Interview with the Domme

"You stupid bitch," he said, as he backed away holding his nose against the crimson flow. "You better watch yourself. I ain't done with you."

He stared at me for a while as he backed slowly away. Then he turned and shuffled off the field.

"You okay?" I asked the girl.

"Yeah," she said. "You?"

"I'm fine."

I am Thunderbird, I almost said, but didn't. Instead I asked her if she wanted me to walk her home.

And that's how I met Natalie.

"I know Natalie," Sally said, when I told her the story later that evening. "She's a good kid. Too shy though, never one to speak up for herself. I'm not surprised something like this happened."

"Are you saying it was her fault?"

"No, not at all. I'm just saying she's the kind of girl without a lot of friends. Like the wounded gazelle on the Serengeti. One look at her and you know all the lions see her as prey."

"Is that another one of your dad's sayings?"

Sally shook her head. "Nah. Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom. Sunday nights at seven."

I smiled. "We don't have a television."

"Natalie will be alright," Sally said. "She's got you to look after her now."

And then Sally took my hand in hers and held it. I remember it as clear as yesterday. Right there at her family's kitchen table, Sally Morning Sparrow held my hand and told me that Natalie had me now.

What does that mean? I remember thinking. Was Sally giving me up because Natalie needed me? Did she feel like she had to give me up? That I wanted her to?

Of course, I had never even told Sally the way I felt about her at that point. Too young, too stupid, I don't know. I wondered for a long time after that moment if somehow she always knew, and just assumed that I did too. But things had lingered too long without saying, and when she saw that maybe someone else needed me too, that she was ready to step aside.

Man, that was a lot for my adolescent brain to handle. So I said nothing. I sat there at Sally's kitchen table, holding her hand, and like an idiot, I said nothing. After a while I guess she got tired of waiting, so she let go of my hand and pushed her chair back.

"You coming over for dinner tomorrow?" she asked.

"My mom's got the day off," I said. "I should probably spend some time with her."

"Okay. If you change your mind..."

I pushed my chair back and stood up. "I'll let you know."

"Goodbye, Betty."

"Bye, Sally."

*

"That part always makes me sad," Desi said. "I always felt like you and Sally should have been together."

"Well, we did cross paths several years later, after college. But she had moved on, had a family, even. We had been away from each other too long." Betty laid her hand on Desi's bare shoulder and rubbed back and forth a few times.

Karin wondered briefly if Betty was trying to comfort Desi, or herself.

"Besides," Betty said, "If I had settled down with Sally, I never would have met you girls."

Desi leaned her head on Betty's arm and sighed. Karin stood up from her stool and moved over behind them, encircling them both in her arms.

"One should not dwell on the past, or the future, but keep the mind in the present," Betty said. "And in the present I have you two, and that is all that I need."

"Is that one of Sally's dad's quotes?" Desi asked.

"Buddha, actually. Paraphrased." Betty's lips stretched into a taut smile, and Karin hugged Desi and Betty a little tighter.

"Would anyone like a little dessert?" Betty finally asked.

"You made dessert?" Karin said.

"Not made, bought. I bought some ice cream. It was on special." Betty shrugged as if that was enough to explain it all.

"So, you and Natalie had a bit of history too, if I remember." Desi was prompting Betty back to the story as Betty headed for the freezer.

Karin tapped the record button again.

*

Betty Nguyen

That afternoon was not the last time I walked Natalie home. At first, she offered to pay me. She said she'd buy my lunch everyday if I'd walk her home.

"I can buy my own lunch, thanks." I didn't tell her I was on Federal Free and Reduced.

"I feel like I owe you something, you know?" Natalie was fidgeting.

Natalie fidgeted a lot. I guess you could say she was a fidgety kind of girl. But I liked her anyway. She was quiet, and polite, and kind of cute in her own fidgety sort of way. If I wasn't so hung up on how I blew it with Sally, I might have even told Natalie this.

"I walk to school with you, because there's safety in numbers," I said. "You remember what that mouth breather said. He said he was gonna get me. We'll if that ever happens, you and me, we can take him on together."

Natalie thought this over for a while, trying to add it all up, how she was going to come to my aid in a scuffle.

"You ever watch Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom?" I asked. "The lions only go after the ones that look weak. We just gotta look tough."

Natalie smiled. I wasn't sure how she was going to pull off looking tough, but my little pep talk seemed to perk her up. I felt a lot like Thunderbird.

"I still feel like I should pay you," she said.

"You can buy me an ice cream," I said, "Would that be okay?"

Natalie nodded with enthusiasm.

And that, I guess you could say, was our first date. Though again, I didn't really see it that way. I simply promised to be Natalie's protector, and she promised to buy me ice cream, everyday if I wanted it. I told her once a week was plenty. Thunderbird is not greedy.

After a while, I guess Natalie felt like she wasn't holding up her end of the bargain. In her own adorable, fidgety way, she told me that she felt there was more that she should be doing for me. And me, in my own dense manner, didn't get it and asked her if she wanted to help me with my English homework.

Math I could do. I was a whiz at math. English on the other hand was a little trickier for me, since I was not a native born speaker. Natalie agreed to my terms.

I figured out later, that while she enjoyed the time we spent together doing homework, there was something else on her mind. It became crystal clear, when one night as I was thanking her for helping me study, she grabbed my hand and stuck it under her shirt.

"I can do more than just homework," she said. "I know what you like, and I can give it to you."

Knowing Natalie, it must have taken her at least a month to get the courage up to do that. It took me almost as long to formulate a reply. For the most part, I was content to stand there on her front porch and enjoy the feeling of her soft, warm skin under my fingers.

"I'll see you tomorrow, okay?" I really didn't know what else to say, but I was coherent enough to give Natalie a little peck on the cheek to let her know that I appreciated her offer.

All the way home I smiled. I may have missed my chance with Sally, but Natalie was a really nice girl, and in spite of what I might have said about her being fidgety, I really did enjoy her company. I figured I would enjoy it a lot more if she wanted me to put my hands under her shirt again. Sometimes it's good to be the Thunderbird.

That night in my bed, I thought long and hard about what Natalie had said—what she was inviting me to do. I wasn't sure if she liked girls like I did, or if she was just open-minded enough that she was adapting herself to what I liked. I never once thought that she could be straight, and just giving me her body as payment for protection.

In my teenage brain, the Thunderbird's benevolence would not allow such a thing as sex for protection to even be considered. Natalie fell in love with me, because I was her protector. She offered her body to me because she loved me and she wanted me to touch her, not because of something so petty as feeling obligated.

That's the way it was in my mind that night, as I lay in my bed, with my hands between my thighs, thinking about Natalie. Natalie and the warm skin of her breast that felt so good under my fingertips. Natalie... My hand rising and falling with her breathing. Natalie... I arched my back and shuddered. Natalie.

The next night when I came around to Natalie's house to study, I nearly dropped my books on my foot. She stood at the door wearing a dress that looked like it was from last year. And I don't mean that it was out of fashion, as if I would have cared about that, but rather that it probably fit her more properly last year.

This year, it was a little shorter, and a little tighter than what her parents would want to let her out of the house with. I marveled at her bare thighs. I'd never really seen her with anything other than jeans and a t-shirt before, and her smooth creamy skin held my attention for quite some time.

"Betty? Do you want to come in?"

"Hmm?" I raised my gaze to her face. "Sure."

I swear I heard a little giggle from Natalie as I followed her through the front door.

"My parents went to the city for the night. To see a show." Natalie picked up my hand and held it in hers. "So we can probably study 'til about eleven o'clock before anyone gets home."

"I -- You... You look beautiful, Natalie." I wasn't trying to butter her up either, she looked absolutely... Wow!

I watched the color quickly rising in Natalie's cheeks and the way she turned her head toward her feet, but yet still raised her eyes to me. She smiled. Natalie was doing all this while loosely holding my hand, there in her parent's foyer. I started shaking.

Everything was so perfect. The way Natalie looked up at me, the warmth of her hand, the softness of her skin. My heart was racing. I honestly felt a little lightheaded.

"Betty?"

I opened my mouth, but no words came out. It felt like someone had just fed me a bowlful of cotton balls.

"Maybe you should sit down."

I nodded and let Natalie lead me over to the couch. Somewhere along the way I realized I had left my school books in her foyer. I couldn't for the life of me remember how that happened, but I had a feeling she hadn't planned for us to get much studying done anyway.

For a fidgety girl, Natalie had sure worked up a lot of courage for that evening. I was still in shock, but she managed to take care of moving my hands wherever she thought they needed to be, and I visited some warm, wonderful places that evening. And at the end of it all Natalie laid her head on my chest and looked up at me with those big brown eyes of hers.

"Did you like it?" she asked.

I nodded. "Did you?" I managed to say.

"Mm-hmm. Thanks for walking me home everyday."

I let out a long sigh. I don't know if Natalie noticed it or not. But that's another one of those things that stuck with me that night, because I felt a little deflated by her words.

Sure, my body was satisfied. But as soon as Natalie thanked me for walking her home, I realized what it was for her—that it really was just reciprocity—payment for me being her protector.

*

"That's so sad," Desi said.

"It is and it isn't." Betty placed a hand on Desi's arm and on mine. "I learned a very important thing that night."

"Never trust an eighteen year-old girl in a tight dress?" Desi quipped.

"No, that I loved the feeling I got when Natalie looked at me as her protector. The things she did for me with her body, that was wonderful, too. But when we stood in her parent's foyer, and she held my hand while looking up with those eyes. That's when I knew."

"That you loved her?"

"That I wanted to be her protector. Her Thunderbird."

"And were you?"

"Yes. For our entire senior year, I walked Natalie to and from school everyday without fail."

"And did you ever—?"

"No. I think she would have, and I think I would have enjoyed it as much as I did that first time we were together. But deep inside I would always know that she was doing it because she felt like she owed me something. She was doing what she thought I wanted, and not what she wanted."

"And that bothered you?"

"Yes."

"But what about us?" Desi asked, taking Betty's hand and sliding it under the gapping fabric of her apron.

Karin looked on with a smirk as Betty's hand disappeared from view and the chest area of Desi's apron was now bigger on the right side than the left.

"It's different," Betty said.

"This is exactly what Natalie did, isn't it?"

"But I know you, my dearest Desi," Betty said. "And I know that you want me to do this. I know it makes you happy to give yourself over to me, to trust me to do as I please with your body."

Desi thrust her head back and let out a throaty moan. "Amen to that, sister."

"Mistress," Betty corrected, and then broke out into a wide grin.

"Yes, Mistress." Desi was pushing her stool back and leaning over the butcher block table with her weight forward on her elbows. Somehow, miraculously, Betty's hand was still attached to her right breast.

"Perhaps you should punish me for my mistake... Mistress."

Oh, I'm sure she will, Karin thought.

Desi spread her feet apart and wiggled her ass.

"I stole a noodle, too," Karin blurted out. "Earlier. While you weren't looking."

Desi looked over her shoulder, shooting a knowing glance at Karin, realizing that what she said was not true, but unwilling to spoil the ruse.

"See Desi?" Betty said. "You enjoy it. Both of you. Giving yourselves to me."

"Yes, Mistress," said Desi. Then she straightened up. "More ice cream before our spankings, Mistress?"

Karin had a feeling that her interview was finished for the time being—at least until they all got their playfulness out of their systems. She reached over and tapped stop on her phone's recording app, before stripping off her apron to follow Betty and Desi into the living room area.

Betty was pulling the two women along with a firm grip on one of each of the girl's nipples. They were all three giggling with delight.

* * *

Part II -- Mother's Journey

Karin and Desi lay, still bent over the back of the sofa, with Betty Nguyen between them. All three women were panting and trying to catch their breath. Karin and Desi were panting because they had just been on the receiving and of ten good, hard swats to their now pink and tingling bottoms. Betty was panting because she had just delivered the ten good, hard swats, simultaneously, to those two very lovely bottoms.

There was no serious infraction to bring about the spankings, but rather just a bit of goading, mostly from Desi, and the fact that like so many other things on this day, it had become a tradition.

"Mmm, thank you, Mistress," Desi practically purred.

Karin, who had lately become more a dispenser of spankings than a receiver, said nothing for the moment, but did smile as she paused for a time to enjoy the warm feeling that came from the expert work of her former mistress.

"Thank you, Mistress," Karin said.

"You girls know how much I love a nice pink bottom." And with that said, Betty rubbed her hands vigorously over both women's bare backs and leaned forward to kiss each one on the nape of the neck.

"Why don't you two recover a little and I'll clean up lunch," Betty said. "Then we'll go visit my mother."

Of course, Karin and Desi wouldn't hear of their mistress doing anything but relaxing, and they were the ones to take care of the lunch dishes. And just like always, the two grown women reverted to some completely immature teenage hijinks, as they giggled and splashed in the kitchen sink, covering each other with soap suds in the process.

When the work was complete, and the suds wiped away, the three of them stood together in the entryway of Betty's home. The mood had become solemn and hushed. Karin and Desi took a moment to get dressed, and Betty collected three handfuls of apricot blossoms before they exited the farmhouse. In another Tet tradition, they were heading to the site of Betty's Mother's grave.

"You never talk much about your mother," Desi said from the front passenger seat of Betty's Subaru wagon.

"Not much to say," Betty replied, not taking her eyes off the road. "She had a hard life."

The three women sat in silence for a time, watching the ubiquitous fir trees passing by as they headed north on highway fifty-one toward Salem.

"But if you really want to know," Betty said.

"May I record this for my book?" Karin asked, from the back seat.

"Of course, dear."

Karin thought she detected a wavering in her mistress's voice. Desi must have sensed it too, because she had moved her left hand to slowly rub Betty's thigh a few times before leaving it there to rest.

*

Betty Nguyen

"Mama, why do we have to go?" I was only six years old at the time, but I remember asking her that. And I remember what she said.

"It's too dangerous for us to stay here. Uncle Chris is going to find us a boat, so we can go to America. They have horses in America. Won't that be fun?"

I had no idea what a horse was at that age, and I was pretty sure that Uncle Chris was not actually my uncle. In fact, he was not related to us at all as far as I could tell. He sure didn't look like Mom or me, but he did try to take care of us. He might have been married to one of Mom's sisters or cousins, I don't know for sure. She never really talked about him after we got to America, and I don't remember him ever coming to visit us.

But, I'm getting ahead of myself.

I was born in a small fishing village in central Vietnam, somewhere south of Quảng Trị and north of the old imperial capital of Huế. I don't know if the village even had a name, and I'm sure you won't find it on any map. This was in June of Nineteen Sixty-Eight, and the country was a bit of a mess.

While I was busy being born, U.S. Marines were busy fighting a pitched battle against the North Vietnamese at Khe Sanh, only about fifty miles northeast of our village. Earlier in that same year, while I was still just a twinkle in my mother's eye, the North Vietnamese had launched the Tet offensive, and the ensuing Battle of Huế had resulted in thousands of civilian deaths. I'm told my father was one of them.

That was probably the turning point for U.S. involvement in Vietnam, the year things started sliding backwards. It was certainly a turning point for my family. I wasn't born yet, so I missed it, but I just wanted you to know what my mother was going through at the time, so you won't judge her too harshly.

We left our village soon after I was born—my mother told me that—we had been evacuated and moved further south. It seemed we were always being evacuated, always on the move, as the country slowly crumbled to dust underneath us. I remember spending a lot of time in my mother's arms as we walked, sometimes for days, to the next place that was deemed safe.

As Nineteen Seventy-Four was coming to a close, we ran out of places to evacuate to. I was six years old then, so I had a better understanding of what was going on. I could tell that my mother and the others were worried, but Uncle Chris assured us he could get us out. He had arranged passage for us on a boat, he said.

All I can say for the boat when I saw it, was that it was floating. It certainly wasn't built to hold the twenty-three people who boarded it that day. But I remember Uncle Chris said all we had to do was get into the gulf and we'd be picked up by a U.S. Navy ship and taken to America.

Well, we made it to the gulf alright, but there were no Navy ships waiting to take us anywhere. Maybe they were all busy doing Navy things, I don't know. There was still a war on, so I suppose it's a distinct possibility. There were some merchant ships, but they all passed us by, like we weren't even there.

To this day, I still don't believe that Uncle Chris deliberately deceived us. I think what happened is that things were in such a state of constant flux; that what was truth one day could not be counted on the next. But I do blame him for sending us out there, woefully unprepared for anything more than a few hour's journey.