Emily loved going to Sunday dinner at Grandma’s. It was a tradition since she was a little girl. Fried chicken, rolls, fried potatoes, gravy, green beans, sweet tea, and assorted pies - heaven. The menu never changed, but somehow, it never got old either.

In the past, the whole family gathered around the table in the formal dining room of the old Victorian house. After dinner, the kids played hide-and-go-seek in the dusty recesses and long-forgotten rooms of the big house. Emily’s Grandpa marathoned old football games he taped on the old console television set with its scratched wood and missing tuning knobs. The rest of the family visited in the kitchen or played horseshoes on the expansive lawn.

But now, Sunday dinners just aren’t the same. Most Sundays, the table is dismally empty - the once joyful house, filled to the brim with family and the occasional straggler Grandma found in town, now sits quiet and sorrowful. Gone were the days of Grandpa grumbling when a wayward grandchild ran in front of his TV, looking for a place to hide. A modern flat screen replaced the old console TV, but it was never on. After Grandpa died, the glue holding the family together slowly disintegrated. The grandchildren grew older, and life seemed to demand more of their time. The family grew apart.

Most Sundays, the smell of fried chicken cooking still fills the air, and flour blankets the counter where Grandma rolls out her pie crust, but the big table is woefully empty. These days, only Emily and sometimes her younger brother - when he is home from college - are at Grandma’s for Sunday dinner. Even her older sister, who made a pact with her when they were younger to never miss Sunday dinner, is noticeably absent.

This Sunday isn’t any different, in that regard. Emily’s aunts, uncles, and cousins are all “too busy” with their lives to make it to dinner, even though they promise Grandma every week they will “see her next week for dinner”, but Grandma is still in the kitchen toiling over hot oil. Her arthritic fingers bulging at the knuckle, as she works the dough for the rolls before they go into the oven. The TV in the other room may be new, but the recipes remain the same.

Flour dusts the counter and sprinkles onto the floor, waiting for her to roll out her crust. The pie is going to be cherry today. Emily offers to help, like she does every week, just to be hurriedly shooed out of the kitchen. Grandma never wants help, a labor of love she says, but Emily never gives up on trying, even though she's hustled out of the kitchen every week. However, she finally gives up on this try and relegates herself to the sitting room.

She decides to try her sister’s phone - no answer - again. She promised to be there this week, but in true Ella fashion, she is nowhere to be found. Emily knew better than to get her hopes up. Ella is always off doing God knows what with God knows who.

Emily sends her a text - a last-ditch effort. Grandma was so excited when Emily told her Ella was coming for dinner this week - she knew better. That’s why the pie is cherry this week, Ella’s favorite. Oh, well. She wouldn’t eat it, anyway. She claims to be on one of those "cleanses". She’s on one fad diet or another every month. Yet, it is one thing to let Emily down, she is used to it, but Grandma - that is unacceptable, and Emily lets her frustration show in her message.

Evan, Emily and Ella’s younger brother, is off at college, but he comes to Sunday dinner with Emily whenever he has time to come home. His school is only about three hours away, so he visits often. But it is October, and he has midterms, so he is just too busy to make it this week.

Emily is more apt to believe Evan than Ella. She doesn’t blame Evan; but Ella, she has no excuse. She is always doing this; disappearing then turning up just in time for Christmas or her birthday - whenever it benefits her. That’s what the whole family does these days, shows up for the holidays and nothing else. Emily shakes her head.

Shame, she thought.

She is tired of sitting, so she gets up and decides to explore the old house. She is sure she hid in every nook and cranny the house has to offer when she was a child hiding from her siblings and cousins. She is also sure she rifled through every room when she was “it”, looking for the ones hiding.

Nonetheless, she wanders through the dusty house searching for some nonexistent lost mystery. Grandma doesn’t clean like she used to. A thin layer of dust coats every surface she passes, and she makes a mental note to dust after dinner. She wanders from room to room on the first floor of the house, finding nothing of interest. She saw these rooms a thousand times. She pauses for a moment in her favorite room in the house - the library. The room isn’t huge, but every available space is covered in shelves with books stacked floor to ceiling. It smells of leather and old paper - her favorite smell.

She browses the shelves for a moment or two, remembering all the days she sat in the big comfy chair in the corner of the room on her Grandpa’s lap as he read her one of her favorite books, Treasure Island. Pirates! Adventure! She misses those days, she misses her Grandpa. She stifles a sob and heads for the door. No crying today.

She leaves the library and heads for the stairs. The old wood creaks under her feet as she mounts the stairs to the second floor. Her old bedroom is just beyond the landing, and she pokes her head in. Dolls and stuffed animals lie peacefully on her neatly-made bed. Her room hasn’t changed since she left for college and moved out. Grandma kept it exactly the same.

Evan and Ella’s room are untouched, as well. She turns from her room and shuts the door. She doesn’t bother looking at Ella’s or Evan’s - she knows what they looked like - it never changes. They moved in with her grandparents when she was 10, Ella was 13, and Evan was seven. Their parents disappeared without a trace, and their grandparents were the only family with room to take them in. Her parents have been gone for almost fifteen years, but the case has gone cold, and no one is still searching. Emily stifles another sob. No crying.

She moves away from the bedrooms to the side of the house seldom used. Guest bedrooms for the wayward soul Grandma found in town or the distant relative in for a visit. A music room with a neglected piano and out of tune stringed instruments. Rooms brimming with dusty antiques and rolls of old maps - her Grandpa’s weakness. She wanders in and out of these rooms, absentmindedly humming a tune. A song she can’t remember the words to - her mother used to sing it to her and Ella to put them to sleep. She wanders further down the hall and spots a door painted a deep red, the paint peeling off in wide strips to reveal a dark wood underneath.

How do I not remember this door? she thought.

She saw every room in this house a thousand times playing hide-and-go-seek. How did she miss this one? The smells from the kitchen waft up to meet her nose, and she knows dinner will be ready soon, but curiosity gets the better of her - she advances and opens the door. It creaks on its hinges but swings open easily enough. She creeps inside and fumbles to find a light. Finally, she finds a plain string hanging from the ceiling and gives it a tug, and a bare bulb sparks to light in the center of the room. It glows flickering and faint, but it is enough to look around.

The room has no windows. She peers through the dim light. To one side of the room, a great desk made of dark wood, etched and weathered as if it survived the elements, with a high-backed chair made of aged leather. Old maps litter the desk, while others are tacked to the walls. Tattered wallpaper patterned with the fleur-de-lis peel off the walls and droop to the floor like wilted flowers. The room smells of dust and age. She sneezes. The air has an oddly salty tinge. She looks around the room in amazement.

How did I miss this room? she wondered again.

She walks further into the room, running her fingers along the smooth wood of the desk. Aside from the desk, chair, and scattered maps, the room is mostly barren. Some books stacked haphazardly on the corner of the desk along with a small lamp. She riffles through the maps for a moment. They are old. Some depicted places she never heard of before. The flicker of the bare bulb hastens, threatening to go out. She tries the lamp on the desk. No luck.

This bulb is smashed.

Across from the desk against the wall is a big trunk. It is black with metal strapping. It is long - easily five feet - and deep. The front of the trunk latches on either side with a key lock in the middle. It looks like an old steamer trunk. The lock is busted, and Emily’s curiosity is at an all-time high.

This trunk would’ve been the perfect hiding spot, she thought.

She opens the trunk; the lid is heavy. A cloud of dust billows from the trunk as she lets the lid fall open. She coughs. Inside the trunk is a collection of forgotten items. She sits cross-legged on the floor and begins to inventory what she found. She pulls out an old compass with a heavy brass case and broken pocket chain, a roll of paper yellowed with age and the edges singed by fire, a parcel wrapped in soft leather, and a heavy leather-bound notebook. She sets the items on the floor next to her and examines them more closely.

She flips open the compass - it seems to still work. The roll of paper appears to have been sealed with wax at one time, but the seal is now broken and chipped away. She unrolls it. A map. The ink is smudged and washed away in some places, and the edges are charred as if someone tried to burn it. The words aren’t written in English - Spanish maybe? She can’t make out enough to be sure.

She re-rolls the map and sets it down. She opens the heavy book next. On the first page, Andrew Robinson is scrawled in dark ink - her Grandpa. She flips through the book and finds page after page of detailed notes. Some pages seem to be some sort of log, while others read more like journal entries. She is fascinated. The journal entries describe some of the places she recognizes from the maps strewn throughout the room. The log entries detail food and water supplies, as well as names and titles.

A ship’s log?

After glancing throughout the rest of the book, she sets it down. Amazement and confusion race through her mind. She unwraps the soft leather parcel and discovers an aged pistol, flintlock, and a telescoping brass cylinder intricately etched with glass at either end.

A spyglass?

The etching on the cylinder matches the etching on the compass case and the lock on the trunk. She extends the cylinder and puts the smaller end up to her eye. It is a spyglass. He heart begins to pound in her chest and her vision swims. Her head buzzes, and she feels faint.

What is happening?

She slumps to the floor.

Do I hear seagulls?