“I never thought I would say this, but maybe you should consider taking a break from your dance training and watch the game with Jake and your dad,” my mother says. “You know I hate football, but you and your father seemed to be making a connection, and Jake and you are just getting back to being brotherly again. Pat, please stop humming.”
“For the second lift you need to look up at me, Pat. Especially just before I go into the flip. You don’t have to look at my crotch, but you have to be ready to push up so I’ll get more height. If you don’t give me a push when I bend my knees, I won’t be able to complete the flip and will probably crack my head open on the floor.”
“I know you can hear me through the humming, Pat. Look at you!” my father says. “Curled up in your bed, humming like a child. Birds lose by a field goal in New Orleans, and your boy Baskett had zero catches. Zilch. Don’t think your dancing through the game didn’t affect the outcome.”
“You look like a retarded snake! You are supposed to crawl with your arms—not slither or wiggle or whatever the fuck you are doing down there. Here. Watch me.”
In anticipation of our big performance, I’m running a little faster with Tiffany every day. We push ourselves, and when we get to the park, we sprint the last mile to her house and get really sweaty. I always beat Tiffany, because I am a man, yes, but also because I am an excellent runner.
“What’s Tiffany holding over you?” Ronnie says. We are in my parents’ basement. I have already spotted him as he benched one wimpy sixty-pound rep, and now he is taking a break. This is a surprise visit disguised to look like a prework lifting session. “I told you to protect yourself. I’m telling you, Pat, you don’t know what that woman is capable of. My sister-in-law is capable of anything. Anything!”
“You’re making the sun with your arms. In the center of the stage, you represent the sun. And when you make the huge circle with your arms, it has to be slow and deliberate—just like the sun. The dance is one day’s worth of sun. You are going to rise and set all onstage—to the flow of our song. Understand?”
“I want you to talk to Tiffany and tell her it’s important for you to watch the Eagles game with your father,” Mom says. “Please stop humming, Pat. Please, just stop humming!”
“The second lift is the hardest by far, as it requires you to go from a squatting position to a standing position with me standing on your hands, which will be just above your shoulders. Do you think you’re strong enough to do this, because we can do something else if you are too weak, but let’s try it now and we’ll just see.”
“Why is this dance competition so important to you?” Cliff asks me. I look up at the sun painted on the ceiling of his office and smile. “What?” he says.
“The dancing lets me be that,” I say, and point up.
Cliff’s eyes follow my finger. “It lets you be the sun?”
“Yes,” I say, and smile again at Cliff, because I really like being the sun, exactly what allows clouds to have a silver lining. Also, being the sun is what will provide me with the opportunity to write letters to Nikki.
“Please stop humming into the phone, Pat. I’m on your side here. I understand wanting to learn an art for a woman. Don’t you remember my playing the piano for you? But the difference is that Caitlin would never ask me to miss an Eagles game, because she knows it’s more than just football to me. I can hear you fucking humming through the phone, Pat, but I’m just going to keep talking, all right? You’re acting crazy, you know. And if the Eagles lose tomorrow against the Buccaneers, Dad is going to think you cursed the Birds.”
“Okay, you know your routine—roughly, anyway. So now I want you to watch mine. I’ll say ‘lift’ when it’s time for one of your lifts, just so you know when they’re coming. But don’t worry, because as long as you do your routine, I’ll make sure we link up with the lifts. Okay?”
Tiffany is in tights and a T-shirt like every other day, but she transforms her face just before she pushes play on the CD player. So solemn. Those sad piano notes and those two dueling voices fill the room, and Tiffany begins to dance beautifully but sadly. Her body moves so gracefully, and it is only now that I understand what she means by crying through movement. She jumps, she rolls, she spins, she runs, she slides. She yells “Lift!” and then falls to the floor dead, only to explode upward in resurrection when the music picks up again. And her dancing is one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. I could watch her dance for the rest of my life, and strangely, watching Tiffany soar around the dance floor makes me feel like I am floating over waves with baby Emily. Tiffany is that good.
“Your father has stopped eating dinner with me, Pat. He’s not taking walks with me either. Ever since the Eagles lost to the Buccaneers, he’s back to his—Pat, please stop humming. Pat!”