Dead. Bloated. Trapped

Leilani

Five.

Four.

Three.

Two.

One.

My eyes flew open against the water again, and I could no longer see Tina’s head poking at the edge of the pool. She fell for it. With renewed energy from the oxygen I had conserved inside my chest, I began to hurriedly uncurl the thick ropes around my hands. It was difficult, because I could not see clearly, I was living on borrowed time and limited oxygen and the water pressure pushing me down and smoldering the life out of me was insane.

The main knot of the rope had come undone while Tina had been pushing me around, and that was when I knew the universe had given me a chance of escape. Now, I could easily unravel the rest of the knots and free my hands. As quickly as possible, I freed my hands from the rope and it floated away.

But my chest was tightening from holding my breath for too long, and I still needed to unstrap the bag from around me so I could swim up out of the pool. The thought of