My dad leaves in the evening. It was a bittersweet goodbye because I'm not sure what paternal wisdom he's been sipping lately, but I'm definitely seeing the benefit of it. I'm looking forward to winter break in a few weeks when I can probe the topic without worrying he'll feel cornered.

I get an email from each of my professors within five minutes of each other: I am no longer subject to the attendance or participation grading metrics for the rest of the term and my work will be emailed to me so I don't have to go to the campus. I like to imagine that they all met up and discussed this together. I'm thrilled that I can take the time to heal fully without damaging my grades, but a tiny part of me is a bit disappointed that I no longer have an excuse to leave my studio.

But I find an excuse anyway.

I bundle up and wander outside. I'm carefully to move and walk slowly, as though sudden movement will exacerbate my concussion. I mean, I guess it could. Biology was not my strong suit.

I traipse along the sidewalks, looking all around my beloved city for the homeless man with tattoos on his face and the voice of an angel. I'm not sure what I'll do when I find him. I guess I'll find out.

I find him between here and the Mission. He sings Ed Sheeran to a crowd of admirers. It looks like some of them are lovers, Heads on shoulders, hands in hands. I drift to them, floating along Evan's music like it's a sweet breeze.

He catches my eyes. He smiles again, his eyes alight with a fresh vigor. He finishes his song with such a beautiful passion that I am not the only one who sheds a tear. I don't even recognize the song.

"That's it for now, folks. Thank you for being awesome," he says into his mic. Bills and coins shower down. A few clap him on the shoulder, smiling as though they don't have a care in the world. Good music has that effect, I've learned.

Instead of taking the time to filter through the cash in the guitar case, he simply closes his guitar into it and latches it firmly. He steps toward me, case in hand, and I look up at his eyes in the streetlight.

"Audrey. Should you be out? With your concussion?" he asks, concern underneath his glowing smile.

"Yeah. Just no lifting weights or marathon-running," I say. "Don't worry about me, Evan." I take a breath. "Can I buy you a coffee?"

There's a twinkle in those gorgeous eyes. "This time of night? Maybe you don't sleep on your mission to save the world, but I'm just a mortal."

I cock my head at him, returning his easy smile. "Then what?"

Evan steps back a bit, shifting his weight away from me. "How about this club down the street?"

"I'm not much of a dancer, even without a concussion," I warn him, even though I love the idea of doing something so spontaneous.

"Me either," he promises. He nods down the street. "I get free admission."

"Do you?" I ask we head in that direction.

"Yeah. I play there sometimes," he says humbly.

"That's awesome. Even though you don't belong in a club. You belong in a stadium," I tell him.

"Thanks, Audrey. That... that means a lot to me," he says. He shrugs his backpack a bit. "So... what's your story?"

I shrug. "Moved here from a small town south of Eugene. I'm attending PSU."

"Not near Roseburg, is it?" he asks.

I look over at him, stunned. "It is Roseburg."

Impossibility lights up his features. "I'm from Glide."

This coincidence completely floors me. Glide is a tiny town, more of a village really, on the outskirts of Roseburg. It's all farmland and country homes out there, so Glide residents have to make the half-hour commute into Roseburg to go to work or get groceries.

"Seriously?" I ask, grinning with incredulity.

"Yeah," he laughs. "Wow. Small world, right?"

"Yeah," I say, marveling at the impossibility. Roseburg only has a population of about twenty thousand people. Glide is only home to about a thousand. Meeting someone from my hometown in Portland, with its population of over half a million, is an incredible coincidence.

"What are you studying?" he asks.

"Social work," I reply.

He gives me a look. "You want to spend your life taking people's kids away from them?"

I shoot the look right back. The phrase "social work" encompasses an incredibly vast field of occupations, but most people associate it with child protective services, and anyone familiar with CPS could tell you that those three letters strike fear and rage into the hearts of many. "Or running the administrations that give people food stamps, TANF, daycare, health insurance, housing assistance, domestic violence assistance..."

"Alright, I get it," he interrupts jovially, waving his hand.

"... foster home certification, public health initiatives, or permanency services which reunite children with parents they were removed from," I continue breezily.

"And which one are you doing?" he asks.

"I'm not sure. I'll probably try to get a job with the state instead of a nonprofit, but I'm keeping my options open. I still have three years until I finish my degree," I say. "I hope I'll have it figured out by then."

"You've got to be leaning toward one or the other," he presses.

I think about this. "I want to do something with housing, preferably. The fact that there are this many homeless people in Oregon is a disgrace. Something needs to be done."

"That's an initiative I can get behind," he says. He nods at the warm, friendly-looking façade of a club. A sign over the door proclaims it as "Black Magic Bar".

I have lost count of the days, but I immediately assume it is a Thursday because of the throwback music playing in the club. Evan holds the door open for me and I pass him easily.

The club is small, but cozy. Tables line the walls and there is a pair of long bars on the other side of the room. But most of the space is intended- and used- as a dance floor. Patrons of every age, race and background smile and sway to the beat.

"Give me your jacket!" Evan says loudly, trying to be heard over the thrumming of the music that vibrates my bones.

I quickly shed my jacket and hand it to him. I watch as he walks over in the dim, purple-and-red lit space. He gives the bartender a bro-hug and gestures to his equipment and my jacket. The bartender nods and takes the items back behind the bar, then to a door on the other side of it. A storeroom, from the looks of it.

Evan walks back up to me. He looks happy to be surrounded by music. "Now, I don't want to exacerbate-"

"Why are you asking me if I masturbate?" I ask loudly, making a fake-offended expression. The music is so loud that he's the only one that heard me.

Evan rolls his eyes and elbows me lightly. We laugh in the darkness. An orange light glides over me.

I smile up at him. "I'll be fine. Let's dance."

Now, here's the thing about dancing. I'm a twenty-one-year-old college student. I've been dragged to my fair share of bars and clubs. At first I was nervous, straight-laced, and on edge the entire time because I don't know how to dance. Then I realized that about 99.99% of humans don't know how to dance. There isn't much how to dancing at all. Sure, there's choreography, ballet, waltzes, salsas and all of that. But the natural, unplanned, responses to music cannot be learned by any but the very observant and very talented. I am neither of those things, so when I dance, it takes me a moment to loosen up. There's head-nodding and around-looking as a fear of embarrassing myself, particularly in front of Evan, grips me tight. Then the music unlocks me. My movements become less regimented and more fluid. I don't think about what I'm doing with my legs or arms, my hands or feet. I just let myself go on autopilot and respond to the music in whatever way I want to.

There's a beauty to this natural progression. It's almost instinctive, like dancing is so deeply encoded in human DNA that it surpasses the rigid constraints of culture and society. I wonder if this is a possibility. If our ancestors benefited from the ability to lose themselves in the beat of a tribal drum, and passed it on to everyone in this room.

Dressed in jeans and a loose blue sweater, I am not the most eye-catching woman in the room. Far from it. There are supermodels with mile-long legs beneath the hems of skintight dresses all around me. But Evan's eyes never leave me.

I don't feel self-conscious, because there are men here that are taller than Evan. Stronger, more tanned, their hair carefully maintained, their outfits more expensive than my tuition. But they are the murmurings of an enraptured crowd. Evan is the song being performed onstage, and I came here for the concert.

Time passes with the beat. Our bodies grow closer, each of us desiring the gap between us to be smaller and smaller.

I'm not sure which one of us touched the other first. Maybe it happened at the same time. It certainly could have. But our hands link together, his long fingers around my small ones. At the apex of a Rihanna song that's only gotten better with age, he twirls me around. He catches me easily in his arms as I return from the twirl, laughing. I stumble, trying to keep my footing, and look up at the man who holds me so protectively against him.

He smells like fresh air and detergent. Our gazes are locked on each other. The club moves around us. Time continues to pass, the multicolored lights washing back and forth over the crowd who doesn't notice this moment we've stolen away from them.

I kiss him. He tastes like mint. His lips are so soft I believe them to be superhuman. I rest my hands on his shoulders, feeling the sturdiness of his frame beneath his shirt. He moves his arms down, encircling them around my waist.

My mind is blank. All I know is the perfection of this moment, this kiss, with this beautiful man.

After some time, we part. I look up at his perfect face, trying to think of something to say. Nothing seems to fit here. Nothing could make this moment better.

"Was that your plan this whole time?" he asks. He has to be loud so I can hear him, but somehow it still sounds like he's whispering.

"Yeah," I reply.

Nothing in the world could end his smile now. Mine, either.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see the bartender approaching us tentatively. I step back, my hand lingering around Evan's, as we both look to her.

"It's eight fifty," he says, gesturing to the watch on her wrist.

I feel how the Prince must have felt when the midnight bells tolled for Cinderella. Angry that this beautiful feeling is being taken from me. But already, I find myself planning how best to see him again.

"Come on," I say, putting on a brave face. "We'll pick up later."

Evan looks annoyed and embarrassed to be reminded of his circumstances. I wish I had the time to address these feelings of his, but we have to get back to the Mission or he'll be locked out on the cold street.

The bartender quickly retrieves his belongings and my jacket. I thank him and take Evan's guitar case so he doesn't have to carry all of that himself. He leads me out of the club at a brisk walk that I match easily, both of us mentally mapping our way back to the Mission.

The nocturnal nightlife of Portland is just beginning to come out and play in the frigid evening. The sight of Evan and I hurrying up the street laden with backpacks and the like raises eyebrows, but I'm sure some of them make the connection to the Mission's curfew.

"That was fantastic, Audrey. I'm so sorry I-" he begins, looking over at me.

I smile. "Don't be sorry. You're right. It was fantastic. Do you have a phone?"

He nods. The defeat on his face makes me wish I had another hour to spend with him. Another three. Another day.

"Promise not to sell my number on the street?" I joke.

His harassed congeniality returns. "I'd never have to busk again."

On the steps of the Mission, I hand him his guitar case. He hops up a step, his eyes about a foot over mine now. I hold out my phone for him and he types rapidly into it.

"See you tomorrow?" he asks quietly. We can't attract attention. After seven, women and children are once again disallowed from the building, but we are surrounded by guests having their last cigarette of the night before the doors lock. They don't pay us much mind beyond simple greetings and waves that I return with smiles.

I nod, taking my phone back. I wish he would kiss me, but we both understand that this would be in poor form so soon after I sided with him in the dispute against Lenny.

So there's nothing. No hug, no kiss. He walks up the stairs and gives me a final look back before he enters the building. I wave to him, not understanding the deep sadness within me.

And I'm left in the cold without so much as a glass slipper.

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