“Where did you learn to dance like this?” I ask, breathless.
“My grandpa,” she says, grinning. “He thought the jitterbug was a life skill.”
She spins out, I catch her hand, and we laugh like we’ve done this a hundred times before.
Then the tempo shifts. Slows.
A softer melody takes over. A crooner’s voice glides across the room like velvet, and couples melt into each other. I should take a break. Let her go. Thank her for the dance.
But I don’t.
Instead, I take her hand again. And with nothing but a look, I ask the question.
Her smile is the only answer I need.
And when she steps in close —closer than before—I’m breathing in honeydew and fresh rain. Like spring, waking up. Like a clean slate I didn’t know I needed.
In this moment, all I know with perfect clarity is that I want her even closer still.
When the band takes a break, we do too.
The sudden quiet feels louder than the music.
“I’ll grab us drinks,” I offer.
She hesitates, then smiles. “I think I need to switch to ginger ale. Early flight.”
I nod, but the words hit harder than they should—like a door starting to close just as I’m reaching for the handle.
I’ve barely scratched the surface.
I return with two ginger ales and spot two open stools at the bar. Neither of us glances toward the big round tables where the real schmoozing is happening. We take our seats at the edge of the room like it’s just the two of us.
She tells me about her planned trip to Europe this fall. France. A long-deferred dream. She plans to use the summer to get the grant initiative off the ground, build the team, put the systems in place, and then go.
“When I graduated from college, I had a one-way ticket and a map of bookshops I wanted to visit,” she says, a little smile pulling at the corner of her mouth. “But the day before my flight, my mom got her diagnosis. Stage four cancer.”
“That’s rough.” I say, “How is she doing?”
“She’s been gone for just over a year now.” She says it plainly, not fishing for sympathy—just being authentic..
“I stayed. I took a job at the local library, thinking I’d be there just until things stabilized.” She lifts her glass. “Four years later…”
My throat tightens. Not just from her story. From her.
She is beautiful—yes, but it’s more than that.
She’s funny. Honest. Self-deprecating in a way that feels real, not rehearsed. With flushed cheeks, bare shoulders, and a loose curl slipping free from her updo, she looks like she stepped out of a story I forgot I’d been waiting to read. There’s a dimple in her left cheek that only appears when she really smiles.
And she’s completely unaware of what she’s doing to me. Like just by looking at me, she sees a person, not a dollar sign.
“Actually, I’m headed to France too,” I say. “Biking -The Haute Route Alps. Seven days. Four hundred miles.”
Her eyes widen.
“You race?”
“More like I try not to embarrass myself. But yeah. It’s brutal. And addictive.”
