Good morning everyone. While I am not yet back to 100% I am feeling infinitely better than I was last week. I slept more from Wednesday through Saturday than I think I slept the entire month of July. Part of that was because July was exhausting the rest was being sick. My body just sort of collapsed and exhaustion took over. But yesterday I managed to stay awake for the entire day which seems like much more of an achievement than it should be. So I am going to start trying to play catch up. The posts may be a little wonky for a bit but hopefully by Friday we will bac completely back on track. So shall we pick up the prompts where we left off? Ready set, write.
Interesting. I only started to glimpse the story towards the end. I think I’d need to set the timer for another fifteen and continue writing just to find out exactly where my brain wanted to go with this idea.
Make up post for Thursday, August 4th: It was unlikely that anyone would notice.
It was unlikely that anyone would notice. In the six months he had been her, Charles hadn’t seen anyone go into the east wing for anything. This room, tucked away in the back had nothing but boxes of storage. The boxes had sheets thrown over them to keep the dust off of them, but the sheets themselves had grown heavy with dust and molded stiffly to the box edges.
As long as he was careful not to disturb the dust then he should be fine. He slipped behind the boxes to the very back of the space. One of the sheets draped to the floor, pooling slightly. He carefully lifted the edge, making sure his fingers touched as little of the sheet as possible. He slipped his bag between two stacks of boxes and slowly lowered the sheet back into place. Not a sign showed of his adjustment.
‘Perfect,’ he thought.
He slipped back out of the room, the dust he disturbed tickling his nose. He checked, but there were no telltale signs of his passing, not footprints, no shifted boxes. Despite believing the wing to be deserted, he paused and listened. All was silence beyond the door. He slipped into the hallway and carefully made his way back to the more occupied parts of the house.
As always he marveled at the size of the estate house. Once a grand house built for one family with more wealthy than they knew what to do with, now parts of it were rented out to the academy. There had been a burst pipe in faculty housing and all of the staff was relocated while the damage was assessed and repairs made. Unfortunately the damage was extensive and additional issues were found. The building could not be occupied until solutions were found.
While the land the estate held was granted to the school, the ancestral home of the family was maintained by the family. No one lived in it for quite some time, but the family still seemed loathe to part with it. As they still had more money than they knew what to do with, selling it had never been a requirement. However while the faculty living situation was sorted out, the family agreed that the west wing of the mansion could be leased to the university for temporary housing, provided the rest of the building was left undisturbed.
Whether his visitation to the East wing counted as a violation or not, Charles couldn’t deny he felt better about having the bag removed from his quarters. He doubted anyone would search the rooms given to him during his stay here, but he was greatly relieved not to have the bag in his possession.
‘It should never have been in my possession in the first place,’ he thought as he headed to the atrium. His intent was to swing by the kitchen to see if there was anything he could claim as a snack before retreating back to his assigned rooms. Charles was of two minds about the bag. Part of him suspected it was left with him to trap him. The other half thought it might have been meant as some form of warning.
Ten til Midnight 