3. Logan
Chapter three
Logan
The airport is surprisingly busy at this time of night as Tara and I walk down to baggage claim in silence. We’re both tired from the weekend, and the long flight that included an even longer layover, even if we couldn’t beat the price.
We spent the weekend in San Francisco at an intensive tango workshop teaching basics, fundamentals, advanced steps, and even hosting a milonga for the final night. It was a good time, as it always is, but my feet are tired and I’m sore.
“So, that was it,” I say.
“That was it,” Tara agrees.
Before we booked this weekend, we decided it would be our last workshop together. Silas, Tara’s long-term boyfriend who’s been crawling his way through medical school, is awaiting match results that will either keep him here or take them both to another state. Tara and I chose to keep teaching our local classes until that news came, but as for travel and competitions, we’re done.
Our bags come down the conveyor and we grab them before walking outside to the curb.
“God, I was just getting used to that gorgeous San Francisco weather," she says. "This humidity sucks."
We’re back home in Florida, greeted with humidity in late August.
“Didn’t Silas sign up for Arizona?”
“It’s dry!”
“I’ll get a car,” I say, laughing.
Her long sigh could be mistaken for exhaustion, compounded from a long travel day, but her shuffling feet as we stand on the curb are saying otherwise.
“You okay?” I ask.
“I’m tired.”
I should probably go to bed, but all the travel has just left me wired and restless and hungry. I don’t want to go home just yet. “Want to go to Waffle House?”
She gives me a small smile.
“Come on.” I jerk my head in the direction of the car that’s just pulled up. “Let me buy you some hash browns.”
“I could go for a waffle,” she reasons.
Our luggage gets thrown into the trunk and we hop in, setting our sights on those bright yellow lights.
***
My hash browns are piled onto my plate, a mess of smothered, covered, and chunked. Tara is picking at a waffle.
She clears her throat. “So.”
“So. Something’s up,” I say playfully.
“Silas matched.”
My eyes meet hers. Silas didn’t know where he was going to match, and he was worried about uprooting his and Tara’s life. But she’s been the positive support in his corner, ready to jump into whatever adventure is next for the two of them. We knew there would be a change, but it’s a much different animal when it’s happening in real time. When I’m halfway through bitter coffee and a plate of greasy hash browns awaiting news.
“Where?” I almost don’t want to ask.
“Arizona,” she mutters.
“You did sound defensive,” I joke. “That’s great, Tara.” I give a smile, but it might look forced. My hand shakes a little as I drink my coffee. Caffeine was a bad idea this late at night. “When?”
She takes a breath. “Twelve weeks.”
“Shit.”
“I know, I know.” She winces. “I found out over the weekend, but I didn’t want to tell you until we got back home.”
I don’t know what else to say. Why does this feel like a breakup? Not that Tara and I ever dated, but our partnership has spanned six years. We’ve always kept things professional between us, but she’s also my closest friend.
“So, what happens now?” I ask.
She looks down at her cup. “Gonna finish up my master’s.”
“That’s awesome.” My smile isn’t forced this time. I’m genuinely excited for this new chapter of her life.
She shrugs, taking another bite of waffle.
“Knock it off. This is great news.”
“I know,” she murmurs.
“Are you sad about leaving?”
“Of course, I am.” She doesn’t look at me when she says it.
“But?”
“But I think it’s time.”
I just nod and let out a deep, almost achy, breath. “I might be getting there,” I tell her, putting words to a strange feeling I’ve been harboring.
“Don’t say that,” she argues, her eyes sad.
“Why not?”
“I don’t know,” she sighs. “I don’t want you to abandon dancing.”
“Like you’re abandoning me?” I joke.
She pins me with a look and purses her lips to keep from laughing. I give her a smile in return. I’m mostly just fucking with her at this point. She knows that, but it doesn’t change the fact that her news is almost setting me adrift into one big, unsure ocean.
“I feel like a giant asshole for doing this," she laments. "I know that it sucks on your end, but I want you to keep going.”
“Don’t feel like an asshole," I assure her. "We knew this move was happening.”
She reaches over to grab a scoop of my hash browns instead of responding.
“Maybe it’s time for me, too, Tara. Maybe this has just run its course. Look at what happened last year.” Our last competition was a year ago, and it was a mess.
“Maybe this move will be good for both of us, then. Maybe what you’re feeling isn’t you, it’s me.” She looks down at her empty mug, twirling it back and forth. “I haven’t been giving it my all lately.”
“Neither have I.”
Tara’s got a plan; she’s getting out of this now. She gets to start a new life, but in the process, she’s leaving her old one behind.
“Maybe I need a new life, too,” I argue.
“No, you don’t.” She shakes her head.
“I don’t know,” I shrug. “I’m just feeling disconnected with it, I guess.”
We’ve fostered a wonderful, thriving community here. We’ve made friends, taught a large number of classes. But it just hasn’t been as fulfilling lately. It stopped being fulfilling a couple of competitions ago. And it was clear after the last one that I was done.
Tara watches me as she chews, a concerned look in her eyes.
“I’m alright,” I tell her. I just need a nap and a day to reset. I finish up my coffee. “Give me a couple of days. I’ll get over my shit.”
“I don’t need you to get over your shit.”
I look at the time, now well past two in the morning. “I think I need to sleep now.”
“Same.” She sits up straight and lifts her coffee cup. “Here’s to the next twelve weeks.”
I tap it with mine. “Let’s go out with a bang.”
What am I going to do? What is my plan? I never thought too much about it, but lately it’s all I’ve been privy to. I’ve been doing this for twenty years. When I discovered professional dance, it saved me. But lately, so much of it has felt like drowning. Like taking step after step to nowhere. What else is there after this? And what happens when it doesn’t give me the same feeling it did when I was a kid? Or when I was on top of the world? What happens if it doesn’t fill my cup like it did? What then?
“Hey.” She breaks me out of my thoughts. “You’ll figure it out. You always do.”
But this time I’m wondering if I really will. I don’t tell Tara any of this though. I just hug her goodbye and head home to my bed.
When I get home, my older brother Gavin is sprawled on the couch, remote in hand, flipping through Netflix, watching absolutely nothing.
“What are you still doing up?” I ask.
There’s a box of pizza on the coffee table, the pie mostly eaten. A bunch of empty Dr. Pepper cans are littered around it.
“And what the hell happened here while I was away?” I look around, inspecting the mess.
“Got laid off,” he answers.
“What?” I must not have heard that correctly.
“I got laid off,” he says a little louder, a bit firmer.
“Shit, for real?”
“Yep.” More remote clicking.
“Why?”
“Company layoffs. Downsizing. Severance package. Blah blah, all that shit.”
Gavin has been at this company doing client relations for years. He works nights and weekends, putting in eighty hours a week, traveling nonstop. He handles client functions, makes all kinds of money. He thrives in it, I think. At least, he did. He likes being important. He likes closing deals. He probably likes being away from home.
“How was your trip?” he asks.
“Alright,” I answer.
“How’s Tara?”
“Leaving,” I tell him.
“No shit,” he says with surprise in his tone.
“Yeah. Silas got residency in Arizona.”
“Ah, damn. Sorry.” He looks at me briefly, then turns back to the TV.
“It’s alright.” I sit down on the couch next to him. “She’s ready to move on.”
“Mm,” he mumbles in agreement. “I get that.”
“You okay?”
“Yeah,” he sighs. “Yeah. I’m okay. I just need to sleep it off. Figure this shit out in the morning.”
“Could you talk to somebody? You were a top earner for them. They can’t just cut you like that.”
“They can. And they did.”
“Damn. Well, severance is good.” But I know he’s thinking about out of control rent prices, the bills. Our shitty landlord that never repairs anything. Things I never gave a shit about until we moved in together and he was breathing down my neck about savings accounts and finances. I always found a way to just make it work. Maybe that’s the privilege talking. The fact that I always had my older brother fighting for me, watching out for me.
Maybe I need to do a better job of watching out for him, too.
“We can look for something new in the morning,” I offer.
He just nods but doesn’t look at me. “What time is it?”
“Um.” I check my phone. “Almost three.”
“Should probably head to bed.”
“Yeah. Yeah, me too.”
We throw the pizza box into the fridge and head to our rooms. I leave my luggage in the corner by the door.
We’ll deal with it all in the morning.