What just happened?

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This evening I address everyone from the safely of the pages of a tender tale told by a conflicted man. I am not that man, but his tale of garbage and flowers allows me to breathe and live, to weep and smile, to build up and tear down, though not very well. His tale leads me onto the dance floor of a small bar in the basement of an old hotel in Beirut or Algiers where there should be no bar, no dancing, and I am very young, and it’s a long time ago. The music is loud, the drinking hasn’t stopped since 1926 and the crowd heaves. I’m alone on the dance floor, spinning while everyone pushes at the bar, their backs to me, shouting for more beer through the yellow haze of smoked tobacco. There’s no way off the dance floor till a girl in a shiny green dress pushes her way through the crowd. The music falters and the spell is broken. Men turn their backs to the bar and lean against it. Whistles, cheers. Long, black hair shaken loose and falling down to the dancer’s waist. I’m pushed to the margins. The girl in the green dress glows and twists. The beer tastes too sweet and my mouth is raw from inhaling other men’s cigarette smoke. The music slows and sets a new rhythm that the dancer controls with her hips as her green dress rides over them. Rides around them. She slows the rhythm right down then leads it till she has control of every man, every anticipating eye in the bar and then she lets the rhythm rise. The shouts of the men, too many men for the room. They know not to spill onto the small square that belongs to the dancer and the music burns and rages till the dancer owns every man in the room and they think they own her. Heat, noise. Movement. The dancer collapses onto the floor, spent and exhausted and the men turn back to the bar and clamour for more beer. The dancer picks up a black shawl to put around her shoulders that are slippery with sweat. She wipes her forehead and disappears into the swell at the bar.