London

by Patricia Evans Jordan

  Jaq finally pushed herself slowly away from the wall. Bronwyn’s cheeks were still flushed, and damp strands of hair stuck to her skin until Jaq kissed her gently and pushed them away. Jaq closed her eyes and leaned her forehead into Bronwyn’s, her voice deep and raw.

  “Holy fuck. That was insane.”

  She ran her thumb over Bronwyn’s lower lip then kissed her softly, sliding her hand around the back of her neck.

  “I had no idea it was even possible to come like that,” Bronwyn whispered, eyes still closed.

  Jaq stood, running a hand through the damp layers of her hair as she looked around. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I don’t think anyone saw us.”

  “Which is fortunate because it wouldn’t have mattered if they had,” Bronwyn said, smiling and tucking the front of her shirt back into her jeans.

  Jaq pulled her into another kiss, then took her hand and led her back to the street and into the crowds of people.

  “Weren’t you going to show me something?”

  “Well, it will be anticlimactic after that,” Bronwyn said, flashing her a smile and leading her through the crowd, “But yes, I want to show you the place I was in love with as a kid.”

  Ten minutes later, they’d walked down the Promenade to Blackpool Tower, then up the stairs into the ornate lobby of the Empress Ballroom. Bronwyn ran to the window in the ballroom doors, but her face had fallen when she turned back around.

  “I got to go inside once when I was a kid, but it’s only open for a few hours a day, and both times I’ve been back to Blackpool I’ve missed it. I took ballroom dancing for years just in case I got to see it again.”

  Jaq looked through the window at the ballroom, which looked like the inside of a palace, with golden balconies balanced under a beautiful Victorian lofted ceiling, also gleaming with gold leaf and antique painted murals. A massive oak dance floor was the central feature, with a few dozen tables and red velvet chairs to each side. Crystal chandeliers scattered amber light across the dance floor, and a lofted stage sat at the end of the room, with ivory organ pipes rising from the floor on either side.

  “It’s quite a sight if you’ve never seen it.”

  They turned around and saw an older woman in a staff uniform, wearing a red velvet blazer. She was searching for something behind the ticket counter and eventually found it, folding a piece of paper into her coat pocket.

  Bronwyn turned back around and looked through the window one last time. “I was here when I was little, and I thought it must be what heaven looks like.”

  “We’re closed for an event this evening, I’m afraid,” she said, “But perhaps you’ll come back to see us.”

  Jaq nodded and kissed Bronwyn’s cheek, looking through the window and trying to memorize it. It was a nice thought, but they both knew they wouldn’t be back together. As they turned to leave, the woman stopped them, drawing a heavy set of keys out of her coat pocket and unlocking three separate locks, one by one, on the door. As she stepped in and motioned for them to follow, Bronwyn looked as if she might die from happiness and walked quickly ahead, spinning around with her arms stretched out the second she stepped onto the floor.

  “We don’t want to put you out,” Jaq said, taking note of the tiny rainbow pin on the collar of her jacket as she spoke.

  “Nonsense,” she said. “We’re done cleaning, and we won’t need to set up for hours. Take your time.”

  “Thank you,” Jaq said, shaking her hand. “We don’t have much time together. This means a lot to us.”

  They both looked over at Bronwyn, standing in the center of the dance floor and gazing up at the ornate ceiling paintings.

  “My wife took me here on our first date, and it’s still one of our best memories.” She squeezed Jaq’s shoulder as she left and told her she’d be back in an hour or so.

  Bronwyn looked over at Jaq as she stepped onto the floor, then behind her towards the door.

  “Where did she go?”

  Jaq walked toward her, hands in her pockets, thinking that Bronwyn had never looked more beautiful.

  “It looks like I may have met your fairy godmother,” Jaq said. “We have the place to ourselves for an hour.”

  Just as the words were out of her mouth, the music started, as clear and rich as if it were coming from the orchestra pit beyond the stage. The first song was an orchestral version of Come Away with Me, by Norah Jones.

  “This is surreal,” Bronwyn said, her eyes shining. “I can’t believe it’s happening.”

  Jaq held out her hand. “Dance with me?”

  Bronwyn looked at her, hesitant, then took her hand. Jaq pulled her close and kissed her, then swept her into a classic waltz, gliding across the floor with Bronwyn in her arms, her steps sure and light. Bronwyn looked into her eyes as if she’d never quite seen her before.

  “You can dance?”

  Jaq spun her smoothly out to the edge of the dance floor, their steps perfectly together as if they’d been dancing together all their lives. She smiled down at Bronwyn. “Looks like it.”

  They danced to every song that played for the next hour. Most were ballroom dances set to music by modern artists like Michael Buble, Sting, and even Lorena McKennit, but Bronwyn paused when she heard the start of an Argentine tango.

  “I’m not sure about this one,” Bronwyn said, looking up at Jaq and biting her lip. “I don’t think I know enough of the steps to be able to move well.”

  “You don’t have to, Bella,” Jaq whispered, her fingers soft at the back of her neck. “I’ll move you.”

  Jaq placed one foot between hers and ran her hand down the back of Bronwyn’s thigh, lifting it to rest against her hip. She held her eyes as she bent her back, pulling Bronwyn’s hips tight into hers and bringing her back up slowly, every inch of her body unfolding onto Jaq’s until they were face-to-face, lips almost touching.

  “Wow,” Bronwyn whispered, breathless before the first step.

  Jaq led her through a perfect Argentine tango, the Gypsy Kings playing in the background, lifting her so her feet were just above the floor during the most difficult steps, then shaping her body beautifully around her own for the slower, more sensual moves. As the song ended, Jaq spun Bronwyn into her body and held her there, their faces an inch apart. She kissed her as the music faded, and the staff they hadn’t noticed watching clapped and whistled.

  Bronwyn blushed, and they took a quick bow as Jaq led her off the dance floor towards the exit. She looked around for the woman that had let them into the ballroom, finally spotting her watching from the balcony with another butch woman sitting next to her, arm around her shoulders. Bronwyn stopped and blew them a kiss, which only amped up the applause they could still hear as they left the building and stepped back onto the street.

  Chapter Seven

  Bronwyn made herself wait until they had chosen an out of the way pub and tucked themselves into a dark corner booth with pints of Guinness.

  “Okay, Bailey,” she said, locking her eyes on Jaq, “Spill it.”

  Jaq laughed and looked down at her pint. “There’s not much to tell.”

  Bronwyn smiled and sat across from her with her arms folded. “Let’s start with how a tomboy from a Texas trailer park learned how to dance like that. And I’m not leaving until you tell me.”

  Jaq ran her hand through her hair and leaned back in the booth. “It’s not that exciting. It just kind of happened.”

  Bronwyn raised an eyebrow.

  “My mom used to bartend at the American Legion Club quite a bit, and I sometimes went with her and waited until closing so I could help her clean up.” Jaq took a long swig of her pint and tapped her fingers slowly on the side of her glass before she went on. “At first it was fine, but then she started drinking earlier and earlier while she was serving so by the time they closed she was usually wasted. I had to restock the bar and wait until she was sober enough to drive us home.”

  “That’s awful.” Bronwyn leaned across the table an
d brushed Jaq’s hand with hers. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Don’t be,” Jaq said. “I didn’t know any different at the time, so I was just used to it.”

  “What was the American Legion?”

  “It was a social club that other organizations rented out for events, and they hired Mom to work the bar sometimes. One of the ballroom dancing studios in Austin started using it for extra dance space that summer and I’d sit at the bar all night watching them.” She paused as if seeing them again in her mind. “I’d never seen anything so beautiful.”

  “How old were you?”

  “Twelve. But by that time I was already five-nine, with an attitude and a guy’s haircut, so I looked a lot older.” She swirled her Guinness around the bottom of her glass and drank the last of it. “The instructor, Greg, noticed one night that Mom was sitting at the end of the bar passed out and he asked me if I needed a ride home. I turned him down and told him I hadn’t restocked the beer cases yet. The next night he asked me if I wanted to learn how to waltz.”

  “What did you say?”

  “Well, I was drinking a coke, and I remember I laughed so hard it came out my nose.”

  Bronwyn laughed, thanking the waitress as she brought their food and silverware. She pushed Jaq’s burger toward her, but she didn’t even look at it.

  “He said no one watches like I did if they didn’t want to learn, so he made a deal with me that he’d help me restock the bar after close if I let him try to teach me to dance. I didn’t realize it then, but he was gay. We never talked about it, but I think he knew I was queer too.”

  “What was your first lesson like?”

  “Awkward.” Jaq looked around and signaled the waitress for another Guinness. “By that time, I’d been watching for months, so I knew what position to start in, but he just shook his head, switched places with me, and said he was going to teach me to lead.”

  Bronwyn smiled. “Yep, he knew you were gay.”

  “After the first lesson, I started practicing at home; I even looked up the steps and memorized them before he had a chance to teach me.”

  “Did you start taking more lessons?”

  “He let me clean his dance studio in town for free lessons, and I came every day. When I got good enough, I helped him with the classes.”

  “Did he ever ask you how old you were?”

  Jaq shook her head. “He never asked me anything. I think he wasn’t sure if I was even a girl for a long time, but I don’t think it mattered to him either way.”

  “How long did you study with him?”

  “Almost two years. After the first year, he bought me a pair of dance shoes and paid me to teach, and then eventually trained me to enter one of the Austin ballroom dance competitions with one of his other female dancers. At first, I was so nervous I screwed it up, but by the third competition, I hit my stride, and we started winning. I got to the national championships the year I turned fourteen as a junior dancer with a female partner.”

  “You competed as a boy?”

  Jaq nodded. “No one ever questioned it.”

  The waitress brought the pint, and Jaq was quiet for a few minutes, just looking down at the top of the glass.

  “So what happened after that?”

  “We won the junior ballroom national title.” Jaq ran her hand through her hair and looked past Bronwyn towards the wall, her face set. “Then later that night, two guys from my school came to my trailer while my Mom was at work and beat me up. Evidently, one of them had a sister in the competition who recognized me and told them I was a girl.”

  “Oh my God.” Bronwyn covered her mouth with her hand.

  “It wasn’t that bad.” Jaq cleared her throat and took a sip of her beer. “But when Greg saw it, he made me tell him what happened. He pulled me out of competition, but two weeks later, I was on my way to Stratford, so it didn’t matter anyway.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He didn’t say much, but I remember him hugging me when he saw the bruises on my face and when he let me go, there were tears in his eyes. I never forgot him. I still keep in touch with him and his husband, and I worked my way through university giving dance lessons in east London. I could never have done that without them.”

  Bronwyn pushed Jaq’s plate toward her until Jaq picked up her burger, then sat back in the booth. “I guess I’ve never thought about what it must have been like to look queer when you were so young.”

  “It never caused me problems after that.” Jaq took a bite of her burger and smiled. “Well, until your mom found out I was sleeping with her daughter.”

  Bronwyn set her knife and fork on her plate and pushed it away.

  “Mum always told me they expelled me, and said that’s why she was taking me home.” She looked up at Jaq. “But it never made sense to me because you stayed in school for the rest of that year. Do you think she was lying?”

  Jaq nodded. “She was just desperate to get you away from me. They wouldn’t have expelled you, or your dad’s money.” She scraped a chip across a lake of HP sauce on her plate. “They named the new lacrosse pitch after him the year after it happened, for fuck’s sake.”

  Bronwyn watched as she stacked chips across her burger and replaced the bun.

  “Actually, they wanted to expel me until he stepped in.”

  “What?” Bronwyn leaned forward over the table. “What are you talking about?’

  Jaq wiped her mouth with her napkin and set it down beside her plate. “The day after you left, he just showed up at the dorm and told me to get in his car.”

  “That doesn’t sound like him.” Bronwyn looked puzzled. “He always liked you, as far as I know.”

  “I thought it was going to be a repeat of what happened after the dance competition, but he was just there to take me to lunch. We went to the Copper Pig pub in London, and he bought me my first pint. I had no idea what was going on.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He asked me right away how I felt about you.”

  “What did you say?”

  “I told him I was in love with you.”

  Bronwyn smiled. “You never said that to me.”

  “Let’s just say I gave that information out on a need to know basis.” Jaq smiled, reaching over and tucking a stray lock of hair behind her ear. “And I figured your dad needed to know.”

  “What else did he say?”

  “That he’d spent the morning in the Dean’s office making it clear that if I was expelled, his money went with me.”

  Bronwyn smacked her palm down onto the tabletop. “I knew there was something about that whole situation he wasn’t telling me. I could tell at the wedding.”

  Jaq smiled. “He called me every year or so after that just to check in, and I think he may have even had a hand in getting me an interview at Scotland Yard. I don’t know how they would have even known about me otherwise, and no one there will tell me.”

  “That makes sense,” Bronwyn said. “His college roommate is fairly high up there.” She looked at Jaq, her eyes moving down to her mouth. “So after all this time, when I thought I’d never see you again, my dad was keeping tabs on you.”

  “You could say that.” Jaq smiled. “It was great to see him at the wedding.”

  Bronwyn just shook her head and stole the pickle off the edge of Jaq’s plate.

  ****

  By the time they made it out of the pub, it was late afternoon, and the warm autumn sun was sparkling on the navy blue surface of the sea. Jaq led Bronwyn down to the beach, still crowded with kids in rolled up jeans trying to outrun the waves crashing into the sand, and there were navy and white striped deckchairs dotted along the shore from pier to pier like late summer garland. The rides on the main pier rocketed around their tracks, adding to the sound backdrop of children’s laughter, waves bringing the incoming tide, and carnival music tinkling down from the ice cream stands at the edge of the promenade.

  “So when is the wedding?” Jaq turned towards her as
they walked along the shoreline, squinting into the late afternoon sun.

  “It’s in three months.” Bronwyn’s voice was suddenly soft, almost swept away by the wind.

  They walked in silence for a while, Jaq tucking Bronwyn’s smaller hand inside hers to shield it from the cold salt air. There was nothing to say. Jaq knew they hadn’t talked about the possibility of staying together because it didn’t exist.

  “Dad told me a while ago that he’ll be there to support me, but he says he can’t give me away if I marry Ian.”

  “Wow,” Jaq said, looking over at Bronwyn and squeezing her hand. “What made him dislike Ian so much?”

  “Remember when I told you that Ian had that crisis at work a year ago?” She smoothed the sand with her foot. “Well, he got really drunk one night and left some marks on me…”

  “What kind of marks?”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Bronwyn said, avoiding Jaq’s eyes. “They weren’t that bad, honestly, but I went home to Mum and Dad’s for a few days afterward, and somehow Dad saw them.”

  “Did you tell him what happened?”

  “No.” Bronwyn slowed, then sat on the beach and took off her shoes, rolling up the hem of her jeans. “I didn’t lie to him, but I didn’t tell him what Ian did, either.” She dug her toes into the cold sand and looked up at Jaq. “Then after my uncle told him what he’d seen Ian do in his cafe, Dad was so angry that I worried he’d go after him or something.”

  “Did he?”

  “No,” Bronwyn said, watching a seagull glide smoothly over their heads and out toward the water. “I made him promise he wouldn’t.”

  Jaq picked up a shell and threw it as far as she could into the waves. “Has Ian ever done anything like that since?”

  “No, not since then.” She looked out over the sea. “He’s a good guy; he just has a temper.”

  Jaq looked out over the undulating surface of the sea, the sun dipping lower towards the horizon at the edge of the dark water. When she finally spoke, her voice was low and rougher than Bronwyn knew it could be.