“I need to hurt you.”

           Five simple words that in themselves said little. It was her eyes, though, those dark brown orbs that I had lost myself in countless times that voiced the depth of those five words. I need to hurt you, she had said, but those eyes said so much more. 

           Her eyes spoke volumes.

           Her orbs spoke the passion that was burning in her veins like the thirst of a man stranded in a desert, a thirst nearly impossible to quench no matter how often or how hard you tried. It was an insatiable beast, that passion, burning like an inferno that consumed all that crossed its path. The passion shining in her eyes, that heat, growing stronger, eating as it grew, growing because it ate. Those eyes were glazed, lost in an unseen reality, staring blankly into the future, straining to catch a glimpse of the means to satisfy the growing need.

Behind her eyes scenes unfolded, her raging thoughts straining to find a means to quench the passion burning there.  Her face reflected the fact that no matter how readily the passion was sated; the smoldering embers remained, waiting to be ignited again with a thought.  The thought that would enflame her passions could be anything, spurred on by a sight or sound, a scent or a feeling.  Always just out of reach, waiting to leap forward and take control, that fire remained.

It was more than her eyes that displayed her need. Her limbs were taut, her body threatening to explode in an uncontrolled burst of passion.  I could see her lips curl up in anticipation, a smile hidden by the passion throbbing in her veins with each heated heartbeat. I watched as her fingers flexed like a cat’s paws extending sharp claws to lash out at its prey. 

Her breathing, normally calm and measured became raspy breaths.  Rapid and shallow, her breathing was more like panting, her body anticipating dousing the raging flames that burned within. Each passing moment her breathing became more heated with gentle moans escaping her pursed and twitching ruby lips.

And with it all, her eyes, her shallow breathing, her taut body and flexing fingers, there was the single word that screamed to be noticed. The word was need.  She had said it so casually, but with an underlying hunger that was tangible.  Need, she had said, I need to hurt you.

Need. One word burning in my memory. It was a need she was feeling, a need to sate the nearly insatiable fire burning behind those dark orbs. A need resting alongside other needs; the need to eat, the need to breathe, the need to sleep.  So casual a word spoken yet revealing the depths of her soul and the yearning burning within her.

Need.

“Yes,” was my simple reply, reading the yearning in her eyes, hearing the passion dripping from those five words.  I could not deny her, would not hinder her attempts to sate that deep hunger. 

“Bring me something, anything,” she said between shallow gasps of thin air.

I hastened to obey.  Running into the bedroom I threw the closet door open and grabbed the hard wooden paddle we kept hanging there, the wood bouncing off of the moving door. With the paddle in hand I returned to Collette’s side and handed her the hose needed to douse the raging flames. 

“I need to hurt you,” she repeated.

And she did.