Chapter 6

When I woke up the next morning I quickly got dressed and ran down the stairs. I was almost to the kitchen when I heard the soft whispered conversation coming from my parents’ room.

At first, I thought nothing of it, my parents talked like that a lot, as these walls are very thin. It wasn’t until their conversation grew louder that I was able to hear exactly what they were saying. “No, listen to me. She disappeared! Poof! Gone! That doesn’t sound like a prank to you?” my dad said. “No” my mom replied “That was no prank. Did you see that family?! They were all crying! The mayor never cries! Her daughter IS missing!” I jumped startled by what they were saying. The mayor’s daughter? I thought. Missing? Crash! I froze. The sound had come from right beside me. I heard my parents’ conversation stop. Slowly I turned my head in the direction of where the sound had come from. Then I frowned. When I jumped my arm must have accidentally hit the coffee table and my mom’s mug had fallen of, shattering as soon as it touched the ground.

My dad stepped out of their room and looked at the broken mug lying on the floor. Then he saw me. “Max” he said hesitantly, studying my face, “How much of that did you hear?” I didn’t need to answer him, my face said it all.

He sighed loudly. “Well, I suppose we have to fill you in on the rest then. Come on.” He gestured towards the door and I slowly followed him. Mom was standing at the window, probably watching Susie play outside.

When she heard us enter the room she turned around. She had a look of distress on her face and when she saw me standing behind dad, it grew even worse. “Max, honey, what are you doing here?” she asked. I didn’t answer. Dad cleared his throat and muttered “He heard”. “Oh” mom said, as she started to walk towards me. I was confused and so before she could get to me I blurted out “What happened to the mayors daughter?” Mom and dad shared a look, and then told me everything.

The next morning at school, the disappearance of the mayor’s daughter was all anyone could talk about. The teachers were as distraught as the students, and so we got a lot of free periods. As I was walking towards lunch all I heard were parts of whispered conversations. And when I entered the cafeteria, the noise only grew louder, until it started to hurt my ears.

I walked over to my usual table and when I got there I saw Alexa, Daniel and Ella talking to eachother and laughing. As I sat down I asked why they were laughing. “Oh it’s just, well, we were thinking” Ella said “That maybe… what if someone kidnapped the mayor’s daughter? What if she didn’t vanish? What if it was just someone who was tired of her acting like the queen. Ya know?” I thought for a minute. No one had really liked the mayor’s daughter. She was stuck up, snotty and pretty vain. But I didn’t think someone would kidnap a girl just because they didn’t like her. Much less the mayor’s daughter. No, I thought something much more sinister was in play. Bit I didn’t say any of that. I just said “Maybe”.