Another Life Altogether: A Novel - By Elaine Beale Page 0,99

got to dance to this.” Amanda gestured toward me.

“Me? Dance?”

“Yeah. Come on,” she said, reaching over to grab my arm. “Don’t be shy.”

“But I can’t, I …” I wanted to explain that, after my parents, I was one of the most inept dancers in the world, that I’d only embarrass myself beyond hope if I were to try to get up and follow her. At the same time, though, I longed to glide onto the dance floor with Amanda. Hadn’t I written about it in my letter to her? Surely I wasn’t going to let this chance go by?

“Oh, come on, don’t be daft.” She pulled on my arm, moved backward unsteadily, and I let her drag me after her, into the crowd.

She pulled me into the center of the floor and, letting go of my hand, closed her eyes, tossed back her head, and started to dance. While the music pulsed and swam, I stood there watching her. She moved within a shimmering sheen of green, clapping her hands, swaying her hips, moving her feet in time to the music’s rhythm, her face—eyes still closed—rapt. She was utterly mesmerizing.

“Come on, Jesse,” she said, opening her eyes, looking indignant. “You can’t just stand there, you’ve got to dance.” She moved closer.

“I can’t dance, I—”

“Everybody can dance!” she yelled over the pounding music. “Come on!” She grabbed my arm and started to swing it.

I wanted to do this, but at the same time I had never felt so self-conscious in my entire life. I started to sway unsteadily from one foot to the other. “That’s it,” Amanda said, smiling enthusiastically. She dropped my arm and I moved beside her, all uncoordinated limbs. I knew I looked completely ridiculous, and right then I would have run from the dance floor if I’d thought I could do it without her noticing. Except, after a minute or so, I felt something shift. The dance floor had become more crowded. We were surrounded by dark and moving bodies in a flashing half-light. No one was paying attention to either me or Amanda. Within that hot cavern of energy and bodies, it was almost as if we were alone. I felt myself begin to loosen as the bass flowed through me, and, as I did, I remembered the way Malcolm had danced—unrestrained, oblivious to everyone around him even though he clearly had no rhythm at all. As I thought about him, I found that I, too, could let myself fall into a similar oblivion, into the sensation of Amanda beside me, the brush of her dress against my hand, the enraptured expression on her face.

When the record ended, she fell against me, laughing and panting. “See, I knew you’d like it,” she said, wrapping an arm around my shoulder and leaning into me. Her breath was hot; it made me shudder, a thread of electric energy that bristled through me. “I knew you’d like to dance with me,” she said, pushing her lips closer, so that I felt them brush against my ear.

As I made my way back through the crowd, I felt the urge to throw my arms in the air, to yell, to celebrate. I had danced with Amanda. I felt light, buoyant, as if my body were made of nothing but air.

“What the heck are you grinning about?” Tracey demanded as I took my seat beside her once again.

“Nothing,” I said, “I just … I just really like this song.” The dj was playing something raucous, with a lot of crashing guitars.

“It’s rubbish. And if he keeps playing all this loud stuff I’ll never get a chance to dance with Greg. Of course, with you messing things up with him, Jesse, he’ll never ask me to dance.”

“Tracey, I’m sorry.” I put my hand on Tracey’s arm. She shrugged it away.

I felt a flash of hatred—for Tracey, for her stupidity for caring about an idiot like Greg Loomis, while she found it so easy to cast me aside. But, almost as soon as the hatred came, I felt a surge of desperation. I needed Tracey.

“You’re not being fair, Trace,” I said, detesting the whine in my voice, wanting, in fact, to slap some sense into her, to tell her to stop being so petty and cruel.

“Life’s not fair, Jesse,” she said.

For the rest of the evening, I sat nursing the hope that Amanda might ask me to dance again. My hope finally expired, though, when the dj switched to playing slow songs, and I