Questions:
A. Quickies
- Tea or wine? Tea! Ginger tea because it soothes my throat but recently, when it was in Taiwan, I took tea with milk and brown sugar and I loved it!
- Read or jog? Read!
- Cats or dogs? Dogs!
- Heels or flats?I used to love heels but when I had kids… well… I’ve tossed that dream out the window.
- Boxers or briefs? Bikini briefs
- Milk, dark or white chocolate – Milk
- Sweet or savoury- Sweet!
- Sea or mountains- It’s so hard to choose. I love them both.
B. Five likes and five dislikes
Likes:
- Unicorns
- The color pink
- Theme parks
- Romantic comedies
- Star Trek
Dislikes:
- Traffic
- Love stories with unhappy endings
- Mosquitoes
- Bad grammar
- Poorly seasoned food
C. Three things on your bucket list
- Visit Paris
- Ride a Disney Cruise
- Actively support a foundation
D. What triggered this specific story?
I was watching the ballet recital of my niece (one of many I’ve seen because I have cousins who grew up dancing ballet and they have shows every year), and I was trying really hard not to zone out. The problem was, I didn’t want to appear rude so I told myself to pay attention and not just scroll through my phone. While watching the young girls dance, bits and pieces of a story started coming to me. I quickly wrote it down. A few days (or was it weeks?) later, I was in my daughter’s school, waiting for her, and I noticed there was a martial arts class nearby and the instructors were quite good looking.
The idea of a ballerina and a martial artist seemed to fit so well together! A few days later, Bas and Geri were born!
Thank you so much for having tea with me, Ines!
We have a lot in common, Ines – I also love unicorns amd romantic comedies!
in your Heart, Only A Kiss, When Sparks Fly, All That Glitters, and Someday
With You.
Vanilla,” “A Captured Dream,” one of the four short stories in Sola Musica:
Love Notes from a Festival, “Things I’ll Never Say,” part of the Summit Books
anthology Coming of Age, and “Before the Sun Rises,” part of the Ateneo
University Press anthology Friend Zones.
magazines and a former high school and college English and Literature teacher.
She is also a wife and mom who lives in the Philippines with her husband and two little girls. Her books are available digitally on Amazon and Buqo.ph.
1. My dad left when I was a kid. have to dance in this smelly studio that doubles as an aikido dojo.
him.
maybe but still, ew.)
same building but whatever.)
is as cute as my friends say.
“Did you see him?” My ballet classmate Helena, whose hair was always in a perfect bun without a single strand out of place, floated over to me, pink skirts flapping up and down in her rush.
“Who?”
“This guy! I can’t believe you didn’t see him when you entered.” Then her bright, excited expression fell. “Oh, Geri, I hope you weren’t wearing your basketball outfit when you arrived.”
I pulled her phone closer so I could study the image on it. I blinked when I saw who it was. It was Dojo guy. He was talking to someone else in a martial arts kimono too. A girl with long hair cascading down her back. So there was no question of who Helena had just stalked in that photo. I put Helena’s phone back in her hand and wrinkled my nose. “Ew. Yeah. We kinda got into an argument.” I saw her eyes widen. “And yeah, I was wearing my basketball clothes.”
