Doppelganger

A lady approached me in the cafe as I was writing and sipping coffee.

"Hello," she said. "Are you James?"

"Yes," I said. "Nice to meet you!"

My name is not James.

She sat down and rattled off anecdotes of professional sound and lighting troubles, and I nodded and laughed and said "yes" a lot. Finally she said to me: "Do you have any ideas?"

"No, I'm sorry," I said. "I'm not James."

Silence. Long, perplexed look, wheels turning. She coughed the first syllable of a laugh and then returned to the turning wheels before proffering a tentative: "but... you said your name was James."

"I thought it was," I said, and I got up and paid my bill.