Danielle pulled a flashlight from her coat and lit up the dark side of the room. This illuminated an old speaker system. Valerie winced.
"And you had a flashlight this whole time?
"Yes, but I wasn't gonna waste battery."
An idea bolted through Jessica's brain. She set the record player down and began taking off her shoes.
"What is the girl doing?" asked Shannon.
"Improvising!" Jessica said.
"To do what?"
Jessica popped two insoles out of her shoes. "I have a job for you guys. Sift through the pile and find me anything with wires. Or just bring me wires."
Val shrugged her way to the pile, fastening her goggles. "Where's a bot when you need one?"
"What are you looking for?" rejoined Shannon.
Shoeless Jessica held the two insoles close together and revealed their magnetic properties. They propelled each other outward. "Adhesive, Shannon. If you find me glue or tape, that'd be m-mazing."
"Okay..."
Danielle flashed her light on Jessica, nearly blinding her. "What're you up to, cyber-punk?"
Jessica smirked. "You'll see. So much twentieth-century technology was based on the innovation of transistors. Three layers of semiconductor material regulated the voltage that allowed most devices to work properly, at home or on the move. Today, there's more Nano-circuitry and laser-based technology. Back then, however, the additional benefits of circuitry resulted in a single silicon microchip, or microsoft, which—you're not even listening to me."
"I'm listenin'," said Danielle. "Don't mean I understand. I think that moonshine really hit ya."
Several minutes later, Valerie arrived with a handful of wires. Jessica started her enigmatic experiment by separating the colors. Meanwhile, Shannon brought a roll of duct tape and a few glue bottles that may have been dry.
After approximately an hour of manual labor and brainpower, Jessica, her friends, and Danielle reached the final verdict. In the end, the generator Jessica contrived was a patchwork of metal—a contraption interlaced with copper wires—resting between the two magnetic soles of her shoes. With the back wires of the turntable touching the makeshift generator, which extended to the speaker system, last but not least, they needed an actual record. Valerie tackled the task.
She discovered a Vinyl album wedging out of the twentieth-century pile and attempted to read the label. "Banana something," she said. "The cover's all messed up."
Jessica silently chuckled before muttering a sentence she thought was clever. "We'll have to play it by ear. Who wants to press it?"
"I feel like, with my luck, I'll fuck it up somehow," said Valerie, handing the album to Jessica.
Shannon loosed a guttural sigh. "Too much responsibility."
"Danielle?" Jessica said. Dani stared blankly at the record, stand-offish.
"I would, but it ain't my scheme," she said. "You built it. It's your horse. You oughta do it."
"No risk, no reward then." Hot anticipation came to a boiling head as she meticulously set the disk on the turntable, touched the stylus to the black surface, and press the button.
Nothing but white noise.
An upbeat jingle broke the silence. Like the generator powering the musical device, the sound was magnetic. A predominant Xylophone introduced the melody, a high-pitched beat that paved the way for a keyboard.
Surprise. Excitement. The vocals enhanced the lively melody. Jessica saw joyful reprieve on her friends' faces. More prominently, Danielle's teeth fell for the first time, thanks to her smile. As impressed as the girl seemed, she may as well have been witnessing the first-ever flying car.
Shannon began dancing first, to the middle of the candle-lit room, without care. The others watched and waited, so she invited them over.
Since she could not dance, Jessica automatically shook her head. Before long, however, Valerie tapped her feet. On the verge of dancing her way to Shannon, Homegirl immediately grabbed Dani's arm and tossed her into the center of the room.
Danielle spun, and when she stopped, her eyes were wide with fury. Valerie didn't care. "Stop being so uptight, leave your gun alone, and dance, blondie." She kept dancing, swaying her hips in the attempt to make their stubborn host do the same. It seemed to work.
As her uptight glare withered into a smirk, Danielle paid more attention to their steps.
Jessica took a knee and let the generator absorb her attention, hoping it would keep the song alive. To her dismay, Valerie appeared above. A pound of fright made her ponder Homegirl's intentions.
"Stop being a loner."
"But I can't do dance," Jessica protested. "I can't do it."
"There's no way out of it." Valerie tugged on Jessica's arm. "What are you afraid of?"
"You're not going to make me—whoa!" Suddenly, she was looking at Dani. The blue eyes criticized her, with less bitterness and more rivalry. Both girls were new to the school of dance, and Dani rotated her arms awkwardly. The eyes continuously tore at Jessica with their challenge. Feeling stupid, Jess accepted the challenge and decided against letting blondie beat her at something neither of them was good at. Therefore, she began dancing the Robot.
Dani and Jessica moved their feet obliviously. In contrast, Shannon and Valerie knew their moves. They had a feel and ear for rhythm – While Valerie's dance involved an exotic swoon of legs and hips, Shannon had limb elasticity and mastery of spinning.
"Come on!" said Shannon, egging them on.
As Jessica felt the rhythm pulse through her ears and into her legs, she looked over to Dani. The girl, too, improved with each passing second.
Starkly, Dani had evolved from surly and stoic to vibrant.
"That's it!" Valerie said. "Con ganas, mira!"
Newfound color flourished in Jessica's cheeks when she saw Dani's eyes. A startling relief. Somehow, the acceptance helped her lose herself as she attempted new dance moves, her friends clapping loudly at the terrible effort. She had forgotten the feeling. Whatever their future, the present didn't have to be a dull place.
"Ciao!"
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