“Can you dance?”

Condescending prick, she thinks and looks at his outstretched hand. If this had been the first time she’d seen him, she might have just let it go, hand and offer both.

But she was bored and she’d been watching him. His mouth was set and a little grim, but it still curved at the corners like a sturdy shot glass. Like he’d known how to smile once, but these days he was trying to cut down.

It was a flight of fancy, maybe, but she saw something beating behind his eyes. It could have been a dozen lesser things, or it could have been his heart.

So she laid her hand in his.

Was a slow night, so the bartender was playing country and blue grass, because Brooklyn got sad for something under its heels other than cold stone.

Was a slow night so you could hear their boot heels as he led her to a clear space between the stools and the tables and chairs. He didn’t look in her eyes as he slow-turned her about.

He wasn’t a very good dancer, she noticed, and mostly he didn’t step on her feet because hers were faster and more aware. Women, she thought, have been making these same concessions for centuries.

He laid his hand on the small of her back, and as his fingers pressed, she felt somebody else. Not a somebody of hers, in his touch she felt the echo of another woman. This man was dancing with a memory.

She could have been angry, but not many men danced anymore. Not even poorly. Not like this. So she led herself sway with him while he swayed with that long-ago her.

She saw his eyes relax and his lips mouth the words to the song like he was the only one in the room. She laid her head on his chest because there are all sorts of charity in this city. A dollar in a coffee cup fished out of a trash can, or allowing a stranger to two-step with the past.

As the song ended, he dipped her low and she felt herself wanting to swoon, if only out of habit. Their eyes met for the first time since they’d first spoke and he snapped awake with an embarrassed smile. Setting her back on her feet, he nodded.

“Thank you.” He said and brushed his fingers against his forehead and returned to his seat and she to her friends. She still watched him. Watched him lay down cash and shake hands with the bartender. Watched his shoulders hunch up again, and eyes his turn toward the floor or someplace much further away. By the time he’d walked out of the bar without a glance, he was back where he’d been.

And so was she.