Page 34 of Stalker's Toy

I should have a heart.

I have neither.

I want more.

I will have it.

I make my demands. I make my desires clear. “Nattblomma. This piece—it will be in the show. That is my price.”

Her face lights up with a hundred emotions.

“You have one month to produce four additional pieces. You are to invite three of your classmates to contribute.”

Her voice shakes, but the words are steady. “That’s it?”

She doesn’t believe this is real.

“No. The work must explore darker subject matter. And no one else may use charcoal.”

“Henrik, I—” It’s a lifetime before she speaks. “Thank you.”

There’s a stillness before I speak again. “Time to start cleaning.”

My voice ignites the air.

Mia stands there, mouth agape.

She looks at me like I’ve given her the world, then crushed it underfoot. “I’ll handle the front first,” she finally says.

I watch her try to keep up with my demands, my desires, my quick and absolute power.

Her nod is too quick, too eager.

I love what it does to her.

I love what it does to me.

Her voice is soft and desperate.It hangs on by a thread. “Before moving to the back. That’s okay…” She watches me closely, too closely. “Right?”

“Yes.”

“That’s where I go nude… right?” Her lips tremble with the weight of it all.

“Yes.”

I step away, letting her start her work and head to the back, grabbing my supplies.

A large black canvas is on the floor, underneath a protective painters’ drop cloth to guard the surface of the floor.

It will be a scene of devastation, of beauty, of destruction, of rebirth.

I wonder what’s taking her so long.

I’m never satisfied, not with her, not with this.

I crave her.

Need her.

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