We were finally at Disney World. I’d been waiting for this all year. I was sixteen at the time, and my parents let me and my sister, Caroline, go for a week with our cousin, Heather. Caroline was twelve, and of course didn’t have to pay for the trip like I did. The whole reason was that I was working at a small ice cream shop in Salem then. The owner was a beast, and I mean really, she was a piece of work.
Heather, well I mean she’s probably the only cool person in our family. She was twenty eight when we went. The three of us had about a million jokes.
The only condition of this trip was that we stayed with our retired family friend, Tom Bruin. I suspected my parents became friends with this man solely on the basis of his last name sense they were, and still are, avid Boston sports fans. If there was any other reason I was failing to find it. Tom was a real strange guy... I mean not in the way that you’re worried he watches you when you’re sleeping, but in the way that most older people are. Tom’s special breed of crazy was that he was clueless but at the same time had no filter on what he was saying. Not only had he expressed his undying love of Molly Ringwald when I was indulging in my latest T.V obsession, “The Secret Life of the American Teenager,” but he had aloofly screamed out “Are you guys cookin’ something? I smell shit!” when I was making bagel bites one night.
So far the trip was going well. I hadn’t had much luck with vacations all my life. When I was about seven years old my family traveled to Sweden and Norway. On that trip I caught Fitz Disease. On our family vacation to Aruba I was stung by a school of man-o-war jellyfishes while doing a handstand on Eagle Beach. When I went to France with school I was the only person whose luggage was lost on the plane. As you can see this has created a deathly fear of things going wrong while I am on a trip. Thankfully, this is not one of those stories.
Once we left the airport and checked out our rental car we headed to a chain store they have in Florida called “Public’s”. However, at this particular location at this particular time, the “L” in the big glowing sign was burnt out, so the sign said “Pubic's.” We had a good long laugh about this one. Maybe a little too long, actually.
If you think I haven’t told enough anecdotes by now, well you’re in luck because this story is leading up to the best one of all.
I felt as if Heather and I had a special connection, my being the oldest sister and all. At that point I was able to talk in a more adult context. This was always my advantage over my little sister. Her immaturity, even though it was mimicked from my behavior at that age, seemed wildly irritating. Whenever I talked to Heather I would try to show her my adult tendencies, like curse words, and inside jokes from shows like “Friends”, and “Will and Grace”. This to me seemed like the edge of grown up conversation.
“I heard mom is six years older than dad,” Caroline piped, wanting to be the orb of gossip.
“So what?” I asked, “Some people are a lot worse.”
Heather was doting and read the hurt expression on Caroline’s face. What a crybaby.
“Kate’s right, but your mom is a puma.”
Both of my sister and I looked confused.
“Well a cougar is a lady who dates a man much younger than her, right? So a puma dates guys that are like 5-10 years younger than her.”
We all burst out laughing at this. This was our new joke. Heather came out of this trip with a multitude of new nicknames. The Cougar, Buddha Belly, la la la la la la la la Cat Scratch, and the most mundane Heath. Of course this name had variations such as Heath Bar, Heathcliff, and Heath Ledger.
On Wednesday we visited Animal Kingdom. This was the hottest park out of all of them. The fact that it was August in Florida and it was overcrowded didn’t help either. The only thing I was looking forward to, other than the pool at Tom’s condo, was Everest. The best, most thrilling ride at Disney. It was a mountain roller coaster built around the myth of the yeti. I guess you could call me an adrenaline junkie because I love the thrill of a roller coaster almost as much as I love Zach Efron. I mean loved Zach Efron.
I was just hoping Caroline wouldn’t wimp out like she did the first night on rockin’ roller coaster.
On the way over we were stopped by a janitor who was sitting on a bench near the ride, clearly not doing his job. He asked Heather for the time. She politely told him that it was 10:24pm and he continued to talk to us.
“Oh, well, my name is Mavis. What’chu guys, like sisters or somethin’?”
“No, they’re sisters, but I’m their cousin,” Heather replied.
“I got a funny story about cousins. Well my friend was tellin’ me about this girl he found on the internet, Facebook or somethin’. He was buggin’ me to check out her page so we went on and at first I was like, damn that girl’s pretty hot, and then I was like, DUDE! THAT’S MY COUSIN!”
We laughed faintly then Heather made up some excuse for us to leave.
Although Mavis will forever be in our hearts, we had a fast pass that was about to expire.
We hustled along to the gates of Everest and jumped into the fast pass line, striding past all the common ride goers, feeling far superior. That is until we reached the line consisting of about ten people ahead of us.
Everest was a two person ride. This meant two of us could sit together, the third was exiled to sit with a random stranger. This ultimately meant my sister and I threw Heather under the bus and made her sit by herself.
As the last set of passengers wobbled out of the cars I anxiously tensed my hands and shoulders. We started to board the mine-cart looking ride, but were instructed to stop at the gates right next to it.
Here’s the most annoying thing about Caroline: when she’s nervous she doesn’t just have that emotion, she talks. A lot. I mean the really talks, and makes awful jokes as well. That and the fact she didn’t know cougar was a commonly excepted term made Heather the perfect target for her attention.
Heather had boarded next to a teenage boy who couldn’t have been much older than I was.
Caroline consequently started giggling to herself.
“What are you laughing at, munchkin?” she said in response.
“You’re such a cougar, Heather!” My sister laughed out, referring to our fellow passenger, who now looked mortified. Our cousin’s cheeks became maraschino cherries, blossoms of bright red blooming unto her skin. She was about to say something, but the harnesses lifted up and the robotic voice told us to take our seats. Once the ride was over, Heather had to explain loudly to my sister:
“COUGAR ISN’T JUST AN INSIDE JOKE, CAROLINE! PEOPLE KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS!”
None of us could stop laughing that night.
PS. If you were to review this *masterpiece* (and I use the word loosely) of mine, please keep in mind that this was told from my sister's point of view, not mine, and that this story is based on true events.
Feedback that I would like to hear is what parts of the story drew you in/ took you out?
Do you think the voice of this character is strong enough?
Is the actual writing interesting?
Don't be afraid to put your brutally honest opinion out there for me to read (as long as you're courteous about it :) ).
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