This is a bit risky - publishing a short story in place of a traditional blog. But as one of my mentors often encouraged: Take chances, make mistakes, get messy. This story might be the hat-trick she was referring to. The trifecta of artistic blundering.

First, a couple of warnings.

One, if you don’t like shorts stories, stop reading right here. (No, don’t read anymore -stop! Really, don’t read this! You’re reading! Stop it!)

Second, while this is fiction, it falls into the category of fiction-barely. Or narrowly-not-non-fiction. It is closely (not loosely) based on reality - a recent true experience that was both strange and (obviously, imo) worth writing about.

Take chances, make mistakes, get messy! - Ms. Frizzle, Magic School Bus

Third, most of the names have been changed to protect the innocent. Hemingway remains Hemingway. As a tough guy (and a dead guy), he probably won’t mind.

Without further ado (and with the short story haters no longer reading this... right?), here is:

No Cat, No Rain

Someone knocked on the door.

He read the sentence again: Someone knocked on the door.

Then he read the one that followed: “Avanti,” George said, before looking up from his book.

And then he looked up from the book, smiling at the timing. Of course, he wasn’t George, wasn’t in Italy, wasn’t lying on the bed in a hotel room. It wasn’t raining. And no one had knocked on the door. He was in an empty doctor’s office waiting room. Still, he was looking up from his book... Funny coincidence.

There was really nothing to look up at: two female receptionists hunched behind their computer screens, safely sequestered behind clear sheets of Plexiglas, and a small fleet of vacant, faux leather seats. A woman had been seated near the doorway when they arrived, but she had been whisked away by a nurse before his wife could even check in.

They were there for her - his wife. A week earlier, while skiing in the Sawatch Mountains, she had strained her knee, reaggravating a decades-old injury. It had grown worse and worse until, last night, with tears in her eyes, she complained of terrific pain.

Imagining the crowd that would be awaiting treatment at the urgent care on a Saturday morning, he had, most brilliantly, thought to bring a book: Ernest Hemingway - The Short Stories. He had read it before, but enjoyed it immensely - enough for a reread. It was a special copy: a fine paperback with a photo of Hemingway on the cover, along with a medallion that said, “The Hemingway Century” and a Staff Pick sticker signed by Cary, Lisa, and Sheryl. These were presumably employees who had worked at the now defunct bookstore in Breckenridge where, approximately two decades earlier, he had purchased it for $15. (The price was listed on the back.)

He surveyed the deserted waiting area again, out of habit, then glanced at the hidden receptionists before returning to his book:

In the doorway stood the maid. She held a big...

That was as far as he got before he heard the door swing open. He turned his head in time to see a man and a woman enter. The man was perhaps 70, with gray hair, dressed in a sloppy sweater and beige slacks, wearing a baseball cap with an Izod logo - an alligator with its mouth open wide. The woman, who was much younger - his daughter? - was clutching the man’s elbow as though he might, at any moment, tip over and fall. The man teetered forward, toward the reception desk. The woman assisted him with great care, saying, “Easy. Go slow. Easy...” She had a look of intense concern on her face.

When they finally reached the receptionists, a voice from behind the Plexiglas asked: “How can we help you today?”

“My ear,” the man said, reaching up to cover his right ear with his hand.

When he failed to elaborate, the receptionist asked, “What seems to be the problem?”

The man, still cupping his ear, looked to his female companion, weary blue eyes blinking curiously.

“She’s asking about your ear, Dad.”

(Ah-ha! Daughter!)

The man nodded. “My ear.”

“He has ringing in his ear,” the young woman clarified.

“The right ear?”

The man looked to his daughter. She nodded slowly. “Yes. The right ear.”

Computer keys clicked, then, “Are you currently a patient here?”

This confused the man and he shrugged. “It’s... It’s my ear.”

“No, he’s not a patient. We haven’t been here before,” the young woman answered.

“I just flew in last night,” the man told the receptionist with great urgency. “That’s when it started. It’s a terrible ringing!”

After more clicking, the receptionist asked, “Name?” When the man didn’t answer, she asked in a lower, conspiratorial voice, “What’s his name?”

“David. David Beckham.” She then spelled the last name.

“Like the soccer player?” the receptionist asked.

“Yes. Like the soccer player.”

The receptionist clicked away at her keyboard. Then, “ID and insurance card?”

“Dad...? Dad...? She needs your ID and insurance card?”

“My what?”

“Here...” She carefully aimed the man at the nearest chair, helped him sit down, then said, “Give me this,” and took hold of the leather satchel he was clutching. When he refused to release his grip, she added, gently and patiently, as though talking to a child, “Please give it to me.”

After a brief struggle, he finally allowed her to take it and she returned to the reception desk. She rifled the contents, then passed across the cards.

The receptionist thanked her, took the cards and quickly made copies. She then handed them back. “We’ll be with you shortly.”

The woman took a seat next to her father. When she gave the satchel back to him, he said, “What’s this?”

“She thought you were David Beckham, the soccer player,” the young woman chuckled.

“What??”

“Never mind.”

Returning his attention to his book, he decided to back up. His eyes ran up the page, searching for the appropriate spot to start, a place to recapture the feel and flow of the story Hemingway was trying to tell. It was the least he could do. Here Hemingway was knocking himself out with this story, and he wasn’t giving it his full attention. He was busy watching old men who weren’t famous soccer players.

He finally settled on this:

“Don’t you think it would be a good idea if I let my hair grow out?” she asked, looking at her profile again.

George looked up and saw the back of her neck, clipped close like a boy’s.

He liked that description. He could see George looking up from his book, studying the back of her neck. Why was her hair clipped like a boy’s?

“I like it that way.”

Before he could fully grasp the reality that she got “so tired of it” that way - short and clipped like a boy’s - a nurse emerged from a door hidden in the wall and called, “David. David Beckham?”

The man turned his head and looked at his daughter, as if asking if that was his name. He had a slightly panicked look on his face.

The woman nodded, rose, and assisted him to a standing position.

“Where are we going?” the man wanted to know. His eyes were wild now.

“How are we today?” the nurse greeted cheerily, smiling as she herded them through the door.

Here Hemingway was knocking himself out with this story, and he wasn’t giving it his full attention. He was busy watching old men who weren’t famous soccer players.

He shifted in his seat, consulted his watch, considered looking at his phone. No. That would be a mistake, a long, wasteful trip down the rabbit hole. He had spent the last two weeks - ever since that dreadful business in the capital - abstaining from his phone as much as possible. The news, Facebook, Instagram, even Pinterest seemed to be even more crammed with silly and incendiary opinions, rumors, and lies than usual. He had, in a fit of anger and frustration, vowed not to engage in any of that. The break, though difficult to maintain, had been quite refreshing. And he had been getting a lot more reading done.

He had managed to finish Camus’ all-too-timely The Plague, finished McPhearson’s Hue and Cry, restarted Atlas Shrugged (given up last summer at about the halfway point - 500 or so pages deep), and made great progress with Hemingway’s short stories.

Leaving his phone in his pocket, he began reading again:

“I get so tired of it,” she said. “I get so tired of looking like a boy.”

George shifted his position in the bed. He hadn’t looked away from her since she started to speak.

“You look pretty darn nice,” he said.

Good save, George. Or rather, nice try. Because he knew what was coming. She was going to complain about her hair and her clothes and not getting to eat a fancy meal and... the kicker: wanting a cat.

Poor George. Like most men, he was in far over his head, up against a force and a situation and a human being that he did not understand and could not possibly deal with. He could empathize with George’s predicament. He really could. This woman, like his own wife, wasn’t having it.

She laid the mirror down on the dresser and went over to the...

The door opened again. Another man and woman. This man looked to be fifty-something, slightly overweight, wearing a gray sweater vest, jeans, and boots. No hat. His bald head gleamed under the florescent lighting. The woman looked to be his wife - similar age, a little frumpy, dull hair, an oversized pants suit without structure.

He watched them make their approach and then wait for the receptionist to notice them.

“How can we help you today?”

The man reached his hand up to his right ear. “I’ve got ringing in my ear.”

He couldn’t see the receptionist’s face, but imagined her adopting a look of either supreme curiosity or perhaps vague skepticism. He heard her repeat the complaint in the form of a question: “You’ve got ringing in your ear?”

The man nodded.

“Your right ear?”

Another nod.

Silence.

The woman added, “He’s had it since last night.”

He leaned forward slightly, expectant, thinking, Don’t tell me this guy was on a plane too... Don’t tell me that.

Apparently this occurred to the receptionist as well. “Have you been traveling?” she asked.

The man shook his head.

He leaned back. Strange. But imagine if the guy had just been on a plane... It would be like a bizarre outbreak of aircraft-related ear ringing.

“Name?”

“David...”

The man said the last name, but it was muffled. He couldn’t quite make it out. Of course not Beckham. Yet it had sounded almost like it could have been something close.

The couple went through the check-in process - providing ID and an insurance card, paying the copay - then sat down in the same exact seats that had just been occupied by the last people.

He tried to return to Hemingway but found it impossible to concentrate. What were the chances of two Davids coming in, back to back, for ear ringing? And both in the right ear? This was Twilight Zone material.

A nurse - a different one this time - appeared, called for David Burnham, and escorted the couple into the back.

Burnham... he thought. That was pretty similar to Beckham.

Weird.

He glanced at the Plexiglas where he could hear the receptionists talking.

“...Two in row. What are the odds of that?” one said.

“Right?”

“I mean, we get some strange things in here, but...”

“Speaking of strange things, did I finish telling you about that new gym that opened right across from Lifetime?”

“Right across...? Like... across the street?”

He returned his attention to his book:

She laid the mirror down on the dresser and went over to the window and looked out. It was getting dark.

He continued reading, picking up speed, his eyes moving easily and happily downhill.

He continued reading, picking up speed, his eyes moving easily and happily downhill. He was anxious to finish the story before his wife was done and ready to leave. He could feel the end coming, feel himself racing for that finish line. He had just reached Someone knocked on the door and George had told them to come in again and George was looking up from his book again when he heard something and he too looked up from his book. No longer amused at the coincidence, now slightly perturbed by the interruption, he saw another nurse emerge from the hidden door.

“David...?” she called, looking directly at him. “David?”

He looked back at her, shaking his head.

The nurse’s eyes darted around the vacant room, brows raised. “David...?” She then looked back at him. “Are you sure you’re not David?”

He nodded. “I’m sure.”

Frowning, the nurse went to the reception area and interrupted the receptionists, who were now engaged in a friendly debate involving Zumba and Pilates.

“David...?” the nurse asked them.

Silence.

The nurse consulted her clipboard. “David...?”

“He went back,” one of the receptionists said.

“David... B.?”

They laughed. “There were two David Bs - Beckham and Burnham.”

The nurse examined her paperwork. “Ringing in the right ear...”

More laughter. “Both.”

The nurse just stood there for a second. Then she shook her head. “Hmph.” Another head shake and she went back through the door.

He returned to his book, his eyes searching to find his place on the page.

“Have you tried intermittent fasting?” one of the receptionists asked.

“You know, I’ve tried it, but...”

“It takes time to get used to it. At first, it feels like you’re going to die.”

“Yeah. I never made it past that part. But I really do need some kind of diet.”

“You should give it another shot.”

As the receptionist began to list the benefits of intermittent fasting, he found it:

Someone knocked on the door.