The minute she slid her thigh between his, he knew why he'd never learned to tango.

He paused mid-step, leaving Maka dangling precariously off balance. She jerked her leg up for counterbalance, trying to keep them from ending up in a pile on the ballroom floor. Again.

"Yikes! Do not," she warned, wobbling, "make me bring this knee up any further!"

He felt said knee nudge him in a place that made her meaning abundantly clear and he hastened to correct their position.

"That's better. Don't make me damage the merchandise." she whispered in his ear. He knew her teasing was meant to unnerve him and it worked. He was a far superior dancer than her, and competitive Maka would level the playing field any way she knew how.

"I'm not sure this is going to be appropriate" he stammered, "Maybe something a little less...touchy?"

"It is fine. This is American tango," the dance instructor said, "And a very basic one. Open embrace...perfectly appropriate for the Halloween Ball."

His eyes sparkled as he adjusted their stance, "Argentinian tango, now that's another story. Very closed embrace. Very passionate. Very sexually tense."

"This feels plenty tense." Maka told him, clinging to Kid's jacket as he steered her backwards across the shining floor.

"Slow, slow, quick, quick,slow." he muttered, concentrating hard on his feet.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" she asked, wishing he'd say "no". Then they could go back to reading together in front of the fire while the bright fall leaves fell past the leaded glass in The Gallows' library windows.

"The King and Queen always do the first dance to open the Ball." Kid sighed, knowing exactly what she was thinking,"It's a tradition, and since we got voted in by a landslide we have to do it."

"You know Kim and Black Star rigged the election, right? I just had to tell her I wasn't running because I didn't want to make a fool out of myself in front of everybody. And I had to do it while Black Star was standing right there. He won't admit it, but Soul helped, the traitor."

"Liz was in on it too. Why else would she happen to have those horrible paper tiaras and all that confetti in her backpack when they announced the results?" Kid shuddered at the memory of being "crowned" in the middle of the cafeteria and spending an hour picking tiny bits of paper out his hair and clothes.

They stumbled and Maka held onto Kid for dear life, her knee threatening his crotch again. If he was still able to father children by the end of all this, he'd be pleasantly surprised.

"I do have to say this whole thing would be easier, and a lot more dignified, if we could just waltz." Kid started off again, trying to keep his arms firm and his steps fluid.

"No way. You waltz better than most people walk, and I'm still a beginner. I'll look like an idiot out there. But neither of us knows how to tango."

He arched an eyebrow at her, "So we'll both look like idiots, is that it?"

"Exactly."

Maka giggled and he grinned at her, in spite of the fact that she was stepping on his foot for the fifteenth time. They broke form and the instructor clucked impatiently.

"I understand that Miss Albarn has never had formal training, but you know every other dance, young Death. How is it that you don't know the tango?" he asked, aligning them once again.

"My mother taught me to dance," Kid explained, "She said it wasn't proper for a mother to tango with her son."

Maka was now stretched along his right thigh, breasts pressed against his chest.

"And now," he gulped, "I know why."

She felt his sudden arousal and her own flared up to meet it. Kid had a sudden vision of being "very sexually tense" on the dance floor in front of hundreds of people.

"You know, I think you had the right idea. Maybe we could abdicate or something?" he suggested.

"No way!" she exclaimed, trying to work her way through a tricky turn, "I wasn't serious. Not very, anyway. If we quit, Black Star would never let us live it down. Do you really want to give him that kind of ammunition?"

"Absolutely not!"

"Me either."

"Then let's tango."