A vase was lying on the ground. What used to be 1 full vase is now smashed in 1 million pieces, like snowflakes, none of the pieces looking the same.

      Walking with a briefcase in one hand and a Coach handbag in another, Julissa, the mother of 7 years old twin boys, thought to herself what craziness had her sons could have possibly gotten into that day. She played all the possible scenarios in her head while walking through her work’s parking lot. Could they have shaved their pet dog bald? Maybe they burnt their action figures limbs off? Julissa knew the possibilities were endless.

     Her sons were young and mischievous. They were always getting into something. It could range from breaking something, knocking something over, dropping something, making someone else cry, burning something or simply just taking cookies out of the cookie jar when no one was looking. Her sons were brave and continued getting into mischief no matter how bad the consequences were in previous situations. Julissa sometimes considered changing their names legally to Thing 1 and Thing 2, in reference to the bad pair of boys in one of Dr. Seuss’ novels.

      Julissa was a hardworking woman. She left the house at 6 A.M. each morning to go to her place of employment for the start of her 7 A.M. workday. She was a CEO of a makeup company called Exotic Beauty. She spent all day going to meetings, handling phone calls with vendors and those who were interested in investing in the company or just simply calling to check in on her boys’ whereabouts or behavior while she has been away. Julissa worked long days, each day with the same 7 A.M. start time then later ending at 5 P.M. These hours were performed Monday-Friday. By the end of each work day she was exhausted and barely had enough energy to carry on a conversation.

      Today had been an unusually non-busy day at work and her boss told Julissa that after her conference call she could go home and enjoy the rest of her day. This was the reason that Julissa was walking in the parking lot to go to car alone early this afternoon. She was so grateful for this early release because she would love nothing more than just relax in her comfortable bed for a while.

      It was summer which meant hot weather and long hours of sunlight. With these conditions, the boys stayed inside the home with an exception of a small 20-minute break to play outside. The boys never stayed at home by themselves, they were always either with their nanny or the maids, so Julissa wasn’t completely worried about what the boys could have done, especially since it was still early.

      After a couple minutes of fidgeting with the house keys trying to select the correct one that worked for the front door, Julissa finally opened her front door. Most people don’t walk with their heads down, especially not Julissa.

      She walked with her shoulders back, chest out and head and chin up high, oozing with a confidence. With her walking form being this way she didn’t see the glass on the floor.

     She finally stepped in it. Her heels making a crackling sounds following each footstep that landed back on the tile floor. She looked down surprised, trying to figure out what she had just stepped in.

      At first, she thought she might have dropped something and it broke, but she realized she wasn’t carrying anything that was fragile and she would know if she dropped something.

      Julissa then began to survey her surroundings and noticed the vase that’s usually on the right pedestal was missing. When you walk the front door there are two medium height pedestals on both the left and the right side of the hall, something you would see in a Greek home almost.

     Julissa pieced it all together and realized that the vase that was usually on the pedestal was what gone… but where?

      Julissa then had an epiphany. The glass that was of nude color was spread widely throughout the floor. Suddenly getting angry even though she wasn't entirely sure who did it, yelled out to names that were most likely tied to this incident: "NATHAN AND OLIVER COME DOWNSTAIRS THIS INSTANT, AND I MEAN IT!"

      Julissa yelled this so loud and stern that the two boys immediately ran down the stairs nearly tripping over each other. They stood in front of their angry mother with wide eyes and their arms placed firmly next to their hips, lips closed tight and feet together. If one wasn’t mistaken, the boys could have passed as statues with how still they were standing, barely blinking an eye.

      Julissa placed her things gently on the floor and took a deep breath. Her eyes shifting back and forth to each of the two boys faces. The mother noticed the boys’ eyes seemed a little glassy, which was odd. Nathan was a bright shade of red and Oliver remained calm and had a still look. The boys’ mother tapped her foot making sure that the crackling noise of the destroyed vase was heard by the two boys. The boys looked at each other and down at the ground simultaneously. Without having to say a word, the boys then knew what was going on clearly.

      "Since we are all on the same page, would anyone like to tell me what happened here?"

     Oliver shrugged his shoulders then turned and glanced at Nathan as if he was searching for both reassurance and maybe an explanation. After Oliver gave Nathan that look, Nathan then looked at Julissa and shrugged his shoulders just like Oliver did.

      The mother squinted her eyes, pulled the left side of her lips back making her lips a flat surface and tilted her head to give the sign to her sons that she was not convinced with their claim that of they knew of nothing. Julissa had suddenly gotten an idea.

      Julissa took a couple steps closer to the staircase that lead to the next floor and yelled up, "LISA! Can you come here for a second? I have a couple quick questions."

      Waiting in an awkward silence, Lisa's footsteps were heard coming down the long staircase.

     Lisa was the head maid. She overlooked all the other maids and had the best eyes in the house when it came to the troublemakers, and has solved many mysteries the boys caused in the past, she was the most reliable source at that moment.

      When the mess was visible to Lisa she immediately panicked, "I did not see this Ms. Julissa, I promise you, I'm right on it!"

      She must of thought that she had called her down to ask her why she hadn’t cleaned up this mess but Julissa quickly responded to Lisa before she could return back to the direction she came from to fetch the broom and dustpan.

      "No I know you were busy with the upstairs and did not see this yet, you're one of my best workers, you would have seen this by now. I wanted to ask you a couple of questions about how today went from your own personal opinion?"

     Lisa quickly turned back to her tan color instead of the brick red that her cheeks were sporting, she relaxed her shoulders, let out the breaths she was holding in and began taking a few more steps downstairs.

     “Oh, yes Ms. Julissa. That is no problem!" said Lisa.

      Julissa looked at the boys and raised her eyebrows indicating that she was sure she was going to get right to the bottom of this in just a few minutes.

      "Were the boys loud today? Did you hear them at all?" Julissa asked Lisa.

      "No they were not loud today, it was rather unusual actually! I don't think I heard them but maybe twice today!"

      Surprised at that answer Julissa widened her eyes, she wasn’t sure what her next question should be.

      With deep thought her next few questions popped into her head and she presumed to ask it, "When you did hear them? Were there toys involved? A ball, remote control car, anything?"

      Confident that she had asked the question that was necessary in order to find out the truth, the mother looked at the maid with a very slight smirk.

     Completely opposite of what the predicted answer would be, Lisa responded by saying, "No there wasn’t. They were walking upstairs to go into the game room and the next time I heard them the boys were in the kitchen eating their afternoon snack. They spent most of their day in the game room playing both board games and the Xbox One."

      Nathan and Oliver started getting anxious, not wanting to continue standing in one place. The boys started shifting from their left foot to their right. Julissa took note of this and decided to ask the boys what happened since nothing else was getting her the answers she needed in order to solve this case.

      "So Nathan come with me, and Oliver can you go sit in the living room until I come and get you in a short while?"

      Knowing that wasn’t an actual question and was more of an order, he left to go sit in the living room and Nathan walked next to his mom into the kitchen.

      Julissa lead Nathan to a seat at the kitchen table that was directly across from the seat she was going to sit in, similar what they do in the old cop or diner mystery movies. After the two got comfortable, Julissa started her interrogation with her first proposal.

     "Now Nathan, if you tell me what happened you won't be punished and I will take you to Toys 'R Us to get whatever toy you would like, but that is only if you answer all of my questions truthfully and help mama figure out what happened."

      Nathan nodded his head excitedly agreeing to her proposal.

      Oliver was always the one who dragged his brother into the mischief. He followed by his brother and always made most of Nathan’s decisions for him. Oliver obtained all of the leader characteristics.
     
      The mother knew that bribery was the best route to go with her sons. 

     "Were you involved with the breaking of the vase?"

     Oliver answered her with his sweet and soft voice, "No, I did not know the vase was even broken!"

      "So you mean to tell me that you had nothing to do with it and did even possibly hear the vase shattering?" Julissa responded quickly.

Oliver shook his head left and right many times quickly. Julissa knew that he was going to be a hard one to crack so she sent him off and brought in the easier subject, Nathan.

Julissa was aware that Nathan was the more honest and passive one. She figured she would get more out of Nathan than she had gotten from Oliver. Oliver got up quietly from the chair and ran into the living room, delivering the message to Nathan that their mother wanted him to go into the kitchen now.

“You think mama really thinks we did that?” Oliver asked Nathan

“I imagine so.” Nathan replied while walking to the kitchen door.

       Nathan walked slowly into the kitchen with his face still a rosy red and eyes still glassy as if he was nervous.

      Julissa pointed to the seat that Oliver was once sitting in and Nathan sat with his knees placed onto the chair and put his folded hands on the table in front of him.

     "You know what I'm about to ask you about, correct?"

     Her son shrugged his shoulders and nodded his head at the same time.

      Their mother started the conversation the same exact way her and Oliver's conversation began,

     "Now Nathan, if you tell me what happened you won't be punished and I will take you to Toys 'R Us to get whatever toy you would like, but that is only if you answer all of my questions truthfully and help mama figure out what happened."

      Nathan's eyes lit up after the Toys ‘R Us plan was revealed, the mother could both see and sense the instant happiness and comfort running through his body.

      "Jackpot."  Julissa thought to herself.

     "Were you involved with the breaking of the vase?"

     Nathan shook his head, and said "I did not know the vase was broken! I was with Nathan all day, we spent most of our time today in the game room and in our bedroom when we took our nap. We only came downstairs for lunch today, no other reason."

       The mother thought it was extremely weird how the two boys had basically identical stories even though Nathan added a little bit more detail about how their day was spent.

     Julissa knew the two boys had seen each other while exchanging places from the kitchen and living room but there just was not enough time to plan out corresponding stories, especially not for 7 year olds. 

     Julissa thought to herself, "Maybe they really don't know what happened to the vase..."

     While thinking about the situation, their family dog Nixon ran up and jumped onto Julissa's lap.

    "Hi honey! Did you just come from outside? Mama missed you!!"

    Julissa gave the dog a big hug, a kiss on the forehead and rubbed behind his ears a bit. After getting the attention the dog was seeking for, he jumped down and ran away.

    She thought to herself how it was odd how every other day she would come home from work she would be greeted by Nixon right away, today was different. Something was definitely off.
    

     The mother gave up on the story and assumed that maybe it just toppled over because of the air condition blowing a little hard or something of that sort.

     She sent the boys upstairs to get ready for their trip to Toys 'R Us and retrieved the broom and dustpan from the laundry room and walked to the front entrance.

     She bent down and started sweeping up the glass off of the floor. While sweeping, she saw a purple object peeking out from behind the pedestal in her peripheral. Turning her head completely it looked like a ball. Moving closer toward the pedestal, she rolled the unknown object towards her and realized it was Nixon's toy bouncy ball.

     Julissa wondered to herself, "Why is his toy behind the...oh…no."

     Piecing it together she played this scenario in her head: Nixon was bored and was alone for most of the day forcing him to play with himself. As he was playing with himself, he picked his bouncy ball to play with. While tossing it up in the air from his mouth and running after it to catch it, repeating this process, he bounced the ball all the way into the front entrance and caught it. He didn’t realize how close he was to the pedestal and casually tossed the ball up not thinking much of it. It hit the vase and the vase crashed to the floor. When I got home from work and saw it, Nixon ran away in attempt to hide from his mistake and came out once he felt everything was back to normal, as dog usually do when they do something they’re aware they’re not supposed to do.

      Julissa walked back to the staircase and walked upstairs and stood at the door, taking a deep breath before entering because she hated being wrong.

     She finally entered the boys’ bedroom.

     “Boys, I'm incredibly sorry for assuming that the two of you broke the vase, come to find out it was Nixon! I found his ball next to the pedestal, that’s why Nixon was nowhere to be found when I came home! He was hiding because he knew he would get in trouble for this."

     The boys giggled and looked at each other. Nathan looked at Oliver and then turned to their mother and said, "It's okay mom” simultaneously. When the boys and their mother turned to exit the room and be on their way to Toys 'R Us, Nixon was standing there in the doorway peering in.

     "I'm going to deal with you later mister!" Julissa said pointing at him.

     Nixon widened his eyes and stood his ears straight up, shifted and dashed away.