Chapter 2

The Treasure Hunt

“RED!” My mom yelled upstairs. “WHAT!!!” I screamed back, hating that she’s still calling me Red and not Ginger. “Andi is on her way. Her mom just texted and said they are leaving now.” “YESSSS! Thanks, mom!” That means Andi will be here in about 30 minutes! I ran downstairs and desperately searched the kitchen for potential sleepover snacks. I found a half-eaten bag of sour cream and onion potato chips, 6 chocolate chip cookies, and 4 cans of bubbly water. I threw it all on to a platter and carried it upstairs for later. We don’t have an icebox up here, but we have a large sink area. I filled the sink with ice cold water and put the cans of bubbly water in it to stay cold. I feel like a genius when I think of stuff like that. This will get us through tonight. I plan on walking to Ray’s Fuel & Store tomorrow with Emily and Andi to buy some more snack loot for Saturday night.

I keep running to the front door and standing on my toes to see out the skinny bottom window. Still no Andi. It’s a bit too early, but I am so excited! Forget this. I am tired of standing on my toes. I’m going to wait on the front porch! I open the door and go out to lean on the lattice. I love this porch. I love how this house makes me feel! I’m Queen of the World…er um…Royal Village….er um…. State Street. LOL. Specifically, 6219 State St.

I see a slow car! It’s red! Yes! I run down the steps and fidget with the picket fence gate, trying to open it as fast as I can! ANDI!!! She’s here! I’m so excited! I missed her so much! I wait until they park the car and I run up to her and give her the biggest best hug a friend could ever give another friend! “GINGER! I missed you so much! Nice house! I can’t wait to see it!” “I miss you, too, Andi! More than you will ever know!!” “Bye, mom. See you Sunday!” Andi yelled as she shut the door of the car. We had so much to catch up on and only 2 days to do so! WE were both so excited to talk that we started spewing words at the same time. “LOL. You first! You’re the guest!” I said to Andi! “Show me around this awesome place! It’s so big! You are so lucky!” “I would be luckier if you still lived next to me and went to my current school!” I love it here, except you aren’t here.” I said to Andi. “I’m here now!” she yelled back, and we took off around the side to give a grand tour of the house.

We entered through the back door. “This is the breezeway. This is where you can put shoes if you want to take them off. I opened the second door, which led into the actual house. “There is a restroom to the right and the kitchen to the left. If you go through the kitchen, it leads to my mom and John’s master suite or to the office and spare bedroom. See? It circles around or you can enter this stairway, which leads to the upstairs part of the house. Or the stairway on the other side, which leads to the creepy basement. We only go down there to do laundry.” “Wow! It is big up here! Do you and Emily share this? Yes. Here is a hall, which leads to our bathroom. Here is Emily’s room on this side of the stairway and my room.” “WOW!” What a great room! I love your ceiling!” screeched Andi. “Thanks! I chose it over the bigger one because I thought it was cozier.” “Where is the famous attic we will be exploring?” Andi asked. “See that door?” I said. I opened it up and she ducked down and said, “WOW! There are a lot of boxes and things in there. Is some of that yours?” “NOPE. Well, they are now. Heehee. But no. That is stuff that was left here. I haven’t gone through it yet, but I can’t wait to see what we find!” “Wait. Let me see your bracelet! That is so pretty!” Andi said as she admired my bracelet. “If you ever want to know what to get me for my next birthday, I would love one with an ‘A’.” Consider it done! I can’t wait until we both have one! We can be twinsies!”

“Well, we are already in the attic! Do you want to explore it now?” “Sure!” Andi squealed excitedly. “Hang on!” I said, “Let me get our exploration kit I gathered.” “Exploration kit?” Andi said in a confused voice. “WOW! You thought of everything!” Andi said as she went through the stuff I gathered. “Well, what are we waiting for? Let’s get our gloves on and dive in!” We put our gloves on and made our way over to a couple of suitcases that were stacked on the floor. Andi grabbed one and I grabbed the other and we flung the latches as fast as we grabbed the cases. Dust flew everywhere. We flung them open and looked down and both yelled at the same time, “OH MY GOSH!” we screamed. “Doll clothes!” We were both staring in to suitcases filled with hand-sewn intricately detailed doll clothes. “These are actually kind of big. Are we sure they aren’t baby clothes?” I said to Andi and se said, “If they are, I’d hate to see that big baby!” We were both confused. Looking at baby clothes that were much larger than any baby we every knew, wondering who these hand-sewn outfits were meant for. “Let’s go see what’s under that sheet!” Andi said as she led me to a far corner of the attic. We were crouching so low since the ceiling is extremely slanted and much shorter than us. We counted to 3 together. “1, 2, 3!” and we pulled the sheet off and screamed! The last thing we expected to see what a life-size child doll, wearing an old mint green dress, standing on a green braided rug, pushing a huge mint green baby buggy stroller. “OMG. That just scared the poop out of me! I thought she was real!” I yelled. “Me too!” and we had an epiphany together and chimed at the same time, “Well, that explains the huge baby clothes!” “JINX” we said together! And started laughing loudly, relieved that the huge girl under the sheet was a life-sized doll.

“Wow! Look in the baby buggy!!” Andi said as she lifted the baby blanket up. Inside, and under the blanket was a very old, large baby doll with a crackled ceramic face and creepy eyes. The eyes were closed from lying down so long that I was surprised and scared to see them open when I sat her up. I jumped and laughed at how stupid I must’ve looked. “I don’t know whether to be excited that I have new dolls or be creeped out by them.” I said to Andi. “They sure don’t make them like this anymore. I think they are breakable. They must be really old.” Andi said back. “The house was built in 1900, so these could be as old as the house!” “Weren’t there any other homeowners in between the original and you guys?” Andi asked. “If there were, they sure didn’t bother the contents of the attic.” I said with gusto.

There were some old dusty books stacked in various spots of the attic floor. I picked on up and I rang out one of the rags I had in the bucket of water. I rang it out a lot and started wiping the cover of a book. “The History of the United States of America 1867 by Charles A. Goodrich. Here is another.” I said as I wiped the cover of a smaller book, ‘Modern Pocket Hoyle Book’ by Dick & Fitzgerald Publishers. Wow. These are so old!! Look at the crumbly yellow edges of the pages!” Andi said “Wow, Ginger, you sure have an amazing place. I would never be bored if I lived here!” I replied with “Thank you for exploring with me! This would never be so cool without you here!” “Are you kidding me?” She said “Thank YOU for inviting me! I’m sure you have new friends you could have chosen but you asked me. I am so grateful to be here with you right now! I miss you so much!” “I miss you too!” I said as I gave her a big hug. “I want to explore more but let’s grab something to drink.” I walked her over to the over-sized sink and showed her my home made cooler I made to keep the bubble water cold. “Great idea!” Andi said as she grabbed a cold bubble water from the sink. We quietly gulped for what seemed to be minutes, so thirsty from exploring! “Hey! Let’s get an attic selfie!” I was so excited to get the idea that I almost forgot to swallow the rest of my bubbly water before blurting it out. “O.k.!” Andi agreed and huddled next to me. We ducked down and the creepy standing doll and carriage were in the background of our picture. “What an awesome shot! We need to put that one in facebook! Tag me in it, ok Andi?” “No problem. Consider yourself tagged! Let me get one of you holding up one of those huge doll clothes outfits! This is so fun!”

“Red and Andi! Come eat!” My mom called from the bottom of the steps. “Yikes! I’m afraid to see what’s for dinner!” I said to Andi as we went down the steps. As we entered the kitchen, I saw about 5 plain brown bags with greasy spots on the side and 5 foam cups with straws. That could only mean one thing…Frosty’s Chill Dive burgers, fries & malts!”

“Come sit down! I remembered you liked your burgers plain, Andi.” My mom was saying as she was setting us paper plates and napkins on the table. John and Emily came in the room. John said, “I hope you don’t mind eating burgers from one of our favorite dives!” “They have the best burgers, Andi!” Emily chimed in as she grabbed her bag and shake and sat down. My mom was still up wandering around, making sure we had everything we needed. “Does anyone need anything?” John answered, “Hon, we are fine. Please sit and eat before your food gets cold and your malt gets hot.” We all sat down and each enjoyed our own yummy bag of food and chocolate malts. I was surprised John grabbed ‘out food’ since we have been very tight on funds since moving. I won’t complain, though!

“How’s the attic?” John said as he was chewing a big bite of burger. “So amazing! We found a life-size doll, a baby doll, a bunch of clothes and there is still a lot more to search!” Andi told everyone at the table all about the treasures we found so far! “Wasn’t that really creepy finding a life-size doll?” Emily asked “Yes! But that is what makes it so cool!! Its life-like and crackle faced. Breakable even!” Andi continued to explain as Emily shuddered from the description. “Keep that thing away from me!” Emily sternly stated as she ate a fry dipped in catsup. “If I were a mean sister, I would stand it by your bed as you slept at night.” I answered back to Emily. “But, I’m not mean so she will stay in the attic.” “I don’t know. Just knowing there is a life-size doll in the attic sends chills up my spine and kind of makes me not want to sleep upstairs anymore. And by the way, don’t you dare.” Emily exclaimed, bothered by the thought of the doll. “Maybe we can buy a good lock to lock the old junk in the attic”, Emily said to John. “She’s been in there this long. She won’t be needing the lock. I’m sure she will stay put.” John replied and Emily looked scared and said, “She better!” “She’s not junk!”, I cut them off “She’s one of the coolest things I think I ever found in my life! Come up and see her after we finish eating!” I normally don’t invite Emily to join Andi and I because I feel like Andi hangs with Emily more than me when she has a chance, but this time I truly wanted her to join us. I wanted her to see the cool sites and experience what we were experiencing. “Thanks, but I will pass. I have things to organize in my bedroom.” Emily said quickly without wasting any time on a response. “Well, if you change your mind, you know where to find us.” I said as Andi and I cleaned up our plates. We threw away our trash and headed back upstairs. “Thanks for the yummy food.” Andi said to my mom and John as we headed up the stairs. They responded in unison, “You’re welcome!”