I never have any control.
Another step. Waist under now, the fabric ballooning. My lungs won’t work right; every breath I take doesn’t feel like enough. It doesn’t feel like air at all.
I can’t breathe.
Do I even want to?
Why is everything so hard?
Why is just existing so hard?
You make everything harder than it needs to be, Gabe.
I claw at my chest like I can dig him out. All it does is feel the drum of my own heartbeat, frantic and weak at the same time.
The water presses tighter. The pull is constant, like it always knew I’d end up here.
My teeth chatter even though the sun is warm. My legs keep moving. I try to make them stop, but they won’t.
I think I’m trying.
The lake takes my ribs. My arms float, skin prickling with pins and needles, and I know what comes next, but I can’t stop it.
I can’t stop anything.
I never could.
The water hits my chest, and I gasp. The sound echoes in my ears, swallowed immediately. My shoulders lock. My body is screaming to turn back. The lake swallows my collarbone, cold hitting under my chin.
Then I’m under.
My feet lift from the bottom of the lake.
I’m weightless, but I’ve never felt so heavy.
My mouth opens and closes on instinct, but there’s nothing but frigid water. It slices down my throat, into my nose, fills my ears until the world is muffled to a single low roar.
Pathetic, Gabe.
His voice slams into me, clear even here.
Look at you. Can’t even keep yourself together.
I thrash, my arms flinging out. They meet nothing. The water gives and gives, but there’s no hold, no anchor for me to grab on to.
Just weight.
A pull.
Pulling me down.
Down.
Down.
Down.
All I feel is Kyle’s mouth against my ear, voice aggressive.Stop making this difficult. If you loved me, you’d let me.My own body frozen under him, shame and fear twisting in my gut, the ceiling above blurring through my tears.
