Salsa show

I went to a small restaurant performing space. The restaurant had a bizarre but cozy lay out with 18ft ceilings and lime green flowered walls. There were four distinct rooms all of equivalent size and a covered outdoor patio. You could pass between rooms through archways that reached to the ceiling. It was mildly maze-like. One of the rooms was being used as a performing space on this particular evening.

Eduardo, salsa instructor by night and barber by day, was having a show this evening alongside some live music. The singer´s sultry voice, and a smooth rhythmic base line filled the smokey air. Twisting and twirling with a Latino beauty perched upon six inch heels, the crowd squished and wriggled into the open spaces to watch the show.

After the performance the dance floor was cleared for the patrons to step out and strut there stuff. Edguardo and his partner took turns moving about the room dancing with all willing and unwilling bodies. I too made it to the dance floor swinging and swirling with those folks that cared to participate.

I took the hand of one woman aged approximately 50 years. She stood upon sharp black stilettos wearing an absurdly low cut dress with a heaving bosom. She was artificially tanned to the point of orange and creased with wrinkles from years of smoking. We danced and then spoke. She instantly realized I was not from around here and asked me from where. I told her New York and she immediately ohhhed and ahhhed and took me around to her friends. After a few moments of excited banter, presumably induced by mild intoxication she asked me if I was here to traffic cocaine, ecstasy, or some other narcotic. That kind of of came out of the blue. And then the conversation moved on and the people returned to the dance floor.