Mayte
WE’RE AT A PARTY AT ABUELITA’S HOUSE. I DON’T KNOW WHAT WE’RE celebrating. But Colombians don’t need to know what they’re celebrating to throw a party. Existence, maybe?
Aguardiente, a Colombian alcohol that tastes like licorice, is flowing in the secret way that aguardiente does—I can smell it on everyone’s breath, but I don’t see the bottle.
Abuelita allows Leo and me to wet our lips on her shot glass just for the taste and then directs us to her candy cabinet for those little pastel black licorice pieces to whet our appetite for the flavor.
I bring Aida a handful of the candies and she shoves all of them in her mouth. Colorful drool fills the corners of her lips.
Someone turns music on so loud, I can barely hear myself think.
Everyone comes out to dance. Tíos, primos, Abuelita, Mami, Papi, people who I’ve never seen before but who seem to know primos or tíos and then those people’s friends and then their friends.
There is so much red lipstick. So many pairs of heels.
Drumbeats and guacharacas and Carlos Vives and cumbia.
“How do I dance?” I ask Leo as she sways her hips, moves her feet, twirls around, her dark hair in the air like levitation.
Aida is wearing a dark blue dress covered in flowers. Her lips are still decorated in the pretty sugar casings of the black licorice. Her seashell hand is held tight against her body.
“Just move your hips,” Leo says. She demonstrates and it looks so natural, clings to the rhythm pouring from someone’s Bluetooth speaker. “You’re Latina. If you just move your hips, everyone will think you can dance, even if you can’t.”
Aida is not moving her hips. Her dance is a stiff limp around the room, dragging the left side of her body with her. Her feet move in quick, tip-tapping step, a lightness on her right foot, the gravity of her paralyzed left side hitting the ground heavy. Sweat pours down her red face.
“Do you need to sit down?” I ask her.
She grunts and shakes her head, turning away from me in her limp dance. She’s smiling, but there is something scared in her eyes. The armpits of her dress are wet.
Abuelita finally takes Aida’s hand and leads her off the dance floor. She gives her a water bottle and then returns to the dance floor herself.
“Just try it,” Leo says, nudging me with her shoulder.
Aida is staring at me. I’m staring back at her. I try to look away and attempt an awkward swing of my hips, mimicking the movements of Leo’s body, but Aida bursts into laughter, water shooting out of her nose and onto the floor.
People are shocked but quickly start laughing. Aida’s eyes won’t leave me as she tries to stop laughing. I try to move my feet like Tía Dely’s, and Aida spits water out this time, laughing hysterically again.
I am embarrassed, but at the same time, I am delighted at Aida’s response.
Usually, I receive grunts and sighs, my sister shoving past me like she doesn’t know who I am or doesn’t want to know.
Right now, I am her ultimate form of entertainment.
I keep dancing, allowing myself to make a fool of myself, flailing my arms, shaking my hips, twirling and twirling, and Aida seems to actually consume very little of the water bottle.
Most of it is on the floor at this point and it feels like the larger the puddle gets, the more I’ve succeeded.
Finally, the bottle of water is empty and someone wipes the water from the floor. A strange sadness settles in my gut as Aida is led away from the dance floor and into another room. To do what? Sit in a chair in the corner, probably?
The rest of my family is dancing, palpable joy and breathless excitement, ribbons of a homeland that I’ve never seen and that I cannot find in my hips. I try to smile as people twirl me, take my hands. I wonder if there is something scared in my eyes the way there was in hers.
“No,” I say to Tía Dely. “There aren’t any stories I’d like to tell at the rosary.”