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"What? She was the Goddess of the 80s."
"She might have been, but that doesn't mean I want to Vogue at my sister's wedding!"
"Okay, you may have a point." Liam looks to the sky seeking inspiration, but Callum provides the next song choice. "Wham's 'Wake Me Up Before You Go'?"
"Ugh. Too cheesy."
"Billy Ocean, 'Caribbean Queen'?"
"Ooo…I like that one," I say enthusiastically, and Callum looks euphoric. "But no. Too groovy."
"You're a hard girl to please!" Liam says with a fake grumpy face, and I have an urge to smooth out his frown and turn it upside-down.
"How about DuranDuran, 'Rio'?" I say.
"I like it…" he says after a few seconds, voice trailing and uncertain.
"What?" I ask, suddenly feeling like my suggestion was a terrible one. I want to paper over it so that he's not displeased with me. "You suggest something else then," I say quickly. Liam is still holding my wrists, which should feel weird but is strangely comforting. His thumbs rest across the vulnerable inside of my skin, and he's looking down at my palms. Then his eyes flick up to mine, and I realize he was feeling my pulse, and he knew my heart was beating faster. He felt my embarrassment in his hands.
I pull away just as the barman turns, presenting three ridiculous-looking cocktails. "Wow," I say as he slides mine across the bar towards me, and I take a long pull at the straw, needing the relaxing effects of more alcohol just to calm my ridiculous social nerves. "Mmm, delicious."
Liam is quiet, and I don't like it. I turn to find the twins looking at each other. They don't say anything, but it's as though they communicate something silently. They both sip at their drink a few times, and Callum passes his key card so the cost of our order can be added to his room charge.
"I think," he says, turning to me with serious eyes, "That your idea is perfect and very clever. You want to know why?"
"I do."
"I think you chose it because you think the DJ won't have it."
I feel my heart sink into my chest. He thinks I'm a coward and that I'm trying to play their game and worm out of it at the same time.
"That's not why I chose it," I say quietly.
The twins don't say anything. They just look at me until the need to fill the silence is overwhelming. They are big, strong men, but they aren't arrogant. There's no real pressure here for me to explain myself, but I find that I want to. I want them to understand, even though it's hard. There's something about them. I can't put my finger on what it is, but among the butterflies that I permanently seem to have in my stomach when they're near, I feel a sense of understanding.
So I tell them. "It was playing on the radio when I left my ex-boyfriend. It…it made me smile when he sings that bit about Rio dancing on the sand. I did that when I was younger and on holiday with Kerry. We went down to the beach with some of the locals our age, and they had an old ghetto blaster. We were so drunk and happy. It was like a sign that I was doing the right thing. Walking away".
There seem to be minutes of silent space between us, but it's really only seconds, and then Callum reaches around my shoulders and side-hugs me, tucking my head against his chest.
"Drink up," he says. "I've got an idea that'll blow this game out of the water."
3
DANCING MY WAY TO HAPPINESS
The sand is slightly cold against my feet, where the heat left by the afternoon sun has cooled under the moon. Liam takes hold of my hand, leading me across the wide expanse of the beach until we’re further from the hotel and closer to the sea. Callum walks beside me, close enough that I can smell his cologne andfeelhis presence almost as physically as if he was touching me. It’s a perfect balmy evening, and I’m so grateful to be away from that stupid dance floor and the pressure to blend in. Even though I’ve only known these men for a few hours, I feel calm and peaceful.
We get to a spot that’s away from the spread of the hotel, and they stop, dropping my shoes to the ground. Liam pulls out his phone and starts fiddling with it.
“What are you doing?” I ask, still puzzled by their sudden change of heart and the idea they seem so confident about.
“I’m looking for something. Have some patience, woman.”
In the moonlight, as they stand side by side, they look gorgeously ruffled and so tall I have to crane my neck to see the top of them. Callum watches his brother, smiling to himself, and then Liam looks up with a triumphant grin.
It’s then that I realize why.
The song starts with a ridiculous scraping sound and then moves into a frantic synthesizer intro before Simon Le Bon belts out the first lines of Rio. Liam rests the phone down in one of my shoes and takes my hand, pulling me up against him. I’m so shocked that I must feel like a plank of wood in his arms, but as he sways us slowly back and forth, I start to melt. I don’t want to be the uptight person I seem to keep morphing into. A flash of memory spins itself into my consciousness, Kerry’s hair fanning out behind her and my arms in the air as we danced our hearts out all those years ago.
