Mound

The frown starts at the corners of her mouth, creeping up the curve of her lips that smell of jasmine.

"You have lost your magic", she says.
"No - you have lost yours", I reply.

The coffee grows cold beside the mound of papers on her desk.

"It's funny, isn't it?" I ask.
"What's funny?"
'The way the word mound can mean a pile of papers, a dirt grave, or a breast".
"I suppose it is", she says.

Her lips graze my neck as her fingers worm their way up my thigh. The white edges of the paper are hard to keep in focus, but I force my pupils not to look away.

"The paper is raping your eyes", she says, her voice tinged with anger that matches her perwinkle eyeliner.

"Are you afraid to kiss me?" I can feel her breath on my cheek: The jasmine tea is mingled with the scent of the cherries we ate for desert.

"I wish I were afraid", I reply.

She recoils.

"The mound of papers has grown larger since last night", I say.
"Yes, time tends to increase papers - unless you lose them, like you do lovers."
"Do you think you could shred me?" I ask.

Then I am being pinned against the beige sheets; her lips are on my lips, her thighs on my thighs, and each kiss is the pricking of a needle.

Once, she would have whispered, "Come lie on my mounds", and I would have folded myself into the crevices between her breasts. Now, I stare out into a night that fades into red, as her hands work their no-longer magic in silence. Beneath the tangled sheets, our bodies grope for each other, knowing that after tonight, our love will be buried by the mound of time.