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Yes, I was dancing, and immediately I remembered why I hadn't danced in a long time. Because when I dance, I dream, or at least I remember, which for me is exactly the same as dreaming. So the band launched into Creedence, if that's what it was, and I started stomping my feet and swinging my arms a little, and just like that, I started dreaming about the last time I'd danced, at my wedding, with Anne Marie. It was our wedding song, and I don't remember what it was ― another thing of which I'm ashamed ― but I had the impression it had been many other people's wedding song as well. I noticed many of the older married guests go soft in the eyes and clasp hands. It felt good to be in the company of so many similarly and successfully betrothed, and for that matter it felt good to have my beautiful girl in my arms, my beautiful, tall girl, who'd worn low-heeled shoes so that she wouldn't be too much taller than I was, my beautiful, tall, thoughtful girl, who smelled like the cake we'd just cut. All was well except that we were dancing, and I started remembering and dreaming that time, too, remembering and dreaming about my parents, who weren't at the wedding, of course, because I hadn't told them about it.

Specifically I was remembering the time when I spied on my mother and father dancing. This was a year after my father had returned from his exile, and it was certainly the first time I'd seen them dance. It might have been the first time I'd seen them even touch since he'd returned. They were dancing in the front entryway. I was watching from the staircase (I was supposed to have been in bed, but I'd heard the music ― it was Benny Goodman, plus his big band, I remember that ― and was spying). It was some highly conflicted dancing, at least on my mother's part. One moment, her eyes were closed, her head on my father's shoulder as if asleep and at peace; the next, her eyes were sprung open and angry, her palms against my father's chest and pushing him away, and the only thing holding her to my father was my father. He wouldn't let go, and she kept saying, "I don't know, I just don't know," and he kept saying, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, oh God, I'm so sorry." Then she'd relax for a while, only to tense up again eventually, and so on. I felt so sad for these confused parents of mine and had the distinct impression that love and marriage and dancing were like being at war with your better judgment. Watching my parents dance made loneliness look happy and relaxing by comparison, and so I went up to my room and went to bed. When I was dancing with Anne Marie at our wedding, I was remembering all this, and at the moment when I remembered going to bed and being alone, happily so, I let go of Anne Marie and took a step to the side as if making a break for it. The guests gasped, Anne Marie grabbed me, I came to my senses, saw my beautiful girl and bride, and finished the dance, and we never spoke about it afterward. She'd grabbed me hard, too. Later on I noticed two large pincher bruises on my upper biceps, as if a lobster and not the human Anne Marie had prevented me from leaving the dance floor and ruining our marriage right off the bat and not waiting eight years to do it.

And I was remembering and dreaming all this in the bar, too. I was so deep in my dream that the song ended with a crash of drums and a shudder of bass and a screech of guitar, and still I danced in the middle of the crowd. People were staring at me. I didn't blame them one bit and would have stared, too. I drank down my shot of bourbon, as though that would make them stop staring. It didn't. I looked around for help, to see if there was someone around who could come to my rescue.

There was: a woman to my right, holding a lit joint. I hadn't noticed her before that moment, and I've never seen her since. She was exactly my height. Her eyes were dark brown and they were squinting at me in bemusement, or maybe from the joint's smoke. She wasn't wearing earrings