Dancing with the Star

Susan Sizemore

There are plenty of people who come into the Alhambra Club for the things we regulars can offer. It’s a nice place, not flashy on the inside, hard to spot from the outside. You have to want to find the place and search for it through friends of friends of friends. If you’re a mortal, that is. The rest of us have used it as a hangout for the better part of a century.

There’s a television set over the bar, a big, flat-panel model, always playing with the sound off. I wasn’t paying attention to it because I was engaged in seducing a handsome young man with far too many body piercings for my usual taste. I mean, if you want piercings, I’m perfectly capable of providing them for you. But, he had nice eyes and a lovely voice, and the place wasn’t all that full of human patrons this evening. A girl goes with what she can sometimes. I wasn’t all that hungry, so I wasn’t trying too hard. I wasn’t paying attention to the TV, but my friend Tiana was. I was surprised when she came up and put her cold hand on my shoulder, because she isn’t normally rude enough to interrupt me when I’m working a fresh feed.

“Did you hear? There’s been a twelve=car pile up on Mulholland.”

This isn’t the sort of thing that would normally interest me, but her excitement got my attention. I shifted my gaze to the television. It showed a scene of fire and carnage spotlighted in beams of white light shooting down from circling helicopters. A crawl on the bottom of the screen was showing statistics about the dead and injured and the amount of emergency rescue equipment called to the scene. A blonde windblown gorl reporter was excitedly talking about the same things.

Beside me, Tiana was starting to breathe heavily. I wasn’t sure who was getting off on the disaster more, my friend or the reporter.

I looked back at Tiana. “So?”

Her eyes were glowing, not quite the death-eating electric blue she gets when she’s feeding, but her pupils held pinprick sparks of anticipation. “You want to go have a look, Serephena?” she asked.

Normally I wouldn’t have been interested, but the pleading in her voice got to me. Tiana’s been my best friend for a very long time. If you know what we are you wouldn’t think she and I would have that much in common. I’m a vampire and she’d – well, all right – she’s my ghoul friend. I feed on the living, she feeds on the energy of the dying. But we both like to shop.

“Maybe there’s a dying movie star out there I can latch on to.” She said. She rubbed her hands together. “A producer would be even better.”

I know what that sounds like, but it really had more to do with psychic power levels than celebrity stalking. There are a lot of high-energy types in show business, a lot of people who are psychic and don’t even know it.

I got up and telepathically told the pierced boy that we’d never met. “Sure,” I said to Tiana. “It’s been a slow night. Let’s go have a look.”

It was gruesome up on Mulholland Drive. Tiana ate it up – literally soaking the energy of fear and pain in through her pores. It was the scent of blood that got to me, but not in a good way. There’s no fun in spilled blood. I need to take blood from the living, breathing source, to taste it fresh and hot, with the heartbeat still pulsing through it. And preferably from a volunteer, because we live in modern, humane times. Unlike some of my notorious forebears I do not get off on pain. The blood on the crash victims gave off a sick scent that rolled my stomach, but I did find hiding in the shadows and watching the emergency crews work exciting. Hey, I’m as interested in all that forensics and rescue stuff as anyone else who watches the geek-TV channels, but this was ‘live and direct’ like Max Headroom used to say on the television show nobody but me probably remembers.

It was interesting, but after a while I glanced at the sky and sighed. The night was getting on. “Had enough yet?” I asked. “You’ll outgrow your size-two clothes if you feed much longer. Besides, it’s an hour to sunrise.”

Tiana came out of her happy trance and turned glowing blue eyes on me. “Oh, sorry, I lost track of the time.”

“No problem,” I said, and took her arm to help her walk away, knowing from experience that she was drunk and dizzy from feeding.

Help me! Where are you?

Here! I shouted to the voice in my head. Where –

“Seraphina!”

I looked up into pinpoints of blue light. Tiana. I was on my knees and she was standing over me. The fierce pain in my head blocked out most thought, but I knew our positions were all wrong. I was supposed to be helping her.

I wanted to run into the wreckage behind us. But when I stood my legs were too shaky. I glanced back. “I –”

Tiana shook my shoulders. “We have to go. Sunrise,” she said.

That was one word I understood in all of its myriad implications of pain, suffering, death. I had to go. Now. Whatever had just happened I had to get home. I took Tiana’s hand and we ran together.

I have a nice studio apartment, where I sleep on a daybed in the huge windowless bathroom. The bathroom door is reinforced and has a strong lock, panic-room style, and the building, which I own and rent mostly to my sort of people, has state-of-the-art security. So normally I have no reason not to sleep very well. Normally I don’t dream, either. I go to sleep. I wake up. It all happens so quickly . . . normally . . .

The path was made of brick, laid out in a chevron pattern It was lined with rose bushes and night-blooming jasmine. The air was so fragrant I could taste it. The stars overhead formed a thick blanket of light brighter than I’d seen them for a very long time.

“I need to get out of the city more,” I said, and continued walking towards the music in the distance.

I was wearing a dress, the skirt long and floaty and pale blue, sprinkled with a pattern of glittering crystals that mirrored the sky. This was not the slinky, black sort of garment I favoured, but it felt right, feminine, beautiful.

I was wearing, honest to God, glass slippers. Cinderella? Me? Well, it was a dream.

And my feet – my whole body – wanted nothing more than to dance.

When the gazebo came into sight, as pretty as a white confection on top of a wedding cake, I ran towards it. Something more than wonderful waited for me there.

“You!” I said, skidding to a halt at the entrance as I spied the man leaning with his arms crossed against a pillar.

“Me,” he replied, a stranger with a familiar voice.

“But – you’re a movie star!”

It was an accusation. I didn’t expect my very rare dreams to go off on such grandiose tangents.

“And I worked very hard to become a genuine movie star,” he answered, totally unashamed for showing up in my fantasy. “Would you prefer meeting a celebrity?” His gesture took in the small building. “Here? In our space?”

Our space? Yeah, it was, wasn’t it?

I turned around, my skirts belling out around my legs. I could see my reflection in the highly polished, white marble floor. And his reflection came to join me. He moved with the grace of Fred Astaire. (I’ve been around long enough to have seen Fred and his sister Adele dance on the stage. I know what I’m talking about).

His hand touched me, one at my waist, one gently gripping my fingers. His warmth against my coolness. The next thing I knew we were circling the room, caught up in the music.

“We’re waltzing,” I said. “I don’t know how to waltz.”

“I learned it when I auditioned for Mr Darcy. Didn’t get the role, though.”

“But you learned how to dance.”

“Silver linings,” he said.

I studied his face. There was a sweep of dark hair across his crow, high-arching eyebrows over penetrating green eyes, severe high cheekbones softened by a lush, full mouth. “You would have made a great Darcy,” I told him.

Of course he had the body of a god – or at least a man who spent a fortune working long hours with a personal trainer – and now that body was pressed to mine. I liked it. The longer we danced the more I liked it.

My skin wasn’t cool any more.

“This is – nice,” he said.

“In a strange way,” I answered.

“You’ve noticed that, have you?”

I nodded. His green eyes twinkled at me. We danced around in circles for a long, long time, caught up in the music and the flow of energy between us. That’s what it was all about for me – flow and energy, give and take. For once I knew that I was giving as much as I was taking, and it felt good.

“What are you – we – doing here?” I asked.

“Dreaming about dancing,” he answered. His smile devastated me. “I’m as surprised by this as you are. One moment I was floating in grey clouds – I think I was screaming, but there was no one to hear me, not even me – and the next I was here with you.”

“I was in blackness,” I said “That’s normal for me.”

“The grey was terrifying,” he said. He whirled me around faster, until we both laughed. “This is much better,” he said. He pulled on me closer. We weren’t dancing any more, but the music played on and the world continued to spin.

“No one should be in darkness,” he said. “Grey or black or any other kind, especially not alone.”

I started to say that I didn’t mind being alone, but being with him made me realize that I did mind. “I’ve been lonely and didn’t know it.” Though I was looking into his eyes, I was talking more to myself.

Neither of us spoke for an unknowable time after that but we continued to look into each other’s eyes and shared – what? Our emotions, our souls, the essences of our beings? All of the above, I guess.

“This is such bullshit,” I finally said.

“But you like it.”

My gaze flicked away from his, but I couldn’t stand the loss of contact for long. “If I could blush, I’d be blushing,” I told him when our gazes locked again.

“We live in a time and place that’s cynical about love.”

“Darlin’, I come from New York. People in LA are amateurs about cynicism.”

He shook his head. “I used to live in New York,” he said. “I tended bar while I went to drama school. I saw plenty of broken hearts there.”

“Broke a few, too, I bet.”

“Too bad I didn’t meet you there.”

I laughed. “I left long before you were born.”

“Really? When were you there? How did you get to be –” He looked puzzled for a moment, then said it. “ – a vampire.”

Those in the know generally don’t ask. Maybe they think it’s rude, or that mystery is part of my mystique, or they are afraid of getting their throats ripped out. I hadn’t told this story for a long time. “I worked at the Plaza back in the 1930s.”

“The hotel?”

I nodded. “I was a telephone operator. There was a Mob boss that lived there.”

“Lucky Luciano?”

“You’ve heard of him?”

“I’ve been doing research to play him in a film.”

“To bad. I hate seeing that bastard glamorized.”

“He did bad things to you,” he guessed.

“He had me killed. He wrongfully thought I’d overheard some conversation and might testify about them in court. A hit man was sent after me. It turned out that the killer was a hungry vampire. He drained me and left me for dead.”

“But –”

“But the vampire didn’t realize I was one of his bloodline.”

“You were already a vampire?”

“No! My family came from Wallachia. There’s some sort of genetic mutation that kicks in when a vampire bites us. Old Vlad the Impaler really is Dracula, and the king of us all.”

“That’s amazing. I’m part Hungarian. Could I be a vampire?”

“Depends if your grandmas got raped by the right sort of invaders, I guess. Do you want to be a vampire?”

He shrugged. “I want to hear more about you.”

“Nice answer. The gist of it is I woke up dead and had to start over from there.”

“Did you go after the one who turned you?”

“You’ve been watching vampire movies.”

“Been in one.”

“I saw it, had nothing to do with my world. But you were good.” I added.

“You’re lovely when you’re bullshitting. What happened to the evil one who turned you?”

“I don’t know if he was evil.”

“He was a Mob hit man.”

His indignation was adorable. “I’ll concede his profession was evil.”

“You’ve never done anything like that.”

His certainty of my goodness was even ore adorable. “No, I haven’t,” I assured him. “But after a while wrestling with all the implications of immortality you get some perspective on good, evil, expediency, stuff like that. And no, I haven’t seen him again. At least, not that I know of. I didn’t get a good look at him while he was sucking the lifeblood out of me.”

“But how did you survive? Didn’t you have a teacher, a mentor? Didn’t another vampire bring you into the dark world?”

I laughed and stroked his cheek. “I suppose there’s melodrama somewhere, but I’ve never been involved in any – other than being rubbed out by a mobster, which I did find pretty melodramatic at the time.”

He traced his hand up and down my back, sending tingling shivers all through me. His sympathy warmed me even more than his touch. “I’m sorry you went through such trauma. How did you survive?”

“I found the right bar and ordered a beer. Getting all the blood drained out of you makes you thirsty.”

“It was a vampire bar?”

I nodded.

“Did some instinct kick in that drew you to your own kind and they taught you how to survive?”

I nodded again. He was smart and quick on the uptake. The man had many great qualities. And he could dance in a way that made me feel like I was having sex standing up, fully clothed, without ruffling a hair or breaking a sweat. Not that vampires sweat. “I’ve explained me,” I said. “How about you? How did you get here? Wherever here is.”

“That is the problem isn’t it? We seem to be dancing in limbo. Though I like being here with you.”

From anyone else, any other time, I would have considered that a line. But his eyes held genuine pleasure, genuine sincerity.

“I’m falling like a rock, you know,” I told him.

“Me too. Is that a bad thing?”

We both shrugged, and that became part of the dance. We laughed together, and that was part of the music.

“As for me,” he went on. “I remember being with friends at their house. We played Scrabble.”

I love word games. “Scrabble? Is that any way for a movie star to spend his evening?”

“Now you know why the paparazzi hate me. I lead a quiet life.”

“Me too. But how did you get here?”

We danced in silence for a while. I watched as every possible emotion crossed his face.

He finally said, “It has something to do with ice cream.” He looked deep into my eyes. “Is that crazy?”

“Probably,” I told him. “But much of life makes no sense.”

“Life and death? Am I dead?”

I pulled him close and we stood still in the centre of the gazebo for a long time, holding each other tight, giving comfort amidst the frightening questions that had no answers.

“You’re so good for me,” he said at last. “I don’t even know your name.”

“Everyone knows yours.” I gave a faint, sad laugh. “No one really knows mine any more. I became Serephena back in my hippie phase.”

It was his turn to laugh, at me, but not mockingly. “Oh, no, that won’t do. That name isn’t you. It’s a flighty name. You’re solid and strong and grounded.”

It was like he was giving me back myself. “Stella,” I admitted. “My name is Stella.”

His smile was a blessing. It was sunshine. It was . . .

I awoke as I always did, at the moment the sun went down. It was normally the most pleasant moment of the night. This time I woke with an anguished shout. I lay on my back with my eyes squeezed shut and tried to will myself back to sleep. That didn’t work, of course. All I ended up doing was crying, and the tears that rolled down onto the pillowcase made a disgusting mess – vampire tears having blood mixed in with the saltwater.

I stripped the bed, threw the sheets in the laundry and paced around restlessly for a while wondering what the hell was going on in my head. Was I going senile? Worst of all, loneliness welled up in me and grief shook me and the heartache . . .

The heartache was a very real sensation. Physical pain radiated out of the core of my being where my shattered soul ached for the loss of half my being.

Or something like that.

I hurt. I really emotionally and physically hurt from what I knew had only been a dream. It took a couple of hours before I could get myself together enough to head off to the Alhambra in the hope of staving off the painful loneliness.

There wasn’t a huge crowd at the club, but the place was jumping when I showed up. Everybody was gathered around the bar, abuzz with conversation.

I spotted Tiana and went up to her. “What happened?”

“Anton went up in flames this morning,” she answered.

“Why’d he do a thing like that without having a goodbye party first?” I asked. Anton was the bartender. He lived on the second floor. Used to.

“He didn’t want to make a fuss.”

“How’d it happen?”

“Usual way. He walked outside to see the dawn.”

It happens. Every few decades the urge to end eternity gets hold of a vampire. I hadn’t succumbed to the depression yet, but the way I was feeling tonight I sympathized with Anton’s choice. I wasn’t sure my usual panacea of show shopping was going to be enough.

“Did anyone sweep up the ashes?”

“Oh, yes,” Tiana answered. “He’s already in a nice urn over the bar with a sticky-note reminder to sprinkle some blood on him in a year or two. The problem is what are we going to do for a bartender now?”

Blood brings us back and we are usually ready to carry on after an ash vacation. I wasn’t in the mood to join in the ‘what are we going to do to replace Anton?’ discussion occupying everyone else’s attention, but I did manage to elbow my way to a seat at the bar. I found myself looking up at the television overhead.

The local news was still dwelling on last night’s multi-car crash. Slow news night, I supposed. “Isn’t there a gang war or a car chase you could cover?” I complained to the television. “I’m bored.”

“You don’t feel bored,” Tiana said, coming up beside me. “You’re unhappy. I don’t mean to snack on your emotions,” she added when I glared at her. “You know I can’t help it. Why are you unhappy? Anton?”

I snorted. “May he rest in peace, but I don’t give a damn about Anton,” I turned my glare back on the TV screen. “What’s so important about last night’s car crash?”

“Four people died on scene,” she said. “Everybody else is hospitalized, most of them in critical condition. But the real reason the networks are still covering it is –”

Her timing was perfect, because at that moment his picture appeared on the screen.

“Oh, good God!” My heart felt like a knife had been plunged into it.

Tiana’s hand touched my shoulder. “I know you’re a fan, but –”

“He’s not dead! Tell me he isn’t dead?”

I only realized I was shaking her when she shouted, “Stop it! Let go of me!”

I did. I pointed at the television. “That’s the man in my dream.”

“The man of your dreams? He’s an actor you’ve got a crush on.”

“I do not get crushes. And I mean he’s the man that was in my dream last day. We were dancing.”

“Vampires don’t dream. And he was in intensive care while you were sleeping.”

The relief might have killed me if that were possible. As it was, it felt like I was having a heart attack. “Intensive care? So he isn’t dead?”

“Not yet, but it’s only a matter of time.” She glanced at the face of the reporter now on the screen. “His death-watch is what all the media fuss is about. They’re worse ghouls than I am.”

I automatically patted her shoulder, knowing that this admission hurt her pride, but my mind was racing on another matter. It hadn’t been a dream. Somehow, it hadn’t been a dream. He’d been there and I’d been there, only where the hell was there? “How did it happen?”

“He and some friends were going out for ice cram when they ended up in the pile-up and the car went off the side of the mountain. He was the only survivor, but he’s on life support and he’s been declared brain dead.”

“His brain isn’t dead,” I said. “It’s been out dancing.” I was sure this was true. We’d been in telepathic contact. But how?

I heard the voice in my head again that had speared into my brain back at the crash site. Help me! Where are you?

“Of course! He’s psychic. He called out for help when we were up at the crash, and I answered him! That’s how we met!” I grabbed Tiana’s cold grey hand. “Come on, ghoul-friend!”

“Where are we going?” she asked as I pulled her towards the door.

I laughed, all my depression blown away by exaltation. “To the rescue, of course!”

“We’re here. Now what?” Tiana asked as we moved across the ER waiting room.

“Go up to the ICU,” I answered. “And take him home.”

“He’s on life support. There’s probably cops and private security in the halls.”

“I’ll take care of them. All you have to do is create a diversion.”

She licked her lips and nodded. Her skin was flushed to an almost-normal human colour. This was one of her feeding grounds and she’d shown me where to sneak in. It had been easy, even with the circus in the streets.

Outside the media and fan frenzy was as thick and chaotic as I’d ever seen it in all my decades of dwelling in this town. There were news vans sprouting satellite and lighting equipment and chuffing power generators. Reporters looked solemnly into cameras as they spoke. Paparazzi were as thick as roaches in a tenement. Helicopters circled. Cops held a crowd back beyond a cordon surrounding the hospital. People held signs and candles and flowers. Some were singing the theme song from one of his movies.

I wondered if what I was doing was any less ridiculous than the behaviour of his grieving fans.

In the ER people were bleeding and screaming and crying through their own problems. It was quiet and peaceful compared to what was going on outside. No one paid any attention as we made our way through a wide doorway, down a hallway and to a door past a row of elevators. You learn to take the stairs when you want to live an under-the-radar life.

“There are three people ready to die here,” Tiana said after we reached the critical-care floor and slipped into an empty room. She looked sad. Hey, she’s a ghoul, but that doesn’t mean she isn’t a kind person.

“Can you work with that?” I asked. Hey, I’m a vampire, remember? She nodded. She prefers living off residual death energy instead of any direct involvement. “I hate doing the soul-sucking thing, but, yeah, there’s nothing that can be done for any of them.”

“Is my guy one of the three?” I asked worriedly.

She looked thoughtful, then shook her head. “Low energy, but stable. Now let me get to work.”

I backed out of the room as she opened her mouth for one of those screams that only the dying could heat. The dying would give up their energy to the ghoul when they heard that sound.

Pretty soon there was almost as much activity on this floor of the hospital as there was outside. Alarms went off at the nursing station, crash carts were hurried into rooms. There was running and shouting, and I moved unnoticed to the room with the guard outside the door.

The guard wasn’t a problem. I made him look into my eyes and he was instantly stunned.

“Is there a security camera in there?” I asked.

“No. There’s a nurse,” he volunteered.

“Tell the nurse to respond to the code blues. Follow the nurse and volunteer to help.” I hoped that was enough of an excuse to keep the guard from getting into too much trouble when I kidnapped his charge. I rushed into his room at once.

Inside the door I stopped with my mouth hanging open. The man on the bed was hooked up to so many tubes and gadgets I didn’t know how to start freeing him. I didn’t have much time, so I whispered an apology for any pain I caused him and started ripping and pulling the life-support equipment off him. Trails of his blood stained my clothes when I picked him up. The scent and warmth of it was intoxicating, but I fought off the sudden bloodlust. My fangs ached like a virgin’s on her first hunt as I carried him away with me.

His weight was no problem, but I’m a small woman and he’s a very tall man. Carrying him was awkward, but you manage what you have to.

I took him downstairs, through the closed cafeteria and to a courtyard garden beyond it where I set him down gently beneath a squat palm tree. I sat beside him and settled his head in my lap. My fingers touched his temples.

Are you there?

You came for me! His voice called from so far away I barely sensed it.

Do you want to live? I asked. You know I’m a vampire. I will try to change you if you want me to. Think carefully before you choose.

In the long silence that followed I had to fight very hard to keep my fangs from sinking into his flesh. I’d never been so aroused by the scent of blood before, but I wasn’t going to taste a drop without his permission. He had to make the choice.

I thought I’d have to be Wallachian, his thought came at last.

You’re part Hungarian. There’s a chance you’ll change.

It depends on if my grandmas got raped by the right sort of invaders?

Pretty much.

I’ll die otherwise, won’t I?

Yes, but that shouldn’t ne why you choose to become a blood drinker, a nightwalker, an exile from every part of the daylight world.

It really isn’t all that bad being a vampire, but there are difficulties and the lifestyle should not be glamorized for potential newbies. No matter how much you want to share a coffin with them.

Can I stay with you if I change?

My heart sang at his question. And, oh, how my fangs ached! Yes, I told him. For as long as you want. For ever if you want.

Forever sounds good to me. Do it.

Remember that it might not take. That –”

Shut up and bite me.

I couldn’t argue with that. So I did.

And I’d never had a rush like it in all my years of sucking the good stuff! I couldn’t count the orgasms that shook me before every drop of him was flowing inside me.

I didn’t have to share my blood with him. Some sort of enzyme in my saliva was transferred to him from the bite and the enzyme would trigger the change if it were going to happen. But just in case, I bit my wrist and poured a few drops of my blood into his mouth. Not that he was capable of swallowing. At this point he was essentially dead. He’d either get better or I’d have to dispose of his body in a way that the marks on his throat would never be seen.

I didn’t want to think about disposal. I didn’t want to think of him ever being dead. I held his limp body and felt it grow heavier and colder, and I worried and cried those disgusting blood-drenched vampire tears. I don’t know for how long. Long enough for my mood to turn bleak and heartbroken.

Long enough for me to be aware that the sun would be up in an hour or so.

There’s an almost physical pressure on the skin the closer daylight comes. Normally I’d be starting to think about getting to cover. Instead, I vowed I’d stay here and let the sun take me if he didn’t come around before the end of the night. I didn’t care if my ashes blew away so far there wouldn’t be anything left of me. Perhaps the fire that took me would burn him as well and our ashes would blend together.

Sentimental, aren’t you?

I heard the thought but it took a long time before I came out of my grief enough to realize that the voice wasn’t my imagination.

“You’re alive!”

Don’t shout. I have a hangover. That’s not right. My throat hurts. I’m thirsty. My mouth tastes like sweet copper.

“That’s my blood. You’re alive,” I repeated, the words whispered in his ear as I helped him sit up. “You’re a vampire.”

“I guess the right Cossacks raped my grandmas.”

His voice was a rough croak, but the most delicious sound I’d ever heard. He struggled to his feet and insisted on giving me his hand to help me up. Living or dead, he was always a gentleman. When I was on my feet his arms came around me. He was weak enough that I ended up holding him up as we embraced.

“We could dance like this for ever,” He said.

I sighed romantically. “We could.” I looked around. “We could if the sun wasn’t coming up soon. We need to get out of here.”

He cupped my cheek and looked at me with his new night vision. “You’re as beautiful as I dreamed you were, my Stella. Thank you for saving me, thank you for being with me now and for ever.”

There’s no way a girl can’t respond to that. I kissed him, and he kissed back and it was real and deep and better than any dream. After a while he lifted his head and gave a dry, hacking cough. “Sorry. Thirsty.”

I put my arm around his waist and helped him to the garden door. “I know just the place where we can get a beer. Now that you’ve changed you can find it on your own.”

“I’d rather go with you.”

You have no idea how much that meant to me.

Tiana met us outside the cafeteria and guided us along her secret route out of the hospital and away from the crowd. He noticed all the fuss as we drove away, he and I squeezed into the trunk of Tiana’s car.

“You have no idea how happy I am to leave the celebrity era of my life behind,” he told me.

“You’ll miss acting.”

“I’ll think of a way to get back to it. Do vampires work? Do I need a job?”

“I’m a real-estate mogul. You can live off me. Wait –” I’d remembered Anton. “The place we’re heading, the Alhambra Club, needs a bartender. I know the owner. That would be me. If you’re interested.”

We were squeezed in pretty tightly, but he managed to pull me closer. “Does this place have a dance floor?”

I laughed, happier than I’d ever imagined I could be. “It will when we’re done with it, If that’s what you want,” I promised.

“I think dancing – being – with you is all I ever wanted.”

“Me too.” I couldn’t stop the girlish giggle from escaping. “I guess this is a real –”

“Hollywood ending,” he finished, not having to be psychic to know what I was thinking.