Salsa

• Angela Rincon, Grade 11
• Short Story
• 2021

The winter air is cool and crisp against my skin, tinged with the faintest aroma of cinnamon and chilli. A guitar strums melodically in the background, the tune resonating deep within my heart. I can hear tiny cheers and shouts alongside the guitar, and if I close my eyes and concentrate, I can just make out a barely audible string of lyrical chords.

I walk towards what draws my attention, my curiosity being peaked long ago. As I round a sandstone building, the stone rough and scratchy against my hands, I see a town square decorated in vibrant greens, blooming reds, buzzing yellows and mellow oranges. Lamp posts cast the square in a soft, warm light, contrasting the inky black landscape above.

There, swaying and spinning is a lone figure. Her body, fluid and flexible moves in time with the allegro of the guitar. Her feet tap, fly, drag and swivel on her toes accordingly, her hips sway side to side, back and forth. The woman’s dress, long and edged with crimson frills, falls delicately over her mocha shoulders. Her hair, deep as the sky above, is tamed and curled, bouncing and drifting around with her. She radiates a simplistic, natural beauty. The people in the square, drunk on sangria, laughter, and life, all clap, cheer, and shout along to the dancer. Roses are thrown, falling around her poised feet. She weaves around the scarlet blooms with grace and elegance.

She twists and turns and sashays towards the edges of the crowd. She reaches her lithe arms to a young boy, eyes bright and blue with wonder and curiosity. The boy moves along with the woman, both creating a rhythm only they understand. They spin around,

The music’s pace heightens, the vivace echoing in my ears. I feel my feet tap along with the rhythm, my fingers drumming against my arm in time. The woman’s dress and hair sway with her. The boy flies alongside her. More roses are thrown. More cheers and shouts and choruses. People have even begun tossing food. Bottles of sangria, blossoming fruits, plastic jars of amber honey.

And then the pace slows, a smooth adagio lulling the senses, clouding my mind in a welcome haze. Both the woman and boy gradually slow down. Staccato steps turn to slow footfalls, quick turns to mindless swaying of the hips. Roses, fruits and blossoms cease. The music stops with the crowd, with the woman and the boy, with the night it seems. And then, silence. Both dancer and boy pause their flow in a dip, this time the child is hanging precariously from the dancer’s toned arms, his spine arched into a perfect bow.

The boy returns to his place in the crowd, by his awaiting mother’s side. A salsa dancer in Cali bows, deep at the waist, her hair falling in inky waterfalls across her shoulders and back. She smiles, straightens back up and waltzes away.