Dancing After Hours by Andre Dubus Page B

and said: “I believe it.”
    At a shaded corner they stopped to cross the streetand he held her elbow as she stepped down from the curb. She knew he was doing this because of the filth and broken glass, and that he wanted to touch her, and she liked the feel of his hand. She liked the gentle depth of his voice, and his walk; his right knee appeared inflexible, but he walked smoothly. It was his eyes she loved; she could see sorrow in them, something old he had lived with, and something vibrant and solid, too. She felt motion in him, and she wanted to touch it. He was a lawyer; he liked to read and he liked movies and deep-sea fishing. On their left, cars stopped for a red light; he glanced at her, caught her gazing at his profile, and she said: “It was bad, wasn’t it?”
    He stopped and looked down at her.
    “Yes. I was a corpsman. You know, the nurse, the EMT—” She nodded. “With the Marines. I got hurt in my twelfth month. Ten years later I started dealing with the eleven and a half months before that.”
    “How’s it going?”
    “Better. My knee won’t bend, but my head is clear in the morning.”
    They walked; his hand with the cane was close to her left arm, and she could feel the air between their hands and wrists and forearms and biceps, a space with friction in it, and she veered slightly closer so their skin nearly touched. They reached the street where she lived and turned onto it, facing the sun, and she did not tell him this was her street. On the first block was the restaurant; she had walked or driven past it but had not been inside. He held the door for her and she went into the dark cool air and softened lights, the smells of bacon and liquor. She was on a carpet now, and shecould see the shapes of people at tables, and hear low voices; then he moved to her right side, lightly placed his hand on her forearm, and guided her to a booth. They ordered: a Bloody Mary for her and orange juice for him, and cantaloupes and omelettes and Canadian bacon with English muffins. When their drinks came, she lit a cigarette and said: “I drink. I smoke. I eat everything.”
    “I go to meetings. I’m in my sixth year without a drink. My second without smoking.” His hand came midway across the table. “But I’d love a hit off yours.”
    She gave him the cigarette, her fingers sliding under his. She left her hand there, waited for his fingers again, and got them, his knuckles beneath hers, and she paused for a moment before squeezing the cigarette and withdrawing her hand. She said: “Doesn’t cheating make you miss it more?”
    “Oh, I’m always missing something.”
    “Drinking?”
    “Only being able to. Or thinking I was.”
    “Nothing horrible has ever happened to me.”
    “I hope nothing does.”
    “I suppose if I live long enough something will.”
    “If you don’t live long enough,
that
would be horrible. Are you seeing anyone?”
    “No. Are you?”
    “No. I’m waiting. I limp. I get frightened suddenly, when there’s no reason to be. I get sad too, when nothing has happened. I know its name now, and—”
    “What is its name?”
    “It. It’s just it, and I go about my day or even my week sometimes, then it’s gone. The way a fever isthere, and then it isn’t. I want a home with love in it, with a woman and children.”
    “My God,” she said, and smiled, nearly laughing, her hands moving up from the table. “I don’t think I’ve
ever
heard those words from the mouth of a man.”
    “I love the way you talk with your hands.”
    They stayed in the booth until midafternoon; he invited her to a movie that night; they stepped out of the restaurant into the bright heat, and he walked with her to the door of her apartment building, and stood holding her hand. She raised her bare heels and kissed his cheek, the hair of his beard soft on her chin, then went inside. She showered for a long time and washed her hair and, sitting at her mirror, blew it dry She put on a robe and slept for