Does Eitan feel it too?
“I like seeing you relaxed,” he says, his hand skating over my ribs.
“It’s hard for me,” I manage to get out. “I’m not good at relaxing.”
“I think your mind is always dwelling on the past or the future.” Eitan’s lips press into a smile. “You just have to stay in the moment.”
“Easier said than done,” I counter. But Iamcaught in the moment. My skin is a live wire of sensations. I’ve been touched before, sure. Kissed. Clumsy presses of lips that taste like gin on a chilly street, the moon hidden behind the perpetual clouds of early spring. One date even tried to take it further. A hand snaking up the front of my body to find my chest beneath a thick sweater.
The sensation felt like being caught in a crustacean’s pincers.
But Eitan’s touch feels like everything.
He leans toward me. I’m sure of it. Maybe he’s being pulled by the same current. His eyelids are heavy, like they want to drift closed. His head tilts down, slowly, like he’s close to letting his lips fall on mine.
In the final lines of the song, Stevie tries to warn me about players. The song slows. The instruments peter out, like the last drops of water escaping a faucet. The speakers go quiet, and with them, the spell that was cast on Eitan and I.
“Eh?” Saul asks, reminding me that he’s been here the whole time. “What did you think?”
“That was—” Eitan scratches the back of his neck, facing Saul. Avoiding my eyes.
My gut twists.Stupid, stupid, stupid,I berate myself. He said it himself:I’m not really a relationship guy. This is pathetic. We’re here to pick out a first dance songforsomeone else, andI’m getting lost in delusions of grandeur. We’re friends. Eitan is here to do his duty as best man, and I need to focus on the same.
Boundaries. That’s what I need. All relationships have boundaries. And apparently, mine include music and touching.
“Romantic,” Eitan settles on, sounding like he could be talking about a standardized test. “Yeah. Could definitely see that being the song. What did you think, Ruby?”
My exhale gets caught in my throat, and I spew a garble of syllables before I’m able to turn them into words. “It was—yeah. Good.”
“Have we found The One?” Saul holds his fists up in the DJ booth.
His words catch up with me, and I blanch. We better not have.
I can’t leaveSaul’s studio fast enough. I haven’t been able to stop sweating since “Dreams,” and I’m probably beet red. I plan to, first of all, forget that this ever happened, and second, climb inside my refrigerator.
Saul insisted we take merch with us, so I have on Mardi Gras beads and a pair of shutter shades. I look and feel ridiculous, standing beside Eitan’s Subaru, waiting for him to dig the key out of his pocket.
“Should I just make camp here?” I ask, impatient.
“What’s the rush?” Eitan finally finds his key and the car beeps. “Got a hot date?”
I squint at him. “Maybe I do.”
His lips purse. “I’m glad to hear that,” he says slowly. Diplomatically. “Good thing it’s not tomorrow.”
I climb into the car and turn on the AC, sticking my face directly on top of it. His last comment catches up to me. “Why is it a good thing it’s not tomorrow?”
“Because we have the movie?” Eitan says, reversing out of the parking lot.
“What movie?”
“Uh…The advanced screening of Blinklebob 3? With Calliope and Steve?” He says this like I’ve missed a glaring sign five feet in front of my face.
I sit back from the vent, temporarily cooled. “I don’t remember seeing anything about that.”
“There’s been a whole group chat about it.” Eitan hands me his phone, instructing me to open his messages and find a four person group chat. I swallow the small thrill at knowing he trusts me enough to have his phone passcode and go to the chat’s information. There’s a number in it that’s one digit off from mine.
“This is not my number.” I point at it.
