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She held her fork out in front of her like a sword and I felt like we were preparing for a great duel. I wondered if I was supposed to count to three or say, “ready, set, go.”
“Okay, go,” I said.
We both cut off a piece of pancake, raised it to our lips, and hesitated. She closed her eyes and we both stuck our forks into our mouths. We chewed. Surprisingly, it was really good. My bite was anyway.
“Mmm,” I said.
“That’s amazing,” she agreed.
That’s how I met Marlena. She finished her shift a couple hours later and I met her for coffee at another restaurant. She only had an hour to spare but that was the greatest and nicest hour of my life.
We talked about so many things. Well, she did most of the talking as my real life wasn’t something that flowed easily in normal conversation.
Turns out she worked during the day as a real estate agent but hadn’t made much money in the biz lately. In the afternoon she waited tables at the restaurant and in the evening she went to the YMCA to teach salsa dancing to teenage girls trying to stay off the streets.
She asked me to join her at the class. She was brilliant. These young teenagers were all between the ages of thirteen and twenty. Marlena told me some of them had gotten pregnant at a young age, some were fresh out of juvenile detention, and some were ex-gang members afraid to spend too much time on the block. Ex members usually weren’t appreciated.
I hadn’t realized Anchorage had such a problem with gangs. Hell, I didn’t know Alaska had a ghetto. But it does. And Marlena was doing her best to clean it up. She and one partner, a guy named Bernard.
He couldn’t keep his eyes off me the whole time I waited for Marlena, especially when she asked if I wanted to try out the class, and stiffly made my way through the steps for salsa, merengue, and bachata. I’d done a little bit of swing dancing in my days but Latin dances weren’t familiar to me.
Marlena had moved to Anchorage to visit a cousin of hers married to a military member. Her cousin didn’t speak a word of English and Marlena, who’d been born in Costa Rica, had studied the language all her life and spoke fluently. She’d only meant to stay in Anchorage temporarily but fell in love with the life. She’d gotten a part time job at a dance studio where she met Bernard.
She’d stayed in Anchorage ever since. She was a giver. Marlena donated all of her time to either selling people their dream homes, serving people breakfast, or teaching at-risk teenagers how to do something joyful with their time.
I knew she was the one for me.
I hadn’t planned on staying in Alaska for long. I was going to head home right after breakfast that morning, but instead I ended up renting a hotel room for a month.
During that month, I saw Marlena every chance I could, which wasn’t often at all. She had so much on her plate.
Finally, I invited her over to my hotel. We ate dinner and talked a little but I couldn’t bring myself to tell her the truth. She’d already told me how much she hated liars and how she’d dated so many of them in the past. She dated one military guy while living in Anchorage and he’d cheated on her with a stripper.
Fucking idiot. That’s all I could think as I listened to her story.
She told me how she wanted kids of her own and how, at her age, she was beginning to get worried.
“How old are you?” I asked.
She hesitated answering and I couldn’t help getting lost in her eyes. She was so absolutely stunning. Her caramel colored skin and long, wavy black hair. She’d taken off her glasses. Her dress was red and sleeveless and as I searched her body for the kinds of imperfections that make a woman perfect, I found a small scar on her upper arm. It was circular and I had no idea where it had come from but I liked it.
As she contemplated answering my question, she ran her fingers over a thin, twine-like necklace.
“I shouldn’t be here with you,” Marlena added. “You can’t be, what, twenty-two years old?”
“Twenty-five,” I added. “But I’m an old soul. Very mature.”
“I’m sure you are,” she said with a sly grin. “Okay, I’m thirty-five.”
“Ohh, I’m sorry, I need to get my coat,” I said as I stood and pushed my chair back from the table.
“Asshole,” she said.
I sat back down and we both laughed. She went on playing with the rope around her neck.
“What is that?” I asked.
“This?” she said, straining to look down at the necklace. “It’s just something my mom gave me before she passed away. It reminds me of her and I guess I play with it when I’m nervous.”
