Dean and Jodie

Two: Dean...

Driving my embarrassing damaged silver Nissan Micra to the parking lot of Lord of the Wings, I smile at the valet and politely step out of my car.

I mentally thanked god I wasn't going to go through parking my car.

I sucked at that, it was the reason my car was practically scraped all over.

I've been driving it for two years now, yet, I still didn't get used to its dimensions.

It'd be so spacious and it'd take two of my car yet, I'd still panic and complain I won't fit in there...

Such situations always end up by me stepping out of my car and letting a fellow stranger park it in for me...

But, oh well...

"Merci..." I smile at the valet thankfully.

It still surprises me that most Egyptians here understand what 'Merci' means yet, not everyone is comprehendible to 'Thank you'.

With a heavy heart, two pair of lousy limbs, and shaky hands, I step into the restaurant and my eyes immediately scan the place.

A man in uniform walks to me and asks a table of how many did I want and I reply with two, in Arabic.

He ushers me to a perfect table by the window and for a moment I hesitate, remembering how ninety percent of the blind dates go wrong in movies when the guy sees the suspected girl sitting by the glass window on a table of two. If the girl doesn't match his liking, he usually bolts and the girl stays in there for a really long time until she feels stood up and goes home, then eventually cries herself to sleep...

The man startles me by asking if there was anything wrong with the table. So I look around and find that the restaurant was already too crowded and realize that I didn't have much of a choice. So I take my seat and assure him that it was fine.

He leaves and I finally get the chance to get an eyeful of the place.

The place was ridiculously crowded with tables of six, eight, and even more. Mostly teens and groups of mid-twenties, but there happened to be a few families with noisy kids around. No one sat solo like I did, and that just made me stand out... It's going to be unquestionably easy for ChrisPBacon to identify Miss HotChickenWing...

That aside, as I watch everyone put on their gloves and dig in, shoving one chicken wing into their mouths after the other and extracting just its bones, I whisper to myself;

"The hell was I thinking choosing this place?!"

I mean I do love chicken wings. I would devote my every day meals to chicken wings for the rest of eternity! I loved them that much!

But this was practically a date! And devouring spicy drooping chicken wings on a date was highly unfashionable and it would eradicate my feminine etiquette forever!

It was 7:30 and I've only been here for five minutes, yet I felt already stood up...

My mind instantly tries to redirect my sentiments and I begin replaying a certain statement in my head over and over again;

"I came for the chicken wings..."

"I'll have 4 of the honey mustard boneless wings and 4 of the garlic parmesan..." I order and he repeats my order for reassurance.

"7: 48..." I read the time from my watch and take yet another deep anxious breath.

I figure I should probably check if he's back online, maybe ask him if we were still on.

But then I make a promise to myself that the moment the wings arrive, I'll set a five minutes timer. If he doesn't arrive, I'm going to devour my wings, pay my meal, and leave at the instant...