Healed from my dreadful condition, I began the dance practice with Mariana next day. We practiced in the throne room, in the dusty, spiderweb ridden empty space behind the throne. The flat floor and the tranquil atmosphere were perfect for concentration, that was something so lacking in Mariana’s life that she could have destroyed Nazi Germany just by walking around Auschwitz.

I raised both my hands above and to the right of my head.

“Well, Mariana, here we are. First of all, I need to teach you to clap to the rhythm”

I gave her a demonstration what I meant, “Now, do it with your ears against your skull.”

She licked her nose, “I didn’t bring my skull.”

“The skull inside your head, Mariana.”

She tilted her head.

“I have one there?”

Lowering my hands, I let my shoulders fall.

“Didn’t you know dogs have skulls?”

“Yes, I knew. I didn’t know I, in particular, had a skull.”

“You are a dog, therefore…”

“One you always call ‘dumb airhead bimbo’.”

“Just… slap your ears against your head, please.”

“Brrrlbrrrlbrrrl,” she sent through telepathy while she shook violently.

Her clapping was frantic, unordered, useless. She would need to get it up to speed, but I had to be fair: I didn’t know what it took to synchronize ear slaps.

“Fine, maybe we can obviate the clapping by virtue of your lacking in the hands department. I need you to walk in a rhombus while looking at me.”

“A what?”

“A cyclobutane, Mariana. Describe a cyclobutane with your step while always facing me.”

She moved in a square pattern.

“No, think of an 1,1-dimetylcyclobutane, with carbon one closer to me than carbon two and four, which should be at the same distance, and carbon three the furthest away from me.”

“Ah, okay.”

She did exactly as I expected. A pop up message appeared between us. It read “Congratulations, you managed to bring your Dog training skill level down!” I tried to think it away, but I was only met with canned laughter.

“But Mariana obeyed. I am going to complain to universe’s manager.”

Another pop up replaced the former: “SECRET CLASS UNLOCKED: KAREN, CAPSLOCKMANCER.”

Flipping the bird at existence, I decided collapsing the ontological underpinnings of this reality was merely an act of justice.

“Walter, I feel like being a bad girl.”

“Mariana, you are biologically incapable of being aggressive. You are a Golden Retriever.”

Mariana lowered her ears and raised her head. She was offended by the truth.

“I am going to… I am going to… I am going to raid the trashcan! Your trashcan!” she threatened me with the worst action her retriever mind could conjure, “And, and, I will pull on the leash, like, a whole lot.”

“All this drama is because my dog training skill went down, isn’t it?”

“Yes, I figured out I had to play along.” She shut up and started licking her paw with disinterest.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“As soon as we are back on Earth, I am taking you to the doggie groomer.”

My best friend gasped. Her face contorted. She started panting, looked to the sides frantically, searching for a refuge from my cruelty.

“How dare you?” she cried.

“Mariana, you may be female, but I have decades of experience in being a cunt. You cannot outdo me, lil pooch.”

I applauded again.

“Come on, Mar, do it too and follow my step.”

She slapped her ears against her skull, and, to my order, took the steps around the imaginary lozenge. AS she did, I realized the ear thing was not going to work if they were used with the dress. Well, one could always drop that little detail out of the dance.

“Good job, girl! Later I will cook you something tasty.”

Mariana’s spinning in place could have fed the energy needs of China for three years if she only had had a couple magnets attached to her.

“Mar, I need you to turn your body slightly to the side once per two carbon-carbon sigma bonds on the cycle. Then, on reaching carbon one again, do a full spin. Assume it’s a simple cyclobutane for this. Do it while walking, like this.” I proceeded to exemplify what I meant with flawless execution, “Now it’s your turn.”

After Mariana improved a bit on the basic steps, I told her to imitate the characteristic finger snaps. For this, I gave her the idea of using her strong, golden teeth. Its clashing was slightly jarring, but it gave results, and that’s all I cared for.

Later, I began instructing Mariana while I practiced the classical shoe tapping of the dance. It requires deft feet, and good coordination with your partn… err… barkner.

The hours passed by and we ignored them like cats ignore their foodslave. With each lozenge Mariana described on the floor, her technique refined, and with every misstep where I almost sprained my ankle, my muscle memory shifted back into an old and dusty set of gears.

My teens came back to me at every muscular contraction: the body wasn’t the same, it was rusty, unkempt. The thighs complained, the back refused to cooperate fully. But the strain of the battles had made the muscular pain a traveling partner, and I enjoyed the dance way more than I suffered the aching body. Dancing hurt without the shadow of death looming over us, it was the kind of pain that made waking up from bed worthwhile.

When I glanced up, I noticed Cornelio sitting with his back against that of the throne, observing with many but not all of his eyes.

“Do you enjoy dancing, boy?”

“It’s fun to watch. But I cannot dance myself, and now and then I get distracted processing an image from another set of eyes,” he blinked with the ones on his forehead and scalp.

“Hey, Cornelio, has your dad taught you Spanish?”

“Tried to. I was born to oversee, not communicate. English is already hard enough.”

I gestured him to come down. “Argentinian folklore songs can talk about lost loves, about the singers and their love for music, about the spirit of a popular party, about the disgrace of a young man battling poverty, or anything else in life; but they are all to share and be enjoyed by everyone who has ears to hear.”

He blinked and silently stared at me for a few long seconds.

“Why are you telling me this, Walter?”

I lowered my gaze before raising it back to him.

“Maybe if I spread the little seeds of my home, who knows, I may hate yours a little bit less.”

He snickered, covering his teeth with a squalid hand, “In all honesty, I find your disgust with this reality amusing. I still remember some of your… vanguard poetry… when you discovered the soap had a mana bar.”

I spat Marianawise without looking “Taking a goddamn bath here is dystopic.”

Mariana tried to focus her eyes on the phlegm that had rudely landed on her nose bridge, where her tongue was unable to reach.

“Sorry Mar,” I told my cross-eyed, struggling companion.

“I’d try to bite you if you did that to me. Mariana is pretty tolerant of you,” he dared have an opinion.

“Cornelio, with all due disrespect, spitting at you between the eyes is physically impossible. Even scallops think you went overboard with the eyeball enthusiasm.”

“I don’t remember or know what a scallop is.”

Insulting him was no fun. His eyesight was a hungry monster, eating away most of his brainpower. Bullying the disadvantaged is only worthwhile when they realize they are being bullied. By the way, if someone is idolizing me and my actions, I wish him or her a quick recovery from the lobotomy.

“Whatever, boy. Come down, if you don’t dance today, when will you? We are planning on giving the world a shiny golden brooch, y’know?”

Mariana stopped trying to eat the phlegm for a moment. “Golden pooch? Will you gift me to the world? Or…” She remained silent for several seconds. “Am I pregnant?”

“To the best of my knowledge, you are a virgin, and you will die like that.”

“I fail to see how that ma…” her attention suddenly shifted back to the spittle, which she tried to paw off her face.

“Besides, I said brooch.” I added, because my ego wouldn’t have a rest until I corrected her.

“How do you know she hasn’t done it with the pit bulls?” Cornelio asked, smiling with satisfaction.

“She is too racist,” I stated matter-of-factly.

“Humans can’t fathom my feelings about racial purity. They are not inbred enough.”

I decided to leave the Hapsburgs out of the conversation. I needed to save them as an insult for when Mariana failed the dodge roll through her one in five chances of developing hemangiosarcoma.

“Will you dance, yes or no?”

“I think I already told you I am unable to.”

The temptation to shampoo that little shit’s scalp grew with each second.

“Fine, die without achieving your potential, me and Mar will continue our practice.”

I pointed at Mariana, who was licking her paw clean. Thoughts about spitting on her again invaded me, because she seemed to be happy with that. But no, practice took priority over indulging in abuses of power and authority.

“Here, Mar, come back to Earth. ¡Una más!”