My hands started shaking. I worried that Jimmy would be angry that we were listening to his record. But he just smiled, and then he took a step toward me, took the Pledge from my grip, placed it on the table, and started dancing with me while singing along with his own record. Izzy clapped and screamed and jumped into her dad’s arms. He, too, sang, Izzy hanging on his chest as they danced. Jimmy held my hands and pulled me toward him, and then away, and then around. At the last line, Jimmy dipped me down and hovered over me. I’d taken lots of ballet and could easily arch so I was like a lowercase letter h one foot on the ground, the other kicked in the air. I could smell the sugary treats and coffee on Jimmy’s breath. I could smell his skin, both sweet and musky, like something warm, maybe melted candle wax with wet autumn leaves. I had a strange urge to bite into him. The words sex addict sex addict sex addict swirled like an eddy of letters in my brain.
When that song ended, a faster song came on. Dr. Cone, Jimmy, and Izzy started fast dancing as if it were no big deal. I stood, leaning forward as if I were about to take a step but couldn’t. I’d never danced to rock and roll before. I watched the others, my mouth open with a half-nervous, half-happy grin. Dr. Cone bounced up and down, his head hanging like a bird with a broken neck, like when the Peanuts characters danced. Izzy flung her arms around and jumped as if she were trying to fly. Jimmy swayed his hips a little, forward and back, as if he were dancing inside a phone booth. He never used both the top and bottom halves of his body at the same time. Each movement was isolated, on beat, with the flow of the music. Izzy grabbed my hands and pulled me into the circle of the three of them.
“MARY JANE, YOU HAVE TO DANCE WITH ME!” She shook my arms until I moved on the other side of them. I glanced over at Jimmy and tried to mirror him. He looked straight at me and nodded. When he moved more broadly, I moved more broadly. Izzy still had one of my hands and was as wild at the end of my arm as a scarf blowing off a neck. I followed the pace of Jimmy’s steps and shoulder shakes. I sensed he was directing me with his eyes.
The longer I danced, the more I got used to Jimmy eye-directing me, the less I thought about dancing. And the less I thought about dancing, the more I danced. Eventually it felt right. Like it was something I already knew how to do that was coming back to me.
We kept on dancing as the next song came on. Izzy screamed at the opening chords and then started singing along, louder than the record. Jimmy laughed and then he sang too. Dr. Cone sang during the chorus. I figured out the words pretty quickly and desperately wanted to sing at the chorus too, but I was afraid to sing aloud with a famous professional singer—the person on the record, no less!—within hearing distance. At the final chorus, Izzy put her face real close to mine and was hollering along with the record. Right then, before I lost my courage, I started singing the harmony. Quietly at first, but then I went a little louder, because I knew I had it right. When the chorus picked up, I went louder still, almost as loud as Izzy and Jimmy. Finally I stopped dancing so I could really sing. I shut my eyes, let the words fly, and I heard my voice vibrating along with Jimmy’s like intertwined electrical currents that were creating a stream of sparks.
The song ended and Dr. Cone and Izzy clapped. Jimmy nodded, smiling. He clapped his hands three times slowly and then said, “Well, fuck me, Mary Jane, you got some pipes on you!”
The fuck me part of that sentence caught in my brain like a piece of cotton in a briar patch. I finally said, “I sing at church,” but I don’t think anyone heard, as the next song was playing and Sheba and Mrs. Cone were dancing into the dining room. Sheba was blasting her voice so beautifully that I felt goose bumps from the roots of my hair all the way to my toes. Her voice was pure and solid, and sounded like an instrument I’d never heard played before.
Jimmy snaked his arms around and danced over to Sheba. She did a circle in the streamers of his arms and then they went hip to hip. Sheba jumped into harmony while Jimmy stayed on melody. Izzy was still outsinging everyone volume-wise, and Mrs. Cone was singing along too. Everyone danced together in a big bouncy circle, smiling, moving, swaying, singing, smiling, laughing, singing, dancing. . . . As the song got faster, Sheba started spinning in circles. Izzy threw her arms out to the sides and spun too. Sheba unfastened her wig and threw it up in the air. Dr. Cone caught the wig and placed it on Izzy’s head. Izzy climbed onto a chair, and then onto our freshly polished table. She stood on that table in her dirty bare feet, wearing Sheba’s wig, and she hollered out the song like she was onstage in front of a stadium. Everyone laughed and danced and kept singing, and no one—no one!—told her to get her dirty feet off the table.