"Grandma! I'm bored!" Nora complained, stomping into her grandma's kitchen.
Grandma Linda turned away from the counter where she was mixing cookie dough. "Well, what would you like to do? Do you want to help me make cookies?"
Nora shook her head. "No. I like eating cookies, grandma. Not making them."
Grandma Linda laughed. "You are your mother's daughter, aren't you."
"So, what can I do?" Nora asked, twirling her light brown hair around her finger.
Grandma Linda tried her hands off with a towel, then leaned against the counter to think. "Hmm...how about you go up to the attic and find some of my old photo albums then we can look at them together while the cookies bake?"
"Okay." Nora turned then walked out of the kitchen towards the door to the attic, which was back down the hall. She opened the door then started up the narrow wooden steps that led to the old attic. She stepped onto the old floor and dusted cobwebs out of her face with a cough.
Nora started towards the shelf in the back of the room where Grandma Linda kept her photos. The floor creaked under her feet as she walked.
She lifted a box off the top shelf and dusted it off. "I bet there are some pictures in here," she whispered as she took the top off. But there weren't any pictures in the box, just an old worn-out journal that said "The Hazelwood Chronicles By Ivy Smith" in faded gold ink.
"What is this?" Nora wondered out loud. She dropped the box on the floor, forgetting about the pictures, then started back down the stairs to ask Grandma Linda about the mysterious book.
"Grandma!" Nora called once she was back in the hallway. "I found this!" She skipped out to the kitchen where Grandma Linda was putting a batch of cookies into the oven.
She turned away and asked, "What is it, Nora?"
"This." Nora handed the old book to her grandmother, who opened the cover and read over it. After a few seconds, she sadly set the book down then held her hand to her heart.
"What's wrong?" Nora shifted from one foot to the other as she waited.
"I remember when Ivy was writing this," Grandma Linda said. "Every night she would work on that, then read it to me. I don't think she ever got to finish it, though. She caught the flu and was too sick, then, well, then she died."
"Oh..."
"You can take it home and read it if you want," Grandma Linda told her. "I can't promise it'll be done, but I still think you'll like it. Maybe you can think of an ending."
"Maybe." Nora carried the book back to the living room and carefully tucked it inside her duffel bag to take home.
******
Later that night, Nora, back at her own house now, settled down on her pink saucer chair and opened Aunt Ivy's book, "The Hazelwood Chronicles." She read the dedication page "'Dedicated to my little sister, Linda.'" That made her smile.
Nora wished she had met Aunt Ivy. She seemed really nice from Grandma Linda's stories, and Nora figured they were pretty close.
She could imagine them swimming in the pond on hot summer days, and walking to and from school together in the fall. She imagined them eating dinner together and whispering secrets at night.
Okay, enough of this, Nora told herself. I need to read.
And with that, she turned the page to Chapter One.
