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The Cotton-Eyed Joe

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All of a sudden, some sort of horrible sound blasted Skye awake. He bolted upright, shocked out of a good sleep, and looked around. The music--if you could call it that--seemed to be coming from outside, so he quickly got dressed and went out to investigate, despite the excruciatingly early hour of 8AM.

Oh, the horror.

There was a boom box sitting in the grass near the watering hole, blaring out the atrocious song. Beside it, he saw his beloved wife and son, who he had previously thought to be perfectly sane, spinning around like idiots. All the jumping and waving and other bizarre dance moves were only made worse by the horrible sync with the already horrible song.

Upon seeing his approach, Kazune's eyes lit up and he halted in the terrible dance long enough to run up to his father. "Look, Daddy, look!" the three-year-old cried joyfully. "It's the Cotnot Joe!"

"The Cotnot Joe?" Skye said, squinting his eyes in disgust.

Claire stopped too, and laughed. "No, it's the Cotton-Eyed Joe. Do you like it?"

"What's to like?" he muttered sourly.

Claire laughed. "Oh, Skye, stop being such a stick-in-the-mud. Here, I'll teach you the dance!"

Skye opened his mouth to protest, but before he could, Kazune jumped up. "No, Mommy!" he said.

Thank you. You'll get a toy car for this.

"I want to teach it to Daddy!"

That's it. No allowance for you.

"That's a wonderful idea, Kazune!" Claire chimed. She skipped over, seized Skye's hand, and dragged him over to the radio--closer to the horrible song than anyone should ever be. "Okay, what's the first step? Do you remember?"

"N--" Skye began.

"Shh!" Claire elbowed him as the child thought.

"Well, you jump up and down and kick," said Kazune. He started to bounce to the beat and put his foot out, then back.

Skye watched him in horror. They don't expect me to actually do that, do they?!

"Wait, what do I do next?" Kazune asked, confused.



"This!" Claire started jumping also, and then lifted her leg in front of her, behind her, and then back on the ground.

"Right!" The toddler imitated the move.

"Claire, don't..." Skye tried again, to no avail of course.

"Remember what comes next, Kazune?"

He smiled brightly. "Grapes! It's like grapes! I love grapes!"

"That's right! It's called the 'grapevine'!" Claire did a strange sideways walk and clapped her hands, followed by Kazune.

"And then SPINNY!" Kazune laughed.

"Yup!" The two of them twirled around, waving their hands like they were wielding invisible lassoes. "And then you start over!" Claire concluded. "Your turn, Skye!"

Oh god.

"I really don't think--"

"Come on!" Claire grabbed his arm and dragged him along as she repeated the awful dance. Neither of his cheerful family members seemed to notice how miserable their silver-haired captive was.

"Claire, no!"

"Oh, please! It's so much fun!"

Anger boiled over. "The lyrics don't even make sense!" he snapped. "And the music is annoying!"

She shot him a playful glare. "So? Just dance already!"

"Dance, Daddy, dance!" Kazune encouraged.

It was clear that he wasn't going to get any help from his wife or son. He was trapped. "Isn't there anything that I could do instead of this?" he begged pathetically.

Claire smiled as if an idea had come to her, but didn't answer at first. She waited until the "spinny" step came up, and then spun right into Skye's chest.

He had to catch her to keep her from falling, just as she'd planned. "Give me a kiss and we'll call it even," she flirted.

"What?" He hadn't expected this.

"Too late!" She grabbed his arms and started to spin him around with her. "You didn't react quick enough! Now you have to do both!"



"...What?!"

"Dance with us, and then kiss me." She pulled on his arms like a puppeteer working a marionette.

"Daddy, you're not doing the right steps!" Kazune whined.

"That's right. I should be disqualified."

"Nice try." Claire smiled and continued the act.

"If it hadn't been for Cotton-Eyed Joe
I'd been married long time ago
Where did you come from where did you go
Where did you come from Cotton-Eyed Joe..."

It just wouldn't end!

Finally Claire saw the distressed look on his face. "Hang in there, sweetie," she said smugly. "Remember, it'll be worth it when it's over."

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Author's Note: For those of you who didn't pick up on this, in that last line, Claire was referring to the kiss she'd told him about. Also, I named the kid Kazune (pronounced Kahz-nay...the "u" is silent) because that's the name of my kid in my game. Yes, I also play as Claire and married Skye.

Oh yeah, and I'm a total Skye fangirl, so be prepared for me to totally abuse this couple in my upcoming fanfics. No, seriously, I'm pretty much only gonna write about them. Ehehehe.

((Ugh. My computer had a virus when I wrote this. It's all haywire and not working right, so please forgive any stupid mistakes for now. I'll re-upload this fic when it's cleaned up.))