Page 106 - NS 2024

I got the sudden urge to run home to my dad, who was probably still awake, all alone in the bedroom they used to share. Didn’t he deserve to be part of this expedition too? I thought that perhaps he already knew whatever secret our mom was leading us to.
Owen found us pretty uickly. His expression was unreadable.
“Let’s go to Mom’s oce.”
Me and Sienna didn’t uestion his sudden initiative. Owen led the way as we walked to her oce and used one of the keys to enter. It was bier than the janitor’s, but almost completely empty. A pit in my stomach formed at the hollowness of the room. Her name was still hanging up outside the door, but I wondered how long it would take before that was replaced. I wondered how long it was until someone new entirely occupied this room before no one remembered that my mom’s oce used to be in this room. It used to be full of pictures of our family, uotes, and books, but all those decorations were gone, except one book, which was sitting on the oor.
I moved the book aside, revealing a loose oorboard. I looked back at Sienna and Owen in disbelief.
“I guess there is a secret library aer all,” Owen murmured, pushing the oorboard up. When he moved it out of the way, it revealed a hole with a staircase big enough for us all to t through. It wasn’t like the tiny hiding spots we occupied as kids, anyone could t here. Still, it seemed adventurous. It was a secret that we had uncovered.
“Who wants to go rst?” I asked. My hand was already hovering over the ashlight button on my phone. Maybe it was the fact that a dead person had led us to this location, but something about the underground room felt eerie.
“I will,” Owen was uick to volunteer. “Sienna, you take the back, and Everly, you take the middle.”
We assumed the positions Owen ordered us into. We all had our ashlights shining as we walked down. When we reached the bottom of the creaky staircase, there was a light switch that caused a ood of light to ow through the room.
“I think I preferred the darkness,” Sienna groaned.
With the lights on, we could see the details of the room. ere were bookshelves, desks, and
whiteboards all around. e whiteboards were lled with scribbles, unmistakably my mom’s handwriting. I picked up one of the books on the shelves, expecting it to be one of my mom’s favorite books, but instead, it was a photo album.
I fell to my knees on the cold basement oor ipping through the pictures. It was a collection of photographs from our childhood. In it, Owen and Sienna looked like how I still remembered them, full of that innocent childhood look. ere was this picture where I was crying because Owen had crushed an ant hill. I was sad because the ants would no longer have a place to live.
ere was a picture where Sienna had drawn all over my hand. I remembered telling my