One of the oldest cities known to man. The oldest cities I’ve ever been to.
Beirut has come a long way in the last thirty years. I had been to Paris on numerous occasions from work to pleasure and had never seen something quite like this place. As if an old forgotten world was bursting from the veins of its very own grandchildren.
“I could lose my job for this.” I remember fondly muttering in the very fundamental French I knew. I’ve always been extremely cautious about how close I get to the family I’m being paid to protect. This was one of the only times I was willing to risk it. It being his daughter I was probably risking more than my job, my life was potentially at stake. Lebanon was very much still a country that people “disappeared” in; I knew that all too well.
Somehow we ended up in a small alleyway en route to “a friends” house. It was no surprise the 20 year old rich girl without a care in the world would lead me on a chase through some random neighborhood in Beirut. Even if her family was so notorious they needed to hire people to protect them.
We ended up in a van sized alcove opposite of an overgrown community garden. She sat on a ceramic countertop in a flowing short dress, her hands grabbed me at the wrists and yanked me closer. I could see the way she’s stared at me the past few days, I would’ve never guessed she’d been this forward.
She started to decipher my belt, I pulled my sidearm from my waistband and placed it on the counter, along with my handcuffs and back up knife. I could’ve cared less about who may have been watching or following us. At that moment I forgot about everything, my career, my personal history back home. As she checkpoints her lips down my chest and to my waist my mind is only on one thing.
Her hair was natural and thick, the kind you get your fingers lost in when you run your hands through them. The kind that’s easy to control when you grab ahold of it in the right place. Her throat was an endless abyss, she could breathe underwater.
We touched every square foot of this little garden wash area. She felt every inch of my being, I tasted every ounce of hers.
She was placed on the countertop where so many plants had been prepared with love, whether it’d been for beauty, or consumption; She was mine for both.
Her half stripped body was placed against walls older than our family names. Her ecstasy filled breaths pushed the dust away from the both of us, leaving parts of her face and chest marked with a powder of a red hue.
At times we were quiet, most of the time we were a symphony. What lasted 30 minutes felt like a lifetime. Before she ended up where we started, on her knees.
It felt like she had a job to due, she worked tirelessly waiting for my physical approval. Before opening her mouth and releasing me with zero care as to her aim. I spilled my entire soap into her mouth and on her face.
We exchanged smiles and put ourselves back together. We barely talked the rest of the job, maybe it was because I wasn’t very good at Arabic or French. Maybe it was because we both got what we wanted out of this relationship. But I’ll never forget the “Paris of the East.” How well it treated me and a specific daughter I’ll never be able to mention by name.
