Jillian Chantal

This week, the writers of Tuesday Tales are writing to the word prompt gut. I am working on my buried treasure story.

Check out the other tales here.

“Your grandmother made some croissants. They’re in the kitchen. She’s gone to meet her friend, Marge, so we may not see her at all today.”

My gut was screaming at me to be fed, but I wasn’t sure about a croissant. That was a lot of carbs when I just had cinnamon rolls yesterday. It was better I eat the protein bar in my bag. But I also knew just how good Grandma’s croissants were. The flakiness of the inside was unmatched even in a Paris boulangerie. “Maybe later. I can put some turkey on one for lunch.”

“Best be hoping your gran doesn’t make it back in time to see that.” Grandad waggled the metal detector he held in his hand. “You know she only likes real butter on them. Anything else is an abomination.”

“You yourself said she would be with Marge all day.” I set my bag on the bench under the tree and plopped down on my rear near the hole I’d already been digging in. “Have you found anything yet with that thing?”

“I was just getting started when you came in the yard.” He stepped over toward my hole. “Let me run this thing over there.”

As soon as he waved the thing around, it went off. A lot.

“Wow,” I said. “And I thought I’d gotten all we could out of it.” I grabbed the little trowel I’d worked with before and dug out some more dirt. “Do you see anything?”

Grandad knelt beside me and moved some soil with his hands. “Look here.” He rooted around with his right index and middle fingers and pulled up a long chain that appeared to have gemstones on it. Not covering it solidly, but interspersed around the whole thing every few inches. It was colorful and would probably shine nicely when cleaned.

I reached out a tentative finger to touch it. “It’s beautiful. I still can’t understand why someone would bury all these things out in the yard. It makes no sense.”

Grandad kept digging. “You didn’t find anything at the library then?”

He looked up at me as I answered. “I found two women who lived in this house who might have the right initials, but I ran out of time before I could do a deep dive on the history of either one.”

“Well, that is progress.” He grinned. “And so is this.” He held up what looked like a tiny bracelet. It had blue and white beads. “Looks like one of those old bracelets they used to put on babies born at the hospital. “Maybe that’s a clue too. Check how many years they used them at Central Hospital. Blue for boys and pink for girls. Then you could narrow down the years possible as well as tell if the woman had a son or daughter.”