𝑂𝑛𝑒 𝐿𝑎𝑠𝑡 𝑀𝑖𝑠𝑠𝑖𝑜𝑛

𝟷𝟿. 𝙿𝚎𝚊𝚌𝚎

My hair afloat, swimming gently above me. I feel the water in my nose, the bubbles floating around me. The clothes are sticking to my skin.

It feels as though I'm centered in nothingness, the water hitting gently on any exposed skin. With each gulp, I feel restricted. The water seeps through entering my eyes as I open them, my vision blurred.

Finally, I understood the confusion about the color of the water. I could see the button in the pool, the blue of the pain, and the clearness of the water mixing becoming one.

My body follows the direction of the water, the hair on my skin is stuck to perfection. I can feel it.

The peacefulness starts to subside and a choking sensation starts to hit me.

I try to hold it out for some time but it can feel my body resisting, telling me to stop. My mind stops fighting it and my body takes over as I swim to the top and the water splashes around and I let out a gasp.

The feeling of the air hitting my face is refreshing, my eyes adjust to the newfound light. I swim over to the edge and lift myself up to sit.

"How long are you going to keep doing that?" Valentino asks from the living room.

We chose to keep the sliding doors open so we could still talk.

"The feeling is quite incredible you know" I've tried to get him to try it but he just refuses.

He looks at me "How can you stay there that long? It's been like 10 minutes"

"The world record is actually 24 minutes and about 34 seconds" When dad has me going through different non-stop training including breathing underwater, I tend to get attached to certain feelings.

Being in the center of nothing just clears my mind, I'm not thinking about anything. But It's not always been that way, dad forced me to start practicing since I was six.

At some point, it became something I hated with a passion. The flashbacks have stopped but the memory is still there.

Stuck in the pool with my head under the water, I'm screaming for him to let me out. My body almost shoots up. He tells me to stick it out, yelling that I'm being a baby.

I was only seven at the time, I'm sure I passed out since mama woke me up 30 minutes later worried.

They argued about dad's ways of teaching, and like always dad won and mama just apologized to me saying she'll fix everything.

It was just an ongoing cycle of dad pushing me to the edge and mama "trying" to fix it.

After a while I enjoyed staying down there, it was my break from everything. No noise, no thinking, no problems I guess I started finding peace in it.

It was then I started to last longer, I guess it also came in handy when I had to hide in water or when it came to last resort.

"What's your longest time?"

I turn around, getting up from the floor. Grabbing a towel as I walked  into the living room.

"It's 15 minutes with some change" he looks surprised but I just shrug it off, it does seem that great when I put all the work in.

"Seriously I could never" he laughs and I just smile. I grab the towel walking up to my room to change. I clean my glasses, wash my hair, take a shower, and change into some fresh clothes.

All my outfits consisted of leggings and large shirts since I didn't have anything else.

Just as I finish getting dressed I hear a knock on my door. I walk over and open the door to see Ginova.