The Broken Hearts Club of Lieutenant McLean

 “But everybody knows
That a broken heart is blind”
“Little black submarine”,
© The Black Keys

When Ritty and I walked in our apartment, Grumpy was snoring, as usual, on the couch near the door.
    “What a good watchman”, with irony said Ritty, “he is snoring so serene, that even a child could rob us, and he won’t even open one eye.”
    Grumpy immediately woke up and grumbled that although he was dozing, he will never allow any stranger to enter in our home. For greater persuasiveness, he bared his impressive fangs and began snoring again.
    “You can’t change him”, said Ritty, “our little tiger cub is a big sleepyhead. Anyway, let's drink some teaoos*.”
    I went into the kitchen to put our kettle on, and sweet tooth Ritty, began unloading on the table sweets and cookies from her rather voluminous bag.
     ***
    While the kettle is boiling, I will make a small digression and tell you a little about the three of us.
    My name is Dan. Daniel McLean. To put it simply, Dan Lean. I am a former flag lieutenant of communications of the very Third Galactic Fleet, which... Well, you have to know everything about an Anton Wolfing betrayal and so on, if you learned history at your school or a college. And if you are from some distant farming world, where are no normal schools, then read about this in the galactic Libnet. Maybe, I’ll tell those stories later, but not now. Because I don’t want to write a novel. I my opinion, our life is collection of short stories. When one of them end – the other is begun. So, be patient, please. Every story should have its own time.
So, about us. We, all three of us, Dan Lean, Ritty Meowsky, and Grumpy (Guido Garrat) Tigrinny - are The Broken Hearts Club, or BrokHeC for short. Ritty calls it The Broken Hearts Club of Lieutenant McLean, because it was I who founded it.
    A little explanation for readers from distant, only human, worlds, before I’ll continue: Ritty is FeliHume – humanlike feline, and Grumpy is TigHume - humanlike tiger. Their races, among others, were genetically engineered approximately two centuries ago in order to adapt human race to life on planets with climates that very different from Earth's.   
   
When the medical board dismissed almost all of our ship crew, three of us decided to stick together until we settled our personal lives. However, Grumpy was only interested in food and sleep, fortunately his (like mine and Ritty’s) benefits of a military pension for a veteran of space battles allowed him to do this. But Ritty and I wanted to find a mate. I wanted to find a pretty blonde girl, and Ritty dreamed of a respectable feline, preferably, also a retired officer, even if not from the space fleet.
    “What will I talk about with a civilian jacket?” - often purred she at evenings, curled up in a ball on a large armchair by the fireplace. “He won’t understand me, and I won’t understand him. I can’t have kittens from such a person! May the Great Universe spare me from this!”
    But no matter how hard we tried - our amorous affairs didn't go well. Only Grumpy was almost snatched away by one person. Young lady of the tiger race tried to charm him once during a park walk (let me clarify that Ritty and I were walking, and Grumpy was sleeping on park grass), but Grumpy only waved off her advances with his paw and continued sleeping. He once had a loved one, who abandoned him, and since then, whenever possible, he prefers sleep to reality. But this story requires individual story.
    We lived peacefully all together, but one day Ritty suddenly disappeared. I began to worry, after all, she is my fighting friend, but two days later I received a message from her consisting of only five words: “Fell in love! Don’t wait!” I sent her in a reply message “Be happy!”, and, leaving Grumpy at the housework, I went to the nearest bar, where I drank to Ritty’s happiness and to my luck, splashing a little from the glass in honor of the fickle Fortune. And, you know, I was lucky. Apparently, Fortune liked that thirty-year-old Oiry**, because two days later, returning from work through the park, I met there a charming blonde girl. Word by word, a several weeks of dating, and three weeks later Lily and I decided to get married. I rented a small but cozy apartment, leaving the old to Grumpy.
I was looking forward for a happy life. But even a month had not passed, when my beloved wife, who had previously cooed sweetly, lost her angelic voice, and instead she began to growl, grumble, and even squeal. To say that I was dumbfounded is to say nothing. It soon became clear that I was such an such, lazy donkey, dumbhead, cretin and so on. She explained me that other husbands carry their wives in their arms all the time and blow away specks of dust from them, and do not allow tender fingers of their wives even to touch household machines. And they also take them, at least three times a year, to the planet resorts of Eris, Mountrain and Flora. And only I want to slip her something for poor like Canary Islands, Tahiti, and Hawaii. Needless to say, I couldn’t stand it for long. I filed for divorce and moved back to Grumpy's in our old apartment. Next day after the divorce I liquored up till my eyebrows, and didn’t remember how got back home.
Smell of beautiful coffee woke me up. 
With difficulty opening my eyes, I saw a female figure against the background of the window and fear struck me like an electric shock. Could it be Lily?
“Who are you?” I asked rubbing my eyes. “And what are you doing here?”
And I heard Ritty’s calm and confident voice.
“Remember for the rest of your life, Dan. If somebody at a morning bring you a cup of nice coffee, just drink it and don’t ask silly questions. Yesterday you got so drunk that you couldn’t walk. The bartender found your communicator in your pocket and called me. And I stuck here all night, because can’t rely on Grumpy in such cases.”
Then she left.
And we continued to live with Grumpy as usual. But after month and a half, Ritty joined us.
    What happened to her there with her chosen one - I don’t know. Only once I tried to ask her a question about this, and her sweet and sad little face instantly changed, she bared her teeth, and from her throat I heard that very fighting roar of the felines, which I heard only during battles. We didn’t return to this topic again. Never. Sometimes Ritty grumbled that all male felines were stray dogs, this, apparently, was equivalent to the human saying “all men are goats”, but the conversation did not go further than that. That's when I declared us a The Broken Hearts Club. As a joke. But, as people say, there is a grain of joke in every joke, and everything else is true.
    ***
The water boiled, I prepared the teaoos (I like to brew the teaoos myself, it doesn’t come out as tasty with kitchen automats), and went into the living room. Ritty and I drank teaoos with cookies and sweets until midnight. Grumpy was still sleeping, but the two of us didn’t feel like sleeping. We sat down in armchairs by the fireplace and began chatting about this and that, remembering our space fleet life, and then Ritty said:
    “You know, Dan, I’m so sorry that you’re not a feline, I couldn’t wish for a better husband.”
    “Yes, Ritty”, I answered, “if you were my kind, I couldn’t find a better wife. Sometimes it happens, unfortunately, you meet a good, ummm, friend, but both of you belong to different biological species. I never had a better fighting friend and friend than you, but I absolutely can’t imagine how I... We…”.
Then I stopped talking and blushed, and Ritty laughed loudly.
    “Yeah, you can’t argue with biology, and I’ll never give birth to kittens from you, and I’ve seen how are you licking your lips when you seeing young blonde ladies. Don't blush! This is normal. I’m also drawn not to you, but to felines like Elveel. Well, you know, the one from the series “Wild Space”, although I know that there’s nothing there other than appearance. A beautiful but empty shell.”
    She was silent for a moment, and then added:
    “Nevertheless, make me your wife, Dan. And I’m not kidding.”
    ***
    The mayor's office did not want to register our marriage.
    “Your species are biologically incompatible,” the elderly lady official registrar gently but sternly impressed upon us, “You will never have offspring. Yes, I know that in other worlds there are interspecies marriages, but here on Earth this is not the case. Basically, I can't register you. Moreover, you don’t have a witness."
    “Who told you that we don't have one?”, objected I and looked out the door and called Grumpy.
    “Good afternoon”, said Grumpy, entering the office, “I’m ready to be a witness for this cute couple. I hope there won’t be any problems with me being a witness?”
    At the same time, he smiled, affectionately revealing his huge sugar fangs.
    As said once one historical figure, a kind word and a toothy smile can achieve more than just a kind word. The official grumbled a little about the depraved morals of today's youth, but she still registered us. We were already at the door when Ritty turned around and said:
    “As for debauchery, this is not about us. We're not going to sleep together. If you've seen too much of some kind of dumb nonsense serials, then all the complaints must be sent to their idiot scriptwriters and their stupid directors. And we just have a friendly partnership marriage.”
    And she slammed the door with all her might, so pendants on the chandelier in the hall began to dance.
    I don’t know how the official managed to call about our marriage, but when we left the city hall, reporters were already crowding the steps. Since Grumpy was walking next to us, they did not dare to come close, they just filmed us from afar.
They just clicked buttons of their holographic cameras. Suddenly, a girl of about twenty-five to thirty years old, representative of human race, shouted from the crowd of journalists:
“I am a representative of FRW! Feline Rights Watch Marjorie Culhyko! Miss Ritty, if the person, who right now next to you, forced you to become his wife, don’t be afraid, tell it to us now!”
Like in slow motion I saw how the happy expression on Ritty’s face change dramatically, heard the still unclear bubbling in her throat, and already imagined the headlines of evening newspapers:
“Combat officer of laser guns deck of the Third Galactic Fleet, first lieutenant of the reserve, Ritty Meowsky tore into small shreds the clothes and face of a representative of the human race, who is working in FRW!”
 Of course, not many persons loved these upstarts from various rights watches, because they always sticking their noses where they shouldn’t, and always interpreting and distorting facts as they please. But the law is the law, as said the hero of the famous comedian of the past, Fernandel***.  Of course, Ritty is a very smart feline and she wouldn’t use her claws, but her tongue is very sharp and there could be a lot of trouble.
Suddenly, two Grumpy’s powerful paws gently pushed us behind his back.
“Dear and too smart young lady from FRW”, roared Grumpy, “you don’t have to shout from afar, you welcome to come straight here and ask your questions to missis Ritty. But I have to warn you, if she finds your questions and fabrications offensive, then I will personally spank your round buttocks by my paw for insulting my fighting friend. And there is will be no consequences for me, except a week in the hospital, because I have a combat wound of mu head. And as for you, please note, that outright fabrications against a military officer, you can be thrown out even from your so-called rights watch.
Needless to say, the young defender of felines rights instantly got lost in the crowd amid the laughter of those around her.
And we went home.
***
    Oh, and there were a lot of noises! Photos of me and Ritty constantly flashed on the screens, the press screamed about the first interspecies marriage in the history of the Earth, we were bombarded with offers to participate in various talk shows and radio broadcasts. Now me and Ritty went for a park walk only together with Grumpy, but still, a crowd often gathered at a distance from us.
And if we went on our businesses, to work or shopping alone, difficult trials awaited us. I don’t know how it was for Ritty, I only saw from a distance a couple of times how one or another fluffed-up male feline was following after her.
And as for me, young girls declared a real hunt after me. Are you laughing? But it wasn’t funny to me at all. Since I prefer to walk, both to work and for shopping, on my way I constantly came across girls who suddenly twisted their ankle, broke the heel of a shoe, or fainted from the heat right into my arms. And how many handkerchiefs and handbags I had to lift! I was lucky that I didn’t visiting a pool or didn’t went to a beach, otherwise, instead of relaxing and swimming, I would have had to pull out of the water brunettes, blondes and brown-haired women, thin and not so thin... 
But they had no success in their hunts. Both, Ritty and I had no intention of cheating on each other with members of our own species. Well, what I mean about cheating, we lived as before, nothing like what is written about in vulgar novels could have happened between us, we simply valued our friendship and trust in each other.
***
    But one day, I finally got hooked, and what’s strange is that it wasn’t a blonde, but a brunette.
    It was happened in the end of September. She was sitting on a park bench and reading a book. When I passed by, I glanced first at the cover and then at the face of the beautiful stranger. The girl was reading Dickens. Notes of the Pickwick Club. She didn't even look at me. My heart sank, but I passed by, walked away, but then returned and sat down on the bench next to her.
    “It’s a good book, isn’t it?” asked I.
    The girl looked at me so sternly that I felt how my ears turn red, and I wanted immediately to get up and leave. I don’t even know what held me back, but I continued, looking into her sea-blue eyes:
   “I re-read this book six times. And among the authors of past centuries, I love Kipling, Chekhov, Gashek, Gogol, Dickens, O. Henry, Simak, Remarque, brothers Strugatsky, Asimov…”
    And then the girl looked up from the book and looked at me with great interest in her beautiful eyes. For a moment that she looked at me, I felt that I starting to blush. And then she again staired into her book.
Dusk was slowly falling on the park. Smell of evening dew was in the air. On the dark-blue sky appeared horns of the young, not fully visible yet, Moon. Distant Jupiter began to flicker as dim dot. Soon this girl will close the book, will get up, and will leave. And I, maybe never, will not be able to find her among many million population of our city.
I have no other choice and used my last weapon. I recited my old poem, just changing a few words in it:
“The light felicity - the indigo night,
  The turquoise melancholy - Her azure eyes,
  Cornflower leaves, ultramarine streams,
  The far deep blue forest near blue hills,
  Violet clouds with gone thunderstorm,
  Twinkle bluish stars and the Moon like a coin,
  Is she reality or a wonder for a while?
  It's quiet.
  There is not a sound, under the fathomless sky.”
She raised her head again, in her eyes there were shining lights from recently lit up lanterns.
“Is this your verse?” Asked she almost in a whisper.
I just nodded.
And then we wandered by yellowish-red park alleys until complete darkness, and I read her my poems from my memory. Like this one, which I made up on the fly:
The Autumn has kitten’s paws,
By rustling in fallen leaves,
She follows you everywhere,
With sadness your heart overfills.
She wouldn't allow you smiling,
She never allows you run,
And even near a hot stove,
She never will let you gone.
She’ll pour near your window,
Herbarium of torn leaves,
And will write a fairy tale story
With a rain’s softly clicks.
She will write on roofs that are yellow,
Then by wind will play a song,
About a summer with a stellar dawn,
And the Moon that like a sugar horn.
She will tell you a long story,
About a dawn that you couldn’t see,
Which melted like a chocolate candy
In a cup of a lemon tea...

***
Victoria and I, (that was the name of the beautiful stranger girl from the park), got married three and a half months later. A month before, Ritty and I divorced by mutual consent. Ritty was all for it, especially since by that time she often returned home after midnight, sparkling with happy eyes.
    Now I can reveal my and Ritty’s little secret. That evening, when she asked me to become her husband, and saw my raised eyebrows, she added:
   “Don't look at me like that, Dan. I love you as a friend, and like you, I am very tired of being alone. You know what I mean. If we get married, there will certainly be dozens, if not hundreds, of yours and mine species who will want to take away one of us. And then be attentive and don’t miss a smile of your Fortune.”
   She like saw it in a magic crystal ball. I don’t know about Ritty, I’d personally thought that I was lucky not to become the object of a hunt, and to find the love one myself. And only recently, when we were expecting our first child, Vicky confessed to me.
    “Dan, don’t be angry... That time in the park I was also hunting for you. Not just like others did. I studied your biography, and even found in your abandoned online diary with a list of books you loved to read. I didn't think I could do it, but... Are you mad at me, Dan?”
    In response, I just hugged her and kissed tenderly her nose.
    ***
    That is how our Club of Broken Hearts ceased to exist. Grumpy was eventually picked up by the very tiger girl who was trying to charm him. She simply impudently kidnapped him from the park - called for transportation and took him to her place. Grumpy didn't even move his whiskers. Ritty’s, mine and Grumpy’s families maintained friendly ties. Grumpy no longer sleeps all day long, he became a famous soccer journalist, and even received the Artem Frankov**** International Prize.
And I and Ritty are not afraid about our marital status. We know, if anything happens, we always have a welcome ally in each other person. As one poet of past centuries wrote:

"Nowhere does it say
What to reliable, great friends
Is forbidden to get married?” *****               

THE END

* Teaoos – a new type of tea in the future
** Oiry  - a brandy like beverage in the future
*** ”The Law Is the Law” - a 1958 French-Italian comedy film directed by Christian-Jaque and stared by Fernandel and Toto 
*** Artem Frankov (1970-2023) Ukrainian soccer journalist, editor-in-chief of the Ukrainian magazine “Soccer” from 1997 till 2022
**** Final lines of the poem “We decided with you to be friends” by a Soviet romantic poet Eduard Asadov

Edited: April 25, 2024