Notes: Slightly humorous and slightly Gary/Carmen inclined. Very slightly.

Set: Before SK2:IoLD.

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Dancing

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Gerti lounges on the sleek sofa, grinning rudely at her older brother and tossing a shining apple from one hand to the other. She has a look rather like that of a cat having caught a large, overly plump mouse in its jagged yellow teeth, and he ignores her as best he can, a faint sheen of sweat beading along his high forehead with the exertion. After a moment of the tinny Latino music pouring from the pocket radio perched on the mantle of his bed, she rolls her eyes and bites noisily through the taut red skin of the apple, ripping off a chunk of the fruit.

"What *are* you doing, loser?" she asked snidely, chewing at the bite of apple. She raises a thin blonde eyebrow and gives him a sardonic look, suggesting she does not need an answer as she already knows the fact, a cheshire smile tugging at her mouth with all the future of sibling blackmail at hand. "'Cause you know," continues Gerti, off-hand, as she taked another loud, pointed bite, "it looks an awful lot like Mexican dancing to me, only you're being stupid about it. Where's the girl?" She pauses, feigning thought and jutting her jaw in mock-consideration, tapping a finger at her cheek before she deduces, with a false show of brilliant realization, "Hey, isn't that Carmen Cortez gir--"

"It's the tango," Gary interrupts before she can finish, scowling at his younger sibling. He's granting her the dirtiest look in his arsenal when he pauses, pulling at his black t-shirt while he steps back from the board outlining the steps needed to be memorized so he can tango properly in any future circumstance demanding that knowledge. "I wouldn't expect you to know what a tango is, anyway, cheeseball," he speaks loftily, chin raising defiantly and tone growing patronizing with all his fourteen years. "Besides, Mom doesn't like you eating in the bedrooms." It is obviously a taunt, as well as a vague promise to tell if she does not opt to leave well enough alone, and he rolls his neck, experimentally bobbing up, once, on his toes as he does so.

Instead of caving in or leaving, surly, she merely giggles her short laugh, one slightly lower in pitch than his is, and slowly, meanly, leans forward to bite the apple with as much suction and splattering noise as possible. "Mom and Dad aren't home and you know it," she chirps with a sickly sweet expression of benevolence. "I think you just want to," she latches onto a dim, half-known recollection on the mysticism surrounding male-female relations, and adds coyly, "tan-go with Car-men." She flashes a smug twist of her teeth at him, the apple clutched yet in her hand, and smirks at his sour look, one implying she has struck gold or missed resolutely by a continent or two; choosing to stick to her gut feeling tather than his disbelieving manner, Gerti accuses, finding it humorous, "You like that stupid Cortez girl, don't you, Gary? Does dumb Gary like pret-ty Car-men?"

"*Like* her?" he scoffs indignantly, and just to put himself at ease, he giggles his own high-pitched way. "As if," he scowls suddenly, crossing his arms and glaring down his nose at her. "She's a dork, and I *don't* want to," he mimics Gerti, "'tango' with her." Gary straightens, adjusting his t-shirt importantly and giving her a look of pure condenscending rightness, telling her effectively without speaking that he wants her to believe she has missed the mark so far as to be blundering around on another planet. "I just thought I'd be prepared in case we ever had a mission into a Latin country." He smirks, triumphant, and uncrosses his arms to carefully step back on the wide board, fitting his sneakers in place where he left off and trying to reposition his body carefully.

"Why not just learn to waltz, stupid?" she asks sarcastically, biting into the apple and hopping off the sofa to stare incredulously up at her lanky brother. "Most formal parties we have to go to," she announces in her nastiest bratty voice, "ask for the waltz, not some stupid Spanish dance. I can't even *watch* you embarrass yourself further." She rolls her eyes, nose wrinkling with her disgust, and grandly sweeps to the arched doorway where she pauses, thoughtfully looking back at Gary as he punches the music back on; she yells theatrically, loud enough to drown out the small radio/tape player, "Oh, Carmen!"

Immediately, Gary - furious and red-faced - launches after her, slipping once on the slick board before he, arms forward to catch and throttle Gerti, manages to escape the confines of the room, with a vengeful cry of, "Cheeseball!"

The music pipes merrily onward, echoing in the room void of people.

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End!

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Feedback: I'll lo~ove you!

Disclaimer: Robert Rodriguez owns Carmen and the Giggles - sounds like a '50s band, doesn't it? "Hey all you cool cats..." Hrumph. Point is, me not own.

Written: 07/10-11/03, PallaPlease