Along Came a Spider, Who Tangoed Beside Him

Posted on Wed 25th Nov, 2020 @ 6:47am by Lieutenant JG Kellian Michaels

1,029 words; about a 5 minute read

Mission: Denouement
Location: Orchids & Jazz
Timeline: MD-5

The silence after the waitress left was awkward. Muffet hadn't meant to insult Kellian, or imply that he was scared by her, but somehow, she felt like she had. "No one's dancing!" Muffet hopped up off her tuffet and strode onto the dance floor. "Maestro!" she called, clear and loud, "Give me something Latin! And give it a beat!"

The musicians -- two Humans, a Bolian, and a Zeta Reticulan -- looked at each other. The Bolian woman stepped closer to the microphone as the Zeta Reticulan set a 2/4 time on the drums. The two guitarists launched into melody and harmony, quick and urgent. There were enough Preslytarians in the Federation to make their King's 'messages' immortal, and when the blue chanteuse began to sing, everyone knew the words. "I said, "Hey little mama, let's sit down, have a drink and dig the band" She said, "Drink, drink, drink oh, fiddle-de-dink I can dance with a drink in my hand!""

Muffet grabbed a glass of water from a nearby table and took the cue. Her right hand held the drink high, while her left sunk down, low on her torso. Her six legs matched the tempo -- the front and rear pair moving in opposition, and the middle pair seeming to do nothing but tapping out the beat. For the length of half a verse, she danced facing the band, before spinning on one front foot and facing back toward the table, extending her left hand and curling her fingers in a clear "come hither" gesture to Kellian.

Work with Muffet was never dull. Obviously play with her would never be dull, either. Equally obviously, she meant to address the eight-legged elephant in the room in a big way. Kellian snickered at that thought and stood. He walked out to join Muffet on the dance floor, moved close to her, and slid his right hand to the small of her back. He bent down to her ear and whispered, "I hope you can lead! If you do, I can follow. Let's do this." He held out his left hand for her drink-filled right one and prayed he wouldn't step on her tarsal claws.

Coming back toward the table with their meals, Jenna was startled to see the two customers dancing, as well as to hear the jazz band playing something quite different from the norm. She set the plates on the table and reached into her pocket to pull out her private communications device. Pressing a button, she set the holo-vid option going for a few moments, watching the two. If anyone had told her how graceful and beautiful it would be to see a human and an Arachne dancing, she wouldn't have taken them seriously ... but graceful was exactly the word that described it. After a few minutes, she put the device away and moved back to the kitchen, leaving them to enjoy themselves.

It was easy for Muffet to lead the dance. She'd marveled, over the years, at the variety of music that fell under the heading of "Jazz," and Bossa Nova, the "New Trend" was just one of those flavors... and a better one, in the Arachnae's opinion, than the "Honk, Squeak, Blat" school of so-called "Modern Jazz." She moved lightly, despite her earlier implication about her three left feet. When she twirled, she shifted her pivot point smoothly from one to another, never letting her abdothorax come even close to smacking her partner. "Loosen up," she told Kellian as she came back in close. "More hips, less shoulder."

To Kellian's ears the music was insanely fast, at first. Then he realized it was actually the same tempo as music he'd danced to in high school, and he relaxed into it, recalling the moves of those dances and fitting them to the figures that Muffet was leading him into. "The song's new to me, but I like it," he said. "And three left feet, my eye. Who taught you to dance?"

"My father," Muffet answered as the song came to an end. She laughed, taking Kellian's hand and leading him back to their table. "Papa Jack loved him some jazz. One of my earliest memories is of him dancing with me, holding my hands while my front feet rested on top of his."

"That's a good way to learn. It gives you a feel for the moves," Kellian said, imagining the scene in his mind's eye as the returned to their table. He smiled and bowed to Muffet with a slight flourish as she sat down on the cushion the restaurant had had ready for her and then took his seat. "What kind of jazz did he like? Ragtime? New Orleans, cool jazz?"

"And Bossa Nova, and more besides. But he had a special place in his heart for Thelonious Monk. I must've heard the album 'Mulligan Meets Monk' a thousand times as I drifted off to sleep at night." Muffet took her first bite of the cheesy, bacony pasta. "Mmmmm!" She rolled her eyes -- the ones which moved, at any rate -- in pleasure. After a moment, she went on, "Though I was a teenager before I realized 'The Lonliest Monk' was not a title."

"All I remember about Thelonious Monk is that he was really percussive on the piano," Kellian said. "You know The Loneliest Monk? The cello and drum duo?" He too took a bite of his bacon macaroni and cheese. "Oh, wow, they need to serve this more often!"

"Or we need to eat here more often," Muffet countered, her own fork busy. After a few moments, she went on, "No; I misheard 'Thelonious' as 'the lonliest.' I was a child." She shrugged. "This duo? You enjoy their music?"

"Oh, we are definitely coming here more often," Kellian agreed. "As for The Lonliest Monk--I admit, I listen to them more for the cello than the drum."

"That," Muffet observed, her fork suspended in the air in front of her mouth, "sounds like an epigram. Here's to cellos and drums, but most of all? To bacon." She lifted her fork as if in salute, and downed the waiting bite of deliciousness.

 

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