In the hopes of actually impressing Arthur with his dancing skills, Alfred spent the next few days watching lindy hop videos on YouTube. His roommate didn't notice a change in his computer habits (spending several hours per day staring at online videos was pretty normal for Alfred), but he did notice a change in his music.

"What is that crap?" Lovino demanded when he returned to the dorm room after classes, glaring at Alfred as he walked over to his desk on the opposite side of the room.

"Swing music. I'm trying to find something good for our competition," Alfred explained, grinning sheepishly as he reached for his headphones. At least, he hoped that it was swing music. Even after his lesson with Arthur, he still wasn't entirely sure how fast the music should go and if he was looking for six beats or eight.

Lovino wrinkled his nose. "Well, it sounds like shit."

"You sound like shit," Alfred muttered under his breath as he plugged his headphones into his laptop. He'd been hoping to finish his music search before Lovino finished his classes for the day. A shared love of Italian food was about the only thing he and his roommate had in common. They didn't like the same sports, they didn't like the same music, and they couldn't even agree on which girls were pretty (Alfred had the sense that leggy was good, but no personal opinions on the matter). Fortunately, life had become much smoother for the bickering duo once they instituted a strict headphones-only policy when the other person was in the room.

It was a small room, with the furniture—dresser, twin bed, desk—lined up in perfect symmetry on either side. Their clothes cluttered the floor, but each had taken care to make sure that his stuff remained on his own side. The imaginary dividing line in their room was the only way the two roommates had managed to survive fall semester.

As Lovino pulled out a book to study, Alfred moved on to the next song on his playlist. The bouncy music cheered him up immediately and he grinned in delight when he found several swing versions of the Game of Thrones theme. If he and Arthur danced to the catchy theme, they would definitely win. Who could possibly resist two handsome dancing nerds?

After a few more videos, Alfred's phone began to ring. He glanced down to see that his mother was calling him. Again. For the fifth time that week.

"Gah, that's the worst one yet!" Lovino complained as the repetitive strains of the Nyan cat song filled the room.

Ignoring his irritated roommate, Alfred stared at the phone in trepidation. He knew his mother wanted to hear the results of his tryout with the Harvard Ballroom Dance Team, but he hated letting her down. He sighed and finally answer the call. "Hi, Mom."

"Honey, is everything okay?" she asked, clearly worried by his tone of voice. "You haven't been answering your phone all week!"

Alfred tried to keep his voice down so the conversation wouldn't bother his roommate quite so much, but he could tell from Lovino's frown that it wasn't working. "Sorry, Mom. I've just been…" he paused, not wanting to tell her about all the youtube videos. "Uh, really busy with dance practice."

She gasped in excitement. "You made it onto the team! That's wonderful, honey."

"Um…"

"Do you have a dance partner already?" she asked eagerly, continuing before Alfred could correct her. "What's she like?"

"Well…" Alfred trailed off, too embarrassed to tell his mother that he hadn't made the team. But he realized a moment later that he didn't have to. After all, he did have a dance partner, so he could answer her question without even lying. "My partner's a great dancer, but really strict about getting everything right," he said.

"Sounds like a good match for you," his mother replied with a little chuckle.

"Hey!" Alfred protested. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Sometimes you need someone to give you that extra little nudge."

"Easy for you to say," Alfred groused. "You're not the one getting chewed out when you miss the beat."

"I'm sure you'll get the hang of it," she replied encouragingly.

He smiled. Even if he did get annoyed by all the voicemail messages, it was still good to hear her upbeat voice. "Thanks, Mom."

"So… what's her name?" she asked, her voice taking on a sly tone.

Alfred's mind suddenly blanked. The only girl's name that came to mind was his mother's name and he didn't think she would believe him if he told her about a 23-year-old Martha. He glanced desperately around the room, hoping to spot a female name on his textbook or somewhere in his room. His eyes fell on the calendar. "April," he said in relief. That was a good name—he'd liked her character in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. He could almost hear his mother open her mouth to open a slew of questions he wasn't ready to answer. "Sorry, Mom. I gotta go. Practice time," he said so quickly his words slurred together. With a final goodbye, Alfred turned off his phone and realized that he did have to leave right away if he wanted to arrive on time. He stuffed his laptop into his backpack and added a towel for wiping off his sweat at the end of the practice.

Leaving Lovino to enjoy their room in silence, Alfred raced through the hallway and slipped between the students studying on couches in the dorm lounge. He stepped out into Harvard Yard and immediately had to dodge a gaggle of tourists that were too busy taking pictures to pay attention to where they were going.

Making his way through a number of tourist groups, Alfred sped across the yard. He crossed Massachusetts Avenue and quickly reached the entrance to the Ballroom Dance Team's practice room. To his surprise, he found Arthur waiting for him outside with a sour expression. "Crap, I'm not that late am I?" he asked, suddenly worried he was going to have to listen to Arthur complain about his tardiness for the next hour.

To his relief, Arthur shook his head. "The practice room is being occupied by the salsa dancers."

"Oh, okay." Even though he had been looking forward to working on aerial flips, Alfred perked up as he sensed the perfect opportunity to convince his dance partner that they needed a modern swing song for the competition, not some old-fashioned tune from the 1940s. "Wanna get some ice cream and pick out our song?" he suggested cheerfully. Perhaps a bit of tasty ice cream would be enough to improve Arthur's gloomy mood.

His idea went over like a lead balloon. "I already have a song selected," Arthur replied, shaking his head with the dour look still firmly planted on his face.

"Come on, hear me out! I've found some really good ones."

Arthur snorted. "Somehow I doubt that."

"I'll pay," Alfred offered, deciding to try a new tactic.

After another dubious look, Arthur finally, grudgingly, agreed. "Alright, fine."

Feeling a little irked at how hard it was to convince Arthur just to listen to some new songs, Alfred led the way to the nearest ice cream shop, J.P. Licks. They joined the students waiting in line and both spent some time studying the quirky, chalkboard menu. When it came time to order, Alfred picked three scoops of the 'negative' cookies 'n cream, which featured vanilla Oreo cookies in chocolate ice cream. For his part, Arthur chose the lime sherbet.

Taking advantage of the nice spring weather, they carried the ice cream and sherbet to one of the cute little tables outside the store and Alfred pulled out his laptop. He took a few bites of tasty chocolate ice cream as he waited for his computer to connect to the free wifi and load the right video. As soon as it was ready, Alfred took out his earbuds and plugged them into the laptop. Scooting closer to Arthur, he popped one into his ear and offered the left earbud to Arthur, who took it gingerly and looked a little uncomfortable putting it in his ear.

Unable to contain his excitement, Alfred hit play and explained his idea. "I know something everyone will love. We dress up as Mario and Luigi and dance to a swing version of the Super Mario Brothers theme! Whatdaya think?"

Arthur raised an eyebrow. "I think April Fool's Day was last week."

"It's not a joke!" Alfred insisted.

"Really? It sounds like a joke to me."

Not one to be deterred, Alfred quickly switched over to the next bookmarked video. "Okay, I've got another plan. It's Harvard, so let's do a song from the Legally Blond musical." He played 'What You Want' and nodded his head to the beat.

"That's not even swing," Arthur complained by the end of the first chorus.

"It's not?"

"No."

"Oh." Alfred looked at his screen and wondered how many of his songs were the wrong genre. He took a few bites of his delicious ice cream to cheer himself up and determinedly plowed into the next song. "Well this one is definitely swing," he said as he played the swing version of the Game of Thrones theme.

"A swing and a miss," Arthur snarked between bites of lime sherbet. Alfred wondered if it was a mistake letting him get a sour flavor instead of something sweet.

"What do you have against my songs?" he demanded.

"The point is to provide background music to the dance. With the ones you've picked, everyone would be focusing on the song lyrics instead of us. And a popular theme song is just a cheap way to pander to the audience. The judges hate that."

"Huh." That actually made more sense than Alfred had expected. He looked through his videos and sighed, sorry to see the 'Duck Tales' theme discarded from the list. He had known it was a long shot, but it brought up such a fun, nostalgic feeling! With those criteria in mind, he turned next to country music, but Josh Turner's 'Why Don't We Just Dance' earned a cold reception from Arthur. When all hope of having a modern song seemed lost, Alfred decided it was time to rely on Disney for a miracle. He played 'Almost There' from Princess and the Frog.

Arthur didn't immediately reject it, which was a huge improvement. He arched an eyebrow thoughtfully. "Well, it has the right beat and I like the 1920s sound," he said.

"You like it?" Alfred asked, giddy that he had found something Arthur didn't complain about.

"I wouldn't go that far, but it's certainly the only acceptable one yet." Arthur gave the video a somewhat suspicious look. "What's it from?"

"A movie."

"What sort of movie?"

"Well... Disney," Alfred admitted.

Arthur rolled his eyes. "No Disney! That's the ultimate pandering tool."

"Geez, if I can't pick Disney, country, or a theme song, what does that even leave?" Alfred complained.

"Something classic." Arthur leaned toward the keyboard and pulled up 'In the Mood' by Glenn Miller. "This is what I had in mind."

As soon as it began to play, Alfred recognized it as the first song they had used at dance practice. He wrinkled his nose as he took another bite of his ice cream. "But it's so boring."

"It's one of the most important swing songs ever written," Arthur retorted. "But I suppose if you want something with a little more spice, we could do 'Sing, Sing, Sing.'"

Alfred reclaimed his laptop and found the other song Arthur had suggested. He was disappointed to discover it didn't involve any actual singing. "This is all so old! Can't we have a song from this century?"

"Lindy Hop was invented in the 1920s. It pairs best with songs from that time period." Arthur set down his empty cup with an air of finality and handed back the left earbud. "Thank you for the sherbet, but you're not going to change my mind."

"Rock, paper, scissors?" Alfred proposed.

Arthur gave him a thoughtful look. "You won't complain about my taste in music if I win?"

"Only if you don't complain about my taste if I win," Alfred replied, feeling a little cocky. He had been the Rock/Paper/Scissors champ at his high school.

"On the count of three, I'm throwing paper," Arthur announced. "One…"

Alfred blinked in surprise. "Wait, what…?"

"Two… three!" Arthur finished.

Not gullible enough to fall for that trick, Alfred immediately curled his fist into a rock. To his shock, he found himself staring at Arthur's flat hand. Even worse was seeing the aggravating smirk on Arthur's face.

"My song choice then," Arthur smugly replied. "I did warn you."

"I didn't think you'd actually do it!" Alfred sputtered.

"The salsa dancers should be finished soon," Arthur added cheerfully. "You can finish moping with your ice cream. I'll be in the practice room preparing our choreography when you're… in the mood."

A/N: If you're interested in listening to the songs, I posted links on the AO3 version of this story!