The Mystery of the Lost Penny By Ashanti

1. The Mystery of the Lost Penny ByAshanti

2. Chapter 1 Emily, Anna, Amaya, and Ashanti were walking home from school for dinner. “What’s for dinner?” Anna asked.

3. “Mom’s homemade pizza.” Amaya said. Mom’s pizza was delicious and all of the sisters loved it!

4. “Look, a receipt!” Emily said, as she picked up a white piece of paper on the road. “It says - Shur Fine, mom’s favorite market.” Then Anna flipped it over. “Hmmm….someone wrote gum on the back,” Anna said. “I wonder why this was written on it.”

5. When they got home they sat at the dinner table. “Mom, can we go to Shur Fine tomorrow?” Ashanti asked. She wanted to follow up on the receipt she found. “Sure,” Mom said, as she put the pizza on the table. “I need cleaning supplies anyway.” She sliced the pizza and they ate dinner, then they had apple pie with vanilla ice cream for dessert.

6. Then the girls slipped into their pajamas, made salty popcorn a little later, and watched some TV. Finally the girls fell asleep.

7. When the girls woke up the next morning sweet pancake smells filled the kitchen. “Rise and shine!” Mom yelled flipping a chocolate chip pancake in the air. The girls ran downstairs to the kitchen, sat in their seats and smelled the air. “Pancakes coming up!” Mom said.

8. Then on each plate went two pancakes. After the girls finished they put on sneakers and headed out.

9. Chapter 2 When they got to Shur Fine they looked in the candy aisle. All they could find was gummy bears, Swedish fish, Oreos, chocolate bars, M&Ms, and Life Savers but no gum.

10. “That’s funny,” Anna said. “Seems like something is missing.” The girls went to Dairy Queen and got tasty ice cream cones. “How could one stick of gum be so hard to find?” Emily asked. She was very curious why the store didn’t stock up on gum.

11. Ashanti turned around to look at the candy shop next door. “The candy shop has lots of candy. How about we go there?” she suggested. Anna licked the last of her ice cream cone and said, “Let’s just go home. We can wait until tomorrow.”

12. “No we can’t, remember we promised to get mom cleaning supplies,” Emily said. “Ashanti is right. We will leave right now!” The sisters stomped out of Dairy Queen, on the sidewalk, to the candy shop. Inside were rows of candy and cookies. There was a shiny brown floor and diamond chandeliers hanging from the ceiling.

13. “This is beautiful .” Amaya said. Ashanti walked over to an aisle full of silver wrappers wrapped around gum. “Yes!” Ashanti whispered. “Whoooa!” Emily said surprised. Anna ran over with Amaya and grabbed a stick of gum with a note stuck on it. Buy this with a penny and find a 2008 penny in your backyard.

14. “Why do we have to pay with a penny and find one at home?” Anna said. “I’m not sure,” Ashanti said “but, I have lots of pennies and quarters in my wallet.”

15. “That’s enough money,” Anna said. The girls ran to the cash register and paid $1.00 and got 1 cent in change. The girls ran to Shur Fine, got the cleaning supplies and ran home. “We have the cleaning supplies!” Amaya said walking into the kitchen and setting them on the counter.

16. Chapter 3 Mom made grilled cheese and nachos for lunch. The girls ate it fast. “This is soooo cheesy.” Emily said. “The nachos make it better.” Ashanti said. “This is so good.” Anna and Amaya said at the same time.

17. When the girls were finished eating, they ran to put their shoes on. “We're going outside,”Anna said opening the door. “Okay. I’m going to clean,” Mom said getting a broom out of the closet. “Have fun!”

18. The girls ran up the hill to a mud pit. In it was a circle shaped piece of bronze metal. “There is the penny!” Emily said. “That’s not a penny. It’s just a piece of metal,” Amaya said. “Oh,” Emily said. “Well, the note said we’d find a penny in our backyard. I don’t see one!” Anna said with a confused look on her face.

19. “Let’s look in the tall grass.” Ashanti said. They ran to the grass. Amaya moved grass away with her hand. They could see pennies! Lots of pennies. There were at least 50. “We found them!” Anna said with no excitement. “We need a 2008 penny. It said on the note.” “Okay,” said Emily as she put another piece of gum in her mouth.

20. “I have a feeling this will be hard.” Ashanti said. “It will take forever to find it!” “Found it!” Anna said. “Or not. It’s like she knew where it was.” Ashanti said.

21. The girls went to their room and used a magnifying glass to take a closer look at the penny. Amaya saw a note on the desk. It said: Put the pennies in the yard. Put the note in the candy shop. Go the the shop on Saturday.

22. “Anna!” Amaya said. She looked mad. “You tricked us!” “I have no idea what your talking about.” Anna said. “You came home late on Thursday just to put a note on a stick of gum? You knew the market didn’t have gum. You stuck the note on our desk to remember.” “You can’t prove it.” “You have lots of pennies to put in the mud pit, you did do it!”

23. “You got me.” Anna said. “You need to cool down though.” Anna ran downstairs and came back up with glasses of raspberry lemonade.

24. “At least we solved this mystery.” Emily said. Then she ran downstairs with Ashanti and came back with Oreo brownie earthquake ice cream.

25. “Great way to celebrate solving our first mystery.” Ashanti said. “We don’t need to celebrate.” Anna said. “You don’t deserve ice cream.” Amaya said. “Well, it’s a great way to cool off.” Emily said. She put an ice cube in her mouth.

26. “We solved a mystery!” The sisters said raising their fists in the air.