If I can’t get laid, I’m going to get fat. I leave a chocolate for Dad on the dining room table; he never mentions it, but I notice it’s gone when we’re walking out the door for our second and last dance lesson together. The feeling of dread that washed over me when we arrived at the first dance lesson is conspicuously absent this time around—I guess knowing what’s inside Madame Garba’s lair makes it a little less terrifying. Dad pays the girl at the front counter, and we make our way to the back of the studio, where once again the little kids are finishing up a Latin dance class. I wonder how Jonas and I would have handled a class like that as children. I wonder how many of these kids will grow up to be friends with their dance partners. I wonder how many of them will grow up to be more. And then I hate myself for wondering all of that when Jonas is the last thing I want to think about. Focus, Shelby, I think as we file in and begin our waltz class, Madame Garba barking out the count structure.
