The journals

The morning sun blazed through the windows of my mom's office. I had to get out of there before my parents caught me. My hands started to sweat. I was only thinking one thing: Run. The stack of journals I had been looking through was stuffed under my arm while I ran to my room. I closed the door and put the pile down.

I heard the door to my parents' room open and the sound of the boiling water in the kitchen. After a while, I could smell the smoky scent of coffee slowly getting stronger. I decided I was safe, with the journals stuffed into my old backpack. I had to go somewhere else to look through the journals, it was too risky to do it at home.

The only other place I could think of was Matia's. "I'm going out!" I said to my parents as I headed out the door.

Knock! Knock! I waited for a long time until finally Matia opened the door.

"I've got something I need you to take a look at," I told her.

She looked at me weird, but invited me inside.

I found a place to sit down on the sofa. "Do you know Syllia?"

"Syllia Farrel?"

I nodded and pulled out the journals.

"Didn't she die eight years ago?"

"That's what I thought too, until a few days ago." I told her everything that happened to me.

"Leslie, do you actually think that Syllia's alive?"

"Why wouldn't I?"

"Because everyone thinks that Syllia has been dead for eight years."

"Then how did Maylin disappear?" I asked.

When she still said nothing I started talking. "I think I can prove that my parents know it too." I took out the journals. "These are my mom's. I think she wrote something about it all in them. We just have to find it."

We started reading through the journals. Hours passed, our stomachs grumbled, my head hurt, Matia rubbed her eyes, and we still found nothing. My eyes were also starting to ache, I flipped to another page. "Matia! I think I found it."

I started reading it out loud: "Today, the Farrels came to find me to talk to me about Syllia. They said that she just disappeared, no one knew where she went. They asked me not to tell anyone about it, that they couldn't bear to think she just left. I found out the next day that they told everyone Syllia had died. When I asked why, they never did really explain. I didn't want to ask much. I couldn't imagine losing Leslie. Who was I to judge?"