The Inheritance

The estate was huge. An old mansion with broken walls and dirty windows with acres and acres of land. My Uncle had left it for me in his will. My family had told me to stay away from him, that he was losing his mind but I had stayed in touch. I always rang to see how he was doing, knowing he was here on his own. But it came as a surprise when he died, because even though he was eccentric he certainly wasn’t ill.

I had never been here before and I had asked my mum, brother and my aunt to come and see it with me. They all told me they would never step foot in that place. Their attitude was that the guy is really crazy and they don’t know what they would find with the jealousy of I can’t believe he left you a whole estate and we got nothing. Id offered to share but my family were stubborn. So here I was on my own.

I headed up the cracked steps which led to the hugest front door I had ever encountered. I took out the large key I had been given and it opened fairly easily but very nosily. The creak continued into an echo throughout the huge open plan foyer up the magnificent staircase and ended with an enormous bang as the front door slammed shut behind me.

It took a few moments for my heart to stop racing but I walked over to the only small table in the whole foyer. I had a small drawer which was empty and a huge bowl sat upon it filed with a hoop of thousands of keys. They were all numbered. I picked them up and looked for the first door. Door number 1. Locked. I found the corresponding key and walked into a large drawing room. Everything was covered with dust sheets but so much dust had settled in that room, I had left footprints on the floor. I left the room unlocked. Door number 2. This led to the kitchen. Again it looked dusty and unused and I wondered if my Uncle had actually been living in here when he died or was he living elsewhere. Doors 1 through 6 downstairs were servants quarters, storerooms living areas, toilets so I headed upstairs. I started with the west wing first as this is where I found door number 7. I opened door 7 to be greeted with door number 8. I opened that and it led me into a small room with two doors opposite each other. 9 and 10. Door 9 led me to a blank wall and door ten opened up to door 11 which went to a cupboard sized room with door number 12 which led me back into the hallway 2 doors down from number 7.

Okay that was weird. I walked back to the two doors I had missed. Number 13 and 14 were written on them. Number 13 opened up to a brick wall which I expected considering the layout of the rooms I had passed through but 14 opened up to a huge oil painting of my uncle. It actually freaked me out a little. Doors 15 through to 32 were pretty much the same ins and outs of doors and cupboards going back in circles. Doors 33 and 34 I found to be bedrooms. Again covered with dust sheets. I headed up to the third floor. Door 36. Wait, where was door 35? I headed down the stairs noticing the large pictures down the walls. One was set just a bit lower than the rest. 'I must be crazy' I thought and pulled the picture away from the wall. Sure enough there was door behind it. 35. It opened up into a closet filled with fur coats and umbrellas. A strange thing to hide but this whole house was getting stranger by the minute. So back up to door 36. I noticed 37 right next to it so I knew I was going into an actual room. What I didn’t expect was to see a nursery. I didn’t go in, I stayed by the door. I recall the nursery from photos I have seen. it was mine. My name still up on the wall in wooden blocks. The chair in the corner was still rocking and lullabies were playing. it wasn’t dusty and it looked like it was being used. My mother walked past me and sat down in the chair rocking a baby to sleep. No. not just a baby, me. I was seeing a moving clip of the photo I was remembering. I closed the door and even though I wanted to turn and run, maybe get someone to come and explore with me, there was something pulling me towards the rooms. Door 37. It opened to a garden, a perfect lawn, flowers growing and a greenhouse in the middle. It took a while to remember this was my grandmas h

ome. We used to help her pick berries from the bush round the side. I walked into the room and round the greenhouse. Sure enough I was there with my brother picking berries. There was no longer a room, it was like I was actually outside in the garden. I headed back for the door. Room 38. blank room. There was a few more rooms of doors, brick walls, cupboards, memory rooms as I started to call them, things I had seen from my past. I started to get tired once I had gotten to room 84 and found myself in a memory of my bedroom when I was a teenager. No longer frightened of being alone and more curious of the house, I climbed into the bed and fell asleep.

I woke and deciding I wanted breakfast and remembering the state of the kitchen headed straight out. I figured I’d carry on exploring later. I didn’t plan on telling anybody what I saw, I know they would either think I was losing my mind or was telling lies. Maybe that’s what they meant about my uncle. I got home to find an old man in a front room decorated differently than I remembered. He looked at me and gasped. It took a few moments before realising that the old man was my brother.

'You disappeared 30 years ago' he explained. We looked everywhere. We went to the mansion we, searched every room. We couldn’t find you. Where were you? I looked in the mirror and noticed I had dramatically started to age. I began to cry.

' I was in the mansion. The whole time. Only a day has gone by. Uncle refused to leave the house because he said it would kill him' I recalled. 'He was right. Inside he was young and full of life happily living in his memories'.