Page 85 of Forever is the Sweetest Con
I may have lost my will to live, but my lungs haven’t lost their will to breathe, and I use all the power in my legs to kick myself up toward the surface. The pressure in my chest tightens like a vise as I rise up, my arms and legs flailing. Underwater stars twinkle in front of my eyes, momentarily distracting me with their beauty, until I realize it means I’m about to pass out, so I kick as hard as I can. I break through, gasping in sweet lungfuls of oxygen.
Sue-Ellen appears at my side, panicked. She grabs me from behind, looping her arm under mine to hold me across the chest. Even though I’m basically drowning, I’m still mad that Sue-Ellen is seeing me like this, so I keep kicking my legs, like I don’t need her help.
“For Pete’s sake, Cleo, relax. I’ve got you.”
Fine. I let myself sink into her. Kei is trailing behind us. We make slow but steady progress, her towing me, me a dead weight. After some time, I’m breathing normally again, and my cramp has subsided, so I break free of Sue-Ellen’s grasp.
Relief flows through me like a drug when I realize that the trees on the other side are much closer than the last time I looked. We’re getting there. But then I noticed that the gap between us and Kei has widened considerably. I squint at him. I can see he is still swimming, but it’s likehe’s doing a charade of “swimming.” His arms lift up and crash down ineffectually, and he barely moves forward. He’s in trouble.
“Kei!” I cry, alerting Sue-Ellen. We both sprint back to him. It’s noticeably easier going with the current than going against it.
He smiles as he sees us coming. As I get closer, I notice his eyes have a faraway, unfocused quality. “Hi,” he says, like he’s surprised to see me. Sue-Ellen shoots me a look.
“Fancy meeting you here,” I say, looping my arms under his, while Sue-Ellen does the same on the other side. “We just need to swim a little further, okay?”
Towing Kei, even with two of us, is slow and hard, but knowing he needs me to get him there safely has given me a renewed sense of purpose. I know my body won’t give up as long as my mind doesn’t, so I don’t let my thoughts devolve again.
I watch the clouds as we make our slow progress. The sky is still a threatening shade of slate, but the rain has stopped and the wind has died down. The swim seems so much more manageable in these conditions.
At some point, I notice that Sue-Ellen is lagging. Her breath is shallow and laboured. I arch my back, trying to see her.
“Are you okay?”
“Fine,” she gasps.
“I can manage on my own again,” Kei says, pulling his arms off our shoulders.
I get a better view of Sue-Ellen. Her face is somehow both flushed and pale at the same time. Behind her, the clear details of the shore come into focus. There is a small stretch of pebbly beach, closed in on either side by rocky outcrops that extend into the water. We’re close enough to see the individual branches of the trees.
Kei starts to flail again, so I grab him underneath both arms, propping his body against mine.
“Sue-Ellen, stop, just take a break for a moment.” She hesitates, but then she stops, mid-stroke, and comes to a slow tread. “We’re so close,” I tell her. “We can do this.”
“We can do this,” Kei echoes.
She nods.
“Just think of how good it’s going to feel to see Tyler in a prison jumpsuit.” She nods again, more enthusiastically this time. “We can’t let them get away with this. Come on, let’s get to shore.”
We lock eyes. All the animosity and mistrust that had been brewing between us suddenly dissipates.
With renewed energy, we make the final push, me towing Kei, Sue-Ellen swimming ahead. My muscles are leaden, and my lungs are protesting, but my head is clear. There is no other way but forward.
Sue-Ellen cries out. Her torso emerges from the water. She topples forward, but then she’s upright again. She has hit land.
I let my legs drift down. I hold my breath, preparing to sink under, but my foot makes contact with the squishy floor of the lake, solid land rising up to support my weight.
We did it.
I pull Kei onto the rocky shore, and then I stumble, gasping and crying onto the beach. I lie beside him at the edge of the water, feeling the lake’s now gentle waves lapping at my calves and ankles. I don’t know how long I stay like that—a long time. When I push myself up, I see Sue-Ellen lying face down, her back rising and falling in a slow rhythm. I claw at the plastic bag around my ankle. I manage to extract the water bottle, and I take a long drink. I only allow myself a nibble of my granola bar, even though my stomach is roaring with hunger. The water and the sugar give me a little hit of energy. I push myself up to sit, stretching my legs out gingerly in front of me.
Sue-Ellen moans as she rolls onto her back. “Are we dead?”
“Believe it or not, we’re alive.”
“I think I might prefer death at this point.” She rolls onto her side, groaning from the effort. “How’s he?” She nods at Kei. His chest is rising and falling in a slow rhythm.
“Sleeping, I think.” Not passed out in insulin shock, I hope. “How long did that take us?”
