Memoirs of a Japanophile [Part 4 of 5]:
A week went by rather quickly. The same outings at lunch continued, flirting continued openly in public now, etc. I then remembered, "$#@!, I still don't have the tickets!"
I remembered because the school's morning announcements said that Sadie Hawkins tickets were to be on sale until 12:00 P.M today.
$#@!. Me. Sideways.
I quickly found a cell phone from one of my friends (I still don't own one, to this day.), and phoned my house. I explained my situation, and had my parents look through my drawers and find the necessary money (42 dollars per couple…$#@!ing school.) Nevertheless, I had to a.) get my parents to drop off my money, b.) find out Akiko's last name (they buy tickets according to your school id number..; sad that I didn't know her surname either.), c.) go to the office and give both surname, my school ID, and money to get said tickets...all of this before 12. My parents dropped off my money during my break, so that was taken care of. I spent the rest of my break (which was 15 minutes.) LOOKING in a school of 3,300 students for a female Japanese foreign exchange student. She hadn't been at the usual hang out spots she frequented....I was really panicking now.
Lunch rolled by, and the same search continued. I was really panicking, since this was past the deadline, and I was hoping to GOD that the lady selling the tickets would be nice. I searched high and low, and no sign of Akiko, nor anyone who knew her last name. Isn't it curious how you can meet someone for the longest time, and not know their last name until later? I had felt extremely guilty for not knowing, but I also knew it wasn't a time for self pity. I was about to give up when I suddenly saw Liz.
HEY wait a mother$#@!ing minute..! Isn't Liz her host-sister?
Yes.
Incidentally, I got her last name (or surname, whatever) from her. The funny part about it was, it was a 3 letter surname. Ha. Ha. Ha. ;
I had to go to class, so I was SERIOUSLY banking on the notion that the lady would accept a late payment of tickets. The reason why there was this uptightness about the ticket purchasing was that in order to buy tickets, you had to owe the school no money, so they'd check your records and what not.
As soon as the last bell rang, I went as fast as I could to the business office, to take care of well..business. By the GRACE OF GOD, the lady there was the sweetest thing. I explained my story and she bought it (even though I wasn't lying), giving me a lucky break. I got the tickets, and sighed in relief.
...Lo and behold, guess who I see walking afterwards? Akiko. Blah! I don't think she'll ever find out the trouble I went through, due to my carelessness. She smiled and said hi. I did the same, acting as if nothing had happened.
It wasn't long before the awaited day came around..
I was dropped off at the dance. I was early, but I didn't care. I stopped by the local 7 eleven right next to my school, as I bought a Red Bull and a condom. I didn't know what would happen, even though I wasn't nervous at all, but I always followed this rule, and it's never failed me to this day.
"When in doubt, buy a condom."
I then walked over to the parking lot, where she would be dropped off. I think I waited for 15 minutes, until she had finally shown up. She had looked real nice, in the outfit we had picked together. After doing a few greeting formalities, I remembered that tonight had also been a Mexican folkloric dance show. Let me rewind here. For the past two years (sophomore and junior year) I was in the school's Mexican folkloric dance group. It was cool, considering there were usually about 2 guys and 11 girls...anyway. Moving on. This year I hadn't been dancing, but I still wanted to give Akiko a nice little surprise. Luckily, the dance wouldn't start for another half an hour, so me and her walked over to the auditorium, where the dance show was taking place.
Akiko and I had went in through the back, because that's where the dancers loitered in between dances. My Highschool wasn't the only ones dancing either; the local community college and our rival high school was there as well. It was funny to see the expressions of my old dance friends as I had walked in (they hadn't seen me in months). They all were happy to see me and whatever, and I introduced Akiko to them. She was delighted to see all these people in traditional Mexican costumes. I told her last year I used to be a dancer, and she got a pretty good kick out of that.
We managed to sneek a peek to see the dancers that were on stage. It was my school, and it was this dance with the guy literally slapping two machetes, complete with a dance movement. I explained to her a little about the history behind that dance, and all that jazz. Afterwards, I had run into my sister (she was dancing that year too, but for the college of course), and I of course introduced Akiko to her (sister wasn't there when I took Akiko home), along with some other friends. People were really friendly about it, and liked that I stopped by. I decided to cut the visit short, because I didn't want to bother them anymore (A quick visit is fine, but I'm well aware of backstage etiquette). I also didn't want to get caught by my old dance director (he'd have a huge fit...maaan.), even though he'd probably want to meet Akiko too (probably say something along the lines of me having no girls. What a bastard.) After saying our goodbyes, we made our way to the dance.
We met up with some of the people waiting in line to get in. Some of them were my acquaintances, others were the friends she had made. The group that we had hung out with had been a small, but very friendly group. Finally, we made our way into the dance floor (which had been the indoor basketball gym), and looked around. The theme this year was Vegas.
God damn was it cheesy. All they did was slap a couple of playing cards on some walls, put some fake cardboard representations of the famous Vegas buildings (Stratosphere, MGM grand, etc.) and called it a day. At least there were slutty looking girls there, so it had SOME realism to it. It didn't matter though; I was there to dance, not sight see at other people's ability (or lack thereof) at arts and crafts and ho's. We saw a huge line of people waiting in line to take their Sadie Hawkins pictures. Naturally, we took our pictures as well. After that, the music had started, and people had begun to dance.
Now, I'm a latin person. If there's anything us latin people can pride ourselves in, it's our ability to make passionate love, our nice round asses, and our natural dancing ability. I'm no dancemaster or anything, but I'd like to take pride in my ability to dance. As Akiko and I made our way to basically do like they do in the discovery channel, but with clothes on..it had dawned on me.
She probably has two left feet.
I was right. As soon as we had begun to dance, and my hands were placed on her hips, I could literally FEEL the robotic effort put out by my cute friend.
Okay, okay. I thought to myself. I can guide her through this. I managed to use my hands, and subtly guide her movements in a bit more rhythmic, fluid, less-mechanical manner. She seemed to get the hang of it after awhile. Pretty soon, I had stopped thinking about how to work her altogether. Maybe it was instinctual to rhythmically grind her ass on my...place, thing, IT.
I decided to step it up a notch, see if she would match. Surprisingly, she WOULD. Okay, what the hell? I started to grind lower, to see if she would follow. She would. She would follow me to a near squat position, then come back up. Geez, I didn't know she'd pick up THAT quick. That's some newtype !@#$ right there.
We'd do this for an hour. I'd ask her maybe once or twice, "Are you okay?" And she'd give me the biggest grin and nod. I think she likes me too.
Eventually, I stopped dancing because well..I'll say it. She wore me out. I don't think an hour and a half was enough for her either. I had just started to sweat a little, and I didn't wanna push it further, the last thing I wanted was to be all sweaty. We decided to stop for a bit and chat a little. She had told me that this was her first REAL dance, she hadn't been to one ever. I guess I felt a little lucky, but at the same time I also felt compelled to give her a great time. We went back to the group we had been hanging out with earlier. After awhile, I think Akiko wanted to go back to dancing.
I had no complaints; I had rested up already.
We went back to the dance floor, and it seemed that some people had grabbed the attention of the crowds with the dancing. We were one of them I guess. We were cut short, however, because it was starting to get towards the end of the dance, and the slow songs had started up. I didn't mind, I didn't exactly like being looked at; I couldn't dance comfortably (fast paced, anyway). Then, when the slow songs began, it suddenly went from a whacky mix of capoeira breakdance + dry humping crazy fest, to a sea of people dancing the "penguin". You've all seen the penguin before..during a slow dance, where a couple grabs eachother, and then rock back and forth simultaneously, slow, and most of the time offbeat to the music. It's kind of amusing to watch it from a 3rd person point of view, but it's kind of nice to partake in it.
Eventually, yes..the dance had come to an end. I really didn't want it to end, I don't think she did either. We walked out hugging eachother still, in that sort of penguin like attaching. I was holding her from her right side, she was holding me on her left, and I had my chin on her head. Her hair smelled really nice...it felt great just holding her that way.
We waited at the parking lot for our ride. It took about 20 minutes, but we didn't care. We just stood there, hugging and talking about different things. She tried to teach me the names for things in Japanese. I still remember Akai is red, Midori is green, and Ao is blue. We were finally picked up by her host parent. As they were dropping me off, her host parent had asked her, "Did you have a fun time?" She said she did, and I guess I believed it, considering the tone she had in saying it. As we got to my house, I thanked the lady for giving me a ride, and I definitely thanked Akiko for being my date. She thanked me as well, as we hugged, and I kissed her cheek. I watched as the car drove off, upon me being dropped off.
Thinking back, I remember believing that it was okay that I didn't use the condom. I had a great night, and I wouldn't have had it any other way. When I got home, I chucked the condom in the trash.
To be continued.
