Dance with Me, page 15
“Oh my God, we’re like teenagers,” Marisa says, joining me in laughing. “And also, you’re an incredible kisser. Jesus. Sorry about that. I didn’t mean to get so carried away, but God.” She shakes her head, her dark eyes wide.
“Right back atcha,” I say, and it occurs to me that I’m still panting, my breaths ragged. “Wow.” I wait for a moment until I catch my breath and the blood rushing through me slows to a normal speed. “Okay. I’m gonna go now.” I jerk a thumb over my shoulder to indicate my car. “Can you—”
“I will be right here until your car starts.”
“Perfect.” I open the car door, and the overhead light seems rude and super bright, and we both squint. “Text me your address for tomorrow and what I can bring.”
“I will.”
I sit there, my hand on the door handle, and I just take her in. Her overall beauty. Her flushed cheeks and kiss-swollen lips. Her hands. God, she’s got gorgeous hands, resting on the steering wheel, her nails painted a deep purple, which looks fab against her skin tone. She’s simply…breathtaking. I swallow down the resurgence of arousal that I feel and say, very softly, “Bye.”
She says it back, and I drop to the ground and shut the door. Once in my own driver’s seat, I wish I could take a few moments and just catch my breath, relive the evening, gather myself before I go home. But she’s still there, dutifully waiting to make sure my car starts.
It does.
I wave to her and give a thumbs-up, and then I watch as she backs out of the spot and drives away. And then I say it out loud.
“Ho. Lee. Shit.”
Chapter Thirteen
“Are you sure you know what you’re doing?”
My head snaps around to my grandmother because to say I’m surprised by the question is a massive understatement. “Grandma! You’re the one who told me to stick out the dance lessons. The playing field is now level. That’s what you said.”
Grandma stirs half-and-half into her coffee. She doesn’t mess around with milk or Coffee mate fake powdery chemical crap. No way. She puts the good stuff in hers. That’s where I got it from. The spoon tings the sides of the mug as she nods. “I did say that. But we were talking about dance lessons. Not dating.”
The way she says the word dating makes her worry clear. And that’s what it is, worry. I know my grandmother well enough, and she’s fully accepting of my sexuality. In fact, she was more welcoming than both my parents at first. So I know her concern isn’t about me dating a woman. It’s about me dating Marisa.
And I stop with my own coffee cup near my lips and just freeze for a beat. Because is that what I’m doing? Am I dating Marisa? I mean, last night was a date, right? And then today, that’s a date, too. Do two dates qualify as dating? My coffee makes it to my lips, and I take a sip before I answer. “It’s just dinner, Grandma. That’s all.”
She turns with her cup in both hands and leans against the counter while she studies me. I hate when she does that. I feel like she sees right into my head, into my brain, into my thoughts. Like I can’t hide a damn thing from her. Finally, she brings her own cup up, and just before she takes a sip, she says, “If you say so.”
Yeah, if that’s not code for I don’t believe you, I don’t know what is. I sigh quietly.
Grandma squeezes my shoulder as she walks by me, likely heading out onto her deck where she likes to sit most mornings in nice weather. “I just worry about your tender heart. That’s all.” Then she drops a kiss onto the top of my head, and I hear the sliding glass door off the dining room open. I eat my Fruity Pebbles—because I’m a six-year-old when it comes to cereal—and try to ignore the tiny prickle of worry my grandmother just created.
A little after noon, I’m pushing through the back door of Get the Scoop because I really need to talk to Adley.
“Hey, Scoot,” she says, not looking up from her laptop open in front of her.
“How’d you know it was me and not some crazy burglar breaking in to steal the world’s best ice cream?” I slide an iced chai latte from Starbucks in front of her, and she makes a little sound of delight because it’s her favorite and I know that.
“Please,” she says with a snort as she pokes the straw through the lid. “I can hear that piece-of-shit car of yours rumbling along from down the block and around the corner.”
“Valid.” I open the lid of my Vanilla Sweet Cream Cold Brew and take a sip. Pretty sure I can feel the extra caffeine hit my system like an injection.
“How’s the fam?” she asks, and I realize that’s my cue to talk to her about random stuff for a bit while she finishes up what she’s doing. I’ll save the Marisa stuff for when I have her full attention.
“Jordie’s dance went well, from what I could squeeze out of my mother. I got two whole pictures sent to me, but then she posted, like, thirty of them on Facebook.” I take a sip of my coffee. “I was kinda bummed not to hear back from Jordie herself, though. I sent a couple texts, but she didn’t answer.”
Adley looks up at me over the screen of her laptop. “Oh, sweetie, don’t take that personally. She’s thirteen. The world revolves around her right now.”
“True.” She’s right and I know it, but it still stings. “There were a couple photos from later in the evening and her hair still looked great, so…” I lift one shoulder.
“Of course it did. You’re fantastic at what you do.”
Okay. That makes me feel a tiny bit better. Just a smidge.
Get the Scoop opens at two on Sundays, so I’m happy to have Adley to myself for a bit before her employees start to arrive. “I bet today will be busy. It’s fucking muggy out there already.” And it is. It’s unusual for mid-June to get quite so uncomfortably humid, but when I left Grandma’s to get in my car, I felt like I was breathing through gauze.
Adley holds up two hands with crossed fingers and grins at me. She takes a pull from her straw, then meets my eyes and asks, “So? What’s up with the Dancing Queen?”
A laugh shoots out of me. “The Dancing Queen?”
“Yup. That’s what I call her in my head. She’s the Dancing Queen.”
“Just a touch.” I sip more coffee. This is why I came here. To talk about Marisa. “Well.” I swallow, and Adley stops what she’s doing to stare at me.
“Uh-oh. This is serious. You look serious. What’s up?”
“We kinda…made out last night.” Before I can say anything more, Adley jumps out of her seat, lets out a loud whoop, and does a little spin as she throws her arms up in the air, clearly joyous. “Oh, that makes you happy, does it?”
“Are you kidding me? Hell, yeah! When’s the last time you were kissed? It was Pen, wasn’t it?”
I nod. Of course it was Pen. That bitch.
“That bitch,” Adley adds. “And now? You’re sucking face with her ex. That’s”—she squints at me—“not weird at all.”
I sigh and drop my chin down to my chest. “I know. I know. It’s not ideal.”
“No. But how was it? What’s she like? What led up to making out? Is she a good kisser? Are you seeing her again?”
I laugh at the barrage of questions, and I tell her the whole story, from start—sitting with Marisa after Adley left the bar on Friday night—to finish—coming here last night, then heading to the lake, the walking, the sitting, the talking, the kissing. Adley listens quietly, which is very unlike her, her chin in her hands, a sweet, dreamy smile on her face.
“I love this whole story,” she says when I finish. “I take it back. It’s not weird. It’s perfect. She sounds awesome.”
“I like her a lot.”
“And? How was the kissing?”
I let my head drop back toward my shoulder blades and let out a long, low groan. “Oh my God. So good.” I lift my head and meet Adley’s gaze. “I could kiss her forever. It’s just…” A shake of my head because finding the right words to describe what it felt like to kiss Marisa, to be kissed by Marisa, is nearly impossible. “Hot. Toe-curling. Limb-melting. Exciting. Tingly. Just so fucking sexy that I get all turned on just thinking about it.”
“That’s exactly how it should be,” Adley says, still grinning like crazy. She’s happy for me, and I can see it clearly. “What now?”
“She invited me to her house for dinner tonight.”
Adley drops her head to the stainless-steel counter in a pretend faint. “Amazing. I expect a full report.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
We’re quiet for a bit as Adley goes about getting things ready to open, pulling tubs of ice cream from the freezer and hauling them out into the store area. I know how this all works, so I pitch in, restocking cones and bowls and spoons, making sure the window-service counter is wiped down and not sticky. Once we have the main stuff ready to go, Adley starts mixing the batter for the house-made waffle cones that make the whole place smell warm and sweet and inviting. As she works, she looks at me and narrows her eyes as if she’s studying me.
“What?” I ask.
“So…” She blinks a few times, kicks out one hip and parks her hand on it. “How do you feel? About all this? About things with the Dancing Queen?”
I blink back at her. “Well. I haven’t really given myself a ton of space or time to get into that.”
“Because the strangeness of who she is overshadows it?”
I inhale and then let it out slowly. “I guess that’s probably true.” And before I can say more, as if she’s privy to every move I make and every word I say, my phone pings a text notification. I slide it from my back pocket, glance down, and feel a jolt zap through my body. I hold the phone up so Adley can see it. “Pen.”
“Oh my God, again? She’s still texting?”
I nod. “Yep. This one says, Happy Sunday. I bet you’re seeing Adley today at the shop. Eat some ice cream for me.”
“Okay, that is fucking creepy.” Adley shakes her head, her dark eyes wide.
“I mean, it is and it’s not. I always come see you on Sundays, so it’s likely just a lucky guess.” Adley narrows her eyes at me again, but this time adds tapping her forefinger against her pursed lips. That’s my bestie’s thinking face. I know it well. “What?” I ask.
She seems to choose her words carefully. Slowly. “You don’t think this is some weird revenge plot on Marisa’s part, do you? I was thinking that before the text came, and I can’t really see how Pen would be involved in that, but…” She lets the sentence trail off and lifts one shoulder.
“What, you think her plan is to seduce me and then…what? Dump me? Kill me and hide my body in the basement of the dance studio?”
She gasps. “Or keep you prisoner in the basement of the dance studio!”
“You watch too much Lifetime, my friend,” I say with a chuckle but don’t share the quick little visual of being tied up by Marisa that zips through my head. And then zips lower.
I spend the rest of the day with Adley’s words about some kind of revenge scheme hanging out in the back of my head. I’m ninety-five percent sure that’s not at all what’s happening, but that other five percent keeps tapping at the inside of my skull. I shake it away because I honestly don’t think Marisa is unhinged like that.
Of course, she was with Pen for a few years.
Of course, I was also with Pen for a few years.
A little while later, Marisa texts me her address and says I don’t need to bring anything but my smiling face. Then she asks if there’s anything I don’t like, and I tell her I’m not a huge fan of steak, so I’m relieved when she tells me her plan is to make salmon. That also allows me to choose a proper wine, because no way am I showing up empty-handed.
Grandma is off with her friends tonight—book club, I think—so I feed Salty and Pepper their dinner, grab the bottle of Chardonnay the girl at the wine store recommended, and check myself in the mirror on the door of the coat closet. I realized as I was getting dressed that I have no idea how Marisa feels about humidity or whether her home has central air, so I had to futz around a bit with what to wear. I opted for a cute pair of tan capris with a buttoned pocket on one leg, and a deep green V-neck tank. I made sure I was shaved smooth, and now as I stand in front of the mirror and study my reflection—with far too critical an eye, Bash would say—I think I’m okay. I grab a lightweight chambray shirt, just in case Marisa does have AC and she has it set to arctic tundra, as many people tend to do in my life, and I’m on my way.
It’s funny, I’m actively thinking about how not nervous I am, being all impressed with myself, until I’m about a block away from where my GPS says Marisa’s house is, and it’s like the robot voice telling me to take a left triggers all those butterflies that have been hanging out in my stomach and napping. They instantly pop awake and start fluttering all over the place, and suddenly, my armpits start to sweat and my legs tremble, and for a good twenty seconds, I think I might have to pull over and throw up on the side of the road. But then I follow the directions and pull into Marisa’s driveway, and she’s sitting in a rocking chair on a cute little front porch, and her face lights up and her smile blossoms, and just like that, everything settles.
Really, really weird, that.
“Hey you,” I say as I get out of the car with my purse and my bottle of wine.
“Hey yourself,” Marisa says as she stands up, and I’m taking her in—her black shorts that are letting me see way too much leg, her simple white T-shirt, her bare feet, her hair in a ponytail, revealing a very long, gorgeous neck—when I hear my name shouted loudly and then what I think must be a cannonball in the shape of a little boy comes barreling out of the house, hits me, and wraps my waist in a tight hug.
“Wow. That is quite a greeting,” I say, ruffling Jaden’s hair with my free hand. I glance back up at Marisa and tease, “You could take a lesson.”
Her smile gets wider. “Noted.”
I really want to kiss her hello, but when she makes no move toward me, I decide she must not want Jaden to see any PDA, which I get.
Marisa’s house is a cute little Cape Cod, light blue with white shutters and a small white front porch. She leads me inside, and the first thing I notice is the smell. It’s soft and subtle and warm. Inviting. Vanilla? Sugar? I can’t tell, but once we pass through the living room and into the kitchen, it’s replaced by the glorious smell of dinner cooking.
“Oh my God, that smells delicious,” I tell her.
“Thanks.” She opens a drawer and takes out a corkscrew. “Want to open that?” Her eyes indicate the wine still in my hand.
“Scottie, come and see my room,” Jaden says, little-boy excited.
I look to Marisa, waiting to tailor my response to whatever lead she puts forth. With a grin, she takes the wine and corkscrew from my hand. “Only for a couple minutes, J,” she says. “Scottie and I are going to have dinner soon. Your chicken nuggets will be done in five, okay?”
“Okay,” Jaden says extra loudly, even as he’s tugging me toward the stairs.
Marisa looks at me and mouths, Sorry, and I shrug and grin back at her and mouth back, Totally fine. Then out loud, I say, “See you in five minutes.”
Jaden’s room has typical little-boy decor. Race cars and dinosaurs and spaceships. His bed is twin size, covered neatly with a navy blue bedspread and red pillows with steering wheels and tires printed on them. In the corner is an enormous beanbag chair with a shelf of books next to it.
“Is this your reading nook?” I ask him.
He scoffs in a way only little kids do when they think adults are being dorks. “It’s not a nook,” he informs me. “It’s a beanbag chair.”
“Oh,” I say, rather than correct him. “What books do you have?”
Jaden begins pulling books off his shelf to tell me a little about a few of them, but then he gets bored and turns to the racetrack set up on the floor. He hands me a bright yellow car. An older model VW Bug. “Here, you can be this guy. I will be this.”
“Wait a minute,” I say and give him a look. “You get to be the coolest, purplest, biggest tires, most awesomest car there is, and I get to be”—I hold up my car—“this jalopy?”
Apparently, jalopy is the funniest word Jaden has ever heard because he cracks up so hard, he falls over on the floor and just lies there laughing and repeating, “Jalopy,” over and over. By the time Marisa comes up to get us, we’re both lost in a fit of giggles.
“Clearly, I’m missing all the fun,” she says, looking from one of us to the other and back again, amusement apparent on her face.
“Scottie said jalopy,” Jaden says, enunciating the word slowly and carefully, pointing at me as he does, and then he’s lost again.
I look at Marisa and shrug. “What can I say? I’m hilarious.”
“Sure seems like it.” She shakes her head. “All right, you two clowns. Dinner’s ready. Let’s go.”
Fifteen minutes later, Jaden is parked in the living room in front of the TV with his chicken nuggets and Tater Tots, watching a cartoon I don’t recognize. Meanwhile, Marisa has set her small dining room table for two, complete with linen napkins and a bouquet of fresh flowers. The wine is poured, and our meals are plated, and it’s all gorgeous.
“I can’t remember the last time somebody besides my grandmother made me dinner,” I tell her as I sit. “This looks amazing. Thank you so much.”
“It’s nice to cook for somebody who eats more than chicken nuggets and pizza.” She pulls out her chair and sits as I lift my glass.
“To new friendships, dance competitions, and whatever life is planning for us.” Is that too much? Is the word friendship too generic? Is the assumption of a future too, well, presumptuous?
I must look panicked or confused or both because Marisa smiles softly and says, “I’ll drink to that.” The relief that surges through me as she touches her glass to mine is almost embarrassing.
