The File chapt. 1

Pete got off the couch and stepped lightly up to the stairs, closely followed by Shannon. He glanced into the dining room. Dad was at the computer, still in his work clothes. They carefully walked up the stairs. His parent’s room was at the top, at the other end of the hall from where Pete’s room was.  He was a man on a mission. he had to find the copy of his last progress report. He had to use it to alter the new one so his Mom and Dad didn’t know how bad he was doing this quarter. He was hoping his computer skills could aid him in deceiving his parents. Shannon crossed over to her room.1

“Well, I’m not gonna get in trouble for this. You’re on your own.” She continued to watch from her doorway, though. 2

Pete opened the door to holy ground. He stepped carefully through the doorway and waited for chaos to rain down from the heavens. This was a strictly forbidden place to be. All remained quiet, though. He moved quickly to his parents closet and slid back the mirrored door. There was the filing cabinet behind all the clothes hanging awkwardly from their hangers. There was a pile on top. He started there. He didn’t see it right away as he flipped through the papers. He figured things were filed alphabetically, so he started in the middle drawer. ‘Pete’ and ‘Progress report’ were both p words, and so were near the middle of the alphabet.  He was disappointed to find the files where not in any kind of order. ‘Income tax’ was right next to ‘gas receipts’ and ‘Shannon’s medical records’ He ran his fingers over every file folder and read all the words printed on each one. It was not there. He shut the drawer quietly and went to the bottom drawer. He carefully scanned the names of each file. ‘Pay check stubs’, ‘Oil changes’, ‘Adoption papers’… It wasn’t in that drawer either. He started to gently close that one as well, when he realized what that last file had said. “Adoption?” he muttered aloud.3