Xander had invited me over to his dojo for six. I was so nervous! I spent extra time applying my makeup, even though my naturally luminescent complexion didn´t need it anyway. I used my "Foxy Girl" eyeshadow; the kind with lots of glitter that made my indigo eyes sparkle, and coral blush that made my sculpted, high cheekbones look like the graceful buttresses of the Notre Dame.
If I had learned anything from dear, sweet Shari, it was to dress for success. And if I wanted to succeed at the dojo, I would have to return to my roots: Japan. I had an idea, the neurons in my frontal cortex firing in sequence, each going off like synchronized fireworks to make the Fourth of July that was my life go as smoothly as possible. For my 10th birthday, Shari got me a low cut Chun Li outfit, which is pretty standard issue for girls in Japan. Shari always said that if I got it, flaunt it. She did the flaunting for me, trimming all my clothes several inches shorter than they were when we got them. As I looked over my Chun Li outfit, I thought that it would be better if I didn't wear any undergarments. The outfit was tight enough to keep all of my nethers where they should be. For shoes, once again, I decided to go with the practical: a pair of high heeled Prada combat boots. Shari got them for me in case I decided to go into the Navy Seals. Looking at myself, I was proud. My breasts looked like taught cantaloupes, as if my chest was pregnant. My figure was lithe and fluid, sensuous feminine lines running from head to toe. I blew my hair out of my face. I hadn't done much to it; I just put it up in a messy bun. Its color and texture reminded me of the earthen tombs of old. I looked just good enough to avoid embarrassment.
I hobbled down the stairs with my 10-inch high heels. What was I doing? Xander would never like me! I was like a lost dove, languid in the torrents of the vicious sea of emotion that was love. The world was not my oyster! What was there for me, plain, boring, Chanthalia Worthington-Smythe.
I saw Bleu walk in the front door. He was wearing clothes. They matched the curtains. Gliding fluidly down the stairs, I threw myself at his feet.
"Oh, Bleu!" I said, wiping tears away from the glossy aquamarine waterfalls that were my photoreceptors. "It's terrible! Xander wants me to visit him at his dojo! But I'm not good enough for Xander! Just look at me!" I collapsed, allowing the sobs resonate within my fragile, feminine body.
Bleu was gay, and he had the gay man's instinct, alright. "Oh, Chancey, you trouble me so. I just walked in the door from two weeks on Fire Island and this how you great me!" He was stern, but when he looked down at my velvety lilac eyes, he just couldn't stay furious.
"I'm sorry…" I automatically reverted like an automaton to my baby voice, praying for clemency towards a man who represented my redemption.
"Chanthaliana, what's wrong?" He asked, his lisps spinning luscious silk from the words that he just said that time.
"Well, there's this boy. Xander. And he's the cutest boy in school. He's handsome and hunky and sexy and has a big penis and he's pretty much the most perfect guy ever. I just met him today. He invited me over to his dojo and he wants to spar with me! To spar! I'm not ready to go that far, Bleu! Bleu, you represent my redemption, my clemency, the passport to all that is good or could be in the gurgling maelstrom that is my life! Help me!"
Bleu had the look of a mother in his eyes as he looked at me. I looked back. "Oh, Chanthy, just believe in yourself. I want you to go to Xander, look into the lustrous viridian profundities of his eyes, and kiss him right on the mouth. Do you hear me?"
"Yes, Bleu…" I hated when he got angry. "Can you drive me to his dojo now?"
"What else am I for?" He said jokingly. He liked to pretend that he was our slave. He found it funny, but the whole shtick could get a little creepy sometimes, because sometimes it seemed like his interest in slavery was more than joking. One time, after my dad hit him for teaching me evolution (AN: If you think about it, there is no valid scientific basis for evolution. Get the facts, guys: creationism.org) I found him rubbing himself in the bathroom and looking at a picture of a bunch of slaves being whipped an old Southern plantation. Since then, I have suspected he was racist.
A few minutes later, we pulled into the parking lot f Xander's dojo. It was in the middle of a verdant field, frothing with wildflowers. The rice paper walls and bamboo frames reminded me of my old childhood dojo in Kyoto. I took a deep breath, my breasts swelling in my Chin Li outfit like ripe pummelos. "Go get 'em, honey," Bleu grinned.
"Okay" I sighed sulkily, and slid from the passenger's seat of Bleu's powder blue Mini Cooper.
I walked up the sun-kissed dirt path up to the front door. When I opened it, I noticed it was chocked full of veritable warriors to be, each seething with frothing bloodlust, and eager to prove themselves. They turned toward me, giving me a collective stare that could shatter bones.
But not mine.
I beckoned them with a porcelain-like, graceful hand. They charged. The first was a brutish boy. He was large. I kicked him so hard in the jaw that I heard a horrible cracking sound, as if his jaw had been broken. It had. My kick had caused his teeth to cleave clean through his tongue and get lodged in the roof of his mouth. I then picked him up with a dainty arm, and punched him in the mouth so hard that he swallowed his teeth. Amateur. The next in line was a buck-toothed broad. She sneered at me and got into a fighting stance. But my feline reflexes were too fast for her. She didn't even register that I had twisted one of her blonde pigtails around her pasty gullet until it was too late. The sound of fracturing vertebrae rented the air and she fell like a fleshy rag doll on the floor on top of the first aggressor.
The rest came at me with no mercy, but just as they showed me no mercy, I, too, would show them very little mercy, if none at all. Bleu watched from the window, his lips curling like coral tendrils into an encouraging smile. I blew a kiss back at him, which he caught with one of his hands, as I whipped out my tessen. Bring it on.
The battle was like a dance, the pulse and rhythm of each successful blow not unlike the unchaste gyrations of a night club. Dodge. Strike. Punch. Kick. Spit. Soon the room of bloodthirsty warriors to be was just a pile of groaning lumps, the smell of burning flesh rife within the air. These guys were wimps. My sister always made sure that I could handle any opponent I fought. She, unlike these veritable wimps, was not a veritable wimp.
Suddenly, I heard someone behind me, clapping slowly. Thinking it was an opponent that had escaped my wrath, I drew my tessen in front of my face and pivoted with the deftness and grace of a ballet dancer. But it wasn't an opponent; it was Xander! He was even cuter than I remembered. He wasn't wearing the traditional ghee, or "fighting shirt". In fact, he wasn't wearing a shirt at all. My eyes were drawn to his well-muscled torso; his taut pectorals adorned only with two lavish participles, gleaming like silver in the light of the cold, pale moon. A fine misting of sweat gave his golden- brown skin a dewy, opalescent quality. I longed to replace his sweat with the saliva from my tongue. In my mouth. The sinuous slopes of his body were, to me, like the unravaged sands of an Egyptian desert. I wanted to explore these uncharted territories. His thighs, which showed through his pants which he was wearing on his legs, were meaty and satisfying. I looked up, afraid of what he might think of my visually devouring him. But his eyes were smoldering with what may have possibly been passion.
