As the guests started arriving for Evelyn's Gold Blazer celebration, Jake stood by the front door.
He paused as a tall, goofy-looking man in a sharply tailored suit stepped through the door. The face was semi-familiar, but Jake couldn't quite place him from his original timeline's general knowledge.
"Hi, I'm Jake Harper," Jake said smoothly, extending his hand.
"Oh, hi! Phil Dunphy," the man said brightly, giving Jake's hand an enthusiastic, slightly overly-firm shake. "A pleasure! Wow, great house. Fantastic crown molding. You know, I'm actually a realtor myself—"
"I know," Jake smiled politely, pointing him toward the champagne fountain.
A quick, millisecond ping to his image search module brought up the file. Ah.
[Tyler Gerald Burrell (born August 22, 1967) is an American actor best known for his iconic role as Phil Dunphy on the hit ABC sitcom Modern Family. His portrayal of the endlessly optimistic "cool dad" earned him two Primetime Emmy Awards and five Screen Actors Guild Awards.]
The rest of the night passed smoothly and without incident. According to Evelyn, it was one of the best nights of her life.
...
The holidays passed in a blur. Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's came and went, and before anyone fully processed the passage of time, May of 2005 had arrived.
Jake, at twelve years old, had shot up to 165 centimeters (roughly five-foot-five) putting him exactly eye-to-eye with his mother, Judith.
One sunny Friday afternoon, he was sitting at the kitchen island, quietly eating a bowl of oatmeal. Suddenly, the front door clicked open.
"Hello! Anybody home? Grandmummy's here!" Evelyn's voice echoed loudly down the house.
Alan and Charlie, who had been peacefully drinking their morning coffee, froze. They locked eyes.
Without exchanging a single word, they both set their mugs down, turned, and sprinted silently toward the laundry room, leaving Jake completely abandoned in the kitchen.
A moment later, Evelyn swept into the room, perfectly accessorized as always and with a radiant smile.
"There's my grandson!" she said with a bright smile.
"Hi, Grandma," Jake said, taking a bite of his oatmeal.
Evelyn glanced around the empty kitchen, noting the two steaming mugs of coffee abandoned on the counter. "Where is everybody?"
"Oh, over there," Jake said, gesturing vaguely toward the back hallway with his spoon.
Evelyn let out a long, long-suffering sigh. She marched down the hall, stopped in front of the laundry room, and yanked the door open.
Alan and Charlie were looking like two deer caught in the headlights.
"Seriously, how many times are you going to do that?" Evelyn asked annoyed.
"I don't know. How many times are you going to come over?" Charlie shot back sarcastically.
Alan nervously grabbed a massive bottle of detergent. "Oh! Hi, Mom! I was just... washing the clothes."
"Oh, shut it," Evelyn snapped, not believing a word out of her youngest son's mouth. "Get out of here."
They trudged back to the dining area. Charlie went straight for the coffee pot to refill his mug while Alan slinked into a chair.
"So, Mom," Charlie started, leaning against the counter. "To what do we owe this unexpected... uh..." He trailed off, genuinely struggling to find the right word.
"Pleasure?" Evelyn offered.
"No. That's not it," Charlie said flatly.
Evelyn shook her head and rolled her eyes. "I was showing a house in the neighborhood, and I thought I'd visit the people I love."
"And they weren't home?" Alan quipped.
Charlie barked out a laugh. They shared a brief moment of brotherly solidarity before Evelyn shot them a withering glare that instantly wiped the smiles off their faces.
Alan quickly retreated, hiding his face behind the morning newspaper.
Evelyn sat at the table, pulled a copy of the LA Times from her designer bag, and immediately flipped to the back pages.
"Oh, goody!" she clapped her hands together. "There's a gorgeous Tudor on Stone Canyon that's going to hit the market very soon."
"How do you know?" Alan asked, still reading his paper.
"The owner just dropped dead of a massive heart attack," Evelyn said, her tone as casual as if she were reading the weather report. "You know what they say, darlings: today's obituary is tomorrow's exclusive listing." She flashed a brilliant smile.
"I don't think anyone has ever said that, Grandma," Jake remarked, entirely unfazed by his grandmother's attitude.
"Ooh! A father of five in Westwood just kicked the bucket! I am on fire today!" Evelyn cheered, aggressively circling a paragraph with a red pen.
"You will be soon," Charlie muttered into his coffee mug.
Jake watched his grandmother circle another grieving family's misfortune, knowing full well she didn't actually need to work anymore.
Thanks to the massive investments Jake had been secretly orchestrating through The Hera Group; Evelyn was making astronomically more money than she ever could selling real estate. She was only hunting for listings now for the pure, sadistic thrill of the game.
Of course, Evelyn didn't actually know the true, staggering amount of wealth she now shared with Jake.
A few months prior, he had detected an anomaly in Evelyn's financial records: her primary accountant had been quietly skimming money off the top of her accounts to fund a lavish lifestyle for his secret lover.
Jake hadn't involved the police or told Evelyn. Instead, he visited the accountant.
After a very brief, "friendly talk" with Jake regarding federal embezzlement laws, digital paper trails, and anonymous IRS tip lines, the terrified accountant had happily surrendered all access to Jake.
Now, Jake was the one quietly pulling the strings.
He managed the massive investments and carefully "hid" the bulk of the wealth in highly secure offshore trusts and index funds; acting as the ultimate fail-safe, just in case his grandmother ever decided to act crazy and blow it all.
"Oh my god, Harry Gorsky died," said Evelyn as her face dropped.