How They May Be

One song passed, then three, then five, and despite my earlier words I had no desire to stop. Only when the band began to fire up a slow, romantic piece could I finally make myself step back, a reluctant smile concealing my disappointment. "Whew," I whistled softly, sweat beading my brow. "You should have stuck with ballet, Emily. You have quite a talent for this."

"Thanks." Her cheeks were ruddy with exertion as she gave me a pleased smile. "Um, are you sure you don't want to go one more song?"

I did want that, terribly, but shook my head as I looked up to the stage, where the saxophonist was beginning to play. "This seems like a natural place to stop, honey. You don't want a slow dance with your father, after all."

"Maybe I do," she murmured softly. I looked back at her, eyes narrowed in perplexity, and she hastened to explain. "I mean, I haven't had any experience with it, really, and the senior prom is coming up pretty soon. I'd kind of like to learn how to slow dance properly, you know, so I don't make a fool of myself."

"Ah." I half-smiled, and my gaze dodged away again uneasily. "Honestly, there's not much to learn. It's a fairly simple kind of dance."

"Well, then," her voice quietly reasonable, "It shouldn't take long to teach." She reached out and grasped my hands with her own. "Please?"

Her touch was a drug, warm delight sapping my sensibility. I swallowed twice, and then nodded, against my better judgment. "Okay, sweetheart. Okay. It's . . . we start out facing each other, like this. The man usually leads; he'll hold your right hand out, up at around shoulder-level." I entwined my fingers with hers and lifted my hand to demonstrate.

"Uh-huh." Emily's expression remained attentively straight, her eyes shimmering up at me. "What else?"

I raised her left hand and placed it loosely at my shoulder. "Well, you keep your other hand up there, and your partner will keep his hand on your waist." I agonized long seconds before following through on that. There was now such a feeling of ownership as I laid my hand upon her side. Like a dog with a bone, my desire convinced that I could just lay claim to her and growl away any competition. "And then, we just step together with the beat - left, right, left, right. Your partner should guide you with his body and hands, so you don't get fouled up and step on each other's toes."

I started to move with her, small steps at first, just back and forth to ease her into it. Somehow I was not surprised at all to find that she was a natural. Her movements synchronized almost perfectly with mine, gliding smoothly without fumble or misstep. "That's really all there is to it," I fairly whispered, bliss welling up inside me as I widened my stride and began to drift with her across the ballroom floor. "Easiest thing in the world."

I had started our dance with a safe distance between us, the width of two hands. But with every step our separation shrank, until our bodies lightly touched in a gently thrilling contact. After a few moments like this, Emily turned her head to the side and rested it softly against my chest, leaning her delicate weight against me the way she had two weeks ago, following that fateful Friday. My right hand slid further around her, paused at the small of her back. It felt more comfortable there, felt - right. Even though I could not see her face, I somehow knew that her eyes were closed, that she was relying utterly upon me to guide her and to keep her safe, and there was a shuddering surge of love within me at the realization. Without thinking I bent my head forward, placed my lips upon her scalp, slowly breathed in the intoxicating scent of her hair. For this one magic moment, I could pretend she was mine. My little girl. My love. My Emily.

The band played on, and as we spun slowly across the tiled floor, the room seemed to vanish around me. The other dancers faded from my consciousness along with all my outside woes and worries, and in all the world there was just us two, only she and I and the music which guided our feet. She was an angel against me, a sylph in my arms. For three short minutes, I was in an earthly paradise, feeling a completeness that I had not felt in decades.

As the song began to draw to a close, a pleasing notion struck me, and I whispered into Emily's hair. "Shall I dip you?"

She did not answer in words, but I felt a smile lift her cheek, and she nodded softly against my chest. I slid my arm further around and up, to her center of gravity, treasuring the feel of satin atop warm, clean skin. For a fraction of a second, her body resisted as I leaned her over backwards, an autonomic panic at the prospect of falling over. Then, with a sudden, sharp inhalation of breath, she went limp as a doll, surrendering herself to be draped fluidly over my arm, arched above the floor. I could see her face again; her eyes remained closed, her mouth curved in a tiny, happy smile inches before mine. I almost kissed her. The urge to do so was incredible - I thirsted desperately to taste her lips again, as a man dying of heat thirsts for water. But I managed somehow to resist, contented myself to gaze upon the beauty of her features. As the last notes of the song died away, her eyes opened into mine, and I felt a spark that sent my already-racing heart to new heights of activity.

We remained in that position for some seconds after the song ended, until finally a raised eyebrow and quirked mouth from Emily brought me halfway back to my senses, made me lift her to her feet. I should have felt guilty for my transgressions, or worried for what I might have revealed, but I didn't. The dance left me floating in a sea of joy, and I could only smile at her as we disengaged, still standing close beside one another.

"That was wonderful." Emily was the first to speak, a merry gleam in her eye. "'Not much of a dancer,' huh? I bet you could give lessons."

Flattery only made my heart soar higher, into the realm of giddy thoughtlessness. "Well, I guess I've had a good bit of practice, even if it was a while ago. I just hope I haven't spoiled you for your future boyfriends." Stupid. Stupid thing to say, a slipped hint of my desire to do just that.

Her smile flickered a moment before reasserting itself. "I guess I'll just have to find someone who knows how to dance as well as you do." The band started up another lively song, and Emily glanced to the door. "Anyway, I think I'm ready for dinner."

The hotel restaurant had acquitted itself well enough the previous evening that we turned to it again for our repast. But today, coming out of our dance, the subdued lighting and gentle music piped in over speakers could not have seemed more romantic. I found myself as tongue-tied as a teenager on his first date, and pored intensely over the menu as an excuse. All I could think of was how lovely she looked there in the booth opposite me, how alluringly her statuesque neck rose from the darkly glistening jewel of her dress. How she had felt to hold, to touch, over the past few days.

"And have you decided what you would like to have this evening?" I hadn't noticed the waiter approach, and nearly jumped as he suddenly spoke beside me.

"I have." Emily answered first, and such was my madness that I felt a little surge of jealousy at the smile she gave the waiter. "I'd like the pesto tortellini, please, with the salad. And, um, balsamic vinaigrette on that."

"Very good," he scribbled furiously on his notepad. "And for you, sir?"

"I suppose I'll have a steak." I hesitated briefly. "Ah, medium. Some sour cream on the potato. And a glass of wine; the claret would be good, if you have a young one."

Emily cut in. "I'll have a glass of that, too."

"Excellent choices, both." The waiter finished his notes with a flourish. "I will have those out to you with all possible haste." And he glided off, as I arched an inquisitive eyebrow at Emily.

"What?" she finally asked, barely concealing a smirk.

"I must be losing my memory," I answered dryly. "I don't recall you asking if you could have wine."

She laughed, and the tinkling melody sent a shiver down my spine. "Maybe you're just dizzy with hunger."

I was dizzy, certainly, but it wasn't with hunger. Not for food, at any rate. Still, I tried to be responsible. "You're not really old enough yet to be drinking, sweetie."

"Come on, Mark, it's a special occasion." She pouted playfully, her lower lip stuck out like some luscious treat, and I felt my attempt at prohibition immediately crushed. I could not deny her. In truth she'd sampled my drink at dinner many a time, so this was not much of a stretch.

"Well," I shook my head slightly. "Next time, ask, if only so I can help you pick out the right one. Claret is all wrong for pasta. You'd want a Chianti or a Viognier, something like that."

Emily seemed to find this terribly amusing, for a sudden peal of laughter escaped her lips. "Okay. Next time, I promise." And she rested on me those adoring eyes that filled my soul with warmth, eyes that now woke a tingle in my loins as well. I could not help but smile back at her. Such a font of sensation she was, every moment brought a new crest to my delight.

Dinner that evening was a thing of impossible gaiety, our laughter flowing like water. We began by talking about our visit to the cultural center, but that was the last time our conversation touched ground; it was thereafter a castle in the sky, built of quick-witted repartee and whimsical banter. Emily drank deeply of her wine, and became progressively more giggly as the evening wore on, her songbird trill tickling joyously at my heart. Several times she stole food from my plate, an event I came to welcome, given how lasciviously compelling I found the sight of her pearly teeth closing slowly around a morsel of ragged meat, her eyes staring teasingly into mine. But I playfully protested anyway, for when I did she insisted upon feeding pieces of her pasta, an experience I could have only savored more if she had put the food into my mouth with her fingers.

I was on my third glass of wine before I realized that Emily was trying to keep up with me, and wisely put it aside. By this point she was clearly inebriated, her pale cheeks aglow, and giggled every time she looked at me. "All right," I finally asked, "Give it up, what's so funny? Do I have steak sauce on my chin, or something?"

"Nooo," she drew out the denial coyly. We had eaten our fill by then, and were only waiting for the waiter to bring back my credit card. "I was just thinking about . . . something nice."

"Is that so?" I smiled inquiringly. "And what would that be?"

Emily bit her lower lip as though struggling to contain herself, and then burst out with "You!" She snickered like it was the funniest joke in the world. "I wanted to say...um, I don't remember if I said this before. But I wanted to say that you're really wonderful, if I haven't said that." And she beamed drunkenly at me.

"Ha." My heart warmed with love, but I couldn't resist needling her. "I know what you think is wonderful, and I'm surprised there's any left in your glass."

"You're right!" she exclaimed, adorably dramatic, and with a theatrical flourish, picked up and drained the remainder of her wine in a single go. My "Wait, don't," came too late. Not that she would have listened to it anyway. I was still shaking my head at her when the waiter came back with the card.

"Let's go!" Emily got up with gusto and nearly fell over, barely catching herself on the table in time. "Oof, I feel like I'm on stilts." She knelt down while I signed the receipt, and stood back up afterwards considerably shorter, clutching her shoes in her right hand.

"Will you be able to get her to her room all right, sir?" There was a trace of humor in the waiter's voice, and I swore I could feel his eyes roaming Emily's body. "Or to yours, as the case may be?"

"Yes, yes," I answered, gruffly possessive. "We'll be fine, thank you." Moving to Emily's side, I put a guiding hand on her shoulder. "Come on, honey, let's get you to bed."

This simple statement prompted a fresh paroxysm of giggling, and she clumsily struggled to shush me through her laughter, putting a wavering index finger up to my lips. People in the restaurant were beginning to stare, and I ushered her quickly out to the hallway, not wanting to make a scene.

Emily, of course, was blissfully unconcerned. Even barefoot she staggered about as though concussed, and I had to slide an arm around her slim waist to keep her upright as we made our way back to the elevator. Perhaps it was just the alcohol that made her blood run hot, but she burned like a furnace beneath my fingers, and I had to struggle, only half successfully, to keep from crushing her tempting flesh to mine. Midway through the elevator ride, she started humming one of the songs we had danced to earlier in the evening, and quickly thereafter broke into the chorus, lyrics mangled and badly off-key but still stunningly euphonious to my ear.

"In the mood, wah wah! That's it, I got it! In the mood, bah bah, your arrow shot it...come on, daddy, sing with me!" Her derrière wiggled enticingly against me, trying to dance despite the firm grip I had on her, and I felt myself stiffen at the soft and lithesome squirming. No more alcohol for her, I told myself firmly - special occasion or not. She couldn't handle it.

"In the mood, dah dah! Oh what a hobbit!" She seemed to forget her command to me as soon as it left her lips, much to my relief. I didn't know the words any better than she did, and was still sober enough to find that an impediment. "Be alive and get the dive you've got to burn now!"

She kept this up, occasionally switching to vague mumblings instead of actual words, until reaching the door to our hotel room, whereupon she turned to me with a slightly lopsided grin and opined "I think I should be a singer."

It was my turn to burst into laughter, the suddenness of this pronouncement tickling at me. Emily looked distantly hurt, until I reassured her that my humor was good-natured. "No, no, you'd be a great singer, you would. You've got a terrific voice." I released her as I unlocked the door; she stumbled inside, leaned against the wall to steady herself.

For a moment I just stood there, admiring the shimmer of light reflected from her dress as it poured off her gentle curves, my heart swelling with complex emotion. Something had changed. This was not simple lust anymore - if one can even call lust for one's daughter 'simple.' I thought of how I had felt during our dance, and goosebumps rose on my skin. I wanted her in every way. Wanted to hold her in my arms, and to kiss her as she had never been kissed before. Wanted to shield her from life's troubles, and to induct her into its delights. To fuck her. To make love to her.

Love. Can a man be in love with his child? That was the shape of my madness in this moment. Our artifice of marriage perhaps had touched me. I recalled my dream, of a kiss shared in a cathedral, and felt a sudden ache in my marrow, the pain of a wish known to be impossible. She was my daughter, the pride of my life. However faint that distinction now felt.

"God, what a day." Finally stepping inside after her, I carefully shut the door behind us.

"It was a great day," Emily corrected me, turning an alluring smile to my gaze. "A great, excellent . . . everything has been so nice." And she stumbled back to my side, leaning herself against my chest again for support. "I don't wanna go home tomorrow. Let's just stay here forever."

"I rather wish we could," I quirked a small smile back at her, my hands rising to rest lightly upon her shoulders. "But the reality is, you've got school and I've got work to go to on Monday. Staying here forever would make that tricky."

"Reality." Grumbling. "Reality's a jerk. All it ever says is what you can't do, what you can't have." And she looked up at me, her beautiful silver eyes setting my soul to ring like church bells. "Okay, shhh, I know." I could feel her body lightly pressed against mine, hot and seductive. "Let's just pretend we're gonna stay forever." Her lovely lips paused, softly parted, waiting for the perfect words. "Pretend we can have...everything we want."

I could say nothing to this. For a long moment I gazed into her eyes, losing myself in their depths, hardly breathing. There was no question what I wanted. It was staring me in the face, pressed into my chest, shifting in my hands. Her beauty called to me, a siren song that resonated in my mind, drowning out reason. It would be easy, too easy, to pretend . . . something inside me finally gave way. My hand rose to cradle the back of Emily's neck, and I bent down to kiss her.

Our lips came together with a feeling like a rocket in flight, a thrill that rumbled all the way down to the bone. Her mouth was still sweet with the flavor of wine, and that slight taste intoxicated me more than all I had drank that evening. With every moment I expected it to end, but Emily did not retreat before this sudden assault. Indeed, she soon began to kiss back, soft and uncertain, our mouths slowly grappling and sliding together as the breath passed hot and wet between us. There was no thought in me - just feeling, sensation, delight. Her lips were pliant and supple beneath mine, and for an ageless instant we remained there in something close to stillness, a dreamy kind of rapture suffusing my soul.

But our kiss had a drive and a power all its own, and this static ardor did not satisfy it. It was only the bare beginning of the ways in which I wanted her, needed her, and our mouths started to move more intensely as the passion I had denied gradually emerged from hiding. My lips clutched and worried fiercely at Emily's, tasting of her as though she were the finest of delicacies. My tongue snaked its way into her mouth, gliding among her slightly crooked teeth, and quickly found there its opposite; they slipped and wrestled at the border between us, that slick and formless boundary which seemed to fill the universe. My arms enfolded her as if she were a rag doll, and I drew her in closer, crushing our bodies together until I could not say whose heart it was that fluttered at my chest, hers or my own. I could hear soft, abortive cries bubbling at the top of her throat, feel heat pouring from her as though she were running a terrible fever, and all of it impelled me onward.

Some small fragment of my conscience awakened then, weak and weary from a campaign of lost battles but still dutifully protesting. This was wrong. I could not deny it. But neither could I control the feelings that were finally unleashed and rampaging through me. I could not call back the hand that worked at the buttons of her dress, nor the lips that danced across her face, trailing in long, lingering reverences upon the base of her narrow jaw. All I could do was plead for her to resist this, as I could not. "Tell me to stop, Emily," I whispered huskily into her cheek between kisses. "God, please, push me away, I can't...don't let me do this."

If she even heard me, she gave no sign of it. Her hands gently grasped at my sides, repeatedly curling against me as my lips dropped lower, pressing upon the bottom of her chin, my tongue sneaking out for a taste of her fine skin. "Oh, you're so perfect," I muttered helplessly. The pale expanse of her neck beckoned to me, and I bent down and placed upon it an emphatic kiss, softly sucking at her skin.

"Mmmm." She hummed ecstatically, her throat sizzling like fire against my lips, and I groaned into her flesh. "God, Emily, that's...do that again."

Obligingly, she hummed again, long and low, and I placed my right hand around her neck, loosely squeezing at the tender, vulnerable flesh. The vibration of her throat in my grasp thrilled through my nerves, resonated achingly in my loins. I had never been so aroused, and I hurried to undo the last of the buttons of her dress, sliding the crimson fabric off her shoulders to crumple silently at her feet upon the floor.