Chapter 1: "Venom"

The clinic smelled like disinfectant, reheated coffee, and wet dog fur. Margot had been working for over ten hours and was still sitting at the desk with a book open in her hands, waiting for a treatment room to be cleaned. She always did that when she had a few free minutes — read even a single page, even if she was tired, even if exhaustion weighed on her shoulders.

"Reading historical romance again?" Diego asked from the front desk while dropping some folders on the counter.

Margot didn't even look up.

"You make fun of me, but when I hear you talk to your ex, you sound like the lead in a tragedy."

"My ex left me because I work too much."

"Exactly. Tragedy."

Diego let out a tired laugh and shook his head.

"One day I'm going to burn those books."

"And I'm going to charge you for every page."

The quiet didn't last. The clinic's automatic door flew open and a man rushed in clutching a plastic box against his chest. He was sweating, breathing hard, looking everywhere as if something were about to jump him.

Margot looked up the moment she saw him.

And set the book down on the table.

She'd learned to recognize real fear in people. That man was on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

"I need help," he said. "My snake's acting strange — she stopped moving a while ago and I don't think she's breathing right."

Diego took an automatic step back.

"They don't pay me enough for reptiles."

Margot stood up.

"Calm down. Set her here."

The man placed the box on the metal table and Margot had barely seen the dark scale pattern when a bad feeling crawled up through her body.

Her expression changed immediately.

"Where did you get this snake?"

"Someone gave her to me a few days ago."

"What species did they tell you she was?"

"A boa... I think."

Margot opened the box carefully, and the moment she saw the triangular head, the jaw shape, and the dull scales, she knew it wasn't a boa.

She felt irritation immediately.

"This is a venomous viper."

The man went pale.

"What?"

"Don't touch it."

The snake raised its head slightly — slow but alert. Margot took a slow breath while reaching for the metal reptile hook.

"Listen to me carefully. Keep your distance and don't make any sudden moves."

"V-venomous?"

"Yes. Very."

Diego was already far from the counter.

"Margot, please tell me you know what you're doing."

"I've got a pretty solid idea of what not to do, and that already helps."

The owner's breathing was getting faster.

"They told me she was domesticated."

"People also say cutting your own bangs is a good idea, and look how that turns out."

"Is she going to bite me?"

"If you panic, probably."

And that's exactly what happened.

The snake lunged inside the box and the man let out a strangled cry, stumbled backward, and hit the metal edge. The box fell to the floor.

"Don't drop her!" Margot shouted.

But it was too late.

The viper slid fast across the clinic's white floor. Diego swore from across the room and climbed onto a chair.

"I am not dying here!"

"Close the door," Margot ordered without taking her eyes off the animal.

The man was shaking.

"Oh God, oh God..."

"I need you to stop moving."

"It's coming toward me!"

"Because you look like a nervous prey animal."

Margot grabbed the hook and moved forward slowly. Her heart was pounding, though her face stayed serious. She'd worked with difficult animals before — aggressive dogs, wild birds, even a monkey that ripped out a chunk of her hair once — but venomous snakes were something else. One small mistake was enough.

The viper hissed as it raised its head.

"Good girl... easy..."

Diego stared at her in horror.

"You're talking to it?"

"Animals enjoy conversation more than people do."

"That animal wants to murder you."

"And you wanted to study veterinary medicine."

"I lasted one semester."

Margot almost caught it. Almost.

The owner stepped back and tripped over an auxiliary table. The metallic crash made the snake react.

Everything happened fast.

Too fast.

The viper struck forward and Margot barely managed to turn her arm.

Pain ripped through her skin immediately.

A deep puncture.

She dropped the hook and pulled back instinctively as the snake slid across the floor again.

Diego jumped off the chair when he saw her.

"Margot!"

She looked at her arm. Two marks. Blood.

And around the wound, the skin was starting to change color.

"Shit..." she muttered.

The man started hyperventilating.

"I didn't know! I swear I didn't know!"

Margot raised her eyes slowly to him, furious even through the pain.

"I told you not to panic."

Diego grabbed a blanket and managed to cover the snake with another employee who'd just come from the back of the clinic. Everything turned to noise around Margot — hurried footsteps, tense voices, someone calling an ambulance.

But she could barely hear any of it.

Her arm started burning all the way up to her shoulder.

Then came the dizziness.

She leaned against the table, trying to keep her breathing steady.

"Sit down, sit down now," Diego said, holding her up.

"I don't like it when you talk like a divorced mom."

"Margot, stop joking."

She tried to say something else, but the words felt heavy inside her mouth.

The owner was still talking too fast.

"I didn't mean to hurt you — I thought she was harmless, they told me—"

"Shut up for a second," she said, her voice weak.

The man froze.

Margot closed her eyes for a few seconds, then opened them slowly. Everything around her was starting to look strange, as if the lights were too bright.

Diego held her face.

"Look at me — hey, look at me."

"You look ugly from this angle."

"You're going to get through this."

She wanted to believe it.

She really did.

But she knew the venom. She knew the reaction time. She knew the odds.

And that was the worst part.

Veterinarians understood too well when a situation was serious.

The pain was already spreading through her chest.

Breathing was getting harder.

She felt rage.

An absurd rage.

She didn't want to die.

She didn't even have a spectacular life. She paid rent late some months, bought too many books, and had spent three years saying she was going to organize her apartment. But it was her life.

And now it was ending because of an irresponsible idiot and a misidentified snake.

"The ambulance is on its way," someone said.

Margot let out a small, dry laugh.

"Sure... now they're quick."

Diego's eyes were wet.

"Don't talk like that."

She looked at him for a few seconds. He'd always seemed relaxed, funny, kind of useless with paperwork. Seeing him scared stirred something in her chest.

"Don't cry early — you're making me feel important."

"Shut up."

The venom kept advancing.

Her fingers started going numb.

The clinic blurred.

She heard distant voices.

Footsteps.

The sound of something falling.

And in the middle of it all, she thought about how ridiculous the situation was.

She'd imagined many ways of dying. Car accidents, some illness, even growing old surrounded by cats because she was clearly headed that way.

But this...

An exotic snake on an exhausting Tuesday.

What a miserable ending.

She opened her eyes just barely when Diego squeezed her hand.

"Hey, stay awake."

Margot breathed with difficulty.

"I'm going to sue this clinic from the afterlife."

"Margot."

"And you're going to lose because you're terrible at lying in court."

Diego let out a broken laugh.

She tried to smile too, though it cost her.

The ceiling started looking far away.

The noise was fading little by little.

And then the real fear arrived.

The fear of disappearing.

Of suddenly ceasing to exist.

Her eyes barely glistened.

"I don't want to die," she whispered.

Diego squeezed her hand harder.

"You're not going to."

But they both knew it sounded hollow.

Margot swallowed with difficulty. Her body felt heavy, cold, useless.

She thought about the books she'd left unfinished.

About the coffee she'd forgotten to finish that morning.

About the simple life she kept hoping to have someday when things got better.

All so normal.

So small.

And still, she wanted to stay.

The ambulance finally arrived. She heard the doors open, hurried voices, people moving her carefully.

The ceiling changed.

White lights above her.

The sound of a monitor.

Someone saying blood pressure.

Someone asking how long it had been since the bite.

Margot could barely keep her eyes open.

And the last thing she felt before the darkness swallowed her completely was frustration.

Because after everything she'd endured in life...

Dying like this was simply absurd.

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