“NO!”
I lurch forward and reach for Kira’s legs as she drops through the air. I manage to grab hold of her calves and try desperately to hoist her upwards but she’s too heavy and she oscillates wildly above me, tipping from left to right as one outstretched hand smacks against the banister, the wall, the banister. Her fingernails scratch at wood and then paint as she tries and fails to grab hold of either. Her other hand is up by her neck, tugging at the dressing-gown cord that bites into her skin. A terrible gasping, choking sound fills the air as she fights to breathe.
“Help!” I scream. “Help! Somebody help me!”
I try to change position, to move the heel of my hand from under the sole of Kira’s foot so I can get a better grip but as I do she kicks out, thumping me in the side of the head. I fight to keep my balance, to keep her leg up in the air, but my ankle twists beneath me and I fall.
“What the fuck?”
Caleb thunders up the stairs and suddenly Liz is beside me. She grabs Kira’s foot as it slips from my fingers and hoists it into the air. She reaches up for the other foot and, as she grabs it, Kira’s head smacks against the corner of the banister. Her hand falls from her throat and she closes her eyes. She is deathly pale.
“Claire!” Liz shouts as Kira’s legs go limp in her arms but I’m already beside her. I reach up and grab hold of Kira’s hips and heave them up in the air. My arms shake. She’s too heavy. I’m going to drop her.
“I’ve nearly done it,” Caleb shouts from above us as his clumsy fingers pick at the white cord wrapped around the banister. “Have you got her? As soon as this is undone she’s going to fall.”
Liz and I adjust our positions so that, between us, we are holding Kira’s near-horizontal body above our heads. Her head lolls on her neck, eyes closed, and her arms dangle at her sides.
Please let her be okay, I repeat over and over in my head. Please, please God, let her be okay.
“There!” Caleb shouts and the dressing-gown cord drifts down from the banister and lands on Kira’s chest.
“Ring nine-nine-nine!” Liz screams as we lower Kira’s limp body to the carpet, but Caleb already has the phone pressed against his cheek.
“Ambulance,” he barks. “Number eleven Whitehart Road. Kira Simmons, nineteen. She’s just tried to hang herself. I don’t think she’s breathing.”