The Lost City of Atlantis

It was a hot sunny Sunday afternoon in Atlanta Georgia, the year being 1996 on July 3rd. I was on my way into town to pick up some things for my mother at the local grocery store, when suddenly something caught my eye. I was about to head over to it when I heard my name.

"JACK! Hurry up your mother is waiting for her supplies to cook dinner for our guests, and you know how cranky she gets when she is nervous." My father yelled.

My father gets on my nerves all the time. He always has to know where I'm at like I'm a little kid and don't know how to handle walking around in a public place by myself. For gods sake I'm 15!

Anyways I quickly got the items she needed, checked out and ran back home before she started to freak out. When I arrived home my father was in the living room chatting with our guests which was the new neighbors that just moved in across the streets few days ago.

I walked into the kitchen where my mom was and showed her the ingredients she needed. She kissed the top of my head and said thank you before returning to cook again. I walked in the living room and joined my father and the new neighbors. They were extremely nice, they had two children, a little girl that looked to be around 8 and quite shy, and a boy that was the same age as me, but his name was Connor. Connor and I talked all night, we have quite a bit of things in common.

Three hours have passed by and they soon went home. But all through dinner I couldn't stop thinking about what I saw by the grocery store today. It was an old, long rusty paper with writing all over it, I really wanted to find out what it was.

I was suddenly snapped out of my thoughts when I heard my mother call my name. "Jack...jack honey come help me clean up dinner." I did as I was told and started washing the dishes. As I was doing so my father said "So what's up? You've been acting odd all night." I told him the story of the paper I found that looked to be a map and asked him if I could go back and try to find it. He said "Well I have to go into town before work tomorrow anyway so we could go then." Before I knew it Monday rolled along, and my dad came into my room saying "Hurry up and get changed! I have to be at work at 10:00 am for a conference meeting."

I looked at the time it read 9:30am. I needed to hurry up! I quickly got dressed and styled my hair into its usua form, and ran out the door into his car. We quickly took off and we stopped at the store so I could find the paper.

Surprisingly it was in the same spot as it was yesterday... Odd. I picked up the paper and saw it was a map of Atlantis! I yelled over to my father "Dad! Dad! Come quick you have to see this!" My dad continued to protest, but eventually got out and came over to me to have a look at it.

My father said "Wow it really is a map to the Lost City of Atlantis, but I doubt it even exists anymore." "Can we go pleeeaassee, this can be our vacation for this summer, it's far less expensive than traveling all the way to Italy, please?" He replied saying "No Jack! It will take to long your mom will wonder where we're at and probably file a missing person alert or something."

Then I said "I HATE YOU! This is finally a chance that we get to spend time together and your the one that always complains we don't spend enough time together...hmm I wonder why oh yea because you always do what you want to do and never consider what I want to do!"

With that I stormed off and ran back home with the map still in my hand. My dad was yelling something at me but I really didn't care I just kept running until I reached the house. I just locked myself in my room all day. My mom would occasionally come by to give me food, and when my dad got home he tried to talk to me, but I just ignored him.

That night I slowly cried myself to sleep. I woke up the next morning to my dad barging into my room saying "Pack your bags we're going to Atlantis!" At that I jumped out of my bed and did as I was told.

I have no clue how I made him change his mind that quickly, but I simply didn't care. "Flight 219 is now boarding." I heard the flight attendant call out. "Ready for this?" My dad said. "Ready!" I replied. I can't believe this is actually happening we are going to find the Lost City of Atlantis! To be continued...