“Can you unstick yourself?” Noah asked.
I pulled against the ropes, but my arms and legs were so wedged in there that I couldn’t move.
“No,” I squeaked in a small voice.
“Right, how are we going to do this?” Noah asked Maxine, who was on my left, while Noah was on my right. I turned and looked at Maxine. She tilted her head as she looked me over.
“Honestly, I’m not sure,” she said.
This did not make me feel better.
“Should we try to get her legs out first, or her arms?” Noah asked.
“Mmmm, legs first,” she replied after some thought.
Noah looked like he was considering this. “But if we do that, she could flip over and damage her shoulders, unless you can support her weight and stop that?”
“Mmmm, difficult, because the ropes move so much.”
“And if we take the arms out first?” he proposed.
“Mmmm, her legs could come loose and then she falls.”
“Mmmm.” Again, Noah seemed to consider this, and I wondered why they were both saying “mmmm” so much. It was not a sound that filled me with great confidence.
“Maybe someone can catch her at the bottom?” Maxine suggested.
“No! NO! No falling. No catching.” I spoke for the first time.
“What if two more people come up and it’s done all at the same time? Legs and arms!” someone yelled from down below.
“Yes,” someone else replied.
“Yes,” someone echoed.
“For sure.”
“Let’s do that.”
“Totally.”
Affirmatives rang out in abundance from the small crowd below.
“No!” someone else said, breaking it. “I think the ropes come loose at the top. We could loosen it and catch her as she comes down.”
“They don’t loosen,” someone else confirmed.
“Shit,” someone moaned. There was a momentary silence from the crowd, as well as from Noah and Maxine.
“Maybe we should cut her down?” someone offered.
“NO CUTTING!” A man wearing a shirt with the gym logo on came running up. He looked like the manager here. “No cutting.”
Another long silence. So loooooong.
Really, very bloody long.
“Where’s Mikey?” someone asked.
