She sighed, and laid the check down. She was still frowning. “Because I 'm worried about your welfare, I'll give in, but I will get my revenge,” she promised.
Then, I saw her grin, and she stood up, walking around and grabbing my hand. She pulled me from my seat and toward the dance floor. “I'm getting my revenge now, and if you don't dance with me, I'll tell Ava that you were rude,” she told me.
I laughed as I walked along with her. She pulled me onto the dance floor, and then released my hand and went up to the band. I stood there, staring at the couples who looked at me as if I was the strangest creature they had ever laid eyes on. I smiled crookedly.
Julie whispered something to the band and then they smiled and nodded, and began playing a song. Julie came back to me, and smiled as she place one hand in mine, and the other on my shoulder.
“Just follow my lead,” she said softly, as the band began to play their instruments to the tune of Linger.
We began to move, and I looked down to my feet. They tried to follow as hers did, moving forward, and then to the side, but I stepped on her toe, and I looked up to apologize.
Julie smiled and squeezed my hand. “It's okay. Just look at me. You'll dance better if you're not looking down,” she told me, and I did as she instructed.
I could feel people look at us, and I felt as if I had been transported back to the arcade again. I knew they were talking about us, or making assumptions in their mind. I knew the words I used to describe myself were probably crossing their minds too, and I grew stiff in her arms.
Julie released my hand, and linked her arms behind my neck. When I stopped moving, she placed her hand against my cheek. I saw the compassion in her eyes, the fear too.
“Ignore them. It's just you and me out here,” she whispered. I found solace in her words, despite my growing panic, and linked my hands behind her back. She slipped her hand around my neck again, and we danced.
Holding her was one of the most amazing past times a guy could have. She was so fragile, and yet, so alive. As if electricity ran through her veins and sparked anyone who got close. I could feel it transfer to me each time it pulsed.
No place in the world could hold me the way her eyes could. Nothing could make me feel so safe, and yet, so vulnerable. Only Julie. She held that power over me.
“You're dancing,” she told me, with her sweet smile.
I laughed. “I realized,” I replied.
“And you said you couldn't.”
“I guess you proved me wrong,” I informed her.
“Wouldn't be the first time,” she said, and things seemed to stop. She had been right. There wasn't anyone else on the dance floor but us. Just her, and me, and our arms wrapped around each other.
Just us. Alone. With the Cranberries melody playing behind us, and Julie's hands moving to the back of my head, and her leaning up to place her lips against mine. Just us. Alone. With Julie kissing me, and me kissing her back.
There was an explosion inside of me that I had known would happen if I ever touched her mouth. I thought to the times I had thought about the way it would feel to kiss her.
This made all of those thoughts look novice. Kissing Julie was better than anything I could have ever imagined. It was thrilling, and stimulating, and exciting and forthcoming.
The way her hands could bring me in, and leave a warm trail where they had moved up my neck would always be a mystery to me. How soft her skin was against my fingertips, how inviting her mouth was to mine, was beyond imagination.
I can't kiss her. I'll die. The thought was sudden, and it brought me back to reality. Her hands were on me, her mouth against mine, and the entire world was watching.
The entire world was watching the Beauty kiss the Beast.
In their heads, they were laughing. I knew they were. What we were doing looked perverse and unnatural. Someone as gorgeous as Julie shouldn't kiss someone as ugly and deformed as me. It wasn't natural.
I pulled away, and when I did, I heard Julie breathe in deeply. I could still feel her hands on me, and I watched how easily her eyes opened. Her face was a picture of innocence, and she looked at ease.
Until she looked at my face. Her features, which had once been soft, contorted and she stared at my face with a mix of fear and hesitation. “What's wrong, Falon? Did I-”
I removed her hands from my neck, and unchained mine from hers, I looked up to see people looking our way. I could see the judgment in their eyes as they looked at their partners and tried to keep their attentions off of us.
“Falon?” Julie said, more persistently. Her hand reached out for me, and I retracted. I did what I did best: hide.
I moved past her and walked quickly from the dance floor, toward the parking lot. By the time I made it to the back of my car, I was panting. Not from exhaustion from walking away so quickly but by what had just happened, how everything had suddenly changed and now, I knew there was no way of getting it back.
“Falon!” Julie yelled, coming behind me. I couldn't watch her come up to the car,
