Page 91 of Two to Tango

I don’t miss how everybody looks to me and Logan sitting side by side, his arm around the back of my chair.

“You know, they say tango skipped a generation,” Javier says. He might be speaking to the table, but he’s looking right at me. “Your grandmother did it, and loved it, but tango bands started to fall off after the fifties. And your parents’ generation got into rock and roll instead. But now tango has come back around, and the younger kids are finding joy in it. I love it. It makes me happy to see it. It makes me happy to see you doing it.”

“Oh, did your grandmother dance?” Tara asks me.

Now the table turns to look at her, a kind of heavy silence that almost feels hilarious.

“You don’t know?” Javier asks. “She doesn’t know?”

“Oh, no—” I start.

“Oh, shit,” T laughs.

“Don’t know what?” She looks around the table, confused.

Logan clears his throat, then says, “Celestina’s granddaughter.”

“What?” she asks in disbelief.

“Well, all of us, actually. But she’s the one that got the shoes,” Delfi adds, pointing at me.

Tara looks at me then to everybody at the table, her mouth agape. “Shut the fuck up.” And then she starts to cry.

“Oh, no, mi amor.” Javier reaches over to hug her.

But then I get up and wrap my arms around to hug her, too. This must be such an overwhelming night for her as it is. Soon enough, everybody at the table joins in for a hug.

“I loved your grandmother so much,” she says through sniffles.

“Oh, Tara,” I tell her. “We did, too.”

And once we part, everybody getting back to dancing, to socializing, Agostina and Delfina stay by my side, looking at me with something that might be pride.

“Wow,” Delfi whispers.

“Everybody still loves her. Everybody still talks so highly of her. I can’t help but think that she wanted me here, too,” I tell them.

“You wanted to create an exciting life for yourself, huh.” T smiles. “You fucking did it, Julie.”

Watching the crowds, the couples that move on the dance floor like synchronized magic, and watching Logan walk back to me with his hand out ready to dance, I think I did it, too.

Delfi spends the night dancing with Javier, and a couple of other regulars. T dances once, and Gavin shows up later and just watches. I can’t deny that I briefly wonder if Ethan will show up to this thing, but he doesn’t. And I spend most of the time on the floor with Logan anyway. He and Tara have one tanda together, and it brings me back to the first time I saw them dance. The magic, the joy. How much I wanted to be her.

The DJ plays the last tanda around two in the morning, and then we wrap everything up. Delfi walks barefoot to her car, carrying shoes in her hand, with T at her side. The jubilation surrounds us, and I'm too happy to feel tired. I gratefully, excitedly, take Logan and my lovestruck heart home.

Everything was such a balancing act growing up, but here nothing needed balance. I wasn’t too much of one thing, less than another. I was just me, and I fit into this space so beautifully. There is a seat at the table for me here, and there always will be.

Chapter thirty

Julieta

The coffee stain onmy blouse has somehow gotten bigger since I walked into the office. I never spill my coffee. I’m never without an extra blouse.

I have also learned to manage my time so well that I know the exact time to leave my apartment to avoid any of the early morning downtown traffic. I didn’t manage my time this morning, though. I rushed out of my house, a frazzled mess, having spent the night with Logan instead. More specifically, the whole week. More specifically, in my bed.

The problem is, when you’re living two lives and toeing the line between them, something is bound to slip.

“Julie. In my office, please.” Barbara is at my door, eyeing me over her glasses, perfect posture as always. But this time it looks like she’s about to rip me a new asshole.

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