When the song repeated itself, he frowned and got up to take it off. No water now, no sounds upstairs. She’d be drying herself, toweling her hair, pinning it back up. He heard a soft movement, like mice, and knew she must be crossing the hall. In his room. He took a handful of records and put them on in a stack so he wouldn’t hear anything else, no rustling, nothing to make his thoughts dart back and forth. Just a piano, bass, and guitar, and the steady rain. He put his feet back up on the sill. The old afternoons had never been long enough-a rush to get dressed, back into the city. Now the minutes stretched out with nowhere to go, as formless and lazy as the cigarette smoke curling up in the empty house.
He didn’t hear her when she came in, just felt some change in the air behind the music, a smell of lavender. He turned his head and saw that she was standing still, waiting for him to see her. Making an entrance, tentative. He stood up, staring, his mind turning over. The bath had given her color, pink as his room, her old face. But there was more. The dress was a little big and she had belted it tightly, making it blouse over on top, a 1940 dress. She had combed out her hair to go with it, letting it fall down around her face in the old style. All arranged, like an invitation, everything he’d asked for. She smiled shyly, taking his silence for approval, and took a few steps toward him, then turned to the phonograph, a girl on a date looking for something to say.
“What does it mean, ‘you’re the cream in my coffee’?” she said, looking at the record.
“That they go together,” he said absently, still staring at her.
“It’s a joke?” she said, making small talk.
He nodded, hearing the lines now because she seemed to be listening. “Like that. ‘My Worcestershire, dear.’”
“Worcestershire?” Stumbling over it in English.
“A sauce.”
She glanced over at him. “Do I look all right?”
“Yes.”
“I borrowed the shoes.”
And then nothing, just looking at him while the record changed, waiting. A slower song now, “I’ll String Along with You,” the kind they dreamed to at Ronny’s. She came over to him, swaying a little in the unfamiliar shoes, and put her hand on his shoulder.
“Do you still know how? I think I forget.”
He smiled and put his hanc on her waist, beginning to move with her.
They danced in a small circle, not close, letting the song lead. Through the thin material he could feel that she had nothing on underneath and it startled him, as if she were naked, past the fumbling hooks and snaps of getting undressed, all ready. He moved away slightly, still unsure of her, but she held him, her eyes on his, keeping him with her. No sound but the rain.
“You didn’t have to do this,” he said, touching her hair.
“I wanted to. You like it this way.”
A smile, pleased with herself, still looking up at him, until finally he didn’t know what it meant, what had happened upstairs, except that questions would ruin it and they were moving together. Just dance, a little bit at a time. The record changed. She moved closer, warm against him, so that he could feel the swell of her down below, the faint scratch of her hair through the material, teasing him. He started to move back.
“It’s all right,” she said. “I want to feel you.”
But she had blinked, like the gasp at the tree, and when she put her head on his shoulder it was to close her eyes, willing herself against him.
“Lena, you don’t-”
“Just hold me.”
They danced through the song, not hearing it, their feet moving by themselves, an excuse for being close, and the music worked, he felt her let go, an easy leaning into him. A little bit more. But she surprised him again, pressing tighter to feel him there and putting her arms around his back, her mouth to his ear.
“Let’s go upstairs,” she whispered.
“You’re sure?”
She didn’t answer, just led him slowly across the room so that their going seemed another part of the dance, rhythmic and dreamy, one leg after another up the stairs. Now it was he who was tentative, not sure what to do, following her, watching her stop halfway up to take off the shoes, a slow, erotic gesture, undressing for him, bending gracefully to pick them up, then the bare feet, pale white, as if they were the most intimate thing about her. He followed the rest of the way, watching her skirt brush against her legs, and then they were in his room, the music went away, distant, and he could hear himself breathing. He stood waiting, still at a loss, while she let the shoes fall and turned to him and opened the top button of his shirt, then the next, movements as deliberate as steps. She opened the shirt, smoothing her hands across his chest, making his skin tense at the surprise of it, then went back to the buttons, down, almost to the last, when she stopped and leaned her head against his bare skin, resting there.
“Help me,” she said.
