Sunday Dance

This wouldn't be the beginning of the book. I'm just posting some pieces.

Sunday afternoon

Aldaria 

My room  

Aralyn 

            I have just over half an hour to get ready. I smile to myself, thinking of the message I sent him earlier in the afternoon. “Fancy dinner tonight? I have plans.” He had replied with “Sounds good to me. Can’t wait to see you.” I really do have the best boyfriend ever.

            But now it’s probably time to get all “fancy”. I laugh to myself and lay the book I have been reading down on my nightstand. Walking across the room, I throw open the door to my walk-in closet. The dress I've picked out for tonight is basically perfect. Silvery blue and sleek, fit to my body. I change into it and turn slow circles in front of my mirror, feeling like a princess. The slightly low cut and long, transparent, breezy sleeves add to the medieval lady look. I laugh to myself. Oh my gosh, Aralyn. You're a nineteen year old Princess and still playing dress up….this is embarrassing.   

            Rolling my eyes to silence that obnoxious voice, I slip my feet into the silvery ballet flats I picked out to match the dress. Perfect for dancing.

            For makeup, I wear pale blush and sparkly blue tinted eye shadow, with an emphasis on the soft, light pink lipstick and extra long eyelashes. Hmmm…what would he like me to do with my hair? Without thinking too much, I sweep my hair up into a high ponytail and turn my head side to side. He’d like being able to see the lines in my jaw and neck....hmmm…Ok I’ll wear it up. I twirl my hair on my fingers and pin it neatly in a French twist, leaving a few strands of hair to intertwine silver thread through and leave hanging down to frame my face and neck.

            I have five minutes and seventeen seconds. One last coat of blush and foundation later, I am walking up the stairs to Darian's room. Funny how I tend to hold my head up higher when my hair is up. I don’t have anything else left to hide behind. Raising a small fist, I knock softly on his door.

            I don’t see or hear him coming; I feel his presence just before the door opens, and I have to suppress the shiver of nerves that snakes like a cold shock down my back.

            That soft half smile greets me. He is even more attractive every time I lay eyes on his flawless body. “Classy,” I hear myself whisper, as I trace the edges of his dark suit with my eyes. Classy outfit or not, I can’t keep my eyes off of his face for long. Those green eyes captivate me, framed by the flawless skin and strong jaw and wide forehead. How is something this perfect my very own?

            His perfect lips twist in a smile that is half smirk. “Why thank you, princess. You don’t look so bad yourself.” He steps closer and raises and hand to the side of my face, bending down slightly to kiss my forehead. His voice softens more. “In other words, you’re gorgeous. I love your hair.”

            I giggle and blush and duck my head into his chest a little. He smiles and holds me close for a moment, before pulling away a little and smiling. “So…this fancy dinner?”

            I laugh, trying to keep the giddy happiness from my voice. “Hehe yes…I has a surprise!”  I take his hand and check the impulse to run down the hallway. Instead, I slide my other hand around his arm and look up at him with adoring eyes. “Come on…eleventh floor.”

            He hesitates slightly as if to say that he would be perfectly happy with no surprise and just my endless blue eyes to stare into. Later, my little Darian. You may get lost in them later.

            The entirety of the eleventh floor has been converted into a fancy dining room and dance floor all lit up in soft shades of blue and purple. The tables surrounding the dance floor are crystal and glass, with light blue tints that glow in the dim lighting of the room. Soft music plays from speakers hidden in the white and blue walls.

            “Wow…” DArianwhispers, looking down at me. “This is amazing. How did you do it all?”

            I giggle. “Not telling…I have my ways.”

            He laughs. “Well, in that case, let’s sit down. Which table would you like?”

            I choose a table on the far right of the room and let him pull my chair out for me. “You don’t have to do that, you know…”

            He laughs and winks as he slides into the chair opposite me. “I know, my angel, but I like taking care of you.”

            “Meh…” I mumble, looking down and trying to hide my blush.

            Dinner is roasted chicken, sautéed potatoes, fluffy rolls, green beans, and sparkling cider. We eat slowly, talking between bites about anything and everything. I tell him about my day and why I chose this dress and about the song I’m working on and why I love the protagonist in the book I’m reading. He listens better than anyone I've ever met, green eyes shot through with that enchanting intelligence I love so much. Then it is his turn to talk and he tells me all about his day and how he is not looking forward to all the things that have to be done tomorrow and about how long it took him to decide what to wear today and about how much he has missed me and how his book is probably better than mine. I laugh and tell him that he’s reading a book I gave him, so, either way, I win. That makes him laugh and then we start talking about us and how we both like to win so much, but we also love being on the same team, and then he comments on how easy it is for me to make him laugh, which gets us started talking about the differences in our jokes and senses of humor. Without noticing, we talk away two and a half hours, just sitting there together.

            I sit back and sigh. “I've never been able to talk to anyone as easily as I can talk with you.”

            He smiles. “It’s really quite remarkable that we never run out of things to say.”

            I giggle and sigh again. “Hey Darian..." 

            He raises an eyebrow quizzically. “Yes, my beautiful Aralyn?"

            “…would you like to dance?”  

            “Of course, my lady.” He smiles across the table at me and then stands and comes over to my side, extending a hand. “May I have this dance?”

            I giggle and accept his outstretched hand and he pulls me gently onto the dance floor. A lilting love song starts playing softly in the background.

            He smiles as we start swaying to the music and he realizes what song it is. Yes, we wrote this one, too. Back when we were a little younger and a little less burdened with the affairs of the world. And I love you just as much as I did then. .

            His eyes are so green. They are hard to look at and yet hard to look away from. I force the tension in my body to relax into his hands, and I lose myself in those eyes. As we dance around the smooth floor slowly, everything becomes a blur except for us. It no longer matters what I look like or what that rude person said or what I am going to have to worry about tomorrow. There is only us.

            He starts singing softly. “Cause it's you and I and this great open sky, this adventure we can only see, forever you and me. Forever and always and one more day. Through all this darkness, you were the way." 

            After the song is over, we dance through another and then another after that until it is well after midnight and we are exhausted in the best way possible. He insists on carrying me back to my room “just cause”, which is extremely cute, but I resist the urge to say so.

            After several soft goodnight kisses, we fall into a peaceful sleep curled up against each other in my bed. My head on his chest, his strong arms holding me close. Hearts beating as one. And everything is right with the world.

 

 

Author's Note

Tell me what you think about this...I know it's super rough and sentimental. The concept is like this world that reflects two people falling in love here on earth.

Reviews

[Shawn Jahaffie]

Romance/Erotica/Young Adult fiction typically isn't my thing, so I agree with Mr_M. Young, teenage girls will eat this stuff up. It's great for that demographic. It's kind of hard to really give a critique on this, as I'm not sure whether it would be in the beginning, middle, or end of a book. How much more exposition and world/relationship building you'd need to do between the two, would be dependent on that I think. Using the present tense vs the past tense is an interesting choice. In some spots though, because of the present tense, it felt like you were almost listing verbs to describe the sequence of the characters, vs. fleshing out the quality of the sequences with descriptions and analogies (a luxury you get when writing in 3rd person). Don't get me wrong, it read very smoothly, I just think you could substitute some exposition in there, or back-story, for some of the redundant verbs in a couple of the sequences. The situation and story snippet here was interesting, now just flesh out the characters and make them more interesting, so there's additional incentive to keep reading!

[Broken Serenity]

Well written and I feel with more fleshing out of the characters this could be beautiful. Regular YA romance fiction isn't really my thing personally. By reading it I can see it had thought put into it even to the language used in expressing thoughts. The characters are really only developed by each-other as far as I can tell. Considering they are developing each-other romantically their bond is the only thing I know about the characters other than small personality traits of your leading female. This would be much more interesting if the characters had of a more realistically imperfect touch as I like to call it (The addition of flaws and imperfections into characters therefore making them easier to connect with). You did a very good job on expressing their love realistically. I could feel how much they loved each-other. As a female somewhere close to this stories aimed demographic I can attest to the fact your demographic would love this story.

[Wilhelmine Estabrook]

I am new to Writers Cafe and this is the first piece I've read. Will try a few more before I rate or comment.
Also I don't understand the last sentence in the Author's Note. What does the word like mean here?

[Cool Girl]

This is so good!! I absolutely love the theme and concept! You did a wonderful job, my friend! :)

[Lizardo]

I really like this story, you know how to keep the reader on their feet, It's a good story.
I haven't read a good love story in a long long time so this one really deserves a prize
The descriptions and the scenes, I could easily imagine it in my head with a very romantico touch to the story.
Great piece of work you have here

[Andrew Liddy]

That was good. I felt the warmth between the two lovers and had a feeling of ok-ness at the end. :)

[Mr_M]

the detail is very good and I can picture the scene and these emotions make it a real love love story. I feel I could be controversial here so I will try and balance out my opinion. I feel for people that love chic flicks and romance, they will adore it. Some may want the chapter to end quicker. This is nothing to do with your writing style or your writing ability. I am not a huge fan of reading lot's of love, rainbows and unicorns for too long, I start to wonder in day dreams. That is my taste. I even struggle to write a chapter like this so I do respect and applaud you and enjoyed parts of it. However the genre and the target audience you will aim for will love it. I feel I can't help you improve upon this Piece. I will say there was a real chemistry between both lovers and the part getting ready is quite clever. you showed us how important this was to her with out simply saying: she was excited. A sign of a very good writer can write about the light as well as the dark.

[Clayre]

I loved the description in this and I really enjoyed the fact that it's a love story! All in all, a delightful read :)

[Rachel Grace]

Thank you so much :) I try to make the characters as real as possible