"You are aware you have Stockholm syndrome, aren't you?"
Alex looked up from her magazine (World Soccer - she'd picked up a copy of Cosmo once in her teens. Looking for tips on how to wear mascara and how to talk to other girls, she'd found tips on how to perform spine twisting sexual aerobics and talk to men. After reading the whole thing cover to cover, with the horrified cant-look-away fascination of someone watching a particular gory car crash, she'd never picked up another women's magazine). Hal was sitting in his arm-chair, watching her. Technically she was supposed to be the one doing the watching. With Tom at the cafe it fell to Alex to babysit their detoxing vampire.
"What?" she asked.
"Stockholm syndrome" he replied in that polished radio 4 accent, sounding as calm and pleasant as if he were a teacher talking to a pupil "a form of traumatic bonding in which victims express empathy, sympathy and have positive feelings towards their captors, sometimes to the point of defending them"
"No. I know what it is, just dunno why you're telling me I have it".
He leaned forwards towards her until his chest was pressing against its strap. Unconsciously Alex shuffled back along the sofa. "Why? Because I've wanted to kill you since the moment I met you. I wasted a lot of time trying very hard not to kill you. Then the creature I made murdered you to feed me. As you so often point out, I drank your blood. Since that lovely second date I've ordered you around, berated, insulted and casually dismissed you. Yet you came home with me, you took my hand, you followed me. You're first instinct was to follow me" Hal paused a moment for affect, looking around the room, twisting his hands up as much as the restraints would allow before bringing the full force of his gaze back to rest on her "and now here you are. Looking after me. Expressing empathy. Sympathy. Defending me" with that a nasty toothy sort of smile spread across Hal's face and he slumped back, finished. No, not quite finished, he was still...watching her. Like a hunter. And no not slumped, with his legs crossed and his fingers spread over the arms of the chair he seemed more like a king in his throne than any prisoner.
Alex, for her part, didn't react. Not on the outside anyway. Inside she was freaking out. Lungs shivering, heart racing, thoughts dancing the god damn can can. Retracing recent events the ghost wondered, Jesus, have I really gone mad? She had died. That was pretty traumatic. Maybe it was normal to be a wee bit cracked after that. But then everything she had here, the companionship she'd been starting to feel with Tom and yes, with Hal, was it all false? The twisted product of a sick mind?
A shrill loud noise filled the air breaking Alex from her reverie. Some car alarm outside. Looking to windows for its source her eyes met Hal's again. He hadn't moved. Had he even blinked? The vampire had been staring at her. Testing her reaction. And that was all it took to break his spell. Dickhead. He'd been trying to irk her, get inside her head and break her. Scary thing was, he'd almost managed. But she'd figured it out. And she wasn't about to let him know he'd gotten to her.
"Are you my shrink now then? Cos I'm not paying you fifty pound an hour. Specially not when you don't even have one of those loungey sofas with the headrest" she snarked breezily.
Shrugging he said "No. But I have come in to contact with the phenomenon before. One could argue it's part of the process every new vampire goes through but personally I find it so much more interesting to study living subjects -"
"I'm bored of talking about this. Should I tell you about my dreams instead? I had this weird one last night where my hands were huge and made of marshmallows and all the folk I met thought it was greet but then they melted. What da ya think that means?" the ghost girl whittered loudly over him. She had a feeling she didn't want to hear what Hal would say next. She could just renta-ghost out of there but it was better not to leave him alone. Safer. And no way was she going to let that creep win now. Not when she'd kept her cool so far. But he didn't stop. "There was a woman in Paris. Anne-Marie. Or was it Sophie-Marie? Or Sophia-Annette? Centuries ago, I don't remember now. But it was one of those terrible hyphenated names the french so loved. And she was used to being loved to. Was quite surprised when I didn't want her. See all I did was keep her locked up. At first. But I never had to force anything because after a few months she was obsessed with me, sweet little Sophia-whatever, on her knees, begging me for it. She was just so grateful you see. Grateful every time I didn't hurt her the way she knew I could. Stupid girl". Alex swallowed. She couldn't help it. Her hands were shaking. And Hal hadn't looked away from her once, not for the whole time he'd been talking. He'd just been watching. Watching her eyes, her mouth, her neck. The ghost shuddered but when she spoke her voice was steady "You can't hurt me. You're tied up. And in case you haven't noticed I'm already dead". The vampire smiled again and licked his lips. Hal was acting like a parody, it would've been funny, if it wasn't so horrible.
"There's worse things then death, sweetheart"
"Yeah" she snapped back "like living with the murders of thousands on your conscious".
That finally did it. Calm shattering like the glass she'd accidentally telekineticed into the wall that morning he leapt forwards in his chair. The leather straps strained against the fabric of the arms, their hooks in the floor, pulling tight everywhere they criss crossed his body till the skin either side of the leather on his wrists turned white in protest. Uncaring, Hal struggled to get at her, hissing and spitting with fangs out and eyes inky black. "You think I care? You think I give a damn about their short, unimportant, insignificant, little lives? You things die like fucking mayflies anyway. It's my right to thin the heard! To hunt the weak! You should do as I say, you should fear me and you should be fucking happy to die for me!" he ranted.
Months had passed with her housemate strapped down in his sitting room rehab. His moods had swung around like a four-dimensional pendulum on steroids. Sometimes he swore, sometimes he cried, sometimes he was just himself. Then the three of them sat around and watched Homes Under the Hammer. With Hal safely strapped down of course. But it was still a laugh. That always made it all the more jolting when the bitches and the hounds started up again. Though while it was a shock it wasn't very effective. They were too used to it. Earlier, when he'd played it clever, talking like Freud, he'd stood a chance. She hadn't been expecting it since she'd thought he was in one of his nice-socially-retarded-ocd-Hal kind of moods. That meant she'd listened to him. Now Alex just raised her eyebrows and let the insults wash over her. Four brothers had prepared her for this well enough. After the family fights five kids and only one parent to keep a lid on it can produce, five hundred year old drama queens were a sitch.
When the vampire paused, panting, to catch his breath she spoke "I know you feel guilty Hal. I saw you on your knees in front of Cutler remember? And later, with the bomb. One of the first things you said to me was that you'd avenge me. Then you tried to help me with my body. You're all over the top guilt and redemption. And you never treated me like a victim. You trusted me to do things, important things, to help save the world. And you don't berate me. We banter. So don't try and tell me why I'm still here. I know why. It's because I've got fuck all elsewhere to go. And, well, you and Tom, you're my friends. And you wouldn't be my friend if there wasn't some good in you. So you can take your psychoanalysis and you're creepy blood sucking stories and shove them up your ass because I'm not letting you out or letting you scare me off" and with that she put her boots up on his pristine coffee table and went back to her sports mag. Alex only occasionally broke off from ignoring his tirade of threats and manipulation to ask if he wanted a cup of tea or talk over him about her dreams.
A few hours later she knew she had her Hal back when a quiet controlled voice said "While I am very grateful for you earlier efforts concerning my rehabilitation, I will be forced to kill you if you do not remove your footwear from my table". Alex turned away from the last page of World Soccer to find his eyes fixed firmly on her shoes. Smiling, she slowly put them down on the nice rug. Hal winced, then smiled at her weakly. "So," he said lightly "do all modern women lack manners or is it only the ones who regularly dream about rolling around in mud?" Damn, she thought, probably shouldn't have told him about that.