“The Kerr mansion is mine now. It has been willed to me.”
I thought it was a joke. Next, I was shrieking and lightly jumping on my feet while my best friend and the new heiress, Adele Kerr, smiled sheepishly during our video call.
I drew my phone closer to my face, wishing I was there physically to hug her. “Is this real or you're messing with me again? You have to stop doing that.”
“Ugh, Ruby. Back,” she waved her hand in front of her phone. “I don't need to see your bulging eyes. Pull your phone back.”
I chuckled, putting a little distance between my phone and my face. “Girl, I'm excited for you! I was a little worried when my calls weren't going through yesterday.”
“Pff, the service here is horrible. It's an old mansion built on top of rocky hills so the network can be spotty sometimes.”
“Wow,” I exclaimed, my imagination already going wild and conjuring the image of my friend's newly inherited mansion. “Can I see it?”
Adele shook her head, giving me a mischievous side-eye glance. “I want it to be a surprise. I'm having a housewarming party this weekend. You must come.”
“Cool! I'll go shopping for something nice to wear to impress your family. Who else have you invited?”
“Please don't stress about a dress. There's a wardrobe full of party gowns in the basement. We'll raid it together, yea?”
“Ugh, not your dead aunt's dress, I hope.” We both burst into laughter. I felt so good inside seeing my friend laugh because she'd been unhappy since she got the news of her aunt's passing.
As a scholarship student from South Africa, I would have been lost in Augusta, Maine if not for Adele who stepped up at the last minute to be my peer mentor. I was excited to be in the United States but realised she did not share my excitement. In no time, we became good friends and inseparable.
She was beautiful, in a striking way. There was something about her eyes that captivated me. They were a piercing shade of blue but seemed to hold a hint of sadness in them. So I often asked if she was okay. One day she lashed out, warning me to stop being ridiculous with the 'weird' question. I did but could never shake off the feeling that my friend needed my help somehow.
I stayed in the dormitory while Adele lived in an off-campus residence with her boyfriend, Nat, a local baseball player. She preferred to spend her weekends with me at the dormitory rather than go home to Nat or her family. This was odd and even unusual that she never spoke about her family. After giving me a vague, mumbled reply one time, I never asked about her family again.
When Adele sent me a text saying she couldn't come to school for the next three days because her great-aunt, who lived in a mansion on the Maine Coast, passed away, I was mildly surprised.
My surprise turned to shock when I finally got her on a video call, and she relayed that her great-aunt left the mansion to her as the sole heir!
“Silly girl! The dresses are my cousins'. So will you come?” She asked with a shy smile as though I might say no.
I rolled my eyes. “Do you need to ask? You stood by me when I literally had no one. I'll head out tomorrow after our 2 pm class, yea?”
Adele sighed with relief. “Sure. And I can show you around the house. It's a big place…with a swimming pool!”
I laughed some more and winked. “Yea? I'll bring a cheeky bikini.”
She gasped in mock shock. “You dare not!”
The cab crawled to a slow stop in front of a giant iron-wrought gate. I alighted and gazed up at the mansion on the rocky hills. It looked really old but well maintained and stately, like one of those Victorian houses in a British period drama. A gravel driveway led to the front of the house.
I approached the gate and within minutes, I was led by a tall, elderly man to the front door. The grounds around the big house were strangely quiet so much so that the crunch of our feet could be heard from a mile away. The silence made me uncomfortable.
It was almost five pm and the temperature was dropping faster than I expected. I rubbed my arms to keep the goosebumps that were awakening at bay. The chilling breeze gently played with my hair, freeing some curly strands from my ponytail. I tucked them behind my ear and smoothed down my sweater top and jeans.
[To be continued….]
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