Experiment 13

~ Chapter 2.2: The King Family ~

I woke up early as it was the final day of school before summer break. I decided I would get all dressed up for this occasion. I started with getting a shower and brushing my teeth. I got out of the shower and looked in the mirror and thought I think I should straighten my hair today. I went with that thought and trotted down to my mother's room, just to ask her for the straightener. Upon walking in I saw my mom getting ready herself.

"Hi hunny, what are you doing up so early?" she stated with a smile.

"I wanted to get ready for my last day of school," I replied "could I possibly use your hair straightener? I was going to ask Adley but she wasn't in her room."

"Sure hunny! But before you get started could you go get your brothers up?" She paused for a moment to think, "Now that you mention that, I tried calling Adley to make sure she was up but she didn't reply...maybe she's with Jonah. Sometimes she ends up falling asleep down there." Mom says calmly.

"Sure, she could be down there or over at Elas house. They did go to the fair together last night."

"Oh right, yeah they did do that..." My mom looked like she was pondering her last words.

I walked across the hall to check with my other brother Everest. I knocked on his door to see if he'd answer. I hope Adley is there...

"It's open!" Everest called."Okay!" I pushed open the door to see Everet sitting there playing with our two cats Oliver and Liana. Liana managed to crawl on top of Everst's shoulder. She perched up there and stuck her head in the air like she owned him.

"Mew!!'

"Whats up kiddo?"

I looked around his medium sized room. His bed was in the corner, a T.V. hung across from it above a dresser, and a black bookshelf was on the other side of his bed by the built in closet.

"Have y-you seen Adley?" I tried to ask proudly.

"Nope. Maybe she's with Jonah. If you want a playmate, maybe you can go play with Lester or Ayko? " He continued to play with the kitties, his blonde hair getting eaten by Liana.

"Okay..." I was worried now but decided to go check with Jonah.

I began my journey to Jonah's room which was in the basement. Great...my least favorite place. I hated the basement, it was so creepy and dark...and just plain scary.

I could already hear my younger brother yelling from the top of the stairs.

"Stupid Zombies! Ugh! Get out of my WAY!!" 

Crash!

I shook my head and sighed. There he goes again breaking things...Moms going to throw a fit.

I wanted to do what my mom asked but I was scared of the basement. I thought it was weird that he wanted the basement at first but mom gave up fighting with him, so in the end Jonah ended up with half of the basement to himself.

One foot at a time I walked down slowly, cautious about each step I took. As I began to reach the bottom one, I stopped and spoke out.

"Hey Jonah!"

I got no response from him besides more shouting.

"Ugh!! Stop..NOOOO!! I'm DEAD! AGAIN!?" Jonah screamed.

"JONAH!" I screamed back, acting like it was a competition.

He jumped startled, then pulled down his headset.

"Why are you bothering me? What do you want?"

He was sitting on his bed which was just a mattress on the floor, it had a dark green sheet. He had a camouflage blanket over him and his pillows were falling off the bed. I noticed what broke from the corner of my eye. Really...you just had to break that. It was the first art painting dad had ever made and now it laid on the floor smashed into pieces.

"Mom wanted me to ask you something..." I said quietly, twirling my finger around my hair.

"O-kaaayyy. What is it then??" He asked harshly and I watched him die on his screen. 

I knew he was probably annoyed from me being here.

"U-Um...is A-Adley down here with y-you..." I stuttered by accident. I only ever did it when I was really nervous, but I was still taking speech therapy.

Jonah looked around the basement like I was stupid.

"U-Um U-h I'm not sure....I-It sure l-looks like she's n-not here..." Jonah mocked my stutter and tears threatened my eyes.

"O-okay...S-owry to bother y-you..." I mumbled quietly knowing I messed up some words and trotted back up the stairs carefully.

I made it to my mom's room quickly. She was still getting ready for the day.

"Mom. Adley isn't here. The boys haven't seen her either..."

"Okay hunny, here is my straightener. Go get ready for school.

I decided to give Ryan a call to see if Adley was with them. Straight away the call forwarded to the voicemail. Um...weird. I hung up quickly and waited for a few minutes. My phone started to ring. It was Ryan calling.

"Hello... have you seen Adley?"

"Have you seen Ela??" 

We ended up speaking at the same time. I barely managed to catch his words.

"You can go first." Ryan said with a small chuckle.

"Okay, sorry about that. Have you seen Adley?!" I asked frantically

"Actually...I was calling you to ask if Ela had stayed the night? ""I was going to ask you the same about Adley. She didn't come home last night...Ela didn't come home either? Where else would they have gone??" I began to get really concerned.

"No. Maybe their treehouse? But-"

The line must have got cut from the bad storm outside because the call ended suddenly.

Beep...Beep...Beep...

Shit! They are both missing. "Where would they have gone?" I began to pace back and forth, not even noticing I was talking out loud.

"If they're in the treehouse....they'll get hurt! The storm...or maybe they got lost on their way back home last night?? Or worse....they could have gotten killed....or kidnapped??"

"Mom! Mom?" Jonah yelled.

I looked over to see Jonah, my eyes blurring with tears.

"She's gone..."

"Mom what do you mean? Who's gone? Is everything okay?"

"ADLEY! She's gone....so is ELA! No one has seen them since last night...they could be hurt...."

Arms wrapped around me tightly, "Mom...mom it's okay. Don't panic, we can report it to the police after twenty-four hours...so for now all we can do is go look for them. Okay?" Jonah rubbed my back trying to calm me down.

Just then Everest walked into the room.

"What's going on in here?"

"Adley and Ela are gone. Ela isn't at home either..." Jonah spoke calmly, trying not to make me panic even more.

At this point I wouldn't be able to calm myself down, my baby is missing and so is her best friend. Anything could happen, and I could only think of the worst things that could happen.

Estelle walked into the room with tears. I pushed myself away from Jonah and hugged Estelle tightly. "Are you okay hunny?? I love you so much. I love all of you so much."

My kids gathered around me and hugged me. I can only hope now that wherever Adley and Ela were, was that they were somewhere safe from the storm and from any type of harm.