I quickly checked the restroom, the water fountain, and the phone booth. No sign of her. I was about to dash outside when I spotted her at the counter, happily spinning on a stool.

"Claire!" I said, rushing up to her. "We thought you were missing." I hugged her, my heart still doing flip-flops in my chest.

"I'm not missing," she said seriously. "I'm right here. All my ice cream leaked out, so I came back to get another cone." She held up an empty cone. The bottom was jagged as if she had bitten it off.

"We can fix that," a boy behind the counter said. "What kind of ice cream did you have?"

"Vanilla. I always get vanilla."

He handed her a new cone and winked. "Make sure you eat this one from the top down, not the bottom up."

We hurried outside, just as Mr. and Mrs. Pike were coming through the glass double doors. They swept Claire into their arms and hugged her, just like I had done.

We piled back in the cars, and after endless rhyming, Vanessa shrieked with joy.

"There's the cow sign!" she said, jabbing me in the ribs and forgetting to make a poem. The cow sign is one of the Pike kids' favorite landmarks. It's a billboard with a three-dimensional purple cow, and they look for it every year.

"And there's Crabs for Grabs!" Jordan yelled a few minutes later. Crabs for Grabs is a seafood restaurant on the outskirts of Sea City.

"And the suntan girl!" Adam and Byron shouted together. The suntan girl is another billboard that they always watch for. "And there is Sea City!"

We're finally here, I thought. I started to relax and then caught myself. Who knew what would happen next!

Chapter 4.

"The wind chimes are still here!" Jordan shouted.

"And they left the swing up!" Adam said, throwing himself into a white wicker swing on the front porch.

"The honeysuckle bush is blooming, just like before," Vanessa said dreamily. She buried her face in the soft blossoms for a moment.