Moondogs - Alexander Yates [72]
“No point.” He waived a small hand in the air. “You got you wrong. That’s not what you look like at all.” Then came some nonsense about her being the tallest woman in the room and not wearing any shoes. Her feet were part of the floor and went all the way down into it, like tree roots into the ground. She had a glow. An aura. A how-do-you-call-it. He was obviously drunker than he looked. Monique left him where he stood and she and Joe returned home. That night, after sex, he asked what she’d said to him. She answered honestly, and he got mad, called her a flirt, and slept in the den, like an infant.
Reynato telephoned the next morning. Monique asked how he got her number and her name. “I really, really wanted to talk to you,” he said. That’s all he said.
THERE WAS NO VALET PARKING, but that didn’t stop Reynato from leaving his Honda at the security checkpoint and tossing the guards his keys. He braced his foot on the front tire and tugged hard to open Monique’s door. They walked up to the hotel, through the tremendous glass doors and into the Shangri-La. The lobby was packed. People in barongs and business suits mingled by the staircases and lined the mezzanine railing with drinks in hand. Two or three of the Filipinos recognized Reynato and pointed him out to others who pointed him out to more others. He waved as they ascended the stairs, stopping once to sign an autograph and again to be photographed with someone’s wife. They asked him what he thought Charlie Fuentes’s chances were, and he answered that Charlie Fuentes was a great friend and a good man. Monique started to wonder if coming here wasn’t a bad idea—if it wasn’t begging to be caught. After all, she was with a man who still sent flowers to her apartment and love notes to her office. If he pulled just one cutesy stunt here, that was it.
Thankfully, Reynato seemed as eager to ditch these people as she was, hurrying them both into the ballroom. He strode right to the floor, ignoring Monique’s protest that she’d rather watch first, not even waiting for a new song to begin. She quickly set her arms like she remembered—she and Joe took a three-week course in the lead-up to their wedding—but before she got her feet right Reynato started moving. Using their outstretched arms and clasped hands as a wedge, he cut through the crowd to an open area by the low stage. The steps were familiar enough—Monique stared down, watching her toes trace box corners on the parquet—but everything else felt awkward. She bumped hard into an older woman and got a dirty, mascara-faced glare.
“You’re all right,” Reynato said, leaning in close, awash in his particular fruity smell, more perfume than cologne. “But you’re drifting left.”
She glanced up from her feet and they stopped doing what she wanted. Reynato’s hand went firm on her back as he moved her out of a passing couple’s way. “I was just trying to follow the line of dance.”
“Ah,” he grinned, almost apologetically. “No such thing here. Manila dancing is like Manila driving. If you see space, take it. If there’s no space, make it. Also some of our dances are different. Your hustle is our swing. Your swing is our boogie.”
Monique didn’t know hustle, swing or boogie. The song ended and when a new one began Reynato came around behind her. He took her hands in his and stepped on the shadows of her feet. “Lindy hop,” he whispered, as though lindy hop meant something.
“You’re a cheater. You said you didn’t dance.”
“I said I didn’t dance well. I don’t. You dance terribly.”
“Ha.” She let go his hand and discreetly pinched his outer thigh, hard. She focused on the floor below. When he started moving, she did too.
MONIQUE FELT CONSPICUOUS after four dances with the same