Waltz of Her Life

Maggie always made them like an event. Sometimes she would have "theme" parties, such as New Year's Eve in July, or she would throw a "Beach" party, even covering part of the floor with sand, playing ocean sounds on a big radio the younger kids nicknamed a "ghetto blaster." Back at that first lesson with Ron, she had no idea that so many people came to the dance studio, and that there were so many instructors. Along with Ron, there was Carl, a suave, ascot wearing guy in his early fifties, Ricardo, a Latin-American guy with swarthy skin and warm dark eyes who came from Puerto Rico, Tony, a fair-skinned and dark haired young guy with liquid eyes.

All types of people came to the studio besides the stereotypical lonely hearts. At least four sets of married couples came, including a husband and wife doctor who practiced at St. Joseph, just down the street from her. That Friday night when Linda made her entrance off the elevator foyer at the studio, Ron strode past the front desk. "Hey, sweetie."

He gave her a quick, glamorous peck on her lips, the way he always did. Tony always liked to hug her. He was just coming off a lesson with a short, zaftig, smiling girl.

On the other side of the room, the men students of The Next Step hovered awkwardly around the female staff. Linda sensed that Maggie liked to hire them young and pretty, with a certain seductive quality beyond that. First there was Wanda, a classy looking older instructor who liked to wear her ash blond hair pushed away from her face and piled atop her head in a sexy array of various chignons. Next, thin, frail dark-haired Janice was finishing up working on Latin motion dances with a short legged bald guy who looked like the maintenance supervisors at the hospital.

Third came Daisy, a dark-skinned girl who might have been either Hispanic or Italian. She was the newest teacher. Many times Linda had seen Daisy posing, on high dancer's heels, placing a hand on her hip for effect, tossing her long tumbles of glossy black hair this way and that. Linda wondered if the girl spent hours in front of the studio's massive mirrors practicing those types of moves. It was probably doing it to pass the time until she built up a client list like all the others.

Through it all, Maggie floated along classily on her designer heels and Halston outfits, shaking hands, offering her cheek for kisses, and giving loud gleeful hugs to various clients. As with all of the other parties, staff people had placed tables and chairs over the sides and corners of the dance floor. They'd hung streamers and balloons from the suspended ceiling tiles and taped orange and yellow construction paper stenciled leaves to the mirrors. Janice and her student had to dance around tables while they finished their lesson.