Lawrence Looks for Treasure

Part 2 - Chapter 7

7

Neither Chris nor Matty answered. They didn't even look up.

'I'm serious guys. We should sneak in.'

Chris laughed. 'Oh yeah?' He said, in a mocking kind of voice.

'Yeah.'

'I dunno, man.' Matty said, also laughing but less meanly. 'Why should we?'

'Why shouldn't we?' I continued, grinning as wide and white as cotton sheets. 'There's nothing else to do. Besides, imagine stealing onto the grounds, late at night, when no one's there. Seeing a forgotten piece of history, worth millions and millions, still stuck in the dirt. We'd remember it for the rest of our lives.'

'That does sound fun,' Chris said reluctantly.

'Okay, okay—let's say we tried, hypothetically, I mean,' Matty said. 'How would we even get there? It's not like we can borrow a car. It's way too far. The bus won't even go up there.'

'I know Terryville.' Chris said. 'Me and my Dad used to fish for cod out there. The train tracks still cut through, but it's a dead town. There was a flood. Now it's pretty wooded. There are areas that haven't been logged since World War I.'

'We could bike, right along the train tracks,' I said. 'It's just past Camp Okanagan. That's what, 500 kilometres away?'

'We could,' Chris mused. 'Shouldn't take more than a week.'

'And even if we don't get there, who cares?' I continued. 'It's a change. Something different. An adventure! A way to spend one last summer together, before you go to university, Chris, and you go to Toronto, Matty.'

'What about our parents?' Matty asked.

'We'll tell em we're going camping,' I said.

'What about my work?' Matty returned.

'Aw, fuck your work, Matty.' Chris said.

'So what?' Matty persisted. 'We're just gonna bike to Terryville, hoping we find the excavation site? We don't even know where it is. The woods are heavy. We could easily get lost and die.'

Chris and I looked at each other knowingly. 'I bet we could find the location of the site written somewhere in the office.'

***

We spent hours on the floor of Chris's dad's office, surrounded by papers and half-empty boxes—the Tessio file. We went through letters and emails, statutes and memos, receipts and projections, private notes and time dockets. After hours of reading this mess closer than a couple of salsa dancers, hell, I could've been Bella's lawyer.

We didn't find anything valuable though. Chris's dad was smarter than I thought. Or, more likely, my idea was dumber. That happens to me, you know, quite a lot. I get an idea in my head. An ambitious idea. An idea where I think, oh yeah, this is it, the path to a better life. Like it'll solve my problems. I get real excited—inspired, some call it. Eventually, though, reality rings my door. And I realize that, um, logistically, my idea's actually pretty dumb. Sometimes, I realize after I've started. I may be halfway through before I see that it's not worth the effort. Other times, I just think practically about starting, and then realize, boy, that would be pretty hard, impossible, more like it. So I quit. And move to another dumb idea. From dumb idea to dumb idea: My life in six words.

Well, in this case, it was after spending hours in Chris's Dad's office that I realized. Maybe we shouldn't trek to the excavation site. We could easily get lost, considering we didn't know where the hell it was. Besides, what's the point? We probably wouldn't get far, considering it'd take a week of non-stop biking. I'd do better finding a job. I mean, what was I doing, bumming around, waiting for my friends to leave town. This idea was one big distraction. A way to delay deciding what to do instead of university. What to do with the rest of my life. It was fun, though, while it lasted. Hunting treasure would be pretty cool. Way better than anything else I could think of.

We sat on the floor of Chris's Dad's office, no longer searching, just kind of stewing in wasted effort.

'It's getting late,' Matty said. 'I should go.'

'Yeah, I guess,' Chris said.

'Hey,' I said, coming down off the high. 'Did I ever tell you about the chest I dug up on Snake Island that night I got kicked out?'

'Yes,' they both said, smirking. 'Many times.'

'Twas an old box, with an Indian head carved on it,' said Matty.

'With a big shiny object inside,' said Chris.

'Hm,' I said laughing, 'Could've sworn I kept that secret. Anyway, bit of a coincidence, huh? That Professor Tessio made her discovery right near Camp?'

'Yeah, except she wasn't high at the time,' said Chris.

'That old kook—maybe she ...' Matty began. But he was interrupted by the low groan of a machine at work.

"The garage door!" Chris said immediately. "We gotta go."

Papers and boxes were strewn all over.

"Should we clean up?" Matty asked.

"Quickly!" Chris said, jerking his head toward the door.

We cleaned in a hurry, but it was too late. Once we'd finished, we heard two voices outside the office door, and saw the handle turn. For the second time that day, Chris found himself hiding under the desk. Now, though, he had company. Squashed next to him were me and Matty. All of us, holding our breath and praying.

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