The narrator recounts being brutally gang raped at a dance club opening event after being invited by her neighbor and drug dealer Moody. She had gone with her friend Tara, who left with Moody's brother Abbas. Later in the night, Moody accused the narrator of sleeping with his cousin Rick and had her beaten and raped by multiple men. She was later found badly injured in her apartment parking lot. The story provides context of the narrator's previous relationship with Moody's brother Mahmoud, who she had cut off contact with after her son was threatened. Years later, she encounters Mahmoud again and finds he has conformed to a traditional religious lifestyle he had previously rejected.

1. Flashback Story
The Great Gala Opening
I believe it was a Saturday Night in late July or early August.
It was that time of the summer when it was still very warm and humid even late
into the night and early morning.
I remember the day prior like it was yesterday. Moody’s cousin Rick had climbed
up onto my second floor balcony delivering to me a huge garment box wrapped
with a pink bow and everything!
The box contained the dress and shoes that I was to where when I accompanied
Moody on that Saturday night to the Grand opening of the “…………. ……..
Dance Club” in Hull, QC.
Moody was my downstairs neighbour who had a wife, a 2-year-old little girl, and
a baby on the way. He was more importantly, my drug dealer and I thought, my
friend. I was accompanying him to this opening because his wife could not. It was
never my intention to have Moody any further immersed in my life, nor did I ever
have any reason to believe any different of Moody’s motives.
The dress and shoes were not something I could ever dream of affording, nor
having a place to where such classy things. The shoes were a hue of rose that
matched to tiny pattern in an otherwise black dress. The shoes were strapless
and had about a 4-inch heel. This rather took me by surprise, as Moody was
barely an inch taller than me.
My best friend Tara was there with me when the package was delivered, and
opened. She begged me to get her invited to this grand opening event. It was,
after all quite a noteworthy event and had been publicized very well. Tara had
ulterior motives as well. She had an on going crush on Moody’s younger brother
Abbas, who, coincidently happened to be attending this opening. It was after all a
“family affair.”
I succeeded in convincing Moody that I simply could not attend with him if Tara
could not be there with me. My excuse, Moody didn’t dance to fast music and
wouldn’t it be better that I would have Tara to dance those dances with me while
he “made the rounds” of the up and comings.
Tara and I set about getting ready for the evening. She told her parents that she
was spending the night with another friend (she was not allowed to associate
with me).
Moody, his cousin Rick and Abbas showed up at the door at 5pm. We decided to
divide into two vehicles. There were Moody, Rick and I in one and Tara and
Abbas in Tara’s car.

2. We got to the club and it was magnificent! All the rumours were true. It was
definitely an Exclusive Club for the movers and shakers in the area.
It had 5 stories with balconies around the perimeter of each wall and cat walks
onto each dance floor or billiard area on each floor. There were bars on each
side of each floor.
It was very, very crowded, and was too easy to lose the people you came with. I
was separated from Tara within the first half hour. Moody was milling around
working the crowd with me on his arm, most of the time. He made sure that my
glass was never empty and that the cocaine was flowing freely.
I caught sight of Tara at one point 2 stories below me, she was dancing with
Abbas. Tara appeared a little drunk, which was unusual for her when she was
driving and she did not do cocaine so I was a little worried. I told Moody that I
was going to go down to see that she was all right. He told me “no.” He would
have Abbas bring Tara to me, that way he said he’d know where I was. This
comment struck me as odd at the time but I let it go. Abbas did however turn up
with Tara tagging along behind him. (He did not like Tara the way she wanted
him to). That was obvious to everyone except Tara. They sat with me for a few
minutes and Tara took me onto the dance floor to dance. I hadn’t danced all night
and she knew that this was not like me. We danced two dances and chatted
about how the evening was going. She was having a blast, as Abbas had been
very attentive. However, she commented that Moody seemed to be keeping a
tight reign on me, almost, she said as though I was his girlfriend and he was a
jealous boyfriend. My answer to that was “well I am his escort to this; I guess it
would look bad for me to be wandering around by myself.”
We walked back to our seats to find Abbas laughing and joking with a couple of
guys and Moody looking very angry! Within a few minutes, Tara announced that
she and Abbas were leaving. I was not having a very good time and was tired, it
was 2am. I asked for a ride home with them. Moody immediately answered for
them and said “NO”. I explained that my son would be coming home from his
dad’s in the afternoon and I needed to get some sleep. He said not to worry as
he and Rick were leaving in about half an hour and I would go with them, then
pulled me aside and said that Abbas wanted some time alone with Tara. That
didn’t ring true for me because I knew Abbas didn’t like her, but thought
something must have changed through the evening, as they often do when there
is alcohol involved. (It really nagged in the back of my head though because
Abbas was a devout Muslim and did not drink alcohol).
So Abbas and Tara left. I had begged Tara to stay the extra half hour but she
wasn’t passing up “her shot at Abbas”. I had a bad feeling knawing in my
stomach and it wasn’t the alcohol.

3. It was an hour later when Moody decided we could leave the club. I felt relieved.
However, as we were walking out with several other people Moody was saying
“we’ll see you there in 20 minutes”. I had no idea where he could be talking
about; home was at least 30 – 40 minutes away and Moody’s own club was
closed and at least 45 – 50 minutes away. I got into the car with Moody, Rick and
3 guys I’d seen at the club, but I didn’t know them. I was tingling all over knowing
that something wasn’t right but kept ignoring it. Eventually I asked Moody where
we going. He told me that we were going to Tony’s place. It was little pizza place
that served alcohol in downtown Ottawa. It was not only yet another family
operation but was famous for staying “open” for select clientele after hours. For
private get togethers, usually family and close friends of the family. I asked
Moody if he was going to drop me off at home first as I needed to get home and
the buses had long since stopped running and there was no way I could afford a
cab from Tony’s place to my home. His response was that we would only be 15
minutes at Tony’s as he had business to do and then we would be on our way.
We entered Tony’s place and found 8 or 10 other people there, none of them
women. I started to get nervous and sat quietly by myself trying not to attract
attention to myself and at the same time thinking, “I’m with Moody, no one would
dare harass me”. 20 minutes went by and no sign of Moody, he was in the back
“conducting business”. Well I needed to go to the washroom badly and decided
to just tell Rick where I was going in case Moody returned in my absence.
I was in the washroom just finishing up when I heard someone come in, now
there were no other women there so I got scared. Then I heard Rick say that
Moody was looking for me and that I had better get upstairs right now. I told Rick
to tell Moody I’d be up in 5 minutes, just wanted to touch up my make up and run
a comb through my hair.
Well before I could open the stall door, it was kicked in, and I was grabbed by my
hair and yanked down to the floor and dragged backwards to the bathroom foyer.
I was too stunned to even react and could not tell who was dragging me.
I was released and looked up to see Moody, his face glowering red! He bent
down and punched me in the stomach. I tried to speak but couldn’t catch my
breath. Then he punched me in the face splitting my lip open. All I could think of
was my beautiful dress getting ruined by the blood, how odd when I think of it
now.
The next thing I knew there were at least 5 sets of legs kicking me. I tried to get
into a fetal position but could not. The kicking to my ribs and abdomen came at
lightening speed and all I could do was put my arms around my abdomen for
some cover. I don’t know how long this went on for but the legs kicked me from
my face to my crotch.

4. Then I heard Moody as clear as a bell say, “she’s all yours”. He walked away.
One by one, they raped me, one sodomized me, and all I could do was repeat
over and over “Why Moody Why”? I have no idea how long this attack took but
the sun was coming up when I felt the last blow to my head, they had resumed
beating me after they were finished raping me. Everything went silent then.
When I came to, I was in the alley behind Tony’s place and there was no one
around. I had to get home and clean up before Justin got home; this was all I
could think about. I lost my shoes some time through the night but I got up and
started walking. Every step caused me to cry out in pain but I had to get home. I
don’t know how long I walked, it had to be 3 – 4 hours, and it was close to 8
miles to my house from Tony’s.
I made it as far as the parking lot of my apartment building and collapsed. As it
turned out Tara and my good friend Todd had stayed at my place, each taking
turns driving around trying to find me while the other stayed at the apartment in
case I came home. Todd even went downstairs to ask Moody where I was.
Moody said he thought I left with Tara and Abbas. Any way Todd was headed for
his car as it was his turn to patrol and he found me on the ground in the parking
lot.
He carried me upstairs and Tara was beside herself when she saw me. They
both started arguing over who was taking me to the hospital and who was going
to stay to receive Justin, who was due home in an hour.
I settled the matter. I was going to have a shower and get dressed and we were
going to come up with a story about why I looked like I did. There was no
argument because they were both afraid of hurting me any further by wrestling
me into a car.
So the agreed upon story that we finally came to was that I was at the opening
and had gone out to get some air, but some drunk driver hit me with their car and
that it wasn’t at all as bad as it looked.
I did go to the hospital the next day and found out that I had 3 broken ribs and my
kidneys were bruised I also had a concussion, my pubic bone was severely
bruised and 2 of my fingers were broken. There were various other cuts and
bruises to my entire body, even the soles of my feet. The doctor asked me if I
had been raped and I said no. I told them the same story about the drunk driver.
He didn’t believe me but he didn’t push me for more information, for which I was
grateful.
As an aside, I did eventually ask Moody what the fuck happened that night and
why he would allow that to happen to me and he said, “I came downstairs to get
you from the bathroom and Rick was walking out, I figured if you fucked Rick that
everyone should have a go at you.”

5. He said that Rick kept trying to tell him that nothing had happened that he’d only
gone downstairs as Moody had asked him too, but Moody wasn’t buying it.
Moody also said that apparently he offered me a ride home after it was over but I
said no thanks! So he told me fuck you and took off in the car, leaving me there
barely coherent and not even able to stand up.
And that is the story of the Great Gala Opening!
Addendum:
Moody was the younger brother of Mahmoud. I had been seeing Mahmoud for
several months prior to this event. I dumped Mahmoud when because of him my
son was held at gunpoint by Mahmoud’s enemies. I broke it off with him after this
nightmare. This was about 6 months prior to the night of the Gala Event. The
great thing about this was that Mahmoud was sent home to Lebanon for “re-
education”. It was his worst nightmare. He hated all things Muslim. A few years
after all this happened I ran into Mahmoud. He was with full beard and had a wife
who was round and rotund (2 things he hated in a woman). And behind her
straggled 2 small children. Mahmoud told me how much he missed his days with
me and I laughed in his face. Told him, this is exactly how you deserve to live,
married to your cousin and a fat woman in a Lebanese dress to boot. He had
become and succumbed to all that he hated about his people.

6. He said that Rick kept trying to tell him that nothing had happened that he’d only
gone downstairs as Moody had asked him too, but Moody wasn’t buying it.
Moody also said that apparently he offered me a ride home after it was over but I
said no thanks! So he told me fuck you and took off in the car, leaving me there
barely coherent and not even able to stand up.
And that is the story of the Great Gala Opening!
Addendum:
Moody was the younger brother of Mahmoud. I had been seeing Mahmoud for
several months prior to this event. I dumped Mahmoud when because of him my
son was held at gunpoint by Mahmoud’s enemies. I broke it off with him after this
nightmare. This was about 6 months prior to the night of the Gala Event. The
great thing about this was that Mahmoud was sent home to Lebanon for “re-
education”. It was his worst nightmare. He hated all things Muslim. A few years
after all this happened I ran into Mahmoud. He was with full beard and had a wife
who was round and rotund (2 things he hated in a woman). And behind her
straggled 2 small children. Mahmoud told me how much he missed his days with
me and I laughed in his face. Told him, this is exactly how you deserve to live,
married to your cousin and a fat woman in a Lebanese dress to boot. He had
become and succumbed to all that he hated about his people.