Today my guest is Tinnean!
--
I’ve talked before of the
necessity for me to have a title before I can comfortably start to write. It
can be as inane as Disclaimers in the
Prologue or as telling as The One Who
Got the Bullet Was Lucky.
This time, it was simple. I was
writing about a couple of men who were getting married, so the title would be Here Comes the Groom.
But then I realized that the crux
of the story was being faithful, so I changed the title to The Wedding Vow. No, wait a second, they’d both be exchanging vows, so: The
Wedding Vows.
I usually find listening to music
very conducive to writing. (and less distracting than watching TV) WAVV, the
radio station down here in SW Florida, is great for the easy listening sound
that’s my music of choice, but Sonic, the music service offered by DirecTV,
nails it when I want to hear tunes of the ’50s.
We were talking about titles, weren’t
we? How did we get to music? Let me tell you about that. ;-)
One evening, while I was
listening to Malt Shop Oldies on
Sonic, Chuck Berry’s “Brown-Eyed Handsome Man” came on.
All right, the perfect title! Brown-Eyed Handsome Man!
Now, Kipp was always going to be
a blue-eyed blond, but Hyde’s coloring was up in the air. Hearing this song
gave me the perfect description for him.
But wait a second: brown-eyed, as
used in song, usually denotes someone of color. (The Righteous Brothers’
“Brown-Eyed Woman” and Van Morrison’s “Brown-Eyed Girl”.) Id never written an
interracial romance before. Could I do it?
Yes, I could! I’ve got a great
title, two loveable characters, and I like the route this story is taking.
So I’m keying my little heart
out, and all of a sudden, Kipp is having a conversation with his Granddad:
I shook my head.
“That clause in the contract…. Why marry me?”
“Haven’t you
looked into a mirror recently?”
“Of course.
‘Item, two lips, indifferent red—’”
Wait, what? Okay, I go for
offbeat titles (see my first Dreamspinner novel, Bless Us With Content –emphasis on the second syllable), but this
one... I liked it. I liked it a lot.
I finished the story, sent it off
to Dreamspinner, and signed a contract for it.
And that, kiddies, is how Here Comes the Groom came to be Two Lips, Indifferent Red.
(Although the folder is still
labeled Groom.) *falls down laughing*
Excerpt:
Charlestown,
Pennsylvania
May
2017
Charlestown,
Pennsylvania was beautiful in May. The trees that lined the streets of the
small university town had leafed out earlier in the month. Flowers bloomed in a
riot of color and scents in front of the stately homes that now served as
dormitories for Charles T. Armand University.
Of
course, I wasn’t able to enjoy that balmy spring day. The semester had come to
an end, and while I’d taken most of my finals, there were two left, and I
intended to do as well on them as I’d done on the others. Scholarships funded
my education at Armand U, and I needed to maintain my GPA.
I
took a break when my bladder informed me in no uncertain terms that if I didn’t
pay a visit to the john now, things
were going to get ugly.
And
since I had already interrupted my studying, I decided to go down to the first
floor, where there was a vending machine. I could use the sugar rush, and a bag
of M&Ms would do the trick.
It
would take a little while for the sugar to work its magic, so I went out onto
the front porch and leaned against the railing.
The
air was like warm silk against my face, and I closed my eyes, tipped back my
head, and breathed in the lovely fragrance of the flowers I’d helped plant
earlier in the spring.
Well, standing
here doesn’t get the studying done. “Time to get back to the books,
Llewellyn.”
I
returned to my room, opened the door, and frowned.
“Hey,
Kipp! I thought you’d fallen in!” My roommate, Andrew Scott, was sprawled
casually on my bed. Of course he wasn’t on his own bed—that was piled high with
the clothes he was packing to go home.
I
could have lived without him, but I hadn’t been given much choice. I’d learned
early on in life not to make waves, and so I generally wound up with the
roommates no one else wanted: players, partiers, and general pains in the ass.
The room would be mine alone during the summer semester, but hopefully, come
the fall I’d have someone who didn’t get quite
as much on my last nerve.
“Kippers! You with me, boy?”
I
paused for a minute before turning and closing the door behind me. I hated when
people called me Kippers, but I hated being called “boy” even more. Hearing
that always made me look around for my father.
“Yes?”
“Phone
call for you!” He waggled my cell phone.
“And
you felt the need to answer it?”
“Hey,
we’re genetically programmed to do that. Besides, that ring tone….”
“Oh?”
My heart felt like it was doing somersaults. “Was it ‘Brown-Eyed Handsome
Man’?”
He
shrugged. “I didn’t recognize it, but it sounded like elevator music to me.”
That
didn’t surprise me. If it wasn’t something like “I Wanna Sex You Up” or “Bust a
Move,” he had no idea what it was.
I
rarely got phone calls, so I assumed it was a prank he had set up. “Tell
whoever it is that I’m not interested and hang up my phone.”
“You
sure? She sounds sexy as all hell!”
Now
I was certain it was a prank. Sexy-as-all-hell women didn’t call me. Not that I
minded; I’d much rather have received a call from a guy, and one guy in
particular. He was older, and so sexy,
although that wouldn’t have mattered—I’d have been content with someone who
loved me, no matter what he looked like.
I’d
learned better than to let a handsome face draw me in.
I
thought of Daniel, who’d not only made a fool of me in high school, but who’d
broken my heart as well.
We’d
gone to grade school together until second grade. At that time, I was sent to a
boarding school in upstate New York, where no one knew me as Marcus Llewellyn’s
son, and where I was happy.
That
lasted until I was fourteen, when, as abruptly as I’d been sent away, I’d been
ordered to return home and informed that I would start Benjamin Martin High in
the fall.
I
ran into Daniel when it turned out we had homeroom together. And
embarrassingly, I popped wood. Every time
I looked at him, I wound up with an erection, and so I got into the habit
of wearing my shirt untucked.
By
our senior year, not only was Daniel a jock, he headed the debate team, played
clarinet in the school orchestra, sang in senior chorus, always got the lead
role in drama club, and was president of the student body. Added to that, he
was so handsome there wasn’t a girl in school who’d say no to him. Rumor had it
that included some of the teachers as well.
