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Reluctantly, I took my feet too, and April followed suit. We waved, feeling awkward and fully aware we were causing a disturbance in the audience as other parents grumbled around us.
"Is dat you? It's so dark."
"Yes, honey," Cormac called back. "Now go ahead and dance. We're watching."
Maddie dropped her hands and straightened, clearly realizing the dance had gone on without her, and then she turned and scuttled into the center of the group of girls. She managed to pick up at the spot they'd reached, just before the final steps of the dance.
They took their seats again, Cormac sighing and sinking low in his seat.
April reached across and gave his arm a squeeze. "They're so great." She whispered. And then she looked at me, and my too-full heart stretched even further to accommodate the realization that I’d already fallen. In just over two weeks, at a time when I was sure there wasn't a thing that could pull me back to the land of the living, here was April. I took her hand, twining my fingers through hers, and I sat through the rest of the show, almost wishing it would never end so I could just bask in the nearness of her and the happy realization that life did, in fact, move forward, even when you thought it couldn't.
* * *
The girls wanted everyone to go together for ice cream after the performance, so that is what happened, and I was glad to prolong the evening. And when we’d parted ways and April and I were alone in the dark cab of my truck, I turned to her.
"Come home with me?" I wanted to hold her close, to feel her breath against my neck, to slide my hands into the hair I loved. I wanted to tell her how I felt, or at least maybe hint around it, find out if maybe she felt the same thing. I thought she did. Her eyes seemed to say she did.
"I didn't pack a bag," she said, her voice low and regretful. "I can't do the walk of shame in this dress tomorrow, and I sent the clothes I’d had at your house out to be laundered."
I grinned at the mental image her walk of shame brought up. "No, I guess not," I said.
"But you could easily do it in your suit," she added.
I glanced at my own attire and realized she'd just given me an invitation. "Your place then?"
"If you don't mind," she said. Her voice dropped even lower and she stared at her hands as she added, "I don't want to say good night to you. Or goodbye, actually."
"I'd see you tomorrow either way." I said this, hoping maybe she didn't just mean for tonight but unwilling to risk being wrong.
She didn't look up, but I saw her chest rise as she took a deep breath, steeling herself. "I mean at all. I don't know how I'm going to go home, knowing that you're here. That we're…" she trailed off, and then raised her eyes to meet mine. "We're…we're something, right? I'm not imagining things?"
I felt his skin heat as I realized I was not alone in my feelings, and I turned to face April in the close cab, ignoring the protest from my ankle as I pushed it into the floor boards so I could turn fully. "You're not imagining things."
She smiled wide for just a second, as if this confirmation was a relief to her too. She lifted a hand to the side of my face, letting it linger there a long moment before trailing it down and running her finger across my lips. Her touch left a trail of tingling skin, and I fought the urge to rocket myself into her. But as her hand dropped, so did the smile. "So what will happen? What will we do when I go?"
I smiled with a brightness I didn't feel. "They have these things called airplanes," I said.
April stuck her tongue out at me and poked me in the leg, but then let her hand stay there, palm flat to my thigh. "I'm going to take half your name away if you're going to be sarcastic."
"So I'll just be 'wizard?' I like it."
"You'll just be a dick."
I couldn't wait a second longer, and despite the protest in my ankle and the tightness of the fitted suit I wore, I leaned across and pulled April in hard for a kiss. I had to feel her softness in my arms, feel her lips against mine. Her arms went around my neck, and her side of the kiss was every bit as ardent and demanding as mine. When we pulled apart, each a little breathless, I said, "We'll figure it out. It'll be okay." I didn't have the confidence that colored my voice—I didn't like the idea of a cross-country relationship. But I had money. I could make it work. "We won't say goodbye."
"Okay," she said quietly, and I knew she wasn't sure she believed me either.
We drove back to the hotel, and April paused in the lobby to greet Annabelle, who was dressed like a nutcracker tonight, bright red circles pasted on her cheeks and a very tall soldier's hat on her head.
"Don't you two look lovely," Annabelle gushed, taking us in.
"We were at the ballet," I explained.
"Oooh, the Kennedy Center?" Annabelle clapped her hands together and looked wistful.
"Uh, no," April corrected. "Miss Rosie's School of Dance. They put onThe Nutcrackerat the high school theater."
"Oh," Annabelle said, but she didn't look any less excited about that. "Well, you two have a good night," she said.
