Chapter 8
EIGHT
The seven-inch heels had been a choice. They pinched every inch and nerve in my feet, and I walked like a newborn giraffe, but this was the price I was willing to pay—especially when I saw the scandalized giddiness on Yazmine’s and Katie’s faces.
“Holy shit, Victoria.” Yazmine dramatically cooled herself with a delicate fan. “You took the alter ego theme seriously! A compassionate nurse by day, dominatrix ready to do harm with her stethoscope by night.”
“I thought dressing in your alter ego was the point,” I said.
“The point is to be sexy—which you are!” Katie exclaimed. She was a sexified version of one of her favorite anime characters, the slits of her skirt traveling to dangerous heights.
“Which we all are,” Yazmine added. She was dressed like a courtesan. Her skirts brazenly fanned out around her legs, taking up several bar seats in her orbit. With each breath, her cleavage crested over her bodice like rising dough.
Katie clapped. “This is so fun. I’ve cosplayed for anime conventions but never like this. It’s very . . . titillating.” She shimmied her small breasts.
“Damn right,” Yazmine agreed. “We get to celebrate our sexiness but without any creeps around trying to hit on us.” She turned her eyes to me. “Unless you want someone to hit on you, and if that’s the case we can take these looks to the streets.”
I barked a laugh. “That’s the last thing I want.” Unless they could help get me off. Nah. I didn’t want to expose my body to some stranger. I also didn’t want something that took effort or time away from my friends.
Thumping bass from the music playing inside the ballroom rattled the wine glasses hanging from the bar.
My body moved on instinct. I’d always loved dancing.
It hadn’t been Alanzo’s thing, and I didn’t have a ton of friends that lived near me to go out clubbing with.
Besides, once I became a mom, I sort of lost the energy to try.
But right now, I had all the energy in the world.
“Let’s go,” I said. “Before these heels kill me.”
Giggling, we swept into the pulsing ballroom. Colorful spotlights pirouetted on the decorated walls and fell over the dancing guests. The room was packed with attendees and authors dressed as their alter egos. Actors done up to look like famous book characters roamed about taking photos.
“This is amazing!” Katie shouted over the blaring beats coming from the DJ booth.
It was. I’d never felt so at home among strangers in my life. These were my people. Our people. Books were powerful in that way. The stories they wove into our hearts changed us. Made us better. They gave us community.
“I’ll get us drinks!” Yazmine bellowed, pointing at the small bar. “Meet you on the dance floor!”
Katie and I bopped to reggaeton as we made our way toward the front of the room.
My hips swayed. My body rolled. For the last twenty-four years, I’d only danced while cleaning the house or stiffly at receptions.
I’d been too self-conscious to move the way I really wanted to with my kids sitting at the kitchen table doing homework or my husband’s business partners milling around the wedding cakes.
Or Alanzo judging from afar.
But the people dancing right now were unleashing their inhibitions.
A mermaid gyrated and writhed around us.
Twin aliens were practically having a threesome on the dance floor with a vampire.
I wanted that. Not the threesome, I don’t think.
I wanted to move and not care what others thought.
I knew these people wouldn’t care. But I also wanted to dance whether they did or not.
So I did.
I shook my tits. I dropped it low, ignoring my popping knees.
I twerked as if my ass cheeks jiggling had the power to save my life.
I suppose this sort of dancing, this sort of openness, was saving me.
It was loosening the gauze I’d cinched around my heart to stop it from being too free.
It kept me from laughing too hard or dancing too sexy or doing anything that I thought a mother and wife shouldn’t be.
With each twirl. Each twerk. I was stripping away every lie Alanzo made me believe about myself. I deserved to feel sexy. I deserved to take up space.
Before I knew it, a circle had formed around me and Katie. Costumed attendees were cheering and whistling and shouting for us to get lower. Yazmine, who stood among the circle, balancing three drinks in her hands, was cheering hardest and loudest of them all.
The joy flooding my veins was so pure, so visceral, I almost cried. But I didn’t want those tears to turn into something deeper. I didn’t want them to remind me of the tears I once shed that tasted of despair.
“Get over here!” I shouted to Yazmine. Without a second of hesitation, she grooved to meet us in the center of the dance circle.
She handed me a whisky sour, my favorite.
Of course, she knew that. My friends knew what I liked.
They knew me. They loved me for who I was and never once made me feel guilty about it.
If anything, they wanted me to be more open with expressing myself.
Now I was.
At that very moment, I was expressing the hell out of my ass. And, holy fuck, did it feel good. More people joined in, until we were all writhing to the rhythm of our own liberation.