Kobayashi had more than a little trouble sleeping that night, and unsurprisingly, when she woke up that morning, she swore she could hear disco music coming from the other room. Unsurprisingly, Kobayashi and Kanna were boogieing down to "I Feel Love" by Donna Summer.
"REALLY!?" exclaimed Kobayashi. "WHAT DID I TELL YOU ABOUT THIS!?"
"Sorry, I just couldn't resist!" said Tohru. "OK, I did get a noise complaint from the police last night, but other than that, it's been non-stop boogie madness! Breakfast is ready, too!"
Kobayashi sat down and went to eat breakfast, but soon found that the constant sequencer rhythm of the song was getting on her nerves, so once again, she attempted to pause the music, only for Tohru to get in her way.
"NO! I've got the fever, and I'm not gonna stop!"
"Tohru, I just got up! That music is getting on my nerves right now! Kanna has to go to school as well!"
"But Miss Kobayashi, I wanna keep dancing!" said Kanna.
Kobayashi smiled and knelt down before Kanna. "Kanna, you can talk with your friends all about disco music when you're at school! You have to go though; you can't dance your way out of it, understood?"
Kanna nodded. "I understand."
"Great! Now if you'll excuse me…"
Once again, Kobayashi went off to work. However, she was having trouble focusing and staying awake, and Takiya took notice of this:
"Long night, Kobayashi?"
Kobayashi yawned. "Worse. Tohru's got a bad case of disco fever. I tried to leave the club last night so I could go home and get some sleep, but she wanted to dance all night. Even worse, she stayed up all night dancing at my apartment, and we got a noise complaint from the police because of it."
"Sounds like you have the exact opposite problem I have. I've been trying to get Fafnir into disco music and disco dancing, but no matter how hard I try, he just won't bite."
"Yeah, well, disco just isn't everybody's taste."
"Sounds like you're not too keen on it, either."
"Don't get me wrong, I love disco music, but Tohru's making it into an obsession, and I can't stand to listen to it for hours at a time like she can…not unless I'm at the disco, if you understand." Kobayashi yawned again.
"I understand. I think you should just give her time. Maybe one day, she'll grow out of it. There was a time decades ago when disco music was on the verge of going out forever, though I read that it varied depending on the country."
"Oh?"
"In America, for example, disco seemed to vanish almost completely overnight except for certain cities and scenes, whereas it continued to flourish and evolve in Europe."
"Interesting. Where did you read about this?"
"I looked it up because I was curious about it. You know me: when I get interested in something, I wanna know more about it."
Kobayashi nodded. "I see. Well, I'm glad you at least don't take it to obsessive extremes like Tohru and Lucoa do."
Takiya chuckled. "Hey, I may be passionate, but I'm not obsessive!"
Kobayashi smiled. "Takiya, you're a really good coworker, you know that?"
Takiya smiled back. "I try!"
Meanwhile, at Oborozuka Elementary, Kanna was having a good day, though it was obvious that there was something she was really looking forward to. When she got to recess, she finally got her chance:
"Hey Saikawa, there's something I wanna show you…"
Riko Saikawa's eyes widened. "Really? Ooh, what is it?"
"Do you know what disco music is?"
"No, what is it?"
"It's this fun music that people dance to."
"Nice! I love dancing! Play some disco for me!"
"OK."
Kanna pulled out an MP3 player and a Bluetooth speaker, and after setting the speaker down, she proceeded to play "The Hustle" by Van McCoy, upon which she started doing the titular dance. Saikawa just couldn't help but be entranced by Kanna's movements, which were made more entrancing by the song's orchestral buildup. Finally, when the song came to its first crescendo with that emphatic exhortation "Do the Hustle!", Saikawa let out an excited scream.
"OH MY GOSH! I LOVE DISCO!"
Immediately, Saikawa started doing The Hustle along with Kanna. She'd had plenty of fun throughout her life, but this…this was fun on a whole other plane, and she couldn't get enough of it. Their little dance session hadn't gone unnoticed by the other students either:
"What are Kobayashi and Saikawa doing?"
"What is that music they're listening to?"
"I dunno, but I wanna dance!"
Within a short period of time, the rest of the students in the schoolyard began to feel the boogie fever, and they were holding their own little dance session. Too young to understand the concepts of the LGBTQ community or homophobia, it happened in some cases where girls danced with girls and boys danced with boys without a care in the world. Soon enough, Kanna's teacher Mitsuka Kawakami took notice of the dance party:
"Oh my! What have we got here?"
"Mrs. Kawakami, do you wanna disco dance too?" said Kanna.
Kawakami smiled. "Oh, what the heck!"
Kawakami joined Kanna's little dance party by the time "Contact" by Edwin Starr came on. At this point, the whole schoolyard was disco heaven, and unlike Tavares once said, it wasn't missing any angels. As heavenly as the party was, however, it couldn't last forever.
"OK, class, recess is over!" said Kawakami.
The students refused to stop dancing.
"Class, it's time to come back inside!"
Again, the kids kept dancing.
"Kobayashi, please stop the music!"
"But I don't wanna!" Kanna kept dancing.
"Kobayashi, you have to go back inside now!"
"OK."
Kanna stopped the music, leading to a dejected "awww" from the rest of the students.
"I know, we were all having fun disco dancing, but we have to learn now!" Kawakami smiled. "I promise, we'll all get to dance tomorrow, though!"
Reluctantly, the students went back inside. Even if her dance party had been cut short, Kanna was at least glad that she got to show off the music to Saikawa.
Later on that day, Lucoa was at Shota Magatsuchi's house, still dressed in her club attire, getting down to "Turn the Beat Around" by Vicki Sue Robinson. Even though she wasn't at the disco, with all those lusty guys fawning over her, she was still enjoying getting down to the music, though it was clear that she wanted to share the experience:
"Hey Shota Baby, wanna dance?"
Shota crossed two chopsticks in a "cross" pattern. "Begone with that lusty music, evil succubus!"
"Loosen up, Shota Baby! It's just dancing! There doesn't have to be anything weird about it!"
"Phooey! This music is meant to seduce!"
"Seduce? Come on, I just wanna dance, Shota Baby!"
"Is that all you wanna do, or is this just an appetizer to the main course?"
"Come on and dance already!"
Lucoa roped Shota into dancing with her, accidentally smooshing him in her massive fun pillows in the process.
Despite her tiredness, Kobayashi made it through her workday all right. All she wanted to do right now was have supper and crash for the night. However, as soon as she walked into her apartment, she would find that her plans would be reduced to an impossibility…
"Welcome back, Miss Kobayashi!"
Kobayashi dropped her jaw when she saw Tohru dressed in nothing but an aqua green sports bra, an aqua green sweatband and matching aqua green spandex pants with white stripes, doing a variety of aerobic exercises while listening to "Macho Man" by the Village People. Kanna was joining in the exercises as well, dressed in a purple leotard and matching sweatband.
"NO!" yelled Kobayashi. "NO! YOU'VE TAKEN THIS TOO FAR! I CAME HOME TO RELAX, NOT TO BOOGIE!"
"Come on, what's wrong with a little disco-robics?" said Tohru.
"EVERYTHING IS WRONG! BESIDES, YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO FIX DINNER WHILE I WAS OUT!"
"Relax! I got us takeout!"
Kobayashi let out a disgusted sigh. "Well, at least you got me something to eat."
Kobayashi approached the stereo and attempted to pause the music.
"YOU INTERFERE WITH MY MUSIC AND I'LL END YOU!" yelled Tohru.
"Fine." (How freaking far can she take this obsession?)
Kobayashi sat down at the table, but decided that the ambiguously gay antics of the Village People were too much, so she grabbed some earplugs from the bathroom and put them in while eating. She then proceeded to lock herself in her room after supper. At some point, somebody attempted to open the door.
"Miss Kobayashi, is everything OK in there?"
"I'm all right, Tohru; I'm just tired."
"Well, don't you wanna go to the disco tonight?"
"I said I'm tired. I don't feel like it."
"Come on! It'll be fun!"
"What part of 'I don't feel like it' don't you understand?"
"The 'don't' part!"
"Tohru, let me rest. I had a long workday and I don't feel like disco dancing at all."
"I'll eat you out if you go to the disco with me!"
"Tohru, we both established that I'm not a lesbian. Now leave it."
"Aw, come on! At least motorboat my tits!"
Realizing that there was no way in Hell that she was going to get Tohru to give up on trying to get her to go to Mutsumi's, Kobayashi staggered out of bed, unlocked her door, and after opening it, she half-heartedly faceplanted into Tohru's cleavage and made a burbling sound as she shook her head left and right. Tohru giggled when she did this.
That night at Mutsumi's, Kobayashi put in the bare minimum of moves needed to qualify as "dancing". All the lights seemed to become a blurry mess as she half-assed her steps, not particularly caring what song was on. Not even Hi-NRG numbers such as "Disco Kicks" by the Boys Town Gang could excite her senses.
When Kobayashi got back home that night, she struggled to stay awake when Tohru was bathing with her. At one point, she fell asleep in the tub, only jolting awake after being submerged and swallowing water.
"MISS KOBAYASHI, BE CAREFUL!" cried Tohru.
Kobayashi flailed around, coughing. "I'm awake! I'm awake!"
After managing to stay awake long enough to dry off, brush her teeth and floss, Kobayashi collapsed into her bed and fell into deep sleep in a couple of minutes, not particularly noticing that Tohru was snuggling with her again.
Criticism is gold. Negativity and nitpicking are pyrite.