Bard: Chapter 37

Trista stood with her back pressed against a wall. All her protests had not been enough to save her from Emile and Lily’s insistence that she come out with them to see the festival. There were no classes in session during the holiday, and that meant none of the professors or masters were at work either. No one needed their assistants. Her only way out might have been to feign illness, but she hadn’t thought of it fast enough and now she was at a dance.

Humans swirled around the square, stepping in rhythm with the music, taking hands and spinning around one another. There was a pattern to it all. The dancers knew where to go next, who would reach for their hand next, and when they should turn. Trista hadn’t seen anything like it before. It was pretty, and she found herself shuffling her feet in rhythm with the smiling dancers, but she didn’t dare try to join them.

Laura was here. That offered her a small measure of reassurance, but she was focused on Travis. The two of them moved in line with the dancers, occasionally stumbling through the moves, grinning and laughing. She had never seen Laura so happy before. She was joyful and light. It made Trista happy just watching her.

“There you are!” Bart exclaimed, stepping around the crate Trista had situated herself behind. He had an undercurrent of anxiousness running through him, like he usually did. “Lily said you’d come, but I couldn’t find you.”

Trista startled, feeling ridiculous because she’d felt him coming. It shouldn’t have been such a surprise.

“Hello, Bart,” she said.

“Hello,” he said, chuckling. “Why are you hiding behind a crate?”

“I’m not hiding!”

“It certainly looks like it.”

“I’m just…” she hesitated, glancing around the square. “I get nervous in big groups like this. It’s so crowded.”

“You really did pick an odd profession for getting so nervous around people.”

“Maybe.” Trista shrugged, and Bart grinned.

“There’s more room out there, I think,” he said, pointing to the dancers. By some terrible irony, he was right. The space where the dancing was happening was more open than the spaces where people watched. She had less of a chance getting bumped around with the dancers than she did on the sidelines.

“Do you want to dance?” he held out his hand.

“I don’t know how,” she admitted.

“That’s alright. I can teach you, if you want.”

“You don’t have to.”

“I want to.”

He seemed so earnest, but that string of anxiousness sharpened. She wished she knew what it was about.

Trista worried her lip, looking out at the dancers, and back at Bart’s hand. Maybe if she went out for a few dances, she could slip away more easily without anyone trying to make her stay.

Maybe she might even enjoy it. Everyone else seemed to be having fun.

“Alright.” Trista nodded, and took his hand. Bart led her out into the square as one song came to a close and the dancers reassembled themselves for the next. His anxiousness…changed. She couldn’t place exactly what it was, only that the feeling was less sharp and somehow vibrating. Why would he ask her to dance if it worried him so much?

They took up a place near the end, where there was a bit more space and where it wouldn’t matter so much when Trista stumbled through every step of the dance, which she did. Being aware of everyone around her helped to avoid running into anyone, but she fumbled and tripped through every step of the dance, going the wrong way, turning at the wrong time, and generally messing up everything. By the end of the first song, she wanted to flee, but Bart held onto her.

“Don’t worry!” he assured her. “You’re doing great!”

“I am not!” Trista protested, and to her surprise, Bart laughed.

“No one does perfectly the first time in,” he said, guiding her to the next starting position. “Did you not have dances in your hometown? We can request one you know.”

“No, we didn’t have…dancing,” she said.

“What did you do for festivals?”

What would even have counted as a festival in her mother’s house? They hadn’t celebrated anything. Each day had been as much the same as any other. Her siblings had brought humans to feed on, and she had served her mother. Occasionally they would have visitors from other houses, or from the hells, but that wasn’t a festival…

“Family would come to visit,” she told him. “And there were…feasts,” it hurt her stomach to call it that, “but no dancing.”

“We’ll keep working on it,” he said, and the worry eased. Trista nodded, glad whatever she was doing wasn’t making him anxious anymore.

“Yes,” she said lightly. “I’d like to keep trying.”

Bart was very patient with her, and Trista did not improve much at all by the end of the reels, even if he insisted she had. She shook off her own worry, focusing on the steps as much as she could, her awareness of everyone else thrumming in the background. He caught her when she stumbled, and as the afternoon wore on she was able to laugh with each misstep. Emile spotted them and smiled brightly, twirling away with her own partner.

Finally, when the musicians took a break and the dancers began to mill about, Trista took the opportunity to excuse herself from the square.

“Before you go.” Bart shifted from foot to foot, his unease back in full force. He hesitated, looking at his feet. “This was nice.”

“Yes,” Trista agreed. “It was.”

Bart smiled nervously, then leaned forward and pressed his lips against hers. Trista froze, shocked and confused, and a moment later he leaned back again, chewing his lip and still smiling nervously.

“Was that alright?” he asked, rubbing at the back of his neck.

“Yes,” Trista said quickly, nodding rapidly and trying to fix her expression into one that didn’t incite so much worry in him. “Yes, it’s alright.”

“Okay,” Bart beamed, and the knot of worry loosened. “Thank you for dancing with me today.”

“Thank you for asking.”

“I’ll see you in class,” he said.

“See you.” Trista let go of his hands and turned away, picking her way through the crowd back towards home. A funny knot in her stomach.