1. One part per turn. A part is 150 to 300 words. (Your word processor can count it for you. Mine is under Tools.)
2. You get one week. When it's your turn I'll e-mail you. If you can't do it, just tell me and I'll skip you, no problem, you can go next time.
3. Read ALL the parts before you write yours! Otherwise you'll have somebody's dog turn into a cat. (This happened.)
4. Don't kill off somebody else's character. Or make them move to Australia. Or anything like that. They aren't yours.
5. Keep it G. No swearing, no gross stuff, nothing scary enough to give a nine-year-old nightmares. We have nine-year-olds.
6. End your part so the next person has somewhere to go. A cliffhanger is the best! Please don't end it with "and then they woke up and it was all a dream." That's not fair to the next person.
7. Only use your first name, your age and your state. My dad says, and he's right.

Tricia had been at her grandma's house for two whole days when it finally rained, and her little brother Mathew had already asked "What can we do now?" forty-six times. She counted.

"Go up in the attic," Grandma finally said from the kitchen. "Just don't fall through anything."

The attic stairs folded down out of the hallway ceiling. At the top it smelled like dust and old newspapers and cedar pencils. There was a dress form that Mathew said looked like a lady with no head (he was right), and boxes labeled in Grandma's handwriting: CHRISTMAS. TAXES. DO NOT THROW OUT.

Under the little round window was an old trunk with leather straps. Tricia lifted the lid. Inside were a blue sweater, a jar of marbles, a stack of old comic books, and, folded into a tiny square at the very bottom, a piece of yellow paper.

It was a map. Someone had drawn Willow Street in pencil, and the creek, and a path into the woods that Tricia had never seen. At the end of the path was a big red X.

In the corner, in tiny letters, it said: J.B. + D.K. 1952. DON'T TELL.

"DON'T TELL!" Mathew read out loud, which is pretty much the exact opposite of not telling.

"Hush!" Tricia said. Grandma was downstairs singing along with the radio, so they were safe.

"J.B. is Grandma," Tricia whispered. "Before she married Grandpa her last name started with a B. I saw it on her old report card. She got a C in arithmetic."

"Who's D.K.?"

Tricia didn't know. She held the map up to the window to see it better, and that's when she saw the boy. He was in the backyard behind Grandma's, in a yellow raincoat, brushing a fat brown pony in the rain like it was the sunniest day in the world.

"That's Randy," Mathew said. "He's eleven. His pony is named Biscuit and he bites. The pony. Not Randy. I asked him yesterday while you were reading."

Well, that was just like Mathew.

The rain stopped as fast as it started, the way it does in summer. They went out to the back fence, and Biscuit tried to eat Tricia's hair, and Randy looked at the map for a long, long time.

"I know where that path is," he said. "Nobody's supposed to go back there."

"Why not?" asked Tricia.

"Because of the old mill," Randy said. "The floor's all rotted. My mom says if I go back there she'll sell Biscuit. She's kidding. I think."

Tricia turned the map over, because she had seen enough movies to know that the back of a treasure map is important. She was right. On the back, in the same tiny pencil, it said:

Start at the rock with the face.
Walk 30 steps toward the bridge.
Turn and walk 12 steps toward the tallest tree.
Dig.

"Thirty steps. Easy," said Randy.

"No," said Tricia. "Grandma was a kid when she wrote this. Kid steps are shorter than grown-up steps." This was a very scientific point. Since Tricia was the same age now that Grandma was in 1952, they made her the official step person.

"Also," said Randy, "the bridge washed away a long time ago. There's just the posts."

"Then we look for the posts."

Mathew had been very quiet. That is never a good sign with Mathew.

"Tricia," he said, and pointed back at the house. "Grandma's in the attic window. And she's looking right at us."

But when Tricia looked up, the attic window was empty. Only the curtain was moving a little, like somebody had just let go of it.

At supper Grandma didn't say one word about the attic. She made grilled cheese and tomato soup, and hummed, and once she looked at Tricia over her glasses for so long that Tricia's soup went down the wrong way.

The next morning they packed a backpack: peanut butter sandwiches, a flashlight, Band-Aids, and string cheese, because you never know. Randy left Biscuit at home because ponies can't climb over logs (that's what Randy said, but I think Biscuit just didn't want to go).

The path started behind Randy's barn. It was so grown over that you could only see it if you squinted. Then the sky turned dark green, which is the worst color for a sky, and thunder went BOOM so loud they all screamed.

"The mill!" Randy shouted. "Right there!"

They ran inside and stayed right by the door, like Randy's mom would want. Tricia pointed the flashlight at the wall.

Somebody had carved letters into the old boards, deep and careful: J.B. + D.K. And under them, hanging on a rusty nail, was a little tin can with a lid.

Tricia pried the lid off. Inside, wrapped in waxed paper, was a tiny brass key.

"A KEY!" Mathew yelled. "Keys go to things! What does it go to?"

Before anyone could answer, something huge came crashing through the weeds outside. Branches snapped. Something panted. Something was coming straight for them!

Randy grabbed a board. Tricia held up the flashlight like a sword. Mathew hid behind both of them, which was smart, actually.

Then the biggest, muddiest, shaggiest dog any of them had ever seen came galloping in, skidded on the wet floor, and sat down right on Randy's feet. Its tail went WHAP WHAP WHAP against the wall.

"It's a GREAT dog," said Mathew.

The storm stopped. They went back out into the drippy woods with the dog following, and around the next bend of the creek was a big gray rock with two dents for eyes and a crack for a mouth. It looked exactly like a grumpy old man.

"The rock with the face!"

Across the creek stood two old wooden posts. The bridge! Tricia put her back against the rock and started counting steps. "One... two... three..."

At step twenty, Mathew, who was walking backward to watch her count, went SPLOOSH right into the creek.

The creek was not deep. It only came up to Mathew's knees. But he sat down in it by accident so he was wet all over anyway.

The dog jumped in too. It thought it was a game. It licked Mathew's whole face.

"I name him Pancake," Mathew said.

"He might already have a name," said Tricia.

"Then Pancake is his middle name."

Tricia went back to the rock and counted again from the beginning. She did it very carefully. She got to thirty. She was right next to the bridge posts. Then she turned toward the tallest tree. It was a big pine tree. She walked twelve steps. Pancake walked with her.

At the twelfth step Pancake sniffed the ground. Then he started to dig with his front paws. Dirt went everywhere.

"Pancake knows!" Mathew yelled.

But they did not have a shovel. They had string cheese but no shovel.

So they ran all the way home to get one. But when they came around the side of the house, Grandma was sitting on the porch steps with her arms crossed. Next to her was a shovel.

"Looking for this?" Grandma said.

Tricia's mouth opened, but nothing came out. Randy looked at his shoes. Mathew dripped.

"I saw you with my map," Grandma said. "I'd know that map anywhere. I drew it."

"Are we in trouble?" Mathew asked.

"You're wet," said Grandma. "That's a different thing." She picked up the shovel. "D.K. was my best friend in the whole world. The summer we were eleven, her family moved away to California. Before she left we buried something together, and we promised to dig it up together someday. We never did. Then I forgot which tree." Her eyes were shiny. "I guess I'd better see it."

So they all went back down the path behind Randy's barn, with Pancake out in front like he was the leader. Grandma dug. She was a lot stronger than she looked. After ten minutes the shovel hit something. CLUNK.

It was a rusty metal lunchbox with a cowboy on the lid and a tiny brass padlock. Tricia took the key out of her pocket. It fit!

Inside was a fat yellow envelope, and on the front, in two kinds of handwriting, it said:

DO NOT OPEN UNTIL THE YEAR 2000!!!

Grandma's hands were shaking. "Well," she said. "It's close enough. Isn't it?"

Juanita, it's YOUR turn!!