“Sleep well?”
I hadn’t slept at all. My face was cold and dry in that way it was when I’d been anxious for a long time, the blood drawn from the surface to protect my core, skin left to its own devices to flake and break out as a result.
I winced. My eyes were dry too. I could feel puffiness beneath them.
I sat up and couldn’t see anyone in the room with me.
“Look down.”
I scurried over to the voice’s source. Through the window I saw Summer, in front of all the Glowfolk, looking up at me.
I climbed into the hammock to dress myself, so they couldn’t see, pulling clothing out my suitcase from the floor.
When I went down the bottle ladder, Joanna was among the waiting crowd. Good. Maybe she didn’t want me here—and I sure didn’t want to be here any longer—but she wouldn’t let anything terrible befall me in the meantime. Surely.
“Good morning, Summer,” I said. “I hope I didn’t delay today’s proceedings.”
“Oh there’s no hurry for what comes next,” she said.
The group rushed me and carted me up by my arms and legs.
“No!” I thrashed around, but couldn’t see anything but a blinding blanket of white clouds. The sides of an alley came into view as they continued to carry me. And then I smelled the fishery.
A hatch creaked open. They whipped me in by my legs. I caught a glimpse of some splashing roaches just before I broke the surface of their pool.
I went into lizard brain-mode, thrashing around, trying to stay afloat and find something to hold onto, maybe to scrabble back up. The sides of the pool, I discovered, were smooth plastic, without a single imperfection I could grip onto. Even as I scratched at it, my fingers slid back off. I tried to reach out and prop myself up by holding onto opposite sides of the pool, but it was too wide.
“We’re very clear on our rules, Lily,” Summer said.
I kept myself afloat, trying to swim in the center, though I didn’t know how. I dipped beneath the surface, my feet reaching down to find the pool’s bottom, but it was too deep for me to stand on and keep my head above water. I held my breath, dropped to the bottom and kicked off the base to resurface and breathe again.
“You entered a restricted area last night.”
“I can’t swim!” I shouted.
“Y-You hear that?” It was Gabriel. “She’s scaring my fish.”
As he said that I felt them thrashing around me, heads bumping into my torso, tails and fins flapping against my hands.
“Come on.” That was Ella. “She’s not doing so badly. How do you expect her to learn otherwise?”
Other Glowfolk chimed in. “Why is she freaking out? It’s just water. If she’s serious about being here, it has to stop bothering her this much.”
“Mhm I agree.”
“It’s hardly torture.”
When I looked up and cleared the hair from my face, I tried to see who was up there, staring down at me.
Summer had gone. Gabriel looked at me with pity, Ella with detached curiosity, and Joanna with pure disdain.
And then they all left.
Cold. It was so cold. Maybe I could stay warm by moving in circles, keep burning energy. But the pool wasn’t big enough for that. All of this had to be by design.
So I would drown here, among the roaches.
Someone tugged on my jacket, held me above water. “Shh shh shhh. You’re doing great, Lily.” That sounded like Melodie. But she held me from behind, so I couldn’t be sure. “I know it doesn’t seem like it right now, but this is good for you. I can’t let them see me helping you. But use this as a chance to calm down.”
I tried to lengthen and deepen my breaths. It took a while, but she held me there as I did.
“That’s good. You’re okay. You’re going to be okay. You’re going to come out of this stronger.”
I couldn’t speak, but I reached up and held her arm to show my appreciation.
“I have to go now. But you can do this.”
In response, I wailed. Tears formed and washed away in the pool.
“Oh hey,” I heard Melodie say to someone as she left. “Gabriel had me worried about the fish. Just wanted to check that they were okay.”
“I’ll remember that,” said the man who’d discovered her there.
So I would stay here and suffer a while and get back out to find—what?
I slowed my strokes, my arms and legs coming to a stop. The weight of my wet clothes dragged me down.
I closed my eyes, breathed out, and dropped to the bottom.
Something constricted around my waist, around my arms. Seaweed, plastic garbage? I struggled against it, screaming out a last bubble.
I struggled, but whatever it was tightened further, pinning my arms in a cross over my chest.
Something pulled me up. I emerged from the water, hoisted up and out the hatch, back onto the plastic floor.
“Hooray!”
The Glowfolk had returned. I turned and fell on my chest, panting, to see five or six of them holding fishing rods, the wires wrapped around me.
A second wave of them lifted me to my knees and covered me with towels that they pressed on me.
“You did it.”
“We’re so proud of you.”
“I knew you were made for this as soon as you arrived.”
“You’re definitely one of us now.”
“Thank you for proving yourself to us. We won’t forget, Lily.”
The cheer in their voice gave no indication that they’d left me here to die.
I slumped back down on my side, shivering, jaw chattering.
“Well done, Lily,” Summer said.
I held out my arms and the Glowfolk lifted me up, still holding the towels onto me, rubbing my hair with them.
“Bring her out for the surprise!”
Gabriel rushed over to me. “It’s a good one this time,” he said.
I couldn’t even look at him.