Double Date Dare -10- by Melanie E. (Patreon)

10.

“Dancing?”

I nodded, doing my best not to smile at the terrified look on Ted’s face. “You did well Saturday night, once you loosened up a bit, and it’s a good way to be able to interact with girls.”

I looked up at him and waited for him to argue or object and felt both relieved and surprised when he did neither.

“Good,” I said, stepping toward my parents’ stereo and turning on the playlist I’d prepared. A mellow country song I liked came on, perfect for slow dancing. “Let’s go over some of what I showed you Saturday first, then… what?”

Ted looked away, blushing. “I, ah, wasn’t expecting….”

“You weren’t expecting what?”

“Ah, that,” he said, looking me up and down.

I gave myself a quick once-over and shrugged. “Most girls will be wearing a dress to prom, and I need to get used to the heels, so I don’t make a fool of myself on the dance floor either,” I said, smoothing out a wrinkle in the fabric of the broomstick skirt I had put on. “And besides that, the more you think of me as a girl and not ‘Donnie from school,’ the more this will help you get comfortable with dancing with other girls, right?”

“I guess?”

“Right,” I confirmed for him. “Now, take my right hand like this, and put your left hand on my waist, and – I’m not going to bite you, Ted,” I told him, as gently as I could while trying my damnedest not to laugh. “Here,” I said, grabbing his left hand with mine and putting it on my waist. “Like that. I’ll put mine on your shoulder. And one-and-two-and one-and-two-and….”

Credit where it was due, I knew that it was a huge leap for Ted to come over to my house at all. That said, it was only three more days ‘til the dance, and I wanted to make sure that all the work Sandy, Butch, and I had put into preparing Ted for the night wasn’t in vain. If that meant giving Ted remedial dance lessons and dressing up pretty, then so be it.

Okay, so none of that was a particularly hard chore anyway. It was still a chore, though. In the end, it had taken me being somewhat circumspect about my plans and using the newest secret weapon in my repertoire to convince him: The promise of a potential dance with Sandy.

He almost backed out anyway on getting to the house and seeing me in my skirt and girly tank, hair up and makeup on, but whatever part of his brain that said ‘Donnie is a boy’ must have been just strong enough to keep him planted there long enough for me to grab his elbow and drag him in the house.

It shouldn’t have surprised me that once Ted got his nerves under control a bit, he was a decent dancer. I’d seen him on the football field at a few home games and knew he had good coordination, and that translated well to him first following my lead for a few measures, and then taking it over.

I had set the playlist up with a sort of wave of slower then faster songs, to give him a break, and when Taylor Swift came on for track 3, he seemed to be a lot happier to practice some of the faster, boppier moves than he had the slower stuff. When track 5 rolled in, an old TLC song my mom was fond of, his nerves returned in earnest when, instead of taking one of his hands and putting the other on his shoulder, I wrapped both my hands around his neck and drew in closer.

“Aaaaah.”

“Nuh-uh,” I said softly and quietly. “Hands on my waist or joined at the small of my back, and… Yep. Just like before.” We stood there for the first verse of the song, not moving, before I counted us in. “One, two, three, four….”

Rock, sway, rock, sway we went. Nothing fast, nothing sexy or sensual. Ted closed his eyes at first but slowly opened them as the song went on, looking down into mine.

“Not so bad, right?”

He gulped but nodded stiffly, and I couldn’t help but laugh a tiny bit.

“See? Nothing to be scared of. If you can do it with me, you can do it with any other girl at school.”

“I guess. But you’re….”

I sighed. “I’m what, Ted?” I asked, my smile slipping.

‘You’re not like the other girls,” he finished, stepping back from me as the song ended.

I almost reached for his hand again for the next dance, but seeing the spark of terror in his eyes, I drew back instead. “How about I go get us some drinks. Diet cola okay?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“I’ll be right back,” I said, but halfway to the kitchen turned back around. “Ted?”

“Mm?”

“Don’t leave while I’m gone, okay?”

He glanced at the door, like it held some kind of safety, then looked back at me and nodded.

I took my time getting our drinks, wanting to give Ted plenty of room to gather his thoughts and courage. There’s only so long you can drag out prepping two glasses of soda before you’re just standing around watching ice melt, though, so probably sooner than he would have liked I was back in the living room.

I found him looking at our wall of family photos. He jumped when I judged his shoulder with his glass, but thankfully I’d been expecting it, so no soda lost.

“Oh, thanks,” he said, taking a sip from slightly shaky hands, then looking back at the photos.

“Something interesting?” I asked him, curious what he was so focused on.

“Uh,” he said, blushing. “Do you have a sister?”

“Sis-- oh,” I said, following his line of sight and seeing the photo of me and Sandy in our matching Christmas dresses from so long ago. “Not unless you count Sandy.”

Pause.

“Do you want to talk about it?” I asked him when he continued to look at the picture. I didn’t pause for an answer. Instead, I sat down on the couch directly in front of the photos and waited for him to make his move.

Surprising me for the second time, instead of walking away or sitting in one of the other chairs, he lowered himself onto the couch too. He was at the opposite end, but it was still the same couch, our drinks resting on coasters on the same coffee table.

“So?” I asked when the silence continued.

Ted gave me a sideways glance, then looked up at the photo again but said nothing.

Guess it’s up to me.

“Me and Sandy have always been super close,” I said. “When we were five, she wanted us to have matching Christmas dresses.”

“O-kay,” he said, shifting his eyes to another photo. I was about eight in that one, and I was wearing a pink and green one-piece swimsuit with a skirt on it, identical to the one Sandy had on next to me, both of us grinning on the beach.

“We went on vacation to Florida and visited the ocean after seeing Disney World,” I said, shrugging.

“And you were….”

I shrugged again.

“Why?”

I thought for a moment. “Why not?”

“Bec--” Ted started, then stopped himself and grabbed his glass, taking a sip.

We sat, listening to the stereo play the end of another fast song and slip into another slower number, an old jazzy piece from a movie Mom had shown me with Frank Sinatra in it.

“Do you see yourself as a guy or a girl?” He finally asked me as the song played, and Frankie crooned about love lost.

“I see myself as me,” I said, confidently, shifting to face Ted. “Some of the stuff I like people call boy stuff. A lot of the stuff I like would be called girl stuff too. I’ve got boy parts,” I said to his unasked question, “but a lot of folks say I look a lot more like a girl than a guy. I’m good with jeans and a tee-shirt, or I can put on a skirt and tights and feel pretty.”

“So…?”

“So… do you see me as a guy or a girl?” I asked, turning the question back on him.

Another once-over.

“I… I think you’re, ah.”

“I’m what?”

“I think you’re very pretty,” Ted said, his blush going nuclear. I could feel heat rising in my own cheeks at the compliment, too, knowing what it had probably cost him to admit. “But.”

“But.” I agreed, knowing what was going through his head. “Not ‘kiss me’ pretty, right? Because of what you know?”

Ted nodded in relief, then looked down, seeming dismayed. “I’m sorry, does that make me a bad guy?”

I shook my head and slid over on the couch, laying a hand on his shoulder. “No, it doesn’t. I don’t think so anyway.”

“I feel like….”

I moved in for a hug, and in another surprise, Ted let me.

I didn’t hold the hug for long, just a quick squeeze, then I slid back to my spot at the other end of the couch, reaching for my glass and taking another sip of the slightly watered-down drink.

“Feel better?”

“I guess.”

“Good,” I said, grinning. “And, Ted?”

“Hmm?”

I waited until he was looking my way, then continued. “A lot of those boy things I like? Sandy likes the same things.”

For a moment, Ted just looked at me confused. Then, he smiled, and in that moment, he looked more like Superman than ever before.