You who are young, be happy while you are young, and let your heart give you joy in the days of your youth. Follow the ways of your heart and whatever your eyes see, but know that for all these things God will bring you into judgment.
-Ecclesiastes 11:9 (NIV)The fact that Gabriela had been startled by Melissa’s apology was encouraging, even if Melissa’s first instinct was to apologize again for startling her. It meant maybe at least some of her fears had been unfounded. Or Gabriela was just being nice. Melissa really tried to focus on the former, though. Elizabeth’s advice still played over and over in her head, and though her words got fainter and fainter with every echo, the message did a much better job of sticking.
“Yes,” Gabriela said. “Let’s do the dancing thing. With the music. And the closeness. And the moving.”
Melissa smiled. There was something else Gabriela said too, but that was less important. “Well, let’s get down to the dancefloor first,” she said.
A few other couples and groups had arranged themselves around the floor, though there was still a rather large amount of space left open. Melissa assumed that that was there wasn’t any music yet; a balcony had been commandeered and a deejay was still in the process of setting up. She wondered if they were planning on using the school’s speakers -- the ones in the ceiling pointed straight down at the auditorium -- to help with the sound, though surely the deejay would have speakers of their own specifically chosen for occasions like these, right?
Melissa took the opportunity to address some of Gabriela’s concerns. She’d prepared for this, and just because there was that slip in the middle there didn’t mean the words didn’t come flowing out of her when she was ready. “Okay, so at dinner, we talked mostly about slow dancing, um, that’s probably going to be, like, a quarter at best of what’s going to happen, though,” she said. “The idea is the same, though. The drumbeat’ll- um, the basic idea is that you count probably to four over and over and then start doing moves to match each count. So, like, um…”
She went through the motions she’d prepared earlier. “So if I’m standing like this, then one is stepping to the side and bringing my arms up like this, right? And then on two, I snap my fingers --” She demonstrated the sound “-- and then get ready for three, where I step the other way and on four I snap again.” Another snap. “And then, I guess you just keep doing that, or some other motion until the song ends
“It’s silly, I know, and you’re probably not like me like this but it’s easy to think you look stupid doing stuff like this if you’re not- if you haven’t done something like this before. But the thing everyone told me last year when they were trying to get me to do this was, um, nobody really cares. The only one who would is me and I won’t. I promise.” Melissa gave a wry smile. “I’ll probably be wondering who else is looking at me, to be honest. But, um, give it a try. Just, uh, one.” She stepped, arms up. “Two.” Snap. “Three.” The other way. “Four.” Snap. “One-”
The deejay cut in. They’d finally set up, apparently, and after a little feedback, the music finally cut in, starting with a chorus even Melissa knew.
If our lo~ove is tragedy Why are you my remedy?
If our lo~ove’s insanity
Why are you my clarity?
Melissa mouthed a “Ready?” at Gabriela, though she wasn’t sure if Gabriela saw or heard that. Still, she started counting, going through the motions again. One. Two. Three. Four. One. Two. Three. Four.
This was the final hill she had to climb, right? This was what all her efforts had gone towards, right? She just had to guide Gabriela through a set and hope that she had fun in the process.
One. Two. Three. Four.
Melissa could barely admit it to herself, but she was almost having fun too.