To pass my time when I was younger, I used to explore my grandparents’ estate in order to see what treasures could be found. For a long time, there was nothing. I was searching in the wrong places. Treasure isn’t always buried beneath the earth. Sometimes it’s buried above it. On the seventy-fifth day of my search to nowhere, my grandfather brought me into his attic where I instantly knew my unsuccessful days of finding ‘buried treasure’ were over.
He supervised my adventures, making sure nothing was broken in the process of pursuing my fictional life as a hero. An old video game console caught my eye on the eightieth day. My grandfather seemed to have forgotten that he owned it to begin with. How insulting. I’m only twelve years old, therefore video games are my life. I went on one last grand adventure to find a game named Campbell to place in the console.
I soon became obsessed. Passionately obsessed more so than any other game I ever played. My grandfather happily sent me home with his old possessions to keep after a straight week of playing them. From morning until night my stubby fingers frolicked across the controller. You would think school was my escape, but every piece of my brain that held potential to hold any new information the world was offering me was preoccupied by my game. I started failing tests in classes I usually aced. That was the final straw for my mother. She took Campbell away.
I didn’t know what to do with myself. Should I start going back on adventures at my grandparents’ estate? Maybe my mother gave the demon back to the man who dished it out. I could find it again if I wanted. Or should I just try to forget about it? There was the key word: try to forget. I couldn’t forget. On the third night that I was left without my fairy tale friends, I shut my eyes to go to sleep and I had the most vivid dream. It was so clear that it could have been reality. I was talking to the King in his castle. He appeared the same as any other time I saw him.
“My crown has been taken by the creatures who guard the Ice Palace on the other side of the kingdom. I would retrieve my property myself, but I cannot leave. A curse has been placed upon me. If my crown is not returned, all of Campbell will end in total war.”
He offered me the chance to take the quest and become the hero I always dreamed of being. In my most impressive voice, I accepted.
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Chelsea Cahill has participated in the Nora Roberts Young Writers Institute at Hagerstown Community College. She attends Palmyra High School in New Jersey and has been one of the editors of the yearbook at her school for the last two years. She is also a member of the Spanish National Honor Society, Student Council, and the National Honor Society. Cahill has written two young adult novels. She is currently working on her third.