Authors: Mimsy Hale
“All of you know the story of how we got together, and of course Andrew’s told
everyone
our proposal story,” Toby says, and groans break out around the room. He glances at Andrew with a lopsided grin and quietly continues, “It’s been, um… it’s been a long journey to get here. To be honest, I didn’t know if I’d ever be able to have this. Not just because of the person I fell in love with and where I come from, but also just… me.
“And then one night, he walked into that awful bar and changed everything,” Toby says. He takes a deep breath, and Jake, watching him blink rapidly, almost fails to notice when Aiden takes his hand. “Andrew, you’ve taught me to ask and to answer, to wait and to fulfill, to love and to be loved. My life began when I poured you that first Negroni, and I don’t want it to ever end.
“Thank you for finding me; thank you for seeing me, and thank you for sticking around even after you tasted my awful Eggs Benedict. Most of all, thank you for agreeing to be my everything,” Toby says. Andrew cups the back of his neck and tugs him down for a brief kiss.
Feeling like an intruder, Jake looks away and meets Aiden’s lingering eyes. Nowadays, he’s used to that look of radiant warmth on Aiden’s face—he missed it after Chicago, and it only came back after Lake Calhoun.
Since their fight, Jake has coasted on being on the road with a wonderful man, transcending time and obligation and the need to be somewhere. Though he’s tethered to something that he is beginning to realize is bigger than either of them, it no longer feels like a chokehold constricting his air supply—instead, it feels like roots.
“Always has to set a high bar,” Andrew mock-grumbles into the mic. Jake hears low chuckles from around the room. “I have a laundry list of people to whom I’m grateful, but there are just a few I’d like to thank in particular:
“Mr. and Mrs. Hillard, thank you for managing to pull off a summer wedding in November—and in
Iowa,
no less! This place looks beautiful, and Myra: I’m sorry I ever doubted you,” Andrew says. “Stu and Jeff, thank you for being the best groomsmen we could have asked for, even if you did leave me in the middle of a field last night.
“Jake and Aiden, our guests of honor…” he says, pointing toward where they sit, “How the
hell
did you end up being in exactly the right place at exactly the right time?”
“Superpowers!” Aiden calls out, raising his and Jake’s joined hands in a semi-triumphant gesture. Jake flushes at the coos he hears from the back of the room.
“Well, thank you for saving me from having to hitchhike
all
the way here. The facilities were top notch,” Andrew continues. “And finally, one last thank you to my late father. He taught me that you have to make the mistakes first so that you know how to recognize them, and…” Andrew trails off, snakes his arm around Toby’s waist and speaks directly to him, “I know it took me making a
lot
of mistakes first, but once I knew, I knew.
“I love you,” he whispers into the mic, and drops a kiss on the corner of Toby’s mouth. Jake squeezes Aiden’s hand, though he doesn’t quite know why.
One of the groomsmen—Jake can’t remember which—stands and takes the mic from Andrew to announce the first dance. As Andrew leads Toby to the middle of the dance floor, their matching rose gold wedding bands catch the light of the globes strung above, and all of the guests turn to watch as Diana Krall’s version of “I’ve Grown Accustomed To Your Face” from
My Fair Lady
begins to play.
“Wasn’t this your parents’ first dance song?” Aiden asks quietly.
Jake sits up straighter in his seat and the black and white wedding video playing in his mind’s eye comes into sharper focus. The smiling couple twirling each other around is suddenly so real to him that he can almost reach out and feel the fabric of their wedding finery. His mother’s best friend Sarah sings on a tiny stage erected in the backyard of his grandparents’ house, and the only source of light spills through the French doors off the dining room, casting long shadows that stretch into the saplings lining the fence.
He opens his mouth to speak, but finds himself without words.
“What’s
your
first dance song?” Aiden whispers into Jake’s ear, and Jake shivers as the hairs on his arms stand on end beneath the fabric of his hastily pressed, white button-down.
“No idea,” Jake replies. He watches Toby and Andrew begin to turn on the spot, their arms wrapped tightly around one another’s waists. They exchange indiscernible words and soft smiles.
“Me neither,” Aiden says, and Jake fixes him with a raised eyebrow. “I guess it’s just something you figure out together, you know?”
“I guess so,” Jake says. He fiddles with the cuff of his shirt and glances at the two grooms again. They look as though they’ve already left the barn, as though they’re dancing in their own walled-off world.
It makes Jake think of the RV, where nothing exists but him and Aiden and the asphalt ahead.
The song ends and the guests applaud Toby and Andrew as they take their bows in the center of the floor. The music bleeds into an upbeat number Jake doesn’t recognize, and he’s just beginning to think about going in search of more cider when he sees the grooms exchange a glance and make a beeline toward him and Aiden.
“I think I owe you a dance,” Andrew says, holding out his hand. Jake looks at it uncertainly for a moment, remembering the pinpoint precision of Andrew’s insight the last time they talked privately, but before he can say no Andrew adds, “As a thank you.”
It’s just one dance,
he thinks, and moves onto the floor with him. Andrew’s hold is loose; his hands are bigger than Aiden’s, and he has a couple inches’ height on Jake. He feels as if he’s in the wrong arms, but brushes it off.
“Thank you again for what you did today,” Andrew says as they begin a quick approximation of a foxtrot in time to the beat of the summery song.
“We couldn’t exactly just leave you by the side of the road,” Jake replies.
“Well, no, but… everything needed to be perfect today, and you two really helped make that happen,” Andrew says quietly as Toby and Aiden pass by on their left. “Toby, he… the reason I got so drunk last night… he has OCD. It’s much better than it was when we first met, but last night he had to flick the lights twenty-four times before he left the house. It hasn’t been more than four in about a year, and I just… you know?”
Jake nods; he can’t quite imagine himself acting differently in the same situation. “In that case, I’m even more glad we found you.”
Andrew smiles and falls silent. Jake glances across the dance floor, catching a wink that Aiden throws his way. The song is fun and flirty, and it tugs at Jake more than he would have expected, capturing his attention and focusing it all on the way Aiden moves with another partner: not too close yet not too far apart, something not quite clicking in their rhythm.
“You still want him, huh?” Andrew asks wryly. Jake meets his gaze, but stays silent. “I know I’m not wrong.”
“No, you’re not wrong.”
“But you still won’t do anything about it.”
“There you’re wrong,” Jake corrects him.
Andrew’s eyes flick between him and Aiden a few times, and then his grin cracks wide open. “How’s that working out for you?”
“We’re figuring things out,” Jake says at length. “It’s complicated.”
Andrew scoffs and rolls his eyes. “I keep trying to tell you—”
“It’s not complicated, I know.”
“No, it’s not. Do you love him?”
“I’m trying not to.”
“Why?”
“He deserves better,” Jake says, “and I’m not so good at trusting people with my heart.”
“But Aiden’s not people,” Andrew points out, and all of the reasons Jake has been conjuring sputter into darkness, as if the words have suddenly become his enemy, loaded with meaning he never intended them to have. Why is he biting his tongue and feeling only the pressure? Why is he biting at all?
Somewhere in the darkest corners of his mind—the ones he rarely feels brave enough to explore—he knows. No matter how much stock he sets in movies and television shows, the characters and their journeys to love and redemption and happy endings, fairy tales rarely happen in real life; and though this wedding could be described as one, they certainly won’t happen to him. He’s known that ever since he was eight years old, after all, when a boy in his class called Zachary became the first breath of air after the long, suffocating grief of his mother’s passing.
Zachary flushed Jake’s handmade Valentine’s Day card down the toilet while their classmates looked on, jeering and calling Jake names he still doesn’t like to hear. He bit his tongue then, the sharp pain pushing back the sting in his eyes, and he’s never really stopped.
The song speaks of memories and Sunday mornings and summers spent listening to Bob Marley, and once more Jake glances over at Aiden—just in time to see Aiden and Toby stop dancing. Aiden steps back with an almost stricken expression on his face. Andrew seems to notice as well, and they both start to step toward the two men but catch themselves at the last second, exchanging a sheepish grin and shrugging it off. Jake will probably get the story later, and with Aiden and Toby taking up the dance again after a moment, it’s easy to do the same.
“Answer me one thing,” Andrew says. “Was it a mistake?”
Jake bites his lip and considers the question. Maybe it’s being surrounded by so much happiness and love; maybe it’s the image of his parents dancing in the faded light; maybe it’s even the burn of Aiden’s gaze from across the room…
“I thought it was, at first,” he finally answers.
Andrew nods, seemingly satisfied, and Jake lets himself relax into the final few bars of the song. Andrew thanks him for the dance and leaves him with a smile to take Toby’s sister’s hand just as she’s trying to leave the floor. Toby himself is standing with Aiden in the corner closest to the speakers, one hand on Aiden’s shoulder. It reminds Jake of Aiden’s brother Matthew.
When Aiden finds him a few minutes later, Jake is admiring the table of wedding favors—packages of green apples, homemade caramels and hot apple cider mix, all wrapped in plastic and tied up with twine.
“I can’t believe you’re
still
wearing this bracelet,” Jake says. He hooks his finger beneath the woven black cord around Aiden’s right wrist and gives it a gentle tug, admiring the different shades of green in its solitary, banded bead of malachite.
“It’s lucky,” Aiden tells him. “Green is lucky.”
Jake smiles, and in an effort to distract himself from just how good Aiden looks with his tie loose and shirtsleeves rolled to the elbow, he asks, “So what other dances do you know? I’d bet money that you didn’t just stop at ballroom dancing. Maybe salsa? Latin?
Line dance?”
Aiden pauses for a moment, looking as if he wants to talk about something else but thinking better of it. “I know the tango,” he says, fiddling with one of the favors.
“You know the tango,” Jake scoffs. “Sweet, naïve, awkward, seventeen-year-old Aiden learned the tango? I’ll believe that when I see it.”
“I’ll do you one better,” Aiden counters, drawing himself up and grabbing Jake’s hand to drag him back onto the floor as a low, sensual piece of music begin to pour from the speakers.
“This isn’t exactly tango music,” Jake says.
“Think you can keep up with me?”
“I know how to tango.”
“Not like this, you don’t,” Aiden says, and pulls Jake into their opening position. It’s a close embrace—a striking difference from what Jake learned in his dance elective. He’s used to arching his upper body away from his dance partner while maintaining contact at the hip, but Aiden has the position almost in reverse, their chests flush against each other and heads close. Seeming to notice his trepidation, Aiden says, “You learned the ballroom tango, I think, but this is the Argentine.”
Jake quickly picks up that the Argentine tango is an almost completely improvised dance that relies on the follower picking up on the lead’s cues. Aiden guides him through a simple
sistema cruzado,
and although the concept feels foreign to him after learning the fundamental ballroom choreography, Jake finds that it’s easy to follow Aiden’s movement. His is a body Jake knows; his arms feel so right around him that he wonders again how he could possibly be wrong.
But I was wrong about Max, and that sometimes felt right,
he thinks, improvising with a sudden rush of flirtatious courage and hooking his foot around Aiden’s calf, dragging it upward. He leans back into a controlled drop; Aiden leads them backward for four steps in time with the beat, and as the song swings down into its chorus, Jake straightens and takes the lead in order to surprise Aiden with a dip of his own.
With Aiden’s dark eyes shining in the light, his chest heaving and limbs pliable, Jake suddenly understands as he never did with his class partners why the tango is described as an overtly sexual dance.
Their movements grow in speed and complexity, and Jake starts to notice that guests are moving off the floor and forming a circle around them. He feels momentarily embarrassed that they’re stealing the focus, but they can’t very well stop now. Imbued with the same alien confidence he found onstage in Ann Arbor, Jake shows off by embellishing a simple step with a
pasada.
“I’m impressed,” Aiden says, smiling when they go back into a sweetheart walk just before the final chorus.
“Told you I could keep up.”
“I never really doubted you,” Aiden says, glancing at their audience and leaning close to whisper, “I’ve always thought that this dance is a little like sex, and we both know you’re okay at that.”
“Just ‘okay,’ huh?”
“Well, you know what they say…”
“Practice makes perfect?” Jake supplies. He fixes Aiden with a mock-glare and reminds him, “This, coming from the guy who was practically celibate?”
“Well, you can’t deny that I’m a fast learner,” Aiden says with a wink. Jake laughs as Aiden pulls him close again and throws a few spins into their steps to give their impromptu audience something to watch. Echoing Jake’s own sentiments from the bowling alley in Minneapolis, Aiden says in a low voice, “I’ve missed us like
this.”