22

It had been four months since they danced at the Biltmore, or anywhere, for that matter, and to Spencer, it felt like a missing piece that they intuitively knew was essential from the start, but strangely, neither had taken the initiative or even mentioned it. Oh, shit! I’m supposed to lead, am I? Spencer was envious of couples who knew actual dance steps, it showed intimate alignment.

He texted and asked if she was interested in taking a Lindy Hop class.

Her: Yes!

She said her friend from Nova Scotia had been urging her to give it a try for some time and had suggested East Coast Swing because it was beginner friendly.

Him: I’ll look into it … Beginner friendly is a must… Before we take over the swing scene 😎

Her: Haha. 🕺🏻 💃🏾 Thanks!

On Saturday, they went to a movie at the Cinematheque and afterwards walked east. The last strips of sun rimmed the vibrant, thick hair of twenty and thirty-somethings, slid down their bare arms and flashed into their happy faces. They wore new money fashions across their supple bodies, laughed loudly over straight teeth, held expensive menus on decorous patios, and sipped glittering cocktails to make their raging desire slippery with possibility.

He and Eva were unseen and irrelevant as they passed, no longer players. He tried to walk upright like a fine wine, but it made no difference. They passed a low office building he knew well when he was that twenty-something age. His girlfriend at the time and her fine-art student friends had been given the basement to use as their studio. It was just an open concrete space that she and her friends filled with easels, canvases, a couple of old couches, and rickety chairs. It was well-used, and soon paint was splattered everywhere. He would meet her there, and sometimes she was the last one working. He’d sit on the couch reading while she painted, but she wouldn’t last long, getting horny, seeing him there reading, pretending to ignore her, pretty soon she was riding him like the world was going to end.

They passed an alley with strings of tiny festive lights strung across it, warming the ruddy-red bricks. Good lighting always caught his eye, and there was nothing so beautiful as a human face with light softening its contours.

“Can I take a picture of you?”

She smiled, flattered, but pretended modesty, and was herself drawn to the beauty of the distressed alley. “Okay.”

“Over here,” he said, surveying where the light was falling and turned her slightly to catch the light. She had a moment of self-consciousness and looked down at her shoes, so he prompted her with a purposely odd question. “What are you doing, having fun?”

She looked up at the lights and exhaled, nearly laughing, her eyes bright underneath her sexy bush of curls. Click, click, he captured it. They continued east, the culture of the young rushed by them like a river in the opposite direction, eager for the night.

Away from the core, he noticed a pinball machine in the front window of a tiny, rustic bar that seemed a bit out of place. “Pinball!” He loved the cascade of blinking lights and triumphant sounds of points racking up quickly into the millions. “Do you like pinball?”

“I love pinball!” she said without reservation.

“Wanna play?”

“Yeah!”

His heart pumped and fluttered as they glided into the bar, dimly lit with an odd yet calming assortment of mismatched, weathered furniture. The only others were three twenty-somethings getting a pre-club drink. A skinny brunette bartender with heavy eye shadow was half happy to see them.

They sat down at the bar and soon sipped beer and cider. Eva ordered fries, which felt reckless, but he told himself it was absurd to think so.

She took the first turn on the pinball machine. Spencer had fun making her laugh by ribbing or praising her every move. “Oh! Nice, Yes! Woo! Oh, fuck what are you doing? No! No! Try again, you got this! Yes! Yes!”

“We should see what’s going on at Rev,” he said.

“Rev?”

“Yeah, near your place. They have dancing there.”

“Sure, we can.”

They continued toward her place and stopped to rest on a bench in a parkette. Like them, other older people were plopped on benches, lazily chatting to partners.

“What’s new with your play these days?”

She seemed anxious to talk about it, as if he’d finally got round to asking.

“I had a fairly big realization, maybe that’s the wrong way of putting it. I know I’ve been working toward something, trying to figure it out.”

“Yes?”

“Candy is actually dead.”

“Metaphorically.”

“Of course.”

“Wait. Is Candy, Sandy, your sister?”

“No, Sandy is Miranda, sort of.”

“You’re Candy.”

“Kind of.”

“Of course, of course.”

“Both of them are dead. That’s what the prison is.”

“The underworld.”

“Yes! I didn’t know what it was before. I just needed them to be forced in a confined space, but it’s actually hell.”

“And Candy is like Orpheus, trying to save Miranda?”

“No, no, not telling that story. It’s about – and this is what I’m figuring out – it’s about reconciling who they used to be before they came there.”

“Before they died.”

“Yes. Candy wants to find the old Miranda, but Miranda won’t have it – she doesn’t see the point of talking about who she used to be.”
“Fascinating…like…how is the past relevant? Is that what you mean?”

She pondered that. “There’s something in that, yes. The last times I saw Sandy I didn’t know her, she wasn’t anybody I had gotten to know growing up and she was so angry. She may as well been a stranger, but she was still my sister and I didn’t know what to do.”

“What could you do?”

“I really wanted to help her. She was my big, wonderful sister. I needed her back.”

“Even if something is gone, you still have love for it.”

“No, you don’t. You have pain.”

“But that will fade, won’t it? And the love is still there underneath?”

She sighed, which felt like frustration.

He squinted upward and could see faint stars and did something he never normally did: He made a big wish that Eva would be okay. That she would heal, be at peace and be happy. She had been through enough, she deserved better.

“Does Candy die in a plane crash?”

“No.” Her tone indicated that it was too literal.

“Candy died when Miranda was sent away – not literally, but her spirit. That’s part of what I want to express – the deaths along the journey.”

“So…actually, Candy dies before Miranda physically dies.”

“Yes exactly.” “So when Sandy left your home…you…”

“Yeah.”

Beyond the parkette, they walked along a quiet residential block to Broadway, raw in some places where he’d not noticed before, sparse locals whiling away their evening on patios. Soon they were standing outside the Rev bar.

“Here we are,” he said, despite feeling quite exhausted and knowing she felt the same. Rev had become popular of late, a dressed-down place to have a drink and dance to 80s music. It was hopping inside. “What do you think?” he asked. Eva looked dubious but liked the idea. “Let’s see,” he said. She followed him inside. It was the usual bar setup, a few dark wood tables at the front followed by a cramped bar with a dozen stools, dimly lit with beguiling reds and yellows, every seat taken by casual locals. Down the passage in the back, New Order’s “Blue Monday” gyrated through a mob of bodies. The woman at the podium, her hair piled as high as her V-line cut low, told Spencer it was $15 per person. He turned and let Eva know. She shrugged, but he could see she didn’t want to be the party pooper. “Let’s do it another night,” he said.

She nodded. He followed her out. “It looks fun, a bit tired, we walked a lot,” she said.

“For sure, but we’ll do it,” he assured.
It was near midnight when they reached her place. She invited him to stay, which was surprising for they were exhausted, but soon he was down on her, her hips bucking, caught in the current, “Oh!” she cried, her breath rapid and desperate for rescue, “Ah-oh! Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah-oooooooh!”

The next day, she texted him a picture of her long, sexy swimmer legs from the bathtub, stretching forever, and his eyes slid up and down them.

Her: Thinking of you. Thank you for last night, it was amazing. Thanks for your patience and being not just friends. Nice all round. 😀

Him: Oh gawd you are welcome. You are incredible. I am appreciating how wonderful my life is.