A Search For Something More

Chapter 14: A Fancy Ball

"Oh, we're here because our cousin and his wife are out of town, and their little * hic* kid and his friends wanted to come here, so our cousin asked to come here with him," Vice Principal Luna answers.

Principle Celestia looks at Vice Principal Luna disapprovingly.

"Luna, he's not a little kid anymore. He-"

"I don't care how old he is, Tia!" Vice Principal Luna barks. "He could be your age, and I'll still see him as that little devil who threw away all of my video games because he thought they were 'so childish!'"

"You hate your nephew because of some video games?" Octavia asks skeptically.

"I worked hard for my collection of old NES and Sega Genesis games!" Vice Principal Luna exclaims, shaking her fist. "And then we had to look after him for one weekend, and that eight-year-old little demon thinks it's his 'social duty' to secretly throw them all away and wait to proudly tell me until after the trash truck collected the garbage. I couldn't do a thing about because 'he's only eight,' and now we have to take him to some prissy fancy ball. My poor games must have vengeance!"

Octavia and I look at her, unable to think of a response. I can understand liking old video games being a nerd and all, but the fire in Vice Principle Luna's eyes is a little frightening to see. Principal Celestia, on the other hand, crosses her arms and rolls her eyes having heard this before.

Vice Principal Luna finishes the last of her drink and with a disgusted grumble and says, "This is bland stuff. I'm gonna check to see if they have anything better."

"Luna!" Principal Celestia ridicules, but Vice Principal Luna has long pushed her way past a few people heading to the bar. She sighs before she turns to Octavia and me.

"I'm sorry you had to see that you too," She says. "Vice Principal Luna rarely drinks. Just enjoy your time here, and please don't bring this up to anyone else in school."

We nod politely before she leaves to look for Vice Principal Luna at the bar.

After a moment of silence, I say, "Well, there's a side of Vice-Principal Luna, we don't see every day."

"Indeed," Octavia says.

Suddenly, we hear a bell ring as an old man is waving it up and down with his head held high before he announces, "Attention, the ballroom is open for dancing."

The majority of the crowd proceeds to the ballroom while others stay to chat.

Octavia takes my hand, and she escorts me to the ballroom.

"Octavia, I may know this from just watching Titanic, but isn't the whole ringing-the-bell-up-and-down thing only for informing that dinner's ready for high-class people?" I ask.

"Back then, yes," Octavia answers. "But they still like to use someone like that old man for other purposes like this."

I roll my eyes before I bluntly say, "Octavia, these people are bigger dorks than I am."

"I know, darling," She says before we stop at a good spot on the dance floor. "Now, do you think you can at least perform an adequate waltz?"

I decide to act confident as I grab her left hand and place my right arm on her waist and smugly ask, "Can you?"

"Oh, someone is a little sure of himself," She says, amused. "Just try not to step on my toes or bump into people."

"Oh please, dearie, you're talking to the 'Dodging Master,'" I say jokingly. "I may have forbidden us from talking about that again, but I can't deny it helped me avoid accidentally harming anyone."