“You popped it, Abbie!” my cousin Katy told her little sister.

“No, I didn't!” she said. “It's just running out of air!”

Katy and I stared at the deflating tube. That summer, my cousins, sister, parents, and I were out on our boat, and we had been taking turns riding on an intertube behind it. My parents had the idea that we had to take turns in order of age, youngest to oldest, which left Katy and me last. Abbie and my little sister Grace had just gotten off of the deflating tube. There was a tiny hole in the thing, and now that we had to go last, we wouldn’t even get to ride!

“Dad! It's popped, and Katy and I didn't even get one turn!” I complained.

“Sorry, Lauren,” he said. “But I guess that you and Katy are out of luck this time.”

“Wait!” Katy said. “Can Lauren and I try to ride on it anyway?”

“Yeah, can we Dad?” I asked.

“I don't know how safe it is, but I guess you two can try,” he replied.

Katy and I climbed on to the tube. It wasn't a tube like you would see in a pool, though. It was huge, big enough for two people, one would sit on each side of it. We got in and hung on to the handles for dear life, because if I leaned back or to the left, I would fall into the lake. Katy was on my right, and she was having the same problem as I was. The sides were deflating fast, and they were useless.

“I'm having trouble staying on already,” I said.

“Me, too,” Katy agreed. “Let's just go and maybe it will be easier to stay on once we're going.”

“Okay, we're ready!” I yelled to my parents.

Dad turned on the boat and then started down the lake, pretty slowly compared to the speed that Katy and I usually tube at. Maybe it wasn't very fast, but I had never been so terrified before in my life.



Katy and I started to lean in to the middle to keep from falling out on the non-inflated sides. But with all of our weight in the center, the tube's sides started to wrap us up inside. Katy and I started screaming louder, and all of a sudden, Dad stopped the boat.

“Why did you stop?” I asked.

“I don't think that it looks very safe,” Mom answered.

“Can we please keep going?” Katy asked.

“We'll balance better this time,” I said. “We won't get wrapped up.”

“Please?” begged Katy.

“Are you sure?” she asked. “I don't want either of you getting hurt.”

“We won't!” I said.

“Alright, if you two are sure,” Mom said reluctantly.

Now that we had gotten a chance to take a breath, we were ready to go again. Dad started down the lake.

“Do you want to go faster?” I yelled to Katy so she could hear me over the waves and boat.

“Yeah, but I can't stay on much longer,” she replied.

“Me neither, but I don't want to tell him to stop,” I said.

“Neither do I,” she said.

My little sisters and Abbie were watching us, we told him to speed up.

“I'm so tired!” I yelled to Katy over the wind.

“Me too!” Katy yelled back.

“But I don't want to tell him to stop,” I said.

“Me, neither. That's no fun,” Katy said.

“How about we just fall off?” I asked.

“On purpose?” she said.

“Sure! You haven't fallen off of the tube yet, anyway.” I said.

“Deal!” said Katy. “But you have to promise that you'll fall off, too.”

“I will!” I said.

“Okay, go!” she yelled.

I rolled off my side of the tube.

I looked up and saw Katy about 50 feet in front of me. I swam over to her.

“That was so scary!” I said.

“I saw you roll out, so I did too,” She said. “It hurt!”

“I know! I skidded on the water for a second!” I said.

“Wait, where did the boat go?” Katy asked me.

“It's...I turned around. It was behind us, but it was on the other side of the lake! “It's over there! I could see our sisters jumping off the back of the boat to swim.

We started swimming to the boat. When we finally got there, our hands still ached from the death grip that we had on the tube handles.

We climbed into the boat.

“I can't believe that you both fell off!” Mom said.

“We rolled,” I said.

“Yeah, we didn't think that it would be any fun to tell Dad to stop the boat,” said Katy.

“It was funny watching you,” Abbie said. “The tube kept coming out of the water!”

“It was really scary, though. I don't think that I've ever been so scared before!” I said.

After we swam, we had to get off the lake for the day. The next day, we went and bought a new tube for the boat, one that wasn't deflating. But Katy and I won't ever forget about the time we tried to ride across a lake-on a popped inter-tube.