Chapter 23 #4
“Do you think we could squeeze through that if one of us lifted the other up?” Cassidy asked.
“It would be a tight fit.” Edie thought she could fit most of her slender body into the hole but wasn’t sure her arms and head could get through together.
“And how would the second person get through?”
“Right.”
Enough light cast from the hole into the tunnel that Edie could see Cassidy staring up at it, fixated just as she was. It was almost a way out.
Something hard hit the floor and skittered across the dirt. Edie looked around but the light from the hole left an afterimage in her vision and she couldn’t see in the pure darkness. She looked back up at the hole, mesmerized.
Then the sound came again, and this time Edie saw a rock break away from the edge of the hole.
“It’s getting bigger,” she breathed.
Maybe it’s more of the magic happening here.
“Say we’ll get out,” Edie said, turning to Cassidy full of excitement that lifted her to her toes. “Like James. Say what you want.”
Cassidy looked at her, confused, so Edie turned her attention back to the hole—was it bigger again?—to show Cassidy what she meant.
“This is an exit, and we’re going to—”
Before she could finish her wish, the hole cracked wide, sending smaller rocks flying into the tunnel and spewing water through the new seams in the wall.
The pressure of the water behind the wall opened the hole up like a diagonal slash, tearing the tunnel open and filling it with cool water from floor to ceiling in a matter of seconds.
The sudden light blinded Edie until the water slammed into her and forced her eyes closed.
She fought the current, but it tossed her like a rock on the surf.
Her shoulder hit something hard that the water dragged her body against. It stuck out from whatever surface it was on, and Edie used it to anchor herself against the rushing water.
She hadn’t had time to take a breath before the surge and already felt her oxygen running low.
As she had done in the empty tunnel, she waved her hand around, searching for a pocket of air or another handhold.
Her fingers emerged above her into air. She tried to reposition herself to hook her foot on the handhold and stay in place, but the water was too strong.
Instead, she kicked herself upwards. The water carried her backward, but she found the ceiling of the tunnel, hitting her head hard on it before she was able to crane her neck up and take in a breath.
It wasn’t enough before the water got into her mouth and closed the pocket.
She kept her hands on the ceiling and lifted herself to them as she was dragged, running over rocks and dirt, and catching on something else that felt like a thick root.
She pulled herself up with the hold and pressed her lips almost to the surface, inhaling dirt, and the taste of decay, but also sweet air that filled her lungs.
Edie had no time for thoughts. Something inside of her solely focused on survival made all her decisions, unconsciously and without method.
Her hands felt out along the ceiling for another root as the current tried to pull her backward.
Anything she got her hands on, she used, pulling herself against the current.
Her nails caught on rocks and dirt and her nailbeds filled with mud, but she didn’t feel it.
She felt one handhold after another, many of them bending under the pressure of her weight even in the water and some of them breaking, but her wild mind found another and another.
Something brushed against her legs and got trapped there. It was solid and soft, like a body.
Edie stopped in her place along the ceiling. Cassidy was under the water. She could feel that she wasn’t putting up any resistance.
“Cassidy!” Edie called. She tried to move her legs to bring the body to the surface, but in doing so the water rushed Cassidy away.
This time, her eagerness to act had nothing to do with survival.
They’d both come too far for Cassidy to die this way and leave Edie alone.
Edie let go of the holds and chased after Cassidy.
It was easier to control herself going with the flow of the water, but she couldn’t see where she was going or where Cassidy was.
She extended her arms in front of her in a stroke, and found Cassidy’s soft form.
Edie wrapped her arms around her and easily lifted the woman to the narrow pocket of water at the ceiling, now slightly larger as the urgency of the water to fill the space slowed.
With her right hand hooked to the ceiling and Cassidy draped over her left, all Edie could do was squeeze the body with all her might. But Cassidy remained limp.
“Cassidy!” Edie shouted. She wrapped her arm around Cassidy’s ribs and pumped again and again. “Wake the fuck up you bloody bludger! Don’t you croak on me!”
Edie’s muscles ached from keeping herself upright and squeezing Cassidy’s body. She didn’t want to leave her, but she was going to need to let go if she wanted to get out, and Cassidy’s head still rolled loosely on her shoulders.
“Cassidy!” She put the last of the energy she could spare into one more squeeze, fist right in the center of the woman’s chest. Cassidy’s body spasmed, her arms flailed, and her head flew forward, hitting the ceiling as water poured from her mouth.
Edie let out a sound somewhere between a laugh and a sob. “There you are!”
Cassidy struggled in the dark and mumbled something Edie couldn’t make out.
“Put your hands up and grab onto something!”
She waited for Cassidy to pull her body away and stay in place in the water before letting go. “Head toward the light!” she said and could only hope that Cassidy came with her.
This time, Edie made more meticulous placements, but she felt the strain in her muscles.
In a couple places, she couldn’t find hand holds and let go to try swimming, but her body was so exhausted she wasn’t sure if she made any forward progress that way.
The light once again got brighter and brighter, and finally the hole was in front of them.
Edie thought the wall completely broke away in the collapse, but the light still only poured in from the top half of the tunnel.
“Can you swim?” she shouted to Cassidy.
“What choice do I have?” came the weak reply.
Edie took a deep breath, let go of the ceiling, and immediately the force of the water dragged her back.
She gritted her teeth and kicked her arms and legs with as much power as she could muster.
Her hands found the half wall with water rushing over it, and she contorted herself to get her foot on the wall and throw her body against the rushing water.
The suction of the water flowing into the tunnel was stronger than the current anywhere else, but Edie didn’t need to swim.
Once she got her feet on the wall, her head just barely stayed above the surface of the creek.
She took a deep breath of fresh, humid air, full of the scents of wet soil but also living plants and sea breeze.
Cassidy appeared next to her, gasping for breath with dark hair plastered to her face.
“Make for the bank!” Edie shouted.
It was easier said than done with the water threatening to pull them back down into the tunnel that appeared in the middle of the creek.
Edie’s knees kept buckling with every step, but she held herself against the top of the tunnel opening and slowly made her way to the grass covered bank of the river.
With both hands, she clawed at the ground, desperate to pull herself up.
Her muscles couldn’t be relied on anymore, so she dug her elbows into the dirt and forced her body over her wrists until she could move her elbows again, army crawling her way into the trees until the river finally let go of her.
She collapsed in a wet heap on a mossy patch and turned onto her back. The light blue of the sky barely broke through the tops of the trees. Edie closed her eyes and let the tears of relief come. Cassidy eventually threw herself down beside Edie, panting with her cheek pressed to the ground.
Edie reached for her hand and laced their fingers together. “We are going to get off this fucking island.”