If you opened a dictionary and flipped to the word "curious," you would find a picture of a very blonde seventeen-year-old girl by the name of Iris Ryan. Or so she claimed. Iris was of the impression that one could define themselves simply by picking their most apparent flaw and transforming it into something useful. Thus, Iris Ryan experienced high school by referring to herself as “The Sleuth," hoping the nickname would catch on (but it unfortunately never did).
As a child, her curiosity ran rampant until reigned in. She would find herself in her backyard, tracking fox trails and slug slime paths until she could find the culprit. She would walk herself down to the creek behind her home and pick berries of every kind, smashing them to see what kind of colors they’d bleed.
Eventually, her parents took notice of their youngest’s berry-stained shorts and matted mess of hair and forbade her from trekking into the woods unsupervised. Iris found ways to slip past her parents’ glance and continued to explore the world outside her home until she grew old enough to find mud-stained clothes unpleasant.
From then on out, however, her explorations grew a bit more dangerous and a lot more illegal.
It started with an “abandoned” cottage, two blocks from her own home. She took two classmates to go examine if the bones of the original owner really were in the basement. Hungry for others to experience their possible findings, Iris livestreamed their search — showing viewers every inch of the house, including the nonexistent bones in the basement, and ending the stream with a siren from a local police vehicle. Apparently, the original owner was very old, very much alive, and very much upset to have teenagers exploring their home while they remained bedridden.
Then she went by herself, without alerting anyone else to avoid possible detainment, into the middle of the woods, to a poor excuse for a cave. She managed to find the leftovers of a bear’s dwelling, and fortunately, she avoided the bear. Iris didn’t, however, avoid police contact despite her efforts — after being missing for six hours, her parents sent a patrol to find her, only to find her in trouble once again.
Her adventures, nevertheless, persisted well after that, well into her senior year.
Despite all the run-ins with authority, nothing deterred Iris Ryan. She moved from one site to another, exploring everything and anything that interested her. She pretended detective, trying to piece together what had really happened at the deserted railroad tracks or the run-down inn that had made people forget them as easily as a bad memory. Iris was curious — perhaps too curious, but her curiosity hadn’t killed her yet. She was constantly itching to discover more, and thus she refused to cease in her searches.
Next on The Sleuth's to-do list, of course, was to uncover the secrets of 303 Pinkerton Way.
