Wartime Jigs

So, haven't been doing a lot of review lately. Sorry 'bout that. Tech week for my play is upon me, and I'm busy as all out. Instead, enjoy another vignette about my nameless couple. Much to my displeasure, I was forced to name a few people in this one to make it clear.

“You should go dance,” Xavier said lazily from her left, indicating the rest of the group, spinning around in gleeful circles to the sound of fiddles playing.

“Not a chance,” she said, crossing her arms and legs, sullenly refusing to look at the man on her other side, who was showing the same level of apathy towards the situation.

“You should mingle with kids your age,” Xavier said. She snorted and cast a glance to her right. Yeah, kids her age. What a joke.

“I don’t want to.”

“It’s being broadcast back home.” She sat bolt upright in her seat.

“Then my family will see this?” she asked.

Xavier nodded.

“Come on,” she grabbed the other man’s hand, jerking him off his feet and dragging him onto the dance floor, despite his adamant protests. “New Year’s Eve jig,” she said to him.

“I don’t know it,” he drawled, folding his arms.

“You’re a terrible liar,” she snapped. “Don’t be more thick than you can help. EVERYONE from home knows the New Year’s Eve jig.” She gave him such a glare that he relented and allowed himself to be pulled into the dance.

To his surprise, she did know the jig, and although she wasn’t the most graceful dancer, she had more energy than the would have thought she could muster for an inane function like this. Ah, the New Year’s Eve jig. It definitely brought back memories; of cold, icy streets, snow softly falling, fires smoldering in the fire place and the sound of lively fiddles playing. The New Year’s Eve jig was all the good things from home, and none of the desperation.

But at the same time, he couldn’t help but feel like a moron. Dancing a jig. He was a bloody Commander. He was THE Commander, and he was dancing a jig with a seventeen year old girl, who’d threatened him into it. However, his determination to scowl through the whole thing was soon lost.

As they danced, they got more and more caught up in the energy, and he caught a look at the was something akin to happiness on her breathless face. She spun and twirled and kicked like she had forgotten all the terrible things that had happened to them. She didn’t hesitate to link her arm with his and dance in a circle, as it required, when the time came. In fact, she seemed oblivious to all her typical boundaries, but he had no doubt that this was more for the sake of letting her family see she was alright than with any desire to be close to him. Even so, she seemed to get more and more light on her feet as they moved, as though she were actually enjoying it. He wasn’t sure what to do with that. As she’d pointed out, he was a terrible liar, but she could give lessons in how to deceive.

She let him wrap his arm around her waist and take her hand and dance her up the center of the floor, and then spin her in a circle, her curls flying out around her. As she swirled back for a brief two-step together, and then move on, he thought he spotted a smile -impossible!- on her face.

When they at last stopped, they were in the center of a circle, which cheered and grinned. She lay draped over his arm, panting and he was balanced almost solely on one foot. The biggest grins of course, belonged to Kerwit and the Terrible Triplets, who looked like they were all thinking of a million ways to mock him for this. Orbokov was nowhere to be seen, which was a massive relief. He hated to think what she’d make of this; she was smart enough to see past the innocent façade that the rest of the party saw.

But when he glanced down at her face, shinning and ruddy with exertion, her eyes sparkling with something he’d never seen there before, it seemed worth it. Almost. He straightened her up and started to lead her back to the table, but she unexpectedly caught his hand. He turned to give her a puzzled look, and she hesitated a moment, as if she were going to ask something, but then she said coolly, “Bring me some punch, won’t you?”

As usual, it wasn’t a question. He sighed and let go of her, making his way through the crowd to the punch bowl.

She weaved her way over to the table and sat down, crossing her legs and looking almost wistfully out at the other couples dancing. The words, killed in their voicing by that…that look from him, were still frozen on her lips: Would you dance another with me?