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“Dammit, Kobra, why can’t you just fucking calm down for once?! I’m sick of this!”
Kobra was tired of being angry. Maybe Jet was right, maybe he did need to calm down but he didn’t know how because there wasn’t a time when he was calm because there was always something to be angry at and he didn’t know how to calm down.
There was too much to be angry at. How could he calm down? Calming down got people hurt. It meant that he let his guard down and if he let his guard down then then then -
No. No!
Kobra’s jaw ached from how tightly his mouth was shut, his disgustingly dirty blond hair falling into his eyes as he looked up through the dim lighting to see his reflection. All he could make out were the whites of his eyes.
Maybe, maybe he was happy that the light in the bathroom hadn’t worked for years. Or maybe he was happy that the lock on the bathroom door still worked, because he knew Jet would want to come to talk to him and he didn’t want to talk to Jet because he made Jet yell and Jet never yelled.
Kobra did that!
He did this every single time! He made everything worse! It was one thing to fight with Poison, it was another to make Jet yell. Jet didn’t get mad, Jet didn’t yell, Jet quietly told them all to shut the fuck up or bad things would happen for good reasons and that was that because Jet was right.
But no, no, Kobra made Jet yell.
He didn’t mean to! He didn’t mean to, he didn’t even mean to fight this time! He just - he just wanted to talk to Poison and it didn’t end up that way and he didn’t mean for it to end up in a fight and and and and and -
Calm down. Right, calm down, that’s what he needed to go. That’s what Jet yelled.
Kobra didn’t know how to calm down.
His nails dug into the grime-covered counter; it smelt of rust and mold, but that wasn’t anything new. He wondered if his fingernails were bleeding. Briefly, he hoped they were, clutching the countertop like he had any reason to be angry. Like he was anything except anger and hate sculpted into the shape of a teenager with no fucking control.
It was true, though, and maybe that was what he hated most. He didn’t have control. He didn’t want to have control, ‘cos then everything would be his fault, even more than it already was because he was a fuck-up and, in every sense of the word, a bastard.
Maybe Poison was telling him the truth when he spat in his face, something about how he was still a Crow, how he still lived on violence and anger. That he probably didn’t even know happy because he was so wrapped up in his own stupid anger that he couldn’t see how sick of it Poison was.
It could be a lie. Poison lied when he was mad, said the things that hurt most instinctively. He was used to arguing with their mother.
But Poison was right. Kobra lived on anger. He lived on anger and hate and maybe he never fucking learned how to forgive things said out of anger because Poison argued with their mother; she wouldn’t even look at Kobra.
Kobra didn’t blame her.
His gaze tracked back to the mirror, to the outline of himself. Despite only barely being able to see, it was - Kobra hated it. He hated it. He hated himself.
No wonder his mother couldn’t look like him. He looked like a dead man and he acted like one, too. Another ghost, whispering, whispering, slipping, slipping, but all he could do was scrunch up his nose and pretend he didn’t feel like he was hell as a person.
It wasn’t edgy or cool. Destroya, Kobra missed when he used to think that hating himself was cool. He was switchblades and firefights; pick apart his insides and they’d burn, they’d burn; Kobra built his throne on the bones of rage and violence fashioned into a glare. And now there was no escape from the crown he’d fashioned himself.
He didn’t want any crown.
He didn’t want to look in the mirror and see himself - a bastard, a killer, something sickening, another skeleton soul waiting for the Witch to deem him ghosted; he was a fake and a fraud; who didn’t know what happiness felt like?
What kind of person didn’t know what happiness felt like? Love?
Who was he if he didn’t know anything but anger? Who was he if all he could be wasn’t a person, but an emotion, and not a good one at that.
Who was he kidding?
He wasn’t anyone.
He was Party Poison’s little brother; he was the Crash Tracks’ best Motorbaby, but those were titles, those were trivial; they weren’t an identity because Kobra didn’t have one. He didn’t need to have one.
It’s not like he was important or anything. It’s not like he was anything more than the failed son or the fuck-up of a brother or the angry friend.
Even his face was not his own. It was that of a dead man’s, wasn’t it? It was the reason mommy didn’t love him, after all.
Kobra almost laughed, a smile quirking up, a huff of breath fogging up the mirror he was so close to. “You fucking idiot. Idiot!”
Maybe he was crying, too, but he didn’t fucking care, because he was picking apart every single detail he could make out.
His eyes. They weren’t shaped right; they looked too much like Poison’s, too, and his father’s, and he didn’t even know the man and he was still the reason Kobra was nothing more than the imitation child trying to play up to how great Poison was!
Poison wasn’t great. But Kobra was far from even that, wasn’t he?
Just look at him. A broken shell of a boy waiting for the bomb to drop, waiting for Jet to tell him to leave, waiting for Poison to give him that cold look until they went back to ignoring each other for weeks because they couldn’t sort anything out without fighting because Kobra didn’t know how.
How was he supposed to live knowing everyone saw the face he saw in the mirror, the bags under his eyes, his nose permanently crooked from all the broken noses, the scars on the side of his face from fights.
Kobra couldn’t.
That was how - he just couldn’t, he couldn’t, he couldn’t he wouldn’t he wouldn’t he wouldn’t!
Before Kobra knew what he was doing his fist was already covered in shards of mirror, a scream echoing off the bathroom’s tiled walls as the glass fell, heaving from the weight of all that he was carrying on his shoulders.
There was no reflection to mistake for a person anymore.
But Kobra almost wanted to gather up all the shards, wanted to piece them together to what they used to be because he was supposed to be clean and make sure everything was neat and he made a mess.
He made a mess, and he had to pick it up.
But he wasn’t the same person that blindly followed the message-man instructions Poison used to give him with that sad look in his eye. He wasn’t. But he was, wasn’t he?
So there Kobra stood, heaving, sweating for a reason he couldn’t place, his knuckles embedded into fragments of the mirror. He couldn’t move. He didn’t want to move. Why didn’t he want to move? Shouldn’t he want to?
Shouldn’t he want to be someone who wasn’t so angry all the time? Who wasn’t the caricature of a dead man? Who wasn’t a bad friend at the best of times?
He didn’t, though… Did that make him a bad person?
Destroya, Kobra didn’t even realize he was sobbing. Was he sobbing? Or was it quiet? He couldn’t tell anymore. Everything sounded like drowning and maybe that didn’t make sense but he didn’t make sense and he was drowning but there was no water in sight.
Nothing was in sight.
He shattered the mirror.
Just another thing he broke, just another mess he’d leave for someone else to clean up because that’s what he always did, whether it was a rebel in a body-bag or a tube of lipstick melting till it ruined Poison’s shirt.
He shattered the mirror.
Was he that atrocious? Was he that horrible to see, to think of? Why could he not stand the sight of himself?
Kobra tried to swallow back all the thoughts, tried to lock them in the part of his mind that his night terrors went, but that wasn’t something he kept too much of a grip on and he couldn’t, he couldn’t he couldn’t.
He was a fuck-up, that was why. Of course he shattered the mirror. Even the mirror didn’t want to stand looking at him.
A scream came from the back of his throat, something about a saint, maybe, or maybe about his mother but he didn’t know because he wasn’t listening and he wasn’t even himself, anymore, was he?
What was he doing?
He still hadn’t even moved his hand; his arm was getting tired and his knuckles were starting to sting, a cold liquid dripping down his palm. Blood, undoubtedly — was it from his nails digging into his palm, or was it from the glass? What did he care?
He didn’t, that was right, or that was what he told himself even though he knew he couldn’t even try lying to himself like that.
Everything, everything, not just his palm, stung when he finally let his fist fall by his side. It was the shame. The shame of being who he was and the shame of being a child who threw temper tantrums and couldn’t control his anger.
The shame of being a killjoy didn’t know what joy was in the first place, but he knew how to kill the smile on hs brother’s face in an instant.
Siblings were supposed to bicker, but they weren’t supposed to fight, not like Poison and Kobra did; they weren’t supposed to spit in each other’s faces and talk about how you’re not fucking meant to be out here, you know that? I should’ve fucking left you in the City.
And maybe Poison should’ve left him in the City, becausae being in the City didn’t burn nearly as much, didn’t make him want to vomit, didn’t make him smash mirrors or make Jet yell or piss Poison off or -
He needed to get the Desert off of him.
he needed to get everything about the Zones away from him and he couldn’t leave them he couldn’t leave them but he could try to get them off of him and suddenly Kobra’s back was against the corner, the cold tile not meaning a thing to him as he started to claw at his arms, erratic, trying to get the dirt and the grime and the Desert off of him because maybe if he did everything would go back to normal and Poison would care about him again and Jet wouldn’t be mad at him anymore.
Besides, dirt was bad and he was supposed to keep clean and he wasn’t clean, he’d never been clean, he’d done nothing but make his mother upset because she didn’t love him and maybe he just wasn’t clean enough and if all the dirt was gone there was nothing but bone left and that didn’t resemble a dead man, at least not the one she thought he was.
Who was he, again?
Oh, what did it matter - it didn’t, because everyone knew he was nothing more than an angry kid with no direction but maybe if he was clean that would all go away and the Zones would go away and the bathroom he was in would turn into one of the bathroom stalls in the Tower and he would be the same kid again.
And his mommy would love him. And so would Poison and so would Jet and so would Ghoul and there wouldn’t be any reason to be mad at him because he wasn’t an angry kid, he was a kid who followed orders and did what he was told.
But even then he would never be enough.
Destroya, Kobra’s arms stung, but he swallowed back the tears, or at least he tried too ‘cos he needed to get clean, he needed to get the Zones off of him because they did nothing but make him worse and one day he would wake up and realize he was part of the shards of mirror on the floor, forgotten because Kobra didn’t know what control was.
What was control beyond knowing what was bad for you? Kobra knew what was bad for him. Dirt.
And if you were dirty, you had to get clean, and suddenly he was climbing into the bathtub, clawing at his legs, too, anything he could see in the dark, anything that he could feel because he wasn’t clean and the water didn’t work, it hadn’t in a long time but it was nice to pretend and maybe if he pretended then he would be for real.
Would be what? Would be… would be… Why was he clawing at his arms again?
Kobra let out an anguished cry, maybe because he didn’t know what he was doing, maybe because it was so much easier to hit his head against the tile than it was to try figuring out what he was doing, so he did that, over and over and over and over again, trying trying trying to find meaning but all he could think about was how he failed, he wasn’t clean and he wasn’t loved and he would never be loved and he was dirty.
“Mama? Mommy?” Kobra cried out, knowing, knowing she couldn’t answer him, knowing she was trapped in his own personal hell named Battery City or she was six-feet-under because both her children left her and he didn’t resent her, not really.
She didn’t love him, but that was okay. He didn’t love him either. He wanted his mommy. Where was his mommy?
Oh, right, she wasn’t coming, right. She was dead, wasn’t she?
He wanted to laugh, and maybe he did, because if she was she got what was coming to her and if she wasn’t he wondered if she thought he was dead. Kobra wondered if she mourned the loss of her son or if she laughed because she’d never wanted him anyway.
Why would she?
There was… shouting? Why was there shouting?
Kobra didn’t get it, but he stopped banging his head against the wall, trying to figure out if he was hearing voices again, if it was his own heartbeat, or it really was someone talking.
From what he could hear, it might’ve been someone hitting the door or it might’ve been his heartbeat, but did it really matter? None of them could pick locks and none of them needed to because he was fine, he was fine he was fine he was fine!
Everything was fine. Everything was fine and he just wanted Poison - er, wait, no, didn’t he want his mommy? Didn’t Poison hurt him?
Poison always hurt him. He lied because he could but Kobra was just like him so it didn’t matter, did it? Kobra hurt Poison too because that was what he did, he hurt people. He hurt his mama and he didn’t even realize it.
Why did they keep saying his name?
What did he do this time? Was it about the mirror? Were they -were they mad about the mirror? He knew they would be, he shouldn’t have broken the mirror! Destroya, he was an idiot and a dirty one at that.
“Kobra? Kobra we - we really need you to open the door!”
That was… Who… Was that’s Jet voice? Of course it was Jet’s voice. Jet was mad that he broke the mirror. Jet was mad that he broke the mirror. Jet was mad. Kobra made Jet yell because he was made. Kobra made Jet yell. Jet was going to yell!
Kobra panicked - Destroya, Destroya, he didn’t know why, scrambling to find purchase on the walls of the tub his hands were blood-slick, only managing to pull himself up ‘cos the shards in his hands caught.
He stumbled out of the tub, blindly searching for the counter, fingers shaking as he started to pick up the shards, he didn’t Jet to yell ‘cos then Jet would be disappointed and Jet didn’t deserve to be disappointed and -
The sound of the door being hit startled Kobra so much he dropped everything he was holding; one particularly sharp shard fell straight into his leg but he didn’t care he needed to clean up he couldn’t be dirty he couldn’t be dirty he couldn’t make his mama disappointed -
“I’m sorry!” Kobra yelled as the door was hit again, jumping, everything in his arms falling once again, so he did too, his elbows hitting the counter alarmingly painfully until he was crying with his head in his hands, mumbling, trying to make them understand he didn’t mean to, “I’m sorry, ‘m sorry, ‘m sorry.”
When the light began to fill the bathroom, Kobra flinched away, the shadows looming over like ghosts, trying to find a way out but only clipping his shoulder into the wall, falling back into the tub and barely feeling the way he hit the bottom.
Kobra scrambled into a ball, squeezing his eyes shut and rocking back and forth because he didn’t want to be yelled at, he didn’t want to make Jet mad, he didn’t want to make his mom mad ‘cos she didn’t love him anyway and he didn’t want her to get rid of him.
“...Kobra?”
Jet was saying his name, but Kobra wasn’t processing it, wasn’t willing to process it because Jet didn’t sound mad, why didn’t Jet sound mad? Kobra broke the mirror; Jet should sound mad. Jet should be yelling.
But he wasn’t.
“What… what did you go…?” Poison mumbled, looking around, and Kobra could hear everything too clear, he hated it, he hated it he’d rather be drowning again but he wasn’t.
He could even hear the sound Ghoul made when he vomited in his mouth.
“Ghoul—”
That was Poison, but Ghoul was already gone, the sound of his footsteps already receding, maybe into the garage, maybe into Ghoul’s happy place.
Kobra wished he had a happy place ‘cos if he did he’d be there and not in the bathtub with Poison and Jet looking at him like a madman.
Maybe he was a madman. Maybe he was crazy. Maybe it was genetic - maybe the prone to suicide would be genetic, too.
Kobra laughed. Threw his head back, and laughed, as garbled as it came out, still unwilling to unravel himself from the ball he’d fit into.
Prone to suicide. It wasn’t even funny.
So why was he giggling? Was it because it was true?
Kobra was going to be one of those tragedies you didn’t even hear about on WKIL. He was going to be one of those suicide-cases that everyone was going to lie about. He wasn’t going to die fighting. He was going to die fighting himself and losing.
“Kobra…” Jet repeated, and maybe he looked spooked, or maybe he looked scared, but Kobra was laughing and his throat was so hoarse he might as well have been screaming some more.
Why not? It’s not like anything would happen. He was already a nothing and a nobody except for the titles he got without earning them; that’s all he ever would be. So what did it matter if he screamed his throat raw?
“Go away!” Was he still giggling or was he crying? Was he even crying? Oh, he needed to drink more water, didn’t he? Because he couldn’t cry if he didn’t drink enough water and he cried so much he might just die of dehydration. He wished.
Did he wish?
“Kobra, what… What did you do?”
What did he do? What did Jet sound so horrified about? Was Jet going to stop looking at him now? Did - did Kobra make Jet hate him?
Like his mom did?
“I - I’m sorry,” muttered Kobra, barely looking up if only because he didn’t know if he wanted to. He didn’t want to see Jet looking away, didn’t want to see whatever he’d done, didn’t want to see the remains of the shattered mirror, didn’t want to be alive.
Jet was reaching out to him, but Poison pushed Jet’s hand away before he had the chance to get too close to Kobra.
Kobra would flinch. Poison knew that. But Kobra didn’t want Poison anywhere near him either, trying his damnedest to curl up again, knees to his chin, because no, no, they couldn’t touch him, he was dirty, he was dirty.
“It’s okay,” said Poison, but even Kobra could detect the numb in his voice, the way he was looking at Kobra as though Kobra was a bomb that had already detonated.
Bombs were not clean. Not clean not clean not clean not clean.
The pointed look Jet sent to Poison meant something Kobra couldn’t hope to understand; he was trying to study their expressions, trying to keep the panic from pooling in his chest till he couldn’t decipher the difference between his nails digging into his the fabric of his jeans and Poison’s hair color.
Jet and Poison didn’t seem mad, even as Poison walked out, for some reason Kobra couldn’t place.
Then again, his mama had never seemed mad before. She was incapable of expressing emotion to her failed child, the problem son. Then she made Poison tell him what his punishment was.
Would they sent Ghoul in later? Would they make him act all sympathetic when he was really just trying to tell Kobra what he already knew and that it didn’t matter whether he was sorry or not because he never really had a home here in the first place and it was time for him to leave.
Kobra squeezed his eyes shut.
He had to, he had to, it was the only thing to keep from crying even more, from sobbing like a child throwing a temper tantrum. That’s what he was. That was all he was.
A child throwing a temper tantrum. A child who could break a mirror. Nothing special.
Maybe he wasn’t even the problem child. Maybe he was just forgettable. Maybe there was nothing special about him and everyone was too upset to tell him all he would ever be was the shadow to Poison’s flame.
If he was even that.
Maybe he was just like his father. Nothing more than a bundle of ashes flying through the dirty air. The dirty air.
Even in death he wasn’t clean. He wasn’t clean because he didn’t deserve to be clean. Did he? Did he not? Who decided his worth?
Didn’t his mother decide his worth the moment she looked away from him after the funeral? Didn’t she decide he was to become nothing more than the son she wasn’t able to look at? Did she know who he was going to become?
Why the hell did his mother get to tell him what to do? She was dead! She was dead she was dead she was dead she was dead she was dead.
He wanted his mommy.
He wanted his mommy and maybe the words slipped out even though his jaw was shut tight because he was scared and he didn’t know whether he was scared of not having a home or scared of her but he was scared and everything ached and he wanted it all to stop.
He kept going off in tangents, kept thinking in a string of what if what if what if what if and all it did was hurt and his head ached, too, but not in the same way his arms burned or the way he was hoping his heart skipped a few beats.
The way he was hoping his heart stopped dead before he had to open his eyes and look at Jet and Poison again ‘cos all they saw was a kid who couldn’t control his anger sobbing in the bathroom for his mommy.
All they saw was some pathetic little kid.
But that’s what he was, wasn’t it?
Footsteps echoed through his ear, but he wasn’t paying attention, not really, trying to reign in everything going on in his head and instead going through it all over again, wondering, what if what if what if before realizing that’s all he was doing, going on a tangent; yet another problem he had, another fuck-up.
“Kobra…” That was Jet again, wasn’t it?
Why was he so close?
Kobra peered out from behind his arms, trying not to flinch back at the way Jet was sitting next to him, cross-legged and with a large, sad smile on his face, one that didn’t reach his eyes and probably never would. No one smiled when Kobra was involved.
“You don’ have to say it,” Kobra sniffled, hating himself for the fact that he was sniffling, for the fact that he was crying in the first place, that he was in a bathtub and there was glass in his fist because he couldn’t control his anger in the same way he couldn’t control his thoughts. “I - I know. I know.”
“Know what?”
Closing his eyes again, Kobra tried to swallow back the next round of tears, only succeeding in choking on his own saliva and being forced out of his ball by coughing, his throat stinging from the effort. “I know what you’re gonna say to me!”
“And what’s that, Kobra Kid?” Jet shouldn’t be so calm! Why would Jet be calm when he was about to tell Kobra this is it, this is strike seventeen. You’re out. He couldn’t be so calm!
“That I’m not worth it!”
He wasn’t. He wasn’t worth all of the pain, even if it was his own, all the selfishness he held in his heart like a burning star. All the anger fueling everything he did, everything he said, till it dripped down from his eyes like gold and melted his fingertips, made him leave his mark everywhere.
Suddenly, but slowly, Jet’s hand was on Kobra’s back, rubbing hesitant, small circles, too afraid to do anything more. “That’s not what I said.”
“You didn’t have to say it!”
Why was Kobra yelling again? Why could he never have a conversation? Why did he always have to make it everyone else’s problem and then blame it all on them when he broke down and try to call out for his dead mother?
Kobra’s yelling was the reason Jet was mad at him in the first place! So, Kobra blurted, over-enunciating every syllable, “I’m sorry.”
Jet was looking at him, Kobra knew it, but he didn’t want to open his eyes just yet, not again; he didn’t want to see that look of calm, didn’t want to look at the mess covering the bathroom counter.
“Can… can you hold out your arms for me? I won’ touch ‘em and you don’t have to open your eyes, Tiger Noodle.”
Kobra didn’t mean to snicker, but really, how had Jet not forgotten that stupid name yet? He wasn’t fourteen anymore, thank you very much. Still, Kobra held his arms out, letting his wrist fall limp, refusing to open his eyes ‘cos Jet said he didn’t have to.
He was tense, waiting for Jet to touch them, to make it sting even worse, but it didn’t, because all Jet did was… was lay his head on Kobra’s shoulder, not saying a word.
Kobra didn’t drop his arms, though, waiting; waiting to see what Jet would do.
Hesitantly, Kobra opened his eyes, if only because he wanted to know what Jet was doing and it was impossible to satiate his own bubbling curiosity and insecurity with his eyes closed and the object of his affliction on his shoulder.
Oh.
Oh, Jet was staring at Kobra’s arms, and Kobra, finally, realized why with a blink.
He hadn’t just broken the skin when he started clawing at his arms. He’d kept clawing and maybe they stung because Kobra wasn’t in the right headspace to register the blood sluggishly flowing from his arms, down his wrists.
But he was when he realized, and that wasn’t good because he could feel and he didn’t want to do that. Not when he’d clawed his arms raw.
Swallowing, Kobra gestured toward the drawer they kept the first aid kit in with his finger, and Jet seemed to get the message, understand the approval Kobra was giving him to come close. Jet had always been the best at understanding the underlying message.
And yet, Jet was hesitant to stand up, rubbing one more circle into Kobra’s back before he did so, stepping out of the tub and turning his back to Kobra, a crunch coming from the broken mirror on the floor, to get the first aid kit. To take care of him.
Maybe he needed to be taken care of, sometimes. Because Kobra clawed his arms open because he was dirty and maybe that was an issue. One would think.
When Jet was done re-organizing it, he turned back to Kobra with a smile once again, more complete, more real even if it was bittersweet, offering his hand out for Kobra to grab.
He then seemed to remember that was not a good idea and sighed. “You wanna get up and sit on the counter, or should I crouch down?”
“Both are covered in shards,” said Kobra, not knowing whether he even wanted to keep his eyes open, to look at all the damage he caused. In one little bathroom, he managed to fuck it all up. In one little household on the end of the street, his mother managed to fuck him up so badly he didn’t even know what to think of her.
Jet shrugged. “It wouldn’t affect the stick up your ass. Counter, yeah?”
With a roll of his eyes, Kobra pushed himself onto his feet, wobbly, watching everything get darker than it already was as a rush of whatever made him nauseous. It made the two steps to the counter, one of the tub, more difficult than they should’ve been, but he tripped his way in and he was able to trip himself out.
It was easier to sit on the shards rather than push them off, not wanting to use his arms now that he recognized how the sting was actually a burning sensation and the burning was slowly turning into something worse if that possible; a combination of the horror and the injury itself and the way he spiralled so much he clawed his own arms open. Who did that? What happened to him?
Why was he so broken?
Nevertheless, trying to tune out the thoughts plaguing his attention, Kobra scooted onto the counter, dryly thanking the fact that he was tall and had long legs. He didn’t want to know if he could support his own weight.
Jet’s touch was gentle on the underside of his wrist, turning Kobra’s left arm from side to side to access the damage. The hmmm sound he made said that Kobra was a dumbass and it was worse than he’d expected, but it’s not like Kobra had had high expectations, even as Jet started slowly cleaning it with hydrogen peroxide.
“You’re lucky we never got rid’a those bandages we used for Ghoul’s ankles.”
It was just conversation to keep him distracted, but it was the closest to a distraction from his thoughts Kobra was going to get. “Weren’t those on his feet? I don’t think we disinfected those…”
“We didn’t. You want my blood-stained ones?”
“Point taken.” So much for small talk. Kobra had never been good at that — it was one of the downsides of living in a place that frowned upon all side conversations not relevant to whatever his mission was at the time. “So… so do you think they’ll scar?”
Jet sighed, heavy with the weight of something, and Kobra didn’t want to think about whatever that could be. “I think there’s no doubt about it. Why… Why’d you do it?”
Oh, he knew the question was going to come up. That didn’t mean he wanted to answer it, though. It was… complicated. Yeah, complicated. “Because I was in the middle of a mental breakdown.”
“Was?”
“Maybe still am. You think I know?”
“I think you’re crying out for something, but I don’t know what it is yet.” Jet was so… so… It was hard to explain. He knew why people did things when they did them and he knew when someone was lying or not, but he seemed genuinely baffled by Kobra.
Then again, Kobra was also genuinely baffled by Kobra. “Maybe you’ll figure it while digging around my insides.”
Jet sighed. “Maybe I will. Maybe you will. But… I… Kobra this is more than just... yelling and fighting. This is self-destruction, case and point.”
Kobra knew that, he knew it, Jet didn’t have to point it out. “I shouldn’t have shattered the mirror. I’m sorry, okay? I’m sorry.”
“You don’ have to keep saying that. I’m not mad. I’m not. I’m scared that you’ll keep hurting yourself, Kobra. I’m scared we’ll lose you to your anger and your breakdowns.”
What a nice way to say he thought Kobra was depressed. How nice of him. “I’m not going to off myself because of a breakdown.”
Even if he wanted to sometimes. Jet began carefully wrapping the bandages around Kobra’s forearm, keeping an eye on the way Kobra winced at certain points. “I’m sure you would also say you wouldn’t scratch at your arms until they bled, but you did. We don’t - I - there’s no good way to say this, but… You’re unstable. And it’s scary.”
“I don’t want to worry you guys.” It felt empty and numb to his own ears - which was surprising considering he’d gone whatever amount of time with bloody arms and hadn’t noticed in the slightest, just that it stung. “I just - I just. It’s a lot.”
“And I’m not going to make you talk about it.” Oh, but Jet was going to make him think about it, albeit in a more linear and organized fashion than crudely crying out for his mother. “But -” And Jet said it as he finished wrapping the bandages - “There needs to be something I or the others - and the others, really - can do to help you. You can’t do this, okay?”
“I can, clearly,” said Kobra dryly, though he couldn’t gesture with his arms, considering they were what was getting bandaged up. Because he clawed them open. Because he spiraled so he permanently scarred himself. What a life he led, huh? “It’s just… Yeah. I’m sorry, I said that, I just - I don’t - I don’t mean to, really, I just - there’s - there’s something that says it’s irrational and there’s something else that overpowers it and says I need to. I needed to stop being dirty, and I couldn’t any other way.”
“What made you think you were ‘dirty’?” Jet wasn’t prying, wasn’t forcing him to answer, but Kobra felt the need to explain as Jet began to clean his other arm.
Maybe he’d been waiting for someone to ask, too. Someone to realize he was spiraling and falling apart. What if he’d really done it all for attention? What if he’d injured himself because he wanted someone to notice? “It’s - I don’t know. My mother. Ex-mother? In the city. I was - I was like the problem child, I guess, but I didn’t want to be, so it was always keep everything clean, always stay dressed, act like the perfect kid even if she couldn’t look at me.”
Jet’s expression could be summed up into that’s a lot to unpack. And they wouldn’t be unpacking it, not that night, not when Kobra needed something else, even if he didn’t know what it was. “That’s - that’s fucked, dude. Of her, not you. Didn’t you get out of the city when you were like… twelve?”
“Fourteen.”
“Close enough. Yeah, that’s fucked.”
Jet worked diligently, though he was trying his best not to look at the wound he was cleaning. Destroya, Kobra felt bad for making him do that, for making Jet take care of him when it was all becauseh e couldn’t keep it together and couldn’t refrain from… Well, anything, apparently.
“D’ya wanna stay with me tonight?”
Kobra blinked at him, though he didn’t know if it was out of shock or not. Was he shocked? Jet was… Well, he didn’t hang out with Jet all too often, if only because Jet wasn’t interested in racing, and Jet had a track record of making sure Ghoul didn’t bomb the place and, alternatively, helping Poison prank Ghoul.
“I mean, you don’t have to, I know you got Poison an’ Runway, but… Offers there, if you want to.”
Kobra didn’t answer.
_
Kobra didn’t answer, no, but an hour later he was holding a teddy bear and a gray blanket tight under his arm, knocking on Jet’s door meekly.
Hearing a vague “come in,” Kobra opened the door, swallowing back his nerves and the pinch of pain he felt in his arm when he twisted the door knob. “I - I know I didn’t say anything back, but…”
“‘Course you can stay with me, kiddo.”
And that was that; Kobra got to be the little spoon, with Jet taking care to place Kobra’s arms in a position they couldn’t get hurt if he shifted a bit, and Kobra pretending it didn’t make him feel like he was real.
Maybe he was still falling apart, maybe he wasn’t over his breakdown, maybe he wanted to know what made him fail so badly as a person he clawed at his own arms in an attempt to make himself clean, maybe he wanted to know why he couldn’t get over that his mother didn’t love him.
But with Jet holding him for the night, maybe it would… Maybe the thoughts would quiet down, if only for a little while. If only for a night.
If only because Jet loved him. Jet wasn’t like his mother at all. Jet was a friend and one willing to cuddle with him after that .