The Discovery

“No you’re a big fat liar!” yelled Lily.

“Yeah, ok. You’re so believable” responded her brother Josh.

“Josh go upstairs and Lily come to me now!” yelled Lily’s mom.

Josh stomped upstairs and Lily stomped to her parents’ room. She sat on the bed and prepared herself for a big, long lecture. Instead what she got was a “Come here.”

Lily responded by saying, “I don’t get what you can show me that has to do anything with siblings being that you don’t have any.”

“Just come look at this,” said Lily’s mom. “This was your Aunt Paige. She died a year before you were born. She was my older sister.”
Lily just stood there, shocked taking deep, deep breaths to calm herself down so that she didn’t freak out. “I’m so sorry mom.”

“It’s ok. In fact, you sort of look like Paige. You keep the picture.” Lily then took the picture upstairs into her room and put it on her dresser on an angle so that the picture frame wouldn’t fall off of her dresser.

The next morning Lily ran downstairs to catch a quick breakfast before her bus came. The grocery store was out of her favorite cereal, so her mom bought her brother’s favorite instead which was one of her least favorites. She instead chugged a bottle of water and had a multi-grain bar. She said her final goodbyes to her mom, since her mom was leaving the state for a business trip. About thirty seconds later, her school bus came.

On the bus she had to deal with fifth, sixth and eighth graders of which some she did know and others she didn’t. Lily was in seventh grade when this happened. There were only two other seventh graders on the bus besides herself. The fifth, sixth and eighth graders always trampled the seventh graders because a large percentage of them were very short. Lily was one of the shortest in her grade and wore pink clothing a lot so sometimes strangers thought she was younger then she was.

When Lily got to school, all she could think about was how she had an aunt and she didn’t even know about it. Jessica, one of Lily’s friends, threw a paper ball with the answers to the worksheet on it because she could tell that Lily was zoned out, and she saw that she didn’t have the answers on her sheet yet. Lily wrote them down fast enough so that when her teacher came around to see if everyone had done their work, Lily’s was done. At the end of class Lily’s friend, said “You owe me now.” And Lily just stood there thinking how could I pay her back?
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The First Clue

When Lily first got home, at the time she was still curious about her aunt, so she immediately ran upstairs into her room and looked at the photo of her Aunt Paige. She held the photo in her hand just staring at it. All of a sudden it slipped out of her hand. At the edge of the back of the frame, she saw a little white piece of paper sticking out. She undid the back of the frame and unfolded the paper. She saw writing on it and read it. It said:

Whoever is reading this, you are about to go on a marvelous journey to find where you can see me again. The first clue is at Maddie’s old house. The one that got burned down.

Have fun! -Paige Heifmen

Madeline, or Maddie for short, was Lily’s mom’s name. She had no idea how she would be able to do this task; she was only 12 and couldn’t drive herself everywhere. Then she got it. She would trick her gullible dad to drive her everywhere she needed to go and say it was weekend homework to take notes for a scavenger hunt. She went downstairs and told her dad about it, holding the note in her hand. Her dad of course, said yes, and Lily got in the car to start her journey.
She gave her dad her mom’s old address from when she was in college. The car ride was quiet until Lily’s dad asked.

“Can you teach me some teen slang?” and Lily just hit her head hard.

Then her dad asked, “If I was trying to be a cool dad, should I introduce myself by saying: I’m the Eric-nator, who are you?”

Lily responded, “No. You’ll look stupid and unprofessional if you do that.”

“Then what should I do Lily-nator?”

“Just say: Hi! I’m Lily’s dad. Who are you? It’s that simple!”

“Really? That’s what teens consider cool dads?”

“Yep. Just as simple as that” and at that very moment, the navigation said, “You have reached your destination.”

  The Second Clue
Lily got out of the car to find an empty space in between college dorms. Her mom’s college dorm really did get burned down. From far away, Lily saw something that looked like a little rock, but as she approached it, she realized that it was a locket. [INSERT IMAGE 2]

She opened the pretty blue locket, and realized it was about the same color as her friend Jessica’s eyes. She had come up with an item to give Jessica back for her I owe you. Lily then opened the locket and saw another paper with a clue on it. She stuck the first clue in her pocket and read the second. It said:

Very well. Good job. You have successfully passed the first task. Now are you up for the second task? Well, go to my daughter, Mackenzie’s house. When you get there, ask her: “Where was your favorite place to go when you were younger?” Once you get the answer, go to that place. You will find another clue there if you look for it very hard. -Paige Heifmen

She called her cousin Mackenzie asking for her address. You might be wondering, why didn’t she just ask her on the phone? Well sometimes when on an adventure with clues, you have to follow what each one says.  Also if you were wondering, she thought that Mackenzie’s mom was Mackenzie’s stepmom.

The Third Clue

Lily got in the car again, and told her dad the new address. It was only five minutes away from her mom’s old house. When they got there, Mackenzie was waiting at the door. “So, what do you want?” she asked. “I want to know where was your favorite place to go when you were little?” responded Lily.

“Oh that’s easy” said Mackenzie, “the little playground two blocks away. My favorite part was the sand box.”

“Thanks.”

“Oh, just asking, what do you need this for?”

“Ummm… school stuff” responded Lily.

“Ok. See you later little cousin.”

“See you later big cousin.”

The Fourth Clue

Lily ran down two blocks, running like she never ran before. When she got to the playground, she immediately went to the sandbox. She thought that the clue would be there because of the information Mackenzie told her. She was right, for there in the sand bucket in the sandbox, there was a piece of paper inside. She pulled it out of the sand bucket and there was another clue. [INSERT IMAGE 3]

The clue said:

Well done! This is the last clue. Come to the curvy yellow slide. Then you will find where you can see me. -Paige Heifmen

Lily then climbed up the ladder on the playground and ran to the curvy yellow slide. She just stood there, waiting patiently for something to happen. She then felt the green bar, which was connected to the top of the slide, and a figure popped up out of nowhere. “Woah!” she said. She saw a human like figure that was bleach white. “Hi Lily! It’s nice to finally meet you in person. I’ve been watching you for a long time.”

“You look exactly like me, but you’re a ghost” said Lily.

“That’s because I’m your Aunt Paige” said the ghost.

“Are you really?”

“Yes. I’m really your Aunt Paige.”

“How can I see you? How can I do this?”

“You can do this because you went on the journey to find me; where you can see me. I have to go now, but remember only you can see me, for you were the first one to go on this journey.”

“Well, I’ll see you when I see you then, aunt.”

“And I’ll see you when I see you niece.” Lily hugged her Aunt Paige and said goodbye.

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