What am I doing here. This man stinks, not just in the deficiency of his skills, but he literally stinks. If you're dancing tango, something so close, why won't you at least shower. He really smells like a block of funky French cheese. And I don't know what he is doing. He isn't clear. He stoops. He lowers his chest as if I were supposed to go down on my knees. He doesn't know what he is doing.
And the people. There are so many people, most also stink literally and figuratively. I am lost. I am tired. I am swimming in a sea of imbeciles who are here for the same reason of loneliness. Yes, I admit it. I came here because I am lonely. I came here because I just saw my ex yesterday by chance through the window of a cafe - in fact, the cafe right next door. He didn't see me because he was busy talking to some tall blond tramp, though now that I think about it, maybe she was a redhead. My heart sank when they held hands, right in front of me! Maybe he did see me.
Maybe I am lonely because I have been going home alone to an empty apartment for the past two and a half years. Other loners, like most of the losers here, at least have a cat or even a fish, but I am allergic to cats and I have no energy taking care of an aquarium. I am a mess. I complain a lot.
The man that has iron grips around my little hands seems frustrated. I can feel it in the vapor of his stink, the vapor of his eyes, the vapor that forms his sighs. He pushes his glasses up a little and then tries again to do this movement. What am I? Just a machine for this man, for men in general, to satisfy some goal. I am a tool and at the end of the day, I just find myself alone, sitting alone while others dance or sitting alone in my living room reading a book about someone else's loneliness.
Oh, there's another place I sit alone. I sit alone in my cubical at work. From around 10 in the morning till about 6 in the evening, I sit in front of my flat screen attached to my laptop and wiggle my finger on the keyboard and mouse for hours, with a lunch break that takes place in the exact same seat except that the finger wiggling involves some food grabbing. I never remember what I eat by evening comes. It is usually that memorable.
Twice a week I leave work and go straight to tango. Yesterday was to what is called a milonga, basically where I sit at a restaurant table and sulk because no one is dancing with me. Today is not so different. I dance with these imbeciles during classes but during the practica the same thing happens to me as in the milonga.
But I still come. I don't know why, really. I blame loneliness. I blame the repulsiveness of loneliness, so repulsive that I would rather drown myself in humiliation than be alone at night with my laptop (again) or feeling sorry for myself in the story of a bad fiction. If only I could get out of this trap, I wouldn't have to be here, be with this moron in front of me that treats me like some operable machine on which the right combination of button pushing would produce the right effect from this lonely robot he is maneuvering.
I sigh. I am sad. I feel sorry for him, too, nearly as much as for myself. I think about chocolate. I just want to have some chocolate. There's a guy here to comes every week at the end of this class with some baked goods, most of the time chocolate. I am waiting for him. He is one of the best dancers around here, but he never even so much as look at me, forget a smile, and definitely forget an invitation to dance. I try not to care about snobs like him, but I can't help feeling humiliated by his ignoring me completely. I eat his food, isn't that a compliment? Isn't that a way to connect? Not for him, I guess. He's not even attractive; how is it that he pays attention to all these women who would, in the real world, be too good for him. The world isn't fair, I guess.
The music is done. Time for more instruction. The machinist lets go of my lonely body. Muscles on my arms, which must be undoubtedly all red, slow relax. I can breathe now. This man smiles but I refuse to smile back. He violated me and he expects some sort of approval in the return for his doomed effort. He pushes his glasses up again, and looks away because he can't stand my stern look. I know I am not as cute as some of the girls that have a lot less experience than me but get the attention of all the best dancers. I hate this. I hate myself, even if I know it's totally irrational.
The instruction for the next sequence is finished, and it's time to rotate partners. Who's next? Maybe one of the good dancers. Maybe even the chocolate boy. Maybe I just need to relax. Maybe I just need to smile, at least pretend to smile. I know I never smile, but with this heavy heart and this stifling air of life, how can I smile? Any smile would surely come out as obviously fake. But I can do it. I can find a reason to smile. I read it somewhere that everyone can smile, genuinely. They just have to find that joy in their hearts.
I bid a silent farewell to the machinist that had mutilated my arms, and I welcome the next, new partner, a new beginning. But he is empty. He doesn't have form. He is merely an amorphous bag of more humiliation, false promises, and an emissary of life's mockery. He is the space that has been rotating around the dance floor. We are missing one man. That's always the case. Actually, the normal case is that there are always far more women than men, even in class. It's not fair. There are many things that aren't fair for us women about this dance. But I am here. For some reason I am here.
Just so for once, I could be held. I know it's cheesy, especially since most guys here can't dance, can't even hold a woman right. I am squeezed. I am tortured. But there's no point to all this. It's all my choice to be here to be tortured, to be gripped so violently. And yet, somehow, even with the insurmountable rage I still prefer some touch than being completely alone. And I am completely alone now. The music starts again, and I have no one to hold me but the nearest chair to sit through this round.
So I sit. I wait.
