Dancing Lessons by R. Cooper

watched family movies. The movies were free. Sitting in the dark surrounded by people he didn’t have to actually talk to might be something he could do.
    He was wondering how to get a copy of the films and times, when movement at the restaurant entrance caught his attention. He took in the sight of Rafael and the baker together, then quickly turned to face the board with some survival instinct he hadn’t known he possessed.
    His pulse was so loud in his ears other people should have been able to hear it.
    Perhaps they could. Or perhaps the small town restaurant had a tiny lobby.
    “Chico, isn’t it?” an unfamiliar voice asked, and Chico flinched. He twisted the straps of his canvas bag around his fingers, which only made the curtain rods stick out even more awkwardly, then slowly inclined his head toward the other two. “You’re volunteering at the studio too, aren’t you?” The baker smiled at him and didn’t seem to notice Chico frozen to the spot. “Sewing or something?”
    “Right. Sewing,” Chico agreed and swung his gaze over to Rafael, only to note Rafael had on a shirt with actual sleeves and buttons. Even covered up he looked good, too good. Chico wanted to see him in a suit. He wanted to put the suit on him with his own hands.
    Chico shifted his attention to something less dangerous to his equilibrium, like the potted plant.
    Those were date clothes, his mind informed him helpfully. He vaguely remembered dates—nerves and dressing to impress, putting on something nice. That, naturally, was what Rafael had done, for his date. His date with that baker. Because the baker had asked him out, and he’d had no reason to say no. He’d had no reason at all to say anything but yes.
    “Are those curtain rods?” Rafael asked. The question was unexpected enough to make Chico glance to him again. “Are you decorating?” Rafael wasn’t smiling, which was somehow unfair. He should be treating this as the joke it was, not regarding Chico seriously.
    But he saw the tension in Chico’s posture, Chico was sure of that. His baker might not, but Rafael did. He was smart, not just good-looking. That’s why people asked him out. Not Chico, not fragile, afraid-of-bad-choices, afraid-of-being-crushed-by-someone-else-again Chico. But other people.
    Chico nodded without forming an answer to the question.
    The two of them were standing close. Close enough that, possibly, as they walked home or back to their cars or to the baker’s door, their hands might touch. The kind of touch that was electric and comforting at the same time, making mouths go dry and hearts race.
    When things were good, according to his parents, touch could stay like that.
    Chico wouldn’t know.
    “I’m Jase,” the baker introduced himself. He was starting to frown, as if just now twigging to Chico’s frozen expression and trembling hands.
    Chico forced himself to smile. “You bake or something, don’t you?” he heard himself saying, spiky with heat and embarrassment and annoyance at being looked down upon for sewing.
    If Rafael was smiling about that, as Chico assumed he was, he shouldn’t be. Even if his dating pool in Brandywine was limited, he could do better than a condescending guy like this.
    The waitress appeared with Chico’s bag of food. Chico accepted it and added it to his awkward bundle in one hand. He regretted ever deciding to eat out. He regretted it even more when the waitress paused to ask Rafael if she should get him a table for two.
    Chico was supposed to be harmlessly indulging in a crush after months of feeling numb. He had no right to get territorial or jealous, to think, in a distant yet urgent way, that he ought to make a scene. He hadn’t even made a scene when John had announced it was over. It hadn’t occurred to him. He hadn’t argued or fought or even hit him with a pillow. Chico had always thought he’d go ballistic if a boyfriend cheated on him. But he’d frozen. He’d had exactly one thought at the