Mad Dreams

The Bad News

I walked into the kitchen and started to make cereal. Then I looked out the window and panicked.

I ran around the house until I found my dad. "Dad!" I yelled. He looked surprised. "Dad, where's the old truck?!" His expression went blank. "Honey, I-" I ran in the back yard and looked around for it. Nothing. My dad walked up behind me. "Dad how could you?!" I put my head in my hands and wept.

"Honey I had no idea it meant that much to you!" he exclaimed. "A man came by yesterday afternoon while you were gone and offered a bunch of money for it. That's how I got the phone back up." I continued to sob into my hands. My dad hugged me for a while until I felt a little better.

"Well," I started. "I'm going to-" I stopped. Should I tell him about Miranda? I will later. "-my uh friend's house." My dad held up his hand. "Oh no you're not. You're grounded." I groaned. "How long?" My dad took a second to think. "Two days." What?! "Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go to the Market for groceries. But first I have to go do Meredith's yard. So I'll be gone a while."

"Okay, dad." I sighed. What am I supposed to do all day? I can't leave the house or watch TV. So I went to my room and decided I'd take a nap. Just when I was about to fall asleep, a thought came to my mind that I hadn't thought about in years.

I reached for the night stand next to me and felt for the bottom drawer. There it was. It was a memory book that I made in 4th grade. It had all the pictures of my childhood in it, with little notes scribbled around. I opened it up.

The pages were filled with pictures of me and my friends. My heart sank as I saw pictures of some of them who had moved away. I kept looking until finally I had seen all the pictures. I missed them all so much. Most of them I still talked to.

There was a picture of me with Kasey and it said "Best Friend's Forever" and a note next to it that she wrote me in 4th grade. Then something scary occurred to me.

Miranda wasn't in any of these pictures.