The Dance
He sits in the same corner, wearing a black tuxedo.
He looks around, calm as the soul music playing on stage.
So many dancers tonight, but he’s seen their type before. They dance to the same music yet they dance differently.
It’s obvious to tell the new lovers from the old, the bad dancers from the good, and the soul pundits from the naive. The obvious is no fun. He’s seen them over and over again sitting in the same corner; his always reserved seat. His tiny notepad and his 3-inch pen scribbled in the dark.
Tonight is different. There’s a new dancer on the stage. A calm one. She dances like Tuuletar, the goddess of the wind. She floats more than she dances. She floats in an unseen wind that only the music can explain. Her gray dress danced in a different tune to her body. Her sweat clings her messy hair to her face and neck. She stomps her feet like cymbals, letting go of her head in a whiplash.
Something about her dance is uncomfortably painful. Something the silhouette of the man in the black tuxedo seems to find intriguing. For tonight, he put away his notebook and for the first time, walked to the dancefloor. A sight every regular in the pub couldn’t shy away from seeing. He stretched his hand in an invitation. She obliged without a word and without losing her stomp. They fold into each other’s arms like a rehearsed dance, they whirlwind on. Quite a beautiful thing I must say.
But this is nothing I haven’t seen before. Simply two terrible dancers both weird in their ways. He is the man that made it to the tip of my 3-inch pen, in my tiny black notepad and she is no stranger to my games – she wears my ring.
I took another sip of wine, covered by the darkness of the opposite corner. Just watching the story I’ve been planning for five months unfold. Tonight I just made the strange man in the black tuxedo dance. Quite a handsome figure I must say. Oh no, I’m not worried. Every bird eventually flies back to the sill of the window they were freed from.
Just sipping on wine with a calm voice in my head saying, irresistible Mr. Tux, she’s irresistible I know.
