The Book of Masks (Vol. 1)

The Dance Floor

Previously: "The Same Question, Over and Over" 

Despite—or maybe because—the SUV is so crowded, it's a fun ride out to the Warehouse. Sure, you're squeezed into the back seat with Cindy Vredenburg and her psycho boyfriend Seth Javits, but he's on the other side of the cabin from you, and you've got Mindy McAdams cuddling up against your chest with her arms around your shoulders. And though the space behind you echoes with shrieks and screams, someone is playing with your hair, smoothing it out with long fingers while Mindy plays with your hat.

It's too loud to think, let alone talk, especially after someone turns the radio on, all the way up to eleven, and blasts the urban nightscape after rolling down the windows so you can enjoy the sound of traffic as well. You can't see where you're going, and not until the SUV stops and someone shines a harsh flashlight in your face do you deduce that you've reached your destination. The car goes into motion again, briefly, until the windows go up and the motor and the radio both die. "Lemme out of this fucking tin can!" someone hollers in the darkness behind you.

You clamber out into a crowded parking under acrid mercury vapor lights. The sky is an oblivious black, and the walls of the nearby buildings look like stage flats: half-illumined blanks of brick and eyeless windows. A growling bassline beats at the air, and when you twist around you spot your destination: a three-story warehouse with open double doors out of which spills a harsh white light. Someone grabs your shoulder as you stare, and you help Mindy out. She slaps your hat back on your head and pulls you close to murmur in your ear: "First dance with me?" You can only nod your head, for your voice dies in your throat.

Hoots, whistles and cheers rocket into the air as your company gathers at the rear bumper of the SUV. The driver, you now see, was Marc Garner, Eva and Jessica's brother. He's dressed in Levis and a soccer jersey, and his spiky blonde hair gleams with gel. His eyes glint as he grins at you, and he raises his hand to give you a high five, which you return. "First time here?" he asks.

"Yeah," you confess.

"You'll have fun." He turns as a girl draws up beside him. She's tall, with a leonine mane of hair. "You know Hannah? This is Will," he continues without waiting for you to answer. "Will, Hannah." You put out your hand, but she puts hers on Marc, and goes onto her toes to bite his ear. He laughs, and pulls her off to the side.

"Christ, Will," Caleb mutters in your ear.

You jump. "Why are you so grumpy?"

"It was like a sardine can back there."

"How bad could it be," you retort, "when Eva and Jessica were two of the sardines?"

"Well, there was a guy back there, too." He must be complaining about the tall guy in front of you, who has his arm around a girl's shoulder.

Before Caleb can resume his plaint, Eva grabs you by the wrist and pulls you over. "Will, this is Tina," she says, introducing you to the girl. "She goes to Eastman."

"Hey Will," the girl says. Her voice is soft, and so is her southern lilt; a nimbus of blonde hair floats about her head. She cocks her head, then glances at Eva. "Is he—?"

"Uh huh!"

Is he what? you want to ask, but you've lost your voice again after Tina brushes the front of your shirt with her fingertips. "Let's get y'all in the light," she says, and she puts her arm in yours even as her guy pulls himself closer to her. You avoid looking at him. You do catch Caleb's face, and his frown, though.

By some unspoken agreement your group of ... Eleven? Were there really that many squeezed into the SUV? ... moves toward the doors. You and Caleb hang back, though, for Javits and Cindy—arms around each other's waists—are at the front of the crowd. Jessica notices you, though, and falls back in stride with you. "Don't get lost, Will," she laughs.

The thumping beat grows louder, and something about it bothers you more than just the noise. It's not until your hand brushes your pocket, and the cell phone you're carrying there, that you remember the danger you're walking into. "Are there any quiet places inside?" you ask Jessica, and you have to put your mouth to her ear so she can her you.

"Ar-you-eff-kay-em?" she shouts back.

"Well, I got a problem!"

"With loud noises?"

You don't answer, for there's a gauntlet to run at the doors—four meaty guys in red t-shirts with lanyards around their necks. You recognize two of them—Erik Carstairs and Joshua Call—and you dodge their eyes even though no one challenges your group. Once you're inside, though, you pull Jessica closer. "My dad's gonna try calling me later, to check up on me!"

"So?"

"So I told him I was at Caleb's! If he hears this noise, he'll know I was lying!"

"Come over here," Jessica says, and pulls you to the side of a wide lobby. But she doesn't say anything for a few minutes as, with darting eyes, she thinks through your problem. "Oh, I know!" she finally exclaims. "Gimme your phone!"

"What do you want with it?"

"Never mind! It's an old trick Eva and I use!"

Reluctantly, you hand your cell over. "You're not gonna just hide it in your SUV, are you?" you ask. "'Cos that won't fool my dad!"

"Don't worry about it!" She takes out her own phone. "I just need to call someone! Go on inside!" She pushes you toward Caleb, who is lingering nearby, then bends over her phone as her thumbs fly over the screen.

"What's that about?" Caleb asks. You only shrug.

The entranceway opens out into a larger lobby area. To the left is a tall set of open double doors, out of which the driving music thunders in concussive waves. You peek inside. The floor is dark, and there aren't a lot of people dancing in it, but along the far wall is a dimly lit stage, atop which gyrate three guitar players.

But Marc and the others have gone through another set of doors, into a room against the walls of which makeshift refreshment bars—sheets of plywood atop sawhorses—have been set up with coolers beneath and behind. Half a dozen teenage bartenders are taking money and handing over bottles of beer. One guy is handing a customer a hand-rolled joint.

"Did you bring any cash?" Caleb asks you.

"Five bucks," you reply. But it turns out your money is as worthless here as it was at Nirdlinger's, for Eva insists on paying for you. She won't pay for Caleb, though, and he glowers as he reluctantly exchanges a couple of bills for a beer of his own. And he watches sourly as Eva positions you next to the bar and takes a picture of you on her phone.

* * * * *

And that more or less sets the pattern for the first hour of the night. Your company sprawls around a warped table on some saggy booths that look like they were rescued from a burned-out restaurant. You're squeezed in between Eva and Jessica, who insist on getting you to talk with that Tina girl, and they pose with you for the pictures that Tina takes. Mindy—a pretty girl who has never paid much attention to you—watches with bright-eyed fascination as you try to make yourself sound interesting. "I just hang out," you have to shrug when Tina asks what you like to do. "Being stylish?" she asks, and takes another picture.

Mindy does get her first dance with you on the still-uncrowded floor, but it doesn't last long because you're not very good. Jessica intercedes and pulls you into a corner, where she shows you where to put your hands on her hips and how to rock your hips back and forth in a solid, swinging rhythm. "Just do that," she says as she pushes your hands off her, "then add little things on top." She adds some snaky moves with her arms, and darts her head around. "Simple downstairs, complicated upstairs," she says. You imitate her, and find it surprisingly easy to do. "Now go find someone," she says, and settles your new hat more firmly on your head and brushes down your shirt front.

"Who?"

"Christ, Will. Anyone. You'll do fine."

And so you do, moving from one free-floating girl to another. You're struck by the fact that in every case you move off the girl before she moves away from you, and that several times a girl will swing in to push one of your partners away so that she can take over.

But it's pretty exhausting, and you're about to give up when Eva sidles up, puts her arm in yours, and turns you toward the door. "Look who we brought for you," she shouts in your ear.

It takes you a moment to figure out who she's pointing toward, for the crowd has been growing thicker.

It's Kristy Suffolk.

She's dressed down in jeans and a windbreaker, and though she's not dancing she is swaying slightly as she scans the crowd.

"Go up to her!" Eva's mouth is right at your ear. "Don't talk! Just pull in her in and dance with her!"

Your heart is like a jackhammer in your chest, and the sway in your step has more to do with the water in your legs than the beat in your feet as you approach her. She does a little double take at you, and smiles. But she's still looking past your ear.

Your inner dance almost stalls out.

Then a sharp fingernail races up your back. Your confidence—how weird it is to feel confidence!—races to life again.

You put your hands on Kristy's hips, as Jessica showed you, and pull her toward you as you dance.

For only a moment she holds back.

Then she's dancing with you.

* To continue: "The Afterglow" 

*
"Table of Contents (Vol. 1)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 1)"