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“Yep. They don’t bother me. But snakes?” I shuddered. “They’re slimy and remind me too much of worms.”
“Fair comparison.” He lifted his beer and closed his lips around the rim of it to take a drink.
I took that second to look around. The bar was busy, and the line of sight between us and my parents had disappeared thanks to all the people who’d filtered in since we’d been here. The volume of the music had slowly crept up over the last half an hour, and some of the tables that were usually reserved for food had been moved to clear an area for dancing.
There was already a throng of people there. Men and women, dancing in twosomes and in groups, and a few were crowded around the modern-style jukebox Mom had installed only a few weeks ago. It was fun because of how it linked up to the main stereo; it waited until the programmed song was done before it started a new one.
It also meant that the music on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays was almost exclusively chosen by the customers. Which meant that one minute you were dancing to the latest song from say, Calvin Harris, and the next thing you knew, you were rocking out to Elvis.
It was hilarious.
Jay followed my gaze. “You wanna dance?”
As a rule, no, but this was a date. “Sure. Why not?”
His eyebrows shot up in surprise, but he followed my lead in finishing off his drink. We stood, and he took my hand, pulling me through the people and toward the dancefloor in front of the jukebox.
Grinning, he pulled me into the middle of the crowd and toward his body. His hands trailed to my hips, and he waggled his eyebrows as the song became more upbeat. He made me sway my hips side to side, and I laughed, gripping onto his arms and he exaggerated every movement.
It was so, so fun.
We danced for a few songs, our bodies moving together, until he put one finger to his lips and slinked off toward the jukebox. I frowned, basically standing still until he came back with a grin on his face.
“What did you choose?” I asked into his ear.
“It’s a secret!” he said back as “The Birdie Song” came on.
“If this was you—”
He burst out laughing, quickly pulling me into him. “No. Mine’s next.”
I tried to escape the mess that was the dance routine to this song, but Jay wasn’t having it. He tugged me back, linking his arm through mine, and spun us around. I squealed as my shoes pinched my toes, but I could barely breathe through my laughter.
Have you ever seen a six-foot-something, muscular, book-cover-model-worthy man do the freaking birdie dance?
It was possibly the best thing I’d ever seen. He got so into it, shaking his ass and waggling his eyebrows as he did the hand movements. I bent over laughing, holding my stomach. I laughed so hard I had to grab hold of him before I fell over, and he responded by winding his arm around my waist and pulling me against him.
His firm body was shaking with laughter, and he pressed his cheek against the side of my head as the song died.
Only to be replaced with the one song I should have known he’d put on.
Ed. Freakin’. Sheeran.
“Noooo,” I groaned, flattening my hands against his chest.
“My roommate loves it when I sing this in the shower,” he said into my ear, his laughter barely restrained. “I could give Ed a run for his money.”
“I have no idea how to respond to that,” I replied right as he started singing in my ear, making my body move with his.
No matter how I tried to pull away, he gripped me tighter, singing deliberately more awful than usual. It was horrendous, honestly. To have the beautiful tones of Ed Sheeran in one ear and the cat-strangling voice of Jay Cooper in the other.
I leaned my head back and met his eyes. He was only mouthing the song now, but he was such an idiot, making the funniest expressions as he did it, and I had to laugh. My stomach hurt from laughing so much in the last few minutes.
His eyes sparkled, even in the dim light. They were so bright, and he was looking at me with such happiness that I really wasn’t responsible for the fact I leaned up and kissed him.
It just happened.
Really.
I pulled back and blushed.
Slowly, he smiled. He slid one of his hands up to the back of my neck and lowered his face to mine, his lips brushing over mine several times until the song changed to something more upbeat and he grabbed my hand and spun me on the spot.
I fell against him, unprepared, and through my own laughter, I could hear the deep rumble of his in his chest.
