© 2010

“He’s really out of it.”

“Look for a key.”

“I told you, I’ve been through his pockets. There’s no goddamn handcuff key.”

“What about the combination? Maybe he wrote it down somewhere, put it in his wallet or something.”

“What, you think he’s a moron? He’s going to write down the combination and keep it on him?”

“So cut the chain. We take the case, we figure out how to open it later.”

“It looks way stronger than I thought. It’ll take me an hour to cut through.”

“You can’t get the cuff over his hand?”

“How many times do I have to tell you? I’m gonna have to cut it off.”

“I thought you said it would take forever to cut the cuff.”

“I’m not talking about the cuff.”

“I’m scared,” Ethan said.

“There’s nothing to be scared about,” I said, turning away from the steering wheel and reaching an arm back to free him from the kiddie seat. I reached under the pad where he’d been resting his arms and undid the buckle.

“I don’t want to go on them,” he said. The tops of the five roller coasters and a Ferris Wheel could be seen well beyond the park entrance, looming like tubular hills.

“We’re not going on them,” I reminded him for the umpteenth time. I was starting to wonder whether this excursion was such a good plan. The night before, after Jan and I had returned from our drive up to Lake George and I’d picked Ethan up at my parents’ place, he’d had a hard time settling down. He’d been, by turns, excited about coming here, and worried the roller coaster would derail at the highest point. After I’d tucked him in, I slipped under the covers next to Jan and considered discussing whether Ethan was really ready for a day at Five Mountains.