Page 13 of The Girl and the Cobra

I know it’s his job to ask me uncomfortable questions, but I really wish he didn’t find them so quickly. It’s like I recover from answering one and he instantly sends another my way. I can’t catch a break… but maybe that’s the whole point of this. The reason why I’m here is to face the fact that I am a broken human being.

That, and to try to put me back together again.

“I… I guess, maybe, I pretended then, too.” The words don’t sound quite right. It’s as if I’m admitting a deep, dark secret that no one else in the world has the right to know.

“How so?”

With everything we’ve already talked about today, I don’t really feel like continuing down this road. “Can we talk about something else?” I’m feeling like I want to crawl out of my skin and hide somewhere where I won’t have to answer questions like his ever again.

Dr. Wolf forces out a smile and says, “Sure.” And to his credit, he finds other things to ask about, things that don’t hurt me quite as badly. We spend the rest of the time talking about my dad and how he’s really trying to make it here.

At the end of the session, right when I think I’ll get away from him before he can ask me any other questions that make me feel like I want to die, Dr. Wolf says, “Mabel, I’d like to give you… let’s call it homework.”

All I can do is blink at him and think: uh-oh.

“You mentioned before you felt comfortable with Tristan because he doesn’t know who you are or what you’ve been through. You believe everyone in the country knows who you are, and I want to prove to you that’s not true, so I’d like for you to do something before our next appointment.”

My stomach is already in knots over what he’s going to ask me to do. Call me psychic, but I have the feeling I’m not going to like it.

“There’s a small coffee shop in town, called The Drip. I’d like for you to go there, order yourself something, and sit while you drink it. I think you’ll find that you’re not as well-known as you believe you are.”

“But what if—”

“What if someone does recognize you? Mabel, the wound is still fresh, but a part of you will always feel as if it just happened yesterday. You are still alive. You have a life. You need to live it. That means you can’t divide your time between your new home and here. You’re young. I know it might not feel like it, but youdo have your whole life ahead of you. Taking small steps to get yourself back out there is something I want to work on with you.”

Honestly? I know he’s right. He’s making sense. I just… I feel like I want to throw up when I think about going to that coffee shop, alone, ordering myself something to drink, and then spending time inside, sitting at a table while surrounded by strangers. As dramatic as it is, I feel like I’d rather die.

I don’t know what makes me ask, but I do: “What about Tristan?”

“What about him?”

“Are you making him go out and do things he’s uncomfortable with?”

Dr. Wolf clicks his pen once, twice, before he answers me, “Tristan’s case is far different than yours. Since he’s been in my care, he hasn’t left the grounds of this house. Frankly, I don’t know if he’ll ever be ready.”

My brows furrow. “Why not?”

“You know I can’t tell you anything specific.”

“What can you tell me, then? Why should I go out and make myself do this when you’re not making him do the same?” I kind of sound like a petulant child, but I don’t care. It really isn’t fair.

The sigh Dr. Wolf sighs tells me he’s softening, and that gives me hope that I might learn more about the other inhabitant of this house. “Tristan is… he’s not like you. He doesn’t look at things the way a normal person would. His mind doesn’t work that way. He did terrible things, made his family disown him, and now he is solely my responsibility.”

The thought of Tristan doing something terrible, let alone multiple terrible things, doesn’t sit right with me. I can’t imagine it—which I know is stupid, because I’ve only spoken to him once. “What kind of terrible things?”

I half expect Dr. Wolf to tell me he can’t get any more specific, that it’s confidential between a patient and histherapist, but to my surprise, he does give me an answer, and that answer is a single word, spoken simply and unflinchingly, “Violent.”

My breath catches, and every time I inhale and exhale, the air in my lungs fights with me, as if it wants to stay trapped inside my lungs and therefore my lungs can’t intake any new air.

Violent. Tristan did something violent. Multiple violent things.

“Oh.” It’s all I can say, mostly because I’m now mentally wrestling with myself, telling my inner self I should have known. I loved my brother more than life itself, and look at what happened there. Of course the first person I’m curious about is violent. I know how to pick them.

“I hope you can see why I hoped to keep you two separate,” Dr. Wolf goes on. “Tristan might seem normal to you, but I assure you, he’s far from it.”

The scars all over him told me that, but I thought… God, I thought that’s why he was here, that he has some obsessive urge to hurt himself that he needs to be supervised all the time. I didn’t think… it didn’t even cross my mind that he could possibly be violent.

Dr. Wolf says, “Just think about what I said, Mabel. Try to push yourself a bit. You’re stronger than you give yourself credit for—it’s why you’re here to begin with. You need to see what I see, what your father sees.”

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