Chapter 4

Jenna confirmed with the National Park and booked a cabin through Emily's reward card from American Beaver Society. I went to an optician but was tested normal on color blind and vision. I still had no clue about the whole thing a week later when we gathered at Emily's, fully packed and ready to go. Well, we were waiting for Emily to get ready.

Lake Superior was the largest freshwater lake on earth, which means it took forever to warm up. It was already May, but snow piles were still scattering around the beach. The sky was always blue, though; and the water reflected the sapphire color.

I turned my head away from our backpacks and admired the beauty outside the big windows. Most trees were still barren from the extreme winter, except the tall and straight pines. I had studied at the University of Minnesota Duluth for almost four years now, and I could not suppress the excitement to graduate in four weeks. Don’t get me wrong— I loved Duluth, but it was time to move on. Duluth was one of the cities where it was big enough to not know everyone in town, but also small enough to drive you crazy. It was always so quiet, so peaceful, and therefore so predictable. I lost my wallet three times, and somehow it came back to me untouched every time. Not that I enjoyed being robbed or something—but the city lacked excitement and energy for a college graduate.

I let out another big sigh. Four weeks, and I was done. Professor Mandy Little was kind enough to excuse Emily, Jenna, Katie and me for a week from our classes to go on this trip with her.

The sun still hadn't made its way down the horizon. I stared at the gray house next door and realized it was almost reflecting a golden color. I had lived there for the past three years, and it had been my home. I blinked when the idea of home passed through my mind, and it felt funny. I ran away from my parents on my 18^th birthday, and at that time I left them a silly note.

Mom, dad,

Thank you for all the birthday presents, but the best present you can ever offer me is freedom. And now I want to thank you for my freedom, too.

Sincerely yours.

I never went back to their luxury resident in San Francisco, CA. My dad was secretly paying for my college tuition until I found out—and then he was openly paying for it. My mom came to visit me during holidays, and literally brought me EVERYTHING. She must think I was eating dirt and living in a cave all the time. No matter how they tried to lure me back to California—money, new car, job, sunshine—I resisted the temptations and stayed. They also tried threatening, of course—but I was already doing so well here that they were more proud of me than getting mad at me. Things just worked out, I guess.

I loved my parents and I missed them terribly when I first left home, but I had to go. There was something very wrong about them, and their giant brick house. I was suffocating every minute I was even near the house, although it was one of the biggest houses in the neighborhood. Anyway, it all seemed a long time ago. I shook the memory out of my head and walked to Emily's dining table. There was a postcard on the dining table, facing down.

“Hey Emily!” I yelled as I picked up the postcard, “You've got another postcard!” It was a picture of Lake Michigan and the skyline of Chicago. I flipped the card to the other side, and it was blank. No handwriting, no stamp, no print. BLANK. "What the..."

Emily's land phone rang, and it went to voice-mail. "Hello, this is our phone. Please leave us a message after the tone."

“Emily and her friends,” An unusual voice appeared at the other end of the phone. “Please leave the building right now.” There was no emergency in the voice; I couldn't figure out the gender of the caller. It was nothing like I've heard before. It sounded like the flow of water: light, continuous, and crisp.

Emily suddenly bolted out of her bedroom upstairs, which made me startle. She must have heard the caller because she looked just as confounded as us. “There is a black Honda Civic parked outside, the keys are in ignition,” the voice echoed around the house, “Please make the right choice.” And the stranger hanged up. I couldn’t help to look outside, and gasped in surprise: The black Honda Civic was parked right there: tinted glass, rear spoiler, and premium alloy wheels.

The car was not locked, and as the stranger on the phone said, the keys were already in ignition. Without exchanging a word, the five of us got in the car with hesitation. The day was getting dark now, and the tinted glass made the car even darker. My head was spinning fast, trying to make sense of everything that happened in the past ten minutes. We must have been followed, and watched…but why…? Before I could analyze further, Emily's house was glowing fiercely, lighting the entire sky above us. Then there was an overwhelming blast that deafened me, surrounding me with waves of terror.

Passenger airbags hit me…I felt upside down…Something inside my body was definitively broken…I let out a scream in pain and passed out.