Rock me mama like a southbound train
The guitar solo starts and Isaac steps up his game a bit. He’s not a bad dancer. At all. He moves me around the dancefloor precisely on beat and when we get to the second verse of the song, I watch him mouth the words along and it’s impossible not to feel this contagious sense of freedom and happiness from dancing with him.
The alcohol doesn’t hurt either. And suddenly the country music that I’m not even that fond of becomes the best sound in the world and I feel at home in the arms of this man that I barely even know.
When the song ends, I expect Isaac to let me go but he spins me around one more time and holds me so close to him that I can smell the beer on his lips. And the beer smells good on his lips. The song changes to Country Girl (Shake It For Me) by Luke Bryan. I haven’t heard that song since college, but Isaac clearly knows it.
He sings to me: Shake it for the birds, shake it for the bees, shake it for the catfish swimming down deep in the creek, for the crickets and the critters and the squirrels, shake it to the moon, shake it for me girl…
It’s easy to get into the song with Isaac egging me on and within a few seconds, I’m shaking ass to Luke Bryan while Isaac claps his hands together and whoops with delight at my foolish ass moves. If Averie hasn’t abandoned me yet, I’m sure she’s clinging to the wall at the back of the bar, wondering how the hell people so different from each other ended up as siblings.
When I’m done with the solo part of my dance, Isaac takes my hand and spins me around the dancefloor again until we’re in the middle surrounded by other couples who took the risk of joining us on the dancefloor. The next time Luke Bryan sings the chorus, Isaac and I drunkenly sing every word at each other before our bodies cling to each other and we rock sideways across the dancefloor.
By the time the song fades and the two of us are close to the back wall of the bar, I wonder if I should slip away to findAverie, but I just can’t. Isaac looks down at me patiently, waiting for the first few chords of the next song and I’m totally weak at the knees when I hear the familiar sound of Chris Stapleton’s Tennessee Whiskey.
Isaac grins. I think he mouths, “I love this song.”
It feels wrong to dance to a slow song like this with somebody else’s husband. Isaac reaches for my hand and I want to pull away, but his hands are so large and wrap around mine with such firmness that I just look into his eyes and let him guide me. His eyes never leave mine as he eases me away from the wall and dangerously close to his body.
There won’t be all those spins and ass shaking with a slow song like this one, but that makes it even scarier to get close to Isaac. His arms move again and as the words to the song start, I can’t help but rest my head on Isaac’s chest. I don’t know where the craving comes from, but something tells me to put my head right up against his strong chest and just let this happen — whatever this is.
Isaac’s chest vibrates as he sings quietly. I don’t move my head, nor do I move his hands from the sides of my hips.
You’re as smooth as Tennessee whiskey…
You’re as sweet as strawberry wine…
His voice sounds good and reminds me of Johnny Cash more than Chris Stapleton. I can’t move my head from his chest, even if we’ve been dancing so closely that it almost scares me. This is the first time I’ve been this close to another man in years. My break up is still so fresh that this feels wrong.
Except — we’re broken up. There’s no going back. Even ifI wanted our relationship to be the way that it was, those good memories could never be the same again. If Derek treasured the love we had, maybe it wouldn’t have died.
But it’s gone now. So I’m dancing in this country bar on a stranger’s chest and I feel the strangest sense of relief and safety from letting him hold me. It’s not fair that he’s a stranger. A married stranger, at that. It’s not fair that nothing can happen between us.
But at least we have this song — Tennessee Whiskey, by Chris Stapleton.
I can hear the guitar chords slow down as the song nears its end. Isaac’s grip doesn’t let up as he holds me closer to him. I look up at him with curiosity, desperate not to seem too attached to dancing with him or holding him. Isaac doesn’t budge, doesn’t seem to feel smothered at all by my closeness the way most men would.
His eyes bore down into mine. Landslide by Fleetwood Mac starts and everybody else in the bar cheers. He doesn’t want to move. I know that much. And maybe he’s thinking about more. I can’t tell.
“I want to kiss you so fucking badly right now,” Isaac growls. “But I don’t want to scare you off.”
“What about your wife?”
I’m afraid of changing, ‘cause I’ve built my life around you.
But time makes you bolder.
Even children get older.
And I’m getting older too.
“I only have a wife on paper,” Isaac says. “Tonight, I’m alone.”
Grief twists him up behind his gaze. I see it because I feel it too. I’ve been there. Too afraid to let go, too afraid to screwup, too sad to do anything but cling to the first person I find.
“I don’t want to complicate things.”
“It won’t,” Isaac says. “I promise.”