Backwards in Heels
an excerpt

“May I have this dance?” It was corny, but then the situation called for corny I think. Something old, classical, well used and worn like the steps of the dance. I nodded, the wasn’t really any other response that fit.
We waltzed, close together, trying not the run into any furniture. There wasn’t as much space as there was at the studio, but that didn’t matter, we were the only couple on the floor. Didn’t really have to worry about wither anyone else was in our way or if we were in theirs. It was just us, a collection of records, and a chair that we kept trying to avoid.
“It’s behind you again,” I said, and Kain pulled us into a box step before we started moving in the other direction. Back and forth, getting steered this way and that. There were several songs and one very distracted moment where I actually did run into the chair, toppling into it and bringing Kain with me. On top of me really.
We were sprawled across the chair, my bottom firmly planted in the seat, my legs crooked over the arm with Kain between them. His feet were still on the floor, but his body was draped across me, still holding me in dance position, one arm around my back, pinned under me, and holding my left hand. It put his face about chest level, in a fairly personal place,which he rectified quickly, blushing the whole time. But he was still enough of a gentleman to help me to my feet, except, well, when I stood we were close, awfully close. Not as close as we usually where when we dance, but when we were dancing we were never face to face. Not like this. I could feel the air heat betweet us, and was still holding the hand he offered to help me up. He was just a little taller than me, just a hair, and at this distance it made all the difference in the world.
And I couldn’t move, not because I was stuck between him and the chair, but because I was looking him in his eyes. We stood there for an eternal moment, his holding hands and just starting. And I wanted him to kiss me. I think he wanted to. I think he almost did, but something stopped him. It wouldn’t have been me though, I was certain of that.
Then the song changed to something different. Very different. And it tore us away from the momnet, but for that silence I was certain that there was something starting I. And I realized that I was in trouble.
He changed the record and we spend another little bit dancing, but something was different, a little akward. It wasn’t in the dance or the steps, but between us. That unspoken moment lingered there. I don’t thing it was as much of a shock to him as it was to me, except manybe that I might have accepted his advances. And I would have. I very much would have.
We practiced for a few more songs, and then headed out to dinner, because he kept about as much food in his apartment as I do. It wasn’t until we were in the resturant that things became comfortable again, that the moment had passed the rest of the way out of our systems. We spoke about his records and my books, he hadn’t seen my library when he came over. I usually kept it closed off, espeically after I left to door open one day and when I came home Gracie had knocked a shelf over. I had no idea how, but I decided it was best just to keep the doors shut when I wasn’t using it.
So when he took me home, I had to show him. It wasn’t that he wasn't that he demanded to see it, but I had a chance to see something as personal to him. It only seemed fair. My library was a pretty small room, but every inch of wall had bookshelves on them. The kind of cheap ones you can buy at Wal-Mart of Ikea, just particle board and laminate, but they served their purpose well. I added shelves to each and every one, to maximize space. The bookcases I had bought with my mother all those years before we in the center of the room, bolted together. I had to ask a man at Lowes how to possibly do that, and he explained the process. It had seemed simple enough to do on my own, but screws are harder to turn that anyone had ever given me the idea of. It had taken me the better part of an afternoon. But it was worth it, for my books.
“This isn’t every book that I’ve ever read, jus the ones that I’ve read twice,” I explained. I had a computer to keep myrecords in. If there was a book that I’d only read once, I boxed it up and took it to the real library. I got the idea from how we keep records at work, except we never give those up, we just put them in boxes and place them in storage, just in case we need them again. Of course, Mr Armstrong the elder, always jokes that since I came to work for the firm, he hasn’t needed to look in the boxes. I took the books for the library, though, so I could give someone else the pleasure of reading them. That’s what books were really for anyway.
Kain seemed impressed, and stood scanning myshelf of science fiction paperbacks while I stood next to him. “I haven’t read this one in years,” he said reaching out for a well worn book. I had to admit that it was one of my favorite sci-fi books too. Kind of hard to get a hold of that one, I had to have it shipped up from a bookstore in Portland. A huge bookstore in Portland. Five stories of heaven in the middle of the city. I heard about it from a co-worker talking in the break room, and since that day I wanted more than anything to visit that store. I couldn’t imagine what it would be like, but I knew I’d love it.
“You can borrow it, if you want. Books are always better on the second read.” He looked at me with a smile that said I had said just the right thing.
“Are you sure?” I nod, and he takes my hand and I’m in trouble again. It’s getting kind of hard to talk to him when he does things like that. Hard to talk because it’s hard to breath. I’d read that happened when men held women’s hands, but only in romance novels. This was life, real life, my life, and it had never happened to before.
“Thank you.” He said giving my hand a squeeze before letting it go.
I spent a long moment being really confused. I thought I had feelings for Havok. Jean Havok, Kain’s friend, the man who danced like Fred Astaire and looked like Rock Hudson. But whatever was happening with Kain, it felt very different. These sorts of conflicts of interest were supposed to happen to other girls, the ones that were the main characters of the movies, not their sidekicks. And as much as I wanted to be a heroine, I knew I was destined for secondary character status. After he left I was absolutely going to have to call Nancy, she might make some sense of this. If not, I had no idea what I was going to do.