Treasure Hunt

“Shut that thing off and get out of the house, now!”

“Why are you yelling at me?” I recoiled from her.

“I’ve told you a thousand times to shut your game off and you didn’t listen. Now you’re making me yell.”

What was she talking about? She hadn’t said a single thing about my game until just now when she exploded on me. I was about to press this point when I saw the look in her eyes and gave in that this was a fight better not fought. I shut my game off and stood up. “What am I supposed to do now? There’s nothing else to do here.”

“Play with toys, read a book.” She waved her hand around my room. “This place is packed with stuff to do. If you don’t think so, you can go for a walk. You just need your face away from a screen.” She stormed out, leaving me standing there.

She went on all the time about how much she hated me playing games or watching TV, but would get really mad if I pointed out that she was the one that bought them for me. She always tried to point out how many toys and books I had, but I’d already played with them all and I didn’t want to read. I didn’t like reading. Even if I hadn’t gotten tired of the toys I had, I was in no mood to play with them now. I decided I’d go for a walk. Once I was out of the house, she’d start to forget about me and kicking me off my game so when I came back there would be no reason I couldn’t pick it back up.

I picked up my jacket, stuffed my feet into my shoes, and stepped outside into the gray, dreary day. It looked like it could rain at any minute. That could work to my advantage. If I went for a walk and ended up caught in the rain, Mom would have to feel sorry for me and let me back on my game. I’d be wet, but I’d have my game.

I started off down the road, my shoes slipping off my heels with each step. They were too big for me, but I’d grown out of my shoes and Mom and Dad gave me my older brother’s old shoes to wear. They said they were perfectly good shoes and that I would grow into them. Buying me shoes that actually fit while I was in the middle of a growth spurt would be a waste of money, they said. Anything I wanted or needed was a waste of money. Even most of the toys in my room had been my brother’s. The only new toys I got were from Christmas or my birthday. I’d been blown away when I’d opened the new game system on this last Christmas. It was amazing, but I think Mom and Dad got it just to hold over my head and use as an argument anytime I asked for something new.

“She’s so proud that she bought it for me and then won’t let me play it,” I grumbled to myself and kicked a rock down the road. It skittered down the road and into the weeds. I would have liked to walk to a friend’s house, but we lived out in the country, a few miles from town. The only things around me were fields on one side of the road and woods on the other. I hated being this isolated. I kicked another rock. The road was full of rocks to kick. Rocks and beer cans. Mom and Dad used to walk the roads collecting beer cans and recycling them, saying it helped pretty the place up and was an easy way to make a few bucks. They encouraged me to start doing it myself as I got older – if I wanted the money, I would work for it. When I saw how little their bag of cans paid, I saw it not worth the work.

I kicked another can, relishing the sound it made as it bounced down the road. The metal on asphalt sounding like a battle scene out of a fantasy movie. I kicked another can.

Clink, clink, clank. Swords and spears clashing against shields and knights covered in armor.

Rocks made a different sound. The sound of billiard balls clacking on the pool table at the bowling alley in town. The sound of an avalanche starting on some far-off mountain. No avalanches here. Nothing but flat, boring, ugly land. Nothing but fields and rocks and beer cans.

I’d had enough and was going to turn around after one last rock kicked.

Clack, clack, clack, THUNK!

I stopped mid-turn at the unexpected sound. The rock had hit something that wasn’t dirt or grass. I walked after it and stepped off the road to find a briefcase lying in the grass. It didn’t look like road trash. It wasn’t beat up and dirty like it’d been sitting there for a long time. It looked clean and new. Had it fallen out of a truck today? What kind of person even carries a briefcase? I’d only seen them on TV shows set in big cities.

I looked down the road in both directions to make sure the coast was clear. The road was empty for miles. I knelt down and popped the locks, only offhandedly thinking it odd that it would be unlocked. Inside the briefcase was a stack of folders and papers that I could instantly tell meant nothing to me. Just a bunch of printed numbers. What caught my interest was the little black notebook lying on top of the stack.

It wasn’t a notebook like I used in school; it was smaller and made of a fancy soft material. I picked it up and thumbed through the pages. They too were full of names and numbers, but they were hand-written. Each name had a large number next to it and then a small number under it. “Harmon, Elliot. 90008255929. 0.005,” I read one aloud. I didn’t know what any of it meant, but the book was full of this. Every page, a name and series of numbers. This really was just some person’s business briefcase. Even the treasure found in this place was boring. I was closing the book when a message on the last page caught my attention. It wasn’t a name and numbers, but a message intended for someone to read.

$20k. In the trunk of the blue Pontiac.

Whoa. Twenty-thousand dollars. What did it mean saying it was in the trunk of the blue Pontiac? Was it telling someone where to find the money? Why would they leave a message like this and why would they put the money in the trunk of a car instead of just handing over the money?

Had I been wiser at that time, I might have been concerned about the situation. The numbers and secret briefcase may have had nefarious implications, but in my young mind I only saw one thing when I looked at the message in that little black notebook. This was a treasure map.

Somewhere there was a blue Pontiac with $20,000 secreted away in its trunk. If I could find it, I would be rich. I put the notebook back in the briefcase, closed it up, and tossed it into the woods. If someone were looking for it, they’d have a tougher time finding it now. I started back home with a plan forming in my mind. I would have Mom drive me around looking for a blue Pontiac so we could check its trunk.

A memory surfaced then. My brothers and I had played in these woods for years and I recalled coming across an area that had been used as a dumping ground for old cars. People had just driven or dragged them into the woods and left them there to rust. Could that be where the Pontiac was? Could the $20,000 be just inside these woods? I stepped into the woods, needing to find out.

I didn’t know exactly where the car graveyard was, but I should have plenty of time to look. As I made my way through the trees, my mind raced with the possibilities that this treasure could bring.

The first thing would be to get rid of these rotten shoes. In fact, no more hand-me-downs at all. I would have shoes that fit and clothes that were bought for me and not my older brother. They wouldn’t be cheap garbage either. I would have the clothes that I saw on the kids in magazines and on TV.

I would need somewhere to keep all those clothes too. My tiny closet didn’t have room and my chest-of-drawers was falling apart. That wouldn’t be a problem with this money, though. Heck, I’d buy myself my own house! I could have an entire room dedicated to clothes and shoes. And another room for toys. Not any toys with missing pieces or chipped paint – brand-new toys from my favorite movies.

If I got bored of the toys, I’d go to my game room. I’d seen people’s game rooms on YouTube and Twitch, but with this money, I could put all of those to shame. Every game and every system with their own TV. My friends would never leave my house.

I could hear Mom and Dad now, telling me how selfish I was being with this stuff, but it would be my money. I could do whatever I wanted with it. Maybe I’d buy them a new car or throw them some money to fix up the house or something. Then we’d see who would hold their charity over the other’s head.

I was walking down a hill and almost slid and fell thanks to my shoes. Yeah, they were definitely the first thing to go. That hill made me think back to my thoughts on kicking a rock and of avalanches. I would see real mountains with this money. I could travel the world and climb a mountain one week and relax on a tropical beach the next. All those places my teachers liked to talk about in Geography class, I could actually go to. I could fly to New York City and buy all the clothes I wanted from there. That’s where all the rich people bought their clothes.

I came to a stream and remembered the car graveyard had been near a stream. I had to be close. I was shaking now, the thought of being so close to this money. So close to changing my life forever. I followed the stream in what I hoped was the right direction.

I was just dreaming of eating a T-bone steak at Disney World when I caught site of a tire through the trees. I’d found it. I rushed forward, taking deep breaths to try calming my heart. I couldn’t tell how many cars there were; many of them were only pieces of cars. Most of their colors had faded into rust. I walked among them looking for any that were blue or had the Pontiac logo on them. With each one I passed, my rapidly beating heart sank a little more.

Then I saw it. It was mostly rust and exposed metal, but there were spots where the blue paint still showed on its body. There was no logo to tell what kind of car it was, but it was the only blue one. It had to be the treasure chest. I rushed to the back of the car and the trunk was lifted ever-so-slightly. Just enough that I knew it wasn’t latched. I put my hands on it and closed my eyes, steadying myself and giving a final goodbye to life as I knew it.

With one final breath, I opened my eyes and lifted the trunk.