HIS BELLISSIMA

NUMB

*Grief doesn't knock. It just rearranges the furniture and waits for you to notice*

The music reverberated through the club, bass thudding up through the floor and into Alondra's chest. She downed her third shot, her throat burning. She welcomed the bitter, sharp taste of the whiskey. It dulled the ache she was feeling. Beside her, Audrey had Dave cracking up about something, laughing too loud and shoving his shoulder every few seconds like she couldn't help herself. Alondra drowned out the noise and took another shot.

"Okay, that's three." Melanie's hand closed over her wrist before she could reach for a fourth. She hadn't stopped watching her since they walked in, twenty minutes and counting, like Alondra might combust if left unsupervised.

"Slow down, babygirl. This isn't a race."

Alondra eyed her, unimpressed, and lifted another shot anyway.

"You guys dragged me out here." She downed it.

"The least you can do is let me enjoy it."

"Dragging you out is not the same as watching you drink yourself into a coma," Audrey said, turning from Dave to point a finger at her, the grin still on her mouth but her eyes sharp. "There's a difference between having a good time and doing damage control at 2 a.m."

"I'm a grown woman, Audrey."

"Grown women still throw up in Ubers."

Dave leaned in, plucking the next shot straight out of her hand before she could argue, and set it down out of reach. "Not on my watch. I'm not carrying you out of here again."

She groaned loudly, more at being outnumbered than anything else.

If she was going to be here, she wanted to drink until she couldn't stand, until there was nothing left in her head but static. Melanie shook her head in disapproval, her black hair cascading beautifully down her shoulders. Something about the way it fell reminded her of her mom.

Her mom. Her dad.

Five months, and it still hit her sideways like that, over nothing, over everything. Five months since she'd stood at the edge of a grave in a dress that felt like someone else's skin, since two caskets had gone down slowly into ground that didn't know her father hummed off-key in the shower, didn't know her mother kept her sofrito recipe on an index card gone soft at the corners. Five months since she'd come home to his reading glasses still on the side table and her cardigan still draped over the kitchen chair, exactly where she'd left it, because she'd said she'd be cold on the way home and decided against bringing it. Five months since a stranger's voice on the other end of a phone call, 11:47 p.m., had rearranged her entire life in under a minute.

Grief hadn't ended. It had just changed shape, folding itself into ordinary moments like this one, someone's hair catching the light wrong, and ambushing her all over again.

She reached for another shot, if only to drown it back down where it belonged.

Melanie beat her to it, grabbing the last one and downing it herself, winking mischievously. "That one's mine. You've had enough sad-girl hour for tonight."

"I wasn't—"

"You get this face." Melanie tapped two fingers under her own chin. "This exact face."

Alondra opened her mouth to argue and found she didn't have something to say.

"Come let's dance…." Melanie said, softer now, already pulling her off the stool. "Love this song."

She grabbed Alondra's hand and pulled her onto the floor. Audrey followed suit immediately while Dave stood alert, the faithful, responsible big brother. Alondra let herself be dragged along.

She didn't want to think.

She didn't want to feel.

She just wanted to be free and light and numb.

The girls rolled their bodies in sync to the music. A few guys drifted over, trying to join in, and for a while it was easy enough, nothing but noise and moving bodies and the bass working its way into her bones. When she'd had enough of it, she peeled away from the group and headed for the bar, needing something stronger in her hand.

She'd barely ordered when she felt a figure, someone sliding into the space beside her, too close for a bar that wasn't even crowded on that side. He was probably good-looking by most standards, the kind of face that photographed well, but up close there was something oily about him, a practiced confidence that felt rehearsed rather than earned. His shirt was unbuttoned one notch too many, and he smelled like cheap cologne applied with the intention of being noticed from across a room. His eyes did a slow pass over her, from her face down and back up again, lingering exactly where they shouldn't, and he wasn't even subtle about it, like he expected her to be flattered by the audit.

"Let me guess," he said, leaning an elbow on the bar like he owned it. "Something dark. You look like a woman who drinks something dark."

"I look like a woman who wants to be left alone," she said, not looking at him.

He laughed like she'd made a joke. "Come on. Let me buy you a drink."

"I'm good."

"I insist." He motioned to the bartender before she could stop him.

"I said I'm good." Her voice hardened, and she finally turned to look at him fully, hoping the flat, unimpressed stare would do what her words hadn't.

It didn't. If anything, he seemed to enjoy the resistance, like it was a game with rules he'd already decided he was winning.

"Feisty. I like that." He shifted in closer, dropping his voice like they were sharing something intimate. "Come on, let's get out of here. I know somewhere quieter."

"I'm not going anywhere with you." She turned back to the bar, done entertaining him, and reached for her drink the second it landed.

His hand closed around her wrist before she could pick it up.

"Don't be like that." His grip wasn't gentle, fingers pressing hard enough to bruise, and the easy charm had already started slipping off his face, something colder showing underneath. "I'm being nice. Most girls would kill for a guy like me to notice them."

"Let go of me." She yanked her arm, but he held on, and for a second the noise of the club seemed to fall away, narrowed down to just his hand and the sudden, ugly certainty that he wasn't going to take no for an answer easily.

Then Dave was there, stepping between them like he'd simply materialized, his hand landing firm on the guy's shoulder and turning him body away from her.

"She said let go." Dave's voice was calm, but there was nothing friendly in it.

The guy squared up, sizing him up like he was calculating whether it was worth the trouble. Whatever he saw in Dave's face made the math simple. He let go of her wrist, held both hands up in mock surrender, and threw her one last look, somewhere between annoyed and entitled, like she'd cost him something.

"Whatever. Wasn't that into you anyway....." He melted back into the crowd.

Melanie and Audrey arrived a beat later, Melanie already reaching for her wrist to check it, Audrey glaring daggers in the direction he'd disappeared.

"You okay?" Melanie asked, thumb brushing over the red marks already blooming on her skin.

"I'm fine." She wasn't, not really, not in a way she could explain without unraveling everything else she'd been holding together all night. The whole club suddenly felt too loud, too hot, too full of hands that thought they were owed something. "I just need air."

"I'll come with you," Audrey started, but Alondra was already shaking her head.

"I'm fine. Two minutes." She managed a small, unconvincing smile and slipped away before anyone could argue, weaving through the crowd toward the side door, needing distance from the noise and the lights and the memory of his fingers on her wrist. She snatched a blunt off some guy at the bar on her way past, the lighter already in his hand, and pushed out into the night before anyone could ask where she was really going.