He pounded her to the bed, tightening his grasp on her wrists to the point of breaking. As if it was her body that angried him, and not the deaf stubborness behind her hazel eyes, now turned darker with helplesness.

- “Say that you love me too, say that you love me too …”

The hand on her neck, holding onto the sides of it, kept pressing her head into the pillow and back up and then again with each word growled by the voice that just a few good minutes ago was whispering sickenly sweet into her ear. She sat her jaw and grinded her teeth into silence. “No, sir, I am not going to say that to you!“, screamed the stubborn creature inside her head. “You will not get that from me, if you break me into pieces, if you tear me into nothingness. If you fuck me to the edge of insanity. If you and only you say goodbye. Because I don’t say that. Never. It’s not enough for me to say that. Just some automatic response. It HAS to be true. I HAVE to come to the point of saying it on my own. ‘I love you’, not ‘I love you too’. Never ‘I love you too’ …“

The knees that blocked her hips were digging deeper in her flesh with every twitch of her body, the weight on top of her pressing harder and harder. The hand that freed her neck was now roaming all over her, finding her mouth, her breast, her belly, grabbing each in turn, then leaving just as she started to want more of that.

- “No”, she worded, hardly breathing, the thoughts resounding in her head, making less and less sense.
Their eyes stayed locked together for all this time. The vein pulsed on his forehead … “Oh, how I want to put my lips on it, drink in all your pain … If only I could want it, if only I’d want to can do it”.

His hand stopped rampaging her upper body and took hold of half of her face. His face drew close, hot breath flowing in her face.

- “I want to hear it from you. Now! Tell me!” The coarse voice made her stop breathing.
- “You can’t make me”, she whispered. “No one can.”

She grinned cruely. “You may need to know it, and I am not covering that need. You will always look for a proof of it. And I will always break them. Because if you are sure, if you feel safe, then you will leave. And I am the only one that leaves.”

- “What more do you want from me”, he burst out, his eyes rummaging hers to digg out the truth behind her words.
- “I want you to make me yours. I want you to be mine. I want you. I want …”

The brutal, angry kiss pushed the words back into her throat, just as his tongue swimmed deeper in. The crushing weight came down, bringing stars in her vision, making her twitch inside and out, drawing moans from her.

The chill air blanketed her and she started shivering, after the initial gasp froze her lungs. He was gone. Stormed throgh the door and left her tangled in her desires. “They’re just words … ” whispered some stray thought, while she wrapped herself in her own arms. The night slowly crawled by.

“You would leave anyway, maybe all this incertainty already broke you that badly. And you will find some nice girl to patch up the hole I’ll leave in you, but you won’t love her. You’ll be grateful to her. Because she loves you. And that, my sweet, precious, crazy, insane man, will be so sad. The saddest thing on the face of the earth. To not love. So many are sad because they are not loved. What do they know?”, she kept on thinking, addressing her earlier assaulter.

Morning sun started to creep from behind the closed curtains. She left the crumpled nest with a sigh. A yawn, a stretch and then the morning ritual dragged her in the new day. Work, friends, some written words to share with the close ones, some coffee and casual chat with some others …

Then evening came and she withdrew in her balcony, to have some wind for dessert. Hot tea, crayons, sketchbook, a book, a pile of magazines kept her company. And dark chocolate. She licked her fingers as she watched her neighbours go about their business.

The radio played Duran Duran’s “Come Undone”. She smiled.

Part II