Sunday, October 9, 2011

Our Last Date

The day before he had to go back to school Juice planned for us have dinner on a sunset cruise.  It was something I really wanted to do and he took care of the details-or else he intended to.  Only when we got to our destination Juice realized he completely got the dates and times mixed up and he actually made reservations for a completely different day.  So no dinner cruise for us.

I was disappointed and sat down on a nearby park bench sulking while he got on the phone to speak to someone about about getting a refund.  "I'm sooooo sorry" was all he kept repeating to me and I just said "it's ok don't worry".  We were both all dressed up with nowhere to go.  So we decided to just get in the car and drive around for ideas.  "Maybe we can just go see a movie" he said, "ummmm nooooo I kind of wanted to do something nice".  Call me vain, but I wasn't interested in doing something that I could do with my girlfriends any time.

Went drove through a suburb on the other side of town and I remembered that we were close to this reservation-only upscale restaurant that both of us have heard about and neither of us have been to.  I called them up and lucky for us they had reservations available within the hour.  My mood flipped and I became really excited.  For a moment I remember feeling guilty thinking that this was going to be a pretty expensive meal for a spontaneous plan.  Spontaneous idea usually involve burgers or ice cream, not five-star restaurants.  What if it was beyond his means?  Of course he would never say anything about price or accept any financial contribution from me.  I told myself I'll just make sure to look at the lower priced entrees even if it just vegetarian, and I wouldn't think about getting a starter.  I looked up the menu on my phone and of course there were no listed prices!

"Hey I've never been here and I heard that it's really expensive.  We don't have to go here we can look for another place...." although the reality is I wanted to go there more than any other place.  "Don't worry about it habibti".  Of course he was going to say that.

It was definitely the fanciest place I'd ever been to.  We were dressed up, but not as dressed up as the rest of the patrons who wore suits and dresses.  The uniformed waiters pulled out your chairs, strategically placed the napkins in your lap, and walked the ladies to and back from the restroom.  We would say things in Arabic to each other so that no one else could understand. "I feel like I should have taken an etiquette class to eat here.  What's the difference between the 3-prong fork and the 4-prong fork?" He insisted we go all out and while we're here try appetizers and deserts too.  We held hands across the table and I was all smiles.  I must have said "thank you for taking me here" about 5 times to him and each time he just smiled back and squeezed my hand.  He kissed the palm of my hand a couple times during dinner and commented on how soft they were.

For me that evening was one of the highlights of the year.  I was really happy and felt like the luckiest girl.  Unlike him I had no previous relationship experience, he was the first guy I seriously thought of as my future husband and to me his visit couldn't have gone better.  He made me feel protected and beautiful.

Little did I know that was the last time I would go out to dinner with Juice.

2 comments:

  1. Why??? Why was it your last? :-( Are you going to finish the story in another post?

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  2. Welcome to my blog MCM, yes I'm telling my story so it'll all play out.

    ReplyDelete