Lieutenant (An Ell Donsaii story #3) (8 page)

Amy thought she saw a blush leaking out around Ell’s hands despite her skin bronzer. “Hah! Momma Amy’s gonna to take care of you. First, we’re going to go join that line dance, then later you can apologize to the guy that asked you to dance.” She tugged on Ell’s arm until she got up and they walked across the floor to the small group of line dancers. They were now seven in number.

Ell found herself at the end of one of the lines. The group had three men and, with Ell and Amy, six women. The steps they were making looked complicated but actually were relatively simple and repetitive so Ell, with her phenomenal mind-body coordination, quickly learned them and danced along. Then she noticed the more accomplished girls putting extra twitches and shimmies into their routines which Ell copied too. Amy, still struggling to get the steps right, shouted over at her, “I thought you didn’t know how to dance?”

Embarrassed, Ell shrugged, “I learn pretty quickly.” Looking out over the dance floor she saw the dark haired guy who’d asked her to dance whirling around the floor with another woman. They were doing a very complex swing dance that involved whirling and spinning, all the while keeping their hands in contact with one another. He even whirled the girl into the air once. It looked like a lot of fun and since Ell’s mind wasn’t really on what she was doing in the line dance she focused on exactly what the swing dancing couple did.

The music slowed and the line dancers broke up to sit. Ell noticed that the young man took his dance partner back to her seat and went back to where his friend still stood. She walked back to her own table with Amy who said, “Now it’s time to apologize to that guy you ‘shot down’ and ask him to dance.”

Ell stuck out her lower lip and lowered her head, “Don’ wanna!” Then she looked up and her eyes crinkled as she said, “But I will if you insist.”

“Yep, ‘Momma Amy’ says it’s the polite thing to do.”

Ell stood started walking towards the man, her heart in her throat. When she was about half way there his blond friend nudged him and pointed her out with his beer bottle. They both turned to watch her approach. The dark haired one lifted one eyebrow as she got close. Ell stopped in front of them and found herself momentarily unable to speak. Finally, she choked out, “My friend Amy,” with a thumb she pointed back over her shoulder, “says it was rude of me to turn down a dance. So, I’ve come to apologize and ask if you would dance with me after all?” She smiled tentatively at him.

Cody’d admired her walking towards him, hoping that she’d changed her mind about dancing. Girls often came up to him wanting to dance after they’d seen him dance with Connie. Connie and he studied dance together at UNLV and liked going out to bars to “slum with the ordinary dancers” as they called it. It was fun to dance with regular folks who struggled to keep up, then occasionally throw in a dance with Connie to show them what real dance was all about. With a serious look on his face he said, “No.”

Ell’s face fell and she turned, red faced, to make a walk of shame back to her seat.

He said, “Wait! I was kidding! I just wanted you to feel all ‘turned down’ like I did. Of course I’d dance with you. I’d love to.”

Ell turned back and flashed him a blinding smile. “Thanks!” She tilted her head. “I guess I deserved that.”

“Naw, you didn’t. I was being a jerk. My name’s Cody, what’s yours?” He studied her surprisingly pretty face.

“E… Raquel, I really don’t know how to dance. That’s why I turned you down earlier. Would you teach me?”

“Hah! I saw you line dancing, you’ve got some nice moves.”

“But I don’t know how to do anything else.”

He shrugged, “Sure, all you’ve gotta do is follow. Keep your elbows bent ninety degrees so I can push and pull on you and then I’ll just sweep you around the floor like a broom.”

Ell widened her eyes, “Oh,
could
you? That’s
just
what I was hoping for.” her eyes rolled.

He grinned, “Ah, a spunky one!” They reached the floor as a slow song finished and another fast one started. His left hand took her right and he started a gentle push pull with the beat which she immediately picked up. His right hand pointed down at his feet, indicating the simple shuffle he was doing to keep time. Cody’s brows rose as she immediately picked up the step he was doing and shuffled an exact reciprocal to his.

Ell looked up at Cody and was pleased that he didn’t look too bored. Delightedly she saw Amy walking out to the dance floor with Cody’s older blond friend. Cody took her left hand and, with a quick pull of his left, twirled her to “cuddle” in his right arm. Smoothly, he began moving her around the floor, their hips swinging slightly together. He twirled her out, then back in to cuddle in his left arm. Her eyebrows rose, this looked hard, but the moves she’d watched him do with the other girl were actually pretty easy. She thought to herself that it must be Cody’s strong lead that made it that way.

Cody’s eyebrows drew together,
she’d lied! She
did
know how to dance!
  Normally, when dancing with someone new, even if they “knew how to dance,” he had to show them each move several times, whereas this girl just effortlessly followed his lead on every move he threw at her! He decided to push her limits. He spun her out and back in, then turned himself to the inside, then began more and more complex turns and twirls. 

Ell followed easily. She’d seen each of the moves he was taking her through when he’d been dancing with Connie. She found them simple enough to copy with Cody strongly pulling her through each of the different turns.

Mixed emotions of irritation that she’d fooled him and pure joy at how well she danced flooded over Cody. He decided to push her as hard as he could.

Ell found the effortless swinging rhythm of the dancing and turning to be exhilarating, though she knew her poor endurance would leave her exhausted if they kept up this pace! She hoped to herself that Cody didn’t have any moves that she hadn’t gotten to watch him do with the other girl.

Suddenly, Cody doubled timed his footwork. Ell matched him and then he double timed the speed of the turns, pulling her through the twirling movements rapid fire. Ell found it breathtaking. Having already danced the moves with him at the lower speed, they were easy to follow, even at the much increased speed. She thumped in against his side, then whirled away, then back in, then spun, then began going under and over in a spinning flashing pretzel turn that went on and on.

He spun her away from him and began dancing solo, feet pounding and hands clapping occasionally. Ell matched him, throwing in her own shimmies and twirls from the line dance earlier. In sudden exuberance Ell did a backflip as the music thundered to a stop.

Ell clapped a hand to her mouth. The other dancers had all stopped to watch them, people at the tables were standing to get a better view, the band stared and the fiddler waved his bow at them. Cody threw a leg and arm out in a theatrical bow to her. In embarrassment, Ell realized that, in the elation of that dance, she had tremendously over performed. Hands to her cheeks, Ell turned and ran from the floor, shouldering through the crowd and fast-walking to the bathroom.

Hiding in a stall with her feet up, Ell heard Amy calling her name. “Ell, where are you?”

“Here,” she said faintly.

“Why’d you run off the floor?” Amy asked, pulling on the door to the stall.

Ell unlatched it to let her in. “Embarrassed. I shouldn’t have danced like that!”

“What do you mean? Why not! Not that I had any idea you could, of course. I thought you said you didn’t know how to dance.”

“I don’t! It’s just that Cody leads so well.”

Amy snorted, “Girl, I guarantee, no matter how well a man leads, I would
never ever
be able to dance like that.”

“Yeah, well, I’m pretty good at athletics and pick stuff up really quick. But performing like that doesn’t exactly help me fade into the woodwork like I’m supposed to.”

Amy tilted her head, “Huh… I guess you’d have to be ‘pretty good at athletics’ to win all those Olympic gold medals. But you’re
embarrassed
about that dance?”

Ell bit her lip and nodded.

Amy grinned, “Sometimes I forget that you’re only eighteen. I’d
still
be out there taking bows if I’d danced like that. Well what do you think, are you ready to go back out and face the world?”

“Can’t we just sneak out and go home?”

Amy rolled her eyes. “Come on, I guarantee all those folks think they just witnessed  something cool, done by someone who’d practiced forever. There’s nothing to be embarrassed about.” She held out her hand.

Reluctantly Ell took it and they headed back out into Tres Locos. As they stepped out of the women’s bathroom, Cody hitched up away from the wall where he’d been leaning. “Raquel, are you OK?”

Ell nodded, though she kept her eyes on the floor and her cheeks heated again. She wondered to herself why she felt so awkward in situations like this. Her training from the Academy stood her in good stead when dealing with people in her usual circumstances. She could handle her superiors and subordinates in the Air Force. But when the situation called for her to interact with strange men in what might become a romantic encounter she got all shy and started acting crazy.

Cody said, “I’m not sure what just happened there? You sure fooled me with that, ‘don’t know how to dance line though.’ Where did you learn to dance?”

Ell said something but he couldn’t hear it over the music. He leaned closer, “What?”

Ell said, “I’m a gymnast. I really don’t know much about dance, but I can follow pretty well.” She hoped that would satisfy him.

“You can’t fool me.” Cody said with some exasperation, “I study dance at UNLV and I have
never
danced with someone who could follow like you. The way you were able to pick up on everything I did, it, it was like we’d been dancing together for months!”

Ell didn’t say anything and after a long pause Cody said, “Can we dance again?”

Suddenly Connie showed up on Cody’s other side. “Come on Cody; let’s show your little friend how it’s
really
done.” She tugged at his elbow. Connie had been stunned at the graceful style that the slender brunette had displayed while dancing with Cody and then shocked and hurt at the way everyone stared at them. The crowd hadn’t even paused to watch Connie dance with Cody earlier. She’d realized that Cody and the girl hadn’t done anything really hard, they’d just done it very well. Connie wanted to show everyone in the bar what she and Cody could really do.

Cody allowed himself to be led away, but not before calling back to Ell, “Raquel, wait for me ‘til after this dance. Please?”

Ell shrugged, then leaned up against the wall where Cody’d been leaning before. Amy gave an exasperated snort and walked back out to her beer. After a moment Ell slowly followed.

The band was playing another fast song and with a whirl Connie burst out onto the floor, then trailed her hand back to Cody, starting a routine they’d perfected for a dance contest a few months ago. They swung around the floor whirling through flips, Charlestons, lifts and other aerials, finishing in a pose that brought the bar to its feet clapping. They took a bow and walked back off the floor toward Amy and Ell’s table. As they approached Ell stopped clapping and raised her glass of Coke in a salute to them.

Connie sashayed past, acknowledging Ell only with a muttered, “Top that, bitch!”

At first Ell’s temper flashed with the intent to do exactly what Connie had requested, top her dance with one leavened with gymnastic moves, but she relentlessly tamped down her anger. She’d caused too many problems in the past, putting obnoxious people in their places. This time she was determined that she would just let it slide.

Cody came back to Ell’s table, “Ignore Connie! She can be a real ass. She’s just jealous of how well you danced when we didn’t even have experience together.”

Ell shrugged, then offered her crooked smile, “Connie’s a great dancer. Give her my compliments.”

“Would you dance again?”

“Take out my friend Amy here. She could use a turn around the floor with a really great dancer.”

“You could probably do even better on a second dance; don’t you want to show Connie what you can really do?”

“Nope!” Ell grinned, “I want you to show Amy what it’s like dancing with a truly excellent dancer.” She gave him a little shove.

He laughed and held out a hand to Amy who took it with a grin. Soon they were out on the floor, creditably swing dancing, though without the grace and athleticism that Cody and Ell had displayed.

Ell and Amy stayed at the bar a little longer. Amy was asked to dance several more times but Ell refused to dance with Cody anymore, having decided that she didn’t want to ruin his relationship with Connie. Cody insisted they were only dance partners at the school, not lovers, but Ell said, “That’s an important relationship. You shouldn’t screw it up.”

No one else asked Ell to dance and she wondered why but Amy explained it without being asked. “Guys are surprisingly delicate creatures, though they won’t admit it. You have three issues keeping them from asking you to dance.” She held up fingers as she ticked them off, “They think you’re too good looking, they’ve seen you shooting Cody down, and they think you dance so well that you’ll laugh at them. They aren’t going to ask you to dance for fear of being humiliated on the basis of any of those three counts. We’re going to have to go to a different bar before you’ll get asked to dance again.”

“Aw,” Ell stuck out her lower lip again, “Just when I’d decided I liked dancing.”

“You really
do
need a social life you know? Something besides going out dancing with me. How ‘bout Gary?”

“Gary?”

“Yes, Gary. The young redheaded guy that almost always manages to pair himself with you at 4MA. You know he has the hots for you don’t you?”

Ell rolled her eyes, “You ready to head home?”

“OK,” as they walked out of Tres Locos, they carefully ignored Barrett and Dan from Ell’s security detail. The guys were sitting at a table near the door. Ell hoped they hadn’t been too bored.