The door had always been shut as far back as Li could remember. Growing up in the old Victorian house with her sister, Li had learned never to ask about the old red door, even though it stood out like a sore thumb against the white walls.
But as Li got older, she became more and more curious, and her curiosity finally reached a boiling point. One night she hosted a sleepover party for five of her eleven-year-old friends, and her sister had gone to bed.
It was Li’s friend Cassandra who started it. “Where does the door go?” she asked, wide-eyed.
Li told her she didn’t know and that she wasn’t allowed to use it, but that did not satisfy her friends.
Vanessa pushed the matter. “Don’t you ever wonder what’s in there? I think we should investigate.”
The other girls loudly agreed, and Li felt the awful tug of peer pressure—the feeling that she should do something she knew was wrong just to appease her friends. Heart beating fast, Li had to silently admit to herself that she, too, was dying to know.
“All right,” she muttered. For the first time in her life, she grabbed the doorknob and tried to turn it, but it did not budge—she should have known it would be locked.
But her friend Allie chimed in. “Do you have a screwdriver?”
Moments later, Li found a screwdriver and gave it to Allie. Allie put it in the keyhole, and after doing some fancy maneuvering she said the door was ready. The girls gathered around to look as Allie pulled the door and it slowly creaked open. Not one of them could believe what they saw.
How do Li and her friends solve the problem in the story?
They use a tool to open the door.
They give up and continue with other sleepover activities.
They push and push until the door finally opens.
They ask Li’s older sister for help.