“Is that your way of inviting us?” Juliet asks.
“Yeah, thanks for inviting us,” Rachel adds, acting all butt-hurt.
“It literally just happened last night. I was going to.”
“Good. You’d better,” Juliet says. “And your karaoke secret is safe with us.”
At least they don’t know about Sam Silversmith. I only ever shared my alter ego with Katya since, well, I thought I was going to marry her. “Thanks,” I say, then open the door and head to my car. “But what’s going on?”
“Oh, I was just telling Rachel about the pretty woman I introduced you to at the dog party, and then I realized we hadn’t done a dating welfare check on you for a while. And lo and behold…the woman from the party was named Chloe. And so is the woman who roped you into this fundraiser,” she says, shooting me atell me moresmile. “Ergo…”
“It sounds like your dating welfare isgood,” Rachel says, real enthusiasm in her tone.
My heart squeezes with that wish once more. “I’m not dating her. She’s actually my…co-worker,” I say, then hop into my car and give them the condensed version of how I met Chloe again.
“But it sounds like youwantto date her?” Rachel asks.
I sigh, thinking on that topic once again but then reminding myself it doesn’t matter. “I want to settle into my new life in this town where my plans don’t get ripped to pieces by a romance that’s a lie.”
Juliet smiles sympathetically. Rachel nods and says, “I hear you.”
“And right now, I need to get to a dance lesson with Chloe.”
“You’redancingwith her?” Juliet squeals. Yes, squeals.
“Yes,” I bite out.
“You’re going to be dating her before you know it,” she says.
“Goodbye, Juliet. Goodbye, Rachel.”
I hang up and head to the dance studio. It’s not a date. It’s a dance lesson.
* * *
I can run. I can bike. I can swim. I can sing. How hard can it be to dance? And the answer is…
“Ouch!”
Chloe’s hopping on one foot on the hardwood floor of the dance studio. And it’s all my fault. Still, I say, “Your fault, sweetheart.”
“I know,” she hisses.
“Want me to kiss it and make it better?”
“Yes, Sawyer, kiss my foot,” she whispers, but then she takes a deep breath, pins on a smile, and says, “doesn’t even hurt.”
“Liar,” I say, maybe because it’s easier than saying I suck at dancing. Only, I hardly need to say it. It’s obvious here at our first dance lesson. Mirrors don’t lie—the reflecting glass across theentire wallis mocking me. We’re thirty minutes into the beginner steps for the waltz, and already I’ve stepped on her toes three times.
But the teacher—Chloe’s dad—has assured me that’s normal.
In tight pants and dapper lace-up shoes, he sweeps by again as I hold my arms out at a precise angle in the so-called starting position, the one I’ll assume during the instrumental bridge of “Fly Me to the Moon.”
“You’re doing great,” he assures us as other couples move around the dance floor, some with more grace, some with less.
I scoff. “You must be mistaking me for someone else.”
“No, you are, Sawyer,” he says again. He’s emphatic and passionate, and he clearly believes anyone can dance—that’s the name of the studio he owns and runs. Those words are etched on to the front door in a scripty font, with a silhouette of someone twirling. Man, woman, who knows. Either way, it’s an invitation to all.
