The next dance was a folk number, and Theo turned me until my back met his chest and held my hands out wide in the starting position. Had it really been years since we’d practiced these steps in the Artisan dance hall, laughing and falling over each other’s feet?
We followed the flow of dancers in a circle. Theo led me with expertise. Feet pounded the plywood and reverberated in my bones. My borrowed red dress arced when I spun, and I didn’t try to stem the gaiety, the freedom of it. My shawl slipped from my shoulders and puddled around my elbows. As always, the tendrils around the frame of my face sprung free, and when I finally looked back at Theo, he was smiling at me—not, it seemed, at the simple happiness of barn dancing.
And it made me sad that I no longer saw him in the same way I
