Reality

©vessa07DUP2016  
All Rights Reserved  

I count the minutes on clock swearing that the tick repeats itself twice every minute, fucking clock reflecting the dullness of the white washed walls. I have become as automatic and robotic as that fucking clock, ahhhhh just listen to my thoughts! Describing the motions of a clock, how monotonous, making comparisons between myself and a clock-how introspective. I shift my eyes to the computer screen and daze out, the light becomes a blur of color and my fingers rest lifelessly on the keyboard. I hate my job...I am bored by my life…how did I get here, I was so vibrant and excited in my younger skin. Have the obligations of my life choices slowly killed me? Have I participated in my lifelong death, each 24 hour passing by as I waste time in this job, in this marriage, with these people!
 
I love my kids, and sure at one point I must’ve loved my wife, but now I just appreciate her. Instead of being her lover, friend, and husband I have morphed into a simple witness of her life. Imparting no real value on the relationship, even my love-making if it can be labeled as such is short and perfunctory. I am uninspired by her body, by her minimal efforts-lingerie, eh-make up, eh-even the thought of a massage does not excite me. The same woman, even though I love her for her loyalty and she is a wonderful mother, it’s boring. I am for all intents and purposes a zombie in all aspects of my life. I try to change it up and make an effort, but really how much change can one make on the outside without changing from within?
 
I adjust the cuffs of my sleeves and shift my weight in my chair, answer some emails and then leave for the day. As I exit the building and stop to light my cigarette someone knocks into my shoulder making me drop ash onto my shoe. Annoyed I look towards them raising my hand vertically giving the international symbolic gesture for ‘what the fuck bro!’ and my hand stops before leaving my side as I notice who it was. The wind blows a minty smell in my direction from her flowing garments and she looks at me apologetically and smiles. This was the highlight of my week, month, year! That small moment brought a rush of youth back into my aging lifeless body! Why didn’t I stare at her longer? Even now the only thing I remember about that first encounter is her lips, teeth, purple veil, and minty smell. Just those small things that every girl could potentially have invigorated me. I went home that night, grabbed my wife’s ass when she was cooking in the kitchen and that night I bent her over the side of the bed and actually enjoyed having sex with her, noticing things about her body that I had grown used to not looking at…
 
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“I need you to respond to those emails by the end of the day, please!”
 
She spoke English with no accent, which I shouldn’t expect since she was American, I guess it threw me off because she was white, American, and Muslim! I was not used to having foreigners (except for the occasional French speaker) walking around the office. Even though I have known females in managerial roles I never actually had one work with me before. My second meeting with her I tried to notice more; maintain eye contact, and check her up and down. I guess she didn’t notice me paying such close attention to her because, let’s face it, every guy in the room was doing the same thing. I was trying to take it all in, everything about her challenged my pre-conceived notions about expats. The French are very cold, insincere, and condescending. I haven’t known many actual Americans from America before and my impressions are that they are warm, well-intentioned, and professional without being withdrawn. For a country that spends their lifetime in work I can see how the people mold their personal and professional together, if they didn’t they would be walking zombies too.
 
She wore a long solid-colored one-piece dress, with long sleeves and a high neckline that reached up to the base of her throat. She wore a geometric patterned veil which complimented the navy blue of her dress. It was form-fitting and clearly she was in shape but she wasn’t bulky and she had wonderful curves that reminded me of the sand glass on my desk. She was incredibly attractive and for so many reasons I did not see the two of us ever having a chance to talk one-on-one and never would I ever have imagined us becoming friends.
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One day I stayed late at work for our project and I must admit I would not have if you hadn’t been there. You were using the conference room as an office and had clearly finished ‘being professional’ for the day. You had turned on some music, kicked your high heels off which were resting haphazardly in the corner of the room. Remnants of take-out were on one end of the conference table and the rest was occupied by drawings and papers with one lone laptop in the sea of white. I just needed to find an angle, all of my cultural customs were telling me not to disturb you, but you were not from my culture. I walked into the room with some sketches and you were relaxed and welcoming. You asked if I wanted some coffee to which I agreed, you instructed me to take a seat and take off my tie. It was just the invitation that I needed after a long day of arguing with contractors and fighting the urge to spend time with you.  
 
I had realized by talking to you in these early evening chats at the office that I was unhappy, even miserable. The fact that such simple conversation was a delight for me just revealed that the obligations of the world were slowly killing me. I had willfully constructed my very own prison, through love and societal pressure to marry and procreate to settle for a job that was beneath me and to stay with the job because it provided support and security for my wife and children! This job did nothing for me, I had slowly become irrelevant in my own life. I was the supporting actor in my own life’s movie. I was lonely, my wife and I used to have conversations about dreams and the future and now I was in the future and nowhere even close to achieving anything that I thought I would. As I talked to you I just unburdened and let it out, fortunately you found it interesting and as the words poured out I experienced a sense of release. I felt important and appreciated and admired. Slowly the fog of words cleared and I began to notice you sitting in front of me patiently. It was like coming out of a dream about you and finding you there by my desk.  
 
You were a friend, a therapist, a sister, shit a mirror. You reserved judgement of me so it was like painting a canvas where we could both fearlessly paint a picture of who we really are. When we were together we were both safe from the lie of our lives and we had the opportunity to work out solutions together. Without putting our foot in it, we found a safe place where we could be ourselves and be completely honest. I began to involve you in my own painting, expressing to you how I enjoyed watching you smoke a cigarette. Watching the silver vapors kiss your skin was like watching a ballet, graceful hypnotic and truly beautiful. We began to chat on social media after work when I was out with my friends playing tarneeb and watching soccer. I confessed to you how much I disliked Egyptian soccer and much preferred the European leagues but I pretended to be an Ahly fan. Like so many other things in my life I pretended just to appease others and to ‘fit in.’
 
Our evening chats were much more intimate; now when I look back it seems that all of our chats were intimate but at work I mostly told you about myself and my life whereas afterwards I confessed my likes my turn-ons and my untold secrets. I told you how much I loved your mint/coconut perfume; I told you how I get turned on by dark cafes and classical Arabic Oud music. I explained how I enjoyed musicals they made me smile like a little boy, they were corning and romantic and I loved them-I secretly watched them with my kids passing it off like it was because of them that I watched them. I loved French music, it seemed aggressive and sexy and made me feel erotic. I told you how the smell of fresh coffee beans, how the steam coming out from the glass and warming my nose reminded me of when I was a child and I watched my father inhale his coffee and smile. I felt as if I could tell you absolutely anything and more to the point you would be honest with me and tell me everything I wanted to know.  
 
I longed to talk to you, I went on vacation to the beach with my family and found excuses to get on my phone and see what you were up to. I considered us more than friends but would never cross the line. Sure I would flirt with you and you would enjoy the praise and compliments but I would always stop myself short. You became a soul mate to me, we connected on a deep level and you were able to accept me without expectation and obligation and I knew that that kind of a relationship was not one that could lead to commitment. Commitment would kill it, like it had killed my marriage like it had killed my dreams. It reached a point though that when I talked to you my words were empty and my thoughts were wild. I thought of telling you in an effort to keep complete honesty between us and so I went about planning the best scenario to confess the very last secret that I held from you.  
 
It was November so the street cafes had almost emptied in the evening hours because of the cold winds coming in from the desert. It was midday so there were even less patrons and I had lured you to the café by saying I wanted to take you to lunch where I played cards. Eager to see a ‘real Egyptian ahwa’ you jumped at the chance not even asking about the food; your personality lent itself to taking risks and craving adventure. We entered the café, if it could even be described as that it was really a bunch of tables and chairs thrown together under a tent. You understandably shivered as we sat down on the ‘lawn chairs’ as how you described them. We ordered sandwiches and hot coffee and after it came I announced to you; “I brought you here for a specific reason.”
 
Your left eyebrow raised slightly as you sipped your coffee, “I’m listening,” you said emphasizing the word ‘I’m.’  
 
I took a sip of my drink staring at you and smiling slyly, “You know how we are completely honest with each other and that’s pretty much the basis for our friendship?”
 
“Yes,” you said still drawing out your words, slightly raising your pitch at the end.
 
“Well,” I continued, “I think your lips are incredible and I want to pull your face close to mine with my cupped hands and spend an hour licking, sucking, and plunging my tongue deep inside your mouth.” The words came tumbling out of my mouth like a bolder rolling down a hill. I paused waiting for the crash…
 
You sat there for a second with the coffee in your hand and shifted in your seat, leaned on the arm of the chair, raised both eyebrows smiling and said, “I secretly forget things in your office so that I have a reason to come back and continue talking to you or just watch you work.”
 
I breathed a sigh of relief and you continued to sip your coffee, your pupils dilated, clearly interested in whatever was going to come next. I took this as my cue, “The tone of your voice and even the way that you speak is comforting to me, I wish I didn’t think of you as much as I do because it is beginning to consume everything I do. I make love to my wife and I am thinking of you, I have been having better sex in the past 6 months than I have since my honeymoon.” I laughed and you giggle slightly as if you could reciprocate. “I doodle pictures of what I think your breasts must look like on napkins and random scrap paper at the office, I’m pretty sure my colleagues think I’m a pervert. I get compliments from some of the guys and random winks from the cleaners who I secretly think keep them after I throw them away.
 
I spend the majority of the morning meeting when you are presenting the project progress daydreaming about the color of your underwear, and I have to immediately think about my mother so that I can un-harden before I get up to leave. It’s more than sexual fantasies that I have been having about you... Do you remember when I told you about my childhood memories about my mother’s cooking during Ramadan?” You nodded, “Well this last Ramadan party here at the office someone had brought some mahlabiya with pistachios that was exactly like my mother’s and when I had told you, you took the biggest plate of it and I watched you as you closed your eyes with each bite and it brought me such joy in that moment that now when I taste that mahlabiya, which my wife makes once a month, instead of thinking about my mom and Ramadan I think about you eating it and the look on your face. You have re-mapped my memories, with each confession that I have made to you I have bonded my honest and true self with you.” I paused waiting to see your reaction…
 
You looked at me with the same longing that I felt for you and I know at that moment that you wanted to reach for me but I interrupted you because I wasn’t done, “I have re-awakened in so many ways because of you and this connection that we have is powerful, even haunting…Take this coffee for example, each time that I have coffee when I am not with you the taste of it reminds me of conversations that we have had, and whether I am out at the café with my friends or even with my mother-in-law I think of you and unintentionally smile. I was at the hospital with one of my friends who got in a car accident and his wife offered me hospital coffee, when I took it from her I instinctively smelled it and smiled and I’m pretty sure she got offended and is questioning whether or not I’m really her husband’s friend!”
 
You laughed out loud which brought the attention of the waiter who annoyingly came over and interrupted my confession briefly. I sensed you relax and settle into your chair for me to continue… “This is more than one-sided, I want you to understand that, things that you have confessed to me have become as much a part of me as my own confessions, I find myself intentionally listening to you. I have to admit though, most of the time I am either imagining you in various stages of undress, compromising sexual positions, and right now even while I am speaking to you I am imagining the wind blowing just right and allowing me to see what color panties you are wearing.” I inhaled deeply while unabashedly staring at your crotch. “My mind is spinning and the thought of you is constantly at its center, when I am with you I feel like a more whole version of myself, I vigorously try to engineer situations that we can be alone together and more often manufacture reasons to my family to stay later at work-something that I have never done before. I can only imagine what my wife must think I have become simultaneously a better lover and a more dedicated employee! When I go on vacation, I get withdrawal and I find myself writing notes on my phone of things I want to discuss with you when I see you again. Instead of making new memoires I simply dream and fantasize of memories that I want to make with you. I sense that you feel similarly because of your body language, the fact that you also seek moments alone with me, and that when we are in group together you seem to position yourself near me. Granted all of that could be a projection of my own feelings on to how I perceive you…Nevertheless you are sexy, and I cannot seem to get enough of you and probably will continue to feel this hunger until I actually do have you.
 
I know that if we have sex, it would be amazing satisfying arousing and probably a highlight of my life. I also know it will lead to either one of two possibilities.” I paused shaking my head, “it will make my feelings and cravings subside and those desires and fantasies will be replaced by guilt. I would feel so badly that it would only happen once because shortly thereafter I would find ways to avoid you rather than be near you and we would no longer have an honest open friendship! The second scenario is that it would be so amazing and we would have such a deep connection through our love-making because of the nature of our existing relationship and I would never be able to get enough. I would question everything about my marriage and my fatherhood and fall so completely in love with you that they would be a faint memory as I spend the rest of my life getting lost in your skin and completely immersing myself in loving you the way no one ever has! In either case the world as I know it would be destroyed, my children would be ashamed of me, my family would see you as the slutty American who stole me away from a dedicated good woman and made me abandon my wonderful children.
 
I think we both know by now that my life has gotten to be so monotonous and dull because I do not take risks. I have a weak character that fears change and adventure but craves it with my entire being. If you and I were to get together it would release this spirit and I would potentially become the best version of myself, but deep down it would be tainted with the completely satisfying life that I threw away as dull and boring as it is.”
 
I looked up and found your expression blank and pensive, almost deflated… “I love what we have; you give me personal attention, sexual interest, intellectual stimulation, and even spiritual strength because I am tempted and do not act for the sake of the One that I serve. I want you physically and I need you personally and emotionally but as I see the situation there is only one path to take going forward and that is for us to remain as we are: lifelong, close, personal friends. You are someone I will always be able to confess to, that I will come to when the world has defeated me and I will seek inspiration and reinvigoration to go back into the grey that is my life and be satisfied. Despite my deep desire to be with you I don’t see an alternative and I am sitting here in front of you more vulnerable than I have ever been waiting to see if you can accept me as a friend and trying to see if you will be able to deny me in those moments that I am weak and try to give in to my carnal temptations?” I stopped and took her hand on the table with both of my own, and looked up to her eyes pleading for an answer and or another alternative.
 
“I wish I was sitting next to you rather than across from you,” you said, “I want to touch your face, I would love to hug you right now, and I definitely want to kiss you.” You leaned in and I did too bringing our hands up in between us. I put my lips and my face on my side of our hands and you did the same to your side. Our faces not even and inch from one another. I inhaled you deeply and closed my eyes. It all felt so new and natural. Something inside us was growing, time flew, a love that could not be denied had developed between us and the inner excitement was so profound it was only a matter of short time before it would blossom in the open.  
 
“I truly believe,” you continued still close to my face deliberately looking deep into my eyes, “that everyone has a purpose and that every action that a person takes will either break them or make them stronger. We might not be able to clearly see our path and what is meant for us most of the time, and when the image is very clear then no amount of negotiating will sway the truth. You and I have love in one another, it is unconventional and has potential to be timeless and wonderful. Each of us could grow from it and become, like you said, the best versions of ourselves. That being said, no path that causes pain or causes an innocent to be hurt is a right one, and only the selfish would choose to hurt others for their own happiness.  Given what you confessed, and considering the options laid out in front of us, it is clear that remaining friends, soul mates, and confidants is the path we should take. I think that relationship will make us stronger for now, it may also make us weak and I cannot promise to deny you when you are tempted because I too may be tempted.”
 
We both sat opposite one another and contemplating the sheer honesty of what had been said between us.
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It was the best human moment that I can remember ever having and when I falter and become almost convinced that gender relations cannot evolve into true friendship without romance I think back on that moment. I went on and remained in my life, sure it was not as satisfying as it could have been but having chosen others over myself helped me become the best version of myself. Yes, I could have gone on with her and left everyone and everything behind but that would have only served me and the moral man within would have been haunted by this thought and every happy moment would have been spoiled. I would have grown old hating her for having taken me away from my family, my children would have grown up without a father and would have never liked the women I had grown to love. Instead we remained very close friends. I told my wife that I had these feelings for another woman that my loyalty and life would dutifully remain hers and that I was going to spend the remainder of my years trying to rediscover us and our love. She accepted and confessed she was feeling the same and that she too was tempted occasionally with old guy friends who she denied marrying to be with me, which I also accepted.  
 
My relationship with the American was an adult, mature relationship and even though I still wanted her with every fiber of my being and she wanted me we were able to establish some boundaries to keep from being tempted. Whenever I faltered and wanted her she redirected me to my family and likewise. She encouraged me to quit my job and pursue other employment, gave me ideas about the world and her travels so that I could rediscover my youth and my sense of adventure, and believe it or not her and my wife became very good friends having me in common. She moved on with her life and pursued employment in the Gulf and then Europe and we to this day remain very close and emotionally intimate. Is this cheating? Is my honesty with my wife just a form of justification? These questions are for greater men to answer…