Amira Read online

  “Thank you, baby! Mwwah! Mwwah!” Serena shouted, giving him exaggerated loud kisses on his cheek.

  She bounced back into the bedroom and flopped onto the bed on her belly, swinging her feet back and forth like a little girl. Maggie liked the idea, and they started talking about what they would wear since Hani hadn't said where they would be eating. The girls decided on “nice but casual but not too nice and not too casual”. In girl language, that made perfect sense, and they laughed about how the guys would grab a quick shower and throw on whatever clothes they found closest to them and always managed to be presentable in any situation. Girls, in contrast, had to plan every detail in advance and had to wear the right outfit, the right shoes, and always had to be properly accessorized, and God forbid if any other girl dressed nicer or wore a similar outfit.

  “Men are like ‘Pants. Shirt. Go.’” Maggie added, simplifying the basic fashion sense of most men before bursting into a fit of laughter.

  This was much shorter notice than Serena liked to have, but Hani had bought her a sleeveless black dupioni silk dress which she hadn't worn yet, and it still had the tags attached. It was much more than she would ever spend on a dress, even for being a simple design, and she wondered about returning it, but he insisted that she keep it. It came down to just above her knees and hugged her curves every inch of the way. She thought it made her behind look too wide, but it was met with Hani’s lustful approval, and he had no words to say other than “Damn.” When he picked his tongue up off the floor, he said her ass didn’t look big, but it was the ass he was going to fuck when they got home.

  She wore a push-up bra, and the tops of her breasts squeezed out of the low neckline. She brushed bronzer into her cleavage and a shimmer powder over her décolletage to accent and contour it even more. He had given her a cashmere pashmina with a beaded edge that she planned wrap that around her shoulders on the way out because it would be cool after the sun went down and she was sure the restaurant’s air conditioning would still be on, even though it was early fall. She was slipping into a pair of silver kitten-heels when Hani emerged from the shower. Looking at him naked and wet, she wanted to stay home and spend the evening in bed together, but they hadn’t gone out much as a couple, but she thought he was amazingly gorgeous and was proud to be seen with him, so she looked forward to a night out.

  She hoped for a moment that she would not be overdressed, but she lived by the rule that if you are dressed too formally, you only make others feel they are the ones who didn’t dress correctly for the occasion. Her hair was still a little damp because she was short on time, so she pulled it up into a casual updo, leaving a few wispy strands at the sides spiraling down to brush her collarbone. She also wore the beach glass necklace, and Hani was right; it made her blue-green eyes appear much more vivid. He grabbed a button-down shirt and black jeans from the closet without giving it a second thought and turned to her for approval as she was finishing her makeup. As usual, he looked stunning with very little effort at all.

  Serena waved to Maggie when they arrived at the restaurant. She was already inside near the hostess station and waved excitedly over the heads of a few other restaurant patrons. An older woman looked annoyed at her exuberance, but Maggie didn't notice the sharp look the woman gave her when she almost elbowed her in the temple when she waved to Serena. Serena didn't see anyone else with Maggie, and she wondered who she had brought along as her date. Even if she came alone, Serena knew that Maggie would not be going home alone; she would pick up the bartender, the bus boy, or even someone else’s date.

  Maggie and Serena hugged quickly and started chatting away as Hani told the hostess that they needed a table for four.

  “You make me look like a schlub! You look so nice!” Maggie said, criticizing her own choice of skinny jeans, charcoal gray tunic sweater, and ankle boots, which were actually more appropriate for the casual steakhouse than what Serena was wearing.

  Serena’s outfit and Hani’s dark clothing made everyone else in the restaurant look subpar. It was a working class town, but sometimes Serena felt that the locals were just a bunch of slobs without any taste. The men seemed to all wear blue jeans, a faded t-shirt from their favorite sports team or a band that they liked in high school, and a flannel shirt for a jacket, and the most of the women didn’t seem to care too much about their appearance and looked like they were too tired to do more than run their hand through their hair before leaving the house.

  Serena started to ask Maggie who she came with, when someone rushed from behind Maggie, tackling her around the waist and tickling her. The smile quickly left Serena’s face when she realized it was Shane. Panicked thoughts raced through her head. Stockroom Shane. Shane-who-I-had-let-feel-my-tits-as-he-masturbated Shane. She felt a wave of embarrassment creep to her cheeks, and she tried to hide her disappointment as best as she could and tried to be social.

  “Long time, no see, Serena,” he said, leering at her breasts at the neckline of her dress.

  She suddenly felt self-conscious and wished she had worn something a little more modest and pulled the pashmina tighter around her, covering her cleavage. It had been a long time since she let him feel her up while he jerked off in the stockroom; in fact it felt like an eternity because that had stopped as soon as she met Hani. She knew that he and Maggie had been hanging out together from time to time and had even screwed around a few times, but the last she knew, things weren't working out and he acted like a dick and Maggie wasn't answering his texts or returning his calls.

  “Nice to see you, Shane. Hani, this is Shane. He works with us at the store, and Shane, this is my boyfriend Hani,” Serena quickly announced, emphasizing the word “boyfriend”. She had stepped closer to Hani, indicating that they were a couple and Shane didn't have a chance with her anymore.

  “Honey? What kind of a guy's name is Honey?” Shane said sarcastically, looking at Hani like he was from another planet.

  “Hani” he clarified, ignoring Shane's sarcasm and pronouncing his name much more distinctly than Serena had. “Hani Fouad,” he added, extending his hand toward Shane.

  Shane ignored the gesture and announced that he was “ready to get his drink on” and wondered when their table would be ready because he was starved. Serena looked at Maggie and widened her eyes in disbelief at the way he was acting, and she just shrugged. She had never known Shane act this way; otherwise she wouldn't have done what she did with him. He was always decent to her and seemed fairly shy and reserved any other time, but now he was really acting like an ass. There was tension in the air as the hostess took them to their table, and Hani politely let Maggie and Shane walk ahead of us. Serena knew that he noticed the awkward looks between all of us, but he didn't let on that it bothered him. He just continued gracefully if nothing had occurred.

  “Let’s get this party started!” Shane shouted as the waitress led the way into the dining room.

  Serena wished that they had requested a booth because they were seated at a small, square table in the middle of the restaurant, and she was uncomfortable with Shane to her right and Hani to her left. At least she and Maggie were across from each other, and they started chatting away like nothing had just happened. Hani ordered mixed drinks for himself and the girls, and Shane ordered a beer, commenting that it was “a real man's drink” and told the waitress to “Keep 'em coming.”

  Serena tried to ignore his rudeness and wondered if he already started drinking before they got to the restaurant, judging from his obnoxious behavior. Sensing she was uncomfortable, Hani stroked her leg under the table, tracing the line of her thigh-high stocking with his finger. She squeezed his thigh in return and rubbed her foot against his. They snuggled like lovebirds and kissed while Maggie joked that they were so sweet together that she was going to gag.

  “Don’t hate the player, honey! Hate the game!” Serena taunted at Maggie.

  Maggie tossed a crumpled napkin across the table at her, and the girls laughed hysterically. From the corner of her e
ye, Serena saw Shane roll his eyes at them, and then he jumped. If she knew Maggie, she had just grabbed his crotch under the table to tell him to straighten his attitude.

  They all started looking at their menus, when Hani announced to the group to go ahead and order anything they wanted as he was footing the bill. Serena wondered if that was a mistake, and that was confirmed when the waitress returned and Shane ordered the largest steak on the menu. Not only that, he ordered the “Surf 'n Turf” platter and told the waitress to make sure the steak didn't 'moo' on the plate. She had never known him to be so boorish, and she was so embarrassed that he couldn't have just asked for his steak to be well done. She looked apologetically at the waitress and silently mouthed the word “Sorry”.

  The food was delicious, although they could not enjoy it very much with the tension at the table. Shane was happy that his steak didn't moo, as he had put it. He ate quickly, munched on his shrimp, and guzzled his beers, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand and belching occasionally. He mopped up the juices on his plate with his bread and licked his fingers sloppily.

  The rest of the group conversed between themselves, ignoring him as much as they could, although he continually interjected himself into the conversation with either loud laughter or crude remarks. Serena felt bad for Maggie who was stuck with him, and they all looked around apologetically when other patrons looked at them, disgusted by his behavior. The evening couldn't go quickly enough, and Hani tried to soothe Serena’s nerves by continuing to caress her thigh under the table and occasionally rubbing her back.

  Hani excused himself to go to the men's room when he finished his meal, and Maggie had gone off to chat with a classmate who she spotted across the restaurant, leaving Serena sitting alone with Shane for a few minutes. As soon as Hani was out of sight, he slid his hand up her thigh, lifting the edge of her dress, and gripped her tightly. She was startled by his brashness and quickly pried his hand off of her leg.

  “What? The princess isn't so easy anymore?” Shane asked, eying her cleavage.

  “Shane!” she said, clenching her teeth and raising her voice but trying to keep it quiet so no one around them would hear. “Can't you see? I'm with Hani now. And I know what we used to do in the stockroom, but it's history! Got it? I can't do that anymore and besides, Maggie really seems to like you when you aren't being King Dipshit, and I swear to God, if you don't treat her right--”

  “Ok, ok, ok. I'll lay off the Ay-rab...” he said, leaning back and rubbing his unshaven chin thoughtfully.

  Serena shot him a disapproving look.

  “Sorry...the Arab,” he added. “But your tits do look amazing in that dress, and I'll be thinking of them when I get myself off later.”

  He simulated the movements of masturbation, and Serena’s face burned with anger and embarrassment as she glanced quickly around the restaurant, wishing that Hani and Maggie would come back and hoping that no one heard what he said.

  “And as for Maggie...” he said, pausing like he actually had a deep thought in his head. “She does suck a good dick, and believe it or not, I actually do enjoy her company, regardless of what she might have told you.”

  Actually Maggie had never really told Serena very much of what went on between them and only said they messed around a few times, so she wasn't sure what the “regardless” part of his comment was about. She wondered if there was something more that Maggie hadn't told her and thought that she would talk to her about it later.

  Hani and Maggie returned to the table, and Serena stood up and gave Hani a quick kiss. Shane's demeanor had completely changed, and he stood and slipped his arm around Maggie's waist and extended his hand to Hani.

  “Mr. Fouad, thank you for this wonderful meal, and if you don't mind, I would at least like to leave the tip?” Hani nodded in agreement, just to keep things moving and hopefully end things quickly, and Shane continued. “And please if you would all excuse my behavior this evening. I just had a shit day at work, and I also got a message on my way here that my grandpa isn't doing that well, so I'm a little worried about him.”

  They left the steakhouse, and it became apparent to Serena that Hani had a bit too much to drink, so she was glad that it was a short drive back to the hotel. The company was paying for the lease of his car with the stipulation that he was to be the only one driving it. She judged that he was steady on his feet and behind the wheel, and his speech was impaired only to where she could notice the slightest difference.

  He only drank a little wine with dinner or sometimes a shot of something harder after a long day, so when he did drink a little more, his accent became thicker and more pronounced. He would sometimes shuffle his words around or forget a certain word, so his conversation would become peppered with words in Arabic or sometimes French, and Serena enjoyed the mélange of languages. He also did that when he was excited about something, and she thought it was charming, and it sometimes became a learning experience as she deciphered it. The more he drank, the more interesting he would speak, but Serena had never seen him completely drunk in their time together.

  After a few drinks was one of the few times that Hani would talk about his childhood; the alcohol loosened his tongue, and he would talk about some of the troubles that he had seen in his home country. He had grown quiet, and Serena thought he might be thinking about those times, so she reached out and stroked his thigh in a comforting way. This time, however, he only sang quietly as Neil Young's "Harvest Moon" played on the radio.

  "It always amazes me how 'you foreigners' sometimes know American music more than we do," Serena teased.

  "Canadian, baby. Mr. Neil Young is Canadian, not American," he said, correcting her softly and returning to the lyrics of the song.

  Back at the suite, Hani seemed more mellow than drunk, and Serena was feeling only slightly buzzed and relaxed as well. She had an 8 a.m. Economics class that she suspected she would miss because it was already getting late and she had a few hours of studying plus an essay that she needed to get started on.

  The professor’s name was Penny Lane, and on the first day of class, she broke into a goofy rendition of the classic Beatles song to introduce herself, but the reference was lost on most of the young students who just looked at her like she was fercockt, as the professor would say. Even if she was not Jewish or German, for some reason she often used Yiddish expressions, leaving the class Googling it on their smartphones in case it was important and then reprimanding them for not paying attention to the lecture. Serena wondered why most professors ended up being the oddest of characters, but at least Professor Lane –“Just call me Penny”, she insisted – didn’t count absences against the student’s grade, contrary to school policy. She said students only hurt their self by not being there to learn, and that should be their only penalty.

  Hani headed directly for the bedroom, and Serena followed him. She teased him for the alcohol hitting him so hard this time and called him a “lightweight”. She wanted to change into something more comfortable before she started studying, but he grabbed her hand as she walked past him and pulled her into his arms. He started to sway back and forth, wanting her to dance with him, but she said she had some chapters to read and there was also no music.

  “Come a little bit closer…Hear what I have to say," Hani sang softly. "See? We have song now, baby,” he added then sang again. “Just like children sleepin'…We could dream this night away.”

  Serena recognized it as the same song that he sang in the car and decided to humor him for a few minutes, even if he sang off key and sometimes mumbled through the words that he didn’t either didn’t know or didn’t remember. His slightly exaggerated accent warmed her heart; she thought it was adorable.

  He rocked her in his arms as he sang, and Serena closed her eyes as she laid her head on his chest. Normally she didn’t even like dancing, but being wrapped in his arms was very comforting and feeling the muscles in his warm body against her, of course, made her very horny. She didn’t want to ruin a tender
moment, so she tried to ignore the wetness in her panties and the fact that his cock grew hard against her as they danced.

  “Because I'm still in love with you…I want to see you dance again," Hani sang as they swayed in each other’s arms. "Because I'm still in love with you…On this harvest moon.l”

  Without her realizing it, he had led Serena to the side of the bed by the time he finished the song. He sat down on the bed, and Serena told him he should lay down for a bit while she studied. She unbuttoned his shirt and told him to lie back, and he complied. She worked dutifully to loosen the buckle of his belt and unzipped his jeans, without any intention of escalating it into anything romantic. She pulled his jeans off of his feet as he lay there, and she went about undressing herself as he watched her.

  “Baby, stay with me. I want to lick your pussy,” he said, sleepily reaching one hand out to her and smiling through his alcohol haze.

  Serena giggled and mocked his accent, repeating “I want to lick your pussy” a couple times and pronouncing it “boosy” as he did. She put on one of his t shirts and pulled her hair up in a loose bun. She liked to tease him when his would say the letter B instead of the letter P because that sound isn’t in the Arabic alphabet, which usually wasn’t a problem, but his pronunciation was a bit sloppy from the alcohol.

  “Yalla, baby. Come on…I want to lick your poooosy,” he begged, this time mocking himself and drawing out the word. She giggled and congratulated him on getting the letter P to come out correctly.

  “It’s P-ussy, baby,” she said, accentuating the P-sound followed by the correct vowel sound. She strutted seductively in front of him. “Get it right, and you can have all of the pussy that you want!”