Dancing in the Dark
B_25
"Spike, what are you doing?"
"Dancing." And, true to his word, the drake was doing just that, or, at the very least, some terrible impersonation of it. He was seining his arms left then right, his body right then left, as his head rocked to the imaginary music blasting inside his head.
Twilight stood at the archway to the kitchen, head slightly tilted since she came across the sight. "I can see that, but why are you dancing?"
"Wish I could tell you why, Twi—" Spike raised a foot and began to twirl, around and around, his right claw hovering limply over his eyes, while his left claw clutched to his hip "—but I only just started doing this recently. I guess because it's fun?"
"..."
"..."
"...Spike?"
"Yes?"
"It's two in the morning."
"So?"
"And you're dancing."
"So what?" he replied, breaking out into a sprint towards her, before dropping to his knees and sliding across the floor, coming to a stop just before the alicorn. "You've had study session that lasted all night. Shouldn't I be allowed to dance for a few minutes while I wait for the coffee to brew?"
"Well, uh." Twilight was zapped for a response. He hadn't been lying about her study sessions, in which, he was forced to stay up alongside her—so the argument of it being too late for him to dance was thrown out the window. If she was telling the truth, which was what Twilight strove to do, she didn't have an issue with the dragon dancing—she was just confused by it. "Well, there's nothing wrong with it, I suppose, it's just kinda weird." Then a thought struck her. "Wait. Did you say you were brewing coffee?"
"Not exactly." Spike grabbed onto an imaginary rope, using it to slowly pull himself up, as his legs began to shake. "I just put the kettle on for some instant-coffee, but I could put one on for you if you want one."
"Uh, sure."
Spike danced across the kitchen, movement odd and erratic, yet there was a flow that kept distant throughout it all. Twilight was impressed, she knew nothing about dancing—and would never dare take to it again—but whatever the drake had going on seemed to work.
"So, just how recently did this dancing begin, Spike?"
"A month or so," he said, opening the cabinets in a swift movement, one that never ceased and was simultaneous with the next act. He craned his head to her. "Tea or coffee?"
"Uh, tea." Twilight watched him as his claws plucked the small cylinder from the cabinet, opening her mouth as she watched it fall, only for the same the same claw to go around his back and catch it before she could call. He tossed it up and caught with the other claw, closing the cabinet with whatever claw was free and continuing his juggling game. "So, how long do you, uh, practice for?"
"I wouldn't say I practice," he said, his face scrunching up in repulsion so the thought, before looking back down on the counter. He popped off the cylinder's top with a thumb, letting it fly and letting it flow, resounded as it hit the counter and began to roll around, all the while the contents it protected were plucked by the same claw.
"It's just something I do while I wait," he said again with the spade of his tail already inside the handle of a different cabinet, throwing it back once again, and dropping the packet of the tea into the cup and then taking it with the now free claw. "Maybe it's good exercise, maybe it's good expression, but I just like to dance, nothing much too it than that."
"I see," Twilight said, daring to step hoof into the kitchen, but placing distance between her and the dancing freak. "So you just dance because you like to, because you'd rather dance than just waiting for the kettle to boil. So you dance out of boredom, then?"
"Maybe. Never put too much thought into it, and neither should you, Twi." A click and the kettle was done. A few swaying steps and the drake had his claw upon it. A tip and the kettle was pouring hot water into the two cups on the counter. Never was there a beat missed, especially when the kettle clicked again, placed back on its stand. "I just dance because I can, Twi. I don't always do it when I make coffee, and I don't always do it in the kitchen, but I dance when I can."
Spike picked up the two cups, eyeing them carefully as he began to move, watching as the liquid inside lap again the rim. Not a drop spilled, that was his memo, a rule to cling too, no matter how much he wanted to bust out the funk. He slowly began to swirl, around and around, both cups held out far from him, coming closer and closer to the lavender mare.
"This is for you," he said in a pause of his moments, bowed before her, with a cup held out as her reward. "Plain, just the way you like, because you found out that Celestia doesn't like sugar in her cup."
"I'm not copying her!" Twilight said as she swiped the cup in-between her hooves, falling to her rump with a face in mild scorn. "It's just, that, sugar is bad for your health and it's bad for your teeth. Just because I made the change within the same time frame of learning that has no effect on it what's so ever!"
"Whatever you say, Twilight, whatever you say." Finally, the drake rose, heaving from finally breath as was the cost of his extrusion, before rising yet again, and sipping on his coffee. "What are you doing up anyway? Late night study sesh?"
"No no, nothing quite like that," Twilight said, seeing her soft smile in the reflection inside her cup. "Just having a little trouble sleeping is all. Thought I'd come down here to find a book willing to do the trick, and then I heard noises, and, well, here we are."
Spike wanted to chuckle, to laugh, to clink his cup into the mare's, but the fact that she refused to look at him spoke of an all too familiar story. "Twilight, are you...feeling down again?"
"Well, uh." Twilight tried to look away, to leave this awful discussion behind, but then, she remembered this was Spike she was talking to, and looked back to him again. "Yes, Spike, I am. Seeing you dance was the only laugh that I got all night."
"Oh come on!" Spike exclaimed, his tone filled with faux frustration. He put his cup back on the counter then struck a pose. "My dance moves aren't that bad!"
"Bad, maybe not." Twilight then giggled, putting her cup back on the counter. "Silly. Oh, undoubtedly!"
"Oh yeah!" He struck a finger at her, turning it back around, then pulling it back. "I challenge you to show me something better, Ms. Oh So Great Dancer Twilight Sparkle!"
"You're probably right," she said, giggling as she now felt her heartbeat. "It's been too long since I've last dance, and you're right in it being bad!"
"Then don't be bad!" Spike replied again, beginning what could be said, as the most, cringe, weird, dancing that the world could ever see. But the look he had on his face told of how much he did not care, for it caused Twilight's smile to grow even larger. "Just be silly!"
Twilight tried thinking of a response, something clever to get her out of the kitchen, but then, she felt it, the nervous beating of her heart and trembling of her hooves. Dancing scared her so, knowing how bad she must be, and, yet, it was the thing she wanted to do most at the moment.
Twilight Sparkle began to dance.
"There ya go, Twilight!" Spike shouted in approval, swinging his hips left and right in sync to how he threw his arms. "Let it all out. Shake your stuff!"
Twilight reared back onto the hind legs, dancing like how she saw Spike was doing, before turning around and beginning to do the disco. She had no clue what she was doing, no idea how to dance, nor how weird she must have looked at that moment—but there was a special beat to her heart, one she felt such pleasure at matching.
Twilight went to the cue of her own heart, her horn igniting in a lavender glow, before a field of magic surrounded the duo, playing real music. The music created a fire, one within both of their bodies, causing them both to dance to deplete the flames within.
Spike came close to her, grabbing her forehooves in his claw, as the two tried to step forward and back in syncation—the only thing they succeed in that goal was the occasional sway of their hips. But, yet again, the duo could not care as bliss came over their systems.
"Hey, Twilight!" Spike said in laughter, the mare doing the same. "I just remembered another reason why I like to dance!"
Twilight giggled some more, threw back her back, before reeling forward to his face again. She smiled. "And what would that be, Spike?"
"Because stupidity makes you happy!"
Twilight laughed.
She couldn't agree more.
