She’d an intensity of looking. Fierce, like she could see into the very heart of things. Sharp as needles or knives and her eyes black as bibles. It’s what I noticed at first. She was outside in the sunlight and she was drawing something and all the world was brushing by her and it was as nothing to her. I made some small remark on what she’d put down on the surface of the paper and she didn’t hear me, that’s how hard she was looking.
I don’t know why I stayed till she was finished, till her gaze dropped and I could be heard then. No, that’s a lie – she was the most beautiful girl I had ever seen, and that’s what kept me there. I asked her, when she was done, if she ever sold her work and I asked if I could buy what she’d just sketched. She laughed and she said I could have it for the price of a drink.
I bought several bottles of French wine and we took them back to my apartment. She set her sketchbook and board carefully down by the door, and her bag of pencils and chalks. Then she kicked off her shoes and took off her dress and draped it over the back of a chair.
‘It’s a new dress. I wouldn’t want you to crease it,’ she said.
Everything moved a lot faster than I’d expected, that’s for sure. She drank the first glass of wine in one even tilting of the glass and her head and then gestured for more and she said I should try to keep up.
She walked about the flat in her underwear, looking into all the rooms and inspecting the cupboards. She said she liked the place, and she fingered the books on the shelf and flicked through my music collection. She selected a jazz compilation and slipped the CD into the machine. She kept the volume low and she asked me if I wanted to dance. It was the middle of the afternoon, sunlight breaking through the windows and falling in bright golden slabs on the stripped wood floor, and Bix Beiderbeck was turned down to a whisper, which is not how he should be heard.
We danced, if holding each other and shifting our feet a little can be called dancing. It wasn’t in time to the music or anything. It was nearer to sex without the breathlessness or the sweating, just her body pressed against mine and she was kissing my neck and stroking my back.
Maybe we drank too much and drank too quickly. I don’t know. I don’t remember. It was dark when I woke. I was in bed and I was alone. I wasn’t sure of anything. The windows were all thrown wide and the air was cold against my skin. I was without my clothes.
I got up, kicking an empty wine bottle across the floor, the fourth of the bottles we’d bought. I walked through to the front room without turning on the lights. There was soft music still playing, the CD switched to repeat, and the one song sung over and over. Her dress was gone from the back of the chair, her sketchbook and board and her bag of pencils and chalks gone from beside the front door.
She’d done a second picture. It was tacked to the blankest wall, right in the centre for biggest impact, right where the streetlight fell yellow and sunset bright. She’d done it while I’d slept. It was just my cock, filling the paper, limp and shy and executed with the same intensity of looking as before. Underneath she’d written ‘dickhead’ and she’d drawn a smiley face and signed it with an illegible scrawl.
I later discovered that she’d taken some of my books, too, and all the money from my wallet, and my watch and a frozen chicken from my freezer. Go figure!
Patricia Ann McNair 
She’d an intensity of looking. Fierce, like she could see into the very heart of things. Sharp as needles or knives and her eyes black as bibles. It’s what I noticed at first. She was outside in the sunlight and she was drawing something and all the world was brushing by her and it was as nothing to her. I made some small remark on what she’d put down on the surface of the paper and she didn’t hear me, that’s how hard she was looking.
I don’t know why I stayed till she was finished, till her gaze dropped and I could be heard then. No, that’s a lie – she was the most beautiful girl I had ever seen, and that’s what kept me there. I asked her, when she was done, if she ever sold her work and I asked if I could buy what she’d just sketched. She laughed and she said I could have it for the price of a drink.
I bought several bottles of French wine and we took them back to my apartment. She set her sketchbook and board carefully down by the door, and her bag of pencils and chalks. Then she kicked off her shoes and took off her dress and draped it over the back of a chair.
‘It’s a new dress. I wouldn’t want you to crease it,’ she said.
Everything moved a lot faster than I’d expected, that’s for sure. She drank the first glass of wine in one even tilting of the glass and her head and then gestured for more and she said I should try to keep up.
She walked about the flat in her underwear, looking into all the rooms and inspecting the cupboards. She said she liked the place, and she fingered the books on the shelf and flicked through my music collection. She selected a jazz compilation and slipped the CD into the machine. She kept the volume low and she asked me if I wanted to dance. It was the middle of the afternoon, sunlight breaking through the windows and falling in bright golden slabs on the stripped wood floor, and Bix Beiderbeck was turned down to a whisper, which is not how he should be heard.
We danced, if holding each other and shifting our feet a little can be called dancing. It wasn’t in time to the music or anything. It was nearer to sex without the breathlessness or the sweating, just her body pressed against mine and she was kissing my neck and stroking my back.
Maybe we drank too much and drank too quickly. I don’t know. I don’t remember. It was dark when I woke. I was in bed and I was alone. I wasn’t sure of anything. The windows were all thrown wide and the air was cold against my skin. I was without my clothes.
I got up, kicking an empty wine bottle across the floor, the fourth of the bottles we’d bought. I walked through to the front room without turning on the lights. There was soft music still playing, the CD switched to repeat, and the one song sung over and over. Her dress was gone from the back of the chair, her sketchbook and board and her bag of pencils and chalks gone from beside the front door.
She’d done a second picture. It was tacked to the blankest wall, right in the centre for biggest impact, right where the streetlight fell yellow and sunset bright. She’d done it while I’d slept. It was just my cock, filling the paper, limp and shy and executed with the same intensity of looking as before. Underneath she’d written ‘dickhead’ and she’d drawn a smiley face and signed it with an illegible scrawl.
I later discovered that she’d taken some of my books, too, and all the money from my wallet, and my watch and a frozen chicken from my freezer. Go figure!