Uncle Mortimer's Mansion

Uncle Mortimer's Mansion-- o3

My eyes fluttered open to welcome a very nice gust of warm Florida air. I shook my head, realizing that Trey must’ve opened the french doors. I lethargically got up and shut the doors, cutting off the warm breeze. I hated breezes.

I spun around my heel, and really looked at the room. It was a small room (well, small considering the size of the mansion). There were the two beds, pressed against one side of the wall, two nightstands on the sides of the bed where they met. The floor was carpeted in what looked like a squishy oatmeal color, and the walls were painted a sky blue and had a trim the same color as the carpet. Across from the beds, was a dark wood dresser, and on top of the dresser was a small television. There were two doors on either side of the dresser, one directly across from each bed. I guessed that it would be the bathrooms, but I was too lazy to check.

As I really surveyed the room for the first time, my stomach started to grumble. I was always hungriest in the mornings for some strange unknown reason. Trey was nowhere to be seen, and his bed was made, so I quickly threw my sheets together and left the room, not even caring that I hadn’t taken a shower in almost three days.

When I shut the door to my room, I heard another door being softly closed from the other side of the hallway, my head snapped over to see a sleepy looking Victoria.

“Good morning, Eileen. How are you?” Victoria asked through a yawn.

“Pretty good thanks, how about you?”

“Eh, I didn’t sleep so great,” Victoria said nonchalantly.

“Why?” I asked, cocking my head to one side in birdlike manner. Wasn’t she the one who said that the bed was like floating on a cloud?

“Well, you and Trey were being kind of loud, and when I woke up couldn’t go back to—“

“Oh my gosh! I’m so sorry!”

Victoria laughed sluggishly, “Don’t worry, I don’t sleep much anyways. Do you want to go grab breakfast in the town?”

“Yeah, that sounds great… but are you sure you don’t want to wait for Jeremy?”

Victoria made a face, “Oh, please. Don’t you know your brother? He doesn’t wake up until after two in the afternoon on good days.”

I laughed. “Sorry, I haven’t lived with him in over eight years, I almost forgot.”

“Alright, let’s go,” Victoria said smiling, clasping her hands together.

I picked at my waffles. Why had I ordered waffles at a pancake house? These were disgusting.

“How do you like your pancakes?” I asked Victoria, who seemed to be scarfing down the whole plate.

“Delicious—want some?” she asked holding out a fork of pancakes.

I graciously took the fork and bit off the entire pancake.

“Jeez, don’t be a hog,” Victoria laughed, grabbing her fork back and concentrating on her pancakes again.

I started to play with the straw wrappers as my phone started to ring.

“Hello?” I answered cautiously. The caller ID had said ‘Private Caller.’

“Hi, is this… Eileen Wilson?” the voice said.

“Yes…” I answered slowly, hinting with my tone that if they were about to waste my time with some stupid sales add that I would hang up on them.

“Sorry to bother you, but you are in relation to Mortimer Wilson. Correct?”

I sat up erectly. “Yes.”

“Hi, Eileen, my name is Brian Greene, and I am calling on behalf of Liberty Bank. Mr. Wilson had been keeping his will with us.”

“Alright then…”

“And you see, there is a major problem with this.”

“There is?” I asked, raising an eyebrow, causing Victoria to look up from her pancakes.

“Yes. You see, the will has, unfortunately, been lost.”

“What are we going to do?” wailed Grandma Rosamund.

After paying for our breakfast, Victoria and I left quickly, and rounded up everyone into a room.

“Calm down, Rosamund,” a male voice I did not recognize answered back (probably one of the older Kempton’s) “the estate, and all of the money should clearly go to Trey.”

“Have you lost your mind, Edmund?” my dad counteracted. “The estate should clearly go to Jeremy!”

“How could the bank just lose a will?” my mother asked in a despaired voice.

“We’re going to need an attorney for this!” one of the Kempton’s shouted.

My eyes found Trey in the back of the room, slumped lazily on a chair with his eyebrows raised. I fought the urge to smile as he looked at me and shook his head in disbelief.

“We don’t need an attorney! The estate clearly should go to Trey!”

“Are you kidding me? Trey isn’t even related to Mortimer!”

The bickering between the two families went on, as I stood there slumped against the wall. Boy, was this disconcerting or what?