Mystery Key

"#WritcoStoryPrompt1
The parcel that had arrived today, contained an old key and a list of instructions to use it."
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Emily was not expecting this parcel, and did not recognize the sender. She read the instructions on what to do with the old key, and as she read what to do with it and what it unlocked, she became more intrigued by the moment.

She got into her car with an overnight bag of stuff for the next few days and drove to the first place in the instructions, with the key safely tucked away inside her purse. When she got to the location, something looked vaguely familiar to her. Emily sat in her car for a few moments wondering why the town seemed familiar to her.

After a few minutes, she took some deep breaths then got out of the car and followed the next instructions on the list on how to use the mysterious key.

The first of 2 places on the list in the set of instructions led her to a bank about 25 miles away from her home. She went inside and asked the woman behind the counter for the box number listed in the instructions on how to use the mysterious old key. The woman asked some questions and Emily must have gotten them all right because she was told that she was expected and then led to a room and given a box, which the woman opened with a special key.

Inside the box was some beautiful jewelry, old photos, a diary, and $555,000 in cash. Emily's jaw dropped. She was not sure what was more shocking, the vaguely familiar people in the photos or the jewelry and large sum of money that was left to her in her name. The woman asked if she needed a drink of water, which Emily gratefully accepted and she rushed off to get her the water. When she returned, she told Emily she realized she must be in a state of shock, but that everything in that box was truly hers, and that there were more surprises in store when she saw where the old key would lead her.

Emily drank the cup of cold water given to her then closed the box, took the key given to her to open it again later on, thanked the kind woman then left for the 2nd and final destination on the list of instructions for how to use the mysterious key. When she was about 3/4 of the way through the list of instructions, and at the final destination on the list, it finally dawned on Emily why the place the key led her to seemed so familiar. She had been there as a child a long time ago, when she was about 5 years old.

Suddenly memories of the place came flooding back to her and a feeling of nostalgia washed over her. She paused for a moment to catch her breath before resuming with the list of instructions. Her final destination on the list led her to a cottage overlooking the ocean in a small seaside town about 30 miles from where she lived.

Emily couldn't believe it! This was her grandmother's house. She used to dream of living there when she was a little girl because she loved the ocean. Her grandmother had just recently died, and the parcel had been given to the postal service to be delivered to Emily upon her grandmother's death. Funeral arrangements had been made according to the woman at the bank, but in the set of instructions was what to do with belongings that had already been packed up and ready to be picked up from the owner of the local thrift store. All Emily has to do was put the belongings outside on the front porch before going to bed that night.

When Emily got inside the house, there was a letter waiting for her on the table in the entryway into the living room. Tears welled up in her eyes as she read her grandmother's final words to her from beyond. The letter was explaining how dearly her grandmother had loved her and she had remembered how much Emily loved that house and the ocean, and since her mom - her grandmother's daughter - had passed away a few years previous, she could not imagine leaving the house to anyone else.

Emily got back inside her car a little while later and drove to the Diner she had gone to with her mom and grandmother as a little girl. She ordered a light meal since she was still recovering from the shock of everything that began with the arrival of the parcel with the mysterious old key. The waitress looked at her with an odd expression on her face.

Then she blurted out that she was Rose's granddaughter and told Emily she had been hoping to see her soon, since she had heard of her grandmother's passing. The waitress, Sue, introduced herself and informed Emily she would be attending the funeral and offered to meet there at the Diner and go together. Emily accepted since she had not been to this seaside town in a long time and Sue would know how to get church faster, plus she was unsure she would be able to drive since she had loved her Nana Rose dearly.

She'd had no clue Nana Rose had been sick or was dying because she last saw her at her mother's (Rose's daughter) funeral a few years previous and she seemed healthy to Emily, other than her heart being broken over her daughter's death at such a young age. She and Nana Rose were both broken-hearted over the loss of their daughter/mother Jade. And now her grandmother was gone too.

When she was done eating, Emily asked for the check, but Sue told her the whole meal was on the house and so Emily kindly thanked her then drive back to her grandmother's house. At nighttime, she put the boxes of clothes and other belongings out on the front porch as she was instructed to do and then got ready for bed and went to sleep.

The next morning, the boxes were gone and a note from the lady who had picked them up was taped to the front door thanking Emily for leaving Rose's belongings on the front porch and offering her condolences for her loss. According to the list of instructions on what to do with the mysterious old key, there was just one thing left to do. She took a few deep breaths and then went into her grandmother's room. She found the jewelry box on her grandmother's dresser, inserted the key and turned it then opened the box up.

Inside the jewelry box was some jewelry that had not been in the safety deposit box, including a locket that when Emily opened it, contained a photo of her, her mom and Nana Rose. The photo had been taken the last time she and her mom had visited Nana Rose more than 2 decades ago. Nana Rose had been the one to visit them after that because she had lost her husband - Emily's grandfather, and his funeral had been the reason she and her mom had been there the final visit to that house and the sma seaside town.

Emily placed the locket around her neck and made a silent promise to her Nana Rose to take good care of it and if her home. Afterwards, she went to the local grocery store to get supplies she would need for the next week, as she usually went grocery shopping once a week. The cashier recognized something familiar in her and then realized she was Rose's granddaughter. Then the lady behind her called Emily by her name and exclaimed how she hadn't seen her since Emily was a little girl, about 5 years old and gave her a hug while offering her condolences over her grandmother's death.

She and the cashier were also apparently friends of her Nana Rose and would both be at the funeral the next day. Emily told them that a Miss Sue from the Diner would be driving her to the church for the funeral as she got money out of her purse to pay for her groceries. But the woman behind her, Claire, insisted she pay for the groceries and for her to put her money away. Emily tried to politely decline, but the woman wouldn't take no for an answer so she finally reluctantly allowed for Claire to pay for her groceries and thanked her and Sarah, the cashier, before heading back to her car with her bagged groceries in her shopping cart.

When she got back to her grandmother's house, Emily marveled at how Beloved her Nana Rose was and how friendly everyone in this small town was, as she unloaded her groceries and put them away. Late in the afternoon, her grandmother's house phone rang and when she picked up the phone to see who was calling, wondering who it could be since no one other than the people she had talked to in person over the past 2 days knew she was there, it turned out to be the minister of the local church.

He was calling to make sure Emily knew what time the funeral was the following day and find out if she needed a ride. She told him that yes she did know what time to be there and that she was meeting the kind waitress at the Diner and that she would be driving her to and from the funeral. He gave her some instructions and more information on the funeral and told her he would see her soon and then they both hung up at the same time. Then she realized she had not called her fiancé about all of this and immediately called him.

There were a lot of people at her grandmother's funeral. It seemed all of Emily's living relatives had been informed of Nana Rose's death, the whole small town and people from neighboring towns were also there to say goodbye to their dear Nana, aunt, cousin, or close friend. Her fiancé also showed up, for moral support. He and Emily learned quite a bit about both her Nana and her grandfather (though mainly her Nana) that day and after the service and burial, almost everyone followed her and Sue back to the Diner to eat and reminisce about their dearly departed Rose. Some of the family members (all who could fit) stayed with Emily at the house, and the rest were staying at the local Inn a few blocks away. Her fiancé Matt stayed at the Inn as well so she could have more time with her relatives.

Emily and Matt spent the next few days talking about how Emily had been bequeathed this beautiful cottage and if Emily accepted it and moved in, she would be moving 30 miles closer to him. Matt lived in the next state over, or about a 2 hour drive to her place 30 miles away, or about a 1 and 1/2 hour drive from her Nana's small town. And Emily was a journalist and was also writing a book, but she could do both of these things from anywhere with her laptop. Her relatives also thought it was a good idea to accept the cottage since they knew how much she had always wanted to live there someday.

After her relatives had left to return to their own homes, she asked Matt to go with her back to her place to help her pack and move in his big truck. He happily agreed and they went back to her apartment with empty boxes of varies sizes and spent 2 days packing, and they rented a Uhaul truck for a decent price, which Emily rode in the passenger seat while Matt drove it with all of her stuff that would not fit in his truck, unloaded the boxes into the cottage, are at the Diner and then drove back to her apartment. They stayed overnight in her 2 bedroom 1 bathroom apartment since it was dark when they got back.

Emily had called her boss a couple of days previous, the moment she had decided to make the move, to fill her in on the move and the article she would be writing as a tribute to her Nana Rose. Her boss was on board with all of it and wished her luck in her new home and agreed that as long as Emily did not mind traveling a couple of times a month for in-person meetings, that she could continue to work for her newspaper of she desired. Emily agreed to it, but let her know in person before leaving with everything that fit in Matt's truck. She handed her boss, Sandy, her finished article and waited for her to proofread it before she left. Sandy approved the article as written and promised to print it in the next day's edition then have Emily a hug and wished her well.

Matt was waiting in the truck and Emily came running towards it gleefully exclaiming that Sandy was going to run the article in the next day's paper and said she was ready to go. So they drove back to her Nana Rose's cottage and a couple of months later, they were married and he moved in to the cottage and transferred his work to the nearby city that was about 15 minutes away from the small seaside town in New Jersey.

Emily wore her Nana Rose's locket all of the time, and kept the mysterious old key and the jewelry box it opened somewhere safe. She read her Nana's diary whenever she had the chance to and got to know the mind and heart of her Nana Rose more and more with each entry she read. She eventually finished writing her book sometime after getting back from her and Matt's honeymoon, and got it published and then, with help from her family and her new friends (Nana Rose's friends from the small seaside town and neighboring towns and cities), she began writing a book about her mom Jade, and her Nana Rose. She called the book "The Mysterious Old Key and the Amazing Lives of Rose, Jade, and Emily" and it took a couple of years to write, but she did finish it and it quickly became an international bestseller all around the world.

During the time she wrote the book about her and her mom and Nana, she got pregnant. As soon as they found out it was a girl, she and Matt both agreed their daughter's name would be Jade Rose, after her mother and Nana. When their baby was born, shortly after the autobiography had been published, Jade Rose was the name they had the nurse put on their daughter's birth certificate with Matt's (and hers now) last name.

The End