Emily Goldberg Learns to Salsa (18 page)

“Oh, it was a crazy day,” I say. “Lucy was, um, sick.” It's easier than getting into a long story, and besides, it's Lucy's story anyway.

“So did you have to, like, do all of her chores for her and stuff?” he asks, like he thinks that's maybe a little bit funny.

“Well, I helped out, sure,” I say. “But not, you know, more than usual.”

“Mmm-hmm,” he mumbles. It's obvious he's concentrating on the game. Good. That makes this easier.

“Look, I was thinking I'd love to get together when I come home,” I say. “We haven't seen each other in so long.”

“Sure, of course,” he says.

“But I mean, we both know that I won't be coming home for another few weeks. So . . . I don't know. . . . And with how we're both going away to college in September . . .” I swallow, hoping he'll pick up on what I'm not saying.

“Yeah,” he says shortly. “I was thinking that too.”

He was?
“You were?”

“Yeah. But, uh, I wasn't sure, so I didn't want to say anything.”

“Right, well. I mean, I wish it were different; I wish I were home”—as I say the words, I realize that they're actually not true at all—“but I'm not. So maybe we should just plan on seeing each other . . . when we see each other,” I finish lamely.

He clears his throat. “Is there—I mean, is there someone down there?”

“Like am I seeing someone?” I ask.

I think of Ricky and the almost kiss. It was Ricky who tried to kiss me rather than the other way around, but it's not as though I hadn't given the idea any thought.

“No,” I tell him. Then a horrible thought strikes me. “Are you?”

“No,” he assures me.

But maybe he's not seeing, oh, say, Shana Rivers the same way I didn't kiss Ricky. But sort of wanted to. I push the image out of my mind. At this point it hardly matters.

“Right, cool,” I say. “Well, uh, I have to get back inside”—not true—“but I'll call you. . .”

I realize that we've just broken up, and suddenly I have no idea how to finish that sentence.

“Yeah,” Noah says. “Um, good-bye.”

“Bye,” I say. I hang up the phone and stare at it, blue LCD screen glowing in my palm. For a moment I'm swept with the urge to call him again, to take it all back, to tell him we should be together forever.

But the moment passes, and I go back inside.

 

I call Ade and Izzy to tell them what happened—with Noah, I mean, not with Lucy. They're both sympathetic, but Isabelle definitely seems a little more distant than Ade. It's typical, but I find that it bothers me less than it typically does. Interesting.

Lucy finds me in the living room, sitting on the couch and staring off into space at nothing. “It's done,” she guesses.

I nod glumly, sigh. “Stick a fork in it.” I look up at her. “I feel weird about it,” which is about as close to accurate as I can get.

“Tell me about it,” she says. “I told Rafael about the test and he was relieved, but he wants to see me.”

“You don't want to see him?”

“I'm not ready yet. We're going to have to see each other sooner or later—I mean, all of our friends hang out together; that's one of the sucky things about breaking up with someone you've been with, like, forever.” She pauses. “But, you know. Not today.”

“I get it,” I say, because I really, really do.

Lucy grins at me suddenly, her eyes lighting up in a way that I didn't expect. “You know what we need?”

“Chocolate,” I tell her. “Chocolate, cheese, and ice cream.” My standard depression diet.

“Salsa,” she clarifies.

“You mean, like with chips?” I ask, confused.

“No, silly.” She laughs. “Dancing.”

“Oh, no,” I say, shaking my head emphatically. “No, no, no.”

She leans over, grabs my arms, tugs me until I'm finally standing upright. “Oh, yes. Yes, yes, yes.”

W
e sneak out, of course. Lucy's got it down to an art form; I feel like Jennifer Garner or some other action heroine. She knows exactly where to step to avoid creaks in the floor, exactly how wide to push open the door, exactly the right angle at which to shimmy through the doorway. And when it comes to backing her car out of the driveway, she's like a criminal mastermind. I'm somewhat awed.

The club is packed tonight, and for once I've got the dress code down. I still wouldn't be caught dead in white pants—I don't care how trendy they are; they are not my finest look butt-wise—but I've got a bright, tangerine-colored halter on that looks like Lucy lite. Of course, being well costumed doesn't make me feel any less self-conscious when Lucy drags me out to the center of the dance floor. Pia, Ramona, and Teresa are there, hooting and whooping in the background.

I stumble around at first—it's been years since tap and ballet lessons, and I don't really know how helpful those would be now anyway. Lucy laughs and shakes her head in mock despair. She pulls a Patrick Swayze and instructs me to follow her feet. I promptly step forward and clock her with my huge, Cro-Magnon forehead. Has my cranium always been so massively misshapen? I'm like the Elephant Man, if he were also rhythmically challenged.

Lucy only laughs harder, and suddenly I realize that I'm laughing too. She twirls me in, out, does a little cha cha cha that's half camp, half elegance, and total Lucy. To my sheer and utter amazement, I find myself imitating her, though I know I still need practice. Ramona catcalls from the sidelines.

Pia, Ramona, and Teresa step forward, flanking Lucy on either side as she moves backward. They form a small circle and begin weaving in, out, and around each other. Before I can feel left out, though, I'm whirled in the opposite direction, spun, and dipped. I look up.

It's Ricky.

I stagger slightly, and we go down. He's left lying on top of me in a heap, and it's so awkward, so absurd, so totally ridiculous that we both lose it completely, laughing hysterically until I'm wiping tears from the corners of my eyes. I can't remember ever laughing this hard. It feels good.

No, it feels
great
.

“Come outside,” he shouts, leaning in to be heard over the music. “I need some fresh air.”

Ricky's idea of “fresh air” is lighting a cigarette and sucking it down greedily, like it's a glass of water and he's just pitched a tent on the sun. “Nice,” I say, gesturing at the cigarette disapprovingly.

“I'm quitting,” he says, grinning. “Besides, how many times have you seen me smoke since you got here?”

“Good point,” I say. “Okay, just this once.”

He puffs away and we stand side by side in comfortable silence. “I can't even remember the last time I had one,” Ricky comments. He squints as if trying to spot a faraway point on the horizon. He must remember then, because his face falls. “I guess I've just been tense . . . lately. . . .”

“Oh,” I say. “Right.” He's not saying it point-blank, but I understand what he's getting at. We both pause. “Look, about that night—” I begin, when I absolutely can't stand the tension.

“It's okay,” he says, waving his free hand at me. “You have a boyfriend.” He flushes. “I mean, not that it's, um, the only reason you wouldn't—”

“Don't worry.” I toss him a lifeline.

“Right, but I mean, the point is that I knew about your boyfriend. So it was pretty sketchy to try anything. I guess I just got caught up. I hope you don't think I'm sleazy or anything.”

“Of course not,” I assure him. “Maybe I was sending mixed signals. Noah and I were in sort of a holding pattern.”

“Were?” he asks.

“Yeah, we broke up. That's why Lucy brought me out tonight. We both needed some cheering up.”

“Good thing Rafael decided to stay home, huh?” Ricky asks.

“Right,” I say. I stare at Ricky and all at once adore him even more than I would have thought possible. He doesn't react at all to the news of my newfound singledom, doesn't say anything that would make me feel pressured or uncomfortable. The question of kissing him comes back to me like a hazy watercolor, not something I am quite ready for just here and now, but a free-form possibility. If and when the time is right.

I realize that I trust myself to know when the time is right.

“Well,” Ricky says, finishing his cigarette and stomping it out underneath his sneaker, “shall we?”

“We shall,” I say agreeably.

He holds his arm out for me like Fred Astaire or some other icon of a classier age. I link my arm through his, and we return to the club.

 

The light is on in the living room when we return home. I shoot Lucy a look as she kills the engine, coasts into the driveway.

She shrugs. “What are we gonna do?” she asks. I can't think of a way to get from the back door to our bedrooms without passing the living room. We're busted.

Oh, well. Even if Tía Rosa grounds us—and I'm pretty sure that she will—it was totally worth it. We get out of the car and lock it up, head off to meet our doom.

But it's my mother, not Tía Rosa, in the living room, still with a pen-level crossword. She looks up at us as we sheepishly tiptoe past. I brace for a rebuke, but it doesn't come. Instead my mother does something curious indeed: she winks. “Can't sleep.”

I wrinkle my forehead in confusion, but I'm not about to look a gift horse in the mouth. “Yeah, neither could we.”

She grins. “You'd better get to bed before Rosa wakes up.” And that's it; she's back to her crossword.

So we do.

 

Two weeks later Rosa has a huge dinner for our entire extended Puerto Rican family. It's like the wake all over again, except minus my father and Max, and this time it's a happy occasion. The house teems with brown-skinned faces, long, lacquered fingernails, backwards baseball caps, beer, sangria, rum, and for the minors, punch.

“
Ay, mami
, you made the sangría?” José calls to me.

“
Sí
, señor,” I reply. “Lucy and I were soaking and chopping fruit all morning.” It's true; I have the stained fingertips to prove it.

“Not bad,
muchacha
. Not bad for a gringa,” he says, teasing.

“Excuse me,” I say huffily. “I believe you mean
nuyorican
.”

José's girlfriend, finally here in what must be the single most marathon incident of meet-the-family, giggles beside him and snuggles up against him. Her name is Angela, and she looks a little bit like Jessica Alba. She's so soft-spoken and friendly that it's impossible not to like her. It's also impossible not to see just how much José adores her. And I give her huge credit for being here, for not being overwhelmed by all of us.

I give me huge credit for not being overwhelmed by all of us. Or, really, for just being us.

“Emily,
que tal
?” It's Juan, Eva's youngest.

“Nada mucho,”
I say.
“¿Y tú?”

“Eh, work is crazy,” he says, matter-of-fact. He's a mechanic, Lucy told me. It sounds like the sort of thing that isn't much fun when it's crazy. But he seems not to mind too much. “So, you're going home tomorrow. Time flies, huh? Tell me,
nuyorican
, are you sorry to be going back?”

Lucy passes by toting a platter of
plátanos
. I eagerly spear one. “She's not going,” she says, overhearing the tail end of our conversation. “Change of plans.”

“Lucy got me a job working at the mall with her,” I say. “So I'm going to stay here for the rest of the summer. I'm going to share Lucy's room.”

With Isabelle and Adrienne gone, there wasn't much for me to do back home but get a job, so no reason, my mother and I decided, that I couldn't just work down in Puerto Rico.

Tía Rosa was fine with it since, as she put it, I've been such a
milagro
, a miracle around the house.

That's me, miraculous.

“
Espérate
, you have to hear the best part,” Lucy says, dashing quickly outdoors to deposit the platter down on the buffet. She runs back in, slightly out of breath. “We're going on a road trip before school starts. The end of August. We're gonna do the chick bonding thing. Like
Thelma and Louise
. With no suicide at the end.”

“But maybe
with
Brad Pitt,” I chime. “Or a reasonable facsimile.”

“Bring on the hotties!” Lucy says, doing an excited little dance in place.

“Rosa's letting you do that?” Juan asks, incredulous. “No way.”

Lucy nods. “I know, I couldn't believe it either. But
Gloria
spoke to her.”

From where we stand, I can see my mother through the kitchen window, holding a glass of punch and gesturing animatedly, responding to something that Rosa is saying.

“So, Emily doesn't get to go cross-country this summer, but she does get to see the Puerto Rican countryside,” Lucy says, amiable. “It's the next-best thing.”

She's wrong, of course. About it being the next-best thing. It's not. It's just different. Way, way different than I had imagined my summer ending. But it's certainly not a consolation prize. I smile at Lucy. “You have no idea,” I say. “Nada.”

Acknowledgments

Muchas gracias to Eloise Flood, Kristen Pettit, and all of the Razorbills for being amazing friends and inspiring colleagues alike; to Bonnie Bader, Jon Goodspeed, and Debra Dorfman for supporting my moonlighting and never complaining when I get to work late; to Kristen Kemp for a much-needed kick in the tail; to my dad, who taught me everything I needed to know about Jewish guilt and new-wave Zionism (separate but related!); to my brother David, a genuine
nuyorican
and the most interesting person I know; to my grandfather Morty and in memory of my grandmother Miriam, who have taught me never to settle for anything less than excellence; to the greater Ostow clan and all of my friends (who are far too indulgent, I must say); to Jodi Reamer, for endless good faith; and to Noah, for unprecedented levels of awesomeosity and big-time laughs.