Letters to Isabella

eleven.

Isabella's POV

I sat on my desk chair with a bobby pin in my hand and a locked drawer on my lap in a desperate attempt to try and open it. I had a YouTube video pulled up on the side called, 'How to unlock ANYTHING with a simple bobby pin!' I was currently on my fifth attempt and still I'd had no such luck in opening up this strange looking drawer. I began to wonder if the contents inside of it were just old and useless but the more I pondered about the mysterious drawer the more I wanted to know what was inside of it.

I'd stumbled across it one evening before bed a couple of weeks ago. I'm not sure how it caught my attention exactly. I suppose the glaring light from the lamppost outside managed to hit the exact spot where this drawer had been tucked away and hidden. It was behind my door and although it had been a little hard to see at first the glistening bronzed padlock gave away the hiding spot to me.

Mom and Dad were downstairs talking and laughing quietly amongst themselves, probably assuming that both Bailey and I were fast asleep in our beds when in reality he was wide awake on one of his PlayStation games and I was wide awake reading whatever book I'd managed to smuggle from mom's bedroom.

I decided that it was too quiet for me to inspect the drawer and I'd most likely be heard if I even attempted to pull it across my bedroom and hide it underneath my bed. So, instead, I made a mental note of where it had been hidden and decided to wait it out until both mom and dad weren't home - luckily for me, that happened to be today.

Nona had come over to babysit Bailey and I for the evening whilst mom and dad went out on their 'date' which meant that Uncle Rocky and our new addition to the family, Auntie Adeline were free to go off and do whatever they pleased without the responsibility of taking care of their brothers kids.

The fresh smell of homemade lasagne seeped underneath my bedroom door and filled my senses as I picked up my sixth and final bobby pin. "If this doesn't work then I don't know what else will." I mumbled to myself as I began to slowly turn the bobby pin around in the lock. After a few more moments of attempting to unlock the drawer I heard a slight noise which signified that somehow little amateur me had managed to open the drawer with a bobby pin. "Oh my god did I just -"

I was quickly interrupted when the sound of footsteps retreating up the stairs made me jump out of my skin.

Someone was coming.

I quickly pushed the drawer back into the corner of the room and hurried back to my desk where I changed the YouTube video to an algebra equation. I pulled one of my maths books out from the pile of random books on my desk and flicked to a random page before exhaling deeply and waiting as the footsteps stopped abruptly at my bedroom door. "Bella? Honey? It's Nona. Can I come in?"

"Um!" I squealed. I glanced at the drawer and realised that it was still visible to anyone who decided to enter my bedroom. I quickly grabbed one of my oversized sweatshirts and chucked it on top of the drawer and gasped as Nona entered through my bedroom door. I began to giggle nervously. "Nona I - I was just -"

She wrapped her arms around her waist and tutted at me before reaching into the back pocket of her jeans and handing me a small piece of candy that was wrapped up in pretty butterfly paper. "Bella you work too hard! You're only eleven sweetie. You aren't exactly on your way to becoming the next president of the United States, although I totally wish you were because who the hell decided that Donald Trump would be a good candidate let alone a -"

"Nona!" I quickly interjected as I closed up my maths book. I turned to her with a smile and arched my back in the direction of the drawer. I couldn't risk her finding it - for all I knew she could know what was in there too. I had to be tactical. "I have a huge paper that's due by tomorrow so I really need to get on with it. Thanks so much for the candy though."