As the cart was climbing higher, her heart kept sinking lower and lower. The boys were giggling and overflowing with excitement, and made her almost sorry she ever had children.
The fall began. She heard her sons" voices among other adrenalin-powered yelps, fighting off the wave of horror that went through her
Ignoring her brain, her body was expecting the fatal stop to come at any minute. Her heart itself was scared and trying to hide, so it squeezed into a tight knot of a tissue, no longer capable of pushing blood through her veins.
The noise of the wind had calmed down, and she could hear the laughter and voices.
"Was that cool, or what?"
"I let go! I held my arms up the whole time!"
And then in a totally different voice, barely heard through the pain in her chest: "Mommy, how come you have blood on your lips? Mommy?"