I would sub title this as: This Devil Didn’t arrive on Horseback
Psst...hint...I'm not talking about Gordon Ramsay .
Here I am editing my new story for publication. The working title is, Dom Chronicles which may change, who knows, but guess what happened? Well, aside from me cracking up on occasion, I mean.
*Leans in to whisper*
Typos are sometimes better than the text purge the editing process makes.
Anyways, there I am working on those typos and suddenly I find myself more than just brushing up an already (to my mind) funny scene.
I figured I’d post the raw version of it here. It did make me laugh when I realized the additional scene could be its own book. This happens occasionally when writing. It usually means the book is a good one.
*Blinks at you* I’m not tooting my own horn here, believe me.
Most authors would agree. Why, you may ask? Well, as it goes with most jobs, by the time editing (the work-to-finish polish) in a story arrives, you want to get in and then out as fast as possible and see how the customer likes it. Right now, tough to do as I am falling in love with these characters all over again and spending major time.
Damn it.
I’m going to call this scene, A DEVIL, AN ANGEL, AND ONE GORDON RAMSAY! I love that guy, by the way, he has such a great way of expressing himself. Haha! He’s the culinary Master of oral persecution and still manages to make his audience laugh. That’s why I’m borrowing one of his favorite words to create this little scene.
This is Gates Mettle and his girl Penelope Andue – he calls her Pan — it’s their story. Pan is interviewing Gates because he’s a respected Dom who needs a bigger and younger demographic to speak to as the D/s philosophy is gaining traction and is now seen as a positive relationship tool for couples. His business has been built on this, and he’s looking to expand.Pan has the social media following, the zest, and the talent to help him while she attempts to break into the legitimate Hollywood reporting arena using these interviews as the jump. The journey isn’t easy. They like each other too much and that chemistry is changing the original business-like format into something very special.
This is the two of them discussing her view on visualizing a personal success. He’s suggested she begin with a new home purchase scenario to get started, so she went with this…
(Excerpt)
“Great idea. I’ll start with a game show.”
I had to give her a side-eye as I paused, picking up my water bottle for a swig. “Why? Are you going to spin it as you win a new home on the show?”
“In a roundabout way. The show is the original LET’S MAKE A DEAL and the way I see this is…” She stared at me and then popped her brows so comically, I fought off a grin. “I’m offered a choice by the host. A new car or the donkey with the hat and a broken down cart. When I seem to be mulling it over for too long, they offer me a mystery envelope filled with cash to sweeten the dilemma, but I go straight for the donkey in his old-timer’s chapeau.”
“What kind of new car?”
She sat back and narrowed those big eyes at me. Clearly she was disappointed I didn’t bite at the animal choose, when she said, “It doesn’t matter.”
“Yes it does. I’d need to know the value before I call you the ass.”
She laughed and leaned forward. There was a nice flush to her cheeks, although how she could be warm when she’d requested the AC lowering temperature in the hopes it would keep my eyes glued to her chest, was a mystery. “Follow me on this. It’s so what I would do, being that I’m young and flexible with a future I’m looking forward to while you’re…well, never mind that.”
“How much cash?”
“Not enough to change my mind about the donkey, okay? Pay attention.”
She sat up and switched the cross of her legs in a slow confident slide that made me look. Watch. Until she continued.
“I chose the donkey to everyone’s surprise, but I had to, being that I had a small shack in Mexico that had his name on it. Well, not on it, literally over the front doorway. Fortuitous, wouldn’t you say? This is why in my version of personal success I made it about kismet in a romantic and fatalistic way.”
“You fell in love with the donkey?” I had to ask. Her bullshit was epic.
“The moment I saw that crinkled hat with the daisy sticking out of it, yes, but that’s not the point here. I got the adorable guy home—”
“To a shack?”
She nodded enthusiastically.
“In Mexico?” I failed to see the success here.
“To my property there, after saving him from a life of tawdry commercialism on the glitzy show. There I was, ready to live a simple life with my new animal, braving the uncertainty of a future that—”
“That you were looking forward to because you’re young and optimistic and I’m old and grumpy.”
“Exactly.” She grinned. “But then when word spread by the locals about my game show win through the poem of devotion I wrote about winning my donkey. The next thing I knew, people were arriving to my little abode and paying to stay and chat.”
“About the donkey.”
“Don’t look at me like that. Who’s to say why the people were interested in the handsome brute?”
“You pimped your donkey’s good looks out?”
“I could have, but people didn’t really pay me with dollars—”
“Pesos.” I corrected shaking my head. Now I was interested in the fucking donkey.
“Yeah, yeah, they brought food, trees to plant and a couple of the guys got together and built this really cool water trough for the spoiled bugger who now had a proper plaque with his name on it, up over the whole shack, not just the front doorway. Anyways, days turned to weeks and weeks to a few months and then this guy shows up and accuses me of stealing his donkey.”
She’s looking at me. Blinking even, and there I was waiting for the rest of her personal success story. No wonder I chose her to do these interviews. “And? What did you do?”
“I got out the paperwork from the game show and I told him to see for himself. It didn’t do a bit of good though, because he might have spoken in the sexiest broken Mexican English accent I’d ever heard, but he couldn’t read a word of American English. And, just when I thought I was going to have to get a translator he could trust, the local Federales showed up and assured the richest man in the Country that I hadn’t stolen the innocent equine, but some gambler had won him in a bet and the show picked him up because they didn’t want him stuck doing tours at the Grand Canyon.”
She looked right at me and insisted. “The poor handsome brute had a bad back. Turns out the cart on the show was just a prop. Pepe didn’t refuse to pull it. He couldn’t on account of his inverted vertebrae. ”
“Pepe?”
“My mule. He wasn’t a frog which was sort of unfortunate. Every time I mentioned I had a mule everyone thought I was growing something else at the shack.”
“I bet.”
“Oh no! Don’t bet. That’s how my poor Pepe got stuck doing the game show circuit. Anyways, now I had a bigger problem on my hands. The richest, most handsome guy in all of Mexico—”
“Hang on. How did the fucking guy go from simply being rich to a Prince Charming with piles of pesos?”
“To my eyes?” she asked this as if she didn’t know how great those assets gleamed right now. Almost as if she was just getting started.
“Yes.”
“It was how determined he was over reclaiming Pepe and wanting him back. A man who loved a donkey that did nothing all day but defy you while you tried to please his arrogant pickiness?—I blame the Hollywood lights for that—is a man to love. But back to my Prince Charming. You may have a Cinderella moment covered, but this man? It was crazy. One moment I had people visiting, bringing me food, trees to plant, and people who could build buildings on my property, and in the next moment Prince Charming was insisting he expand my place to a working hacienda.”
“The shack is a hacienda now?” I nearly choked over the improbable—
“Yup, and by the time Prince Charming was finished constructing it, the only things I recognized were the original cart, we filled that with seasonal goods for the locals to come and take what they needed daily, and the humble shack? It was transformed into a living shrine to Pepe. He was quite the ham when we pulled out the camera. The whole tiny building had shots of only of him, and Prince Charming and I had five children with one on the way, at the time I was making up this personal success story for you.”
Silence.
Then? It happened. The truth hit me.
I couldn’t believe it. I was actually envious of the donkey and ready to kill a storybook character that never got laid. “You fell in love with a man who accused you of stealing his animal?”
She gave me a smile I hadn’t seen from her before. It grabbed me by the heart and tugged like a bitch. “I did. Exactly that. The man made an ass out of himself trying to get that donkey back. Can you imagine? But, here’s the thing. I refused when he said he wanted to buy Pepe for an outrageous amount. No matter how he upped the ante, I said no. I couldn’t put a price on giving up my baby, and my Prince Charming? He couldn’t expect me to, nor could he walk away. Instead he built me exactly what I wanted right down to the Saltillo tile floors, the equipale chairs, the woven white plaster ceilings skewered with hand-cut wooden beams, in the huge hacienda I’ve always dreamed of.”
I felt like shit and it was only a hypothetical story. “He loved you that much, eh?”
“Who said that? He loved Pepe that much, and he didn’t want him living in a shithole.”
Now I felt better. But… “What about the five kids with one on the way?”
She gave a curt nod, and said, “You are an astute man, Mr. Mettle, circling back to the purpose of this exercise. I like it. My personal success was achieved simply by making the correct decision for me. By doing so, I highly doubt anyone could accuse me of conforming to any of society’s conformities. Let’s face it, no one wants the donkey in that instance, right? And, until this story, I bet you hadn’t envisioned yourself with six, maybe seven kids in attendance, so yeah, that’s my personal success.”
She was quick. That’s why I loved her writing. She’d come up with this without any planning. I was smiling. I couldn’t help it. “So what are you saying? You’ll have my children?”
“I’m saying you can’t accuse me of being a conformist who doesn’t have the guts to challenge the elephant, whether he’s the richest guy in Mexico or a big, bad, Dom who says that he’s too old for me. He’s—you’re not. And, if I can spin a game show win into a romance like that, I’m pretty sure we can take these exercises for my personal growth off our agenda and maybe talk about your personal Dom experiences. That’s what’s going to sell this package to the Networks. How does that sound?”
“A non-reply.”
She blinked.
“Oh, that.” She waved as if to say, no sweat. “Sure. I intend to fill our house with beautiful babies, but first I need to find out what motivates their Dad so I can exploit that angle to get what I want.”
“A huge hacienda?”
“That would be so great, really, but right now I’m in need of an interviewee who trusts me without the constant tutoring. It’s exhausting and unnecessary. I’ll have your children after you give me my Cinderella moment.”
I leaned forward and asked, “What about Prince Charming with the sexy accent?”
“It might be a little crowded, what with all our kids and all, but if you don’t mind, I wouldn’t complain.”
A smile. That’s what she flashed at me and I knew I was fucked.
(End of excerpt)
Haha! This is the thing with these two. I love spending time with them. Their conversations are epic and when he winds up bringing her on a business trip to get the hours of recording in, I was shocked.
*Insert me flashing my magic decoder ring at you and swearing on the bauble that I’m telling you the truth—here*
They have other people during the trip that enter their twosome mix and I think that’s why they are even greater together. I love when I smile reading my work. Usually I’m too busy finding typos.
As always, thanks for stopping by!
Riley
FYI? DEVIL ON HORSEBACK is an old favorite recipe of mine – Oh, I didn’t come up with it, but I did like to serve it.
There are different versions, I guess for the color of the horse.
One goes like this: Bacon, Figs or Dates and cheese baked together. I’d make the cheese goat of some kind. I have seen this where they do it with a pungent stilton.
The second kind. This is the one that the donkey liked. 😉 That’s why I always made it with bacon, scallops and a water chestnut for crunch.
I had to add the recipe. I wouldn’t want to get flogged by Gordon Ramsay…I do what I want in the kitchen and he seems to like structure.