"Hi, Salven. Want to go to a dance with me?" Cora asked sweetly. Salven, wearing a T-shirt that proudly proclaimed that he did indeed fuck on the first date, spluttered and lost the legendary cool that he bragged so much about to the point where he fell off his chair. His shades slipped to the very edge of his nose, and he pushed it up in an attempt to look cool.
"Eh?" he said.
The two of them were in Salven's room. Salven had a stack of paper pushed to the far corner of his desk in an 'in' container. The 'out' container was void of work - instead, there was a magazine of questionable repute.
"A dance." Cora repeated. "With me."
"This isn't like, ballroom dancing, is it?" Salven asked suspiciously. He put his feet up against the desk, careful not to track mud on any of the magazines or papers on his desk.
"No." Cora wondered what ballroom dancing was. There were few types of dance in Mexico that Cora had seen - there was of course, traditional dances, then there was the type of wild, unrehearsed dances that Amelia and Cora did to the newest pop hit on their radio, and then there was the bump n grind.
"Aah, so it's like a corperate dance or summat? One of those "hi, we're not such bad guys, now don't breath out of tune or we'll shoot you all" kind of events?"
"That sums it up pretty well." Maybe Salven was smarter than Cora gave him credit for.
"Hmm." Salven seemed to be considering. The door opened, and Lydia Salven came storming in with her arms full of groceries. Cora had never seen Lydia before, and so she was quite interested. She didn't know what she had been expecting , but 'Ruben Salven' wasn't a name to carry positive connotations, and she had expected Mrs. Ruben Salven to be a woman of similar stature to her husband - scrawny, lean, greasy, and Mexican.
To Cora's surprise, she was nothing of the sort. From the looks of it, she wasn't Mexican - she had a long mane of golden brown hair that tumbled to her waist and big dark blue eyes that bespoke of a temper. Her nose was small, and delicate, speckled with freckles, and she had a red, sulky rosebud of a mouth. She was beautiful in a sulky, petulant way.
"Hello, Rubey." she said fondly to her husband, then turned those big eyes to Cora.
"Hello, Mrs. Salven." Cora said, shaking Lydia's hand. "My name is Cora Merandez, and I'm a fellow soldier of your husbands. I'm just here to ask him if he would mind accompanying me to some social event of sorts."
"Oh thank God, Rubey. I thought she was another of your side dishes." Lydia Salven sighed, her face filling with relief. "Of course, of course. If you were one of his ..." That sulky little mouth twisted in disgust, and she continued without saying the word. "If you were one of his friends, you wouldn't be clothed and you wouldn't be saying anything coherent or intelligent. Yes, of course you can go to this little social event"
"Thank you, Mrs. Salven." Cora smiled graciously.
"How did you do that?" asked an astonished Salven. Two pairs of eyes - one blue gray, one dark blue swiveled to the man.
"Honey." Lydia said dangerously. "I've asked you not to wear that t- shirt in the house."
"But, Di, sweetie. It's just for the irony."
"You said that about the boxers with the other girl's face on them that you had personalized."
"That wasn't for me!" Salven said, trying very hard not to look at Cora. Lydia sighed.
"Well, you better be nice to this girl. I like her."
"Yes, Rubey." Cora said mockingly. Salven winced. "I'm going to see if you have anything good enough for this thing." Cora strode over the closet, jerking the door open. She pulled out a black long sleeved shirt, then frowned at it. It wouldn't do.
"The man," it proclaimed, with an arrow pointed up. "The myth," it added, with yet another arrow pointing towards where Salven's face was. "The legend." The arrow was pointing down this time. What it was trying to say was obvious - but not believable.
"This'll do." Cora pulled out a black jacket, made by Armani - or at lest the tag claimed.
"Honey." Lydia's voice was anything but loving, even as she spoke the name of endearment.
"Um, yes?" Salven sounded nervous.
"What is that young woman doing to that OTHER young woman in that magazine?"
"Oh, I never noticed that." It was impossible for the deep surprised concern in Salven's voice to be real. "Oh my! It appears that she's well ... she's hugging the other woman. Because they are both happy."
"THIS IS PORNOGRAPHY, RUBEN."
"Um." Salven didn't seem to have a reply to that. "Yes, well." he found a train of thought and clung on for all he was worth. "That's arguable."
"LESBIAN PORNOGRAPHY!" Lydia was towering over the young man, her sulky mouth was twisted into a scowl and her mane seemed to bristle. "I TOLD YOU I DIDN'T WANT ANY MORE OF THIS FILTH IN MY HOME!"
"Well, I read it for the articles. No, wait, no... it's a subjective look at human nature."
"YOUR DISGUSTING LUSTS ARE NOT HUMAN NATURE, RUBEN!"
"I'm sleeping on the couch again, aren't I?"
"I hoped this new job would make something of you Ruben." Lydia wasn't shouting any more, and Ruben wiped away his sweat. Cora knew though that he wasn't out of the fire yet. "But it didn't, did it?"
"Honey!" Ruben said. "We're rich!"
"Money isn't everything." Lydia pouted - or was she just calm faced? Her mouth was just that sulky.
"But it's enough for us to buy what we need."
"LIKE YOUR DISGUSTING INCARNAL LUSTS YOU DISGUST ME!" Lydia roared, then subsided, red in the face and panting. She glared at Salven once, and then stalked out of the room, slamming the door behind her.
"Um..." Salven was left staring at the door.
"Had this conversation before, Rubey?" Cora was grinning widely.
"God hates me." Salven professed.