
Every idea that you guys are throwing around right now seems like it could be right. Like, this could just be a giant game of dress-up for Amanda as LINDARTIST seems to think? Or maybe ♥MLE♥ is right and Amanda’s parents are in serious trouble and she has to protect them, to keep their identities a secret. Maybe they are really famous. They all could be true like AllieK believes.
Anyway, I’m not the Van Gogh type, but I’d give my guitar-strumming hand to see Amanda stroll down the hallway in her platinum wig right now. But since that’s not happening—what lead do we follow? I feel like that guy in the poem about choosing the road less traveled. Only, instead of just two roads there are ten! And they’re not just roads, they’re super, interstate highways. . . . And there’s traffic!
I was sulking all day, not knowing what to do. When I met up with Callie and Nia after school, I could tell their moods were pretty much the same as mine. We decided to grab some comfort food at the Orion Diner. It’s my favorite place. Their pancakes are amazing. But it was harder than we thought to talk about anything but Amanda. Instead of clearing our cluttered brains, we just brooded.
Three milkshakes and a giant plate of fries later, we had talked ourselves into exhaustion. “Every time I read the debates on the website I’m convinced of a new theory. Everything seems possible.” Nia shook her head. We were about to leave when Callie gasped. She launched across the table and grabbed one of the cups of crayons they keep there for little kids. She dumped out an orange one and began furiously drawing on the paper placemat. Nia and I looked at each other, worried. I honestly thought she had just snapped, you know, gone crazy. Someone was bound to crack, I just thought for sure it was going to be me.
“Remember when catrin was talking in Debates about a triangle location? LOOK!!!!” She yelled, waving the placemat at us. There was a crude cartoon map of Orion on the mat, it’s meant for tourists, but Callie’s was now covered in orange crayon circles. Nia and I exchanged another look of confusion, and I’ll be honest, concern.
“I’m not exactly up for a game of tic-tac-toe, Callie,” Nia snapped. But Calie didn’t flinch, her orange crayon flew over the page.
“These are all the places we thought Amanda might be. All the places she told us she lived. Our first reaction to her going missing was to visit THESE places!” Callie beamed, pointing at each orange circle.
“Okay. . .” I said. “so. . .?”
“See!” She began to draw lines between the circles, as if she were playing Connect the Dots.
“I still don’t get it.” Nia squinted at the odd markings on the map.
“Each circle is a star!” Callie was shaking with excitement. “All the places Amanda told us about, they make up this shape!”
She shoved her strange drawing at us, triumphantly: “The constellation Orion!”
