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The roller coaster towered in front of them. It seemed as though it had been designed by a toddler with a crayon or one of those painting chimpanzees. From below it was difficult to tell where or even if the loops and curves went in separate directions. Only the motion of the train of cars gave any clue as to the sequence of the ride, and even then they moved away so fast that they could be quickly lost to the eye that blinked or looked briefly in another spot. There was a nearly constant thunder from the car wheels on the rails, and an undulating scream from the passengers, rising and falling like the sound of a siren, warning the people in line of the terrors they would soon face.
The day was stiflingly hot. There was no breeze except when the cars whooshed by somewhere near the line, and the popularity of the coaster kept the waiting riders backed up all the way around the maze of restraining bars all day long. The moment they'd entered the park, Will had insisted on going to the coaster, but from a hundred feet away his father could see that the line was packed and insisted that they wait until later. They spent an hour half-heartedly riding other things before he would let them walk back in the direction of the roller coaster, only to find that the line was just as long as before.
"C'mon, Dad, we've been on every ride on this side of the park, I want to go on the coaster!" He added that whining tone than all fourteen-year-olds have mastered. It was a gamble. Will knew his father hated it when he whined, hated it enough that he might even make them leave, but if Will couldn't go on this roller coaster, he'd just as soon leave anyway.
Chris stopped dead in his tracks, closed his eyes and grunted. The sound of his kids whining was enough to make him want to scream. Will knew damn well that they would get to go on the stupid ride, so why did he have to behave like he was five years old? They had been coming to this amusement park for ten summers, and from the time Will was eight they had been riding this damned roller coaster. Chris took his baseball cap off to reposition it, feeling the sweat trapped underneath come trickling down into the corner of one eye. "I said we could come back to it when the line lightened up a little bit, Will."
But they both knew that the line was not going to diminish, and they both knew that each wanted to ride the coaster as much as the other. Will fidgeted a little, and Chris deliberately let him hang, using the moment of tension to mop some sweat from his brow with his arm. Just then the cars pulled back in to the loading area and a couple of dozen people stumbled off the ride, laughing and making mock shrieking noises. One or two immediately returned to the end of the waiting line, but the whole line lurched forward a little.
"See, Dad? It's moving!"
Chris let out one more overheated sigh and handed his video camera to Annie. "Let's do it," he said, trying to let his exhaustion cover his own excitement.
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