Just 12 Years Of Life

Drowning

See, while I may have had an interesting life by far, my parents have told me some stories from when I couldn't remember anything. So let's start on the first story; When my dad dropped me in the pool to pull up his pants. Yes. To pull up his pants. I was one years old and we were swimming. Well, I was screaming at the water. My dad was carrying me in the pool and he was walking with my feet just touching the water. I love the water, well, never doing laps though. And then, big show time, Dad felt his trunks slipping down and so he just - plop! - dropped his infant daughter into a meter deep pool.

And then, according to my mother, when she looked up, her child, who was supposed to be with her husband, was doing the dead man's float and drifting away while her father was more concerned for his pants. Then she screamed, "Oi! Your daughter!" And my Dad quickly looked up and left and right like he forgot he just dropped me into a pool. Then he saw me drifting away and panicked. He got me, and I coughed a little. Then, guess what he did, he laughed. Yes, he laughed. He didn't apologize to me or my mother for nearly drowning me, he laughed.

Twisted humor? Yes, got it from Dad. But that's not the only time I drowned. There was another time in Hongkong. My apartment had one of those pools that got deeper the farther you go. So my friend and I, let's call her Suzzie, swam all the way to the end where there's a shallow part meant for sitting so we sat there to catch our breaths. Hey, we were like, 6. Then here's where the trouble starts. She dared me to see how far down we could go. She bet she could go all the way down to the 5 meter mark. "Bet" I said. And so we descended. I left my goggles on the other end or the pool and I didn't feel like walking or swimming all the way there so I went down without them.

I squeezed my eyes shut, and pushed myself down not releasing air at all. I got to the bottom, and the pressure was amazing. I thought my head would shrink. But I sat at the bottom for a second anyways, just to prove the point that I could go all the way down. Then I needed to breathe. So I pushed up with all the power I had. Then I felt something on my shoulders. They felt like feet. I continued to push up but this person was trying to go down. I opened my eyes to see who it was and, surprise surprise, it was Suzzie.

She was smiling at me sadistically. And she had goggles, so not seeing me was not an excuse. And yes, she was pushing us down. So I tapped her leg and pointed up. She shook her head but went up anyways. I thought she was going to let us up to get air. I was half right. She let herself get air. She was laughing. I was hitting her legs and my lungs were screaming. I wanted to cry. I might have been I wouldn't know because I was still underwater. I could hear her laughing so much above water. Then she got a good breath and joined me underwater.

At this point, I was feeling dizzy and the pressure was not helping either. Everything hurt in those moments. But most of all, I was angry. Angry at her trying to drown me while laughing. Angry at myself for trusting her in the first place. Angry that I let her know me so well that I got caught up in everything. I considered biting her ankle until it bleeds. Until I could taste her blood in my mouth. Until our corner of the pool turned blood red. I wanted to do it. And I was so close to doing it.

I opened my mouth to bite, but she kicked my head and I lost some air. I looked up at her and she was laughing. Bubbles were erupting out of her mouth like a volcano. I wanted to bite her so bad. Now that I think of it, I wished raw human flesh wasn't covered by a huge organ called skin. Then the meat would have probably been soft under all that protection. Basically, I felt like a cannibal. But the need for air was too much at this point so I scratched her. I remeber it left white streaks in her ankle but no blood. She kicked me again. If I could go back in time, I would have teleported right behind her to suck her blood like a flipping vampire. But I can't so it is left as it is. Or I would have pushed me from under her. I wasn't locked by her feet or anything, she just stood on my shoulders.