Valentina never bragged at summer school. She never showed up with a fancy ring or necklace. Claudia had never thought Valentina was so rich. As soon as she had seen the mansion, she was sure this was one. At least it's a mansion compared to my house. Claudia had never met a rich girl, so she wasn't sure how they acted. She silently apologized to whoever she had offended whoever she stereotyped.
Claudia reached into her back pocket and pulled out the crumpled post-it note that had Valentina's address. Claudia looked at the post-it note then at the number on the mailbox. They showed the same number. She walked to her front door on the long narrow pathway. She admired the roses. It had reminded her of her house in the past. Her father planted roses around their house and Claudia always helped out. But now her mother was too busy to do the same. Claudia tried to hold it up, but was unable to do it herself. She rang the doorbell, she didn't have to wait long because Valentina opened the door only a few seconds after.
"Hi! Did you have trouble finding the house?" Valentina asked.
"No, it didn't take long." Claudia replied.
"Well come inside. I started my math homework while I was waiting for you."
Claudia was so nervous herself, that she didn't realize Valentina was as nervous as her if not more. She stepped inside her house and followed Valentina. She looked around expecting there to be statues and famous paintings, but found that the inside, unlike the outside, was quite ordinary. She came to a room which she guessed was Valentina's. She came inside and saw the room neatly organized. I don't know what I was expecting , but this room is a lot neater than I thought it would be. There was a white desk in one corner and a white bed in another. The whole room seemed to follow a pink and white theme. The bed, closet, and desk were all white. The walls and the chair were light pink.
Claudia dumped her backpack on the floor and started to pull her school stuff out of it. Valentina joined her on the floor after she pulled her backpack across the room. Claudia noticed and said, "I didn't know your backpack was that heavy."
Claudia had expected Valentina to laugh or say something like, "these teachers always give us too much homework".
However, Valentina stiffened instead and looked nervously around the room. Finally, she said, "Uh… yeah… teacher's homework…"
Claudia gave Valentina a suspicious look. What is Valentina hiding in that bag?
Valentina "So... should we start working on our homework," Valentina asked. "Sure!" As they started on their homework, all of Claudia's suspicions drifted away… at least for the moment.
"What is 6² + 66?" Claudia asked. They had finished all their homework and were now comparing their answers for math.
"I got 102," Valentina said.
"I got 78," Claudia said at the same time. Valentina said.
"Oh! I see what you did. It's exactly what I did at first, too." As Valentina explained how she got 102.
Claudia noticed that Valentina had a weird look on her face, like she had just figured something out and couldn't believe it. "Are you ok?" Claudia asked.
"Um, yeah… just fine. I, um, need to go look at something. You can stay right here." She quickly left, before Claudia could start asking her questions.
Claudia, however, wasn't about to ask questions, because she had remembered that Valentina had acted like this before when Claudia had made the joke about her backpack being so heavy.
Claudia waited for a minute. Then she poked her head out the door and looked both ways. All clear. She knew she wasn't supposed to and she knew it wasn't the right thing to do but Clauida needed to find out what was in the bag. Her curiosity was killing her. The only thing that stopped her was her ethics. Maybe the thing in the bag has something to do with the case. And if I just peek then maybe I can find something that's important to the case and then get Valentina her sisters back. Claudia was trying to convince herself that it wasn't the wrong thing to do. She took a deep breath and double checked that no one was in the hall. Then she slowly zipped open the bag. Almost afraid of what she would find. No way! Claudia's mouth dropped open.
Claudia heard footsteps coming down the hallway. Claudia quickly zipped the bag and ran to the other side of the room. She plopped down on the floor and began to pretend like she was reading the directions of a math problem. When the footsteps stopped, Claudia looked up and saw Valentina in the doorway with a dazed look on her face. It looked like she was surprised. "Valentina?" Claudia asked. When she didn't respond, Claudia asked again, "Valentina?"
Valentina snapped out of it and said, "Um… let's just finish the rest of our homework." She sat down and started to brainstorm ideas for the reading assignment. Claudia always had trouble with poems and usually needed to think a while before she started. Valentina sensing that Claudia needed some help with her poem asked, "What do you want your poems to be about?"
"Nature," Claudia replied after a few seconds.
"Ok then let's go outside and try to find you some inspiration."
Claudia nodded gratefully and stood up. She grabbed her school iPad from her backpack to use for searching up some inspiration, her reading notebook, and pencil and brought them both outside. Once she found her way to the back porch she realized that Valentina wasn't behind her. She put down her iPad, notebook, and pencil and then looked around. The backyard had a lot of flowers, all different colors. It looked like holi, like a burst of colors. She started thinking about her poem, maybe it would start with "the flowers burst with color". No, that's not right. Maybe I could do one about nature and the other one about something else. Something tapped Claudia on the shoulder. Claudia jumped. "What is this about?" Valentina asked after Claudia turned around. Valentina was holding her detective notebook. She didn't sound mad, just curious.
"It's um… well it's… it's about… it's about your sister's… sister's kidnapping," Claudia didn't know what answer would be the right one.
"I can't believe you didn't tell me. Friends tell each other everything." Claudia felt guilty. Valentina's words stung. She was so surprised, she didn't know Valentina considered her as a friend.
Then, as if someone turned onto another road. She got angry, really angry. Claudia wanted to calm down, but she couldn't. She needed to get this out of her. She almost shouted, "if friends tell each other everything, why didn't you tell me you are also investigating their kidnapping?"