed to it and Brian ran off. The camera crew was finalizing the cameras in the bus and the production assistants were getting waivers signed, since the punishment was going to be live streamed.

At 9:40pm, Brian boarded the bus and Pete, the executive producer, let the passengers know that, other than physical harm they could have fun at Brian's expense. He also pointed out the crew members who would be on the bus for the duration of the ride. Brian let Sal handcuff him, with a pair of pink fuzzy handcuffs.

"See ya in Florida!" Joe yelled as the guys laughed and exited the bus.

Brian sat alone for a while, probably because most of the passengers wanted to sleep. But along with the live stream there was also a chat box and fans were able to send in questions to Brian. He tried to stay awake to answer them and anytime he started to drift off a crew member would squirt him with water from a water bottle.

Twelve hours into the punishment they were in Raleigh, North Carolina. Brian was allowed to beg for food from other passengers while they changed busses. Someone did take pity on him and bought him a breakfast sandwich. At that point there were several passengers who took turns sitting with Brian, taking photos and asking him their own questions.

Two young women got on in Raleigh and spent the bulk of the afternoon trying to flirt with him. They would take selfies with him and one did an Instagram live where she gave Brian a very harsh massage on his shoulders. He was okay with them buying him food when the bus would stop for a while. Not only did he get a break from their incessant chatting and giggling but he could use the empty water bottle to relieve himself. Around 8pm one of them fell asleep and the other had her iPad out and let him choose a movie to watch, that came with her leaning on his chest the whole time. And, much to his chagrin, he did fall asleep with this 20 year old fan drooling on his chest.

At 2:15am they did one last transfer while in Orlando. He was able to get away from the two young women a little bit when they both fell asleep a few rows behind him. He finally back to being alone, which meant more water to the face and answering any questions that came in on the chat box.

The producers did let him sleep from around 5am to when they got just outside Tampa, around 9:15am. He was so glad that the punishment was almost over. When they pulled into the bus station he could see the crew and the cameras and a large group of fans with posters. He tried to psych himself up so he would be as upbeat as possible when he got off the bus.