Tiny Bubbles

Dawn Marie knew one thing: Ginger ale and crushed ice could save the world.

Not the kind you got in a restaurant. It had to be home-made. And not from a refrigerator's ice machine. By hand.

This restaurant wasn't too bad at it; The ice chunks were a bit too large, but it wasn't too bad. She sipped and tapped her feet to the band.

Her eyes strained out across the dance floor. PJ and Lance were at it again. Dawn waved to them, and they waved back; a cool grin masked her bubbling laughter. They often danced together, PJ and Lance, to ward off amorous women.

Dawn only wished that she had to bat away amorous men in such a way.

They did that for her, and so Her dance card sat empty, and it was just she and her ginger ale.

She wanted to dance; her feet tapped the floor and she bounced in her seat, unable to sit still. The men were circling Amy like a shark instead, and no one offered her a crumb of attention. Her eyes tickled over the floor. She saw a familiar pair....she would have sworn it was the Blue Meanie....and Stevie Richards. Dawn tipped back her glass and took a long drink, contented with the drink; they made a suitable pair for the night.

*************

"Man, go ask her to dance!" Brian Heffron exclaimed.
Michael Manna's eyes were trained on Dawn like a sharpshooter's crosshairs. His enormous fondness for her ECW performances used to be his secret. Until Brian had stumbled upon his poetry.
"If you don't," Brian teased, "I'll email her a copy of 'Light of Dawn.'"
Michael flushed, "Don't you dare!" 'Light of Dawn' was an entire sheaf of poems Dawn had inspired.
Brian danced away to the beat of a Whitney Houston remix, "Shake a leg, Mikey."

As he walked up the stairs from the dance floor to the bar area, pick up lines danced through his head.
"Hi, are those reflective pants? Cause I can see myself in them...Wrong....You sound a little horse, all the better for me to ride you all night....No....What am I going to say?"

When he touched her shoulder, and her hair shifted from her shoulder. Dawn studied his face, and he recalled with sudden clarity what he had read the night before. It was a biography of Lucy and Desi Arnez, and The only words he could remember were the ones that Desi had wooed Lucy with Forty years before.

He smiled the biggest, cheekiest, corniest grin in all of creation, and shouted over the music, "Hi, my name is Michael. Do you know how to rumba?"



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