Mandy Exly

Shallow Breathing

Nobody can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say. But I heard my own perfectly. Even if the sound waves hadn’t been trapped inside my helmet, ringing in my ears, I still would have heard my screams. The sound would have reverberated within my own body. Through my bones and muscles. It may have resembled screaming under water, dull, distant, with more bass and still very present. Like when you’re a kid on a hot summer day, cooling off in a pond or lake. First, you do a few handstands near the shore. Then you practice holding your breath. Then you see how loud you can scream underwater and how long you can scream before there’s no more air in your lungs and you have to resurface.