A Fly-By-Night Affair

The nightclub was loud and crowded, people dancing on every square inch of the dance floor while the obnoxious DJ spun remixed tunes and yapped in between the music. I was there with some friends, who were all on the dance floor right now, gyrating to the music. It was neat to watch, but I was content to nurse my drink for the moment.
That was when I saw her. An amazingly beautiful woman dressed almost entirely in black. She looked like one of those types who I never really talked to, one of those “freaky chics” that you saw every so often. The type who wore black all the time, had a chip on her shoulder, and often could be seen sporting a spiked “dog collar” type necklace and black lipstick.
But as I saw her drift effortlessly through the crowd, I saw that she was not that type. She had dark lipstick, but it was not black. More like a deep red, almost the color of blood. She appeared to have dark hair, but it was all pulled up inside a black beret with deep red accents. In fact, her entire outfit seemed to be black or deep, blood red. I was definitely enthralled by her captivating appearance.
Not usually the type of person to approach strange people, I sat back and continued to watch as this dark angel moved among the club’s various dancers and drinkers. She seemed not to be bothered by anyone else and a path always seemed to open up in front of her intended direction. She ordered a drink from the bartender and glided back through the crowds towards my table. She stopped and seemed to hover in place, waiting, much like a cat waiting to pounce on its unaware prey. The couple at the table in front of me left to find a place on the dance floor and the mysterious woman smoothly slid into the table’s booth, resting her drink on the table top and scanning the dancers on the floor.
Her gaze was penetrating as she scanned the revelers on the dance floor, watching them move and gyrate to the loud music. It seemed almost as if she had some type of sensors for eyes and was scanning for something in particular. She turned and faced me. I could feel her eyes burning deep into my insides, as if she had x-ray vision. I looked back at her and saw her deep, dark black eyes. I had never seen anyone with eyes that color. I merely smiled at her as she finished her scan of me and returned to watching the dancers.
A couple of my friends returned to the table and we chatted for a bit, my attention torn between the mysterious woman sitting alone at the table in front of me and what gibberish my friends were spewing forth from their drink-slacked mouths. They blocked my view of her and I gradually began to put her out of my mind. Finally, my friends returned to the dance floor and I could see across the table again.
She was gone.
I silently cursed myself when I felt someone lean close to my ear and say, “Mind if I sit down?”
I looked up and over my shoulder and there she was. I waved her to a seat opposite me, which she accepted, sliding into the booth with the same gracefulness of a professional figure skater performing a routine at the Olympics. She placed her drink, a dark red beverage, onto the table and cracked a quick smile at me.
“I saw you looking at me earlier,” she said, leaning across the table so she could be heard over the din of the nightclub.
My face flushed red, “I’m sorry…I didn’t meant to make you uncomfortable…”
“No. Don’t apologize. I was kind of flattered. Most people dismiss me as one of those Marilyn Manson types who sacrifice kitties and puppies at night for the glory of Satan.”
I smiled and laughed. Her remarks caught me off-guard. I figured her for a totally serious type, not one to make a smart-ass remark. “I actually didn’t think that about you,” I told her, leaning across the table close to her ear.
“I know,” she said. “That is why we are having this conversation.”
I sat back, surprised.
“Don’t get weirded out,” she said. “I just could tell that you were not misjudging me the way most others do at a glance.”
“Thanks…I think.”
She smiled again at me and leaned back across the table, “would you mind if we went somewhere else to talk, somewhere quieter?”
Stunned, I sat in silence, my brain frantically trying to keep up with the quickly changing events while endeavoring to phrase a response that didn’t sound stupid.
“Sure. Do you have a place in mind?”
“Yes, I do.”
She stood up and held her hand out to me. Her fingers were cold to the touch.
I waved to my friends and they noticed I was with a woman and they began hooting and hollering and acting like children. I waved to them one last time and turned away, my new friend leading me toward the exit. Once outside, she turned to me and said, “Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Arianna.”
“Alex,” I replied.
“I know of this little coffee house across town that I like,” Arianna said.
“Sounds nice,” I replied. “Much quieter there?”
“No annoying DJs.”
“That’s a start,” I said, feeling her gently squeeze my hand.

She was right about the coffee house. It was indeed much quieter. Soft music echoed through the room and people clustered within the various booths and at the tables, talking softly amongst themselves.
Arianna pointed to an unoccupied booth at the back of the place and went to the counter, returning with two steaming beverages. “I took the liberty of ordering for us,” she said, setting the drink in front of me. It smelled slightly of coffee, but also of cherries and chocolate. I had never smelled any drink quite like it. She sipped hers and I decided to do likewise. It wasn’t too bad, considering I don’t like coffee.
We chatted for a while over the drinks, getting to know each other some more. I told her some about my life, the things I’d done and the places I’d gone. She told me of visiting Europe one time, when she was younger. She told grand stories of large castles and natural beauty beyond imagination. I marveled as she told me the tales. She also told of her summer travels with her sister.
The drinks had been mysteriously refilled while she was talking and we continued to sip them. I told her of one particular misadventure I had had. She laughed at the conclusion of the story, the first time I had really heard her laugh aloud.
Our drinks empty, she leaned across the table and whispered into my ear, “Want to go back to your place?”
Again I was caught off-guard and stumbled over the words as my brain swam, trying to come up with the right answer. “Sure.”
We both stood up and she grabbed my hand again, “Lead on.”

I opened the door to my apartment and was going to flip the light on but Arianna stopped me, moving in close and planting a deep kiss on my lips. “Trust me,” she said after she broke the kiss.
We moved silently into the bedroom, our clothes peeling off our bodies like reptiles shedding their skin. Arianna pushed me onto the bed, climbing on top of me, her naked body hovering over me, her pale white skin seeming to glow in the darkness of the room.
continued in pt2