by LC Lehesaho
"Have you seen Cobra?" Falcon's voice asks someone. "I swear just five minutes ago she was on the dance floor with me, and now I can't find her anywhere."
9
Oh, my fucking God.
I stare at Tiger's brown eyes, and shock ripples through my body. I can't even breathe. First of all, we both hear Falcon talking to someone just around the corner, trying to find me. And second… his hand is between my thighs, and I was just about to let him fuck me.
What is wrong with me?
Our eyes are locked, and I know that he knows. This was it—the wake-up call.
We almost made the biggest mistake of our lives.
Falcon curses to someone about what a hussy I am, she is not wrong, and then she apparently leaves because the voices fade away. I count to ten to make sure she's gone and then I buck Tiger off me with force, jerking my hands free from his hold. Which I’d loved.
"No." I throw my index finger up to stop whatever he is about to say or do and gather my breath. "No."
He doesn't move, of course, it's not like he'll rape me because I changed my mind.
"Fuck," I curse and bang the back of my head to the wall. The pain lingers inside me, from the hit, and from the knowledge that this might break us for good, knowing we can never look at each other the same again. I don't want that. I want my best friend back.
"Don't do it." His voice comes out as a rough plea. "Don't walk away from me."
I squeeze my eyes shut, keeping my head on the wall, my fists curled into balls at my sides.
"Cobra…"
"No."
"Please… we can make it work, you know? I know we can." Tiger sounds as tormented as I feel. "Don't walk away from me now."
I feel a tear rolling down my cheek, but I don't open my eyes. I can't. Feels like my world came crashing down. Reality hit me with a baseball bat straight to my face. Dropped me in the middle of an Arctic Ocean. Tore the heart from my chest and put it in a grinder.
We'll never be the same again.
I push myself off the wall and open my eyes, trying to keep myself together. I can't even look at him. I just… can't.
"I'm so fucking sorry." That's all I get out before I turn and walk away, not looking back.
But my heart is not following me. It stays in the hallway with Tiger, and I know I'm never going to get it back.
Because for the past five years, it hasn't belonged to me.
"Are you sure you need more?"
Luke watches me, slightly worried maybe, but how the fuck should I know what his worried face looks like? I don't know him. I don't want to know him. Right now, he is just a guy who orders me drinks and keeps other guys away from me.
I don't mean him. I haven't seen him since I walked away.
"When I want your opinion, Luke, I’ll ask for it. I'm sure I didn't frame that into a question," I growl at him, and I know I'm being a bitch, but that’s what happens when you don't have a heart.
Bitches don't have a heart.
"Are you going to get me that drink, or do I have to find someone who will?"
He takes a deep breath and nods. "I'll get it."
"And hey, while you're at it." The truck on my chest forces me to ask, no matter how much it hurts. "Let me know if you see my... If you see Tiger, okay?"
"Your brother?"
No. My fucking everything.
Pushing those thoughts aside, I force myself to nod. "Yeah, him. I need to know if he's still here."
"Sure thing, beautiful. I'll be back soon."
Luke gets up from the couch and walks to the bar, leaving me with my slightly suicidal thoughts. It was my luck that he was around and felt sorry for making me bleed, which wasn't his fault in the first place, but now I have someone to use as a shield. I texted Falcon, telling her to leave me alone, and well, my brothers have their own things going on, so no one is interested in what I do, especially if I keep Luke by my side. They think he is some one-night wonder I'm hitting it with. I let them think that because it's a surefire way to keep Dad away. He doesn't want to think about me having sex.
"I decided to make you happy and brought you the whole bottle." Luke slumps to the couch next to me and hands me the champagne bottle. "And I changed your order to that. Thought you could enjoy the gold sparkles when you vomit it in the toilet."
His Aussie accent makes him sound incredibly comical. That's the funniest shit ever, and if I'd been in a mood for laughing, I would have laughed my ass off.
"How considerate of you, thanks." I take the bottle and take a long swig. My taste buds were gone a long time ago, so I can't tell if it is good or not. I hand it to him, not being a complete bitch. "Want some? And did you see him?"
He takes a gulp and gives it back, watching me with his baby blue eyes. It makes quite a striking impression with the skull paint.
"No, I didn't. He probably left already, 'cause there was no sign of him," Luke answers, shrugging one shoulder. "I'm tempted to ask why you're drinking yourself under the table, but I know you wouldn't tell me, right?"
I hope to God that Tiger is okay, and he went home, not killing anyone on the way. We need to talk, that's for sure, but it's not possible tonight. I'm wasted, and he'd been drinking way more than usual, so the best thing for us is to stay far away from each other in this state.
I realize Luke is staring at me, clearly waiting for me to speak.
Did he ask something? Think, think...
Ah. "Correct, I wouldn't."
"I want to talk with you, but you make it slightly hard. You're not very approachable."
"Apparently, I'm enough approachable enough 'cause you're sitting right next to me even though you don't know who the fuck I am," I say before taking another long gulp. Pushing him out of my mind and trying to survive the night. The itch inside me wants me to carve my arms open for walking away. No—for letting things escalate that far in the first place.
The pleading look on his face is carved in my retinas, haunting me, killing me from the inside.
Don't think about it now. Make it through the night. Stay the fuck alive.
"Then tell me, who are you?"
"Cobra."
Luke laughs, all happy and wavy, not accepting my moody demeanor. "I know that. But who exactly is Cobra? Other than a stunningly beautiful girl who drinks like a man."
I turn my eyes from the bottle to him. "You think I'm beautiful?"
He nods with a wide smile. "Duh, ridiculously beautiful."
Then I remember what Falcon said about our horoscope. And the fact that I'm gonna be a heartless bitch from now on. Make myself forget. I tilt my head, looking him in the eyes. "So, do you want to fuck me?"
Luke starts to cough his lungs out, stunned. "What?"
"Do. You. Want. To. Fuck. Me." I can't say it any clearer than that. Communication is the key, that's what the stars foretold.
"Now?" He looks around like he's trying to find help.
"No, Luke. Next week, Wednesday at eight a.m. Of course, now goddammit."
"Uh, yes?" he answers like he's not quite sure if I'm joking or not.
"Good enough." I get up, swaying a bit from all the booze I've been drowning myself in, but I don't care. I take his hand in mine. "C'mon."
"Are you sure about this? Maybe when you're not so… uh, when you're sober?"
I turn to him, meeting him eye to eye. "What did I say earlier? When I want your opinion, I'll ask for it. I didn't. So, will you fuck me, or do I have to find someone else who will?"
"Bloody hell, Cobra, you're spicy. Yes, I will fuck you 'cause no way on earth I'm going to let someone else touch you. You're way too wasted." He shakes his head, a disapproving look on his face. "Someone could take advantage of you."
I laugh, I fucking laugh out loud. "You're a funny guy, Luke. Taking advantage of me? Bitch, please."
He gives me a judgmental look, but dear Luke doesn't know I can kill a man with my bare hands, even if I'm drunk as fuck.
I guide him outside bec
ause I don't want my Dad to jump out from behind anything, so inside the club is a no go. When we get just around the corner, I turn around and kiss him. Luke tastes like saltwater; fresh and clean.
I don't feel a fucking thing, but I'm not surprised. Why should I? There is nothing but pain inside of me—otherworldly anguish suffocating me, drowning me in darkness.
Now, everything I do is just trying to find a way to breathe without his help.
I run my fingers through Luke's hair and jump into his arms, wrapping my legs around him. Luke takes a firm hold on my ass and walks us, so my back meets the wall. I can feel his dick pressing through his jeans to my core, and I can't wait to forget. Sliding my other hand between us, I rip the snaps open between my thighs.
A restless groan escapes from my throat when I realize he's wearing a motherfucking belt. He’s holding me so tight that I don't have to worry about falling down while unbuckling the belt with both hands. Not that I would be worried. I could drop down from an airplane for all I care.
"Are you sure about this?" Luke breathes into my mouth.
"Why are you still talking?"
"Fine. Do you have condoms?" he asks me, slightly frustrated. "I don't, 'cause I don't do things like this."
"Fuck girls outside of the club?" I mock but quickly restrain myself, so I don't scare him off. "No, I don't have condoms. I'm clean, though, and I take the pill."
He leans back to look at my face. "I'm clean too, but…"
Like I care about his health records. I don't care about anything. But the knight in a shiny armor seems like he needs some convincing.
"I promise I'm not lying. Babies are the last thing I want, and I was tested just a couple of weeks ago, and I haven't fucked anyone since." It's true. Dry season.
"You're ruining me, darling." He sighs but helps me get his dick out of his jeans and pushes himself inside me with one long thrust. "Bloody hell, you feel so good…"
I can't argue. He feels fucking amazing. But then again, probably all dick feels the same. I've ruined his skull paint already by kissing him like there is no tomorrow, and I have no fucking clue who he is, but I need him more than anyone or anything else at the moment. I need him to take my body, sink into me, and make me forget.
Forget.
"Harder," I moan, digging my nails into his neck, and he delivers.
The stranger makes me forget who I am.
10
"Are you ready to go home or what?" I grumble to Puma, who's still watching the crowd with an expression that tells me he is not entirely OK.
None of us is OK.
I'm not fucking OK.
"Home." He pushes himself up from the couch. "Let's take an Uber, I don't have the energy for the family right now."
I agree. Completely.
We've been sitting on this couch since… that, but Puma doesn't know what's tormenting me, and I don't know what's tormenting him, so that makes us a perfect pair.
I walk behind him, unable to concentrate on anything. She left me. She fucking left me, even when I begged her not to. Everything was perfect until it all exploded into a million fucking pieces.
"Well, at least one of us is having the time of their life," Puma declares, and I trail his eyes to the side street when we get outside.
My blood goes cold and it feels like my heart is being ripped from my chest. I know those heels. I know that hair. I know her. And she is fucking someone against the wall. My brain is having a hard time figuring out if this is really happening or if it’s just my imagination.
Puma sees it too.
Cobra is actually having sex outside of the club with… that's the Aussie. I just know it's him.
"C'mon, our Uber is there." Puma jerks my arm, but I don't move. I just stare at them. The rhythmical pounding. Her pink hair flowing down his arms. Her arms around his neck.
"Stop staring, and let's go." Puma jerks me again. "Tiger? Man, seriously, what's wrong with you? Come on."
"I…" I turn my eyes to him. "I can't come. I need to…"
I don't know what I need. Suddenly I don't know who I am or what I should do. This can't be real. She can't…
"Tiger, Jesus Christ." Puma steps in front of me, hands on my shoulders, and looks me in the eye. "I know you're overprotective of her, but you can't seriously be thinking about interrupting that? Cobra will kill you, and I'm not even kidding."
Am I going to interrupt? I don't know. I seriously don't know. I don't know what I should do. I'm drowning on dry land. My heart is pounding through my chest and not in the right way.
"Come home with me, bro. We are both done for today." He practically pushes me inside the Uber and I let him. There is not even an ounce of strength left inside me.
I thought I knew pain before, but after this… it's all been child's play compared to this. All these years I've wanted to tell her how I feel, that she is the only thing I see. The only one that matters to me.
She was the one who made me want to live, and not put a gun in my mouth and pull the trigger after Leo brought me here. He saved me, but at the same time, he gave me the freedom to end my life if I wanted.
I was ready to die.
I had lived through all the fucking sick and twisted things for three years before he came to kill the man who we thought was our father. He'd fucked-up his business with Leo. Just like he'd fucked us up after our mom died on our twelfth birthday. Three years in hell made me want to die, but I wasn't allowed to—he wanted me to suffer.
Leo gave me the gun a week after he'd brought me home and told me that I need to think it through. He said that if I want to, I can give up and kill myself or keep that gun and make sure nothing like that happens ever again. He promised that when I recovered, he'll help me find the rest of them and I can kill them the way I want.
I didn't say a word to him.
I hadn't spoken for over a year before he took me out. But then she came, sitting outside my door and reading Peter Pan to me. I'd never heard of the story before, my mother had read Grimms’ Fairy Tales to us when we were little, but I listened to her even though I had no idea who she was or why she was sitting outside my door every night. I didn't step out of the room for a month, and the only one who came in to bring me food and ask if this was the day I wanted to come out was Leo. He told me about his own children, and then I concluded that the girl reading a bedtime story to me was one of his daughters.
She read Peter Pan over and over again, and one day when the story ended, she spoke. Before then, she had only read. But then she actually talked to me and said that she would love it if we could be like Peter. Never grow up and meet the cruel world, but because the world is fucked-up already and there are bad people, we need to grow up. That we can't let them win, and we can be bigger than our monsters. Her voice was always so innocent and angelic that I couldn't imagine that she could know anything about the cruel world.
So, I opened the door she was leaning against, and she fell on her back on the floor. Her hair was pink already then, but what got my attention was the black eye and stitches on her cheek. There, lying on the ground next to my feet, she looked up at me with her beautiful hazel eyes and smiled.
I'm Cobra, and I would like to teach you how to shoot with that gun of yours.
And she did. She also taught me how to use a knife, and when we weren't training to kill, we watched movies and studied because I was three years behind from the other kids my age.
I've always loved her.
She's the reason I decided to stay alive. Cobra never asked what happened to me, nor have I ever told her. Leo is the only one who knows because he said to me that he needs to know what he’s dealing with.
I told him without looking at him the entire time. I was so ashamed of it that tears fell from my eyes, not because of the memories but because of the feelings. The shame. The guilt. The filth. After that, he tracked down every one of those sick fuckers, and I made them pay. It didn't take away the shit they did to us, but it felt so damn good that I
still remember the first actual deep breath I took in three years after killing the last one of them.
I'm grateful to Leo for everything he has done for me. And I know he would probably slaughter me for wanting his daughter, but I'd be willing to risk it. Leo knows I'm not worthy of her, and I know it too, but I don't care. For five years, Cobra has been the light of my life, the air feeding my fire, and I can't fucking lose her.
But I did.
I just fucking know I lost her today. I'm mad at her for rejecting me, but at the same time, I want to beg her to forget everything that happened today so we could go back to being at least friends.
But...
I don't even know if I would want to go back.
Maybe this was the wake-up call for me that I can never have her, no matter how much I want us together. Perhaps Cobra was right when she said that there are no happy endings for people like us. Maybe I am Peter Pan, after all, the boy who never grew up. Perhaps those kids never grew up and went to Neverland because they were already dead. Like I was dead inside five years ago.
Like I am now.
Maybe it's time for me to actually accept that I'm one of the lost boys who won't find their way back home.
The Uber moves, but I don't even realize it until the car stops in our yard. Puma pays the fare and drags me out just like he shoved me inside. I end up sitting on Puma's couch with a joint in my hand.
"Smoke it," Puma orders while sitting on the low living room table facing me. "I don't know what the hell happened to you tonight, but I saw that look on your face five years ago, and there it is again, so no. I'm not letting you drown."
I don't smoke it. Yet. "Why do you loath relationships?"
Puma takes the joint from my hand and sucks in a long breath. He observes the sizzling gleam for a moment while holding his breath. Then he exhales it, the thick cloud floating lazily in the air, and turns to look at me. "Loving any of us is a death sentence. Everything we touch dies, no matter if we want it or not."
He’s not exactly wrong. I take the joint, dragging in the smoke. It tastes like shit, but I don't care. "Have you ever been in love?"