Page 31 of The Girl and the Cobra

It goes on like that for a while: me frantically searching through the darkness, stopping only to call out her name every so often. I don’t know how much time passes, but with each minute that ticks by the hope inside me flickers and threatens to fail.

I can’t stop. I have to keep going. I have to find her.

I need to find her.

Fate, for once in my wretched life, is kind to me. The next time I call out her name, in the distance I hear Mabel say “Hello?” It’s a weak response, but it’s all I need. It gives me a direction to run to.

I zip through the darkness like it’s my home and I’ve finally returned to it. I move deftly through the forest, my eyes having long since adjusted to the near-pitch-black level of light. The moment I come across Mabel I skid to a stop and drop to my knees beside her.

She’s huddled against the trunk of a wide tree, and when I reach her she breathes a sigh of relief. “Tristan,” she whispers, sounding tired, “I was looking for you.”

“Really? I guess you found me.”

Mabel laughs, but it’s a sad, pathetic sound, and her laughter dies off shortly after. “I got lost, and then… I tripped on a log and twisted my ankle. It hurts to put weight on it. I might’ve sprained it or something, I don’t know.”

She’s fortunate all she has is a sprained ankle. Things could have been so much worse. I could have stumbled upon her corpse and a mountain lion with her blood coating its fangs.

“Why?” I ask.

“Well, I didn’t see it. It’s kind of dark out here. I’m not used to hiking in general, so—”

“No,” I whisper, inching closer to her. “Why come looking for me? Why not just let me go?”

Her voice comes out far softer than it has any right to sound, “Because I wanted to. Because I… you have a habit of running away when we talk about things you don’t want to. I know how that feels. I don’t have anyone who would run after me, so I just thought—I thought I’d find you. Obviously, I didn’t think it would end up like this.”

On my knees beside her, the breath that escapes me right then is one filled with relief. Relief and something else I can’t quite name. Before I know what I’m doing, I reach for her and pull her into me, tucking her face against the crook of my neck as my arms wrap around her.

I don’t think she anticipated the move; that makes two of us. She’s tense at first, but after a few seconds pass, she relaxes into me and clings to me like I’m her lifeline.

“It’s cold out here,” she whispers. “You’re so warm.”

“You shouldn’t come into these woods alone,” I tell her. “I can handle myself, but you? You’re—” Every way I can end that sentence, it’s not enough. She’s so much more than I could ever say.

Maybe I never really regained my mind. Maybe I lost it a long time ago and there’s no hope of it returning. It’s the only way I can explain the way I feel right now, the only way any of it makes sense.

The moment she smiled at me that day we first spoke, I was a goner. There was no coming back for me. Surfacing in these waters was impossible; I’ve been drowning in Mabel’s waters since the first time I saw her.

The obsession. The desperate drive to be near her, to do whatever I can to keep her safe. The infernal craving that constantly threatens to take over.

I’ve felt it before. I’ve known all of this before. It’s what drove me to become the Cobra, to be someone else, the monsterbehind the mask. It led me to pain and loss and denial. Nothing good ever came out of it.

What hope is there for me now? Who’s to say this won’t end exactly the same? With three new bullets in my body and all-new waves of regret. They say insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting the results to miraculously change even though nothing else has.

I am Tristan Arrowwood. I’m still the Cobra. I’m a man who deserves no happy ending. My crimes, my sins, go against all logic and all religion, blurs the line between right and wrong. I still think of killing Wolf and anyone who dares keep me from what I want. I haven’t changed.

Mabel shivers against me, cuddling into me as she asks, “I’m what?”

The equation isn’t the same, I realize. I might not have changed, but the latter half of the equation has, and therefore the answer will be different. It must be different. I need it to be different.

I need someone who needs me as much as I need them.

Mabel pulls her face away from the crook of my neck, and through the darkness she stares up at me, still waiting for me to answer.

What can I say? How can I describe any of it without sounding like I’ve lost my mind? So I don’t answer. I don’t tell her a single thing. Instead, I move a hand to her lower jaw, and as I do so, Mabel swallows hard, but she doesn’t pull away or stop me.

It’s mechanical on my part. Instinctual. Like I’ve been waiting to do this ever since she graced me with her smile.

I stop overthinking. I let the old me take charge, the me who knows exactly what he wants. I lower my mouth to hers and kiss her like I’m a man on death row and she’s my last meal. It’stentative at first, hesitant on her side, but I’m too lost and there’s no possible way I can pull away from her.

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