Chapter 6: DJ Dale Play
“It is a
truth universally acknowledged that there will always be a gentleman to dance
with,
except
at just the moment when you require one most.” –Anna Godbersen
Danielle
went through men like toilet paper. She
loved flirting and she had honed it into a perfectly crafted art. Danielle knew exactly how to get the guys to
fall for her. Oh sure, being 5”7’ and
extremely fit and tan definitely helped but Danielle had become a hazard not just
to men, but to herself. She was in her
last year of college, finally. She kept
having to take breaks so she could come home and waitress in the local café to
earn money to go to the next semester worth of classes. She had changed her major four times already,
so that made the journey that much longer.
She had started out as an Elementary Ed major but soon found out there
weren’t any guys in any of her classes. That was simply unacceptable. Her roommate her freshman year had warned her
that she was addicted to men and although Danielle laughed it off at the time, she
finally came to the sad realization that indeed she was. She ended up changing her major to Exercise
Science so she could be where the boys were.
And as with any addiction, nothing could quite satisfy her hunger. Danielle was a pro at “the chase” as she
called it but once she got a guy to notice her and start dating her, she didn’t
have a clue what to do with him. Within
4-6 weeks she would have her sights set on someone else to chase and the poor
guy she had captivated was left alone to heal his broken heart.
As
she looked over at Anton she almost felt sorry for him knowing the fate that
surely waited for him. She almost felt
guilty that Anton had paid for her tuition for the following semester but hey,
it’s not like she had begged him to. She
had simply had a crying spell one day about how she wasn’t sure how her
waitress tips were going to cover her college expenses. He was the one who had foolishly agreed to
become her financial benefactor. It was
as though he was trying to dump as much money as possible. Danielle was happy to be the recipient of
Anton’s rash spending habits. They had
been dating less than a month so Danielle knew it was almost time to move
on. She winked at Anton as the next song
on the playlist blasted through the speakers.
Lucy
announced the next song to be DJ Dale Play by Mara. Mara?
She thought to herself. The last
final exam Danielle had taken was in a world religion class. She remembered that in Buddhism, Mara was a
demon who tempted Buddha by trying to seduce him with visions of beautiful
women.
“Play
by the books now…
Make
everybody look now…”
Danielle
thought about the lyrics of the song…play by the books? Her last religion final had been a
nightmare. She had entered the testing
center feeling totally prepared for the multiple choice exam. Danielle was an incredible writer so a multiple
choice final was like the kiss of death.
She knew it was going to be rough when she started reading the first
page of the test. At first she wondered if
she had accidentally been given the wrong test but no, this was definitely
about world religions. She decided to
implement a strategy her highschool teacher had taught her back in the
day. He had told her to fill out the
bubbles to the ones she knew first and then come back to the others. The only problem was Danielle had skipped the
first seven problems before actually filling in a single bubble. She thought about the questions on her
exam. She knew that in Budhism Mara
personified unwholesome impulses, unskillfulness, and death of the spiritual
life but the question asked what were the names of Mara’s daughters. Seriously!
It was as if every question was a trick.
You know, the kind of test that you don’t just choose a, b, c, or d. You have to know if it’s a and c or b and d
or all of the above, or yes, even the dreaded….none of the above. The exam seemed to draw on for hours as
Danielle realized she had studied all the wrong things. She was devastated and couldn’t wait to hop
in her car the next day and head back to Boomerang Valley. The test was scanned and the results came
back…60%! So apparently I am a 60%
guesser she thought to herself. So even
though she had a 96% overall grade going into the final, because of the weight
of the exam, she ended up with only a B+ for the course. She was so mad about it that she needed a
fix. And since she had already broken up
with Ben the night before, she had decided to update her online dating profile.
Oh
sure she didn’t have a problem finding prey, er um a date, on campus but she
knew she was headed home for a few months.
She was losing interest in young, poor college students so when she had
seen Anton’s profile pop up on the local dating site back home, she knew she
had found her next chase. Since all the
studying for finals had left her worn out and tired, she knew she needed an
easy conquest. Anton was of Italian
decent so naturally he was tall, dark, and handsome. He had a steady job which Danielle was
excited about and he loved dancing. The
more Danielle looked at his profile picture, she was intrigued with the
possibilities of dating such a man…and so much older than her too.
The
chorus to the song was just beginning with everyone ramping up the cardio to
another level…
“DJ
Dale Play-ah
Let
the music take me very far away-ah”
All
the people in the class put their hands on the sides of their heads, squatted
down, and flipped their head from one side to the other. “Mas, mas, mas…” that meant more, more,
more. Danielle knew she looked amazing
as her auburn curls bounced as she danced.
Her dimple in her right cheek always made her smile look
mischievous. As she caught a glimpse of
her body’s reflection she thought to herself, “Don’t hate me because I’m
beautiful”. The sad fact of the matter
was though that many people did hate her.
Of course, the men she dumped and left in ruins hated her but so did
those men’s previous girlfriends. It was
the weirdest thing.
Her
sophomore year of college, back when she was a Secondary Ed major, she had made
her housing decision based on what any realtor would say to a prospective
client, “Location, location, location.”
That’s right, Danielle made sure to sign a lease on the Roman Gardens
apartment complex because it was within walking distance from the dance hall, The
Palace. Danielle went dancing two to
three times a week. Of course she didn’t
have money for the cover to get in so she always ended up getting friendly with
a hot guy waiting in line. Over the
years, Danielle had become a natural at being attracted to guys with
money. Not that any college student was
loaded but she knew how to smell the greenbacks by literally sniffing the brand
of cologne a person was wearing. She
could smell an imitation Obsession from a real Drak’ Ar’ Noir.
Word
started spreading about Danielle’s meaningless relationships and soon some of
the girls losing their boyfriends to one night stands at The Palace, started a
hate campaign. No literally, one night
as Danielle was returning home from yet another night of dancing with hottie of
the night Trey, she passed by one of the girls apartment and saw a “We Hate
Danielle Club” flyer. Oh, that’s mature
she thought. Apparently, the girls in
the apartment complex were sick and tired of the competition Danielle posed to
them. Danielle laughed it off. She figured she was doing them a favor
because whenever a guy would be dumped, he became open season for any college
girl who wanted to “comfort” or console him.
If they were too dumb to know how to swoop in on a rebound then Danielle
had no desire of being friends with them at all. And so the “We Hate Danielle Club” continued.
At
first Danielle could ignore the other girls but then when the rumors started
flying about Danielle sleeping around, she was extremely hurt. Even though Danielle was addicted to men, she
had a line that she was not willing to cross.
She had studied too much as a Psychology major her junior year, about
the harmful effects that sex before marriage can have on a young woman. She had kept her virtue all through high
school and saw no reason to bend her standards as a college woman. No, she was waiting for Mr. Right and vowed
to wait until her wedding night. The
funny thing was, all the girls thought she was some sort of a tramp but all the
guys knew full well what Danielle’s standards were from the get-go and were still
willing to date her. She was “safe” as they called it. They knew that even though their fling might
not last very long, they knew Danielle was sober, was only kissing one guy at a
time, and gave all her attention and devotion to only one guy at a time. And as sad as it sounds, Danielle always let
them know where they stood. Only one young man had ever tried to cross the
line with Danielle. Thankfully, an
urgent phone call from home had
interrupted what Danielle was sure would have been a potential date rape
situation. She shuddered at the memory.
Danielle
would find the oddest reasons to break up with a boyfriend. One guy had a nose that was too big, another
bored her to tears talking politics all the time, another had announced to his
family that he was marrying Danielle before he even had proposed to her (so
obviously that was good enough reason), and one she had dumped because his
slightly balding head was bugging her.
She broke up with guys because they spent too much time playing sports
and not with her. She broke up with guys
because they listened to the wrong music.
And she even broke up with guys if they had the wrong major. But nobody had ever broken up with
Danielle. She was always the dumper and
not the dumpee. Oh sure Ryan had tried
to break up with her but when he had pulled out flashcards with notes on the
reasons why he was dumping her, Danielle demanded he let her out of the car and
she had walked home…after yelling to him, “You know what…we’re through!” What kind of guy has to bring notes to a
breakup? What’s next a PowerPoint
presentation break up?
In
a weird demented way, Danielle had her standards and wasn’t shy in enforcing
them. She was a master at frustrating
men. She was a contradiction just as the
song she had woken up to on the radio said, she was a “Beautiful Monster”. At first she had been surprised at how upset
men would be at her to know that she wouldn’t allow any moral slip-ups but over
time, she was even more surprised at how many men felt she was “safe”. Danielle had a talent of making men feel
really good about themselves without all the physical nonsense that can
sometimes confuse a relationship. And
just when a guy thought he was taking the relationship to another level…boom,
Danielle would leave him high and dry and find someone else to chase. Someone once told her if you wanted a guy to
ask you out, all you had to do was touch his elbow while talking to him. It had worked like a charm every time. So easy.
If
Danielle were honest with herself, she was getting kind of tired of the old
routine but she didn’t dare admit that to herself. She refused to ever be at home alone on a
Friday Night. So whether the guy was 23
or 43, Danielle was up for the challenge.
Anton was so different from the younger guys. Anton genuinely cared for her well-being
although sometimes their conversations seemed more like a daddy-daughter
relationship. At first Danielle had
freaked out when she found out about Anton’s kids. She was closer to their age than she was her
own boyfriend. Ew! But then she reasoned that it would only be
logical for his kids to be close to her age for a man at that age. Besides, Anton would be left in the dust soon
anyway.
...She
flashed her devilish smile at Anton as the song came to a close but did a
double take as the owner of the club entered the aerobics room in the
back. She had heard the club was under
new ownership since her last semester being away at college and apparently all
the rumors were true. Did it matter that
a finely chiseled young Jamaican male had bought a club in middle-of-nowhere
Montana? What brought him here? Danielle was intrigued by his muscles and
smooth dark skin. As the song ended,
Danielle caught herself thinking, “Mas, mas, mas!”
Mara. DJ Dale Play. Rec. 13
June 2013. YouCloud, 2013.
