Treasures

She left the office with her head still in a light fog. It had been a couple of days since the snow had fallen, but the walkways were still largely untouched on this end of the street. Melanie savored the sound of her boots on the snowy ice, the feel the snow crunching and crackling with each step. She loved Real Snow. The soft white crystals that blanket everything in tiny white flakes like the powdered sugar on her mother’s cupcakes. But there was something in the way the snow-covered ice crackled beneath your feet after a few days of only ‘near’ freezing temperatures…the noise that it made when her boot broke though, that was oddly satisfying. It looked like snow-- still white and crystalline on the surface, but when you stepped into it, the hard top shattered, sinking your foot into a crunchy powder below that you did not expect.

She smiled. “There is more to you than everyone expects,” she said to the path in front of her. Her aunt had said that about her when she was small. “You sit there quiet and observing, but you aren’t what anyone expects. One day you will surprise even yourself.”

The wind picked up a little as she walked to her car and her cheeks and fingertips tingled. She shoved her hands into her pockets and her fingers brushed the soft worn leather of the little black book the lawyer had given her. It had been unexpected, too. Something found months after the reading of her aunt’s will. She and her mother had inherited the old brownstone and been told at the reading that there may be some money- enough to fix up the house-- and there had been some, a few thousand dollars even, but not nearly enough to get everything done.

The lawyer said that though her Will clearly stated they were to have all of her remaining assets, her aunt had pulled most of her savings out of the bank shortly before her death and no one knew what she had done with it. Melanie and her mom had begun the process of cleaning and fixing up her Aunt’s house anyway but had not found any sign of the money. They had not talked about what to do with the house yet, though Melanie, who had been living in an apartment was considering moving in if they could get all of the repairs done. She had been surprised when the lawyer had called to say they had found an envelope for her that had gotten separated from the other papers. When she met him, he had not offered any explanation for how it had gotten separated, and there had been someone else waiting to see him, so she had not stayed to look at what she had been left, other than to open the envelop and find only this small black notebook. If looked like an old address book, but when she had quickly flipped through the pages, they seemed to be more of a sketchbook or journal, so she had pocketed it and left.

She reached her car and got in, starting it right away to warm up after her walk through the ice. While it heated up, she pulled the tiny book out of her pocket and ran her fingers over the smooth surface. It felt like so many other books in her Aunt’s house. Most of those were old though, and this one looked relatively new. It was just bigger than her palm and warm from being in her pocket. It felt comforting in her hand. She had a brief image of her aunts old, wrinkled hand in hers. Warm and comforting. She opened to the first page. “Things are not always exactly what they seem.” said the page.

It was a theme her Aunt often spoke on. She had not been what she had seemed either. Her Aunt Ida had been much older than her sister and was often mistaken for her mother when they were together. She was small and frail looking, with a pile of white hair twisted up on her head. She knitted and volunteered at the library like other old ladies, but she had been an adventurer—right up until the end. Or nearly the end. When Ida was young her mother had called her a treasure hunter, who had run off with a man who dove for sunken ships in search of gold. She would disappear for months and return with some piece of carved wooden furniture, or art from a far-off land, and a sparkle in her eye. As she got older home ended up filled with treasures from around the world. When Melanie was little, her Aunt had sent her on her own treasure hunts looking for clues around the yard. When she was diagnosed with cancer, she hadn’t told anyone. She cleaned her house and packed for her next trip. When she returned, she had been weak, and had quickly fallen ill. Melanie had offered to stay with her, but she refused, though she did allow her to come for daily visits and bring her meals. She had passed only a few weeks later.

Melanie held the notebook in her hands and let the soft warm leather remind her of her aunt’s hand. She closed her eyes for a moment, then turned to the next page.

“There is more here than meets the eye.” It read, in her aunts sloped handwriting.

Clearly, she thought with a grin. And turned the page.

On the next page, there was a sketch of a room. Melanie recognized it as the spare bedroom in her aunt’s house. There was vase on the table near the window that was colored in with blue, but the rest was just pencil.

She turned another page and saw a pencil sketch of the back garden shed. A little flower shaped tea pot in the corner of the shed was bright pink.

She flipped slowly through the rest of the book. It was short, but there were several other sketches that each had one item colored in. Something nagged at her memory. Pictures. Maps. Treasure hunts. On the last page, in her aunt’s beautiful, stylized script, “Everything you need is at the house.”

She flipped back through the book looking at the pictures again, then her eyes refocused. She grabbed her seatbelt and put the car into gear.

Picking up her phone again just before pulling away, she dialed her mother. As soon as she picked up the phone, Melanie said, “Mom, meet me at Aunt Ida’s house. Right now. I think I know what she did with her money.”