June 2024 Writer’s Workshop - World Roller Coaster Appreciation Month

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Example:

Liam was not looking forward to getting to Six Flags. Well, that wasn’t entirely true. He was looking forward to riding Goliath - he loved Goliath. He was not, though, looking forward to being around his classmates in the relative lack of supervision that abounded on a school trip. The teachers were all going to be riding themselves, sitting on benches and pretending to be vigilant, or not even attending. The safety of the classrooms would be nowhere close, and the whole sitting alone thing was going to underscore once again how Liam had no one in the whole school to hang out with.

Liam considered and quickly dismissed asking Annie if she wanted to be ‘ride buddies,’ but for one, he couldn’t think of a less lame thing to call it, and for two, she might be one of those weird anti-roller coaster people and he couldn’t stand the thought of her saying yes and then having to watch the coasters all day from the train or carousel or something.

So, here he sat at the front of the bus, next to the history teacher who was leaning against the window and looking about as excited about this trip as a little kid going for his vaccine shots. Liam glanced around the bus while trying to look like he wasn’t looking around the bus. He didn’t want to draw attention now, while there were too many eyes on him.

This bus was the one with the less horrible students on it. Granted, in Liam’s opinion they were almost all horrible, either because of what they did do or because of what they didn’t, but the ones on the bus now were those who tended to be horrible because of a lack of involvement, watching the horror happening rather than actually encouraging it, or even causing it to happen. So, overall the situation could have been worse. As long as he was able to separate himself from the herd quickly enough once they arrived he could potentially avoid anything terrible happening while at the park.

Arriving at the gate, and getting off the bus, Liam ignored the direction to stay by the bus until everyone exited, feeling the punishment for ignoring that rule later would be less of a problem than being caught by the bulls. Because that’s what they started calling themselves, owning the fact that they were horrible bullies. They self inflicted the moniker ‘the bulls’ on themselves with the intent of being bullies. Liam had no interest in drawing their fire today. He walked past the groups milling about, trying to get a decision about where to go first in the park and headed straight for the big guy: Goliath. ‘At least I don’t have to ask anyone else where they want to go,’ thought Liam bitterly. The one perk of having no one to hang with is there is also no one to have to compromise with.

In line, Liam brought out the manga he had with him, small enough to tuck into his pocket when the time came and started to look over the cover. He knew he wouldn’t have long to wait though, the lines at this time of day were short. He started getting into the story he was reading when a noise gave him chills. He heard the laugh of Brick Johnson near the end of the line. Liam worked on staying calm, continuing to look at the words and images before him, and not anywhere near the group that was entering the line. He didn’t want to give them any reason to notice him.

But he should have known that wasn’t going to be enough to keep him out of their sights. He heard some whispers and then felt an ice cube pelt the side of his head. Liam inwardly winced, but outwardly just rolled his eyes and looked back at his manga. He learned from experience though, that this could sometimes illicit them leaving him alone, but other times be taken as a challenge, with an effort to up the harassment in order to get a better reaction.

In this case, the timing was on Liam’s side. He got to the front of the line before the bulls had a chance to decide it was a challenge, and saw that Annie was standing alone in the section of the line reserved for those riding in the back seat. Liam now had another choice. Either avoid that he wanted to ride the back of the coaster or go over to Annie and break their unspoken agreement to keep out of each other’s orbits. Liam heard the coaster going through its track and the decision was made for him. He gave Annie half a smile when he got to the end of the coaster line with her. She half smiled back and said “want to just ride together?”