Chapter 30
Chapter Thirty
My thesis novel is due today. And it’s actually finished.
Or at least as finished as it’s going to be.
With one click of a button, I’ll send it to my MFA committee.
In one week, I’ll stand before them as they ask questions and pick it apart.
I’ll defend my choices and make a case for my book. Then, all this will be over.
I just have to press the button and send it.
I wish I could read it through one more time. I’m not happy with how it is, but there isn’t time to change it. It’s done. It needs to be done. But I can’t seem to bring myself to push the send button.
I pick up my phone and text Kiara to see if she’s turned in her book yet. She doesn’t respond. She’s probably already off relaxing somewhere. I text Cosmos. Taking Mom’s words to heart after the disastrous family dinner. I’ve decided to howl and see if I find my pack. He doesn’t respond either.
I’m a little surprised, because I know he’s off today. We made plans to celebrate tonight. Although, if I never work up the courage to hit send, we won’t have anything to celebrate.
I don’t know why I’m stalling. Dr. Paatel has already read the full manuscript.
I’ve shared it in workshops with my peers.
But this is different. I don’t know the other professors on my committee well.
They’re all published authors, some with notable awards and merits in the literary world.
And the critique I’ve gotten in workshops lately hasn’t exactly been glowing.
I glance at the clock. There’s plenty of time. I’ll send it later.
Mom is coughing in the other room, so I make her some tea and curl up next to her to watch The Importance of Being Earnest. She complains about her back feeling stiff from all this lying around, so I give her a massage while we watch.
We say most of the lines along with the actors.
When it’s over, we start 10 Things I Hate About You.
I’m so distracted I don’t notice the room growing dark until there’s a knock at the door.
It’s already seven. Shit. It must be Cosmos.
“Can you let him in?” I ask Mom, scrambling out from under the blanket we were cuddling under. “I’ll just be a minute.”
I dash into my room, throw on a dress, pull my hair up into a bun, and look in the mirror. I should have put more effort into getting ready. But I can’t do anything about it now.
Before I can second-guess myself for the twelve hundredth time, I send my thesis off to the committee, grab a pair of heels, and go rescue Cosmos. Hopefully, Mom hasn’t embarrassed me too much.
When I come back out to the living room, they’re laughing. That’s good. But Mom’s still coughing a lot. I hope she’s not getting sick.
“That’s just the start of it,” Mom says. “She was so nervous she kept her hands like this through the whole solo, without even realizing she was doing it.” Mom cups her breasts to show him the weird way I stood during my fifth-grade choir recital.
“Mooooom!” I can’t believe she told him that story. “I was eleven! And it was soothing.” I grab my coat and forcefully shove my arms in the sleeves.
Cosmos opens the front door, still chuckling at Mom’s story. “It was great to see you again, Mrs. Berton.”
Light rain drizzles down on us as we step outside. Cosmos rests his hand on my elbow as if to steady me on the slick steps.
“Don’t be home too late.” Mom’s voice is casual and teasing, but I know she doesn’t sleep well when I’m out. We should try to be back before ten. I don’t want her staying up just for me.
Cosmos opens my car door, and I slip inside and buckle my belt. Mom stands on the front steps, just out of the rain, waving. She coughs, and the wave turns into an attempt to shield her mouth with her elbow. She looks pale. Maybe this was a bad idea. Maybe I shouldn’t leave her tonight.
Cosmos walks around the front of the car, and I try to calm my frayed nerves.
I’m not just worried about Mom. It’s also Cosmos.
And my thesis. And everything. I feel like there’s a volatile little girl inside of me, and if I’m not careful, she’s going to burst out and ruin the best thing in my life right now.
Cosmos starts up the car. “You okay?”
“Hmmmhmmm.” I bite the fleshy side of my thumb hard, trying to quell my nerves.
Cosmos fiddles with the radio and then gives up, apparently dissatisfied with every radio station he tries. We drive in silence for a couple of minutes, that vulnerable girl inside of me growing more anxious with every passing second.
“I’m sorry. I don’t think I’m going to be much fun tonight. We can do this another time if you want,” I say, unable to keep quiet anymore.
Cosmos glances at me, then back at the road. “You know you don’t have to be fun, right?”
“Yeah, right.” I don’t say it sarcastically, just deflated.
He takes my hand in his and squeezes. “I want to get to know you, Hazel. As you are, right now.” He lets go of my hand to flip on the blinker and turns onto University Way.
“So, where are we going?” If I have any hope of getting through this, I need to change the subject before I end up spilling my fragile insides all over Cosmos.
“You remember what I told you I wanted to be when I was little?”
“A superhero?”
“The other thing.”
I try to think back to the conversation weeks ago in the hospital garden, but I can’t come up with anything, so I shake my head.
His smile broadens. “Good. It’ll be a surprise.”
It turns out Cosmos’ surprise is a nondescript brick building on the south side of the university.
As soon as he opens the door, music pours out into the night.
We step into an open room with hardwood floors and dim lighting.
Small round tables are set up along the walls, leaving the center of the room open. A handful of couples fill the space.
One breaks from the crowd, spinning closer to us.
The woman wraps one leg around her partner, and I swear her other foot is completely off the ground as he twirls her by her waist directly into a dip.
It’s mesmerizing and sexy, and there’s no way I can move like that.
I’ve always wished I could dance, but I was born with two left feet and not enough body awareness to keep from running into things.
Cosmos takes off his coat, every move fluid and graceful. I’ve noticed how he moves before, but now it makes even more sense.
“Do you come here often?” I almost have to yell to be heard over the music.
He brushes his lips against my ear as he helps me out of my coat. “Not in years.”
Coming around in front of me, he tilts my chin up so I’m looking at him. The room goes blissfully quiet. The dancers behind Cosmos freeze in lovely, intricate shapes, bodies in varying degrees of connection.
“I know you’re not a fan of loud places—”
“How did you know?”
“The Book Bar.” He looks a little sheepish at having figured this out about me. “If it’s ever too much, just let me know, and we’ll take a break.”
It’s nice to have the option to turn the world off any time we want. I’m amazed that he’s figured out how noise overwhelms me, but also confused why he’d bring me somewhere so loud, knowing that. “Why here?”
“My parents used to bring us, before—” He swallows and his eyes grow even more intense. “I learned to salsa dance by watching them. And serving as the stand-in for my older sisters when no one asked them to dance. This place is special. I wanted to share it with you.”
I shiver, feeling the ghost of a relationship that has no bearing on my life and every bearing on Cosmos’. The weight of that makes me look away. The sound of the club crashes over me like a rogue wave.
He cups my cheek in his palm and directs my eyes back to his dimpled smile, pulling me from the depths of the sea into the silence we create. “Don’t worry. I’m a great teacher.”
That’s not what I’m worried about. It’s everything else. It’s waiting for the sword of Damocles, that proverbial weapon hanging by a thread, to fall and slice me open. Waiting for Cosmos to realize I’m not his equal and go looking for someone else. Like Jeremy did with my mom.
“Hey. I lost you, didn’t I? Where’d you go?”
“I’m sorry. I told you I wasn’t going to be much fun tonight.” Looking away, I pull at the hem of my dress, feeling frumpy and casual compared to the glamorous couples on the dance floor.
“And I told you, you don’t have to be.” He rubs his thumb along my exposed collarbone, jolting electric energy through my body. “I am, however, determined,” he leans down and kisses my neck, “to get you,” he gently bites my earlobe, “out of your head.” His lips find mine.
The music pounds in my ears, but I don’t care now.
Even my anxieties don’t feel so loud and all-consuming.
The warmth of his hands and the taste of his lips overshadow everything else.
Still kissing me, his palm spreads across my mid-back.
His hips press close, and with gentle physical prompts, he guides me backwards, one leg coming between mine, stepping steadily to the beat of the music.
He keeps kissing me until my back brushes against a tall table.
He pulls away, and I feel like Velcro being torn apart from its other half.
He’s only gone for a second, setting our coats on the chairs, before taking my hand and leading me onto the dance floor.
An hour later, I’m sweaty and breathless and smiling so hard my cheeks hurt. I haven’t thought about my thesis or even about Mom. All of my focus was on our bodies, our movements. Cosmos led me around the floor so deftly it was almost easy.
Occasionally he slowed to show me a step, modeling it before he guided me through it, but mostly he just moved us fluidly in and out of positions I didn’t even know I could do.
The pressure of his palm on my back directed me where to go.
He pushed me out and spun me in, used his hands to twist my hips, his elbow to lift my elbow, his thigh to direct my thigh.
He grabbed my leg and lifted it, moving me exactly where he wanted, how he wanted.
I became a water droplet, flowing around him.
When I missed a step or went the wrong way, he changed course to accommodate and worked my motions into his own. We became a river, fluid and magical.
And when we stopped, breathless and smiling, he backed me into a dark corner and kissed me with just as much passion.