
jeronimo sanz
JOHN
It was the coldest night of January 2009; Minnesota does not fuck around with January, temperatures and wind chills dip below zero regularly to test your mettle. You can brag about surviving them later. I put on two pairs of tights and threw a furry vest over my turtleneck dress for extra warmth, but it was still an impractical outfit. John and I joined our handful of friends on the street outside of Dinkytown and we walked to Andyās party. The others were in the basement, sticky and sweaty from dancing and spilled keg beer. The heat and Talking Heads rose to meet us as we walked down the stairs to join.
Later, my stupid vest abandoned on the floor, John and I were alone upstairs in the kitchen. Someone had put āSilver Liningā by Rilo Kiley on the iPod, a song both of us loved. And in the unspoken language you have with your best friend, your partner, the Will to your Grace even though you both deny that, we locked eyes and reached for the otherās hand. I danced to him in swishy little steps in my broken-down boots with the busted heels and we twirled around the room singing to each other. Someone came in to watch, but we didnāt notice. Those four minutes were ours. As far as we were concerned, no one else had ever danced to this song before us.
That night, we left the party together as we always did. Itās very, very cold at 1:30 AM in Minnesota in January, but we didnāt wait for a bus or call a cab. āLetās just sing every song we know,ā we said. āThat will help us forget that weāre cold.ā
And so we did. For our entire walk home, all 25 minutes of it, we sang whatever popped into our brains. I donāt remember feeling cold at all.
ANTHONY
I spent most of my working hours with Anthony and we bickered like a married couple. It happens when youāre running a store together nine hours a day, five days a week. Iād bitch at him for not getting enough change for the register drawer, and heād snip at me for eating a McDonaldās sundae behind the counter. Iād call him a slob. Heād tell me I was too uptight. I hate being told to relax.
We had fooled around a few times that year, bolstered by the godawful winter and some lethal, boozy punch. We were close to the same height, both blonde and blue-eyed and good-looking in a healthy, corn-fed sort of way. Anthony was the one I went to when Iād done something really stupid at a pool party, busted up my knee bashing it on my steering wheel, fucking a boy who immediately left me for another girl. I crawled into the store the morning after, hungover and makeup-free, and went right into his arms. I donāt really like to be hugged, let alone touched, but I always felt so secure in Anthonyās embrace. Maybe thatās how itād feel if I had a big brother. He let me cling to his stocky, muscled chest as long as I needed. He was always so warm, radiating heat.
When weād get into tiffs at the store, both of us stubborn as cattle, heād stop in the middle of the carpeted circus of rolling racks carrying discounted Varvatos shirts and dad jeans and beckon to me. Heād go into a lunge, point a finger at me and wiggle it along with his eyebrows, demanding I come towards him. I always did. Heād grab me, pull me close and dance with me until I laughed and forgot why I was so pissed at him. Weād twirl, weād spin, heād dip me low til I squealed and customers would laugh at us.
Later that year, when he drunkenly pinned me against a wall and asked me through a mouthful of whiskey why I wouldnāt date him, when he followed me down to his vomit-splattered bathroom repeating the question and yelling at me to answer, I tried to remember the dancing to bash out the bad memories. It didnāt work then, but it does now, two years later. Certain songs will play while Iām ringing $10 t-shirts and Iāll pretend heās standing behind me, waiting for me to wrap up with the customer so we can dance again.
UNCLE JEFF
Our small town bar was bustling with people; there was a band playing, a band of men who lived nearby and appeared to play cover songs when asked. They werenāt good, but they werenāt bad. They played Tom Petty and āFishinā in the Darkā and things like that, the kind of songs Midwesterners like to hear when theyāve been drinking. Comfort songs. Iād been celebrating my old classmate Donnyās 21st birthday with my four best girlfriends, the girls I grew up with and love like sisters, drinking rounds of Bud Light.
I always liked dancing with the men I grew up with, farmers and agronomists and the like. They knew a few dances, they led, they held your hand confidently and chatted sweetly, simply with you as you danced. My dad doesnāt dance, but my brother does. Some of my uncles do too. And I, like my mother and her band of sisters, love to dance with a man who knows how.
Donnyās sister, drunk and grinning, pushed my uncle Jeff towards me. āDance with your niece!ā She crowed. My dadās brother had been silent, grouchy, through my childhood; he was mad at me when I was little and drew kitties, pink and blue and childish, all over the cement of the shop with chalk. That defined our relationship for the next few years.
Most of my paternal uncles are quiet men who mumble a few words at their niece who lived on the home farm, a girl they watched grow from a tiny child singing āSomewhere Out Thereā to anyone who would listen to the young woman I am now. I know that all of them are proud of me and that they love me, but they just donāt have the words to say it. From them I have inherited a lonely streak, a sharp tongue and quick wit and a tendency to hit the bottom of the bottle a little too hard sometimes.
I was buzzed enough to grab Jeffās hand and let him push me awkwardly around the floor for a few minutes. It was the only time we ever talked for more than a moment or two and the only time we ever touched. He died a year or two ago, cancer, left three grown daughters and a son who is now 14, shy and mumbly as his kin. I didnāt go to the funeral; I stayed with Grandma and chatted aimlessly at her as they buried her son. I know she appreciated my company, but she never said it. She didnāt really need to.
SAM
I keep this memory wrapped up in my brain, wrapped like a present and labeled āSAVEā in heavy red printing. In my mind, itās tied with a velvet ribbon I can run my fingers across when I feel particularly grey, when Iāve stayed up too late or slept too long or driven too far. Maybe I should let it go, but itās too pretty to forget.
It was the night of your birthday and all the guests had left. My mouth tasted like champagne and grilled peaches; you were tipsy with gin. The living room of your house was silent and dark, save for the icy blue light of the computer screen. We stood in the middle, your hands on my waist and mine threaded up in your hair. You had turned on an old Dire Straits song, one I knew you loved because you mentioned it when weād first started dating, and we were swaying to it, my black silk dress and bare feet, you singing and me smiling into your face because you couldnāt sing but I liked it just the same.
We had many lovely moments, other moments I threw in that box in my head, but nothing as simple and perfect as that. I hope you spend every birthday dancing with a girl that way.