Darcy and her father return back to their old stomping grounds of New York City. With her, Darcy brings habits of being reclusive. She is perfectly content spending most of her time within the walls of her father's café and sees nothing wrong with t...
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At Marissa's place, we settled down in the small courtyard located at the back of the apartment building. While it was a space that was shared by everyone in the building, it was fortunately empty when we arrived. The entire area was surrounded by a fence or the neighboring buildings, providing privacy from everyone except those who could look down from their windows. On the far side of the space was an iron table bench set and an impressive amount of potted outdoor plants lining the rest of the space.
"It's not the biggest place to practice, but I thought we could practice here for a while until I can see about renting a room at the gym that I work at. Sometimes if the rooms aren't booked for any classes, then anyone can put their name down. People use it for martial arts, dance practice, private yoga, things like that," Marissa explained as we dropped our bags down at the table bench. She took out her laptop and pulled up the dance video. Then, she looked at me and Chris and gestured towards the empty space with a flourish – our indication to step up to the dance floor. Bryson and Cooper were already sporting matching grins on their face as we did. From behind his backpack, I could see Cooper raising his phone in a pathetic attempt to sneakily record us. I glared directly into the camera.
Marissa glanced up from the laptop and raised an eyebrow. "So, how detailed do you want to get?" she asked me.
"Uh... as specific as possible, I guess?" I answered.
Marissa nodded. A smile crept up onto her cheeks as she said, "Okay, well, the very beginning starts with you placing both your hands on Chris's chest and looking lovingly into his eyes."
The boys burst out into laughter.
"Oh, knock it off, you shits. You can't laugh at every single thing we're gonna do!" Chris shot at them.
"Oh, crap," muttered Marissa. She forcefully tapped the keys on her computer, then dropped her hand with a growl. "My laptop died, stupid thing. It said it had 24% left. Phil, can you come with me to get my charger? And you two idiots, if you want a drink, come with me now," she said, pointing at the boys at the bench.
They got up and began to follow Marissa into the building, but not without Cooper shouting, "Hope you two can get into the starting position before we're back!"
And I hope he could feel my hot glare boring into his back even as the door closed behind them.
Shaking his head, Chris stepped forward. "Don't worry about it, Darce. They're idiots. Here, go ahead if this is the starting move." He opened his arms wide in an invitation, even scrunching his features into a silly face to make me feel better, but I didn't have the nerve to keep looking at him. The courage I have with this whole dance process was always unstable and wavering. Here one moment, gone the next. I was beginning to panic, but it shouldn't be a big deal, right? Not when falling asleep in his arms has set the bar so high. I just have to keep a cool head.
But stare lovingly into his eyes? God, I'd rather stare lovingly at my boots.
At that, I did drop my gaze. These shoes were old, but they were well-loved. I was busy noting how the material was wearing off in the creases when Chris's shoes stepped into view. He reached out to tap my left toe. I smiled and tapped back in reply. Then his right shoe came for my right toe, this time with such excessive looking force that I pulled back before impact. "Don't stomp on me!" I cried.
