Autumn Leaf by Elizabeth L. Brooks
He knelt on the floor, panting. “What are you doing to me?” he asked hoarsely. “What is it that you want from me?”
Slowly, like approaching a wild animal, I crouched beside him. Lightly, barely making contact at all, I touched his cheek, lifted a lock of hair from his eyes. “I want you to fall in love with me,” I said.
“Why?” he asked. There was a spark of anger, of challenge in his eyes, though he still would not look at me.
That spark must have ignited some kindred annoyance in me, or I would not have answered the way I did. “So that I can hold your soul in my hands and then crush it like a dry autumn leaf.”
He stared at me directly, finally meeting my gaze. The moment stretched, thin and unbearable. I was on the verge of saying something—I don’t k
