Riley's Box

Part 20

A box. 

A box? 

A box! 

Now, there was one main question on my mind: what the hell was I supposed to do with this box? 

My grandmother had essentially handed it to me and left me with no answers as to why she had given it to me. 

The party ended in the early evening and by the time I got home, I hastily unwrapped the box in my room, with my father present. 

I wasn't sure why he was there. Perhaps he was concerned my grandmother had accidentally bought me something dangerous as a birthday gift. 

"A box?" he asked me. 

My thoughts exactly. 

"No, no, dad," I started to say, with a friendly smile upon my face. "It's not just any box. Not at all. It's a golden box." 

A truly elusive, never been seen before, golden box. 

It had a strange design to it, as though it was ancient. 

My mother soon wandered into my room and looked down at my new present. 

"Hm. Perhaps it's an heirloom?" she asked. 

My father eyed it with narrowed eyes. 

"I don't know," he said, with a shrug. He squinted at the box for a couple of further moments and then eventually backed away. "I've never seen anything like it before." 

"You've never seen a box?" I asked. I couldn't help it. The blurted question had left my lips sooner than I could prevent it from doing so. 

"I've seen a box, Riley. This is different," he said. 

Well, he could certainly say that again. 

When a girl thinks about what she wants for her sixteenth birthday, usually a car or new phone or even a relationship is up there on the list. I don't think any teenage girl in the history of teenage girls has ever wanted a box. Then again, what did I know? Maybe there was a huge demand for boxes that I had previously had no idea about! 

"Maybe you could use it to store your collectibles," my mother said. 

She knew that I hadn't had collectibles since I had been a young girl. What on Earth was she talking about? 

"Grandma said that I shouldn't-" I knew what words were about to come next but I wouldn't dare speak them. My parents would probably think that I was crazy or, well, they would think my grandmother was. 

As I stared down at the box, I had to wonder for a moment as to whether it was magic. It looked as though it could be magic, but it was probably a silly thought. It was definitely a silly thought! For one thing, this wasn't an anime or a video game. For another, magic simply did not exist. At least, in my opinion, it certainly did not exist. 

"She said you shouldn't what, hija?" my father asked. 

"She said I shouldn't waste too much time in using it! Guess I'm going to have to start finding things to put in it. I'll see you two later!" I said, as I wandered to the door of my room with the both of them. 

Their mouths had come slightly agape and they looked as though they really weren't about to appreciate being shoved out of my room like this, but hey, what was I meant to do? I had important business to intend to. 

"See you later, then-" my dad had started to say, before I quickly closed the door behind them. 

Right. 

Well, that was settled and I had reached a conclusion. 

After the whole driving thing and the box as a gift, I could only conclude that my grandmother was acting extraordinarily strange. 

Nonetheless, I couldn't help but think about what she had said to me, outside the hall, earlier in the day. She had told me to never open the box. What could she possibly have meant by that, besides the obvious? 

I sincerely doubted that anything could be particularly dangerous or troublesome enough that opening the box would cause me any harm. 

With that thought in mind, I went to open the box. 

However, I couldn't do it. 

Not without the key. 

Where was the key? 

After a short while of looking for it, in a slightly mild panic, I found it on the floor beside me. 

It must have slipped out of the wrapping paper without me noticing! 

I grabbed a hold of the key, prepared to open the box, and then realised that I just could not do it. 

I couldn't go against what my grandmother had told me. 

That thought was in my mind, the moment that my phone buzzed with a new message from Jason. 

He had just texted to wish me a happy birthday again. I should have known that he would do something like that. he didn't seem to be in the most talkative of moods, since the party, now thinking about it. 

I knew that I had to prioritise Jason over some weird box, so I stood up from where I had been sat on my carpeted floor and turned to look at it. 

"You. Wait there," I said, as though there was a possibility that the box was suddenly going to grow legs and escape. 

The mental picture was slightly amusing, I would grant you, but I had more important matters to deal with! 

I needed to be a good friend. 

With that thought in mind, I raced down the stairs and out through the front door, prepared to go to a bus stop as soon as possible, so that I could get a bus to Jason's house. 

Trouble was, as soon as I was at the top of the driveway, I realised that my grandmother had parked up on the other side of the street. 

I tried to hide my surprise behind a smile. 

My grandmother waved to me, locked her car, and then made her way across the street. 

Fortunately, my grandmother could still walk fairly well. 

"Hi, mi nieta," she greeted me. 

"Alright, grandma. What's in the box?" I asked.