Cut the strings and set me free

Part 4- if the strings snap will you let me float away?

And though he looks devastated at the idea of letting her go, he does it, gently lowering her to lie flat against the sand, the cloak cushioning her head.

I force my hands to still as I place my hand down on the centre of her chest, the other coming to rest on top, fingers interlaced and raise myself up to level myself, on legs that feel as if they'll buckle, give out any moment and press down, pushing my entire weight onto her chest, releasing the compression and repeating. Over and over. The metal of the heart pendant remains trapped between my hands, biting into skin- a freezing chill that seeps from it and doesn't warm.

"Jimin-ah..." I call gesturing to her face, and though panic and grief is struck across his face, he responds to the authority in my voice, in the command that pushes him into action, gently tilting her head back, pinching her nose shut and sealing her mouth with his, blowing air into her steadily. He does it again, our eyes desperately falling to her chest which is still, which doesn't rise and fall with breathing.

And so the torturous cycle continues, my weight pushing down on my hands as I give compressions, Jimin's soft lips sealing over hers to force air into her body.

And as we continue, I find hope slipping away, find horror and grief strike me at the sight of being so close to her and under such horrific circumstances.

That the first time one of our lips touched hers it wasn't to whisper intimacies into her mouth, wasn't as an act of love and devotion to her but a desperation to save her.

Jimin sobs when he moves back and I pray with every bit of me for her to breathe, hands pushing down once more on her chest, a ragged breath tearing out of me when it causes her body to arch slightly, water coughed out of her lungs, head rising slightly off the ground.

In an instant it seems as if all the strings have been cut. As if we can suddenly breathe when her chest rises and falls weakly, slowly, far too shallowly breathing...but breathing, nonetheless. 

And we scrabble to her side, to draw her up into our arms, legs pressed against each other as we hold her, cradle her close.

Too much. It was too much. And too close.

We had come devastatingly close to losing her and performing compressions on her, to try get her heart to start beating again had been a gamble.

Because her body had already stopped struggling, stopped fighting. Because the last breaths had already left her body and she had had no intention of making it out alive.

And I sob, feel the control, the little strength I'd held onto for her vanish, body shaking as I curl over her, desperate to keep even the sight of her away from the waves, from the sea. My hand reaches over to grab hers, feeling the chilled freezing skin shock my system, a brutal reminder that if we hadn't been told, if Jungkook hadn't rushed to tell us then she wouldn't be here, she wouldn't be alive.

"If she had....if she had....gone." I gasp out, unable to bring myself to say the word, unable to fathom it for even the most terrifying moment that she would leave, that she would go from this world and leave two broken shattered lives behind.

"Tae...we need to get her warm. She might be breathing but she needs to be warm. She could get sick; she could get weaker. We need to leave with her now." Jimin says, voice a mixture of softness and firm- underlined with the strength that had left me the moment I'd heard the shuddering wet gasp of her trying to breathe.

As if that sound had been my undoing, the reason I felt weak and drained and unable to do anything but clutch at her, fearing as if she'd slip away if I wasn't holding her, as if she'd vanish from sight if I couldn't feel the coldness of her shocking my system, spurring my mind to get her warm, get her safe.