16. One step, two step, red step, blue step
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
one step, two step, red step, blue step
By Friday, Forrest has started peeling and has the most defined tan lines around his wrists, where his shorts ended, and where his socks began that I’ve ever seen, but with a bottle of moisturizer in tow, he’s feeling well enough to go out for his inaugural In-N-Out burger for lunch.
After taking one bite of his animal style fries, he says he can feel the healing speed up.
After Forrest’s request at the gardens to see my real life in Arizona, I’d reached out to my closest friends to see if they had time to go out before Thanksgiving.
I missed them desperately, and I was eager to show Forrest what was most important to me out here.
The stars aligned, and they all had this evening after work free.
While I could have eased Forrest into my Arizona group with something low stress like a meal, I opted instead to throw him to the wolves. He said he wanted to see my life, so I organized a night out doing one of my favorite hobbies for letting loose when I was in college.
Line dancing.
My love of dancing together with Forrest’s comical apprehension about the chosen activity for our outing are doing a stellar job at keeping my nerves at bay.
Thankfully, he’s a good sport, agreeing to give dancing a try, and his self-depreciating humor about what he expects his talent level to be keeps me laughing.
I’m impressed he’s so willing to go along with my shenanigans.
If I stop and think too long, I run the risk of realizing my worlds are colliding in a big way.
The beer I’m sipping doesn’t hurt either. Forrest said that since I’ve been chauffeuring him around so far, he’d drive tonight, so I’m good to go.
Most of the enormous rectangle room we’re in is lit by bright neon signs dotting the walls, but the large dance floor is flooded with yellow spotlights.
Designed to look like a rodeo, I’ve even seen this room host its fair share of mechanical bull nights.
But tonight, the polished wooden floor is packed with dancers instead.
Everywhere I look, I see blue jeans, big belt buckles, and boots.
About once an hour, an instructor takes us through a few dances, teaching the steps before filling the in-between with other line dancing songs.
For something like this, the group is always heavily filled with regulars who know all the dances, and who are usually more than happy to help newcomers pick up the footwork.
It’s such a good community that even watching and listening can be a blast.
Since it’s the focal point of the room, the dance floor is surrounded by a high-top counter, broken only to allow people to enter and exit the floor.
The rest of the room is filled with old metal diner tables, uncomfortable vinyl chairs, and three long bars along the walls.
This place is dark and dated. It still smells a little like cigars even though smoking indoors has been illegal for almost twenty years.
And I love it here.
“I’ll be right back!” I promise the group as I scurry off the floor and head to one of the bars, dropping off my empty bottle and ordering another Mexican beer and a water.
Everything has been going really well so far.
As I expected, Forrest and my other friends got along instantly, with all of us surrounding Forrest so he’d have somebody to watch no matter which wall the dance faced and—more importantly—to keep him from slipping off the dance floor should he decide to make a break for it.
After a couple of songs, it’s clear the second reason is unnecessary. While he still sometimes struggles to keep up, Forrest seems happy to at least try every single dance. We’ve been drinking and laughing and tripping over each other all night. It’s been perfect. Better than I could have hoped.
I chug my water and take my beer to the bar top around the floor, setting it down while I catch my breath and look out at the dancers.
Somebody slides up next to me, leaning against the ledge too. She doesn’t need to speak for me to know it’s Melina. When you are as close as Melina and I were, I think your body is attuned to theirs forever. Like Forrest’s and mine are too.
Melina got the distinct displeasure of being my randomly-assigned dorm mate when I first got here.
I was a fucking disaster for at least the first month of school—a nervous, naive mess prone to bursting into tears without warning—and not much better for the couple of months after that, but somehow, she didn’t run for the hills.
The woman has the patience of a saint. I think that’s part of why I fell in love with her.
After we lived together for that whole sophomore year, while I healed and grew and found my place in Phoenix, Melina and I dated for almost two years.
We knew it was temporary because I always planned to move back East after a few years while Melina’s future was here, but what we had was still precious while it lasted.
She taught me how to be still in a way I’d never known before. When I was with her, she reminded me to slow down and see beauty around me, even—especially—on the bad days. She also grounded me and called me on my shit like nobody else had before.
I like to think I helped her be a little more selfish.
As the oldest sibling of three with lots of cousins, Melina was always taking care of those around her, something she thrives at.
She pulled me out of my rut with that kindness too.
But she readily sacrificed what she wanted for the comfort of others, and she didn’t even realize she was doing it.
I wanted to make sure she had the same joy for herself that she made happen for everybody else.
When we broke up, it was very much a be happy it happened, not sad it ended kind of situation, and I’m grateful I didn’t lose her friendship after.
“I’ve missed you, carino. I’m glad you came back,” she says, using my old nickname, something that stuck even after our relationship ended. It’s still loving, just in a new, platonic way.
“I’ve missed you too,” I say, comforted by how easy it is to fall back together like no time has passed. “I should have come sooner.”
I see her curls bounce out of the corner of my eye when she nods.
“He’s exactly like you described him,” she says, lifting her chin and jerking her head toward the dance floor.
By the edge of the ring so they don’t cause any collisions, Melina’s brother Cristian and our other friend Ava are both still shouting footwork at Forrest as he tries to keep up with the crowd of cowboy-hat-clad people.
It’s not going very well at all, but all three are red-faced from laughing so hard.
“He’s a good man.” I sigh and take a long drink from my bottle.
“I’m still surprised he’s here with you, after everything.” Melina is the only person who knows why I came to Arizona the first time.
I wanted a fresh start here, so as far as everybody else knows, it was just a simple school transfer for a great writing program.
With how close Melina and I were, I was safe to tell her my fears and my mistakes.
How poorly I handled leaving Forrest, and how guilty I felt about it after the fact.
I didn’t realize how badly I needed to tell someone until I told her.
“Important things survive.” I look over at her, finding rich mahogany eyes staring into mine. “You and I did.”
“We did.” She smiles brightly and pushes her long, dark curls over her shoulder. Her expression becomes serious again. “So, you’re ok? You talked things out? Told him how you were feeling?”
I know my face gives me away from the way Melina narrows her eyes at me.
“Camilla…” The accusation in her voice is clear. “You did talk, right?”
“I—” I have nothing good to say.
“You know you have to—”
“If we’re just friends, do I though? Can’t I just let us be happy?
” I look down at my now empty bottle and start peeling strips of the label off.
I know I should talk to Forrest, just to close that door and clear the air.
But is it wrong of me to just want to move forward?
“I don’t want to fight with him about it. ”
“You are stronger than this. You don’t need to be afraid,” she says softly. “He’d be a fucking fool to let you go again.”
“But what if he does? What if bringing it all back up again breaks us for good this time?” I ask, voicing one of my deepest fears to the person who has proven she will hold my secrets safe.
“No man who looks at you like that is going to let anything take you away again,” she says with a knowing smirk.
“Like what?” I ask, looking between her and the dance floor, where I see Forrest’s eyes dart back to Cristian. I can’t tell what Melina thinks she saw. “It’s nothing. We’re just friends. He’s spoken for.”
“Someday you’ll see it,” Melina says with a shake of her head.
She taps the neck of her bottle against mine before stepping around me and onto the dance floor, the overhead lights making her bronze skin glow.
Cristian and Ava look to Melina when she shouts that she’ll show them how it’s done, but Forrest’s eyes slide to mine. I give him a little wave, and he jogs over to me.
“You can’t bring me line dancing and then just watch from the sidelines,” he says once he reaches me, a brilliant smile bringing out the often-hidden dimple on his cheek.
I scrutinize his face, trying to figure out the look Melina was talking about. Is this it? This is just happy Forrest. His hair is curling more than usual from sweat, and he’s still flushed from a mix of his sunburn and the heat in here, but he looks so alive, free.
“What?” Forrest asks as he takes off his glasses to wipe sweat from his face with one of the little cocktail napkins on the counter before me. I try to figure him out like one of those optical illusions that pops out toward you when you cross your eyes.
“Nothing,” I say, shaking my head. “I was just taking a break. Let’s go.”
I turn and immediately crash into somebody.
“Sorry,” I say, getting my footing and hopping back from the tall man in a cowboy hat.
“No, I’m sorry. My fault,” he says, before he looks me down and back up and smiles a Cheshire cat smile that makes my skin crawl. He smells like old beer and sweat. “Can I buy you a drink to apologize?”
I’m about to decline when a strong voice comes from my side.
“No,” Forrest says clearly, drawing both mine and the cowboy’s attention. It must be a trick of the light, but his eyes look like an inferno.
Cowboy looks between me and Forrest before taking a step back, hands held in front of him, palms out in surrender.
“Ope,” he chuckles, but Forrest doesn’t smile back. “Alright, alright. Sorry then.” Then he actually tips his hat at us and walks away, stumbling a little to one side as he goes.
When I look back at Forrest, his expression has softened, but the hand he barely touches to my lower back when we walk back to our group shakes a little.