Chapter Nine

I was sitting in Leila’s room, trying to sleep, but Leila kept tossing and turning.

“Could you please stop?” I muttured.

Suddenly the lamp turned on. I glanced up and saw Leila bent over her furry blue journal. She rapidly scribbled something on the paper, then slammed the book shut. Then she scrambled out of bed, went in the closet, and came out with a bag. A travel bag. Leila started packing clothes, books, a flashlight, some money, and her diary. Then she went into the bathroom.

Why is she… I pried open the bag and opened the journal.

I can’t sleep. I’m thinking about Sia too much. Everyone is. So I decided to be the hero. I am going to go find Sia. I’ll do whatever it takes. It’s like the Great Depression all over again, and I’m going to stop it. At lunch at school tomorrow, I’m going to go to the police department to see if they found anything, then after school, I’m going to use those clues and search for my friend. Ready or not, here I come, Sia!

Leila’s going to go look for me? I can’t let her do that! She won’t find anything!

I tried to write in the journal to tell her what was happening, but every time I wrote something, it disappeared!

“Nooooo! Leila, DON’T”

I stuffed the diary back into the bag. Leila came out of the bathroom and jumped into bed. She wasn’t tossing and turning this time, but still didn’t fall asleep. For such a meaningless goose chase, she was going to need rest.

***

I followed Leila and Kelli into the police department. Leila told Kelli that she was going to go looking for me, and Kelli insisted that she would come. Yay, more people looking for me and won’t find anything.

“Two heads are better than one,” Kelli had recited.

Kelli marched up to the counter. “I would like to see Officer Dindyal, please.”

The receptionist smirked. “And what would Officer Dindyal have for you, little girl?”

Kelli slowly opened her mouth, but Leila interrupted her. “What’s that to you? And I would take note that Kelli is NOT a ‘little girl’.” Leila pronounced “little girl” in and old witch’s voice.

The woman rolled her eyes, but said something into a walkie-talkie. Then she pointed to a door that said “Breakroom”. “You’re lucky he’s on break. And fix your attitude, kid.”

“Fix your judgement,” Leila shot back as she walked through the door. Kelli followed her in, giggling. I went in behind them.

Inside, Officer Dindyal was sipping his coffee. He looked up when the three of us--two, really--came into the room. “Oh, hello girls,” he greeted kindly, unlike that crazy receptionist.

“Good afternoon,” Leila returned politely. “My friend Kelli and I have come to ask about the case about Sierra Cornaccia.”

“Oh?”

“We were wondering if you found anything important about it,” Kelli said.

The cop pushed a file towards us and shook his head. “Nothing. I was just pondering about that, actually.”

Kelli and Leila frowned.

Yes! Nothing! Now stop going to look for me! No clues, no ME.

“But…”

My friends looked up.

“There is something else that happened recently that is related to Sierra’s case…” He took a paper out of the file and showed it to them.

I kind of choked. It was a picture of my dad. Dead. With the knife.

Kelli shuddered. Leila’s eyes widened.

“Who is that?!” she cried. “Who killed him?”

“Apparently it was suicide. If you look to the left, you can see a note.”

Kelli took the photo from him. “I’m sorry for what I did to you Sierra,” she read, squinting her eyes. “Daddy?!” She gasped.

There was a moment of silence.

Finally, Leila broke it. “Did her father kidnap her?”

“We searched the house, but we didn’t find anyone.”

“I still want to go to that house,” Leila said. “Just in case.”

Officer Dindyal jotted something down on a piece of paper and handed it to Kelli. “The address.”

Kelli nodded.

Leila stepped towards the door, then turned around. “Thank you,” she breathed.

“Anytime.”

***

Kelli crawled through the window of Brad’s house and pulled Leila through. I just walked through the door, but they didn’t seem to see the door open.

“Ok, the plan is: spread out and search for anything useful. Read all the papers you find. Search through the laundry basket. We need all the information we can get. Got it?”

Kelli nodded. The two girls spread out and started to look. When they didn’t find anything downstairs, they went upstairs and searched his bedroom. I followed them. Then I saw it. A piece of paper. It said “BRAD BRAD BRAD BRAD BRAD BRAD BRAD!”

The notes!

The pad of paper and a pencil appeared in the ball again. I picked it up and wrote:

Leila! Kelli! It’s Sia! Somehow I got trapped in a bubble and no one can see me but I’m in the same room as you! I wasn’t kidnapped! HELP!

I was so excited I could’ve burst.

Speaking of burst, the bubble just burst my happy bubble (not the actual one I’m in right now). When I tried to push the note out, the note didn’t get out.

Aaaarrrgh!

I just had to hope that they would find the notes I sent my dad.

Kelli picked up a piece of paper. “Hey… what’s this?”

“Yes!” I shouted.

Leila walked over curiously. “It says, ‘I’m in here’”

“That’s Sia’s favorite song!” Kelli exclaimed.

Leila picked up another note. “Can anybody see me?”

“Can anybody help?” Kelli read.

Yes! Help meeeee!

“Was her dad writing the lyrics to that song?” Kelli muttered. “What the heck?”

“That’s Sia’s handwriting, though,” Leila murmured. “I’m in a… trapped! Help me get out!” Leila read. “This one got water damaged. I can’t read it.”

Noooooooo! I thought. Maybe they could find more notes.

But there were no notes left. All they had were that water damaged one and the other small notes. Maybe I could write more. Maybe if I write enough they could figure out what really happened and they could help me get out. There was a flicker of hope inside of me. Suddenly a pen and paper appeared inside the bubble. There was writing on one of the pages.

You can only write to them when you're at their house.

Then off to Leila’s I go.

***

When I got to her house I went up to her room I sat on her desk and wrote:

I miss you.

My note just disappeared, but then it reappeared on her desk.

I'm trapped and I need help getting out. Please help me.

Suddenly the pen and paper disappeared. Leila must be home, because I heard footsteps. It was Leila and Kelli. They slowly walked to the desk.

“OH MY GOD!” Leila exclaimed.

“Who w-w-wrote that?” Kelli was stuttering. She only does that when she's scared.

“It must be Sia!” Leila cried excitedly.

“But what does the note mean… do you think someone kidnapped her?” asked Kelli.

“No, how do you think she wrote that?” Leila pointed out.

“Then maybe she's hiding from someone.” said Kelli.

“She literally has no one to hide from! Her dad is dead! No one else can be worthy of hiding from!” Leila said angrily.

“OMG, what if she's dead and communicating with us as a ghost?” exclaimed Kelli.

“Oh my gosh! How stupid can you be? She wouldn't be able to write, she wouldn't be trapped, and how would she need our help? Oh wait! Maybe we can bring her back to life, cause we have SUPER POWERS,” sneered Leila sarcastically.

“Geez, you don't have to be so rude about it,” said Kelli in her defense. “What do you think happened?”

“I don't know, maybe she’s trapped inside her head and hiding from her thoughts, or maybe trapped in something literally.” said Leila

“Like a bubble?” said Kelli.

“Don’t be ridiculous, I don't think it's possible” Leila said, frustrated.

Kelli muttered something under her breath barely audible.

“Ok, ok, sorry, but I’m just really stressed right now,” Leila explained.

“We all are,” Kelli mumbled.

Leila pulled up another chair and sat down in the original one. “Let’s put what we have together. Maybe we can figure this out.”

As Kelli took a seat beside Leila and they went over the notes, I tiptoed out the room, went to Kelli’s house and in her room, and began to write everything I knew about my situation.