Free Cinderella in the Surf by Carly Syms

my family ever decided to take us. Besides, from what I know, Disney doesn't have roller coasters like this."  
    I nod because he isn't wrong; it's a heck of a lot more intense here than it is at the Happiest Place on Earth. But I'm still wondering how it's possible that someone who's so clearly excited about these roller coasters has made it twenty years without ever getting on one.
    The next string of ride cars pulls into the station then, before I get a chance to ask him anything else. Instead, I'm mesmerized by the shaken looks on the faces of the people who've just been through the Python Pit.
    At least it looks like they've also escaped death's jaws.
    Walker and I get into our car, three back from the front, and he pulls the big metal safety bar down over our laps and I listen for the clicking noise that means it's secured into place.
    I look around for the guy who's operating the ride, waiting for him to come make sure Walker's done this right and there isn't some major step we're missing that's gonna send us hurtling through the air and crash landing to our deaths somewhere inside this amusement park. I catch sight of him at the back of the ride, talking to two girls inside the last car, and I stare impatiently.
    "Relax," Walker says from beside me. "Your eyes are buggin' out."  
    "I'm not about to go flying through space just because we're not buckled in right."
    He shakes his head and smiles. "It's gonna be great."  
    But I can only grimace. "Says the guy who's never been on a roller coaster before."  
    And before he can say anything else, the ride attendant presses down on the metal bar and moves on to the next car before I even realize he's done anything, and then suddenly his voice comes over the intercom, wishing us a "safe trip through the python's pit."  
    Fabulous.
    The ride moves forward slowly, like it knows how badly I need this to be over but has decided it's way more fun to tease me mercilessly instead, the creaking of the wheels along the track sounding like the cackling of an evil witch.
    We're coming up on the coaster's first hill, a fifty foot mountain that we'll climb, then plummet down the other side, and I try to take a bunch of deep breaths.
    It's just a ride, it's just a ride, it's just a ride.
    I repeat the phrase in my head over and over as the car creaks up toward the top.
    "That doesn't sound so good," I mutter under my breath, not intending for Walker to hear me, but he does.  
    "It's a rickety old ride, that's for sure," he says gleefully, and I manage to unfreeze myself long enough to shoot him a dirty look. He frowns when he sees it. "What? You're looking at me like I just threw your dog off the top of this coaster."  
    "I hate these rides!" I blurt out, and immediately feel my eyes widen and a fresh wave of nausea pump through me. I hadn't planned on telling him this. Walker already knows enough about my issues; I don't want him to think I'm damaged beyond repair.
    Which I very well might be, but does everyone have to know it?
    It's his turn for his eyes to get bigger. "What?"
    I shake my head. "Nothing. It's nothing." We're only a few feet away from the drop and I stare straight ahead, hands gripping the metal bar in front of me so tightly my knuckles are paler than I usually am before the start of summer.
    But he won't listen. Walker reaches out and puts a hand on my shoulder. "Rachel, are you okay?"
    I answer him in screams.  
    The roller coaster plummets over the hill and down, down, down, and I'm shrieking, my hair flowing behind me, my cheeks feeling like they're falling off my face.  
    We hit the first spiral and I haven't seen it coming and just as quickly as I'm upside down, I'm right-side up again, and we're still shooting through the air, and I'm pretty sure my heart's about to beat right out of my chest, and the car is going faster, faster, and suddenly I see the coaster's biggest loop looming in the distance.
    There's no time to even think about shutting my eyes