Now You Don't

Chapter 2: Top Floor

I tightened my grip on the suitcase and walked inside, Daniel just behind me. He insisted that if I was coming, I had to at least get a ride with him to the hotel. When we arrived, Jack, Henley and Merrit were already there. All of them had a large suitcase with them but Henley had a trolley with at least 3 or 4. They all waved to us."Your finally here!" Henley said.

I sighed. "Sorry. Would have gotten here sooner if Daniel had just let me ride a taxi here." I said groaning.

"Your 15 this year."

We walked over to the elevator and pushed the number for the top floor. I was extremely excited. Although I knew it wasn't, the entire elevator looked like it was made out of solid gold. The elevator dinged open and I practically ran up the aisle to find our room. Our door was the farthest from any room in the entire hotel, which told me alot about how big it was inside.

I opened the door first and was the first to run into the room, pulling my suitcase behind me. It was huge. There was a giant kitchen right next to the door and in the middle of the room, there was an enormous lounge room with a 2 couches opposite each other and two individual armchairs opposite themselves as well, all turned towards a medium sized coffee table.

The others followed me in and Henley placed all her bags down. I looked over and finally noticed the giant swirling staircase leading upstairs.

I carried my suitcase upstairs to a long hallway with 7 doors. The first five doors have one name each on them, the 6th door lead to a huge bathroom, and the 7th led to the roof.

I entered the room with my name on it, which happened to be next to Daniels. I opened the door and peeked inside. There were 2 large bookshelves standing on opposite side of a double bed in the corner, with a desk at the end of the shelf. There was a mirror as tall as myself standing up against the wall and next to it sat a set of drawers. I noticed a medium sized box under the bed and made a note to myself to take a look at it later. I turned to the left and saw a large dressing screen as well.

I placed my suitcase onto the bed and then looked out my door to see the others claiming their rooms. "Looks like we're gonna be here for a while," Merrit said, his voice a little muffled as his voice echoed through the hallway.

I open my suitcase and unpacked the content of it into the drawers, stuffing my cards and magic stuff in a little box that sat on my desk. I heard a knock at the door. "If your gonna tell me to not unpack Lex, don't bother." I said, not bothering to look up as I pushed the empty suitcase under my bed.

"I'm not going to tell you to leave Emma." I heard Daniels voice say. I looked up at him before he came into my room and sat on my bed. "What did your letter say Emma?" Daniel asked me.

I shrugged. "Beats me. I only read the first few lines." I lied. Daniel didn't take it.

"We both know you read it Emma." He said, as I stood up.

"I have no idea what your talking about." I said cluelessly. I walked over to the door but Daniel blocked my path. "The longer you continue to nag me Daniel, the longer I continue to refuse." I pushed him out of the way harmlessly.

I walked down the hallway and found that everyone was already out in the kitchen, sitting at one of the 5 stools. Henley was opening the envelope that I had picked up yesterday at the apartment, addressed to all of us. She opened it and everyone looked over her shoulder to read it.

It was the blueprints for the show we had seen yesterday, and Henley lay them out on the counter, allowing all of us to see.

Daniel came up behind me and looked over my shoulder as I sat down in between Henley and Jack.

We sat in silence, all 5 of us reading a page of the blueprints. Daniel pushed the blueprints away and so did the others. "What?" I asked them. They all stared at me.

"It doesn't make sense," Daniel said, the others nodding along with him.

I looked confusingly at them. "It makes absolute perfect sense." I told them, and they continued to stare at me. I sighed and took out a tiny notepad from my pocket and a tiny pencil.

All across the blueprints there were tiny numbers and random letters, which to the others made no sense. But to me, they were a code.

I started to write stuff down off the blueprints and everyone crowded around me. Henley and Jack stayed where they were and Merrit and Daniel looked over my shoulder, with Daniel pointing things out to me.

We sat at the bench for about half an hour before I put my pencil down and Henley smiled at me. "I would be lying if I said I wasn't amazed." Henley said.

"That was amazing." Jack said to me, and Merrit nodded.

I pushed my seat back and stood up. "You guys can read over that if you want, but I'm gonna do some stuff upstairs." I walked across the massive room and up the spiral staircase. I stopped at the top of the staircase our of sight and listened.

"How is it that a 15 year old girl can figure this out, but we are just stumped on this." I heard Merrit say.

I heard a sigh. "No one really knows. She's been like this since she was about 12. She has been able to figure out the most complex things. I'm not sure if she's still the same since it's kinda been about a year and a half since I have seen her and but she used to do schoolwork that was at least two grades above her." Daniel said.

"A YEAR AND A HALF?!" I heard Henley shout. "DANIEL ATLAS! YOU HAVEN'T SEEN YOUR SISTER FOR HOW LONG?!"

"A year and a half." Daniel said, kinda of quietly, it was hard to hear.

"You would think she misses you Danny." Henley said.
"She probably doesn't. She often told me to go away if I ever visited, so I just stopped. I bet she wasn't the least bit excited when she saw me. She might have been a little happy but that's just because she didn't want to be mad at me in front of other people." Daniel said.

I had tears in my eyes. How could he say that. I couldn't take it anymore. I ran out to the top of the staircase and looked at Daniel. "You wanna know why I told you to go away? Because I was mad at you that you were never home! You just left me there! You didn't care that I had to work to live in a tiny apartment! You only care about yourself and how well your doing! I'm 17 for crying out loud!" I shouted across the room and Daniel just stared at me. "I thought you were 15." He said to me.

I looked at him in bewilderment. I couldn't believe this. "I turned 17 this morning Lex. Like I said, catch up."

-Authors Notes-
I have written up to chapter 7 so let me know if you want me to keep going!