Luci Guest Writer 
Last Saturday, Dina and I made plans to go have brunch at the place the whole town has been buzzing about. We were sitting discussing her long distance boyfriend Ben, or so she likes to call him as she hasn't been seeing him a lot lately. I had the feeling she lost interest in him and the way she talked about him confirmed my suspicions.
Dina: When I happen to see him, I feel like I'm not fully there. He's not as interesting as he used to be.
Me: How's that?
Dina: Not sure, but all he talks about is work and his brother Jerry. I'm in a relationship with him not with all the other boring things in his life.
Me: Shit! Dina don't look, just keep looking at me.
Dina: What? Why?
A tall, very well built guy with dark hair and green eyes just walked in with a blonde girl on his arm. The problem here isn't that this guy is hot, but that it was Dina's ex-fiance. I didn't know how to break the news to Dina, as it took her ages to get over him. Personally, I think she never got over him.
Me: To my right, don't look, it's Hussein.
Dina: Oh crap! What should I do? Should I act cool?
It took me a few seconds to reply to that. Last I remember, when this asshole dumped her, was that he's been ignoring her and completely avoiding her, to the extent that he changed his phone number.
Me: No, I think we should leave.
Dina: But what if he saw us. He might think...
Me: Who the hell cares what this jerk thinks? Take my keys, and go to the car. I'll pay the cheque and will follow you in a minute.
She didn't argue much, I guess she was super confused. I could see her taking a quick look at him and noticing the bimbo sitting with him. She made it out of the place without him noticing, thank God! I was hoping to do the same once I paid the cheque, but he spotted me.
Hussein: Luci, is that you?
Yes, it's me jerk! Should I ignore him and keep going? No, that'll be too childish.
Me: Yeah!
Hussein: How have you been?
Me: Good!
Hussein: Great to see you.
I looked at my watch as if I needed to be somewhere right now. I hope he got the hint that I'm not interested in any way to have a conversation with him.
Hussein: How's your friend Dina doing?
Me: You mean your ex-fiance Dina, right? She's doing great!
Hussein: Good. I wanted you to meet my wife Lara.
Lara: Nice to meet you.
Me: You too. Listen, I have to run, I have somewhere to be.
Without waiting for them to even respond, I left as quickly as I could. I could see from Dina's look from the car window that she knew I was a bit late because he was speaking to me.
Dina: So?
Me: Nothing, I was trying to leave before him noticing me. But I couldn't.
Dina: What did he tell you?
Me: Nothing much, I didn't respond to anything.
Dina: Come on Luci, I'm a big girl, I can handle it.
Me: Sure?
Dina: Yes, now shoot!
After thinking about it for a second I decided to tell her everything, but I hoped for her sake she can handle it. She acted all okay, but I know her too well, she was going to burst into tears any second now, especially when she heard about him being already married.
Dina: Can you drop me home?
Me: Sure. Do you want me to come with you?
Dina: Sorry, but I'd rather be alone now.
I gave her her space and didn't talk much till I dropped her off. I could see her walking down memory lane and so did I. Dina and Hussein were a couple since their junior year in college. I had known Dina for a very long time as our families go way back. I've always looked up to her as a slightly older sister. Can you imagine Dina being the wise kind of sister? Well, the Dina we know now and the Dina she used to be are completely two different personalities. It's very heartbreaking I must tell you. She was never as naive as Habiba for example, but you could consider her to be the innocent type of girl. Anyway, so for Dina Hussein (her ex) was her whole world, he was all she could think and talk about, but not in a boring way. When I first met him, I thought he was bad news, he wasn't a good person, I could tell from his eyes. After getting to know him better, my suspicions were continuously confirmed. He never used to treat her that well, he would ignore her or sometimes give her really mean comments in front of people, which I found very rude. He used her love towards him and always asked her to do the silliest things for him, like run errands, help him with his graduation project to mention a few. I know it's normal for a girlfriend to be there for her boyfriend, but he abused her being helpful.
I never understood how she failed to see that. I always thought she can do so much better than him. So the days started passing by and they got engaged. She was the happiest person ever! Hussein on the other hand drank so much on his engagement party and kept on dancing here and there with tons of his friends instead of giving her the proper attention she deserves on such a day. What I didn't get was why he got engaged in first place if he obviously didn't love her that much. Was he after her money? Or after the sex? Dina's family is very well off, but so is his. Then it must have been their intimate moments together, Dina never revealed that until they broke up, which I'll tell you about shortly.
I will never forget the day Dina called me at 2 am back then.
Dina: We're getting married soon, wohooo!
Me: What?
Dina: You've heard it right. Hussein visited my dad today and they agreed we'll be getting married in four months from now.
Me: Do you think four months is enough for you to plan the magical wedding you've always wanted?
Dina: Yes, doable. You have no idea how happy I am.
Poor Dina! If only she knew how badly things would turn out for her. From there on, things literally went down the road for her. His level of rudeness started being unbearable. They had a fight once, right in front of me, and he talked to her in a very aggressive way and held her roughly from her arm. When I tried to come between them and talk some sense into him, he then started making sure I don't see Dina as often as I used to. I hated this jerk and at this point, I really felt the right thing to do was to speak to her about it to talk some sense into her. She's a beautiful woman and she doesn't deserve to be treated that way! When she didn't listen much to me, I thought of speaking to her mum, but then the gang advised me against it, as Dina might stop talking to me.
Billy came to me once and told me he saw Hussein in a club making out with another girl. I was shocked, though it was expected coming from a person like him. I tried telling Dina about it, but she refused to listen. She pulled away even more, until she called me one month before her wedding.
Dina: Luhhccii, I don't believe it! (crying voice)
Me: Calm down, what's wrong?
Dina: He forgot his mobile in my car, I didn't even know it was there until he received a message.
She continued telling me about the message, which was from the same girl Billy saw Hussein with at the club. She then opened his inbox and found tons and tons of messages from lots of random girls. I could imagine the shock she was in. He's a complete and utter jerk!
Me: Dina, talk to your dad now and tell him, this asshole doesn't even deserve a call from you to confront him.
Seems like she didn't take my advice into consideration, as she later told me what she really did on that day. Dina called him and confronted him, he went ballistic and made it to her house pretty fast to take his phone. He screamed and shouted at her and ended up throwing his engagement ring into her face. Dina didn't reveal much details about that hurtful incident, but I'm sure a lot went on during that fight.
It took Dina more than three years to get over Hussein, and like I said, I'm not convinced she got over him completely. The coward avoided her dad's calls, changed his number and I know from common friends that he was spreading lots of rumors about Dina being unbearable and that's why he dumped her. She had every reason to go into depression, but we always tried our best to cheer her up, even if it's for a while. That's when I started viewing life as a bucket of ice-cream, as Dina and I made it a habit to stuff ourselves with ice-cream and bitch about life on a weekly basis. Can you blame her for turning into the person she is today? We call her the man-eater and she's quite the player when it comes to men now. Dina turned into a completely different person, colder on the outside, trying to give off that "I couldn't care less what people think" attitude and playing it strong and tough. I know deep inside she still has that innocent and caring girl somewhere. I guess she thinks giving off that strong frontal wouldn't enable anyone to hurt her again, but that's life and you can never prevent those things from happening.
As I was about to send her a text to check on her, my phone rang.
Dina: Hey!
Me: I was about to text you. How are you feeling?
Dina: I'm better now. I cried a lot, but then realized how lucky I am. If he didn't forget his phone in my car back then, I might have been married to him now or even worse, I might have been divorced. I'm truly lucky!
I was really happy to hear her say that. It took her quite some time to get there, but she finally did. Bottom line is if you're in an abusive relationship, get the hell out of it, even if you love him and think he's the one. Reality check, he can't be the one and treat you like that. Take my advice and run for your life!
