"Reese, Vince asked if I wanted to have special lessons with him. What am I supposed to do?" I gushed the moment Reese answered my call. I was alone in my apartment, and I couldn't sleep. I was contemplating hard whether I should yes to Vince's proposal or not.

"Wait. What did you just say? Vince asked if you what?"

"He asked me if I wanted to have special dance lessons with him! I don't know what to do. Help me, please," I pleaded.

"Are you seriously asking me for help?" Reese asked, and I didn't bother to respond. Usually, I was the hopeless romantic in the group, but at moments like this, all of my dreams and fantasies just come to a blur.

"Ivy, of course, you say yes to those kinds of proposals. Would you rather humiliate yourself in front of him or in front of the whole company?"

I shouted no almost immediately. My eyes were wide open, and the thought of me making the most absurd mistakes in front of more than a hundred people made me shiver. It felt like I had to quit my job if ever that happened.

"Once and for all, set aside your feelings for him first. Focus on your goal and act like a professional. But if your ultimate goal is to make him your boyfriend, then I can't do anything about that now."

"Reese!" I screamed at the top of my lungs, and I heard Reese laughing on the other end of the line. My cheeks started to burn from all the thoughts that were running through my mind right now.

"But seriously, Ivy, it's just all in your head. I know that you can do it. Vince might just give you more reasons to do better. Good luck, Ivy," Reese said, and she ended the call. With my heart on my sleeve, I looked for Vince's number on my phone and started to compose a message.

Hi, Vince! I'm in.

Let me know whenand where the practice will be.

Thank you, really.

-Ivy

~

Vince decided to have our special lessons on Tuesdays and Thursdays after office hours. He said it was better to do it on days that we didn't have our group practices so that we didn't have to stay that late in the office. Since he was a part of a dance group before, he knew someone who had a dance studio in Makati. Now that we had the place and time for our lessons, I suddenly felt more nervous than ever. This was it, and there's no turning back.

We were in the middle of a meeting with Sir Dustin when my phone vibrated, indicating that I received a new message. I slowly fished my phone from my pocket, and to my surprise, it was from Vince.

Hey, just confirming our practice later.

I'll meet you at the G/F lobby at around 5:30.

Upon reading Vince's message, I didn't know why a smile formed on my lips. His message wasn't special, but I felt like I was a step closer to him. Ever since we had that dinner together, we'd been exchanging messages more often. I was not even sure if it could be considered progress, but he added me on all of my social media accounts as well. And yes, we talked a lot on those too.

Shucks. This is bad, I thought to myself. I then shook my head to free it from this nonsense. Before I could even compose a reply to Vince, Reese softly pinched my arm, which jolted me back to my senses.

What is wrong with you? she mouthed. I shook my head again, but instead of regaining my focus, I lost it even more. Even if I tried to deny it, the truth was already out in the open. I was excited to see Vince later, and nothing could change that fact.

Our meeting ended at five thirty. The moment Sir Dustin announced that our meeting was adjourned, I gathered my things and immediately stood up from my seat. Shane and Reese were giving me judging looks, but I didn't have time to explain everything to them. I didn't want Vince to wait for me on the first day of our special lessons.

When I arrived atthe lobby, Vince was already there. He was talking to another engineer, so I decided to walk slowly towards them. I was a few steps away from them when the other guy suddenly looked in my direction and informed Vince of my presence. I'm not quite sure, but I think I saw the other guy giving Vince a knowing smile. I disregarded that thought for a while when I finally reached them.

"Hi! I'm sorry to keep you waiting. Sir Dustin decided to punish us all, so he kept the meeting going for three hours and ended it at five thirty," I told him, and a small smile formed on his lips.

"It's okay. By the way, Tristan, this is Ivy, my partner for the dance contest. Ivy, this is Tristan, also one of our engineers." Tristan offered his hand, and I shyly shook it.

"It's nice to finally meet you. I've heard so much about you," Tristan said, and Vince nudged his side.

"What?" Tristan asked. After battling it out with intense gazes, Tristan surrendered and left us alone.

"Uhh, let's go?" Vince offered, and we proceeded to the dance studio.

"I hope you're okay with taking the bus. I can't use my car today because of coding," he explained apologetically. I gave him a small nod in response and patiently waited beside him at the bus stop.

Since it was already rush hour, a lot of people were waiting in line alongside us. Horns kept on blaring, and commuters complained about the traffic situation. Sweat trickled down our necks, and the humid air didn't help at all. Some were pushing other people just to get through, and we weren't exempted from that. A guy in his thirties suddenly bumped into me, which made me lose my balance. Vince, upon seeing this, immediately grabbed me by the wrist and pulled me closer to him. We were only a few inches away from each other, and it made me more self-conscious than ever.

"Are you okay?" Vince asked, making me lift my head to face him. Wrong. Move. I could feel his breathing now, and I could see how cute he was. My heart was beating so fast, and it's as if it could break out of my ribs anytime now.

"Uhh, yeah. Thanks," I stammered, and I pulled away from him. At that moment, I wanted to slap myself for acting like a fool in front of Vince. And in a public place, for crying out loud! When I came back to my senses, the bus finally pulled up in front of us.

The first special lesson with Vince was okay. We started out with the basic steps for cariñosa. We stood facing each other and were a meter apart. Vince told me that cariñosa was similar to a waltz—we take three steps to our side in a left-right-left motion. We then finish the move by tapping our left foot on the floor. We then repeated the steps, but started with the right foot first.

"In the next steps, we will be standing closer to each other. Then we'll tap our left and right foot one after the other. After which, we will turn around and exchange positions," Vince explained, and I tried to follow the steps. They looked simple when he was doing it, but when I tried to tap my foot on the floor, it seemed like I was just fooling around. Vince tried his best not to laugh, but with the way he smiled, I knew that I looked like a joke.

"Let's try to make those steps more graceful, okay?" Vince pointed out that the tapping of the foot didn't really have to look that exaggerated. It needed to be graceful but, at the same time, a little bit flirtatious. The term made me choke, but Vince just laughed it all off.

Vince decided to take a breather after going through the routine thrice. He started to talk about his field work and how he got to travel around the country for free. We also talked about our dream destinations and agreed that Batanes should be on top of our list.

"I feel like it's a different world out there. Based from the pictures that I've seen from my friends, I could even consider it as a paradise."

"We should definitely go there someday," he said while looking me in the eyes.

"Yup, someday," I replied, with a small smile—holding his gaze.

"Come on, it's getting late. I don't want to keep you late." Vince helped me get up and made sure that I got into a cab that would take me home.