I look around, but don’t see her behind the bar; instead, Benny is serving Maggie on the other side of the bar. Graham looks at me, his face assessing me in a way I don’t necessarily like, before he shakes his head and sets his empty glass on the bar top beside Miles’ beer.
“No, no, I’ll dance with you,” he says, and my stupid, traitorous heart skips a beat. “But I really do have to leave after; I’ve got a ton to do still.”
“Of course,” I say, biting back a victorious smile as we walk toward the center of the room. Once there, we stand before one another awkwardly before I say a mentalfuck it, then move and rest my wrists on his shoulders, our chests touching. In response, his hands move, resting on my waist in the most polite way possible before we awkwardly begin to sway. Tension builds, and not the fun kind, and after a few moments of silence, I shake my head.
I don't want to force him into this if he’s genuinely opposed.
“You don’t have to do this,” I whisper after a moment, making to step back and relieve him from his duty. “I can walk you out?—”
“No,” he says, his voice firm as his hands slide over my body to my hips, pulling me in tight, keeping me from stepping away. “I want to be here, June. I’m just not sure about the protocol. This is all new to me.”
I lick my lips and swallow.
“You want to dance with me?” I ask, a whisper. He pulls me in tighter, and he looks down at me in a way I want to imprint in my mind forever. The bar is dim, and my friends move and laugh and dance around us, but I’m a bubble, just me and Graham.
Instead of answering, he asks another question. “Friends dance, right?” he murmurs, his hand lifting to push my hair back behind my shoulders, then gliding soft from my shoulder to my hip. Each inch he touches makes my pulse beat faster.
“Are we friends?” I ask against my better judgment. My voice sounds breathy even to my own ears. Despite the music and the people laughing and chatting all around, he still hears me, his attention locked on only me.
“I wouldn’t come to a dive bar and spend two hours having small talk with people I don’t know for just anyone,” he says. It sounds like a confession instead of a statement.
“I need you to say it out loud,” I say, and despite the emotional turmoil in my chest, I’m beaming up at him. He rolls his eyes and sighs, his warm breath coasting along my collarbones, exposed in the tank top I changed into before heading here, and a chill runs through me.
“You’re a real pain in the ass. Has anyone ever told you that?” he asks, and I nod.
“Yes, every day of my life. Now say it, Hawthorne.”
He watches me for another moment as we sway.
“Yes, June. We’re friends. Okay? You win.” I squeal with excitement, my arms tightening around his neck in a hug. When I pull back, a smirk is on his lips, the tiny hint of a dimple returning.
“Does that make me your best friend? Since I’m your only friend?” I say, unable to stop myself.
“I give an inch, you take a mile, huh?” he asks, and I go to agree, but I’m distracted by what happens next.
I get a smile.
Not the small tipping of his lips and the dancing of his eyes I’ve gotten before, but a true, genuine, wide grin. And I was right: he hasdimples. Not just one, but two perfect dimples I desperately want to rub my thumb over. The man has fuckingdimples.The entire picture is so terribly handsome, beauty in its most natural form, that it feels criminal that he constantly hides it from the world.
Right then, I set a new goal: to make those full, joy-filled smiles the rule, not the exception.
And in my heart, I know I’m going to succeed. It is my lucky summer after all.
“He smiles,” I shout, throwing one arm in the air, almost giddy with joy. I expect him to hide it when I call him out, but I’m pleasantly surprised when he shakes his head, grinning a bit wider before pulling me in tighter.
“You’re a nut,” he murmurs through the smile.
“You’ll get used to it.”
He stares at me for a moment longer than necessary before shaking his head, that smile still there but somehow softer now. Sweeter.
“I don’t think anyone could ever get used to you, June Taylor.”
NINETEEN
Despite my best efforts, I spent the entire weekend thinking about that smile.
Every free moment, I plot ways to see it again—schemes, jokes, surprises for him.
