Pressing into her feet, she hoisted her hips into the air, and here she could feel the immense pressure of the water behind the car, pushing, pushing, pushing against the frame.
She thought her car was safe as long as the SUV below her held.
She stepped a foot out of the window, then fished it over toward the trunk.
Fear clawed at her heart, snagging it with its sharp talon.
Her toes found the frame, then wiggled forward until they were on the box.
Auralia jumped her hand to the trunk lid and curled her fingers tight like she was climbing the rock wall at her gym. She had a vague idea of how to shift her weight over; she also had an image of getting stuck, neither in nor out of the car, neither in nor out of the trunk, and losing the capacity to move either way.
In her mind’s eye, Auralia could see the image of two women underneath her, mouths held like little fish bubbles, craning their necks to suck the last of the oxygen from a pocket of air.
Don’t rush, your falling in means you can’t get them out.
Auralia closed her eyes and took a breath before sliding her foot along the box toward the back of the car, bringing her hips lower in an ice skater squat. Leaning her chest against the vehicle, she lowered her hand to the lip of the trunk, which felt like a better grip.
Ducking low under the trunk lid, she pulled hard and was able to jump her second hand over, edging them one at a time until her weight was entirely on the trunk.
Her right hand caught between the boxes, followed by her left.
Now one foot in the car, ass in the air, hands gripping the boxes at the center of the trunk, her air bag like two puffy black wings at her back, Auralia lowered her right knee to the box, gritted her teeth and made the same guttural rage noise that the power lifters made at the gym as she dragged her left foot toward her chest.
There in a bear crawl, Auralia paused to make sure that her jostling around hadn’t shifted the car, and she wasn’t about to slide into the current.
The slow part of the show was over.
Auralia wanted her feet on the shore.
Sitting on the back of the trunk, she opened the box containing her hiking supplies and put her clothes bag in before sealing it against the water. Then, she lifted it to the back lip of the trunk, spreading her thighs wide to balance it there.
She turned and failed at lifting the second box with a twisted spine.
Auralia wrapped her left hand around the handle of the hiking box. If she fell in, at least she had this. Facing away from the bridge, clenching her abs, Auralia jerked the second box to get the bottom onto the edge, and that was going to be about it.
She was stuck.
The little bird on her right shoulder said the hiking box was enough.
The little bird on her left said that the camping box could save lives, and she knew there was probably a rope inside. Auralia would listen to the bird on her left.
But she was out of ideas, and frankly, almost out of steam.
Adrenaline, she’d learned in her life as a reporter, ebbed and flowed. When it was on like a spigot, it often turned off without so much as a trickle.
Even a trickle would be helpful right about then.
She decided to pull a Morrison.
Releasing both boxes and being careful not to prick her airbag, Auralia twisted and squirmed, grabbing here then grabbing there, until her feet were on the bumper and she was facing downriver.
She wrapped a hand tightly around a tote handle on either side of her. Then, pretending she was back at the gym, shepressed into her heels like the squat machine and arched her head backward.
What happened next was total body chaos.
Water rushed into her nostrils.
Her wrists were wrenched this way and that until the totes figured out how to align with the current. Her airbag was airbagging to its best ability, though it had squirmed out from under her pits and was now a belt under her stomach.
