Page 139 of No Greater Oblivion

In a haughty tone, Brent replies, “Why don’t you ask Karina yourself? Seeing as how the two of you are so close.”

“Brent.”

He steps forward and gives Diego a push but I immediately stand between them, preventing Diego from attacking before I’ve gotten the answers I need.

“You think I haven’t noticed what goes on between you two? My wife leaves a room, you follow. My wife enters a room, you’re the first one to approach her. I used to think it was pathetic; a grown man trailing behind a woman he can’t have like a lovesick child. Maybe I was wrong,” he snarls. “Maybe I shouldn’t feel guilty that she got what she deserved. Infidelity probably runs in the family. She must’ve learned how to be a cheating slut from her deadbeat fath⁠—”

In an instant, the muscles and tendons of my right arm contract as my fist connects with the center of Brent’s face. Cartilage and bone break beneath my knuckles and a vicious crack fills the air, telling me his nose has broken. Pain radiates up and down my arm but I hardly feel it. The punch disorients Brent severely but he scrambles to restore his balance and fixes me with a near murderous look. I feel Diego behind me; he grabs my shoulder as if to send me behind him but when Brent steps forward as if to pounce on me I meet him there. I seize him by the lapels of his suit jacket and pin him against the vending machines.

“Did you slam the car door on purpose? Did you crush Karina’s foot on purpose?” I shove him hard enough for his head to whip back and hit the vending machine behind him. “Did you?”

Brent made a mistake in underestimating me. He never thought I was capable of biting back and in the event I ever mustered up the nerve, he knew I’d be doing it alone because Karina would never defend me. For years, it went on like this. The two of us arguing and being dismissed as having a “sibling-like” dynamic when in reality, I always sensed and feared he was capable of more. People’s underestimation and glorification of him protected him from real consequences and weakened whatever valid arguments I may have made. Not this time.

I have Diego with me. Someone who believes me.

Brent begins to hyperventilate.

“I—”

“Say it.”

The guilt-ridden confession tumbles past his lips. “I didn’t mean to.” And then with unexpected malice, he whispers, “But I’m glad.”

An insatiable desire for violence overwhelms me. Images of myself at Moises and Bertha’s with a knife in my hand flash before me. In and out, in and out, the blade sinks deep into warm, human flesh, spilling blood all over the blue and white tiles until I can no longer see the flowers.

I imagine doing it now. Taking whatever is closest to me—a needle, a pen, a scalpel—and plunging it into Brent over and over and over again until the only way to identify his corpse is through dental records. Images of horror flutter through my imagination faster than I can count them but none are so grotesque or fear inspiring than what I can unleash with a simple command to the man beside me. I release Brent and step back.

With a single breath, I say his name.

“Diego.”

Before the last syllable has left my lips, Diego swings.

I watch it all happen in slow motion. Hear people’s voices as if under water.

Diego grabs Brent by the front of his shirt and throws him into the vending machine, over and over again until his face breaks through the glass display. Doctors and nurses and staff alike all try to intervene, but Diego sends Brent flying through the waiting room doors like a sack of flour and I follow after him. Alejandro is up in an instant and grabs the chair Diego is about to use to crush Brent’s skull. I think he says something, but I can’t hear a word. When Alejandro tries to intervene again, I push him out of the way. He’s so taken aback, he freezes and stares at me like a deer caught in headlights. Diego grabs Lettie’s chair and swings it against the side of Brent’s head.

Security rushes in and it takes four officers to pull Diego off Brent, who at one point lies flat on the ground and takes enough punches to the jaw to loosen every one of his teeth. And because that isn’t enough, once the officers have Diego detained, I land a few heavy kicks of my own, stomping and puncturing his sides with the sharp point of my heel. Alejandro eventually manages to pull me away.

I know he’s speaking to me, I just can’t hear a word. Is this what happens to a person when they shut down? Is this the numb, quiet place Alejandro goes to when I can’t reach him?

Because I can’t think of anything else.

I want Brent dead.

Alejandro

“What’s going on?”

Karina arrives on a wheelchair with a doctor behind her—Dr. Brosnan, I think. Lyss’s aunt.

I can only imagine what this must look like to her. Brent, bloodied and crawling across the linoleum floor toward her, while Diego is being forced into a chair by four struggling security guards all the while Dahlia is practically unresponsive. I wish I could snap her out of this stupor but her eyes turn a shade of black I’ve never seen before. Deep down, I have to confess that seeing her like this is almost terrifying.

She speaks but I can’t hear her above the noise.

“What?”

“He did it on purpose,” Dahlia says. And then, louder. “He did it on purpose!”