My anger returned, rushing back into my body in a flood of pent-up emotion. Tremors shot through me. My hands and feet trembled. My ears burned. The blood vessels in my forehead and neck felt like they were going to burst. So did my eyeballs. They seemed to inflate inside the sockets, and I wondered what I’d see if I looked in a mirror at that moment. Would my reflection be the monster they all said I was? I thought it might. At that moment, I was okay with being the monster. Somebody had to be.
Alyssa kept crying, whispering Jose’s name over and over again. Bile burned my throat. I bit my lip to keep from screaming. My teeth sank into the fresh cuts, and the pain was exquisite. Blood ran down my chin like the juice from a fresh peach. Shivering, I went rigid. The newspaper rod slipped from my grasp and clattered to the floor, and for a brief second, time itself seemed to freeze.
Alyssa stiffened at the sound of the rod hitting the floor. Her sobs turned into a gasp. She began to turn around and I charged forward. Her eyes widened when she saw me. She tried to stand up and back away at the same time, but her feet got tangled under her. She pitched forward, and would have fallen on her face had I not been there to catch her. My arms shot out and I wrapped my hands around her throat.
“Don’t worry,” I whispered. “I’ve got you. I won’t let you fall.”
Alyssa stiffened in my grasp, and tried to push me away. Her movements were weak, but frantic. I tightened my grip.
“It’s okay,” I said, trying to soothe her. “I won’t let go. I’ll never let go again, sweetheart.”
Whispering soothing words of comfort, I lowered her to the floor. I tried to be gentle about it, but the back of her head smacked hard against the linoleum. Alyssa’s bangs slipped in front of her face. She twisted her body, thrashing and trying to get away, and as she did, her hair parted, revealing her eyes. Those same beautiful eyes that I’d stared into so many times before were now wide and bulging and filled with fear. Tiny red blood vessels filled the whites of them like spider-webs.
“Calm down, Alyssa.” I squeezed harder, relishing the feel as my fingers dug deep into the flesh of her throat. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
Her tongue popped out of her mouth like a glistening jack-in-the-box. Shifting my weight, I kept my grip on her neck and knelt on her stomach with both of my knees. Her entire body convulsed beneath me. She slapped the floor with her hands and kicked out behind us. She tried to raise her leg to knee me in the back, but I dug in deeper, sinking my fingernails into her flesh. Her tongue stuck out farther.
“See?” I hissed. “You wanted me to find you and I told you I would. Here I am, baby. You told me to look for you.”
Alyssa punched my shoulder, but I barely felt the blow.
“This is what you wanted, right? You wanted me to look for you? Or maybe you were looking for me? Or was it other men you were looking for all along? Like when we divorced. Remember that? We signed the papers and you updated your Facebook status from the parking lot outside the lawyer’s office. You’d just got done telling me that you loved me, and you were sorry it didn’t work out. Then you changed your status to single, and said you were interested in dating and looking for men. Who does that, Alyssa? Who goes from ‘I love you’ to ‘Hey, anybody on Facebook want to fuck?’ that quickly? Is that how you met Jose? Did you think I wouldn’t find out?”
Alyssa didn’t respond. For a second, I got pissed off at her reticence, but then I realized that she probably wasn’t answering because I was choking the shit out of her. I thought about letting go, but found that I couldn’t. My fingers refused to obey. It felt good to squeeze her neck, so I did it some more. Her eyes grew wider. I clenched my teeth. My lips pulled back in a snarl. Saliva dripped down my chin and landed on her forehead.
“You played me, you bitch. Don’t deny it. You got me to do all your dirty work. You were just as unhappy in our marriage as I was, but you didn’t want to be the bad guy, so you played that passive-aggressive bullshit on me. Did it for so long, hoping I’d leave. Got me to fuck up so that you’d have an excuse to leave me. You couldn’t just be honest. You had to make me be the one to lie and cheat. Fucking coward.”
Alyssa struck at me again, raking her fingernails across my cheek. I gasped at the pain, and tore my head away from her reach. My cheek stung and felt warm. I put all of my weight into my knees and tightened my grip around her throat even more.
“I could have had a good thing with Hannah. She loved me. She actually fucking loved me. I didn’t have all the history and baggage with her that I have with you. I hadn’t lied to her. We could have made it work. But you couldn’t let me have that could you, Alyssa. You took her away from me. Made me turn my back on her. And then you went right out and hooked up with this… this Jose.”
Spittle flew from my lips as I said his name. Alyssa’s struggles grew weaker.
“You were looking for men? Well, you found one, Alyssa. You found a man. Congratulations. Here I am, and I’ll never let you go again.”
I kept squeezing, even after she’d stopped moving. I didn’t let go until her bladder and bowels did the same. Then I stood up quickly to avoid the mess—too quickly. The room began to spin as I gained my feet, and I reached out to steady myself and found only empty, unforgiving space. I tottered forward, stumbling, and my foot came down on Alyssa’s face. I glanced down and saw that she was no longer Alyssa, but Susan.
“Oh, shit. But… but that—”
Something warm and wet tickled my neck. I reached up to touch my face and found four long claw marks running across my cheek where Alyssa had scratched it. I looked back down at Susan’s left hand. Her nails were bloody. There was skin beneath them. My skin. My blood.
“But…”
I didn’t recognize my own voice. It was whiny and weak. Indecisive. I hated the sound of it. I stared at Susan, confused. Then someone else called out from the hallway.
“Susan? Are you okay?”
It was Phillips. Without turning around, I recognized his voice. Unlike mine, it was strong and certain and defined. Still staring down at Susan, I reached for the screwdriver in my back pocket. The door swung open and Phillips, still speaking, stepped into the pharmacy.
“Susan? Chuck wants you to come back. I thought I heard—”
He stopped, gaping at us both. His gaze kept darting from Susan to me and then back down to her again. When he opened his mouth to shout, I charged. I clamped my left hand over his mouth, muffling his cries, and shoved him against the wall. Phillips tried to knee me in the groin, but I sidestepped his attack and thrust the screwdriver deep into his stomach. It made a farting sound as it punched through skin and fat. His eyes went wide and he took a deep breath through his nose. I felt the air rush over my fingers. Phillips tried to scream again, but I mashed my palm tighter against his mouth and stabbed him again. Phillip’s moaned through my hand. His teeth grazed my skin. They felt dry, like the scales of a reptile. His skin, by contrast, was slick with sweat, and I had trouble holding him in place as I stabbed him a third time, plunging the screwdriver into his abdomen again. Phillips shuddered against me. Warmth flowed over my knuckles as I pulled the screwdriver free. Phillips’ legs buckled and he started to sag forward. Grunting, I shoved him back against the wall.
“Where is she?” I asked. “Where’s Alyssa? What did you guys do with her?”
He mumbled through my hand and tried to shake his head. I squeezed his mouth harder, digging my fingernails into his cheeks.
“Don’t try to deny it, Phillips. I know she’s here. Now where is she, you son of a bitch? Tell me.”