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The Dreams of Dance Studio isn't a particularly notable establishment, at least not from the outside. Sandwiched in-between a convenience store and a thrift shop, there's little more than a sign above the yellow painted door to announce its presence. But inside it opens up into a well-appointed dance studio with a gleaming wood sprung floor and mirrors along both long walls. At the far end there are two doors - one labeled "Office" and the other labeled "Lockers". There's also a stereo system that was probably top of the line oh... about ten years ago between the two doors. Adela is sweeping up the general dust and such that accumulates no matter how one tries to fight it. She is also trying not to glance at the wall clock every few seconds. Spicy's supposed to come by and, well, Adela's a bit anxious.
Spicy arrives, maybe a little earlier than what she was meant to, but with a smile and a spry step. She's wearing a rather casual set of jeans and black t-shirt with a rainbow print on the front. She's carrying a lunch box with her and seems to be in a rather good mood otherwise. "Adela?" she calls out aloud as she tries to find the other woman. "I'm here, I made you some nice lunch."
The bells on the back of the door jingle as Spicy enters, so Adela steps out and waves. "Hey there!" she says with a smile. "You didn't need to do that!"
"No, but I wanted to." Spicy hands the box to Adela with a bright smile. "I'll go change, won't take me super long." a short yawn. Inside the box are two subs which are freshly made and tasty. She looks around for a brief moment and head toward the lockers. "They can be kept in the fridge no problem."
"I've a fridge in the office. I'll tuck this away there and then we can eat after we've worked up some sweat" Her voice is cheerful, though there's a slight distance in her gaze. She stares at the box for a moment before shaking herself and going to put it away. Then she returns to the main studio and fiddles with a giant binder of CDs by the sound system until she finds the one she wants. By the time Spicy's finished changing, there's some classical-style music playing and Adela is running herself through some basic stretching.
Spicy comes back out of the locker room and she's wearing some yoga pants and a stretchy, soft undershirt than clings to her body, her hair is tied back into a tight bun and it might strike someone how much she does not have the body of a ballet dancer. "Fair warning, I went to the market and sold away some luck, so I might just... fall more than usual or kick the wall or something."
She does some stretching, though it seems like it's stretching tailored to sports and workout more than it would be for dancing specifically.
"As long as you don't break a mirror you should be fine. And they stand up to five year olds, so..." Adela cocks her head to the side as the reason for the possible clumsiness filters in. "What did you sell your luck for? Obviously if it's not a private thing."
She continues stretching, though most of her attention is watching Spicy. On the plus side there's a lot of overlap in stretching types, so she doesn't feel the need to correct anything right away. Warming up is warming up after all. "Have you ever done barre warm ups before?" she asks.
Spicy's look to Adela at the question spells out the answer, she doesn't even know what Adela is asking about. "I doubt it." she bounces in place. "I traded some goblin fruits for it, I'm trying to build up some kind of garden and reserve that I can use to help when we need to go into dreams."
She yawns once. "I traded other stuff too, for seeds, cookbooks and paying off goblin debts."
"Sounds like you've been busy! Things for dreamwalking would be good. Your fruits were a big help last time I got involved in... that stuff." Again she pauses, and then shakes herself.
She flashes a smile and beckons Spicy over to the barre attached to one of the mirrored walls. "Well, they're good for limbering and strengthening muscles that other stuff tends to miss." She stands at a right angle to the barre, hand lightly resting on the wood, in perfect first position. "Stand like this, heels together, toes out. And then..." She plies. "Bend the knees, and unbend. Kinda like squats but not exactly."
Spicy follows the instruction and while she's not particularly good at anything dancing, she's flexible and athletic enough to be able to convincingly perform the warm up routine, smiling as a result when she manages to match up with what Adela is doing. "Yeah I see, I feel it."
"They were specific to the situation we were in, which is why I suspect they were so potent." Spicy explains.
Adela goes through a few more barre warmups, most of which are very thigh intensive - especially inner thigh. Finally she comes to a rest. "Good. You're no natural dancer but we knew that." A flash of an amused smile takes any sting out of the comment. "The two most important things in dance - any type of dance - are balance and strength. Grace helps, but honestly it's mostly just the balance and strength." She gives Spicy an appraising look. "You've done sports of some kind? Or martial arts?"
"I workout in general to keep strong and I learned how to wield big swords around efficiently." Spicy says. "Most of the martial and physical activities I do are related to the not-iron side stuff. Also, I'm a sculptor so, even my art is hitting stuff." a very ogre-ish smile there.
"I'm a very physical person, I'm a little weaker right now, because I had to trade a few things at the market, but that should come back soon." a smile is offered while Spicy seems to be rather comfortable with the exercise level so far.
Adela nods in understanding. "This'll help. Well, not with the pure strength aspect maybe. Dance is great for lean muscle not bulk strength. And, hopefully be fun." She crosses over to the sound system and changes out the classical music for something still instrumental but more contemporary. "The other thing is being able to follow a beat." She begins bouncing slightly to the music. Then she takes a few steps forward to the beat and then back. "Like that"
That is the part where Spicy simply does not have any sort of practice or talent. She tries, sure, but it's particularly terrible, it's like she doesn't understand what to listen to in the song. It takes all but a few tries for Spicy to starts laughing nervously at how bad she is at this part of it. "I'm sorry, I can tell I'm bad at it, but I can't tell you why."
Adela looks thoughtful, more than upset. "You probably don't have an ear for music rhythm. Here." She turns the volume on the music down a little, and turns back. "You've done, like, sword drills? Strike, block, strike, that sort of thing?"
"Yeah I've done stuff like that." She says, making a two handed motion swing around herself, which is easy to imagine her wielding her large blade with it. Spicy smiles at the explanation and listen closely.
"Okay, well we'll start like that. Four beats. Beat one, plie. Beat two, step forward. Beat three, step forward again. Beat four, plie again." Adela demonstrates as she explains. "Now you. One. Two. Three. Four" With each slow number she claps her hands.
To say that it takes Spicy "a few tries" to get it would be generous, there's just a thing or two that doesn't quite gel well with the way she follows, rhythm is definitely not a thing the Ogress is used to have, but eventually, with a bit of patience, she does manage to follow the instruction and perform the simple first few steps with it.
"Good! Now again, just a bit faster!" Adela says this with the patented false enthusiasm of any teacher knowing their student is rapidly going to get sick of what they're doing. Once she's sped up the small routine a couple times she stops. "How're are you doing so far? Need a break?"
"Just water." Spicy says, it's not that she's getting bored, mostly that she's worried about the impression she's making on Adela. She grabs her water bottle and down it rapidly. "I can go another round or we can try to go further, I'm good either way." she bounces into place.
"Okay, two more repeats and then we'll add a bit more." She runs Spicy through the four beat routine, then stops. "Okay. We have One, Two, Three, Four" She steps though the steps as she calls them. "Now lets add Five, a step to the left. Six, a step back. Seven, a plie. And Eight, spin in place" She demonstrates each step. "And all together. One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight" She goes through the routine then steps back. "We'll start slow again."
"I swear i'm going to wreck my ankle doing that spin." Spicy comments with a smirk and she start following the instructions, it's not quite as bad as what she predicts, but the spin sends her out of balance the first time, she falls on the floor the second time and it's still wobbly by the third repetition. There's progress made, really, but she's probably starting from further back than Adela is used to.
"You're doing fine," Adela says, with a small smile. "Spins are hard, I just though it'd be a nice little finish. We're just getting the basics, not trying to be artistic right now." She smirks slightly. "You're better than my toddler class."
Spicy snorts and it quickly devolves into a loud laugh, she holds her stomach and leans against the nearest walls as the laughter bellows out of her. "Oh my god." another round of laughter. "Thanks for being honest." she wipes at her eyes a bit, thoroughly amused.
Since the laughter had at least somewhat been her intent with the comment, Adela joined in, though her laugh was lighter and more restrained than Spicy's "Well it's true," she says, eyes still twinkling with amusement. "If nothing else you haven't asked to go to the bathroom eighty million times or anything."
Spicy chuckles "No, I planned ahead." A shrug of her shoulder and she roll her shoulders a little bit. "Alright, I think I'm ready for another round..."
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