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Brooks’s usual stoicism is nowhere to be found – that’s a combination of booze and Sarah. ‘You want to see my snake hips?’
‘Bet your sweet ass I do,’ she tells him.
She stands and pulls Brooks by an imaginary tie around his neck, backing onto the dance floor. It’s great to see them so happy.
When they are out of earshot, Becky asks, ‘Are they…?’
‘Sarah and Brooks? No, just good friends. They both have stuff to figure out. Do you want to dance?’
‘Sure.’
Taking her hand, I lead her onto the dance floor. The track changes to a trippy, danced-up version of Lana Del Ray’s ‘Diet Mountain Dew.’ In the middle of the floor, I tug her to me, our bodies so close, they’re almost touching. She’s rigid as she glances around us.
‘Relax,’ I say against her earlobe.
‘I’m sorry, it’s just, I haven’t been allowed in a club for a long time, let alone dancing.’
‘Allowed?’
She jerks her head back to look at me. ‘I just mean it’s been a while.’
This issue she has with being controlled. Not being ‘allowed’ to do things. I think I’m starting to get a picture of Becky’s life before New York. I could be calling it wrong. Maybe the champagne is making me think I know things I don’t. But there are Edmond’s words again:she’s been through enough. And if holding her didn’t feel so right, if I hadn’t consumed a skin-full of booze, I might remember all of the reasons this could get complicated.
Right or wrong, I encourage her to move into me and tell her, ‘I’ll never try to control you, Becky. I want you to be whoever you want to be.’
Her chest seems to deflate, as if she has been holding her breath, or more, for too long. She gives the faintest of nods, uncertain, I think. Then she takes my hand and twirls under my arm, suddenly happy, free, and absolutely smokin’.
We dance through a few tracks, more because I am enjoying watching her than because I love dancing. But we are shouting at each other, trying to be heard above the heavy bass. Eventually, it becomes so frustrating that I ask her if she wants to come back to my place, making a sign for home with my hands.
I’m fairly sure she shouts yes and then something along the lines of no funny business. Smirking, I tell her, ‘Not unless you make the first move.’
She must get the gist – I’m game if she is – because she shoots me a jovial scowl.
I take her hand and find Sarah and Brooks, who are still dancing. ‘We’re going,’ I yell above the music.
Sarah kisses my cheek and gives me a drunken wink. Brooks grabs my hand, pulls me into him and thumps me on the back, harder than he would if he were sober. ‘I’m not going to see you in the gym tomorrow morning, am I?’ he asks.
I lean into his ear. ‘I really hope not, buddy.’
‘She’s a good girl, man. I like her.’ His s’s are severely slurred. ‘Never seen you fight for a chick like that. She’s good for you.’
‘You’re wasted.’
‘That. I. Am.’
‘Are you two going to get home okay?’
‘We’ll be fiiiine. Go,’ Sarah says, nudging my chest away from them.
* * *
I’ve never been more grateful for the location of my apartment. Ten minutes in a cab was all I could take. Being so close to Becky, her perfume, her slender thighs tempting me from beneath her dress, I was dying in there.
The fresh air – as fresh as city air gets – is welcome when I step into the street. I move around the car to open Becky’s door, but she’s already climbing out by the time I get there. She blows out so hard, it puffs her cheeks, then she sucks in air just as hard and straightens her shoulders, pulling her fingers through the front of her hair.
‘Rough ride?’ I ask.
She just stares at me, like she’s staring into the depths of me. Once again, I’m left wishing I could read her mind. Just the smallest insight to tell me I’m not crazy for being absolutely blindsided by this woman, tackled sideways and knocked on my ass by the spiral she’s got my head in.
