Not Just Any Dancing Day

Chapter One: Class Time
Author\'s Note: This is a fun little plot bunny that hopped into my head that I decided to write for a friend of mine to cheer him up. Enjoy!


“Get on the floor and dance!”

I glanced up to see my favorite dance instructor motioning for her class to move onto the dance floor. I chuckled a little and shook my head. Despite her best efforts at the beginning of every class to push students onto the dance floor, Mrs. Peterson barely managed to get a few couples dancing. I had to give her credit though for trying but with the many students being nervous shy guys and hormonal teenage and college age girls there was plenty of uneasy awkwardness between classmates. This once more was the case as a half dozen hesitantly walked across the hardwood floor to give a try to the swing dance playing on the karaoke machine.

A blur of blue and red passed in front of my eyes suddenly. As I refocused, I realized it was Terrance with his latest victim. He was one of my few fellow intermediate classmates but his dancing was definitely lacking. I have no idea how many classes he has taken but it does not show in his technique. He also tends to attempt advanced dance moves with partners who are fresh beginners, which of course makes the dancing pair look quite ridiculous. He then proceeds to blame his inexperience partner on the inability to get any steps right. Most of the girls try to avoid him since he sweats profusely and is an older dirty old man that stares at the girls like he\'s undressing them with his eyes in his mind.

“Memphis! Get a partner!”

I looked to Mrs. Peterson as she glared at me. I sighed and stood up from my chair as I looked around the floor for a partner. Mrs. Peterson liked me a lot; especially since I was one of her best male dancers so that also meant she loved to pick on me for examples. Tonight was a free dance night for our ballroom dance class and we would not have to worry about lessons. However, a lesson always seemed to come about when a beginner asked a question or Mrs. Peterson noticed improper body structure or leading. I hoped to myself that it would not come to that tonight.

“Save me,” came a whispered reply as I felt a hand grab my arm.

I turned to find my good friend Lauren clutching me in a death grip.

“What’s the matter?” I asked, prying her fingers from my bicep.

“He just showed up and he looked my way when Mrs. Peterson called for partners,” she said as we started our steps.

I knew exactly whom she was referring to when she said ‘he’ with that emphasis and fright. Charlie was another intermediate classmate but he was even worse than Terrance. Even though he had taken multiple ballroom dance courses, Charlie always managed to be offbeat for every type of dance, including the simplest of them all: foxtrot. The girls in my class dreaded him more than Terrance because they actually feared for their lives whenever Charlie got a hold of them. One girl ran screaming from him last week yet it did not seem to faze him one bit. He did not even realize everyone laughed at him at every class. What a wanker.

I took Lauren into a barrel roll and twisted back around effortlessly. Swing was both our favorite so we enjoyed it a lot when we got to dance together. Lauren trusted me and was always welcoming in attempting a new lift or move. But it was the typical story of my life: great dance partner but no more than friends.

“Are you in a sour mood today?” she asked suddenly as I whipped her close to me in a sweetheart move.

“What makes you say that?” I asked, a little annoyance filtering into my voice.

I certainly was in a foul mood today but I was hoping it would not come across too much tonight since the dance class was the highlight of my week. I cannot fool Lauren though, she knows me too well.

“You seem distant today,” she said. “Does it have to do with Kim?”

Bloody hell, she had me. Kim was a girl I had my eye on for some time and she was avoiding me since I asked her out recently. Some of my friends knew about it but I had not said much. You could say I was pretty disappointed when she practically blew me off but I’m not the type to flaunt my feelings easily especially for someone I am interested in seeing exclusively.

“No, my sister was on the rampage again,” I lied though it was a pretty believable excuse considering my family.

“I see,” she replied simply.

I could tell she knew what the real reason was but respected that I did not feel up to talking about it. We finished our dance in silence and parted as the song finished. Luckily for Lauren, her boyfriend finally showed up. She would not have to run from Charlie for the rest of the class. I watched her run over to him and throw her arms around his neck happily.

My foul mood returned and I averted my eyes from the blissful couple image that I still sought out for myself. The jailbait girls skirted quickly out of my path as I went straight to a chair on the edge of the floor. They knew not to get on my bad side tonight at least. The music suddenly stopped and what I had been dreading happened and for the worse.

“Ok, everyone! We have a question on tango,” Mrs. Peterson suddenly said to the class. “Find a partner and get into four lines. We’ll be doing rotation.”

Groans were issues across the room and I cried inwardly in anguish. Rotation was the evilest invention of all for this class. Not only did I have to dance with the worst dancers in the class but somehow one of the girls always managed to mess up the partner switching. Mostly it was the constant start and restarting of the simple steps of a dance that drives me over the edge. The repetition can drive someone insane.

I ended up with a random girl whose name I could not remember for the life of me. She was not half bad so I managed to not suffer extremely in the first pairing. Mrs. Peterson was in the middle of explaining something when one of the doors to the large dance hall opened and someone came inside.

“Come up here between these two wonderful gentlemen. Thanks,” Mrs. Peterson instructed to the late arrival.

Since we ended up with more girls than guys, the ones without partners were always spaced out in a certain two pair pattern so everyone could get a chance to dance even if it was not with their choice dance partner. I could not see who it was that arrived because she was standing behind a taller and much wider classmate of mine. She was placed a few lines behind me so I knew I would not get her in rotation anytime soon. No matter to me, most of the late arrivals were the high school kids who did not give a rat’s ass about the class.

We then got back to the lesson at hand, an easy pass turn. Not hard and I easily mastered it long ago in my first ballroom class. I just had to hold onto my urge to hide in the foyer of the building until the insanity was over. I had just turned my partner when I almost faltered, practically stepping on her feet. My distraction was warranted though as I saw the gaze that had alighted on me.

It was the hair I noticed first, it is always what I see initially and is my favorite trait on women. The warm brown tresses just reached her shoulders and had a shape that framed her face almost perfectly. Her round, dark brown irises transfixed me in my position and I found myself unable to move away. The chocolate touch of her eyes played well with her olive tan skin, giving her an almost uniquely exotic allure.

It was then I decided I had to get to her tonight.