A tinge of snow in the air, the smell of decaying Christmas trees and the shrieks of children filled with chocolate Santas and hyperactivity - I knew it was time for my annual lunch with Kelly Moss. Since Kelly is my co-writer on I Can't Think Straight and one of the Executive Producers, and since I am the other writer and the director, we feel justified in referring to this 3 hour long homage to red meat and red wine as the 'office Christmas lunch'. Anyway, it's become an annual tradition, and one of the few things (along with runs in the park, grocery shopping, cooking and kids' homework) that Hanan generally steers clear of. Today, however, as she dropped me off outside a pub sporting fairy lights without and a fireplace within, she waved folornly.
'I'll just go home and have some salad,' she said.
I hesitated. It was zero degrees. A random snowflake grazed Hanan's head.
'Why don't you join us?' I offered. She considered. I knew she was drawn by the idea of warmth and hot food, but balked at the idea of sitting with two people who find themselves much more amusing than anyone else seems to.
'Would you like me to join you?' she asked.
Now that's a loaded question.
If you've ever been married to a woman - no, actually, if you've ever had a relationship with a woman, slept with a woman, or just spoken to one in a bar - you will know that there is only one correct answer to that question.
'Of course I do,' I said. And, in fact, I did. I love having my wife with me everywhere. But, where Kelly and I tend to sit about for hours admiring each others ability to make limericks out of the word 'dissolute', Hanan tends to order her main course and the bill at the same time and expect intelligent conversation in between. The 'office Christmas lunch' has certain standards, all of them quite low. Could two diverse cultures meet? Thinking of Tala and Leyla, even Amina and Miriam, I knew they could. So, I breezed into the dining room feeling goodwill to all women and we sat down with Kelly. I greeted her. Hanan greeted a passing waiter:
'We need to be out in an hour and a half,' she said. Hmm. It was downhill from there. We ordered the steaks and wine, but it wasn't the same with Hanan watching my glass ('You have to work') and picking stray bits out of my hair while silently miming to me to sit up straighter. Call me a grinch, but by the time she had admonished the waiter for taking three whole minutes to bring coffee, while Kelly and I galloped through a shared dessert trying not to chew so many times, I was filled with a warm Christmas feeling that was more like heartburn than compassion.
We hit the pavement towards the office leaving Kelly still draining the dregs of her wine, and as I hurried after Hanan tripping on my half-worn coat, she turned and watched me. I thought I felt it all. The irritation that she'd wasted all this time on two people who weren't funny enough to write a cracker joke, never mind a movie. The horror that she was married to someone daft enough to trip on her own coat. But her face broke into a smile.
'That was the most relaxing meal I've had in ages,' she said. I smiled too, relieved.
'In fact,' she said. 'I think I'll join you every year!'
Marriage. The agony and the ecstasy.