The Secret

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Dotti slipped silently out the back gate and down the sidewalk. When she got to the more crowded area of town she tried her hand at staying in the shadows.

A loud bang sounded from an alley and she jumped. Someone popped up next to her, making her jump again. "Who are you?" They asked.

"Phsaw! I should ask the same thing! Who are you?"

The girl dusted her arms off. "Quiet down, will ya? Are you another one of the seven?" Dotti nodded numbly. "Then come on! I heard someone following me a minute ago, so I ducked in the alley. We have to hurry or we'll be late."

She grabbed Dotti's arm and they went silently down the street. "Say, are you from here?" "Yes." She pushed Dotti ahead of her. "Great! You lead! I just got here from Texas."

Dotti rolled her eyes, and continued to the meeting place.

When they got there, it was complete darkness. No one. "You sure this is it," the girl asked. Dotti learned her name was Kimmy. She was a third cousin on her mother's side or something like that.

"yes I know this is the place. I'm not wrong," Dotti glared at her. Kimmy lifted her hands in surrender. " 'K 'k, I believe you!"

"Believe who for what?" The two girls turned around. Two boys and another girl were standing there.

"So this is the place," the girl asked. "That's what we figured," Kimmy said. Dotti rolled her eyes. "There's only five here. Where's the other two?"

One boy sat down against the wall. "Guess we'll just have to wait for 'em."

It didn't take much to start a conversation with them. Soon they learned what everybody's names where, how they were related, and where they lived.

The other girl was Callie. She lived in Australia.

The boy who sat down was Daniel, from Maine.

Stephen was from England.

"So how'd you all end up here," Dotti asked.

"Same way you did I suppose. Some relative showed up, said some things, gave me a slip of paper. We conversed I little bit and I finally believed what he was telling me. Then I was given orders to meet all the seven here tonight." Everyone agreed something similar had happened with them.

Finally, around 1 a.m., the last two showed up, panting. "Oh gosh! Are we late?"

Dotti recognized one of them. She laughed. "Late is a little understatement Eli. But you're always late." The boy rolled his eyes. "I can think of a couple times you never showed up for parties or important meetings Dot." Dotti and Eli had been best friends, or maybe best cousins?, since they were five.

Kimmy was greeting the other boy with a friendly punch to the arm. Yeah, she was that type of girl. Nothing wrong with that. "Hey, you broke your record!"

The boy, Ollie, rubbed his arm. "Yeah, yeah, don't have to rub it in."

"Well it looks like you're all, finally, here," a male voice said. They all looked up.