Starting on FridayI have a brand new short story. It's been cut into three parts which are a little longer than I like to post but it was where the natural breaks in the story are.
This isn't a story I planned to write at first but while working on my novel I found myself needing more of Cal's backstory with Lucas. The problem with this is of course that I don't write love stories, not out of any objection to them, I just have no sense of romance (which every guy I've ever been with can attest to). So instead I approached this story in two ways:
First I wanted to play with some tropes of both vampire stories and romances, either subverting them or making them fully justified by the circumstances (actually playing with genre tropes is one of my favorite parts of writing). For example, fabulous sexy wardrobes are a staple of romances but Cal and Lucas are both pretty casual dressers most of the time. So the circumstances they meet under justifies being dressed in sexier outfits than their everyday wardrobes which lean heavily to jeans and tshirts.
Second I wanted to explore why Cal would choose to start a relationship with a vampire. I'm not a fan of soul mates, love at first sight, or overpowering attraction as the reason for a relationship, it seems like a lazy way to throw two people together who otherwise would never otherwise get together. Real relationship grow into love, they don't start that way, so why would anyone start dating a monster who sees them as food? Cal has her reasons and I wanted to explore them (Lucas of course has reasons of his own but most of the story is from Cal's POV).
I have more I want to say about Chance Meeting but I'm going to save it for the wrap-up post.
