Free Insipid by Christine Brae

he scoots his body down, stretches out his legs, and rests his head on my shoulders. Slowly, he leans in to plant tiny kisses along the side of my chin, trailing along until he teases my lips with a slight brush of his. The energy in the bar is turned up drastically when the DJ starts to play dance tunes. We sit in silence for a while until he stands up and takes my hand. “Dance?”
    “No thanks.”
    “Oh, come on. It’s Pitbull. We have to.”
    “Pit who?” I joke with a puzzled look on my face.
    He rolls his eyes but doesn’t respond. Gingerly, he pulls me by the hand until I find myself following him on to the dance floor. We move together. I keep up with him. He looks so young, so full of energy. He gawks at me, surprised at the fact that I can dance. The floor is so crowded that I lose him for a minute. There are two men surrounding me, dancing with me, but I don’t pay any attention to it. I keep dancing. I’m lost. In every sense of the word.
    He finds me and makes no qualms about hooking me by the waist and pulling me close to him. “You’re so sexy I can hardly stand it,” he gushes in my ear. “And you can move.”
    “Hip hop dance classes are the best for cardio! You should try it!” I yell through the loud music. Just as those words leave my lips, I’m hit with a flashback of the life I used to have. I would give up this night with him to go back to the beginning.
    “What’s the matter, MP?” he asks as he pulls me close, nestling my head on his shoulder. We’re slow dancing to a hip hop song, but the tune that plays in my head is one I don’t care to hear.
    “Nothing. I was just thinking about how much I missed you, Double O,” I whisper.
    “I’m here now,” he answers. “I’m sorry I stayed away for so long.”

 
     
    I SPEND MOST of Wednesday morning recounting a play by play of what happened between us last night. We spent a few hours watching the view of the city, talking, laughing, catching up on our lives on opposite sides of the world.
     
    “Enough about me, Jade. Tell me about you. Your family. Your life.”
    “There’s nothing to tell, really. I plan to take some time soon to see my parents. My dad is in the middle of another acquisition, so I’ve been helping him with that in addition to everything else that’s going on.”
    “An only child, huh? Did you have a lonely childhood? I know I can’t imagine my life without my siblings. Our house was always full of activity when I was growing up.”
    “I kind of like being by myself. I didn’t really have anyone else so it’s not like I knew what I was missing.”
    We both started stifling our yawns by 2:00 am. It was time to call it a night. We both walked out of the bar, quietly smirking as he wrapped himself around me when we passed by the two servers who ogled him all night.
    We stood by the train tracks across the street to share a cigarette before addressing the inevitable.
    “Take a cab with me, Jade. I’ll drop you off at your hotel.” He kept his arm around me before taking my hand and waving his free arm in the air to hail a taxicab.
    “Don’t be silly. My hotel is right there.” I pointed at the glaring neon light right across the street from us. “I’m just going to walk.”
    He pulled me towards the door as the cab stopped right in front of us. I stepped back and released his hand. “No, Luke. It’s okay. I’ll walk. You get in and I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
    He let out a sigh, looking right into my eyes. He didn’t say anything, but the expression on his face showed me that he wanted to say more than just goodnight. “Okay. If you insist. I’m not going to force you into anything. Goodnight, Jade.” He leaned over slowly and planted a quick kiss on my lips.
    “Bye, Luke. Thank you for such a fun evening,” I said as I turned around and walked away.
     
    I’m kicking myself. Our hotels were so close to where we were that I know the cab ride was going to be the start of something. I