AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Up to you.” And like that, the standoffish switch had been flipped on. She rubbed her face then met his gaze. “I glanced. Open at your own risk—that’s all I’m saying.”
“Okay...” He flopped next to the shoved-aside grouping and opened the first one. The strong scent of aging, damp paper filled his nostrils, and he wrinkled his nose. When he looked inside, a strange pit welled in his chest. Treasure maps sat on top of a black piece of fabric with white paint. If he unfolded it, he’d see a skull and crossbones. “Oh.”
“Yeah. I’m not sure it has any value beyond the sentimental kind.” She leaned back, palms on the floor and attention on the box.
The instinct to toss it all spilled through him. It was from a past that didn’t matter now. Instead, he found himself pulling out the top piece of paper and unfolding it with care so it didn’t tear. “Did we ever find any of thesetreasures?”
“No. Wait... Maybe one. Remember? That wooden box under the porch, with all the chocolate coins in it?”
He smiled. “I wondered when I got older why she put so much effort into the stories.” Something metal clattered to the ground. He set the map aside and grabbed the key. It was corroded and rusted. Welded steel, looking like something that might belong to an ancient lock. Or on a chain around someone’s neck. He had no idea if old keys actually looked like this. He held it up. “Perfect example. Why go to all the effort of hiding this up here?”
Bailey furrowed her brow and studied him. “You really think that?”
“Think what?”
“That she made itallup.”
He returned her puzzled look. “Pirates didn’t hide chocolate coins under Nana’s back porch. You realize that? And the Easter Bunny isn’t real, and neither is Santa?”
“Dork.” She tossed a wadded up piece of packing paper at him, and it fell to the ground long before it reached him. “Okay. So she did some of it for you, because you loved the stories. If you resent that or have a problem with it, I’m going to think you don’t have a heart.”
“I never said that. I’m just wondering. By the time I was ten, I knew the stories weren’t real, but she kept telling them.” He expected the gnawing inside to turn to pain, but it felt light. Relieved. He realized he was smiling.
Bailey looked amused too. “Who says they’re not real? So she enhanced one or two tales. It doesn’t mean there’s no truth to them.”
He gestured to the map he’d unfolded. “Say I follow this, which looks a lot like something straight out of an Indiana Jones movie, and use the magic key. Does that mean I’ll find the pirates’ buried treasure? As nifty as that idea is, if you’re spending your time pillaging the high seas for a living, what kind of long-term investment plan is burying the gold in a box on an island?”
“The reality isn’t actually about buried treasure.” She laughed. “That part was embellishment; I’m sure. But there’s a lot of history here around this being a layover for pirate ships. Back in the late sixteen hundreds—and even later, before colonists figured out how to make their way down here—it was a good stopping point.”
“So I can’t bank my retirement on this opening a secret treasure chest, worth billions in doubloons?” He gave an exaggerated sigh.
“No. I suppose you’ll have to do it through smart investments and a wicked-scary grasp of the financial market instead. Poor you.”
“Sobbing all the way to the bank.” He tucked the key into his pocket and dove back into sifting through the contents of the box. He unfurled thepirateflag. The paint was chipped and faded, and there was no doubt an inexperienced artist—him—drew and painted the skull. Bailey did the crossbones underneath. “I’m keeping this, though,” he said.
“What are you going to do with it?”
“Hang it behind my desk during tough negotiations. What else would I do with it?”
“I don’t have a better answer.”
Every time she laughed, it filtered through him, chasing away the cobwebs and lingering darkness around why he was here in the first place. He’d do a lot to keep her smiling. The abrupt thought caught him by surprise, and he shoved it aside. Random side effect of the afternoon; that was all that was. As he dug through the box, he found hand drawn maps, homemade eye patches, and a cardboard sword. Most of it was too yellowed and fragile to be worth saving. It ached, for reasons he couldn’t explain, to toss it into the trash pile, but he didn’t have room for mildewed clutter back home.
Nestled underneath it all, was a small wooden chest. “No way.”
“What?”
He pulled it out. It had an ornate carving on the top and sides. An intricate pattern that almost looked Celtic. And it closed with a tarnished brass latch—fragile and held in place with tiny screws. “This.” He flipped the clasp and opened the lid. Foil wrappers sat inside. Gold and silver, half-torn and crumpled, and still holding the shape from when they’d been wrapped around candy.
“I can’t believe she kept that.” Bailey crawled forward, settled next to him, and sifted through the glittery trash. “I can’t believeyouput those back in there.”
“Wasn’t me.” Neither of them bought that. They’d made themselves sick that day, eating an entire box of chocolate. When it came time to clean up, he thought the foil was too pretty to throw out.God. He was a sentimental little kid. It was probably a good thing he outgrew that. He emptied the contents into a trash bag.
“What are you doing?”
“It’s junk, Ale.”
“But...” She sighed. “I know. The box is an antique, though. Hold onto that.”
