In the first part of Lenah’s story about breaking her relationship with Yassine to her parents, she finally confesses the details to her mother, whose reaction is priceless. After answering a million and more questions, she rushes to bed before her protective father comes home and fights off waking nightmares about him choking her alive!
I managed to doze off later that night for what felt like only five minutes. I woke up that morning to huge hands pressing on my shoulders, and the first thing my eyes see is my dad towering over me saying: “Wake up now, and come to the living room.”
SHIT. Let me tell you, I was AFRAID in every meaning of the word. But I managed to conjure up a tiny bit of confidence because he actually had a little smirk on his face.
I walk into the living room, and sitting there was my grandpa, mom and dad. My heart was beating out of my chest, and of course, I sat right next to my beloved grandpa and held his hand.
My dad still had a smirk, and the reason for it was because he couldn’t believe what I’d done. So my game plan for this conversation was to let him let it all out.
“Well, you turned out to be a sneaky one!” he said. My face was so red, eyes fixed on the ground.
“I just can’t believe it. Who the hell is this guy, anyway? Moroccan/French? Are you kidding me?” he said. My eyes stayed fixed on the ground.
And the scolding continues: “And you went behind our back! You better thank your lucky stars that your grandfather knew about this the whole time, or I wouldn’t even be talking to you like an adult right now.”
Amidst scolding, Sarah popped her head through the door, only to quickly tip-toe away from the tension-filled room. Dad heard her and yelled: “Come back here! I know you’re in on this too, fakra nafsek say3a w eny mesh ha3raf?!”
She pretended she didn’t hear and literally ran out of the apartment. Woos. I was all alone, but grandpa was still there! And finally he stepped in.
He was the voice of reason, explaining how Yassine was actually a good, decent guy and how he proved it in the past months. But this only made things worse because my dad was finding out new information and becoming even more annoyed.
He couldn’t even say Yassine’s name! He kept saying “this guy” or “what’s his face” and going on about every Moroccan stereotype you could think of.
So after he let all the frustration out, he looked at me, annoyed as hell, and finally asked me about him and his background.
So I told him everything a dad would be impressed by/interested in, like where he graduated from, what his major was, where he worked, and how decent his family was.
He still wasn’t impressed, but he did calm down the breathing, and his face returned to normal human color.
So my grandpa took advantage of that, summoned us to the breakfast table and continued talking about Yassine and how he completely approves. I jumped on the bandwagon, too (my confidence level rising significantly) and explained that I’d never done anything this crazy in my lifetime and that should count for something!
He asked a million questions (like Mom) about his background, again, and everything else. Breakfast was over and he calmly closed the subject and excused me from the table.
Phew! That went well, I thought! No. With my dad, it’s never over. Later that day, he came to me and said “I want Yassine’s e-mail.” What? “NO, what do you want it for!” I exclaimed.
He said he just wanted to know more about him, and introduce himself. Ph, yea right! I told him I wouldn’t give it to him until he showed me what he’d send.
Now, I can’t even begin to explain what the content of that e-mail was, so I decided to show you guys a snapshot of it:
Yes, people, this is real. And this is the edited version. The other one included a command demanding that Yassine take a PICTURE of himself with his hand on the Quran. I can’t even make this up. Of course I asked him to remove it, among other things.
I argued with him, begging him not to send it, but gave up in the end and decided to let him do this one thing to take away from my guilt of not telling him.
NOTE: That last part of the message where he told him not to talk to me until he answers? Yea, my dad added that AFTER I gave him Yassine’s e-mail address. So I had no idea.
I kept BBM-ing Yassine that night (when we all held Blackberries) and he wouldn’t answer! I thought the e-mail definitely drove him away and he didn’t want anything to do with me or my family.
The next morning my mom excitedly wakes me up saying, “Your dad approves! Don’t tell him I told you!” So I casually go to my dad and he tells me that Yassine replied and that he was impressed with all of his answers.
So I tell him, “Well, too late now. You drove him off. He won’t even answer me.” The look of guilt surfaces on my dad’s face (yes, I get that from him) and he says, “Oh yea, I told him not to talk to you until I give him the green light.”
I was annoyed, but I didn’t even care because my dad, whom a few hours ago I thought would choke me alive, approved of my Moroccan/French boyfriend! I was amazed.
I force my dad to reply to him right away and Yassine BBMs me and apologizes profusely. It was like he was imprisoned and helpless the whole night and my dad (the warden) finally let him out. I felt great, and what felt even better was my dad saying, “Plan for him to come to Egypt next month. I want to see him. Mabrouk ya baba.” 🙂
WE SAID THIS: If you missed the series from the beginning, check out all of the Diaries of a Bride to Be here!