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We dance in silence for a moment. I lean my head against his shoulder again, his jacket left behind somewhere, his shirt sleeves rolled up, forearms exposed. A bead of sweat trickles down his neck, from his sideburn to his collar, and despite myself I want to lick it off him.
I lied earlier.
When I told Seth that I don’t want to know anything, I was lying through my teeth. I want to know everything.
I want to know the name of every woman he’s fucked. I want to know dates, times, frequency. I want to know what position they did it in and where they were and how kinky she was and if she was better in bed than me. I want to know which ones he loved and which ones he didn’t even like.
I want it all. I want every last dirty detail, but I’m also finally wise enough to know that what I want isn’t always what’s good for me.
So I’m not going to ask, even though I know he’d tell me. I’ve made that mistake before. It took a long time to get over.
It’s none of my business, and it doesn’t matter, and it doesn’t matter, and it’s none of my business. We’re just friends who happen to be at this wedding together, dancing and reminiscing about how we used to be in love.
“Don’t look now, but I think there’s some kind of meeting going on,” he says after a while.
“What kind of meeting?”
“Your sisters, your stepmom, and the other bridesmaid,” he says.
“Evelyn.”
“Sure. Evelyn’s shaking her head, your one sister is sort of making a motion like she’s clutching pearls, but I don’t think she’s wearing any —"
“Turn me.”
The slow song begins trickling to its end, something faster rising in its place. The crowd on the dance floor shifts, re-finds its footing. We spin slightly, Seth’s back now to my family.
“Am I hiding you from them, or were you tired of my play-by-play?” he asks, grinning, as we pull apart slightly.
“Both,” I tease as he lets my hand go and pulls at his tie.
“My play-by-play was great,” he says.
“You didn’t even know which sister it was.”
He grins, shrugs, tugs.
“Stop it,” I say, and grab his tie myself, pull one end gently from the knot. The backs of my knuckles brush against his skin and I tug gently, re-center his tie, pause. I don’t let go.
And then, before I quite know what I’m doing, I’m unbuttoning the top button on his shirt, drawing closer, the material stiff and the button small in my drunk fingers.
Seth flattens his palm against my back, his thumb on the bump of my bra closure again. I unbutton another button. Pull back, my hands on his chest. Look up at him.
“Undressing me in public?” he murmurs, so low I can barely hear him over the band.
“This is the highly exclusive society event of the year,” I say. “I’d hardly call it public.”
“Still, we’re in front of all these people.”
“Am I embarrassing you, Seth?”
He answers just as the band crescendos, the new song picking up volume and tempo, drowning out his response.
“I didn’t—"
He pulls me to him, leans in, and then his forehead is resting on mine and our noses are touching and his hand is flat against my back, the other covering mine on his chest, and I think my heart has stopped.
“Not in the least, Bird,” he says again.
My eyes are closed. Did I close them?
The music swirls around us, rising. We’re swaying back and forth slightly, like seaweed underwater, people around us dancing and laughing and talking, and I know some of them are watching us and some of those people are thinking there’s that Loveless boy and his latest bridesmaid conquest. How cliché.
I wish I didn’t care what people thought, but I do. We sway together with our faces touching and our lips an inch apart and I think: I was here first.
As if that makes me somehow special. As if it makes me different from every other woman he’s fucked.
“You have to stop calling me that,” I finally murmur.
“Sorry,” he says, a smile in his voice. “Old habit.”
Deep breath in, eyes still closed. Still swaying.
“It’s been years,” I say softly. “Don’t habits die?”
“Doesn’t feel like it.”
Before I can answer he pulls his face away from mine, keeps his arms on me.
“Incoming,” he says, and I open my eyes to see my sister Olivia striding across the dance floor toward us, couples parting around her like she’s Maid of Honor Moses.
Moses of Honor?
“Delilah,” she calls, all business.
“Hi,” I answer, the best I can come up with.
She stops a few feet away, raises her eyebrows, and gives us a long, speculative look. You wouldn’t know that she’s had her hair and makeup done since eight this morning, or that she’s been at a wedding for the past several hours, because she somehow still looks picture-perfect.
