Dreams of a Robot Dancing Bee by James Tate

Author:James Tate
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, azw3
ISBN: 9781933517711
Publisher: Wave Books
Published: 2008-12-01T05:00:00+00:00

THE EXAMINATION

Dr. Shroeder, at the age of thirty-four, had every reason to be pleased with himself. The spacious new house with its solar heating system came complete with a little apartment in back for his mother. And his new black BMW made him feel sportier than he actually was, and he liked this, and told no one that he had to sit on a pillow to be able to see over the steering wheel. With his practice growing day by day, the six-figure income helped compensate for his premature baldness and the curse of his diminutive height. He was tall of mind, he liked to say. His mother had taught him to say that when he was teased in high school.

At the clinic he demanded complete respect from his nurses. They brought him coffee between patients and they removed the Styrofoam cups from his desk each morning before he arrived. They, Susan and Patty, often asked one another why it was not possible for the great doctor to simply dispose of the cups in his wastebasket himself. But it was a small matter, and they knew he was a stickler for detail. Everything had to be just the way he wanted it or he would have one of his little tantrums. He would not walk across the room for a tongue depressor. It had to be right by his left hand as he was examining the patient.

When a female patient required a vaginal examination, one of the nurses was always present, and Dr. Shroeder’s behavior was as cool and thoroughly professional as could be, betraying nothing but medical satisfaction that he could remedy the problem. And when the patients were young and beautiful and shapely, Patty or Susan watched the doctor’s every expression in hope of detecting some interest or stimulation, but, alas, his little round stone face was a perfect blank.

One spring morning, on his way to the clinic, listening to classical music on his tape-deck, Dr. Shroeder accidentally drove over a pair of birds copulating in the middle of the road. His heart jumped and he looked quickly in the rear-view mirror. Sure enough, they were thrashing wretchedly, and he couldn’t help but wish another car would come along in a moment and finish them off. While making love! Perpetuating their species! And he, a doctor! He quickly put them out of his mind and looked at his clipboard on the seat beside him. Ah, Mrs. Ramstetter.

Mrs. Ramstetter was truly statuesque, she towered above him like a Scandinavian goddess. She was seated in the waiting room reading an old issue of Natural History. She had called the day before and Dr. Shroeder was able to fit her in this morning.

“The doctor will see you now,” Patty told Mrs. Ramstetter.

Mrs. Ramstetter sat in the examination room for several minutes before the doctor entered. She had been coming to Dr. Shroeder for almost two years now and they had struck up some small rapport. She was a healthy, vigorous woman, occasionally plagued by small complaints.

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