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“I’m letting you dance,alone.”
“No,” I reply, my voice raised, tremulous, angry. “Come back.”
“You need to do this without me. Trust me on this,” she insists, her voice further away.
I reach up to remove my blindfold, my fingers hovering over the material, stilling only when she shouts at me, the pain in her voice lancing my chest.
“No! Keep dancing!” she commands, the kindness in her voice replaced with sharp edges.
I’m tempted to ignore her, but something stops me. Something nags deep inside, but instead of listening to it, I make a demand of my own in one last ditch attempt to get her back in my arms. It worked once before, why not now?
“Dance with me!”
“Not this time, Xeno,” she replies gently, Hozier’s haunting voice settling over my skin, taunting me with memories as my heart slams against my rib cage in a desperate attempt to reach the woman it beats for. “This time you dance with your emotions alone.”
And just like that, the past collides with the present. Her absence is filled with the ghost of her memory, reminding me of all the pent up emotion that had begun to leak from me the moment I’d danced with her blindfolded in the studio all those years ago.
That was the start of it. My unravelling.
Tiny is reminding me of that moment, not to taunt me, but to show me that we’ve been here before, dealing with big emotions, and we survived. Love will always hurt me as much as it soothes me, and Tiny will always be the one to remind me of myownstrength, just like she’s doing now.
Dancing together might give us joy, it might complete us, but dancing solo?That’swhere we found our souls, our true strength.
We have to start there first.
“Move your body, Xeno. Don’t think. Let the music guide you,” she encourages.“Forget about the past. Forget about your feelings for the moment. Forget about me. Just dance. Remember whoyouare. Draw strength from that.”
I’m tempted to remove the blindfold, to chase her across the room and relieve myself of my emotions temporarily whilst balls deep inside of her. I could fuck them into submission, gorging myself on the woman I love, with a heart so fucking damaged that it tries its best to kill me on the regular.
I don’t.
And I don’t forget about her either.
I force myself to relive that moment I stepped into the studio. How it had felt back then to watch the girl I both loved and hated move with such passion and fire it had completely disarmed me. I had watched her with such awe and reverence that my heart had swelled with emotions it hadn’t allowed itself to feel for a long, long time. It’s with that memory in mind that I start to move, though it isn't bachata that guides my steps, but lyrical.
“That’s it, Xeno, dance,” Tiny encourages as I bring my curled fists into my stomach, bending at the waist, imitating how it feels to live with my big emotions, how they often wind me, taking my breath with their hugeness.
I could stop there, breathless by my emotions, gasping for breath in a sea of feelings, but I don’t. Instead, I force myself upright, reaching up with my left arm, swimming against the tide, fighting for breath as I leap into the air.
Once I shake off some of the heaviness of my feelings, my steps grow more confident and deliberate, and as I press my palms together, it's almost as if I'm cradling a ball of emotion that’s swirling with fear and anxiety in my hands. It fizzles there, a part of me, yet outside of me.
With one powerful push, I send the sensation tumbling away, propelling myself backward in the process, but I’m not throwing away my love, I’m releasing the stress and anxiety that makes it seem too huge to handle. Too overwhelming.
Because Icanhandle it.
Loving Tiny, loving York and Zayn, loving Dax iseasy. It’s the fear of that love hurting me somehow, causing me pain, that I can’t handle. It’s fear of losing the people I love, fear of being out of control that overwhelms me.
That’s what I'm trying to let go of now as I dance, the fear. Nothing else.
With every step, I brush that fear off. I push it down. I force it away. My movements are contained, controlled, and decisive as I dance. Bending my knee, I lift my foot off the ground, bring my arms back then stamp down, in an attempt to squash the fear. I push harder, striving for control and that sense of relief, release.
This isn’t me ignoring my feelings. This is me acknowledging them, thanking them for what they are, and letting the ones that no longer serve me go. Fear holds me back. I understand that better than anyone, and as that realisation slides through my body, like an undulating wave, my arms roll in one singular, fluid movement.
Of course nothing is ever easy, and this fear that’s so entangled with feelings of love tries its best to hang on. It builds once more inside of me in a last ditch attempt to bring me to my knees, to make me turn in on myself. But I refuse to let it.
Resting my palm against my chest, I gather that rotten emotion and force it upwards and out of my mouth. It tries to smother my face, but I grasp it in my hand, pushing it away.
I battle against it, grasping that invisible ball with one hand as I move around the studio, still blindfolded, still trusting every step as I dance.
