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The first was right when she walked through the door and practically got hit in the face with Jordan's slack jaw and Simone's awkwardness. Not to mention the romance novel play by play that seemed to be occurring between them as the night went on.
Well not exactly play by play . Layla was pretty sure she was messing up that admittedly out-of-the-ordinary love story just a little bit. It's not every day the prince looks at you while dancing with the princess and you have to force your eyes to fixate on something else.
Asher’s voice wakes her from pointedly trying not to look at Jordan look at her.
"You okay?" He carefully asks, moving his hands from a typically slow dancing position to something more grounding. Layla clears her throat and looks up at him with a grateful smile. "I'm fine."
When that's over Layla tells him she just has to get some punch and the music picks up its pace again. Sitting at her table alone, watching JJ do some variation of the sprinkler with a straight face, she was left her wonder how she even got here.
Even the sweetest weirdest thing like her friends dancing and being happy together couldn't truly wake her up from this slump she'd been feeling. She just couldn't shake it. Layla's dark red nails fiddle with the table cloth. She couldn't shake him.
Or this awkward phase of break up/non break up because they were never really technically together, that they found themselves in.
Layla's both grateful and mad at Olivia for getting her off the couch, "because it was a Saturday night and no boy is worth a wasted Saturday."
The curly haired beauty pouted and immediately teased her she was starting to sound like Ms.Baker, Olivia automatically sent her to get dressed after that remark.
She'd been in her head so much she hadn't seen him coming. Kinda like he caught her off guard at their junior prom with their dance in the hallway; the start of it all.
"There's been something I've been meaning to ask since I saw you were here," Jordan slowly asks her. She looks up at him from her seat with those spectacular brown eyes of hers momentarily stealing his breath before he could finish. "Can I have this dance Ms.Keating?" He finally proposes, stretching out his palm toward her.
Layla studies his hand. He feels his heart skip a beat not just because her eyes then study the rest of his figure but because for a minute there, he thinks she might say no. "It's may I." She softly corrects him, a lazy smile stretches on her lips at his confusion.
"What?"
"You asked wrong. It's may I have this dance." Layla insists, now standing before him observing his hand carefully again.
Jordan releases a breathy laugh, his eyes practically spilling fondness he hopes she can't see. "You're killing me." He shakes his head at her. Layla giggles in response and it's brighter than all the cool-toned lights above them.
The curly-haired beauty contours her amused expression to a hesitant one, then she bites her lip and finally takes his hand. The all too familiar feeling comes back, the electric current passing through them both at the contact flows. Jordan tries to keep his expression impassive but he doesn't think he does a good job especially when he notices her eyes noticeably avoid his hand on her waist.
Jordan had wanted to tease her, tell her maybe, considering their history may be dancing at the senior prom wasn’t their best bet. It would've been so easy to let the words pass between his lips, fall back into that ease and banter with her that had somehow felt like it'd always been there since they were kids.
But now with her closer to him than she'd been in weeks, her hand in his and the resolute right feeling centered in his gut that flowed all the way to his toes, he couldn't think of anything funny to say.
"That’s a really nice necklace." Jordan says, gesturing toward her platinum heels.
Layla fondly smiles, "I rarely wear it, I thought it could use a night out I guess." she quietly cringes into his broad shoulder for a second. A night out?, she swallows and shakes her head when she feels it start to get a little cloudy because of his cologne.
"Nothing like your good luck charm for the studio though." Jordan notes.
"I think I might've left it at my dad’s when I went to go visit him in London." Layla admits with a tone of regret.
Jordan quirks his brow and shakes his head, "I'm not sure you did."
"Yeah how's that?" Layla snorts, keeping her eyes leveled toward the punch table. Olivia and Spencer now looked to be in a particularly engaging conversation while JJ busted out some other move.
"Because I found it for you." He softly admits, trying to catch her gaze. At that Layla's eyes snap back up to him curiously.
"What?"
Jordan's lip quirk to form a familiar smile. "You were freaking out about not being able to find it before a deadline," Layla bites her lip, recollecting the story. "So I went back to the beach because I thought you might've left it there, I was right."
"You've must've spent like the entire afternoon in the sun to try and get it, You remembered it?" It comes out more as a question but it had truly been an observation.
Layla knows he had found it for her. She remembers kissing the living daylights out of him when he'd brought it home to her before her deadline.
“It was your mom's.” Is all he says after a while and it gives her pause until he whispers something else when he comes impossibly closer, "I remember everything.” Layla's brown eyes hold his for a moment. Then he takes her hand and spins her around smoothly.
"And you know there's the fact that a necklace like that kinda sticks out." He finally points out when she's facing him again.
"Well that's me one in million." Layla confidently says with a nervous smile.
"One in a million." Jordan murmurs as if in a daze while they sway.
Layla clears her throat and sneaks a quick look down at her impossibly sliver shoes then back up to him, "So you finally learned the difference." Jordan fixes her an inquisitive glance, one so cute she has to fight the smile working its way to her face. So she ever so imperceptibly moves her hand to the nape of his neck to distract herself.
Jordan feels her fingers graze the nape of his neck, his confused expression becoming relaxed even though he now fights the urge to rest his forehead against hers.
"Between the dances?" She reminds him of their endless visits to the Keating residence back when they were kids. How she'd tried to teach him the difference between a simple waltz and a slow dance when they were younger, after her cotillion classes. It had only gotten effective when Jordan stopped trying to get close to her every five seconds and stopped that ridiculous incentive game where she'd kiss him on the cheek or hug him for every step he got right.
Jordan looks down at his shoes feeling the color rise to his cheeks. "This is the waltz," His arms take the appropriate formation, one around her back and one holding her hand while she smiles up at him, "this is high school dance." His arms loop around her waist again, only now she feels a little closer than before. The soft smile painted on his lips as he studies her face lets her know she is.
"The student becomes the master." Layla replies amused.
Jordan snorts, "We both know that's a lie."
"I don't think I'd count you out just yet, Baker." Her brown eyes soften in the cool blue and white hue. They sway but Layla can't help but feel like she's gliding on air like her feet weren't even touching the ground.
But the song ends. Then it's just them in the middle of the dance floor not really wanting to let go while another slow song plays. Layla knows she has too. She especially knows when she looks up and sees his eyes following Simone's retreating figure out the door.
"I just wanted to remind you what it was like Jordan." Simone reasons, her shoulders falling with her disappointment while the breeze passes through her coils. Jordan's sad eyes follow hers.
"I know that! I'm trying to get back to how things used to be but-" Jordan insists.
"But what? Why can't it?" Simone asks but she fears she already knows the answer. She knows it when his eyes as if of their own accord travel back to the double doors then quickly face her.
"Why can it be like it used to?" She finally asks, tired of the back and forth. Simone's willing to let his words be enough. Then it hits her. “It’s Layla isn’t it?”
Jordan feels his eyes shut, he can’t even face her now. “Simone-”
“You're in love with her.” Simone see’s it all so clearly now in the silence. She can practically feel it off of him, even if they didn’t know every detail about each other for some reason she’s struck with this fact about him; of this, she’s sure.
“Simone just let me-”
“You can’t even say it to me.” Simone says with wide eyes. She doesn’t know what's worse, that he can’t admit it to her or that he feels it.
“I-” Jordan stutters and blinks through his next breath. Every memory of Layla seems to pester his mind incessantly at that point, every baited in the hallway she would pass through, every laugh he’d try to pry out of her after her mom died, every disapproval of her boyfriends regardless if they were his friends or not. Her smile, her kindness, her love of music, Layla Keating .
Jordan swallows, “I love her.”