Fun's End
Yalana glanced around the warehouse; it was packed with bodies, all moving to the hard beat of the music. She put the boy, and how similar he was to Remy, the boy from two year earlier, out of her mind. It was eerie…he looked so much like Remy, but the "vibes" she got off him were somehow different. He was a flirt, he had the same looks…but he came off as more sincere…more serious in his flirting. Less like he just wanted to see how she reacted and more like he wanted to actually get to know her…less like he was just trying to get something from her.
She shook her head violently…determined to put the two away, in that place in her mind where she stored people and things she didn't want to look to closely at yet. She'd get there…in time. For now she melted into the crowd and danced, letting the meat take her where it would. She smiled, moving with the beat, and, sometimes, against it.
The music made her free, for a moment, from the terror she jokingly referred to as her life. It took her away from the pain of the lies she had grown up with, away from the life she now lived surrounded by the kind of people she had run away from. Talk about going back to your roots, she thought bitterly, before she forcibly pushed it away, refusing to let anything ruin the fun that this night had started out as.
She danced harder, letting her the beat take her where it would, loving the carefree feeling it invoked in her. She danced with others, if they took the initiative to come to her. She didn't play favorites; she danced with anyone who offered. Boy, girl, hot, or ugly, it didn't matter. She danced and let herself go, hardly noticing when one partner left and another took their place. It went on, the music hardly paused between songs before a new one was on. In the morning she wouldn't be able to describe most of the people she had danced with, let alone remember any of their names. At least that was the plan.
She didn't know how long she had been there, how many different people she had danced with, before the boy who had invited her in the first place showed up to claim a dance. He wasn't like everyone else; he didn't let her get away with dancing without acknowledging his presence. He made her stop when he said hi, made her tell him her name and told her his in return. Lapin, what kind of name was that? She actually laughed when he gave it.
"Lapin," She said dryly, "as in Rabbit? Like the kind that have fluffy tails, hop around and eat carrots?"
He rolled his eyes, "Oui, li'e da' on'y 'm a lo' mo'e fun t' cuddle wid." His smile was flirty and she rolled her eyes in return, not sure rather he was joking or just full of himself. He was one of those rare people she seemed to have problems reading, just like Remy…she just couldn't read them, not in the least. It was the one thing that put her on edge around this boy, the fact that he was so far from readable, so unlike anyone else. Nine times out of ten she could trust her instincts on what a person was like, she'd learned to read people out of necessity, but she couldn't place Lapin. Just like she hadn't been able to place Remy two years ago. Why does that little ingrate keep popping into my thoughts? she raged at herself. He has no place in my thoughts…so why can't I keep him out? She slapped herself mentally, determined to have fun. Determined not to think of him again, determined to enjoy the party, even Lapin's company if it would just get that Cajun creep out of her thoughts and out of her dreams.
She started dancing, not really caring if Lapin chose to join her, but determined to dance herself into exhaustion before she went home and collapsed into bed to sleep until her alarm went off, calling her to another night of plunder just to stay in the "surviving" category of life. She'd just started to relax. Just started to get back into the flow of the music and started enjoying herself again. When she heard a voice straight from her dreams, straight from her nightmares.
"Lapin, mon ami, s' dere yo' are! An' who's dis yo' go' dancin' s' pr'voc'tively wid yo'?" Yalana stopped dancing and whirled to face him.
"Oh, no…Not you…anyone but you," she breathed not daring to raise her voice. She didn't want to believe it.