He had a boom box set up on the table next to us.
(Don’t ask. 2004 was a very strange time.)
The radio was on a pop station, playing shitty music that Sandy liked.
“I don’t want to study for this fucking test,” I growled, glaring down at the open book in front of me.
Sandy was on his Motorola RAZR flip phone, the latest high-tech gadget that I wouldn’t ever understand. Apparently, somehow, you could even get on the Internet with it, which I thought was ridiculous. I was sure that would never catch on, because most people spent their days on a computer. Why on earth would you need a cell phone that did that too? “Then don’t,” Sandy said, sounding bored. He frowned as he typed out another message to some guy he was probably blowing, or thinking about blowing, or wanted to blow. I, on the other hand, did not have anyone to blow and decided that it was better that way, as I was going to wait for my one true love. “It’s 2004, Paul. We’re young and cool and we have all the time in the world. Twelve years from now, we’ll probably be old and boring with nothing going on in our lives, and you can study then.”
He had a point. In twelve years, I was probably going to have abs and ride a hoverboard everywhere I went, and so I thought it was probably a good idea for me to make the most of my youth. I closed my textbook with a grim finality, not caring about a librarian who glared at me as it echoed loudly in the quiet.
“What should we do, then?” I asked.
Sandy shrugged. “We could always—”
And then it happened.
From the radio, came a song I’d never heard before.
It hit my ears and burst down into my very bones.
I gasped as I felt myself twitch, like I was… like I was trying to dance.
“What sorcery is this?” I whispered as my shoulders began to sway.
Sandy was gaping at me. “What’s happening to you?”
“I don’t know!” I said, pushing myself up to my feet, the chair falling down behind me. It tipped over and crashed onto the floor. The librarian stood up, bringing her finger to her lips and shushing me loudly.
But it was like I had been taken over by some force I couldn’t fight. I knew I could be thrown out of the library, that the librarian had the power to have me banished. But for the life of me, I couldn’t find a single reason to care. All I wanted to do was dance.
And so I did.
Kind of.
“Are you having a seizure?” Sandy demanded as I gyrated my hips, bringing my hands up and rubbing them over my chest and stomach.
“No,” I panted, already sweating. “It’s… it’s this song.”
Sandy blinked at me. He looked at the boom box. Then back at me. Then back at the boom box.
And then he smiled evilly.
“No,” I begged. “Please. Don’t do it. Sandy, don’t do it.”
He turned up the volume until it was blasting.
And I danced.
I shook my ass like I’d never shaken it before.
The librarian came over, telling us we needed to leave.
I grabbed her hand and pulled her close, her back against my chest. I swayed my hips, and even she couldn’t fight against it. “Oh my,” she said as I dipped us both low. “This is highly inappropriate.”
“I know,” I said. “But it can’t be stopped.”
And as the song went on, I got friskier with Helga, the sixty-three-year-old librarian who had worked for the University of Arizona for thirty-one years.