Stephen Leather - Once bitten

I went back and put my eye to the viewer. It was her. It was almost midnight and she was standing outside my front door. What the hell was going on? I opened the door and she smiled up at me.

"Hi," she said. She was wearing a black linen jacket with the sleeves pulled up to her elbows, a black t-shirt, black leather jeans and wraparound sunglasses. She meant it when she said that black was her favourite colour. God knows how she managed to cross the road without getting run over.

"Do you know what time it is?" I asked.

She grinned. "Late," she said. She looked at my clothes. "You weren't in bed were you?"

I wanted to ask her what she was doing, why she was there, how she'd got my address, and how come she looked so bloody attractive so late at night.

"Aren't you going to ask me in?" she said, almost petulantly.

A weird thought flashed through my mind, the bit in all the old Dracula movies where the Count stands on the doorstep waiting to be admitted, because unless you invite the vampire over the threshold he can't get in.

She saw the look of hesitation on my face and shrugged. "OK, fine. I just wanted to thank you, that's all."

She turned to go and I stepped towards her and touched her shoulder. "I'm sorry, don't go," I said. "It's late, that's all. And I was surprised to see you."

She turned back to me, smiling. "You were so kind to me, you really seemed to care, you know.

They were giving me such a hard time. I just came to say thanks."

I held the door open for her. "Come on in," I said. Her jacket brushed against me as she went inside. Somewhere up in the hills a dog howled like its balls had been trapped in a vice. I followed her inside and closed the door.

She walked through the house, checking it out like a prospective purchaser. "Neat," she said. "I like it."

"Turn left," I said. "We'll go into the study."

I watched her hips swing as she walked. God, she looked good. She stood in the middle of the study, looking around. She took off her sunglasses and turned to look at me. I'd forgotten how black her eyes were. There were no marks on the skin of her cheek, but I couldn't tell if they'd gone or if she'd hidden them with make-up.

"This is different," she said. "I never pictured you in a room like this. It's, I dunno, pretty severe. Not like the rest of the house at all."

"Yeah, this is the one room my wife let me call my own. She designed the rest."

She raised her eyebrows. "Your wife?"

"Ex-wife," I corrected.

"She has good taste, for sure. What was her name?"

"Deborah," I said, a bit miffed that she rated her taste above mine. I mean, I liked the wood panelled, rugged intellectual look. I put a lot of thought into it.

"Divorced. Or did she, like, die?" The straightforward way she said it took me by surprise.

"Divorced. Take a good look at the place. It won't be long before I have to sell it."

"Alimony?"

"Alimony," I agreed.

She went over to the bookcase and scrutinised my diplomas.

"These are pretty impressive," she said. "What does the D stand for?"

"Dean," I said.

"Jamie Dean?" she said, then realisation dawned. "James Dean? Your parents named you after James Dean? That's really cute."

"Yeah, my mother was a fan. I was born on the day he died."

"Friday September 30, 1955. Highway 46. Cholame Valley."

I was impressed. Most Californians knew where he'd died but not many people would have known the exact date.

"He crashed his Porsche at 5.45pm. I was born just after six. My parents had decided to call me Derek but when the news came over about the crash my mother wanted to change it and my dad agreed."

"That was nice," she said.

"Yeah, maybe. Though I'm not sure how good an idea it was to saddle a kid with a movie star's name. Not a kid in the north of England, anyway. I got teased a bit at school."

"Is that why you call yourself Jamie and not James? And why you don't use Dean?"

"No, that's more for professional reasons. It'd be hard to be taken seriously as a psychologist with a name like James Dean."

"Sounds like the same reason to me, Jamie. It'd just that the people who'd tease you would be older, that's all."

I couldn't believe it. The girl was barely out of her teens and she was trying to psychoanalyze me.

"That's not why at all. It's not a question of being teased. It's just that…"

"I know, you didn't want James Dean appearing on your office door. People might laugh."

"It's not a question of being laughed at, it's a question of being taken seriously."

She looked at me with an amused smile, her eyebrows raised. She didn't have to say anything.

Maybe it was the same thing.

"Would you like a drink?" I asked.

"No thanks. I just came to thank you. And to take you out."

"Take me out?"

She laughed. "To show how much I appreciate your helping me. Get your car keys. Don't bother to change, you look interesting enough like that."

Interesting? An old pair of Levis and a Billy Idol t-shirt is interesting? That's not how Deborah would have described it. It belonged to the "You're not going out in that, are you?" school of fashion.

"You got a jacket?" she asked. "Something leather?"

"I've got an old motorcycle jacket somewhere, but it's been years since I've worn it."

She laughed. "Great, go get it."

I was in the bedroom going through the closet when I realised that I was following her instructions like a little kid. It was strange. She wasn't putting me under any pressure, I just wanted to do as she said. I wanted to win her approval. To win her smile. I found the jacket and to my amazement it fitted and I went back to the study and stood there with my arms outstretched.

"How's this?" I asked.

She put her head on one side and nodded thoughtfully. "Neat," she said. "But you should put the collar up."

"A la James Dean?"

"Try it."

I did and she smiled. "It looks great."

"Where are we going?" I asked her.

"It's a surprise."

"Is it far."

She laughed. "About an hour's ride on a good horse."

"What?"

She grinned at my confusion and shook her head. "It was a joke," she said. "Not far. Come on, let's get your car." She took me by the arm and half-led, half-pushed me to the hall. "Kitchen?" she said.

"What?"

"Kitchen. Where is it?"

I nodded to the left and she took me into the kitchen. "Rice?" she said.

"Rice?"

"Rice. Do you have any rice, Jamie?" She spoke slowly as if I was a retarded child, but smiling as she did.

Yeah, I had rice. Deborah had some special Japanese stuff that she used for her sushi parties.

"Cupboard by the fridge."

She knelt down and took out the large glass jar. "Neat. Garbage bags?" She looked over her shoulder. "Garbage bags?" she repeated. I pointed to the drawer. She stood up and pulled it open and took out two black plastic garbage bags. There was a brown paper bag on the work surface and she poured three or four handfuls of rice into it, screwed the top closed and put it into her jacket pocket. She rolled the garbage bags up and then waved them at me like a conductor winding up an orchestra. "Let's hit the road," she said.

"Terry, where are we going?"

"It's a surprise."

"I don't like surprises."

"You'll like this one. Trust me, Jamie."

She walked up to me, her black eyes seeming to swallow me up as she drew closer and put her arms around my neck. I could see the distorted reflection of my face in her pupils. I looked frightened. Her nose barely reached my chin and she looked up at me. "Trust me, Jamie."

I melted. "OK."

"Yeah!" she said, then stood up on her toes and kissed me lightly on the cheek. "Come on."

She grabbed my hand and took me through to the garage. It was only when we were driving through the city that I realised that she hadn't had to ask me the way to the garage, as if she already knew where it was.