Hey everyone! Here's the next chapter! Thanks for reading! Let me know what you think in the comments!
Getting into the lobby of the building was easy and I left Mei there in the hallway by the mailroom where the security camera was broken so she could pull the alarm. Two people climbing up the fire escape to the fifth floor while looking inconspicuous in broad daylight was nearly impossible.
I texted Mei to tell her it was showtime and not even 5 seconds later I heard the alarm ringing throughout the building.
"Let's go!" I told Soo-Ling as I jimmied open the window and stepped inside the empty apartment.
We crossed into my grandfather's study and I opened the big wooden armoire with the safe in it.
"This is the safe you had trouble with?" Soo-Ling laughed and pulled the thing back away from the wall. He pulled a paper clip out of his pocket and jammed it up in a little hole in the back of the safe. It said, 'reset' just beside the hole.
"You're kidding." I deadpanned. "It was that easy?!"
"I'm just experienced with this model. They use them a lot in hotels." he laughed and pulled the door of it open.
I saw my grandma's good jewelry in one side and in the other was a file of paperwork. I decided it was worth pulling everything out.
I laid the jewelry and paperwork out on the desk top, knocking the picture frames and pen holders off onto the floor. I sorted through the paperwork, taking everything with mine and my mother's names on it, including my passport. It was most of the paperwork. I was in a rush so I didn't read anything other that the names as I scanned them.
"Elie..." Soo-Ling reached for a necklace on the desk, "What is this?"
"What's-" I looked at the box he was holding and nearly started crying. It was a locket. I had never seen it before. I held it in my hand and felt grooves along the back. I checked them.
"Happy Birthday Izzie! -A" I read. I popped it open, but there were no pictures, just a quote written in soft rounded letters with no harsh edges to be found even in the most linear of letters. It said, "We would be together and have our books and at night be warm in bed together with the windows open and the starts bright."
"What does that mean?" Soo-Ling looked at it, "Do you know?"
"I think my dad gave this necklace to my mom. Isabel was her name. She died a long time ago and I never got to know my dad."
"Do you know if the words mean something? I mean besides being a sappy love bird's promise." he asked.
"It's a quote from Ernest Hemingway. My grandmother hated Hemingway. She hated everything that my dad gave my mom. She found me reading one of Ralph Waldo Emerson's books that I bought myself with my birthday money and threw it in the fireplace."
"That's horrible, what the hell? All over a damn book?"
"She said she never wanted me to be anything like my dad. She said he was a horrible person, but then again, she said a lot of things about my dad and all of them were bad so I can't believe all of them." I sighed and yanked open the top desk drawer of my grandfather's desk, fishing out the wad of emergency money from the back of the drawer.
"Is this everything you needed?" he asked.
"One more thing. My mom's diary is locked up in my grandparents room. It's in a lock box on the top of the closet. Can you grab it for me while I get some of my things?" I asked.
"It sounds like you aren't coming back here for a while. Does Mei Lin know about this?"
"She's coming with me. We're going to find my great grandmother and hopefully some more of my dad's family up in Massachusetts. Maybe they'll know where I can find him." I ran off to my room to pack a backpack. We met back up in the living room a few minutes later and fled out the fire escape.
It was 10 am when we made it back to meet Mei Lin in Times Square. Some of the greatest places to hide were in a crowd of people.
"Mei!" I waved at her as I jogged over, Soo-Ling not to far behind me. He was on a phone call talking in rapid fire Chinese so I hadn't bothered trying to talk to him since he took the call 10 minutes ago.
"You got the goods?" she asked.
"Everything is here! I got my emergency cash too so we should be all set for now." I heard Soo-Ling hang up his call and I turned back to him, "Thank you so much for your help." I smiled and took the lock box from him.
"Not a problem, I'm glad to help. I have one more thing for the two of you before you head off on your little adventure." he pulled something shiny from his pocket, "This is a credit card. It's for emergencies. Flash it in Chinatown in most major cities and they'll either recognize the name or the company it's under. Show it to Guppy at the Marina in Bayville. He'll give you a ride to Martha's Vineyard on his boat, don't worry about your motorcycle he takes mopeds all the time. When you arrive there you can take the Ferry across from the Vineyard to Barnstable." he explained.
"Thank you for everything, Soo-Ling!" I gave him a hug and at first he seemed a bit uneasy, but then his face softened and he smiled at me.
"Good luck finding your family, kid." he pat my head and gave Mei Lin a hug, "See you when you get back, cousin. If you aren't safe your mom will kill you."
Mei shuddered at the thought but then cracked a laugh as we all separated and headed off to start the long journey to Cape Cod.