I was thinking about this story today, because a girl on the bus reminded me of one of the characters. Well, not the character herself--she reminded me of Susitna, a girl I went to grade school with.
When I wrote In The Eye, my MMF tornado chaser menage, I named the "F" Susitna, after my school friend. My friend's name was pronounced shoe-sheet-na. We called her Shoe for short. When I wrote In The Eye, I didn't want to explain the pronunciation so I had the guys call her Susi for short... but in my head, she's Shoe.
In The Eye was originally published as a Torquere Sip. After its contract expired, it was picked up by loveyoudivine
as an ebook. Now it's also available in the Kinksters anthology I've been talking up over the past week.
Excerpt from In The Eye:
“No, I get it,” Susitna snapped. Scooping up her King Charles spaniel, she rose
to her feet. “Come on, Charlie. It’s a boy’s club. No girls allowed. What else
is new?”
Dale stood to follow her out of the Grad commons, but Susitna
surprised him by standing still. “It isn’t a boy’s club,” he said, even though
there was only a narrow sense in which that was true. “Wait, you named a girl
dog Charlie? Weird.”
“You’re not allowed to bring dogs in here,” Xu spat before Susitna
could answer. People are allergic.”
“Are you allergic?” she
shot back as the little dog licked her chin.
Xu looked down at the ping-pong table and rolled his eyes. “No.”
“Then shut up.” When Susi turned back to Dale, her expression softened.
She was obviously willing to put up with Xu’s attitude only because she was so
fond of Dale. “Are you allergic?”
Dale smiled at the care in her dark eyes, and shook his head. “No, I
love dogs.”
Muttering something about dander, Xu gripped his ping-pong paddle
and said, “Come on, Dale, stop wasting your time with this chick. We’ve got a
game going, here.”
There was no taming Xu. He was rude to everybody until he learned to
trust them. He’d learned to trust Dale long ago, which is probably why he held
on so tight. But for Dale, there were other avenues to explore. Sure, he liked
Xu. Loved him, even? But every instance of intimacy, whether sexual or not,
seemed like just a moment in time. Nothing was set in stone.
“I’m sorry,” Dale said to Susitna. “I mean…maybe you can come.”
“Dale!” Xu hissed. Bouncing his ping-pong ball off the smooth green
table, he whacked it so hard the little white sphere went soaring across the
room. They all watched as it struck the ceiling before bouncing off the far
wall and then plummeting to the floor. Charlie yapped like crazy and struggled
to escape Susitna’s hold as the ball bounced up high a few times, and then
rolled underneath the ping-pong table.
The dog kept barking, even as Susi shook her head and said,
“Anyway…”
“You can’t come,” Xu said. “And it’s not because you’re a girl, it’s
because you’re brown.”
Dale couldn’t believe his ears, but it was Susi’s jaw that dropped.
After an eternal moment of disbelief, she threw her head back and laughed.
“Fuck you!”
“Xu!” Dale snapped. “Seriously?”
“What?” Setting his paddle down on the table, Xu explained,
“Bringing a brown girl along for the trip isn’t the best way to blend into the
Midwestern United States.”
Susi set her dog down on the floor, pulling the leash tight so it
couldn’t chase the forgotten ping-pong ball. “Oh yeah, like a Chinese boy’s
going to blend in that much better.”
“I might not blend in, but at least I won’t get put on a terrorist
watch list!”
“What the fuck are you talking about? A, I
was born in this country, and B, my family is Indian…and Hindu! It’s not like
I’m a goddamn sleeper cell for Al Qaeda!”
Xu shook his head self-righteously. “Where we’re going, none of that
matters. Brown is brown.”
“Okay, okay, okay!” Dale couldn’t bear another second of this
ridiculous argument. “Cut it out, you two!”
To Dale’s surprise, they both shut their yaps and stared, wide-eyed,
in his direction. He wasn’t sure what to say next. Dale had never been
subjected to any kind of racism during their past trips to Tornado Alley, but
as a blond-haired, blue-eyed white guy, he was hardly likely to be targeted. Xu
might be right about small-town xenophobia, but Dale wasn’t about to turn
Susitna away on account of her skin color. Anyway, he wanted her to come along
on their trip.
“Xu,” he began, keeping cryptic in front of Susi. “Maybe it would be
a good idea to let her come along…you know, to act as lookout and even do some
driving when we’re getting close?”
Dale watched as Xu’s expression turned from irritated to intrigued.
He kneeled down to pet her pooch. “You have a driver’s license? Are you a good
driver?”
“Yes and yes,” she replied, glancing up at Dale. “You want me to
drive into a tornado?”
“Possibly,” Dale admitted. “Very possibly.”
***
If you like a story with characters who challenge each other with brutal honesty, lots of comic repartee, and a few twists and turns (and tornadoes!) you might just enjoy
In The Eye.
If you like threesomes, group sex, BDSM, and fetish erotica, Kinksters is for you!
Get Kinksters today from retailers like
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