DANI AND TYLER ARE talking the entire car ride, but I have no idea what they’re saying because their voices are competing with a billion formless thoughts that flow through my body to my brain all at once, jumbling together, so that I can’t parse out anything coherent, anything that remotely makes sense.
Less than ten minutes after she picks me up, Dani is pulling into a big, crowded parking lot. There’s a neon sign at the entrance of a giant warehouse-looking building that flashes THE SPOT, THE SPOT, THE SPOT, over and over again. We’ve only just stepped out of the car, and already my eardrums vibrate with the sound of the music pounding.
“Okay, listen up. Both of you,” she announces as Tyler trudges up behind us. “I plan on having a good time tonight. So no excuses from either of you—we’re dancing, all of us, and we’re going to have fun. Got it?”
“Yes, drill sergeant,” Tyler murmurs unenthusiastically, raising his eyebrow at me—the corner of his mouth hooking up into a smirk, which makes me laugh.
“Come on.” She reaches for my hand, pulling me along, and I suddenly feel like such a normal girl doing normal things. Then she drapes her arm across my back and around my shoulder, something between us buzzing with new energy.
I stop laughing then. I stop breathing, because Tyler’s stupid voice has lodged itself in my head, whispering, Are you? Are you? over and over again. I focus on the fresh air. I swallow gulps of it, trying to fuel my mind back up with oxygen. And when we get to the door, I have no choice but to let her do the talking, because I’ve been rendered speechless by the weight of her arm across my shoulder. She tells the bouncer at the door that we’re here for the Unhomecoming Dance and then pays my cover charge for me. I notice that Tyler pays his own.
“Thanks for getting that,” I yell over the music as the bouncer draws a thick black X on each of our hands as we enter. But under my words there’s a thought brewing—one that makes my heart skid through a few beats—Is this a date?
Being inside this club is like being inside of a giant speaker. I swear I can almost see the sound waves hammering themselves out through the air, ricocheting against the walls. But that’s probably just the flashing lights. I move in close to Dani and have to shout in her ear, “I’ll pay you back!” Except I can barely even hear my own words once they’re out of my mouth. I have to repeat it two more times before she hears me, and then she shakes her head, gives me the thumbs-down, and grabs on to my hand again, leading me through the sweaty bodies jumping around, covered in glitter, spilling their drinks.
The three of us huddle in a circle and Dani holds her hand out to Tyler, as if she’s waiting for him to give her something. He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a little bottle of hand sanitizer, squeezes a glob into his own hand, then Dani’s. Then Dani grabs my hand and turns it over so Tyler can give me some as well.
“You guys . . . ,” I caution, feeling my eyes widen as I look around. “What if we get caught?”
They look at each other and start laughing hysterically, rubbing their hands together until the black X disappears.
“Drinks!” Tyler shouts. Then he walks off into the crowd. We follow in the direction he went until we get to the bar. Dani gets me a drink—it’s pink. She orders one for herself and Tyler, too. I have no idea what it is, but when I bring it to my nose, it smells fruity and toxic, all at the same time. We stand there next to the bar and she holds up her glass, and then she reaches over to position my arm so that I’m holding my glass up as well, and yells: “To unhomecoming! And to us surviving our first Robinson exam!”
“Cheers, y’all,” Tyler sings.
Dani clinks her glass against mine, then Tyler’s, then takes a sip.
I do the same. I’m too embarrassed to admit this is my first adult beverage.
It’s like I can feel it traveling through my veins immediately, both warm and cool. It sizzles when it reaches my chest, and gives me the chills when it reaches my brain, then it’s inside of me, moving everywhere, working its way through my extremities, untying all those knots. I take another sip.
The three of us move through the bodies again, out onto the dance floor, except this time it’s like I’m swimming with the current instead of against it. Dani leads us to the very center of the place, the source of the pulse that pounds through the walls and floors and me. The DJ—a girl, superthin, with wild, curly hair that sticks out in every direction—is up on this elevated platform like a deity, surrounded by turntables and equipment and adoring dancers. She has her eyes closed. With one of her hands she holds a heavy-duty set of headphones to one ear only, and she raises the other arm in the air, moving it back and forth to the beat that she’s creating, like she’s conducting some invisible orchestra. Then she opens her eyes slowly, like she’s waking from a dream, finding Dani immediately. Then Tyler, then me. She smiles, mouthing the word “Hey,” and she holds her arm still as she points at us, a strangely warm, welcoming gesture. She gently absorbs the momentary stillness into the rhythm and goes back to blissing out, everything in her body thumping along smoothly, in total harmony with the music.
“That’s Kate!” Tyler shouts. “Dani’s ex!”
My heart plummets. My whole body goes still. That girl is older than us, cool, confident, clearly so out—the exact opposite of me. There’s no way I can ever compete.
“They’re totally over, though!” he assures me.
I take another sip of my drink—no rules, I remind myself—and soon enough it begins to feel like I’m drinking the music, too. It works its way into my blood and my bones; another burst of fire and ice flows through me like electricity. I think about the now again, because this is a place composed solely of nows. In this moment—in this now—I have no past, I have no future. And I don’t know why, but somehow this is one of the most comforting thoughts I’ve ever had. I take another sip, and another.
The next thing I know, somehow this place has taken me over, and my body moves on its own. I am dancing. The bass goes crazy—faster, somehow louder, more intense—like a veil has been torn off the whole world, making everything that much clearer, that much sharper. I jump up and down with them like I was made to do this. I’m laughing so hard, except I can’t even hear myself. We hold on to one another’s hands, flying them up above our heads like flags through the air and the sound waves. And it’s like we become one person, and we become one with the people all around us, one with Kate, up there on her pedestal, one with the building, and one with the music and the air and lights. We all breathe the same breath; our hearts beat the same beat. There’s no such thing as time. Just now. Right now. Dani leans in and kisses me on the cheek. And I never want this song to end.
The rest of the night is a blur, but in a good way—a fantastic dream half remembered. As I lie down in bed and close my eyes, I replay the movie of this night on the walls of my eyelids, feeling connected, as if there’s an invisible thread still tethering me to that place, to Dani.
Then comes my favorite part. The part where Tyler and I are standing outside waiting for Dani to pull the car around, the perfectly chilled autumn air flowing through me, our backs against the brick wall, and Tyler looks at me, his eyes slightly glazed, and says something I didn’t know I needed to hear so badly. “You know Dani likes you, right?”
I open my eyes. I am here in my bed. I place my hand over my heart, but it’s almost like it’s beating outside of me now. In the floor and ceiling and walls. Boom-boom, boom-boom, boom-boom, contracting and expanding in pairs. I hear its pulse in my ears, whispering this one word over and over, like a bass line: NowNowNowNowNow.