The Storm was raging, and I was all alone in my small cabin on Point Bellingham. It seemed as if the cellphone tower nearby had been damaged because there was patchy phone and internet. At least I had power from the buried cable. I had nothing much to do except curl up with a good book, and I had a few of those. In fact, given all of my recent relationships I felt as if the storm might be fate’s gift to a girl like me – cut me off and give me peace, with fury just background noise.

About the last thing I expected was a knock on the door, let alone two within an hour.

The first visitor was Nate, failed relationship Number One. I was not pleased to see him, but the fact is that he was positively soaked. He told me that he had been out walking and then found himself walking along the coastal trail. Not a very convincing tale. He said that he had no idea that the storm was coming until it was upon him. To give him credit the sea can make storms come out of nowhere. He said that he saw my cabin and headed for it hoping I would take him in.

It was all very unlikely, but I hustled Nate inside just as a clap of thunder rolled in. He stood there dripping on the tiled floor of the tiny entrance hall, shivering.

I told him to get his clothes off and head into the bathroom that was just off the hall – a practical design for stormy weather – a large room tiled like the hall with a toilet, bath and laundry and a dresser where I could prepare myself before heading out the door. Apart from that tiled area the cabin was a single room partitioned only with curtains – a small kitchen and space for a large bed screen off from a living area with views of the sea, now screened off with shutters.

I told him that I had no clothes that would fit him other than a robe hung up by the bed. It had belonged to Mark, failed relationship Number Two. I started to run a bath for him and went to get it.

“This robe is huge,” he said, sitting on my makeup stool and pulling off his socks. “Clearly it is not yours?”

“Look, I have taken you in and getting some warmth back into your body, so show some gratitude and don’t ask questions about my current relationship,” I snapped. But for some reason I added – “Not that I am in one right now.”

He looked even scrawnier than I remembered, with his underpants being the final item to hit the floor with a splat. Maybe after the massive Mark I expected all men to have more muscles and more cock, but I found it hard to understand why I was attracted to him. He was long-haired, small, weak, and needy. The very opposite of Mark. And yet neither of them was right for me.

I told him that it was warm enough to get in and he should keep the water running until he could fully immerse. I had seen the early signs of exposure in him, and immersion in hot water is the best way to restore body heat. He should stay in the water until I told him to get out and dry off.

I wrung out his shirt, underpants and socks and draped them over the extra towel rail and put his jeans in the dryer on low temperature. They would take the longest to dry, but in an hour or so I could take them out and put the other items in on heat. He could even put the jeans on wet. I did not want Nate hanging around once the rain cleared.

I returned to my book. I may have read a chapter, but not more. There was another knock on the door. The weather was crazy and yet I had another visitor.

It was Mark. I was even less happy to see him, if that was possible.

“The weather was just so bad that I thought I would come up and help you to close the shutters and cover the outside furniture, but I see that you have done it?”

In his usual style he did not wait to be invited in. He simply slipped past me.

“Is somebody else here?” he said, pointing at the bathroom door.

I suddenly realized that Nate could be a problem. I had discovered during our relationship, Mark is not only huge but he is also quite violent. Not to me, that is, but he can get jealous and moody. It seemed sensible to avoid him finding another man on the premises.

“That’s just my friend Natalie who is staying with me at the moment,” I said, stepping up to the bathroom door to call through it. “Hey Natalie. Are you enjoying your bath? I just have a visitor out here, but you just carry on. He’ll be gone when you get out.”

“Hello there Natalie. My name’s Mark,” he called out, clearly as if doubting that there was a girl in there.

But then a feminine voice came through the door – “I’m just going to wallow a little while longer, so I’m sorry I missed meeting you.”

I was surprised but relieved. Somehow Nate had been able to summon up a total convincing female voice. It clearly convinced Mark, but he made no move to leave. In fact, he stepped into the living room and went over to the wood burner which served to warm the room (and the bed area, and provide another hotplate for the kitchen) to warm his hands.

“I am actually a big woolly Saint Bernard,” he said. “Like a good rescue dog, I brought brandy. I thought we might share it.” He had in his hand a quarter bottle of St Remy VSOP, which he knew that I liked. He simply sat on the couch as he had done when were together, although he had been told weeks ago never to come back.

I asked him to consider leaving the bottle but that he had to go, but then as if the heavens were shouting “bitch!” at me, there was another flash through the shutters and a might clap of thunder. He just looked at me and raised the bottle.

“When it’s finished you’ll go,” I said to him. “And I’m not asking!”

“I think we’ve seen the worse of this storm,” he said, in apparent agreement. I put two glasses on the table and he filled them. I took mine and threw it back, but he just sipped his, looking infuriatingly smug.

I sat down and stared at him – one of those looks that a woman can give that should give a man the message that he is not wanted. He understood it well enough, but he was not moving. I was conscious of Nate in the bathroom. He could not come out so long as Mark was expecting a woman. Why had I created this problem? And then the solution struck me.

“I had better take Natalie some clothes,” I said. I stood up and went through the partly drawn curtains to the bed and wardrobe. I found the things I needed and then headed back across to the bathroom and closed the door behind me.

“Look Nate, you can stay in the bath indefinitely if you want, but if you have to step into the living room it had better be as Natalie,” I said. “Mark is a brute of a man, and I mean dangerous, and he fills that robe hanging up so he could beat you to a pulp. So, I have some clothes here for you including some underwear and padding. No pants though – I’m wearing those. I think you might have the legs for this dress. There is a razor over there. And you will need to put on some makeup. All the stuff you will need it over here, and an instruction sheet from Sephora – daytime makeup, please. Or just stay here. I am trying to get rid of him, but it is hard work.”

“I thought you said you were unattached at the moment,” said Nate, I swear in the feminine voice.

“I am,” I said. “I don’t want this guy. The door is open for Natalie if she wants him,” I teased.

Back in the living room there was another shot of brandy in my glass, and it was much better sipped.

“I think about you a lot,” said Mark.

“I never think about you,” I said truthfully. “But thanks for being concerned enough to come out in this weather, Mark. You deserve a girl who needs you. It’s not me, so I suggest you keep looking. Cheers.”

We both sipped.

“You’re right,” he said. “The end of the bottle and then the end of us. I won’t waste my labor on dead earth.”

I was just dirt to him now, and I was happy to hear it. We may have spoken a little more, but I can’t recall what about. Everything changed when Natalie waltzed into the room.

The dress fitted perfectly, and the shaved legs would be the envy of most women. To my surprise the makeup job was close to perfect, but then Nate had always been one of those very precise men. Now it seemed as if he was not a man at all. Natalie was a total babe - a very pretty woman.

His hair was in one of those towel turbans – a very clever touch. He had borrowed that and also, I detected, some of my perfume that seemed a little out of place in my seaside cottage. It was one of those spicy scents with a sexy name, as if promising the capacity to lure a man in. Perhaps that was the intention – to draw Mark away from me and win me back. Neither of those could happen.

“You must be Natalie,” said Mark, getting to his feet in a manner I had seen only once before – the first time he met me. I could see by the lascivious leer that he was quite impressed.

“We met through the bathroom door,” Natalie reminded him. That voice again – it was perfect. “You must be one of my friend’s ex-boyfriends. I can’t keep track. It is a revolving door. Oh, to find somebody reliable out there.”

It was a clear dig at me, but it was difficult to see whether Mark was picking any of this up. He was just staring at her. To me, I could still see something male in Natalie, but clearly he couldn’t. Or perhaps there was something but it only made Natalie more attractive to him.

“How did you get here,” said Mark. “I didn’t see another car outside.”

“I actually walked up, but before the storm hit,” said Nat. “It was all so sudden. One minute a stroll in the sun, and then, this. I was caught out. Luckily, I had a girlfriend living up here. She is such a sweetie taking me in.” Natalie gave me an adoring look.

“I could give you a lift home if you like,” said Mark. “If you walked here, you must live nearby?”

“On Channel Street, near the bridge, at least for the next week. And, yes, I will take you up on that. I need a lift when I dry off,” she said touching the turban.

“Oh, you are looking for a place? I might be able to help with that too,” he said, leaning forward, as if to take in that perfume. “Are you working near to Channel Street? Can I ask what you do?”

“I am unemployed at the moment. Recent events have left me a little abandoned, but I don’t want to go into that. I am looking forward.” It was all aimed at me although we had not been together for months. I should feel sorry for Nate because he had taken on a bigger place he couldn’t afford in the hope I would join him – that was his problem, not mine. As for quitting his job, it was a lousy job anyway. Nate needed to move on, like Natalie was ready to.

“Actually, I own a Restaurant not far from the bridge,” said Mark. “I am looking for staff. In fact, I am looking for a front of house – somebody with a bubbly personality … like you. It is just that it has a theme. It is a 1950's style diner. Would you mind if I saw you without that turban on?”

I took a breath, but then I remembered that Nate’s hair was long. He had not cut it or shaved his sparse beard since we broke up. It seemed like some kind of visible penance, I guess. But the beard was gone now, and the eyelashes were fluttering and the painted lips pouting. Mark was under a spell, as Natalie pulled off her turban.

“I don’t know why, but I sort of thought you might be a blond,” said Mark. The revealed hair was light brown but looked darker being wet, but there was plenty of it.

“Would you prefer it blonde?” said Natalie. There was no mistaking it now. She was flirting shamelessly. Was she seriously playing for a job?

“If you like. The length is just right for one of those 1950s hairdos,” he said.

“They can be high maintenance – regular trips to the salon,” said Natalie. “If you are offering me a job, then I would be the face of the restaurant and need to look as classy as the food and service must be.”

“That is what I am looking for,” said Mark. “Yes, I am offering you a job. And the restaurant is housed in a building with a small apartment upstairs.”

“I should warn you that you don’t know anything about me,” said Natalie, in a serious but playful manner. It was her way to talk to him like that, and clearly, he liked it.

“You can tell me all your secrets on the way back down,” he said. “I think that is the sun appearing. The storm is over.”

Indeed it was, but I wondered if another storm might strike them soon, once Natalie revealed who she was. Still, I would not be caught up in that. It seemed to me that Natalie had rescued me, and I nodded in her direction as if to acknowledge that I was grateful to her for that.

I opened the shutters, and the cabin was bathed in early evening sunshine. The dark clouds were already miles away and the grey in them fading to white. I led them both to the door, and Natalie gave me a hug.

“Be careful,” I whispered. “Maybe get out of the car before you tell him?”

She just smiled. She looked confident. She turned to him and made him smile too – perhaps the biggest grin I had ever seen on his face.

He opened the door for her, and she got into the car as a woman might. How did she know how to do that? They drove off.

I had some tidying up to do outside. My port in a storm had held up well. It was not until later that I started to wonder how things had gone between my two ex’s later that night. But I did not dwell on it. I had my own life to lead.

It was weeks later when I was dating another guy that he suggested we go to this 1950s themed diner in town. I wondered if we might meet Mark. I was certain that we would not meet Nate.

So imagine my surprise when we were greeted on arrival by Natalie, now sporting a side parted blonde wave hairstyle. The outfit was pink and outrageously feminine, and Natalie was behaving to match with a broad bright lipstick smile. She greeted me with a hug, and offered one to my bemused date.

“We go back quite a while,” she explained to him. “And I guess I have her to thank for my job, and for my boyfriend. That’s him over there, the owner. I will have him visit you at your table, but let’s get you seated first.

We followed her, with her hips swaying. I swear that there was a jiggling of the flesh that could not properly belong on a man. What was going on here? How could Mark still be with Natalie? He must know, and be happy about it.

Mark came over and introduced himself.

“You are a lucky guy,” he said to my date. “We dated for a bit, but I guess we both worked out that we were not a match. Still, she helped me to find the perfect woman, and she is running this place for me these days. I guess I was always looking for a girl with something extra, and that is what my Natalie has.”

I saw him looking over in her direction and give her a little wave. She spotted his attention and gave him a little wave back. It was so cute. They were in love.

It makes you think about all those ships that pass in the night never knowing that they were meant to sail in convoy. And then, maybe one day, they both head for a port in a storm and they meet, and things turn out the way they were meant to be.

The End

Author’s Note: A correspondent of mine, Cindy, sent this idea to me years ago, but I only recently rediscovered it. Thanks, Cindy