“Ouch.” She wasn’t wrong. What she didn’t know was how much I’d improved in the past few years. Or maybe she did know if she’d watched me at all at the dance the other night. I’d tried not to watch her. Even with a few stolen glances it was pretty obvious Grace still loved music, and she loved to dance.
But that wasn’t the only reason I’d brought up country dancing or this particular memory. Back then, I was just the annoying friend of her younger brother. I was a placeholder in every sense of the word. There had been a guy at the bar that night she’d had her eye on. Someone much better at dancing than me. Grace had taken me out on the dance floor, hoping he’d see she was open to being asked to dance. And it worked. She came back after dancing with him and gave me a stealthy high five. And then we got kicked out. Thanks to Isaac.
“What do you say, partner?” I straightened from the counter and walked over to her, putting my hand out. This was for old times’ sake. Tonight, I would once again be a non-threatening stand-in for whoever she wished she was dancing with instead of me. “How good is that sound machine in Piper’s room?”
“She sleeps like the dead. But even if she woke up, she’d just join us.” Grace’s lips twisted for a moment before she reached out and let me pull her to her feet.
I released her immediately, channeling my inner chill. I would pretend Grace was just like every other woman I’d ever asked to dance. I’d picture that nice old lady I’d danced with at Isaac and Carmen’s wedding reception. The one who wanted to set me up with a girl from her matchmaking book. I’d turn on my platonic charm and not think about having Grace close to me, or the steady blue of her eyes on mine right now, or even that strand of hair that kept falling across her face, gracing the curve of her cheek. As if aware of my attention on it, she swept it back and tucked it behind her ear.
“Do you want me to pick a song?” I asked.
“Nah, I got this.” Grace pulled out her phone and started scrolling through song lists. “You still allergic to nineties country?”
“I love it. I listen to it all the time. Old country songs are my favorite.”
“Liar.”
From her phone came the opening notes of “I’m From the Country,” by Tracy Byrd. Super honky-tonk twangy. Not romantic at all. Perfect. She grabbed a little speaker from out of a cupboard and paired it with her phone, starting the song over before taking my outstretched hands. “I don’t know if we have room for this.”
I let her go and jogged away to tuck in a couple of kitchen chairs, being careful not to let them loudly scrape across the tile, before coming back to her. “We’ll get creative.”
It took me a minute to get my bearings. I hadn’t done this in a while. I’d had one girlfriend a few years ago who loved country swing and wanted to go out dancing a lot. I’d learned to lead with confidence and not step so far away that I’d have to yank on her arms to bring her back to me.
I kept us in the same star pattern for several turns, lifting our joined hands and crossing the space, occasionally giving Grace a more complicated twirl where she had to run her hand lightly across my back before coming around to the front of me. We were both laughing at the ridiculousness of doing this together after all these years, and I did my best to avoid prolonged eye contact with her. Grace was on the edge of having fun, but she wasn’t quite there yet. I wasn’t either. My fear of messing up or making too much of this wouldn’t let me.
The next song was “Watermelon Crawl” and I felt her loosen up as we got used to each other. Her hips swayed a little more. Her sassy face came out, and so did her full smile. It took me by surprise, it was so bright. I’d be scheming ways to make her smile like that all the time from now on. Grumpy Grace was fiercely beautiful. Happy Grace? Oh, man, I was done for.
“Ready to really move?” I asked.
“What?”
She squealed as I pulled her to me and tucked my arm around her back, launching us out of the kitchen in a waltz of sorts. We’d get no points for technique, but she followed my lead, laughing as we leapt over an ottoman in the living room and kept going. The layout of her house was circular, with one arched doorway leading into the kitchen, and one arched doorway leading back out. We made the rounds a couple times and then Grace tugged on my hand, bringing us to a halt.
“Okay, try this,” she said, taking a step back from me and adjusting our hands. “In, out, in, out, side, side, cross, kick, cross, kick.” She led me through steps which I epically butchered, but she nodded at the end like I’d mastered it. “Good. Let’s do it again. Just don’t kick my shins this time.”
“Did I really kick you?” I was mortified.
She swung into me so her back was against my chest and glanced over her shoulder. “It was more like a nudge of your toe. Ready?”
“I guess I’ll have to be.”
My second attempt was worse, and her laughing didn’t help. I made her show me again slower. Shania Twain’s “Any Man of Mine” came on, and we sang along while we tried a third time at what was basically a line dance mixed with a partner pretzel twist of hands and arms. “I think you made this up to torture me, Grace.”
“Someone made it up. Not me. That was better.”
“Define ‘better.’”
“Your kicks were in the right direction, and you didn’t step on my feet.” She made me do it again, and I should have hated every second of it, but I didn’t hate being barely good enough at something she was great at. An accomplishment was only an accomplishment if not everyone could do it.
A George Strait classic ballad came on, and I took us back to a regular dance position, with my hand lightly on the small of her back, her hand on my shoulder, and our other handsclasped together at our sides. We stepped back in the beginning of a box step, moving fluidly without having to plan it out.
“When did you learn to dance?” she asked, letting her forehead rest on my shoulder. Her breath was warm on my skin through the thin material of my shirt. I could live in this moment forever, but I was trying not to.Stand-in. Stand-in. Stand-in.I let the words echo in my mind.Placeholder.Placeholder.Grace didn’t want me, but she wanted this. This moment. This night. And I could give it to her.
“I’m definitely better at dancing like this than I am at that other thing you tried to teach me.” I ran my thumb down the line of her spine and immediately checked myself, putting my hand back into position and willing it not to touch her in anything but a platonic way. I’d done it unconsciously, but while she didn’t seem to have any reaction to it, I knew I couldn’t do it again.
“That’s because you’re better when you lead. Don’t let this go to your head, but you have skills most guys don’t.”
“I have skills,” I mused. “I’ll be quoting you on that forever.”
