Hills like Hemmingway's, Only Different

The man sighed, agitated, and sucked down some more Saranac.

She took a long sip of her gin and tonic. "You do this every year," she said. "In May, you get all excited brainstorming for your book. School ends, summer vacation comes along, you don't write a word, and you get all upset."

"Every English teacher in America thinks that they are going to write a book. I can't get past the first couple of pages. What a cliché." The bottle was empty. He went into the kitchen and rummaged around in the refrigerator for another.

She called in from the other room, "Why don't you rewrite Ulysses in Syracuse, like you said you were going to two years ago? Mike Kester loved that idea, and it fits completely with the theme of that book. Metemwhateveritwas."

"Met-hem-pike-hoses," he pronounced phonetically, sitting back down on the couch. "The idea that people are reincarnated and situations repeat themselves with slight variations. I think. I don't know. I had to read two other guidebooks in order to understand it. The problem with it really is that James Joyce already did it. And I'm not James Joyce. It would be a poor copy. I think Mike was excited that one of his non-Irish English teacher friends had endured the book. Besides, it's common practice among English teachers to acknowledge and support one another in the writing the book they both know will never get written."

"Well then, why not last year's idea? Don Quixote as a modern day man who reads too many spy novels and thinks he's a secret agent?"

"There are lots of problems with that. Once again, it's someone else's plot. It would get mired down as a parody of today's security paranoia. Besides, it would have to be me as the character. I can't develop characters well, so I have to use myself. I don't really want to paint myself as a lunatic. It's flying too close to the flame. And no one would get it. No publisher would touch it with a ten foot stick." He punctuated the critique with another long drink of his beer.

"I like your short stories. I like your stories about you."

"I know you do, and that's why I write them. And I think I really know now what I really want to do. But I'm going to need a lot of help from you."

"You know I'd do anything for you."

"I'm going to rewrite Hemmingway's 'Hills like White Elephants', only I'm going to do it completely differently."

"I don't know that one."

"Hem never came out and said directly what it was about. I missed the point entirely, and so did a bunch of guys in the class. The only people who got it were the women, who were amazed that the rest of us couldn't see it."

"Sounds mysterious."

"Yeah. It's a dialogue, you see. A man and a woman are talking about something at a bar in Spain. I'm just going to make us those two characters. Of course, we won't be in Spain, but that can't be helped."

"But what are they talking about?"

"That's what I'm going to change. Give me some of that drink, will you?" He gulped it down. His mouth twisted at the taste, having forgotten that he didn't like gin. It gave him an unintended angry look. "Do you remember what we talked about last March?"

"All we ever do is drink and talk. Talk and drink. March is kind of blurred into the past right now."

"You know what I'm talking about. It was March. Your memory is better than that."

Her eyes opened perceptibly. She took the glass and went into the kitchen. He heard the ice breaking. "You're not talking about plots anymore, are you?"

He walked into the other room, stood in the doorway, and nodded his head. "Scary but true."

She tried opening the window, but it was stuck again and didn't let enough air in. "It's a common thing," she said back. "Lots of people do it. It's easy."

"Yeah. Common. So common that no publisher would touch it. And besides, it's not that easy."

"I wouldn't want you to do anything you wouldn't want to do."

"It's not that. I want to. It's just that I'd probably give up on writing the book."

"You could still do it."

"No, I wouldn't. I don't really want to anymore. Once it's done, it's done. There's no going back. And I'm fine with that."

"Okay."


She set down the bottle of tonic and put her arms around my neck. She looked up at me and smiled. "Do you feel better now?"
"I feel fine," I replied, trying to smile confidently, but instead giving off a sheepish grin. "There's nothing wrong with me. I feel fine." And I did.

Marty's Criticism of this Story
Copyright Dave Sipley
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