Page 56 of Across Time

I force myself to smile, watching Claudette pull Henri onto the dance floor. “Yes,” I reply. “It’s a very nice dance.”

For someone who claimed to have no interest in swing dancing, he does it quite well, and that doesn’t surprise me. Henri’s one of those men for whom athleticism comes easily, naturally. Even the things he doesn’t want to do, he does well. And as much as he’s hurt my feelings tonight, I wish I were the one out there dancing with him.

“They make a pretty couple, don’t they?” asks Marie-Therese, observing them.

I shrug. They do, but I refuse to agree to it. “So who’s this Xavier?”

“I told you,” she says without interest. “Just someone who went to school with Henri.”

“He was cute,” I say, waiting for a reaction from her. “Is he nice?”

She nods, barely paying attention to the question. “Very.”

“He didn’t ask you out?”

She takes a sip of her drink. “He did. I told him I couldn’t while we still had company here.”

I laugh. “Oh my God. You stick me with a broken ankle and then use me as your excuse? It’s one date. Why not go out with him?” And move on from the priest, since you refuse to act on it. Move on with your life so Henri can move on with his.

“This town is not so big that you can just go on a single date without repercussions. He’s someone I’ll have to run into for the rest of my life. And speaking of people we keep running into, André is coming this way.”

I sigh. André is perfectly nice, but I’m not interested in him in the least and I’m feeling slightly too tired and disgruntled to be pleasant right now.

He holds his hand out to me. “May I have the next dance?”

I shake my head. “I can’t get out there. Not in a cast.”

His eyes twinkle. “But you could if they played a slow song, couldn’t you?” As if on cue, the music changes, and a ballad begins. “Don’t tell me I bribed him for no reason,” says André with a grin.

He leads me to the dance floor and we pass Henri and Claudette, who are just on the way off. Henri’s eyes darken as we pass. “Your cousin doesn’t seem to like me too much,” says André.

“Don’t take it personally,” I reply. “He doesn’t like me too much either.”

He places one hand politely on my waist and clasps the other and we begin to dance the way they mandated in high school, one body width apart. I find myself thinking about last night with Henri and the chocolate bar, the way we were pressed together, that desperation in his eyes when I was on top of him. How was that only yesterday, when today I’m apparently the only unattractive female in the whole town? My God, what a wasted effort this all was.

André asks if I’m having a nice time and I smile at him. “This is my first dance of the evening, so at least I can say it’s improving.”

The floor crowds quickly and he pulls me closer. “Here,” he says, after a moment, “come with me. People are getting too close to your cast.”

He pulls me into the hallway and off to a balcony on the other side, and we are suddenly alone. “Oh,” I say. “I thought you were taking me to another part of the dance floor.”

He pulls me toward him, holding me closer than necessary. “We can still dance,” he says, his breath gusting against my ear before he pulls me closer still, throwing me off balance just enough that I land against his chest. “It’s better when it’s private like this, I think.”

I pull back but he doesn’t release me. “I think this will look a little inappropriate if anyone comes out here,” I say, trying to wriggle from his grasp.

“Who cares?” he asks. “Are you really so worried about what your cousin will say?”

His head lowers as if he plans to kiss me, although I think I’ve made it amply clear that I’m trying to push him off. I’m saved by Marie-Therese, who throws open the curtains and stands there looking at us with wide eyes.

“Henri is looking for you,” she says, nervously. “We’re leaving now.”

“What a shock,” says André drily, slowly releasing me. I stumble in my haste to get away and hobble back toward the ballroom while Marie thanks him for watching me and then runs to my side.

“Are you okay?” she asks, steering us down the side hall instead of the main ballroom.

“I’m fine,” I say between my teeth. “Although I don’t understand why the hell you just thanked him for watching me. You treat that family like royalty.”

She looks at me uncertainly. “Henri and I have no family at all. No grandparents, no parents, no aunts or uncles. If something happens, we may need to rely on the people of the town to help us, and because of that, alienating anyone is a bad idea, and alienating the Beauvoirs is an especially bad idea, because they are wealthy and employ a lot of people here, and much of the town will take their cues from them.”