Rhea went up the staircase, a bounce in each step. After dumping her bag just outside her bedroom, she zipped towards where the attic was located. She came to a plain door on a scarcely decorated wall. Rhea jolted the knob open and pushed the door in. Inside were boxes stacked on top of each other, furniture draped with a white sheet, a bay window at one side, and a – was that her old rocking horse? As if stepping into a newfound piece of the world, Rhea carefully took a step in. Immediately, the aura wrapped itself around her. The light dancing its way into the dark room made Rhea see the dust idly floating around.

Far corner...far corner... Rhea navigated herself around old trinkets and antiques that have been put away. First of all, there were about six corners in the room. The girl went and checked the ones nearest the door. There was so much of the world in this dark room! Why did her mother trade them away for a simpler and duller look? Wonder began to fill the girl's eyes, but she had to concentrate.

Just when she was about to postpone the history hunting for tomorrow, Rhea heard a whisper from the north side. She couldn't make out the words, but it was tugging her there. When she reached the corner, there were about three boxes. She opened them one by one, only to see more bits and pieces of a family history that was locked away. Rhea needed documents!

Finally, when she opened the last of the boxes, Rhea found the oddest of things. She gingerly reached in and pulled out a beautifully crafted box with some sort of puzzle on it. Next, she pulled out shells of (Easter?) eggs, snow globes, a snowflake crystallized in a small clear sphere. There was a crack on it, though, so she paid extra care to this little thing. Lastly, she found drawings – lots of them.

"That's odd," Rhea muttered, gingerly looking through the artworks in her hands. From what she knew, her family wasn't exactly gifted in the art department. Well, she guessed they weren't for her house was dull and boring and she never saw her family pay any mind to anything other than their work which was far from anything that had to do with the right hemisphere of their brain. In fact, much to Rhea's disappointment, she couldn't even draw a heart let alone people.

One drawing had a boy soaring through the air on a sled and the others seemed to feature the boy's friends. Several of the drawings, Rhea noticed, held the same set of characters. There was a large man in a red coat and a Russian-looking hat, a rabbit that stood on its hind legs and seemed to be as tall as a man (if not taller), a short golden man, a woman covered in feathers and a boy with a hoodie, staff, white hair, and no shoes.

The white haired boy seemed to be in a lot of the drawings and Rhea wondered why. "What's so important about you?" She asked the drawing as if she was expecting it to answer.

She flipped through more drawings before reaching the final few. The white haired boy was now joined by a girl around his age with long black hair. Rhea's eyes widened at the sight of her. Where in the world did she come from?

Rhea looked into the box once more and saw a battered leather notebook inside. Her brows shot up when she saw that it was held shut with a garter and some of the pages were about to fly out. She carefully opened it and saw that on the first page was a name: "Property of Jamie Bennett".

"Jamie Bennett?" Rhea mused, flipping through the pages. Jamie's hand writing was neat for a boy's and every few pages held a doodle at the corner of the page. Majority of the doodles were the white haired boy but there were also some of the Russian man, the rabbit, the feather-clad woman and the golden man. There was also some that had the dark haired woman.

"Could he be my grandfather?" Rhea asked when she flipped back to the first page, reading Jamie's name once again. "Or perhaps great, great?"

Rhea flipped to the last page and found a wrinkly, slightly-torn piece of paper. Some parts of it were faded and blurred, as if tears had landed on them. What must have been elegant cursive written on the paper was unreadable. It was if water splashed onto it. Big and fat drops of water, that is.

It was signed by a woman named 'Ana.' At least, that's what she can see clearly. The rest were indistinguishable Who was Ana? Could it be the feathered woman? The black haired girl? Jamie's wife? The silence rang in her ears as she let the message sink in. Riddles – Rhea's never been good at riddles. She held the paper a little further away from her, looking at it every which way. She even held it up at the light, but nothing new came up. It was an old crumbled bit of paper with ink blotches that carried out a puzzle.

Rhea put the letter inside the pocket of her jeans and put everything back to the box. She wanted to know more of this Jamie Bennett. Picking up the box with both hands and cradling them in her arms, Rhea made her way back to her bedroom. All in all, she was happy she found something from her past.

As she walked past the bay window, the girl didn't notice the growing floral patterns of frost form on the glass.

Dinner, as always, went as smoothly as dinners go. For the most part, anyway. Rhea has yet to touch her plateful of lemon chicken and pork tonkatsu. A palm was to her cheek, while her free hand was making a dome with her rice. Now, the teenager has more or less behaved like so, but not if two of her favorite dishes are served up. She'd have finished it in three minutes flat – and that's including seconds.

Her mother, a lovely woman with chocolate hair and eyes, noticed the sudden change in her daughter's demeanor. "Sweetie," she says, sharing a glance with her husband, "Is something the matter?"

"Huh?" Rhea blinked, sitting straighter in her seat and dropping her hand to her lap. She caught her parents' worried looks and shook her head. "Oh it's...nothing."

"It's not nothing dear," her mother replied, "It doesn't take a huge stretch of imagination to know that. Tell us, what's wrong?"

Rhea bit her lip and glanced down at her plate, pocking the meat around with her fork, thinking of how she should phrase her words. Family was a touchy subject and it wasn't really a dinner conversation for them. "It's just..." She paused, taking in a deep breath. "I just have this project and... and I'm not exactly sure how to do...it?"

"Is this about the Family Tree?" Her father sat back in his chair, slightly surprised. "Well, I'm sure you'll find your way around it. Rest your mind – I think you're putting too much pressure with the thinking and all."

"It's not exactly easy, dad," Rhea pouted. "I only found some trinkets. I need names. Their names, their spouses and children."

"Trinkets?" Rhea's mother repeated, raising her eyebrows. "How – where..." She trailed off, not knowing how to ask the question. It registered in her mind that her daughter found the box. "Why were you up in the attic? Couldn't you have just asked your father?" She shot a pointed look at her husband.

"Dad said to go up there," Rhea shrugged. "And I want to go as far back as possible. I'll get a higher grade if I do."

Her father grunted, clearing his throat. "I - I believe there's some documents in my study. It doesn't go very back, just your great-grandfather's grandfather. Will that suffice, dear?"

Rhea pursed her lips, wondering if she would be satisfied with that. It would give her a reasonable grade but that was just her father's side. She needed her mother's side too. "That's great and all, dad, but..." She trailed off, thinking twice about what she was going to say. The air at the dinner table was tense and she didn't know if what she was going to say would make anything better. "I need mom's side too."

"Just make up names, Rhea! They'll never know!" Her mother suddenly cried out, slamming a hand on the table.

The girl's eyes widened and she jumped slightly in her seat, surprised at her mother's actions. She sucked in a deep breath and looked over to her father for help. The man wasn't making eye contact and Rhea wasn't quite sure as to what to do next.

Tension hung in the air; the silence was deafening. It was a few moments before the lady at the table has finally convinced herself that she's calm enough. "Apologies, dear. Just... just finish your dinner and go up to your room," she said carefully, focusing on each syllable so as not to repeat what had happened recently. "We will not speak of this tomorrow or the following days. Understand?" She looked straight at her daughter's eyes, waiting for an answer.

"Un...Understood," Rhea stuttered out, picking up her fork and knife, digging into her meal. She guessed asking her mother about Jamie Bennett and Ana was a big NO-NO.

Rhea brushed her hair away from her face and sat down on her bed, turning to face the box she got from the attic. She had just finished her nightly routine (taking a quick shower, brushing her teeth and slipping into her favorite cotton pajamas and said goodnight to her parents. Her door was locked and she figured no one would check up on her at this time of hour. Biting her lip, Rhea opened the box and carefully took out Jamie Bennett's notebook. She furrowed her brows and flipped through the pages once more. Rhea gathered that Jamie Bennett was from her mother's side of the family and from the bits and pieces of his writing that she read, he didn't seem all that bad. Why would her mother be so against the idea of her knowing her family? Her mother never told her to make up names before! Heck, there was even a time when Rhea had to interview one-hundred people in two days and her mother threw a fit when she asked if she could just make up names for the paper. Why now? What was going on?

"Who are you, Jamie Bennett?" Rhea muttered, turning to the first page of the notebook.

A/N: There's chapter two! We apologize for not updating sooner - undertakings on this side of reality have been keeping us up. We thought it unfair if we update immediately, posting a half-arsed chapter. Anyways, we hope that this chapter was quite the wait! Remember, every review (and criticism) counts. Thank you for taking the time to read this story, and we hope that you'll stick with us!