"Did you read the letter? Really read it? It was real. I tell you, it's real. All of it's real."

"All of what?" He was in the kitchen, puttering about with the teapot and coffee mugs and sugar.

I sighed. "I fell in love," I said slowly, "with a vampire. A real vampire."

He joined me on the couch and handed me the tea. "A blood fetishist? I read about those. Or just a tall, skinny guy all dressed in black? I remember you used to have a taste for those."

"No. I mean... pointy fangs, white skin, drinks blood to survive, bleh bleh bleh." I held up my hands and hunched my shoulders, Bela Lugosi style. "Could crush your skull with his thumb, can't die, the whole works."

John's forehead was wrinkling interestingly. "What?"

"Like this." And I lifted my upper lip to show him my fangs.

He actually jumped, spilled his tea on the sofa. "What the hell are those?"

"Those are my teeth, John."

Now he was shaking, nervously rubbing his hands together. "So let me get this straight... you fell in love... with a vampire... and he made you into a vampire... and then you went to L.A.?"

"Well, no, I fell in love with a vampire, and we had a fight, so he sent me to L.A. to this other vampire, and he made me into... well, you get the picture."

"No, I don't think I do at all."

"It's true," was all I could say. I sipped my tea.

"That's... that's insane... not to mention impossible... not to mention totally... totally incomprehensible..." He rubbed his chin, bit his fingernails, glanced about the room in a panic, as if looking for some device, some prop, that might help him explain this. "Ariane, tell me this isn't true, tell me I'm still asleep, I'm dreaming."

"I wish that were the case," I said. "So you came back here just to tell me this?"

"No, I came to see you. I miss you. I love you."

"I thought you were in love with someone else." I sighed. "I think I'm finished with that sort of thing for a long while. It seems to be nothing but trouble. I just left the two of them arguing. They used to be in love, you know?"

"The two bloke vampires?"

"Yeah." I couldn't help it. I laughed. "Exactly." John stared at the ceiling and made jerky movements with his hands. "Homosexual vampire mutants," he intoned softly, "in Los Angeles. It really almost makes sense. If it were a movie, I'd go see it."

"So would I," I said. "Probably how I got myself into this mess."

"And you want me to help you," John said. "No. Nobody can help me. They can help me, but they're too busy either clawing each other's eyes out in a classic catfight, or they're fucking right now. Either way, they haven't got time for me and my little problems." I yawned. "I think I just wanted to go someplace that made sense, even for a little while. I just want something to make sense." I glanced up at him. "You make sense. The way I feel about you makes sense."

John stood there a moment, looking at the phone, the door, the navy blue sky out the window, then at me. I didn't want to influence him in any way, but I couldn't help thinking, Trust me. Please. He cautiously approached the couch and sat down; growing bolder, he reached out to my face. "You're cold," he said, snatching his hand away.

"That's because it's cold outside." I shrugged out of my jacket. I took his hand, placing it inside my shirt and against my side, where I knew he could feel my heart beating. "I'm not cold there, am I?"

He shook his head. "Where's your scar?" he asked in a whisper.

I looked. Of course, now my appendectomy scar was completely gone, along with my freckles. "Now do you believe me?"

His color had come back into his face, and concentrated itself in his cheeks. "Congratulations then, I guess," he breathed. "I guess you've discovered a new life form, Dr. Dempsey."

"You can't tell anyone," I said, exerting gentle pressure on his hands. I didn't want to break any bones accidentally. "You'd be putting my life in danger."

"From whom?"

I rubbed my hands together. "I kill people, John. I have to. I don't want to, and I don't mean to, and maybe someday I won't ever need to... but at this point, I've killed at least three people and maybe a fourth one. Either I'll be classified an animal, in which case they'll kill and dissect me, or I'll be classified as a human, and spend the rest of my life in jail. And when I die, they'll dissect me. And then the others will be hunted down and exterminated, and John, I care about some of these people. I haven't met a lot, but the ones I met, I... liked."

"I know it's inappropriate at a moment like this," he said, "but you're incredibly beautiful."

"I thought you'd miss my scar." I blushed.

"I do." He smiled. "And I miss your eyes."

"My eyes?"

"They're quite different, close up. They're darker. But I can still see the insides of them."

I touched his face. His cheek was marvelously smooth, marvelously rough down the side and the chin. I was shaking. "I know it's inappropriate at a moment like this," I said, focusing my eyes on his mouth, "but I really... really want-"

"Ssh," he said, and kissed me.

There was nothing that could compare with this. I didn't know how much I missed him. I had forgotten how incredibly sweet it was to make love to him. There were none of the athletics that Daniel had engaged in; I had forgotten what plain old boring sex was like with someone who I was in love with. It was marvelous. And it was completely different than when I was human; every single simple touch curled me up with pleasure. It would be fruitless to describe it; there was nothing that you don't already know about, and the things that were new I can't express.

Overwhelmed in orgasm, my body reacted in the only way it knew how; I bent over him and pierced his neck with my fangs as I felt him nearly coming beneath me. His eyes popped open and he gasped; I drew my mouth away wet with blood. He went rigid, and then lay still, eyes closing.

He was silent for a very long time. "John?" I asked worriedly. "John? John? Are you all right? Say something. Please." I wiped my lips with the back of my hand.

A slow smile spread across his face. "That was," he purred, "the best orgasm I ever had."

I rubbed the mark on his neck. "Really?" He said nothing, awash in bliss. "God, I thought I'd killed you."

"I thought you'd killed me too." He finally opened his eyes. "How'd you do that?"

"Apparently, I can't help it. I'm glad you liked it."

"It hurt at first."

"Yes, it does that. I am breaking your skin, after all."

"Do I taste good?"

"Better than nearly anything I've had." I sat up and reached for the phone on the bedside table. "I have to make a phone call."

John was too content to make any protest. I called the Saskatchewan.

"Saska'tch'wan Hotel" came a dull voice through the phone.

"Suite 900, please."

A long pause, with the purling sound of an internal phone system ringing. At last the connection was made. "Who is this?" Ricari's voice could have cut glass.

"Good, you're still awake."

"Where are you?"

I rubbed John's shoulder, pulling the covers over him. He gazed up at me from the quilts with an expression I recognized; I had seen it in Lovely's eyes, in the eyes of all of Daniel's teenage lovers. It had been in my eyes. John was mine, for as long as I wanted him. "I went to John's apartment," I said.

"Who?"

"John. John Thurbis. The man I was going to marry."

"Oh. I think I remember you mentioning that... but it didn't seem important to you, so I forgot it."

That stung. "Well, it's important to me now. He's the only person I know that isn't dead, thinks I'm dead, or hates my guts forever."

"I don't hate you," Ricari said, defending himself.

"You know what I mean. The only... human."

"Oh, Ariane." I heard him sighing on the other end, clearing his throat.

"Is Dan still there?"

"He's asleep. He sleeps too much. Like a mortal."

"He eats food too," I added.

"Lord, preserve us. He's been changed for seventy years and he hasn't given it up yet? I hope you grow out of that. It's so wasteful it makes my skin crawl."

"Maybe it's soothing."

"Soothing. Debussy is soothing. Eating is perverse."

I found myself laughing. "Orfeo, Orfeo, Orfeo, how sweet you are."

John was looking at me strangely.

"Are you coming back?" Orfeo asked.

"Yes," I said. "Not right now."

"You can't go back to that, Ariane. Leave him. You'll only drive yourself mad this way. We'll go away together, you and I, and you can learn what you need to know from me."

"I love him," I said.

"Do you love me?"

I wished he wasn't doing this. "Yes."

There was a long pause. "Is he the sort that would come with us," he asked slowly, "and not cause trouble?"

"Like me, you mean?"

He made a quiet noise that sounded like a laugh. "No. You had too much will even for that. You were trouble."

"John's another scientist. He's a physicist, so he won't have some of my, er, troublesome qualities-"

Ricari was definitely laughing now.

"-but he will question. He won't be a slave. I could never tell him what to do in the first place."

"What are you talking about?" John asked sotto voce.

"I don't know what to tell you, Ariane," Ricari said. "But we do have to go."

"Is Daniel all better?"

"He fell asleep waiting for you before I could do anything."

"He's good for about eight hours," I told him. "Look. I need to sleep myself. I'll figure out what's going on when I wake up. I'll come as soon as I'm awake and alive."

I hung up, hoping he wouldn't unthinkably take off without me. Despite my cavalier attitude, I really needed Ricari; I did need to learn from him. I still didn't know half the things that even Daniel took for granted. John nudged me with his forehead. "What's the time?" he asked.

"Looks like-seven thirty-two."

"Hand me the phone," he said. "I'm going to call the Physics secretary."

"Calling in sick?"

"I'm not getting out of this bed for a while..."

I lay there and listened to him leaving a long and detailed message, with instructions for each class that he would miss and each appointment that would have to be rescheduled. Before he was finished, I had gotten up, wrapping a blanket around me.

John hung up the phone. "Where are you going?"

"I have to go to sleep," I mumbled.

"Then come here, for heaven's sake."

"I can't sleep with you."

"Why?"

"I just can't... let me sleep in the study. And don't come in."

"You're not sleeping on a couch. You're exhausted. It's bad for your back. Really, Ariane, how bad could it be?"

I looked at him. "Do you really want to ask that?"