Axis Powers Hetalia belongs to Hidekaz Himaruya.
West Side Story belongs to Arthur Laurents, Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim.
All Lady Gaga songs belong to her own fabulous self.
Twenty or so teenagers were milling around the auditorium, chattering carelessly to one another. Francis stood along the sidelines, hair pulled back into a loose ponytail and hands on hips. An expression of reluctant concern played upon his face.
"Just a reminder, but you volunteered for this position."
At this, Francis turned and frowned. Arthur, arms folded innocently on the production team table, looked up at him smugly. "Having second thoughts?"
"I don't have much of a choice, do I?"
"No, you don't." There was barely suppressed glee in the tone of voice. For a control freak, Arthur seemed to be more than happy to let go of the reins this one time. Then again, this was a choreography rehearsal.
Francis grimaced. "Fine, then let's get started."
Arthur stood up and clapped his hands together. "Right! Everyone, come listen to Francis. Today's all about choreography, so he's in charge."
"Wooooow, big move for you, Kirkland!"
"Shut it, Beilschmidt."
Francis took in a deep breath, then slapped on his most charming smile. Several girls giggled back, which was always the best response. "Hey there! Welcome to the first dance rehearsal, which will be a lot more fun without Arthur bossing you around." More giggles, good. He ignored the scowl burning into his back and continued. "If you feel like you aren't coordinated enough to dance well, don't worry about it. You wouldn't make it to this stage if you weren't! It's my job to make the choreo easy for you, and everyone here will practically be pros by the end of our run."
Okay, so he was spouting off a few white lies, but it was all for the sake of boosting confidence and assuaging feelings. A few cast members were clearly not buying it. Francis kept up his cheery attitude as best as he could, herding the mainly blank-faced group into a scraggly circle.
"First off, we're going to do some stretches and warm-ups."
He glanced behind him, where Arthur had his nose buried in other notes, completely ignoring him. Luckily, Maddie looked up from her laptop. "You need music?"
"Yeah, anything upbeat."
In a few seconds, the place was filled with people doing jumping jacks to 'Poker Face.' Anything to get heart rates going. Francis made a point to keep the stretches short and useful, even going for some drills. He'd assumed that the most basic things, such as turns and kicks, would surely be doable for most people, but some couldn't even remember to point their toes. After catching Raivis spinning off-centre for the umpteenth time, he decided enough was enough.
"Oooookay! We're good," he declared, shoving the kid back into the pack. "Gilly, over here."
A certain someone was still prancing around on her own in a corner, her high kicks resembling karate attacks instead of graceful ballet moves.
Eh-ey, eh-ey, I wish he never looked at me that way...
Antonio reached over and tugged on her sleeve. "Gilly!"
"Gill?"
"Gillian, get with the program!" Arthur shouted.
She stopped mid-kick and flashed a completely unapologetic grin at Francis. "Great, great. So, today we're going to learn the 'Dance at the Gym' sequence. It's what we used for the auditions, if anyone remembers. Don't worry if you don't remember it anymore; we're going to relearn it - and with new partners. So, I'm going to call out names. After you find your partner, you go to where I put you and don't move!"
He fished a piece of paper out of his pocket and began to rattle off pairings. The crowd slowly shifted and split up with the Sharks on one side and the Jets on the other. Alfred found himself at the front of his group, partnered with Natalya.
He confidently held out his hand to her. "Hi! I guess we're together, huh?"
She stared at his proffered hand for a few moments before announcing coldly, "I want to dance with Ivan."
"Well, um. He isn't in this song." Alfred was taken aback at the rejection. "He's not even here right now."
Natalya glared at him for a few more seconds before turning away. Alfred found himself at a complete loss for words. Most people seemed easy to befriend and liked his outgoing and cheerful attitude...well, there was Arthur, but nothing ever pleased that guy. He tried to recall everything he knew about Natalya. She was in his year, but mainly kept to herself and spoke very little. At some point, he'd picked up some news that she was apparently a really good gymnast, even though she wasn't on the school's team. She was just that good, to do it with a more professional trainer. Alfred eyed the stoic girl, finally noticing how she was dressed. With the dark ribbon in her hair, along with the elegant dress and fancy tights, she looked more like a model than an athlete. As an athlete himself, he found that fascinating. He remembered the hoodie and basketball shorts he'd thrown on after Phys Ed and suddenly felt self-conscious.
"Oh Alfred, please stop checking your partner out and pay attention," Francis's voice sang out.
Snickers echoed throughout the group. Alfred shrugged and grinned, basking in the limelight. Natalya didn't seem to care or even notice.
Francis was having second thoughts about his plans for "Dance at the Gym". This number was the biggest, most unruly dance song in the entire show, and he didn't want to pressure people into perfection. He had figured that swing dancing would make things fun. He thought that teaching the basic steps and a few snazzy moves would trigger self-motivation. He had assumed giving them some choice in what moves they wanted to do would make things easier, but... some people had two left feet, or something!
"No, it's like..." He sighed and reached over to grab Tina's ankle in order to rearrange her footwork. A shadow fell over him, and he peered up into Berwald's suspicious eyes. "Um...Gill, let's show them."
His own partner skipped over cheerily, not having minded being free to chortle at everyone else's mistakes. Francis explained the moves as they demonstrated together.
"Turn in with your right foot, then, while still with your weight on that side, lean onto your partner so you can kick up with your left."
He arched back, letting Gillian snap her leg towards the rafters. As they straightened up, he heard a loud squeal, followed by the loud crash of two bodies hitting the floor. Francis whirled around.
"What happened?"
Kim disentangled herself from her partner and stood up, frowning. "All we were doing was trying that lift! We did what you told us to do, hold the other person around the waist with both arms, and then kick up. But when I grabbed him, Mr. Smooth here flipped out and dropped me."
Yong Soo rolled over from where he had been splayed out on the floor. "I'm ticklish, okay!"
Francis groaned. From her seat on the sidelines, Lovina sniggered heartlessly at his predicament. Next to her, Antonio watched her face.
"Hey, it's great to see you smile. You should try it more often."
"And it was great to not hear your voice. You should try it more often," She responded rudely. Feigning indifference, Lovina slouched, stretching her legs and sliding down to the edge of her seat. "If we're not dancing at a dance rehearsal, what's the point of being here?"
"Well, if you want to dance...we could, you know. Want to try some moves?"
"Wh...no! I only meant-"
He had already hopped to his feet. "Come on, let's swing!"
Lovina felt herself yanked off the bench and tripped over her own feet as Antonio pulled her aside. Facing her, he positioned her hands whilst announcing directions. "So, guys palms up, girls palms down."
She blinked and looked up at his grin. Suddenly, she felt a creeping suspicion, and snatched her hands away just as he tried to slap them, hard. Antonio laughed.
"Okay, okay...you're pretty smart, aren't you?"
"A lot smarter than you." Lovina felt relieved and even a bit proud at catching onto the game. "Which shouldn't be so hard anyway."
Antonio shrugged, apparently not minding such an insult to his intelligence. "Fine, I promise not to trick you. Let's try the twirl." He fished for her hand, which she twisted out of his reach, eventually hiding it behind her back. "Come on, I need to hold your hand!"
"You hit it last time!"
"I'm sorry. I'll make it up to you." Lovina dodged, but Antonio managed to finally get hold of her hand. "Here."
He shot her a smirk, then bent forward and kissed the back of her fingers. She stared down at him, awed, aghast, and against her will, totally charmed.
Seeing that Lovina was finally incapacitated, Antonio tugged lightly, and she executed a flawless twirl into his arms.
"Very nice. Too bad you two are the only ones who don't need to do that..."
Francis was paying them attention at last. Lovina made a noise reminiscent to a dying beaver, then shoved Antonio away, desperately trying not to turn red. She decided to give her fingernails an in-depth examination whilst Francis yelled for everybody to take their positions for the cha cha portion of the dance. He then ushered Antonio to one end, and Lovina to the other.
"So, basically like in the movie, you guys are going to walk slowly towards the middle -"
"And this needs rehearsing?" Lovina demanded.
"Well, while you're doing that, I'm moving these people -" Francis waved his hand at the dancers irritably. "To their respective spots so they all mingle. It's something like crossing the bridge between racial differences, or whatever."
Antonio blinked. "That's...pretty deep."
"Apparently, every small move on stage is significant," Francis grumped, shooting a look at Arthur, who was still barricaded behind the production table with his notes. Only Maddie paid any attention, faithfully jotting down every piece of choreography for reference in the prompt book.
He sighed and turned back to the rest of the cast. "Alright, I have it figured out. It's going to take three counts of eight. It's just that the rest of you have to find a way to get to your new spots within that time without crashing into anyone. I don't care how you do it, because everyone's going to be watching Antonio and Lovina anyway. Just don't have any head-on collisions." He pulled Gillian to his side. "Now this is what we do when they meet, it's almost exactly like the movie. Antonio, Lovina, you do this too. We all do it at the same time."
He went through the moves and described the simple dance simultaneously. "All the girls will be on the right, like Lovina, and the guys across from her, like Antonio. Boys, be a gentleman and bow. Girls, be the ladies you are and curtsey..."
Gillian tugged at the sides of her pants as she bobbed up and down.
" This part is when it gets almost exactly like the movie. Lovina, stand in front of Antonio. Gill, in front of me."
Lovina begrudgingly obeyed. All the other pairs were staring at them now. Francis and Gillian never had a problem in the limelight, and Antonio probably didn't even notice, but she had never asked to be a star. Whose idea was this again?
Right. Feliciana's.
"Up on our toes. Lift arms to the side. If anyone in this cast exists who can't do this, you are an idiot," Francis declared. "Girls turn your head to the left, guys to the right. Now, tiptoe walk sideways in the direction where your head is turned. When you stop, put your arms down. "
Lovina's arm brushed against Antonio's chest. Instinctively, she spread her fingers out and shoved him back. Antonio lost balance and nearly fell into Gillian.
"You're too close," she tried to claim. Gillian frowned, and Francis rolled his eyes.
"He's supposed to be close to you! It's a dance of romance!"
"I'm okay. Watch out next time," Antonio said generously, resuming his position. Lovina would have rather pushed him again.
Francis went on. "Do the exact same thing back. Tiptoe, arms..." The students obeyed the commands. "Heads still looking the same way, demi-plié."
"What?"
"Bend your knees." He demonstrated. "Feet in first position, which you all should remember learning about in warm-ups. Heels together and toes turned out."
The general height level of the auditorium momentarily lowered as everybody tried to plie. Some standardization would have to be introduced.
"After you're doing your plié, snap your fingers twice. You'll hear the beat in the music when you're supposed to do it. Watch Gilly and me do it." They went through the entire sequence together. "Allow your body to be more relaxed, and lean back, looking at your partner as you plié. So yeah, you can tilt your head back if you're shorter."
Lovina cursed her height. She was a good height for her age, but Antonio was stupidly tall. Ignoring Francis's instructions, she only stretched her back with the smallest increment possible and glared up at him through her bangs. He only smiled benignly, like this was some sort of inside joke.
Damn his good looks! Not that she was going to admit he looked good.
"After the plié, gently straighten up, and that's when you snap your fingers. Like..." Francis sang a little as he and Gillian moved up and down with great dignity. "Lalalalalala, snap snap. Lalalalalala, snap snap…and now-"
The two of them changed places, their feet moving in rhythm with the last phrase. Now, Francis was in front and Gillian in the back.
"So, on that last part, you do a turn still on demi-pointe, arms in fifth position – up in the air – until you're back into the original set up, but places swapped."
He and Gillian turned around. People were finishing the moves at different times, trying not to bump into one another and remember what positions had been called out. Francis sighed.
"Okay, let's do it again..."
Francis did not know how many times he had grilled the cast on that one piece of actual ballet choreography. It seemed to mesh all together in his head, and he didn't feel like listening to a cha cha for at least the rest of the week. Unfortunately, there would be another dance rehearsal in three days' time, so he would have to resign himself to his fate.
"Lalalalala, snap snap! Lalalalala, snap snap!" Gillian giggled heartlessly as she mimicked his instructions from before. "Great vocabulary, Fran-Fran."
He pulled out his ponytail and began to fluff his hair to remove the kinks. "Oh, shut up. I can't believe I agreed to do this."
"I like dance rehearsals. They are way awesome. See my kicks?"
"But you're not the one leading them. And yeah, of course I did, Miss Ninja."
Gillian was incredibly pleased with his choice of words and began to karate chop at his waist whilst he gathered all his belongings. Antonio ambled towards them from the crowd, looking happy. Before he could speak, Francis cut him off.
"Looks like we had fun today, didn't we? Dancing with a certain someone? Hey, I saw the look on her face. Smooth moves."
Antonio grinned and shrugged. Gillian turned and aimed at his arm instead, doubling her speed.
"Who's her? Lovina? So like, she's falling and stuff?"
Antonio looked a bit embarrassed. "I dunno about 'falling'. I still feel like I don't know her. Normal stuff, like what her hobbies are, what she likes or doesn't like...even today, I can't tell if she liked the dancing or not. I don't even know why she's in the play."
"Yeah, she's like that." Francis could not offer any advice. Lovina had made it clear that she did not consider him an ally. "You'd be better off figuring that out from Feli, her sister."
Gillian paused in mid-slice at Antonio's elbow. "Wait, is this cute Feli? As in, Ludwig's Feli?"
"Probably."
"Oh, she's awesome! Let's go find her," she cried, snatching up Antonio's arm firmly. "I love talking to Feli. Think there's a sort of art club or whatever she's in right now. We can ask her no problem, Feli's a sweetheart. She'll tell us everything!"
A/N: For those who have read this story before, I confess that I'm changing a lot more than I expected. The reason is because I feel that previously, my characters had been super-flat (coughlikeAntoniocough) so a major aim for editing was to make them more 3 dimensional. Anyway, I hope you appreciate the changes - luckily, most have been additions or reaction responses rather than complete exclusions!
I have a small running joke in regards to fem!Prussia being a massive Lady Gaga fan. It's very silly, really, but isn't that what inside jokes are all about?
Once again (and until forever), thank you for reading!