Ride or Die {Book 1} ✔️

Chapter 33: Dropped With A Pop

"Evan!" I screamed just as the water came up to my knees and my feet was moving on their own, dancing with panic as I tried to find somewhere to place them and hoist myself out of the water. However the step below the rusted one was too far away and the one above it was too high up for my legs to clap onto. Holy shit, the water smacked against me, trying to tug me down as it rushed upwards and before long it was on my waist. It soaked through the sweatpants, causing them to drop with heavy weight and my hands were beginning to slip.

"Kylie!" I looked up; Evan was still on the last few steps, looking down at me with clear panic that was probably replaying on my face. He began to retrace his steps, coming down quickly and I dared to reach one of my free hands out. His grasped mine tightly and by then the water was up to my mid-section. Come on, come on, come on!

I hoisted myself up with a hard breath that left me gasping for more oxygen. My left leg found a step and I pulled myself up another and then another, and then my right leg gave out again and it dangled in the water. Evan had climbed out and was at the surface, leaning over and reaching out for me to take his hand. But I had to climb up three more steps before I could get a grasp on it, the benefits of being short.

"I can't move my leg!" I screamed, my knuckles turned white as I strained to get my dead weight of a leg to move, even the slightest. But it wouldn't or couldn't and I could feel a ton of blood gushing down my leg and I winced with pain. My head was pounding and my pulse was jumping in my stomach. My hands were beginning to ach terribly and a burning sensation came over me and I felt like letting go, dropping away and having all the pain go away. The idea was so tempting and my grip was loosening on its own.

"Kylie, dammit, move your ass!" Evan yelled, breaking through my thoughts completely and sending a jolt of shivers down my back, or maybe that was from the freezing cold of the water. It had reached me again, coming up to my stomach.

I shook my head, tears' blurring my vision as my chest burst was panic, fear, and desperation all in one package and it felt like I was having a heart attack. "I can't! I fucking can't, Evan!" The words came out as sobs instead of the anger yell I wanted them too. But the frustration inside of me ripped my other emotions to shreds and dumped them out of existence. What the hell was I doing, thinking, wanting to do? Who the hell did I think I was?

A voice inside of me responded for me, that wise voice from before, that voice that reminded me so much of the real me. You're being a damn girl. Get your ass up that ladder! You think this is hard? You haven't even seen hard yet! Stop being such a selfish bitch and get your ass into gear!

Whoever I was, that was inside of me, was completely right and done to the tea. This isn't me, I wasn't going to be like this, no ever. Why was I slipping and losing it like this? But something still dragged me down, everything that's happened; it feels like I've been strapped of something that was rightfully mines.

And it was time to steal it back.

.

She wasn't looking at him anymore and that made him worry. Panic was building up inside of him, making him want to scream and jump away, to get away. But he forced himself to stay put and look down into the sewer, at the rising of the water, and his fear made the distance seem longer than it actually was. "Kylie!" He called one more time.

This time, when she looked up, she took his breath away. Her eyes were narrowed and they shined like the color of her sweatpants, a dark blue that swirled with something that reminded him of the bold, confident, and not taking any bull crap from anyone type of girl she really was. Her jaw was set with determination and her lips were drawn in a tight straight line.

Her hand reached up, grabbed another bar of the ladder and she grimaced as she pulled herself out of some of the water with heavy difficulty. Evan knew why it was like that for her, because she had gotten shot in her leg, not the way she thought she did. Jordan hadn't shot her; they had both shot at the same time. Carl got her in the leg and Jordan got him in his mid-section, he saw him do it right before he fell down to the ground and loss consciousness. That's what really happened and it made him hurt for her, beyond the pain of his own injuries, beyond the pain of anything he'll ever experience.

He knew if he had gotten close to her that this was going to happen, that death would follow their paths and catch them at one point. But the attraction to her, the immense pull of his heart, it was too overwhelming and to see her being hurt in any type of way broke through his defenses and caused him to feel the hurt she felt. And at that point Evan would do anything in his power to make sure she never felt that way again, but back then he distanced himself and didn't want it to happened, feared it from happening.

However, seeing her personality, seeing her determination, seeing her for her it made him want to think of this time, it'll be different, it'll work out, and they'll be able to be happy. Now look where that type of thinking had gotten them, look what happened to them now. Evan wanted everything to work out, to have everything to be normal and happy for the both of them.

He watched her take another step and his brain went heavy with one thought. Come on, Kylie. Come on!

She grabbed the last step, the one where she'll be able to reach his extended hand. A bubble of relief started to make its way up into his throat before it was shot down just as kept. Kylie's face twisted with so much pain the sight was unbearable and to screamed a blood filled one that tour through his entire core.

Right before she slipped and dropped with a pop into the water, which now was rising towards the opening.