CONTENT WARNING: When I say adult content, I don't mean people being shot okay? In my book that's PG-13 okay? To put it in the baseball metaphors of my youth, this is third base and on so if you are not old to vote, cover your ears. And vote or die yo'. Also, please note that the Arabic herein has been culled from random word lists in the net. I try for accuracy but what the hell do I know?
Abaya: an over-garment worn by some Muslim women.
Habibi: darling.
Jamila was sitting on a stack of soda-pop crates eating a green apple when the garden doors were pushed open from the sidewalk. She had seen the camouflaged crowns of helmeted heads bobbing above the tall security wall along with the other clinic employee, Raziya, who preferred to do her spying from the safety of the window. The 15 year old was a second wife and a mother of two but 15 nonetheless. She joined Jamila in the porch as the men came in. Her curiosity went unsatisfied
"Yalla! Ruuh ishtira chaay," Jamila ordered giving the girl enough money for a month's worth of tea. "Yalla." There was a brief moment of conflict on Raziya's face but she chose the sudden windfall over whatever unknown could be learned from the American's visit and disappeared with visible joy in her step. Jamila recognized Sgt. Murphy behind three of the wooden crates marked with Red Cross insignia as she opened the clinic door for the men. They lined up the boxes just inside the room.
"I was about to give up on you Sergeant," she said to their backs. Murphy had Silas' attention, tapped his radio to remind him of their pre-arranged signal and gave him a knowing smile before he stepped back out into the porch.
"I went by your house earlier but I didn't see your goat. I thought maybe you moved."
"No." She hauled one of the heavy boxes to an examination table and worked at the nailed lid with claws of an old carpenter's hammer. "I ate it."
"You ate Lexus?"
"You named my goat?"
"He was cute. He had a spot on his butt like an 'L,' kinda made him look like a car."
Jamila finished logging the contents of the first box in a lined composition notebook. Silas took off his helmet. They were bad theater sans ridiculous plots, slamming doors or any of the other deliberate absurdity of a farce. Her pencil moving right to left on a sheet of paper was the loudest sound in the room for a whole minute.
"I never know what to say to you," she said at last.
"Then we are a matched set." He popped the lid on a second box glad to have something to do.
"My last name isn't Al-Shahrani." She produced the laminated ID she had shown Del Rio earlier. "Muslim women don't take their husband's last name. Jamila Haddad, see?"
"Midwife?"
"Well it should say assistant in the bottom. I'm still learning. Did you know umbilical cords should stop pulsing before you cut them? It can go on for an hour and I helped at a birth last week where the placenta was almost as big as the baby. It's so… spongy. I haven't been able to eat meat since." She stopped after a glimpse of Silas' crinkled nose and laughed nervously. "More than you wanted to know?"
"A little."
"Your friend outside," she asked looking at the back of Murphy's body armor before she closed the curtain "do you trust him?"
"Yes."
"Good." Jamila smiled. She unfastened the pins keeping her headscarf in place and began rolling off the long stretch-lycra gloves that covered her arms to the elbows. Chris took her hands in his.
"I don't want you to think I only come here…"
"To get into my panties?" She interrupted. Chris surprised himself by replying in kind.
"Be fair darling girl." He bent down to kiss her and told himself, briefly even believing it, that nothing else would happen. "You don't wear any." Jamila pulled the neckline of her abaya away from her body, peered down and spoke in mock shock.
"Why Sergeant, I think you are right!" She took off his ICOM headset before he had a chance to protest and started on the impossibly powerful Velcro lapels of his body armor.
"No. Jamila. I'm dirty. I don't have a condom. I'm pretty sure I stink." He listed the reasons without conviction more for his own benefit than anything else.
"Sergeant," she said finally freeing him of the twenty pound vest, "shut up." It took every reserve of his common sense to stop her hands on the buttons of his jacket.
"I can't turn off responsibility Jamila." She smiled; amused by the tangible sorrow in his face as he spoke, like basic human decency was a burden he'd grown accustomed to shouldering.
"Staff Sergeant Christopher Silas," she said working her way down the five button shirtfront, "the East was teaching the West how not to get their women pregnant while you were all still trying to figure out the alphabet." Her hands rested on the buckle of his belt waiting for him. "Do you think maybe we can get naked now?"
It was as if he'd shifted to drive, helping Jamila with his issued belt when she couldn't get the ends loose enough to pull them free of the buckle without resorting to a knife. Unlike her, Silas knew design wasn't always an Army priority and simply adapted to work around the problem. He began hiking up her abaya as they kissed, wise to the trick in taking it off and wishing he had more than two hands to work with.
"Don't take it all off," she ordered helping him keep the bunched robes above her waist. The words sounded harsh out of fear ingrained deeper than any other personality trait, bringing some more of the unwelcome reality into the room with them. Jamila pulled off his soaked undershirt and stared for a second at the thick, polypro long johns in her way. "What on earth…"
"It was cold this morning." She pinched the spongy thermal underwear one last time and went back to the task at hand, Chris' dick. He groaned in response to the light touch and reached under her dress in the general vicinity of her breasts until he was able to cup a perfect handful. He stood still as her tongue explored his mouth then began untying the decorative trim of the abaya's neckline for enough room to be able to take her nipples between his teeth and enjoy the low, purring noise she made when he did that. He pushed her further back on the rickety exam table, leaned into her and let his fingers dance randomly along the hot skin of her inner thighs, teasing her until the speed of her breathing matched his. She tried to grasp his dick through the three garments still on him.
"I can't," he gasped, holding her hand around the wrist, "wait."
"Okay." She tried to get everything off in vain. Silas was still wearing the thigh holster for his M9. The clothes didn't budge. Jamila leaned back for a better view and opened the button-down fly of the BDU pants. She lined up the fly on the pants with the long johns and the boxers underneath, spread her legs and wrapped them around his waist as he guided himself inside her. She moaned in tune with the more guttural sound that left his throat, overwhelmed by the sheer sensory overload and the feeling that there was a God and He was kind and merciful if only because nothing else would ever explain the wonderful sensation of that very first second inside her. Then, he was suddenly terribly aware that condoms sucked and that he wasn't going to last long enough to bring her anything more than a lot of frustration. Jamila could see his muscles tighten in groups, legs, arms, shoulders and Silas pulled her closer for that last thrust of his hips, holding her like nothing could ever bring them close enough as he came.
"I'm sorry," he mumbled into the crook of her neck. A fat drop of sweat made the plunge from the top of his Adam's apple down the center of his chest. He looked up. "I'm sorry." His cheeks were flushed red; first grade with his hand in the cookie jar.
"Shhhh." She said stopping whatever he was going to say with her index finger on his lips. She let her heavy abaya fall to around her and scooted to the edge of the table reaching for the sandals she'd kicked off minutes earlier. Chris pushed her back. He kissed her friskily slightly amused at the mix of irritation and reluctance he got in return. She bit his lower lip and for a second, he wasn't entirely sure she hadn't meant for it to hurt. He righted his pants, buttoned up the fly and chuckled smugly.
"I think I'm going to teach you the alphabet song," he whispered in her ear. Jamila did a double take; her right eyebrow arched impossibly high. Chris knelt in front of her, much too amused to tear his eyes from her face. He hiked up the skirt of her abaya and made Jamila yelp startled when he hooked both hands around the backs of her knees and pulled her to him. Jamila leaned back instinctively to give him more room. A, b, c, d, e, f, g…
"Oh habibi."
If you are reading this you obviously didn't cover your ears, tehehehe.
Thy Author and Her Editor.