Page 146 of Desperate People

“But look at you now. Look at you!” He points a trembling finger, spit flying.

“You-You broke into my apartment?—”

“I left you gifts! Didn’t you like them? You were supposed to understand,” he bends down till he is eye level with me, then he screams. “FUCKING BITCH!”

I flinch.

This man is not right.

He’s crazy.

He starts pulling on his hair, pacing and mumbling.

“You married that fucking tattooed freak! That criminal! You chose him over me! Over us!”

“There is no us,” I whisper.

I want to scream.

But my mouth won’t open that far. And my throat has gone dry.

I’m frozen.

Trapped in a nightmare I never saw coming.

“No us? How can you say that when I’ve loved you for so long? When I did all this for you?” he asks.

“What are you talking about?”

But I barely finish the question when he takes the knife in his hand.

“You just don’t know how much I love you. How much I adore you. You don’t belong to him. I’ll show you. I’ll show you,” he says over and over like a song stuck on repeat.

He slices his shirt, ripping it open, and shoving it off.

His pants are next, and then he stands there proudly, baring himself to me.

Bile rises in my throat as I see the full horror of his man’s obsession with me.

Carved onto his skin are bloody scabs—no, not just scabs, those are words.

My name.

Or the bastardization of the nickname my dad gave me when I was little.

Diablita.

Carved into his skin. Over and over.

I feel nauseated.

“You fucking exhaust me, Diablita. But it’s okay. I forgive you. No one can love you like I do,” he says, nodding and creeping me the fuck out.

“Pretty soon, you’ll see. First, I’m gonna cut you. Put my name on you so the world knows you’re mine,” he threatens, and starts to walk towards me, knife held in his steady right hand.

For the first time since this all started, I realize—I might not make it out of this.

My breath catches. My lungs stop working.

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