If I'd known what was to happen, and what she was capable of, I would have avoided her like the plague.
Thinking back now, I realise that I never really did know a great deal about Su Ling.
Apart, that is, from the fact that she was young, graceful and extremely beautiful.
We'd met one night, or rather early one morning, late last summer.
It was after one of those seemingly endless lines of Auckland summer barbecue parties.
Everyone standing around clutching burnt sausages and grease-smeared glasses, inhaling clouds of smoke and saying the same "barbecue party" things. The only true common factor being the alcohol and a desperation to show everyone that you're having a good time.
Maybe I'm a bit anti-social or down-market or something, I don't know, but after several hours of scintillating conversations on real estate, the share market and who's got the most expensive car, I'd just about had enough.
Even these inane subjects couldn't get discussed for too long, before someone would have to break off to answer the imperious call of their cell-phone. Leaving you poised in mid-sentence and tapping your feet as their attention took off into the ether courtesy of Telecom.
My fellow guests seemed to be enjoying themselves. Or at least making a good pretence of it, but for me, the whole affair had eventually taken on the feeling of being stuck in the middle of a rather bad long-playing record that was jammed on replay.
I downed my drink and headed for the door.
I'd made the usual appreciative farewells to the host, deeply into a monologue lamenting the woes and headaches of maintaining his backyard swimming pool. Tossed my half-eaten sausage into the cause of all his troubles, and made my way down the car-lined drive to my own vehicle which was parked unobstructed at the driveway entrance.
The sight and sound of the party receded thankfully into the background, hidden and filtered by the house and the dense growth of rhododendrons strung out along the side of the drive.
Where she appeared from I don't know.
I certainly hadn't seen her amongst the crowd at the party. But one minute I'd been alone, opening the car door, the next she was standing there beside me, gently pressing against me and looking up at me with the most exquisitely beautiful almond-shaped eyes that I have ever seen.
Those eyes that I was to learn, could change from pure innocence to pure evil in no more time than it took to blink.
Now whether it was the alcohol, or whether it was because I was lonely, or even maybe because she'd hypnotised me. I still don't know for sure.
I do know, that the next thing that happened was that my arm was around her and we were driving back to my apartment across the Auckland Harbour Bridge and onto the North Shore.
Anyhow, that was how we met.
Socially, I had been doing the "Lone Ranger" bit for quite some time. Long enough to know that being alone, particularly in the evenings, was something that I didn't really care for at all and meeting up with Su Ling seemed at first, to be the finest thing that could ever happen to me.
She soon made it known that she intended to stay with me on a permanent basis and I on the other hand, being firmly under her spell, was only too willing to agree to anything she wanted. Initially, Su Ling was an affectionate and loving addition to my life, always there waiting for me at the end of the day and showing a kind of dependence that stirred the protective instincts deep inside me.
Unfortunately though, that was to slowly change over the coming days, with things gradually getting out of hand and ending with that terrible blood-stained day last week.
My apartment was located in one of those idyllic settings taken straight off a picture postcard. Fringed by a serene belt of green native bush, two giant kauri trees framed a breathtaking view of the upper Waitemata Harbour.
I would sit for hours in the shade of those two giants, watching the yachts below tacking back and forth across the harbour. Their white sails spread like the wings of huge birds gliding silently across the water, the summer sun dancing and reflecting off the harbour surface like a million scattered diamonds.
It was not difficult for me to understand why the ancient Maori had long ago named this harbour the "Sparkling Waters".
If it hadn't been for this ideal setting, I would certainly have moved on long before.
The main problem was my landlady, a singularly unreasonable woman, who unfortunately lived in the adjoining property like some ever present security guard. Her shrill voice was forever complaining or laying down some new condition of tenancy.
I don't think we'd ever managed to conduct a normal conversation. The nearest I'd got to that privilege, was the afternoon I'd moved in, when she'd spent over two hours telling me how impossible her estranged husband had been to live with. How he'd run out on her, taking with him the girl who had been living in the apartment at the time.
Her shrill voice raised an octave with, "And all he left my little boy Albert and me was the apartment and not much else, thank you very much!"
Little Albert, was a spoilt, hyperactive and overfed five-year-old, and Mrs Symes the landlady doted on him.
I felt sorry for Mr Symes and couldn't help but wish him well in his new-found freedom and release from his tyrannical wife.
It wasn't long before having Su Ling around presented me with a major headache.
The fact that the landlady had stipulated no other tenants whatsoever, seemed to mean nothing at all to her. She would insist on coming and going as she pleased, with no attempt at secrecy and with a selfish disregard for anyone's peace of mind but her own.
There was nothing I could do, when all it took was one look at me with those beautiful eyes and I'd melt away, losing any thoughts I might have had of complaining, or of chastising her for her unreasonable behaviour.
Unfortunately, there was also another problem.
Just like a rose with it's thorn, the beautiful Su Ling was also endowed with her own type of thorn. In the shape of an unpredictable and violent temper.
The first time I discovered this, was when I'd arrived home early from work one evening to find her relaxing in the courtyard behind the apartment.
Gracefully stretched out on her stomach, a drink at her side, she lay luxuriating in the last of the sun's warmth. I'd approached her softly from behind and calling out her name in greeting, had reached out to touch her black velvet-like hair. She'd spun round immediately, and lashed out at my face as I'd bent over her. A malevolent look had transformed her features and I leapt back in shock to find that she'd raked a long deep scratch across my cheek, narrowly missing my eye.
Casting a disdainful look at me, she'd retreated silently into the apartment, leaving me standing alone and holding my handkerchief to the side of my face, hurting both physically and emotionally and wondering what could possibly have made her behave in such a way.
There was certainly no doubt that Su Ling could look after herself, the painful scratch was proof enough of that. But what hurt me the most, was the fact that she had showed no remorse whatsoever when she saw what she had done.
It was obvious that someone with that kind of disposition, wasn't going to be able to conceal their presence for long. In fact, anyone with her kind of disposition, probably didn't give a damn about concealing anything!
A few days after that incident in the back-yard, Su Ling had returned home early one morning from yet another one of her unexplained absences. Absences that were becoming more and more frequent.
I had been standing at the kitchen bench drying the breakfast dishes, and looked out the window to see her approaching the apartment's small courtyard from the driveway adjoining the landlady's property.
I was always worried when she insisted on using this entrance, as it was so visible from the lounge window that Mrs. Symes spent most of her time sitting at. To make matters worse, young Albert was out on the neighbouring back porch at the time, playing with one of his numerous toys. I heard the high pitch of his voice call out as he looked up to spot her in the driveway alongside.
Su Ling had paused briefly, her eyes fixed on him. Then she had slowly turned around and moved in his direction. I knew only too well, that for some reason, Su Ling had even less concern for the obnoxious little Albert's welfare than even I had and realised instinctively that things were suddenly about to come to a head.
I couldn't see her face, but from Albert's sudden hysterical behaviour, I knew that her intentions must have been pretty obvious, and that Albert didn't care one little bit for what he saw.
Luckily for Albert, Mrs Symes had suddenly appeared at the door to investigate his cries, and swooping Albert up in her arms, had carried him from the porch and deposited him safely indoors, before casting a withering glance at Su Ling and then advancing purposefully towards my apartment.
I could see she meant business!
I stepped out to meet her in the courtyard, my brain frantically trying to think of any apologies or excuses that might help quell the impending storm that was about to be unleashed on me.
My brain failed miserably, and I winced as she burst into full voice.
"Mr Peters," she thundered, "you know full well the agreements of tenancy! I will not tolerate ANY breach of the rules and I will DEFINITELY not have my little Albert being upset by any unpaying, unwelcome guests!'�
Throwing another withering glance at Su Ling, she frantically waived a copy of the agreement in my face,
' The tenancy agreement was made perfectly plain to you, and you've chosen to ignore it!
You can take one week's notice, then you can pack your bags and the BOTH of you can get out!"
If she'd known what was to happen, she would have sent us packing right then and there.
The terrible day came six days later, just one day before we were due to move out.
I'd arrived home shortly after it had happened.
Su Ling hadn't been at home when I left for work that morning, in fact she hadn't been at home all night, but I was about to find out that she was certainly at home now with a vengeance.
I could see Mrs Symes on her back porch as I swung the car into the driveway.
She was obviously in a state of near collapse, crying hysterically and clinging to the door frame of the porch for support.
I slammed the car door shut and ran over, a cold feeling of foreboding clutching at my chest.
I knew instinctively that Su Ling must be responsible for whatever it was that had happened,
and steeled myself for the outcome.
Mrs Symes looked up at me, white-faced, shock and horror etched across her features; she was out of control, and screaming over and over again, "My God she's killed Albert, she's killed my Albert!"
I hurriedly pushed past her and entered into the house.
The sight that lay before me will be something that I'll remember for a long time.
Albert's small lifeless body lay on its back in the centre of the room, his head twisted at an unnatural angle, a crimson stain slowly spreading from his neck onto the oatmeal coloured carpet that covered the floor.
Su Ling stood facing me, half crouched over the body, her mouth covered in Albert's blood, a look of intense evil and cunning clouding her eyes.....
I've got a new apartment now.
Su Ling has gone, and life is much easier.
After all, it's hard enough finding accommodation nowadays, without having the extra burden of a Siamese cat.
Especially one with a pathological attraction for birds like Albert, the landlady's five-year-old cockatoo.

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