Max's face got red. "I am not a princess! I am a pince! They give us training on this like these. You know, posture and how to walk balance with light steps and on the balls of your feet."
"Isn't that basically princess training?" Alex said.
"No! It's not! I am not a princess, nor do I have princess training!" Max said, his face the color of Sarah's hair.
"Ok buddy. Whatever you say. Don't worry, we won't tell anybody about your princess training." Sarah assured him.
"It's not princess training!" Max yelled back.
Alex and Sarah began to laugh as they headed down to the pool to test their abilities of holding their breath under the water and to see how many laps that they could swim around the pool in five minutes. Max just stomped down the steps of the spinning log and followed Molly over to the changing areas.
Discreetly, Trinity and her guide had come in to do hair tests. She did nearly as well as Sarah, stopping at the 10th level before she could go no longer. Then, when she was at the spinning logs, while the others were busy seeing how long they could hold their breath underwater for, Trinity was busy successfully making it across the log on her fifth try.
Sarah began her third test. She was in a swimming suit, of course it matched with her room. Purple. It was kind of funny, the irony of purple. She had worn a gorgeous purple dress to the ball that day. Then, she had subconsciously chosen the purple room. Now, she was wearing a purple bathing suit. It was like purple was taking over her life.
She climbed into the huge pool. She sat down on the ledge and prepared to push off to swim. Terrance walked over to the side of the pool. He held up his stopwatch and nodded his head at her, signaling that he was ready to start whenever she was. She did not respond back to him but instead just pushed off the wall. She swam for five minutes. She swam about 2 laps. The pool was very large, but it was not the typical size for a proper lap so she was not really sure how many laps that she had technically swam.
She came out from under the water. Terrance nodded to her showing that he had the results and peeled the stuck on wires off of her so she could go and change. The worst thing about doing the swimming test was that her hair was now wet and Terrance told her that they 'didn't have time' for her to shower or to at least blow dry it.
She quickly changed back into her outfit and walked out the stall.
She walked up to Terrance and said, "What's next?"
"Rock wall." He stated.
"Rock wall? Sounds fun! I have never been on one of those before!" She walked with Terrance over to the rock wall. He strapped her on and he started the timer when she began to climb. She was about 20 feet up when as she was looking for a foothold, she noticed how high up she was. She immediately clung herself onto the wall and her breathing rapidly increased. She had never been up so high before. What if she fell?
Terrance noticed that she had stopped climbing all together so he shouted up to her, "What's the issue?"
In response, all he got from Sarah was a shrill shriek.
The others hear Sarah's squeal so they looked around to see what had happened. Max was the first one to realize why she was freaking out. Sarah was afraid of heights.
Stopping in the middle of his test and running away from Molly's angry remarks, he stood near the rock wall and shouted up to Sarah. "It's ok! Just breathe and take your body off the wall, push off and then land your feet on it again. If you keep jumping off the wall, the harness will lower you down!" He said.
Just as Terrance had, all he got from her was a squeal of fear.
Sarah, who was twenty feet off the ground, could hardly hear what they were saying. All she knew was that a mere piece of rope was holding her life and if it were to break, or if the thing holding the rope were to break, she would fall, and ultimately die the moment she made contact with the floor.
Max sighed. "Sarah Caroline Benson! Listen to me!" He yelled up at her.
Hearing her full name slightly snapped her out of her trance of fear. She looked down to see who was talking to her but all that did was remind her how far up she was from the ground. She began to shake slightly. "What!" Sarah yelled. She was too busy being scared out of her mind to notice how loud she was being.
"Come down! Use the hand and foot holds if you need to." Max advised.
Sarah looked around her at all the rainbow colored hand and foot holds, then at the ground below her before vigorously shaking her head. "No. No way! What if my hands slip and I fall?" She said.
"Then the harness will catch you!" Max yelled upwards.
"What if it breaks?!"
"The rope won't break!"
"What if the wall breaks?!"
"Why would the wall break?!?"
"You never know till it happens!"
"Sarah!"
"What!"
"Nothing will break. I promise you. How about this, if you fall, I will catch you. Ok?"
Sarah hesitated. She trusted Max with her life. They had been best of friends for the last eleven years, other than her mother, she trusted no one for then Max. "...Are you sure it's safe?"
"Yes. I promise you, it is safe." Max replied. Max knew he could never catch her if she fell. If she landed, she would die, if he caught her, at the very least, he would break his arms,, but Sarah would still die. There was no way to possibly jump from that height and survive when all that was below you was the cold, hard cement. But, if she did slip and fall, the harness would do that catching for him, that was it's job after all.