Not all of us are perfect-Chapter 2

-May 1st, 1990

Okay, breathe in and out. Calm down, Jules. We don't want to have a panic attack, do we now? After steadying my breath, I pushed the door to Caleb's room. Here goes nothing; you got this.

"Oh, hey Jules. What's up, kiddo?" Caleb says, slightly startled by my arrival.

"Nothing much, um, I just have a question?" I ask. What are you doing, Jules?

"Sure, go for it," he reassures me, noticing my twitchy, anxious behavior.

"Have you ever heard about the Paris Mansion? Cuz, I just found out that we have a mansion," I say. Gosh, you sound so stupid, Jules. Shut up, shut up!

"Oh yeah, you learn about it when you are 18, and there's this whole thing where you inherit something ‘special’ that steers you on the right path. Or something, I don't really know; it's like a mansion full of expensive things that our family has owned for decades. Has it been a century? I don't know. I inherited our grandpa's brother's pilot hat from the U.S Airforce," he rambles while spinning a pair of car keys.

"Wait, is that why you wanted to join the Airforce? Cuz of a hat?" I question, angry tears starting to well up in my eyes.

"No, it was encouraging, but- wait, are you crying, Jules?" Caleb asks, softly getting up from his chair.

He walks over and pulls me into a tight hug. Gosh, I couldn't even hold in a few tears. I didn't want Caleb to leave, to abandon me. Sensing my thoughts, Caleb looks me in my eyes and says,

"Juliana Valentina Paris, you listen to me; I am not abandoning you. I'll be back for vacation and for some days off as well. Nothing is going to happen that's going to keep me from being with you. You can always write letters, and we'll stay in contact. There's nothing to worry about."

He wipes my tears away. And at that point, I couldn't hold it in anymore because everything was not going to be okay.

"No, listen, I heard dad and Aunt Jackie talking in one of the rooms. And I heard this…."

Using my photographic memory, I repeated exactly what I heard to Caleb. Sitting down, his face turned from shock to confusion to stress.

"Do you know anything about this--"

"Sorry for interrupting, but I do know what this is about," Julian said, pushing open the door and walking into the room.

"Julian! I said not to let them know we were eavesdropping! Wow, you're such a snoop; you can't keep your nose out of anything these days." Julie sneered, obviously mad at Julian for something.

"I'm a snoop? Well, hello there, Miss I'm-so-innocent; you were the one rummaging through mom's jewelry so you could go to that little party of yours. Guys, did you know that Miss Julie here has a secret boyfriend? And she's been hiding it from the rents because he vapes and has tattoos. Oh, and piercings, let me add. Wait, and did I tell you that he..." Julian kept on rambling on and on about Julie's secret boyfriend.

"Alright, that's enough. I said ENOUGH! We do not need to know every little detail about Julie's little boyfriend. And we'll keep your secret. Julian, please shut up and tell us what you know about the situation," Caleb said, slightly annoyed at the twins.

Julian replies, "Aye-aye Sir. Okay, so listen to this. I was walking through the house the other day--"

"Can you just get straight to the point?" Julie snaps, pissed at her twin for spilling her secret.

"Alright, sheesh, who ruffled your feathers? Anyways, there are 5 siblings, right? 5 is an odd number, so you know, things can't be split evenly into five. Since dad was the only male, he got most of the goods that grandpappy left. This obviously made the others angry, you know what I mean? Lawyers were called, and court hearings happened. And then dad still got the majority, except the sisters each got a little more. Blah, blah, blah. Our aunts never stop complaining. I remember the other day…."

"Julian, will you get back on topic! For Jesus' freaken sake!" Julie snapped again. Something definitely happened between them. Julie never gets this mad.

"Jeez, okay. Back to the topic. Now at your grand wedding Caleb, Aunt Jackie, in front of most of the people living in East Hamptons, will hand over that beautiful necklace to Amanda. As Jules said, it's missing, or shall we say stolen. I looked at dad's book in which he keeps checking all the items in the mansion, and the necklace isn't the only thing missing. The emerald, green gemstone collection is gone. The paintings of Pablo Picasso that our family collected are gone. So, on so forth, we got a lot of stuff in there. And there are other things, but my mouth is getting kind of dry," Julian says, his mouth exhausted.

He grabs a water bottle on Caleb's desk and starts gulping it down. So basically, we were getting robbed. But by who? I mean, since I never heard of it, that means not many people know it exists, so that means one thing, right? It's got to be someone in the circle.

"Who knows about the Paris Mansion?" I asked them.

"Well, all five siblings know, the uncles, their children, I assume, lawyers, family friends. I don't know who else," Julian says, thinking aloud.

"We have to find this robber. You know what dad said; if we don't figure out what's going on, our family will be torn apart. I can't let that happen; we need a plan. Also, this will be a great experience for my future of being a detective. I'll call my squad to help out." I speak.

"We're like teenagers with one guy who just reached the drinking age; how are we going to find some criminal mastermind who's been going behind everyone's back and trying to destroy our family?" Julie questions me.

"Guys, calm. Take a chill pill; no one's out to get us. I'm pretty sure it's some random old robber. The police can deal with this." Julian says, not caring about anything in life besides snooping on people.

"Of course, you don't care. Here's your nose back, Mr. Take-a-chill-pill. It was in my business" Julie sneers.

I mouth to Caleb CODE RED. We've got to get the twins away from each other, or else they might just start physically fighting. And it's happened before, and the damage is not pretty.

"Why don't we solve this case, you know, since school's let out, and we've got nothing else to do with our lives," I say, trying to settle things down.

"You mean besides Julie making out with her secret boyfriend," Julian teases.

"You know what, you little-"

"Why don't we make this team eight? Hmm? I can help with the connections I have in this town" Amanda says, startling everyone in the room.

"Woah, dude, where did you come from?" Caleb asks.

"Nowhere; you said we were gonna have some ice cream, so I came and heard this little plan to catch a thief. I want in," Amanda says.

"You're in; let me call the squad. Let's meet at the beach where we surf. Amanda, do you think you can get us some files on the case? I'm pretty sure my dad reported this." I ask, ready for a great adventure.

"Sure, girl, I'll sneak into my dad's office and find what I can," Amanda replies.

With that, everyone leaves, and I head out to grab my skateboard. It was time to convince my friends that this plan would be fun and not dangerous at all. I mean, after all, how difficult can catching a thief be?