AN: (DOUBLE UPDATE--HAHA!!!) It has nothing to do with the story except that it has the same name as the chapter title, but if you've never heard the song up there, please, please take four minutes and watch and listen. The Hooters were a moderately popular band with the college crowd in the 80s, and this song was one of their best, IMHO. It is pure, unadulterated joy, and if it doesn't make you want to jump up and dance, well, there's something wrong with you. And the bridge, well, it's sublime 🤗

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Elliott saw a pair of legs with muscular calves walking backward down the stairs, and saw Phil slowly appear. He was taking video with his phone held out in front of him, focused so keenly on what he was filming that he didn't notice he'd reached the the bottom of the stairs and nearly fell down. The object of his intense scrutiny was walking carefully down the stairs, trying not to laugh at her father, and therefore didn't really pay attention to the presence of her date in the foyer, even though she knew he was there.

The same, however, couldn't be said for Elliott. He stared at Ruthie and realized when he started to feel light-headed that he'd forgotten to inhale. He carefully took in air, being careful not to be too noisy about it and draw attention to himself.

Ruthie, meanwhile, was looking between her fathers and Elliott, waiting for their opinions.

"Well? Pop wouldn't really say, though I think he liked it. It's kind of out there, I know, but I like it. What do you guys think?" She looked hopefully from Todd to Elliott. "Not too weird? Not too much like a costume?"

She had a point. Her dress was gray, and embellished with gray beads and pink rhinestones. It was sleeveless, in the 1920s flapper style, and only the attention to detail and its simplicity made the difference between it looking like a costume for a play and an actual dress that a woman would wear out. With it she wore high-heeled silver strappy sandals that showed off her pretty pedicured toes and slender calves.

As Elliott watched her turn toward him, an expectant smile on her face, he realized that, though there would probably be much more scantily dressed girls at the dance, none would look so alluring as his date. The neck of her dress was cut round, barely showing a hint of cleavage, and it was cut nearly straight down, with no indentation for her waist. The hem, along with the sparkly fringe, ended a modest two inches above her cute knees.

But the dress was sleeveless, leaving her beautiful arms bare. And the fit of the dress was almost perfect, pulling taut across the front in little diagonals with every step she took, from breast to hip, making the fringe sway this way and that as it sparkled prettily. Her legs were as gorgeous as her arms, the perfect color and tone.

In short, Ruthie was a vision.

Wow.

[AN 10-31-2018: I'm sticking a picture in here because someone asked me about it. It's not a picture of the dress, because I made that up, and it would be amazing if I could find that, but this is close, and kind of inspired the description I came up with:]

"Ruthie, you look--spectacular," was what he finally came up with. He leaned in and kissed her cheek, letting the tiny curls of her hair tickle his face as he inhaled the lovely fragrance of her, which was enhanced somehow for tonight.

"Oh! Here you go, I hope this is right?" He held out a corsage in a box, which Ruthie accepted eagerly.

"Elliott, god, where did you get this?" she asked, voice quiet with shock. "This is the most beautiful corsage I've ever seen." She lifted the clear plastic lid and held it out so her fathers could see.

"Miniature dendrobium," Phil murmured. "Holy smoke, Elliott, these must have cost a small fortune, not to mention at least a tank of gas." He turned to look at Elliot. "How far did you drive to get this?"

"Ill never tell," Elliott said with a grin. "The, erm, person I got it from was surprised that we were having a formal dance in late October, but I told her that it was so. I told her the dress colors were gray and pale pink, and she assured me that this was the way to go, and nothing else would do for the most beautiful girl in the world."

"Oh lord, I'm swooning," Phil declared, taking a step back and putting a hand against the wall.

Ruthie rolled her eyes. "Jesus, El, please stop, it's already gay enough around here."

"So, where do you want it, dress or wrist?" Elliott asked as he removed the flowers from the box. They were indeed smaller than normal, and the whole sprig had been used, so each had a small string of three or four buds that trailed attractively away from the couple that were blooming.

"Oh, on my bodice, please, so there's less chance of them breaking," Ruthie said.

Elliott leaned forward obligingly and pinned them to her front, up high and on the left.

"And I don't have a boutonnière for you, as you requested, though these would've looked great with your outfit," Ruthie observed.

"Oh, speaking of more flowers, hold on, hold on," Elliott said, stepping out on the porch. He came back in holding a bunch of cosmos wrapped in paper towels.

"I pillaged the pretty lot," he said from behind the bouquet. "I hope that's okay? I didn't think they'd last much longer, anyway, you know?"

"Oh, how wonderful," Pop declared. "You know she loves them, obviously."

Now both her dads were smiling at her.

"And they'll look marvelous right here on the table!" Todd declared. "Much better than these orange mums, which were all I had." He cleared the mums away post haste, and replaced them with the cosmos, which spread out of the vase in all their pink, magenta and white beauty, and made the perfect backdrop for their photographs.

And five minutes later they were pulling away into the brisk night in the Nicholson's dark blue Mercedes, which was huge and luxurious compared to either of Ruthie's dads' Toyotas.

"You really look so, so beautiful in that dress, Ruthie," Elliott said as they drove toward the high school.

"And if you're really nice to me, I might let you see what I look like out of this dress," Ruthie quipped, grinning at him.

Elliott pulled over abruptly, making the tires squeal a little bit.

"What the fuck? We're not even there yet," Ruthis said. "You want to see me out of the dress now?" she asked with a laugh.

"Okay, we need to talk about this now, I guess," Elliott said, turning off the engine and looking at her in the near darkness.

"What?" she asked. She reached over to cover his hand with hers.

"Look, you've been making jokes like that, about taking your clothes off, about giving me blow jobs, about letting me feel you up, and it has to stop, okay?" Elliott stopped talking and just gazed at her.

Ruthie was really confused now. "Why?" she finally asked. "I mean, I'm just making jokes, I"m not being hurtful or mean in any way, I don't think--?"

She sat back as a thought occurred to her.

"Oh, wait a sec. Is it because you don't want to do those things with me?" she guessed. "Elliott, is that it?"

The silence in the car grew until it was huge.

"Fuck it all, Ruthie, of course I want to do those things with you!" Elliott finally exploded. "How could I not? You're--I mean-- come on--look at you! I've never seen such a-- you're the most beautiful girl I've ever seen in my life," he finished, trying to keep his voice down. "I can't believe you're here in this backwater town and not, you know, sunbathing on a sultan's yacht in Capri or whatever--"

"What?" Ruthie couldn't help the laughter that escaped her.

"Oh, shut up, I'm trying to make a point, here," Elliott snapped. "Anyway, you're stunning, and so sexy, but you'e only fifteen, Ruthie, and only just, you know? It's not like you're nearly sixteen. So, I'd like to keep things, pg rated, so to speak, for a while, if that's all right with you."

It was difficult for Ruthie not to laugh again at how stuffy and proper Elliott sounded when he said these words.

"Elliott?" Ruthie asked. "It's not because--you--don't have experience, right?"

Elliott turned and gave her a withering look. He bit his lips together.

"No," he finally said. "I've done just about everything there is to do, darling Ruthie. Twice."

Ruthie finally took a deep breath. She reached for his hand, which he willingly gave.

"Okay, here's what I'm going to say."

Elliott turned his whole body to face her.

"Forcing someone to do things they don't want to do sexually, for whatever reason, is repulsive and repugnant and wrong, whatever their gender," Ruthie said. She kissed Elliott's hand, and even the feel of her lips made his abdomen tense.

"I think your reasoning is flawed and specious, but it doesn't matter what I think, does it?" she continued. "I'll respect your wishes, or I'll try to, anyway, and I'll leave it up to you, okay?" She released his hand. "We'll go as far as you want, whenever you want, always. And I'll assume the reverse is true also."

Elliott nodded.

"Can I assume we're exclusive?" Ruthie asked. "You're a hot commodity, Elliott. Girls like Joanna Barnes are everywhere, and they're going to be throwing themselves at you."

"Even after they see us kissing?" Elliot asked, disbelieving.

"For some girls, that's the clarion call," Ruthie said. "They love a challenge. Anyway, every party, every dance," she said, nodding toward the high school, every social occasion, they'll be all over you, wanting to do with you what you don't want to do with me. What's going to happen when you're all horny and one of them wants to take you home?"

Elliott looked at her. "I don't know what you're used to Ruthie, darling girl, but I don't get randy in general anymore, that stopped when I was about twelve, you understand? I'm not going to want to shag some random person, it's just not going to happen.

"We're exclusive, me and you, until one of us tells the other otherwise," he said firmly.

"Now, can we get to this sodding dance before it ends, please?"

Ruthie nodded, and leaned over. "We can still kiss, right?"

"You better fucking believe it," he answered, kissing her hard and long.

So they finally got to the dance, and the gym was decorated with trees and leaves, and pumpkins and fake flickering bonfires. It looked like a forest of changing colors, and hay bales and wagons and scarecrows and barns.

"Marvelous," Elliott declared. "Dance with me?" he asked his beautiful date.

Ruthie nodded, and they stepped out, and both were pleasantly surprised that the other was a fairly good dancer. They danced until they were sweaty and happy, until a slow number came along, and Elliott could hold his girl close and breath in the warm fragrance of her hair and perfume, and put his hand on the small of her back and her lovely neck.

"Elliott, I know I said I wouldn't put pressure on you, but being like this with you?" Ruthie began, squeezing his shoulders with her hands and speaking into his chest.

"Mmm?"

"I bet sex with you is just beautiful," she breathed, pressing her hips against him.

"Ruthie, please don't."

"I know, I'll stop."

And she kind of did. At least she stopped talking about it, but all through the dance, Elliott could think of nothing else.

He could feel her sex pressed against him, and he knew she could feel his erection. She certainly wasn't moving away from it. Her beautiful breasts were pressed frankly and firmly into his front, they way they would be if they were doing something else, and they were moving and swaying to the beat of the song, the way they would be if--

He tried to wrench his thoughts to his calculus homework, or to the new dialogue he was learning for drama, but all he could think about was how her breaths on his chest were in rhythm to the song, just like they would be if they were joined together.

Fuck.

"Ruthie?"

She lifted her head questioningly, and whatever he was going to say was lost as he leaned down and kissed her as they danced, hopelessly lost in the desire he was feeling.

God she was beautiful.

"Mm," Ruthie murmured as she kissed him, opening her mouth a little.

Finally, the song ended, and they parted.

Ruthie gave him a dazzling smile, and he was helpless not to smile back.

"I'm thirsty," Ruthie said. "Let's get some punch."

Elliott nodded, and they walked over to where the punch bowls were.

"Hello, you two," they heard.

"Ms. Piper," Ruthie said, smiling. She was genuinely happy to see her favorite teacher. She looked very pretty in a dark brown dress with yellow flowers on it.

"I didn't know you were chaperoning tonight," Elliott said, leaning in to give her a hug.

"Just trying to keep you guys from breaking the rules," she said with a smile. "Ruthie, you look outstanding. Your dress is one of the most beautiful I've ever seen."

"It is, isn't it?" Elliott agreed. "It took the sight right out of my eyes, to be honest," he added.

"Thank you," Ruthie said, obviously a little embarrassed.

"Just try to keep your PDAs to a minimum, okay? I'm sure you'll have time alone together later," Ms. PIper said.

"We'll try," Ruthie said, grabbing some punch and leading Elliott away.

Pepsi found them, her date trailing after her, looking anxious.

"Ruthie, Brett saw you guys kissing just now," Pepsi told her, looking back and forth between Ruthie and Elliott, her eyes wide. "He's pissed, big time."

"Maria, I don't think this is any of our business," Carlos said, pulling nervously at the collar of his shirt.

"Carlos, I told you I don't hear you if you call me that," Pepsi said without turning her head.

Ruthie suppressed a laugh. Poor Carlos. He looked like a nice guy.

"What Ruthie and I do or don't do on the dance floor is none of that wanker's business," Elliott told Pepsi. "You need to relax, Pepsi, and just have a good time with your date, yeah?"

"Yeah, okay," Pepsi responded, looking a little starstruck at hearing Elliott talk to her and hearing him use such an authentically English pejorative as "wanker."

And a little later, they heard the same thing from Gordon and Linda.

"You guys should be careful," Gordon told them. "Brett saw you guys making out earlier, and I heard he's going to beat Elliott up."

"We weren't making out, my god," Ruthie replied. "We kissed, once, that's it." She looked at Linda, who looked really nice in a black sparkly skater dress. "Who's Brett here with, anyway?"

"Barbara Corcoran," Linda told her.

"Really?" Ruthie asked, surprised. Barbara was a sophomore, and therefore Ruthie's own age. She was not the sharpest knife in the drawer, Ruthie remembered. She was very pretty, though, looking very much like a Dutch doll, with yellow blonde hair, pretty blue eyes, fair skin and rosy cheeks, and a round full figure.

"I hope she knows what she's doing," was all she said.

"Come on," she said to Elliott. "Let's go dance some more, okay?"

"Okay," he said with a smile. "I love this song, let's go."