Splendor House - Chapter 4 ..... The eyes

So Penny met Megan in the cafe around 9:30 am. They had moved up to the apartments and begun the "look see". They were both overwhelmed with the amount of stuff that they encountered in the 3 apartments of the upstairs space of the building.

Megan begged off the process about 1:45 pm to join her husband and kids for a late lunch at the park. Penny continued poking around the space and getting an idea of the amount of real work that it would take to get this space into usable real estate for them.

Even one rental apartment in this area could easily pay their entire mortgage on the building and since Megan was expecting another baby and thinking of buying another house and Penny wanted to redecorate the cafe, they were getting serious about the possibilities of the upstairs area.

Penny finally got into the back apartment, number 1 around 3:00 pm and was amazed at the number of boxes, crates, bins and even some steamer trunks. She had forgotten all about these items. She wondered out loud even, why she and Megan had never poked around in here or ever had an interest in opening  the crates. Certainly, like the basement finds, there could be some valuable items to sell or use.

As a matter of fact, these trunks could be reused in the cafe in the new Parisian theme she had in mind. And the crates, oh with some well chosen antique looking items she could complement the exposed brick walls of the cafes bar area. So with that in mind she started looking for whatever wonderful items there were to be had.

Penny pushed her way into the farthest corner and used her handy dandy look alike Swiss army knife to pry open the first wooden crate that appeared to be the easiest to get to. Nothing really interesting in the top layer. Penny found an oriental vase and lots of excelsior, which gave her the willies. Mice liked to snuggle into the straw looking fluff and Penny wasn't exactly a fan of rodents. The thought of a mouse running up her arm or leg made her shiver.

She was about to put the lid back on the crate when she noticed the tip of a parcel wrapped in leather in the bottom of the musty smelling crate. Upon careful examination, Penny found it was soft leather and tied up with red string. It was so light that when she picked it up, it felt as though it would fly. The feel of the parcel was almost exhilarating to her. There really wasn't enough room to take a good look back here in the shadows, so she tucked it into her jacket pocket, replaced the lid and made her way to the front room of the flat.

When she reached the top of the stairs, she felt slightly dizzy as though she were a little tipsy. It must be that she was more tired than she thought or maybe it was the dust in the room. But whatever the reason she made a decision, rather than stay upstairs, she went down into the closed cafe to make herself some tea. While the tea was brewing, Penny sat down in the booth closest to the back door.

She was shocked back into the present when she realized it had grown dark outside, and the tea had gone cold. Realizing that she must have blacked out again, she found her purse behind the counter, got out her cell phone and called Megan to let her know how awful she was feeling. After speaking to her friend she sat back down. And the next thing she remembered was Megan touching the back of her neck and waking her. She also realized that she wasn't as she had been when she sat down. Her shirt was unbuttoned as were her jeans and she had that ache in her nether region as though she had had sex and had a vision of those eyes again.

When Megan dropped Penny off at her house around 6:00 pm, they exchanged hugs but no more details of the upstairs or the aftermath downstairs. Penny chose not to worry her friend until she could get things straight in her mind. Penny thanked Megan's husband for driving her car home. They all agreed that there would be no more solo excavation of the upstairs and made their plan to clean out the upstairs of their building in a week or so. They also agreed that Penny needed to keep her appointments with the doctor and therapist in the week to come because Megan was very concerned about the way Jenny looked.

After promising that she would do so, Penny went into her house and locked the door securely behind her.