He takes it up the stairs just as the chorus kicks in. Nora picks up a wooden spoon from a box labeled ‘kitchen’ and pretends it’s a microphone.
I find my hairbrush in a box and use that as my microphone. We dance around the living room, dodging boxes and singing at thetop of our voices, until I trip over a cardboard box and we end up in a pile on the floor giggling.
“What are you two doing?” Dana leans against the door frame, shaking her head, but there’s a smile on her face.
“We’re dancing,” Nora explains, pointing the wooden spoon at Dana. “And it’s your turn.”
“I don’t dance.” Dana folds her arms across her chest.
“Let’s do the routine!”
Nora claps her hands together, ignoring her sister’s protests. She shoves the wooden spoon between Dana’s folded arms and grabs herself a spatula from the box.
“You have a dance routine?”
“No,” Dana says at the same time Nora says, “Yes.”
They glare at each other, and Nora puts her hands together in a begging motion, turning big round eyes on her sister.
I glance between them, wondering who’s going to win the standoff. In the six months of getting to know Joel and the girls, I’m not surprised when Dana gives in to her little sister.
“Fine.” She takes the wooden spoon in her hands. “I probably don’t even remember it.”
But she’s smiling as she shoves boxes out of the way to clear space in the living room.
Nora finds a song on her playlist, and I perch on the edge of the couch to watch them.
The music starts, and the girls freeze in their starting positions. As the beat kicks in, they move in sync, sliding to the side, then spinning around each other. Dana drops low while Nora goes high, then they switch around.
By the time the song finishes, they’re both laughing, and Dana looks more like a carefree girl than the young woman who graduated high school a few weeks ago.
I clap and cheer, and Nora runs forward to grab me by the hand. Her small hand is warm in mine as she pulls me off the couch.
“You’ve got to learn it too.”
She shows me the first few steps, and I try them out, sliding to the left and then to the right. There’s slow clapping from Joel, and I glance up to find him smiling from the doorway.
“How’s the unpacking going?” He looks pointedly at the stack of boxes pushed to the side of the room, but he’s smiling.
“We’re getting there.”
He comes into the living room and slides an arm around my waist. “Let me know if you have any pictures you want to put up.”
In one of my boxes is the single framed photo I own of my dad in uniform and my mom and me. I rummage in a box until I find it. “This one.”
I follow Joel to the stairway, and he holds it up on the wall next to a photo of him and the girls. “Here…” He moves it to another space next to the girls when they were small. “Or here?”
I slide my hands around his waist. I’ve never stayed anywhere long enough to put a picture on the wall.
“There,” I say, pointing to the space next to him and the girls.
The entire wall is full of family photos and artwork from when the girls were young. It’s messy and overcrowded and perfect.
Joel leans the picture on the floor against the wall. “I’ll get my toolbox.”
He slides his arms around my waist and kisses the top of my forehead. “You’ve got half the wardrobe and a chest of drawers in the bedroom, but if you need more space, I’ll find more.”
I shake my head. “I don’t own much. That will be fine.”
