The summer we turned thirteen (Published)

Chapter thirty-three: Ice cream and honesty

James

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"How could you have said this ride is for babies?!" I yelled to Harlee as we glided through the air and above the trees of The Winnington Aerial Park.

Our first adventure for our week together was to go zip-lining.

Mrs. Ramirez drove us over early that Monday morning before she drove to work and gave us some money to hang out around town after the park closed. We ran into a little trouble at first, because when we first arrived, Harlee had wanted to sneak onto The Death Trap zip-line, a zip-line that was only for adults. The Death Trap was said to be the scariest ride in the park, hence why Harlee was so adamant about sneaking onto it.

Fortunately, I was able to talk her out of it, hinging on the promise I'd ride it with her once we were both eighteen.

To my surprise, she agreed to it.

Normally, she was the one that talked me into things, so it felt pretty victorious to finally talk her out of something.

There had been a few times I had before that incident, but for the most part, the process went the other way around.

"I didn't say it was for babies! I said it was for kids!" she clarified, yelling back against the wind. "And, to be honest, I forgot how intense it was!"

We passed over a small lake, and Harlee excitedly screamed.

I had forgotten how intense it was as well.

How had we survived this thing before?

And how on earth was The Death Trap scarier than this?

"Hey, James, do you have your phone on you?!" she asked as the zip-line started nearing its end.

"No, I left it in your mom's car! Why would I bring a phone on a zip-line with me?!" I asked, baffled by her question.

"Why wouldn't you???" she asked, sounding genuinely shocked. As we slowed down for a bit, she started pulling something out of the bottom of her shoe then slide her foot back into the sneaker.

I rolled my eyes at her craziness when I realized it was her phone.

Only Harlee, I thought.

"They technically told us to leave these behind! But you know I had to break at least one rule today!" She held the phone up to take a picture of us despite my protests for her to put it back in her sneaker.

"Harlee! Put that back in your shoe!" I told her.

"No way! And miss a chance to get a photo of this?" she said back.

"If someone sees us, we're gonna get banned or something!" I warned her. "Plus, what if you drop it?!"

"So? It's just a phone, James!" She laughed. "Dropping it wouldn't be that big of a deal!"

"Yeah, well what if it landed on someone's head?" I pointed out.

"At least then, it wouldn't break!" she said back then laughed again at that.

I couldn't help but smile at my best friend's antics.

"You're insane!" I replied, finally laughing with her.

Harlee giggled. "Thanks! Say, sky-high!" she squealed, holding her phone up in the air to take a selfie of us.

"Sky-high," I said weakly, feeling worried she'd drop her phone and smash it to pieces.

"You're not loud enough!" she prompted me.

"Sky-high!" I yelled, smiling as Harlee snapped the photo.