What could she tell her friend? It wasn’t some horrible fate that had sent her running back to Dubai. It wasn’t a broken heart or a terrifying nightmare. It was just the knowledge that Liyah had accomplished nothing in five whole years. Sure, she’d gotten a degree and even a teaching job, but she hadn’t been able to connect with anyone. The more she tried to get past her comfort zone, the more she ended up walling herself in. There had been weeks when the only time she’d left her apartment was to go to work and run errands. She hadn’t had a date in a year. She wondered what Mila would say about that. She’d made no real friends since college. She felt like she was just existing rather than living.
But someone like Mila, who thrived on life, would never understand, and it was humiliating to admit as much. Swallowing hard, Liyah shook her head.
“Fine,” Mila said with a long-suffering sigh. “But you will have a good time here if I have to drag you out every day and every night to do it!”
“I want to enjoy myself,” Liyah assured her. “So drag away.”
They had wandered around the market for some time longer when a table on the edge caught her eye. Beautiful jewels sparkled in the sunlight, displayed in the most intricately carved wooden boxes she’d ever seen. Unable to help herself, she reached out a hand. She didn’t dare touch the jewels; instead, she ran her fingers along the curves of the darkly stained wood.
On the other side of her was a table that held burning incense, and for a moment, Liyah was enthralled by the scent. Sandalwood and frankincense. She recognized the distinctive odors immediately. They were thought to be a powerful trigger for mystics. A woman covered in the traditional dark hijab stood behind the table, but she was also draped in gorgeous colorful glass beads. Each one caught the sunlight, and Liyah couldn’t help but stare. It seemed that each bead was unique in color and design. Dark eyes stared at her intently from under the woman’s cover, but their owner made no move to approach Liyah or attempt to sell her anything.
“She’s a full-blooded Nawar,” Mila whispered in her ear as she tugged Liyah away. “They’re the gypsies of the Middle Eastern world. Sahaar says they keep to themselves, but I’ve always been curious about them. It’s rare to see them in the center city market. They usually peddle their wares outside the crowds.”
After relenting and purchasing the pretty crystal bracelet that she’d first seen and some cardamom for Sahaar's delicious pudding, Liyah caved and applied for an alcohol license at Mila’s insistence.
“You’ll thank me later,” her friend said with a wink. “You’ll want to be able to drink when you visit me at the lounge.”
Finally, as the sun started to set, Mila hailed a cab to take them home.
Home, Liyah thought as she stared out the window. It was strange, really. Her home used to be the series of small two-bedroom apartments where she grew up, but her mother moved around so much to avoid climbing rent prices that it never really had felt homey. Even her dorm room and the cramped quarters of her rental back in the States hadn’t felt like home—but there was something about this city that called to her.
It wasn’t comfortable. It was hot and loud and messy and everything she shied away from, but she just couldn’t stay away.
Days passed, quiet and uneventful—and unproductive.
Mila hadn’t been able to take any extensive time off work, and Liyah refused to allow Sahaar to show her around since her exchange-mother walked with the pain of arthritis, so she went out on her own. It didn’t surprise her when the locals gave her the cold-shoulder treatment, so she spent most of her time job hunting and reading in a small cafe that was only a few blocks from Sahaar's home. It afforded her a chance to people-w
atch and get out of the heat. As the tendrils of steam curled above her chai tea, she looked out through the patterned-metal frames to the parts of the city she hadn’t seen. Despite Mila’s insistence, she hadn’t visited the lounge yet, but she knew that she needed to try something new.
Maybe tomorrow, she told herself, but when tomorrow came, she always had an excuse not to go.
Two weeks had passed, and still there were no job prospects. She was about to despair that she’d made a terrible mistake in coming to Dubai when Mila stomped into her bedroom, took a double-fisted grip on the blankets that Liyah was using, and yanked them away. “Sahaar says that you are spending every day in that ridiculous café, reading. You could do that at home! Tonight, you’re going to the lounge—whether you like it or not. The man of your dreams could be there looking for his sheikha. Will you really keep him waiting?”
Unable to help herself, Liyah giggled, then laughed outright. The idea that she’d meet a sheikh was absurd, but when Mila waved the green guest pass around in the air, Liyah reached up and snatched it.
“Fine, I’ll go, but I’m not going just so I can meet a man. Most of them are overrated, anyhow,” she muttered.
Mila rolled her eyes playfully. “But every girl is waiting for her dream man,” she said dramatically and pretended to swoon on the bed. Liyah laughed and moved just in time before her friend could fall on her.
One of the things that had always separated Liyah and Mila was their views on men. Liyah had watched her mother struggle, no thanks to the male segment of the population. The only thing a man ever did for her was to knock her up and abandon her when he realized what having a daughter really meant.
Liyah didn’t want that. Casual hookups had never been her thing, whereas Mila had men following her around wherever she went. Her lively friend was comfortable around the attentions of men, but Liyah knew that she’d never find what she wanted.
The type of love that Liyah dreamed about didn’t exist. A soul mate, the type of connection that she could feel down in her bones, was a thing of the past. Technology had made dating impersonal, and impersonal relationships were the result. Sure, some turned into marriages, but it was more the status of being married that drove the relationship and not that soul-shattering love that Liyah had read about in books.
But that was fiction, and this was the real world.
2
The ride to the lounge on the commuter bus was hot, and Liyah’s skin glistened with sweat. “So much for picking up hot men,” she joked, but Mila whipped out some rice paper and blotted both of their faces.
“Gorgeous!” she declared.
The bus stopped, and Liyah took a deep breath as she stepped out and viewed the southernmost nightlife district in Dubai. Five years ago, she had been so wrapped up in her studies that she hadn’t really had a chance to go out with other students to enjoy the city at night, and she’d obviously missed out. The glitz and glitter of the city lights married with the gorgeous old-world Arabian pattern-cuts in the walls and gates, and decorative enamel on the doorknobs.
It was breathtaking.
The streets were filled with young partygoers, dancing and laughing as they moved from one destination to the next. Liyah had never been one to party, and her heart fluttered nervously, but she tried to look like she belonged.