The Marabu night club. Light is dim. The music throbs dark. Twisted. An orchestra of sound fills the space, pleasing to the body. This dance. The way it makes you feel. Feel your power merging with your partner’s, not a battle for victory, but a challenge for balance.
I take her, the mina from the street, the woman from my dreams. One of my hands clutching one of hers, one arm entwining her as a vine, binding her to me yet allowing her, her own flow.
“You are my soul,” I whisper in her ear. She laughs turning her head, as she steps trying to escape me. “You are my heart,” I say to her eyes as she swings back into my arms. She does not pull back, sliding down my leg. Eyes fixed on mine. I pull her back to me. “You are my breath,” I say to her lips. We sit low as dancers drawing into each other, our feet side by side, our legs entwined, our bodies together. A battle of desire is fought in the steps, in the sound, in the trust of each other. The closeness of our touch, the heat of the dancers mixing together, the Marabu becomes one breathing, pulsing beast. Partners change. More men than women. Men dance with men. Women with two men at once. Jealousies are tested and tasted. I see her passed again. I see her pressing her body to another’s. The tempest of the music boils in my blood. I snag her arm; take her back. A clash of eyes, a challenge. We are two men; we must bear it to the street.
Music slides through the doorway, catching the cold winter air. A circle forms around us two compadritos. We sway, spreading our feet into the earth. Drawing slowly a map, a dance of passions imagined, of passions ignited. Baying from the surrounding men pushes us closer. We two circle, both who would seduce her, both who would have his body along hers, both who would conquer… Knives flick from our sleeves. Strike, withdraw, we circle in this measured cold air. This conquistador’s passion is not imagined. Circle, circle. Attack. Withdraw. A nick. A drop of blood rolling down an arm. Leap once more, a final embrace.
Victor. I look for my prize. She has vanished into the night. Adrenaline is leaving. My heart weighs heavy, as the other man’s slows and stops, wasted life.
I stumble towards oblivion, shadows passing me as the Frogs behind hold their bleeding soldier in the pooling light of a lamp. Behind them on the oily skin of the wall hangs a sign, "Today debut: Aníbal Troilo and his orchestra" flecked with red. A breath to my side, from a darkened alley she is in front of me, I smell her, I taste her in the slowness of the night.