“Nick,” Mira began, softly, “Do you ever wonder if the people you think you can trust are actually untrustworthy?”
I looked up from my phone and stared at her, “Considering the fact that I have major trust issues, yes.”
She inhaled a bit, walking over towards me with a wary expression, “Well, uh. I found something in my secret santa gift bag, earlier.”
I narrowed my eyes, “What?”
She revealed a Santa hat from behind her back, but the various rips and tears that the hat had running through it made it seem like someone had decided to mangle it. I raised an eyebrow in confusion.
“But, nobody else ever comes in this house except for the seven of us. Your secret santa must think it’s a joke.”
Mira sighed, “If it’s a joke, it’s not funny.”
I silently looked at the ground. It couldn’t of been Mira’s secret santa. I was her secret santa, after all. I hadn’t gone near her gift bag all week. I opened my mouth to say something when both Kira and Isabelle rushed into the room.
“This is one sick and twisted Christmas gift.” Isabelle started with venom in her tone, holding up a poinsettia that seemed to be dead, but the colors were still bright.
Kira frowned as she showed me the old, hard, moldy gingerbread man that she had been given. It was missing a head, and it looked like it had been bitten off.
“I would’ve been fine with a gingerbread man if it wasn’t disgusting,” Kira said, “What a waste of gingerbread.”
“I don't get it. Why are y’all bringing this to me? What do you expect me to do?” I asked, looking up at them from where I sat.
“Because we’re all dumb and you’re the only one who’s smart.” Mira told me.
“Because we’re all smart but you’re just smarter.” Isabelle spoke after Mira.
“Because you’re just dumb, but we’re just too lazy to figure this out.” Kira finished.
I rolled my eyes at Kira’s response, but I stood up from my chair. As if I wasn’t already going to be busy this weekend, now I had something else to worry about.
“Wait, where’s-” I was cut off by a high-pitched scream.
Ettie.
Ettie darted into the room. There seemed to be a fire in her hazel eyes and she furiously grabbed me by the shoulders.
“I’ve been threatened!” She shouted, shaking me back and forth out of fear.
“Ettie, just calm do-”
“Someone threatened me!”
“Ettie, shut u-”
“I’VE BEEN THREATENED!”
I had to forcefully remove Ettie’s hands from my shoulders, and I tried to reassure her despite the fact that she was overreacting, as usual.
“Calm down, okay? What happened? Who threatened you?”
“I don’t know…” Ettie began, calming down, “There’s no names on the note I got, but it does say have a ho-ho-horrifying Christmas. It’s clever! It’s also scary, though…” She trailed off at the end.
I sighed. I had no clue if this was some huge and elaborate prank, but I also didn’t know if this was a real, serious issue. That’s when my first thought randomly came to me.
“Where’s Amanda and Sean?” I asked, frowning.
Mira stiffened, “I haven’t seen them since yesterday afternoon. I didn’t think that this would show up the day afterwards.”
Apparently this is a serious issue.
“Do you think they’ve been abducted?!” Isabelle asked in a tremulous voice.
“That’s pretty much the only thing that seems possible right now, especially since they haven’t been seen since yesterday and I know nothing else about this.” I said, trying my best to sound calm. My little sister was missing, how could I stay calm about this? Well, then there was Sean, and I guess I was worried about him… but not as much as I was about Amanda.
Mira didn’t meet my eyes, but she still spoke anyways, “I hope they’re okay.”
“I’m gonna find them. It’ll be okay, don’t worry about it.”
“But-” Ettie started.
“No, Ettie, I got this. I always do, right?”
She hesitated, but nodded anyways.
Kira crossed her arms, “As long as we can all agree that Isabelle and I don’t have to do anything, I’m outta here.”
She grabbed Isabelle’s arm and practically hauled her out of the door. Ettie silently followed after that. That just left Mira.
“Nick, are you sure you don’t want any help?” She started. Her voice was shaking a little, “We’re a team, remember?”
My gaze softened as I looked at her, “I was never planning to do this without you. I just didn’t want the others to think that I was putting you over them.”
A small smile grew on Mira’s face, “Okay.”
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“Well, at least we found the head of the gingerbread man!”
“But it still looks like someone bit it off.”
Mira shrugged, “Maybe they did, but they didn’t eat it. It’s moldy, so who would wanna eat it in the first place? Maybe they bit it off then spit it out.”
“Then how would it end up in Amanda’s gift bag?” I asked.
“Sean and Amanda are the ones missing, so maybe they’re just both pranking us. Amanda may have bit it off and put it in her gift bag so we’d think that something happened to her.”
“But… Amanda wouldn’t do that. It’s not in her to prank us about something that could actually be serious,” I shakily tried to explain, “She also knows how badly my anxiety flares up when one of you guys go missing.”
Mira frowned, “I guess so, but it’s still a possibility.”
I lazily reached back into Amanda’s gift bag to see if anything else was in there that we could use, and I paused as I felt my fingers run over dirt at the bottom of the bag. I didn’t say anything to Mira about it. Instead, I reached into Sean’s gift bag and felt dirt in it as well.
“What?” Mira asked, sounding confused.
“There’s dirt in the bag.” I told her.
“Why would there be dirt in there?” She began with a lost tone in her voice, “Dirt comes from outside, so, they must’ve been outside when they got abducted.”
I instantly raced past Mira, who stiffly stood there for a few seconds before following me.
“If you’re gonna run past me then at least let me know before you do it!” She called, before finally catching up with me outside.
“Sorry,” I muttered, “Anyways, I need you to tell me about what Sean and Amanda were doing yesterday before they disappeared.”
“Oh! Amanda was going to see if she could find poinsettias for an art project and she was dragging Sean along with her for help.”
My memory went back to the brightly colored and dead-looking poinsettia that Isabelle had found in her gift bag.
“I don’t know anything else, honestly,” Mira told me, “But didn’t Isabelle find a poinsettia in her gift bag?”
I nodded, slowly, “Everything that we’re coming up with is like it’s making it clearer that Sean and Amanda pranked us… I don’t wanna believe it, though.”
I could practically feel the panic attack that was slowly starting to rise up. I couldn’t let my anxiety interfere with this, I had to find my sister… and Sean.
Mira placed a hand on my shoulder, “I don’t wanna believe it either, so let’s not… at least, not yet. We don’t even have that much evidence, yet.”
I averted my gaze to look her in the eyes, “Okay, then.”
I slowly ran my gaze along the hedges that lined the edges of the building. Mira noticed what I was doing and looked at the other side. If there was dirt in the gift bags then there were probably crumbs on the ground where all of this went down.
“Nick, look.” Mira tugged on my sleeve and pointed to the other side of the building that she had been looking at.
There was a gap in the bushes, and the dirt around it was clumped up in some places while some other places barely had any dirt.
“I’m gonna run past you.” I warned Mira, like she had asked me to do earlier, and quickly skirted around her.
She spun on her heel and followed swiftly.
“Ooh! Can I guess what happened here?” She asked, eagerly.
I gave her an exasperated grin, “Sure.”
“Okay, so, when Amanda and Sean came out for poinsettias, they must’ve noticed one here. Everything else around here are rose bushes. See the roses in this bush? They’re way too brightly colored to be real, just like the poinsettia that Isabelle found in her gift bag. Plus, there’s some crumbs in the dirt, so they must come from the gingerbread men.”
My grin turned into a full-on smile, “Good job, Mira.”
She seemed to enjoy my praise due to the small smile that grew on her face, but she looked away in embarrassment.
“Okay, so what do you think that means concerning Amanda and Sean?” I asked.
“They obviously came outside and one of them noticed that there was a single poinsettia in a bunch of roses. It was colored really brightly, so it was easy to notice and it stood out. So, they both went over and something happened here. Like, maybe their abductors came out and tried to attack them! I still don’t see how the gingerbread man has to do with this.”
My mind went back to the gingerbread body and the gingerbread head that both looked like they were bitten. If there was dirt in the bag, the cookie pieces were obviously picked up from the ground and put in the bag along with the dirt it picked up. If there were crumbs on the ground then the cookies fell to the ground.
“It was a gag.” I suddenly said.
“Huh?” Mira raised an eyebrow in confusion.
“If you’re trying to kidnap someone, why would you want them to scream so everyone can hear? You want to put a gag in their mouth so they can’t say anything. They must’ve used the gingerbread man as a gag to put in one of their mouths, and they must’ve bitten it and spit it out on the ground.”
Mira clapped in excitement, “Great! We have that settled. What about what I found, though?”
“Oh, that’s right. You found a torn up Santa hat in your gift bag, right?” I asked.
When Mira nodded, I tried to think about what could’ve happened.
“Go get the hat.” I told her, trying not to sound too commanding.
After Mira darted off and back inside to get the Santa hat, I sat down, cross-legged, in the grass beside the mini crime scene that we had found. The ripped up hat couldn’t of been random. There was a pattern here, the abductors were using Christmas themed things for their abduction. I didn’t understand why, but that was an unimportant detail. Either they were wearing the hats or using them as a bag of some sort. There weren’t any other ways I could think of as to why there would be a Santa hat involved. Honestly, I didn’t even care about who the abductors were or what they were doing. I just wanted to know if my sister was safe, and I wanted to know where she was… and Sean, of course.
Mira ran out with the santa hat in her hand and let it drop into my hands once she reached me.
“Here.” She said, sounding tired and breathing hard.
I spread the santa hat out and stared at the rips and tears that went up and down the red part. I gingerly ran my finger along each of the marks. It was too thick to be a knife mark, I knew knife marks like I knew the back of my hand.
“Maybe they’re-” Mira paused, “No, nevermind.”
I immediately looked up and her, “No, Mira, you can tell me. Any idea is a good idea at this point.”
She sighed, “Okay. Maybe they’re claw marks. I’m thinking that either Amanda or Sean made those when they were trying to fight against the abductors-”
I cut her off, “Who were obviously arctic foxes considering the white fur inside the hat… anyways, continue.”
Mira took a breath, “So, since there was only one gingerbread for one gag, and there was only one santa hat, they used the gingerbread gag on one of them and the santa hat on the other. Amanda and Sean both tried to fight back by biting off the gingerbread and ripping up the hat, and the purposefully tried to leave clues behind so that we could find them all. I don’t know where the abductors could’ve brought them, though.”
“I’m guessing somewhere Christmas themed, considering that everything they’ve done has to do with Christmas for some reason.”
Mira and I were silent for a few seconds to think.
“Mira!” I suddenly exclaimed.
She gazed at me, “Huh?!”
“Ettie’s note! Didn’t it say something like have a horrifying Christmas?”
“Yeah, it said have a ho-ho-horrifying Christmas. Remember that Santa thing that Ettie bought last Friday?”
“Yeah, it was like a Santa doll. You got irritated with it, though, and threw it out somewhere near the woods in the backyard.” Mira said.
“I think they’re there.” I said, looking over at her with wide eyes.
“Oh!” Mira paused to think about it, “That makes sense.”
I stood up, letting a grin grow on my face, “You did well today, Mira. You helped solve most of this mystery. I just smoothed it out for you.”
She smiled, “O-oh, thanks.”
“C’mon, let’s see if we really solved this mystery after all.”
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“I knew it! I told you, Sean. I told you that they’d come for us.” Amanda said as she walked beside me.
Sean looked over at her, “Alright, fine, maybe I was being a bit pessimistic.”
“A bit? You were officially convinced that we would be stuck there forever.” Amanda shot back.
Turns out Amanda and Sean had been just where I thought they would be. The Santa figure that I had tossed out into the woods marked the spot where Amanda and Sean were tied to a tree with a painfully tight knot.
“How’d y’all find out what happened? Did you see the clues that we tried to leave?” Sean asked.
“Well, yeah, but Mira found most of it.” I said and winked at her after she met my gaze.
“I still haven’t found my poinsettias for my art project,” Amanda sounded disappointed, “I need them.”
I tightly grabbed my little sister’s arm, “There’s no way I’m letting out of the house until 2018 comes around.”
“But Nick…” Amanda complained.
“Forget it! I’m not losing you again.” I shot back.
I noticed how Mira grabbed Sean’s sleeve, “And I’m not losing you again, Sean!”
I watched as Sean swatted his cousin’s shoulder, “Let go of me, for goodness sake.”
I held back a laugh as the two interacted. At least Mira and I had gotten them back… that was all that mattered. However, I couldn’t help but think about the abductors. I still wanted to know who they were and why they had even bothered to abduct Amanda and Sean. I guess that was the next thing I had to figure out, but I had more time now since the two of them were back. I warily looked at Mira, and she nodded, knowing what I was thinking.
I was going to find those abductors…
And they weren’t going to like what I was going to do to them once I ended up catching them.