Dance with Me
Banner Image: Couple Dancing
Author's Note Prior to Story:
The following story is great on its own! However, if you want to add a little more dance vibes while reading the story, feel free to play the above YouTube video. The song on it is Dance with Me by Drew Seeley from the classic movie Cheetah Girls 2.
It was the finale. Brighter lights! More cameras! Glitter everywhere! Fifteen minutes until Clara and I will dance our samba out on the ballroom floor. This stage is all too familiar: it was the Senior Division Ballroom Dancing Finale. Clara and I had gotten to the finals for the past two years, but we never won.
Suddenly, I heard snickering coming from behind the curtains. Then, constant chimes were ringing ding-a-ding! ding-a-ding! My phone was blowing up - text messages, GroupMe notification, missed calls! What was going on??
On my phone, I found a picture sent to me hundreds of times: Clara and Elliot dancing. I could not believe it. Elliot was our biggest dance competitor. However, here Clara was showing him all our choreography. Did she want me to look like a fool during the competition?
Ten minutes until "places!" are called.
This image, I would like to imagine, is the photo Noah sees of Elliot and Clara dancing.
Suddenly, I saw Clara run towards me and say, "Noah! You look weak - like you are about to faint! Take a seat on that chair over there while I go grab you some water!"
How dare she? She thought I looked weak! Me? Weak? I grabbed her hand as she was turning away from me and angrily said, "I am not weak! You know how much strength it takes to be a dancer and how many hours I have dedicated into the sport. However, you may think Elliot is stronger. Why don't you just dance with him for the competition? You already showed him our choreography for the competition anyway!"
Clara first looked at me offended... followed by confusion... then sadness.
"What are you talking about?" said Clara.
"Oh, don't bluff, Clara. I have all the evidence that I need," I said as I pulled out my phone with the picture of her and Elliot.
Once again, Clara appeared confused as she glanced at the picture and said, "I wasn't showing him anything. Liz was out sick that day and Elliot just needed someone to practice their choreography with. Plus, you know Elliot! You two were best friends when you were younger. If you don't trust me, you should at least know Elliot and remember who he was to you."
I angrily walked away. Who was she to tell me about my past? What gives her any right?
Seven minutes until showtime.
I found two of my buddies behind a curtain. Ahhhh, these were the two I heard snickering earlier. One of them told me, "Did you see Clara and Elliot, man?! Why do you even put up with Clara?"
The other said, "You could dance with anyone! Throw her to the curb."
I paced up and down the hall. I really had no time left. I had to dance with Clara, right? I should believe her. I saw a picture of her and Elliot, not a video. But then again, what about everyone who texted me? What are they going to think? They obviously believed that Clara was a cheater. Why shouldn't I believe them? I did have Clara's understudy to step in if I need a partner for the dance! I am panicking.
What should I do??
Five minutes until I am supposed to be on the dance floor.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw Elliot on the floor about to stretch. Suddenly, memories of our past friendship rushed to my mind.
Noah sees Elliot is on the floor about to stretch for his dance performance.
Elliot and I met when we were seven years old in a ballet class. We were the only boys in that class. I get it. There is a stereotype about ballet and it is assumed as a girly thing to do, but both Elliot and I loved to dance. Any type of dance - ballet, tap, jazz, hip hop, Latin ballroom dancing - we begged our parents to enroll us in the class.
One day before dance class began, I sat on the floor stretching. My classmates were just coming into the studio, but I liked to get there early because the sooner I got on the dance floor, the sooner I entered my safety world of dance. However, that particular day, the brother of one of my classmates, along with his friends, dropped off his sister. That's when they saw me. They saw me in my white tights and black leotard. So, they ran up to me, pointed at me, and laughed at my face. They said dancing was for girls.
That's when Elliot came. He started to yell at the other boys and told them to stop laughing. Elliot held out his hand towards me to help me get off the floor. That was the beginning of our best friend friendship.
However, as time went on and high school began, I got invited in the cool-kid crowd and I left Elliot. I still missed my old friend, though. I kept kicking myself for never apologizing to him.
Three minutes until performance time.
I approached Elliot. I took out my phone and showed him the picture. "Was Clara just filling in for Liz?" I asked him.
"Yeah. I meant to thank you for letting me take some of your practice time with Clara. That was kind of you, Noah."
Wow. I misjudged the two people that were constants in my life. Instead, I cared so much about what everyone else was going to say about me. I had to find Clara.
I knocked on her dressing room. She opened the door dressed in her dance costume but tears filled her eyes.
"I am very, VERY sorry, Clara. I misjudged you and thought bad of you. You are a beautiful dancer but you have a more beautiful heart. If you are still willing, will you dance with me?"
Clara smiled. She lightly hit me upside the head. "That's to help you get rid of worrying about what others think of you."
Showtime!
Clara and I danced our samba. Elliot and Liz brought home the trophy, and I was truly happy for Elliot. Clara linked her arm through mine and gave me a big smile. We walked out of the competition with full hearts and better trust.
This is how I believe Noah and Clara's final pose for the competition looked like.
Bibliography: Sita Sings the Blues, Part B by Nina Paley. Created 2008.
Author's Notes:
My story is based of the film Sita Sings the Blues, Part B. I based my story over the doubt Rama had over Sita's pureness. In the original story, Ravana took Sita captive, but when Rama saved Sita, he accused Sita of being unclean and to have been with another man. Even when Sita argued against Rama's personal belief, he did not change his opinion. Rama had no proof to validate his suspicion. When his people doubted him as king because he would take in a woman who has been in the possession of another man, Rama banished Sita from the kingdom.
I wanted to keep the classic triangle between Sita, Rama, and Ravana. In my story: Sita is represented by Clara; Rama as Noah; and Elliot as Ravana. However, in my story, I wanted to make it where the two guys are both nice. Ravana was obviously evil in the original story, and as a reader I rooted against him. However, in this case both Elliot and Noah are both good guys, which gives the reader a choice on which guy to root for. In the original story, Rama did not seem to give banishing Sita a second thought. However, in my story I wanted to incorporate the main character's deliberation between who to believe: "the others" or Clara.
I chose the setting as a ballroom dancing competition because it added a twist to the story while incorporating something that I want to do in the future. I have personally been a big fan of the show "Dancing with the Stars" and I have been in awe of ballroom dancing ever since I started watching it. I just wanted to add a touch of me in the story by incorporating dancing.
For my first revision, I decided to add music to the story! This was my first time embedding a YouTube video into one of my stories and I think it really adds another flavor or dimension to the story. I titled my story "Dance With Me" prior to adding the song with the same title as the story. However, this song is very dear to me because I did a dance to it one Christmas with a Filipino group when I lived in Michigan. The children of the Filipino group were "The Little Flowers of Mary" as it was a Filipino and Catholic group that met weekly, but the six of us who danced to this song were always called the "little girl group" and we were between the ages of seven and nine when we did this dance. Oh the memories!
The editing challenge I used was "Visual details" for my second revision. I felt that only one picture as the banner and then one picture at the end did not capture all the visual details that I wanted. Therefore, I added more images to the story. It went very well. I learned that sometimes I can picture the storyline in my own head just fine. This is because I created it. However, in order to help another picture the story while reading it, visuals greatly help.
Overall, I wanted the lesson to be not to care about what others say. We can control our own opinion and not the opinion of others. Both Rama and Noah were poorly affected by listening to the opinions of others even against their better judgement. Therefore, I hope this story reminds us to avoid the mistakes of Rama and Noah, and instead trust the constant people in our lives.