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“Well, I hope this night is fun for all of us.” Okay, she just couldn’t take it anymore. “Okay, nowI’mgoing to explode if I don’t ask this. Which one of you is Callie, and which one of you is Rex?”

They both burst out laughing.

“She’s Callie,” Floral Button-Down said, pointing at Black Jumpsuit.

“And they are Rex,” Black Jumpsuit said.

“Nice to meet you again, Callie and Rex,” Avery said.

“That was fast, even foryou,” Liz said to Taylor as they walked over to get the wine.

“What?” Taylor asked. She wasn’t paying her that much attention. Had she been wrong to leave Avery alone with Callie and Rex? Not that she thought Avery shouldn’t be able to handle talking to two strangers without her around, and that’s what they were here for, after all. Still, throwing someone into a situation where everyone but you knew one another was never a fun time. Callie and Rex were great, though; they’d be nice to her. Maybe this would be a way to ease Avery into meeting new people tonight, even though she hadn’t planned it this way.

“You and Avery,” Liz said. “I didn’t know you were dating someone new.”

Taylor laughed.

“Oh—no, it’s not like that. We’re just friends.”

“Oh,” Liz said. “I just thought…bringing someone to queer salsa lessons definitely seems like a date kind of thing.”

Taylor shook her head again.

“Nah, I just remembered about these classes, and when I mentioned it to Avery, she decided to come along.” That was a lie, but it wasn’t like Taylor was going to tell the world she was teaching Avery to flirt. That was Avery’s story to tell. And if she told most of her friends about this, they would think that she was only doing it to get into Avery’s pants.

Yes, shedidwant to get into Avery’s pants, but she couldn’t get into anyone’s pants for a while, so she might as well try to have other—lesser—kinds of fun.

“Oh. Well. I hope tonight is fun,” Liz said. “Have you seen Gemma around lately?”

They got up to the front of the line just then, so Taylor didn’t have to get into a conversation with one of her exes about another of her exes. She thought she and Gemma would be able to be friends, eventually, in the same way she and Liz were friends. But Gemma had made it clear that she didn’t want to see or hear from Taylor for a while, and Taylor would respect that.

Avery, Callie, and Rex were all laughing when Taylor and Liz got back to them. Good, that had gone well.

“Here you go,” she said, handing off the wine to Avery. “I think we have about five more minutes before they start, from what I heard them saying over there.”

Avery took a gulp of her wine, and Taylor held back a grin. It’s not that she thought it was funny that Avery was nervous aboutthis; it just seemed so contrary to how confident and self-assured Avery was in other contexts. She put her hand on Avery’s back for just a second, and she could feel Avery take a deep breath.

“You’re going to be great,” she said under her breath. “A beauty like you?”

Avery’s stoic face relaxed into a smile at the reminder of the woman at the check-in.

“I want to grow up and be just like that woman,” she said. “I’m half in love with her already.”

Taylor nodded.

“Oh absolutely.”

“Attention!” They all turned to the commanding voice at the front of the room, and there she was, a microphone in her hand and a huge smile on her face. “Welcome to our queer salsa class! I am Elena, and this is my partner, Alisha. We are delighted to see so many of you here today, especially all of you here for the first time! Now, let’s begin: at first, we will have the beginners dance with the experts and intermediates, and then we will swap it around. So, beginners, to the green corner! Intermediates, to the pink corner! And, experts, to the red corner!” There was some looking around to see where the green, pink, and red corners were, and some shuffling, but it was apparently too slow for her. “NOW!”

Everyone moved quickly to their correct corner of the room. Taylor grabbed Avery so they wouldn’t get separated as everyone moved around, though they lost Liz, Callie, and Rex. Honestly, Taylor was grateful for that since this wasn’t meant to be a group excursion; tonight was for her and Avery.

“Excellent job, everyone!” Elena said. “Now, Alisha and I will demonstrate the first dance for today, and then you’ll all pair up. We will go slowly at first so you can see the steps, and then we’llshow you how the dance is supposed to look.” She beamed at them all for a second. Then she called out, “MUSIC!”

The music started immediately after her command.

“I wish I could yell like that and have things happen immediately,” Avery said in Taylor’s ear. “Imagine how great that would be.”

“What an absolutely you thing to say.” Taylor turned to her with a grin.