Chapter 8

 

       What I had thought was starting to become true; I could already feel our old friendship starting to rekindle as a couple weeks progressed. The love I felt for him as a kid didn't rejuvenate though, and the fact that I felt that way towards him before never really crossed my mind either. I had to admit though, Jack did look a little hot, but those emotions I had before just didn't return. I was too focused on just becoming his friend instead.

       After those two weeks of hanging out, Jack started to get busy – more so than when he was a kid. He always had to do chores, run errands with his mother, and a lot of other things. We barely got much of a chance to hang out after that, but I luckily got a hold of him at the end of July. He said he was free Saturday, and we decided that we would go up to Kings Island for the day.

       When that day arrived, I headed down to Jack's house. His mother took us and dropped us off, telling Jack to call her whenever we were ready to be picked up, before driving away. Neither of us had a pass though, so we had to pay the somewhat expensive admission fees. Jack offered to pay for mine too, but I just told him I'd pay for my own. What did he think I was, broke? I had plenty of money with me, so it would have seemed pointless to me to have him pay for it if I was going to have to repay him later.

       Fortunately, the amusement park wasn't as crowded as it was when we came here years ago. But of course, it wasn't Bring a Friend Free Day either, which helped to cut out some of the numbers that would have been here otherwise. This kind of made me happy though because then that way we might actually have a chance to get on some other rides without Jack complaining about how long the lines were.

       “Hey, we should go ride the lost parents ride,” Jack told me with a smirk as he pointed towards the yellow building that could be seen in the distance.

       “No, that's okay,” I said, chuckling a little.

       “Aw, why not? We had so much fun getting on it the last time we came here.”

       I laughed a little. “Okay, if you want to ride it that badly, then go ahead. I'll just go ride some of the other rides while I wait for you.”

       “No that's okay. It wouldn't be any fun if I went on it by myself.”

       We dropped the joke after that. I had to admit though that I never really got tired of the joke. Every time I thought back to that day, I couldn't help but to laugh about it because of how we couldn't even see Jack's mother when she was apparently right there in front of us the entire time.

       The path we decided to take around the amusement park was the same as the one we took when we were younger. After walking for a few minutes, we got close to reaching The Viking. I couldn't help but to smirk a little as we got close to it, recalling how Jack acted when we got on it the last time.

       “You still afraid to ride it?” I asked.

       “Of course not,” Jack replied.

       “Okay, then let's go on it.”

       Jack didn't protest. He definitely proved to not be afraid when we got into line for one of the ends of the ship. When we got on it, I was getting ready to see Jack freak out the entire time. Unfortunately, he didn't show the slightest ounce of fear, but instead joined in on the screaming war between the two sides as the ship swung back and forth over the small lake that surrounded it. I have to admit that it kind of disappointed me a little too. I was expecting to have some laughs to see Jack wetting himself during the ride.

       When we got off of The Viking, we continued to make our way around until we arrived at the Adventure Express. Jack asked if I was too afraid to get on it and I said no, so we got in line. It was much shorter than the last time both of us came here and it only took about a minute before we could get on. When it was our turn, we got on in the middle of the coaster. I looked around a little while we waited for the ride to begin before I felt Jack grab onto my hand.

       “Don't be afraid now,” he told me before laughing some.

       “Get off of me,” I said as I jerked my hand away from him, smiling some. “I already told you, I'm not afraid to ride it.”

       “So you aren't afraid of riding any rollercoasters then, huh?” he asked.

       “Nope.”

       Jack nodded, a small smirk on his face. I didn't really think anything of it though as I waited for the ride to start, which began about half a minute later. I didn't have a single bit of trouble riding it like I did the last time. Like I told Jack, I wasn't afraid of riding the Adventure Express. But of course, this one didn't have any loops or real steep hills like some of the other ones did. When the ride was finally over, we got off and walked over to another part of the amusement park.

       “Well, since you aren't afraid of riding rollercoasters anymore, I figured you wouldn't mind riding the Son of Beast,” Jack said as we neared the queue for it, a smirk on his face. “Sounds pretty fun, don't ya think?”

       “I don't know,” I said. “I mean, it's probably not all that fun.”

       “Sounds like a lot of fun to me. There's a huge hill and a loop in it. I don't think it could get much cooler than that.”

       I tried to think of something else to say that would get me out of going on it. The truth was that I really was still a little afraid of going on most rollercoasters, but I didn't want to tell that to Jack though because I didn't I want to admit my fears. He would probably never let me live it down if I told him. I mean, rollercoasters didn't bother me if they didn't have any loops or really steep hills, but the Son of Beast? I would probably die just trying to go on the damn thing.

       Jack and I finally reached the queue for the Son of Beast. We stopped there and Jack looked at me, waiting for some kind of reply. I continued to try to think of some kind of excuse, and it was then when I finally thought of something.

       “Are you really sure you want to go on it?” I asked, smirking a bit. “The line's pretty long after all. Do you really want to wait that long for just one single ride?”

       “Doesn't bother me any,” Jack replied, also smirking. “This ride will be worth the wait. Now come on, stop stalling and let's get in line.”

       Jack grabbed me by the wrist and tried to pull me to the nightmarish ride. I jerked my wrist out of his grip and stepped back a little. It was then when I realized that I probably gave myself away from doing something like that, especially since I forgot to conceal the fear on my face for that second. I mentally cursed a little before sighing.

       “Okay, I admit it,” I said in a slightly defeated manner. “I'm still not that comfortable with riding rollercoasters yet, or at least not something like this one anyway.”

       “Ha, I knew it!” Jack said before chuckling some. “Sorry, but I wanted to hear you admit it. It's okay though. We can just ride some of the other ones so you can get used to those. Who knows? Maybe you'll feel like riding the Son of Beast some other time.”

       He clapped me on the arm a little. I nodded and just smiled some. Well, at least he didn't make fun of me for it too much. We went over to the ride to the left of the Son of Beast, which was Top Gun. We spent about three minutes walking until we reached the end of the line. It only took about a minute before we got on it.

       After we got off of it, we resumed walking around Kings Island. We rode quite a few rides—a lot more than what we did when we were both here the first time. When it was around five o'clock in the afternoon, we decided we would take a break and get something to eat.

       Once we were done eating, we went around and rode a couple other rides such as the Scrambler and Vortex. The Scrambler wasn't too bad since it was just a ride that spun around the entire time. The Vortex was a different story though since it was a rollercoaster that had a few loops and a corkscrew, but I liked it.

       There weren't any other rides around that we wanted to go on, so Jack got the idea of playing a few games. We first went to the arcade for about half an hour before we decided to try playing a game at one of the stands. After walking around for a bit, we decided to play the game where you had to shoot a water gun at a target to move an object until it reached the finish. Jack won and he picked out a blue stuffed monkey (they only had stuffed animals as prizes).

       “Here, you can have it,” Jack said with a small smirk on his face as we walked away from the game.

       “I don't want it,” I told him.

       “Aw, why not?” he asked as the smirk grew a little wider. “I won it for you.”

       “Just give it to someone else,” I replied. I had to admit that I thought it was nice when he said that, but I doubted he was being serious about it. He was smirking after all when he said that, and that was always a good sign of someone only joking, right?

       “Nah,” he replied.

       He set the prize on top of a trashcan, leaving it for some other person to take if they wanted it. We didn't really feel like staying any longer, so we had Jack's mother come pick us up. I had to admit that I thought the day was a lot of fun, and I felt that I had grown a little bit closer to Jack. It wasn't love though, but just a real good friendship. I didn't feel that close to Jack just yet.

       When we got back, it was pretty late—about seven o'clock in the evening. Jack and I were a little too exhausted after spending the entire day at Kings Island, so we didn't bother hanging out anymore. We said bye to each other before I went up to my house.

Reviews

[Amund Schofield]

I like this chapter better.

[Amund Schofield]

you use the word queue too much.

Also, this chapter seems more about moving the story line along, rather then developing your characters. Re-write so you would include more of Jay's personal feelings while they walk around. Tell us what's going inside his head all the time he is with Jack. Does he still love Jack, is he afraid of Jack hating him? Give us some insight.