First Place: Leila Buffington, 9th, Osage High School, (Non-fiction) "My Very Own Episode of The Twilight Zone" “For safety, you should be in good health and free from high blood pressure, heart, back, neck problems, or other conditions that could be aggravated by this adventure. Expectant mothers should not ride.”
I stared dead ahead at the safety warnings of the ride I was about to face. The warnings were practically the same as every other foe I had seen before, but something was different. No, these warnings didn’t magically apply to me this one and only time, but I actually knew what this ride did. It was going to be the worst of the worst. It was, quite literally, the Tower of Terror. “Mom, I really don’t want to go on this one, I-I know what this one does,” I sort of stammered out, mumbling a small bit. My mother just reassured me it would be fine. “We’ve been on the other rides and you were fine then. Remember how much fun The Haunted Mansion was?” She did have a point, The Haunted Mansion being a ride I actually enjoyed, but I wasn’t convinced. I knew what this ride did. My panicking before every ride had been because I didn’t know what was about to happen. This time, however, I did. I’d heard about this beast. I knew what I was in for. “No, I’m serious. You hate heights, right? We have to go really high and they drop us down,” I further pushed. “The other times were before I knew what happened. I actually do this time.” By this time, my younger sister had taken notice. She began to look a bit worried. She’d sort of just brushed off my previous anxiety filled breakdowns, but now, even at the age of 6, she could tell I was serious. “But how do you know you won’t have fun with this one?” my aunt, who had basically made this whole trip possible, chimed in. “Just trust us, you’ll enjoy it.” I would not enjoy this. I knew that for a fact. I, at age 10- two months away from 11, would be dead. I would be dead, all because of a Disney ride. A Disney ride my family thought would be fun.
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