Amira (10 page)

“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 eye, 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!”

He lay with his chest exposed and his hard-on bulging and
straining at the buttoned fly of his boxer shorts.  Serena brushed her finger
slowly up and down his rigid cock, thinking that she really should study, but
she could not resist, so she reached down and slid his boxers over his erection
and pulled them off the rest of the way then playfully tossed them on his
chest.