Quaranteam Ch. 29

Chapter 29

The next day, Andy and Ash met up with Eric and Lily for lunch in a restaurant, something they still weren't accustomed to, even though they'd done it a couple of times since moving into New Eden. They'd been in quarantine so long that the basic things like eating out felt alien. They'd found a nice little BBQ joint that someone had opened within the walls of New Eden, and Andy was ecstatic.

Andy's hope was that they were going to keep getting more varieties of food in their new home town. The little 1950s dinner was nice, but the village needed things like a Mexican joint, a Chinese restaurant, a ramen house, a place where he could get a banh mi... Andy realized he really just needed the place to be less exclusively white.

The guy who owned and ran the BBQ was a big black guy named Bryant Walters who'd apparently played football for the 49ers a couple of decades ago. He'd settled in the Bay after his football career ended, and he had brought his love of southern BBQ to opening his own restaurant, called "Smoke On The Water." He had a dozen of his own BBQ sauces, brisket that he smoked for at least twelve hours and some of the best damn ribs Andy had ever tasted. It didn't hurt that Bryant was also massively friendly, making sure to come out and talk to patrons of the place. The wait staff was comprised of his partners, five women in all, at least one a former 49ers cheerleader.

Over lunch, Andy made sure to tell Bryant that he should have delivery service for the community, and the big burly man told him that was an excellent idea, and that he'd start working on a website for online orders.

The meal was the first chance that Andy and Eric had really been able to sit down and catch up one on one since they'd gotten to New Eden. Sure, they'd seen each other at parties and big gatherings, but with just Ash and Lily there, it felt like a throwback to the first days of the whole adventure when they'd been a pair of new couples sharing a tiny little condo.

"So yeah, what with all the casualties on my team, I've been promoted up the food chain to be director of the division," Eric said, poking at his brisket with his fork. "I like the responsibility and the increase in pay, but it's also incredibly depressing to think about all the former coworkers that died, none of whose funerals I can attend, because nobody's allowing funerals."

"Yeah," Andy sighed, "Phil told me they're moving to mass cremations now, since so many people died. They'll probably build some sort of memorial after we're through all of this, like the Vietnam Wall or Ground Zero for 9/11."

"It's so strange, seeing all the names on Slack that aren't lighting up any more," Eric sighed. "At some point, the death toll crossed from a number I can understand to a number I can't."

"Kill one person and it's murder; kill a hundred thousand and it's a statistic. Good ol' Stalin," Lily joked, squeezing his hand reassuringly. "Don't try and think about it, dear. You're only going to get angry or depressed again, and we're having a nice lunch here, with everyone getting a chance to see one another. I mean, I love Niko to death, but if Andy shows up with his entire tribe, it takes over the whole room. How many are there now, fifty?"

Ash giggled, rolling her eyes. "It really isn't tha' bad, Lily. How many're over there?"

"Seven, including Lily," Eric said.

"I refuse to let them send any more," Lily growled. "Each of the girls gets one day a week to spend with him, and he gets Sundays off."

"Then when do ya get time with him?"

"Any time I fucking want to," Lily laughed, waggling her beer in Eric's direction. "We're trying to have a kid now, and I'm refusing to let any of those other bitches get a go at getting knocked up until I'm well and truly swollen. Once I'm half way through my second trimester, then I'll let'em get off their birth control, and not a minute fucking sooner."

"Still got Eric under your thumb, huh, Lil?" Andy teased.

"Thumb, palm, elbow and heel," she said, grinning at him. "Not that he complains."

"Not that you'll let me," Eric grumbled, although he did have a smile on his face.

"Oh, you know that you love it."

"I mean, you actually seem really happy, Eric," Andy said. "I know the whole polygamy thing wasn't what you had planned, but you seem to be managing it pretty well."

"It's a new world, Eric," Aisling said to him. "Ya just need to roll with the punches and go with the flow. Craic on, and you'll do alright. Andy had some challenges when our pod jumped in scale, but he learned how t' manage."

"Well, the girls seemed to divide themselves into cliques pretty well on their own, and that helped."

"It didn't hurt that two of them are drop dead gorgeous world famous actresses either," Lily said. "Not that I blame you one bit. If Sarah Washington came at me with those big jiggly tits of hers, I don't think I could've said no."

"They are great tits," Ash giggled. "I've gotten lost in them more than a couple of times. I spent an hour reading last week with me head nestled between'em like pillows." Andy reached over and swatted Ash on the wrist, and she couldn't help but giggle a little bit more. "Oh like ya haven't as well."

"Didn't say I hadn't," he said with a smirk.

"So are you ready for your interview tomorrow?" Eric asked, changing the subject. "Don't forget to plug your books or Nicole'll have your head."

Andy nodded. His publicist, Nicole, had made it abundantly clear to him what she'd do to him if he didn't mention the books at least a little bit when he had screen time, but Andy had also stressed to her that he didn't have control of what they did and didn't air, something Nicole had, reluctantly, agreed with. "I mean, it's weird, knowing we're going to be getting interviewed for 60 Minutes, and that we're going to end up setting the standard for the new post-pandemic family unit. Who the hell saw that one coming, right?"

"Have you been doing any prep work in advance for it?" Eric had always been the more practical of the two men. "I know you don't think it's an adversarial interview, but it never hurts to be prepared, just in case it turns that way."

"I've done interviews before, Eric," Andy sighed. "You know that. Shit, you probably remember the phone interview I did with the Guardian in the UK a few years back."

"That was such a strange article they wrote. I swear, they were way more interested in getting you to talk about the rights being licensed out than they were the books themselves. It was funny, because I could've told them you barely knew anything about what the movie studio was doing, but they didn't seem to want to believe you."

"Yeah, I felt like they wanted to create a 'gotcha' moment they just weren't going to get from me. After a while, they just got frustrated and gave up."

"Dermot read that article," Ash said to him. "He said ya came off looking way smarter than the reporter did."

"Well, there's one vote of confidence in me," Andy joked. "Niko's at the base today, doing the tour along with Phil and Charlotte. Phil's running the show, but the good doctor's walking the reporter through the process itself, and Niko's giving them a sort of ground eye view of how the whole thing works, from arrival to departure. The President apparently thinks, and I happen to agree with her, that transparency is the best approach to all of this."

"Is everyone going to take part?" Lily asked them.

"Well, the plan is that everyone's going to be around for the day, but nobody has to talk to the reporter if the don't want to. The only people who've said in advance they don't want to be interviewed are Lauren and Sheridan," Ash said.

"They just don't wanna?"

"Well," Andy said, "Lauren's worried about how it'll reflect on the 49ers, so rather than ask the team's owners about it, she's just not going to take part."

"Same for Sheridan and the owners of Cirque," Ash said. "Everybody else seems okay with talking to the reporter, if they want ta, and Andy thinks it's best if we appear like we've nothin' to hide."

"We don't have anything to hide, Ash."

Ash giggled. "Taylor will, of course, be wearing clothes for the whole day."

"Okay, we don't have anything else to hide," Andy chuckled.

"I'm a tad nervous," Ash admitted, "but it's important we do it. I'm just wonderin' if there's going ta be some curve ball we didn't see coming."

"You'd think they'd ask Phil those kinds of questions," Eric said. "If they do, I'm sure he'll give you a heads up what to expect. The government's going to be far more careful about this than you are, so if the reporter gives him too much trouble, he'll just call off the entire interview process and tell his boss to revoke their permission to be in New Eden. Major General Fielder has the final say on these kinds of things."

"Better him than us," Ash said, as she reached into her pocket. Her phone had started vibrating, and she looked at the screen, seeing it was Niko calling. The picture of her with her tongue sticking out was Ash's profile photo for Niko, and it always made Andy grin. "Better take this. I'll just step outside an' see what's the craic. Carry on without me."

"What's the agenda going to be like tomorrow?" Lily asked Andy while Ash got up from the table and headed outside so her conversation with Niko wouldn't disturb them.

"Tour of the house first, a one-on-one with me and the reporter second, then a group interview with me and basically all the girls including the staff, then a handful of one-on-ones with some of the girls afterwards. I know Emily and Sarah are going to do one together, so they can talk a little about their relationship before the plague and how it affected them. Neither Sarah or Ems were out as bi before, and it certainly wasn't public knowledge that they were a couple, so I'm sure the reporter's going to have some questions on why they kept it quiet, but that's typical Hollywood bullshit. They'll handle it just fine without me getting in the way."

"Didn't you say you had some girls showing up today?" Eric said.

"Yeah, three people today, but I imagine they'll probably still be in the imprinting process by tomorrow, so they won't be around for interviews, although we'll see, I guess."

"Speaking of handling it," Eric sighed, "how are you holding up with Matty's death? It's awful that he got sick and died from trying to help someone."

"Yeah, but that was classic Matty," Andy shrugged. "He never stopped to think about these things if he thought someone needed his help. I'm dealing with it, some days better than others. From time to time, I just want to call him and talk to him about all of this, but then I remember I can't, and I have a good cry for a bit. But Xander's moving here to New Eden, and that's going to help, I'm sure."

"Cool," Eric said. "Xander's always been a good guy, and it's smart to keep in touch with the people who knew you back when you were young and foolish."

"I was young and foolish then, I feel old and foolish now."

"Having Xander around will be good for you. He's always been better at calling you out on your bullshit than I am," Eric said, picking up a french fry. "And your long history with him means he knows when you're not saying something."

"You know, I still think it's unfair you got both Sarah Washington and Emily Stevens, Andy," Lily joked. "You should've sent one of them over to me, er, Eric. I'm, I mean, he's jealous."

"They're a set, Lily," Andy laughed. "You would've had to take both of them, and I think you probably would've gotten Sarah killed when she found out I was here. I know everyone's in love with Emily. You didn't strike me as a Dagger Academy fan when we were sharing the condo, though."

"I'm not," Lily said, raising her empty glass, making sure a waitress caught her eye and started heading over to refill it. "But I fucking loved the Badass Ballerina movies, and I would've done Sarah in a heartbeat. Is she ask spunky as she seems on TV? That time she was on The Daily Show, and that girl in the audience told Sarah that she was on her boyfriend's list, and she started flirting with the guy immediately, that fucking killed me. Tell me she's really like that."

"She's absolutely really like that," Andy said, as a waitress refilled all of their glasses. He'd been trying to cut down on his soda intake, but when he was stressed, he tended to double down on it a bit, so he was drinking Pepsi, same as Lily and Eric. "She's also a massive fan of the Druid Gunslinger books, if you can believe it."

"Bullshit," Eric snorted. "I don't think there's any possibility she's a bigger fan than Dave, who got us in here just to get a copy of the new book six months early."

"Wanna bet?" Andy grinned.

For the next few minutes, Andy related the story of Comic Con panel from last year, where Emily and Sarah had participated in his Q&A, asking questions while being disguised in head to toe cosplay, so nobody could recognize them. By the point that Andy was telling them about how Emily had done her best to maneuver both her and Sarah into his care, Eric and Lily were both laughing quite openly, incredulous to the surrealistic twists and turns their lives had taken this year.

"Holy fuck," Lily said. "I guess you weren't kidding when you Sarah would've raised hell if she found out you were here and she wasn't paired with you. I bet she fucking devoured the new book as soon as she arrived."

"Well, I didn't tell her it was done until the day after she was imprinted, but yeah, as soon as I did, she grabbed it and refused to do anything other than read it until she'd finished it."

"What did she think of it?" Eric asked.

"She thinks it's the second best one in the series, after 'Have Totem, Will Travel.'"

"Yeah, I still think that's the best one as well, but you're not done yet. On that topic, how's it coming?"

"I've finally got a draft I'm mostly happy with, and I'll be sending it over for your thoughts probably in the next couple of days or so."

Eric grinned from ear to ear. "Well, that just made my day. First draft?"

Andy clicked his tongue, rolling his eyes in frustration at the challenge the book had presented to him in the writing. "More like fifth. I finished the first draft like a month and a half ago, but when I sat down and reread the fucking thing, I tore a shitload of it apart and rebuilt the entire second act so that it didn't suck."

"I'm sure it didn't suck before."

"Well, it's better now, that's all that matters."

"Can I read it as well?" Lily asked. "I don't want to intrude if it's not cool..."

"Of course you can, Lil," Andy told her, a little delighted and surprised. "I thought you weren't a fan of the books."

"Well, I'd only read one of them before meeting you and it was the one you weren't a fan of yourself, so Eric made me read the first one about three weeks ago, and since then I've read them all. 'The Problem With Were-Bears' really is a terrible place to start."

"I know, I know, alright?" he laughed. "If I could unpublish it and rewrite it from the ground up, I would, but it's out there, and I can't."

"Stephen King rewrote the first book of The Dark Tower and published it a second time," Eric pointed out.

"Stephen King I ain't, Eric," Andy deadpanned in return.

"So what's this new one finally called? You seemed like you went through a dozen titles."

"It's called 'The Fatal Solstice,' although I have to see if Nicole thinks it works."

"Nice fucking title, dude!" Eric cheered. "I think that sounds badass."

"Sarah started reading it this morning, so she'll have my first set of fresh eyes on it."

"You're just now letting her read it?"

"I just finished the draft yesterday! I didn't want her reading it until I felt like I had a semi-finished final draft."

There was a jingle of a bell as the front door to the restaurant opened and Ash moved back inside, heading to the table, a grin from ear-to-ear on her face, one that almost worried Andy a little as the Irish redhead slid back into the booth next to him, wrapping her arm around his shoulder.

"Okay, I'll bite," Andy said, after a few seconds of silence, with Ash not saying anything, just grinning at them in an expression that bordered on derangement. "What's up? What did Niko have to say? Everything fine at the base?"

"So Tala, Whitney and Jade will all be arriving soon," Ash said. "Tala seems like a gas. Niko let me talk ta her for a couple of minutes, and I cannot tell ya how glad I am you chose her, having now spoken with her a bit. She's going to fit right in."

"Dare I ask what that means?"

"She and Niko seem like kindred spirits, that's all I'm saying."

"Yeah, well, Niko once blew me in a public park because she thought I needed to take the edge off, so maybe that doesn't put me as much as ease as it does you," Andy smirked.

"Did it?" Lily asked.

"Did it what?"

"Did it take the edge off?"

"I don't have to answer that."

"I suspect it did take the edge off."

Andy scowled at her, narrowing his eyes. "That's not the point."

"I rather think that it is," she teased.

"Fine," he admitted. "Yes, it did. But that doesn't mean it was a good idea."

"No," Ash said, "that means it was a great idea. Waitress? Can we get the check please?"

The woman at the counter nodded. "How do you want it split?"

"No split," Andy said. "I'm covering it."

"Andy, man, you don't have to do that," Eric said, looking a little pained.

Andy waved his hand. "I told you that Watkins just gave me a shitload of cash, so let me spend a little bit of it on my friends from time to time. Speaking of which..." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a personal check he'd written a few hours ago, sliding it across the table to Eric. "That's for you."

"What's this for?" Eric said, not even looking at it yet.

"Look, I know you were undercharging me rent for years and years, Eric, because you knew I couldn't afford more, and because you liked having someone else sharing the condo with you, but now I do have a bunch of money, so consider it me paying off back rent."

"I'll remind you that there were a couple of years where we were both out of work."

"So that just makes it even in more important that I settle up my debts," Andy said, handing his credit card to the waitress, not even looking at the bill.

Eric picked up the check, looking at it, shaking his head. "C'mon, Andy! Man! This is too much! I can't take this!"

"You already did," Andy said with a grin. "I don't often get a chance to do nice things for my friends any more, Eric, so you're just gonna have to give me this one."

"I mean, you brought me into New Eden," Eric laughed. "I think that would've settled all our debts right then and there. I mean, my house isn't quite as nice as yours, but it's still a fucking fifteen room mansion here in the Bay, so between that and this," he said, waving the check around, "we are now absolutely, unequivocally even, okay?"

"Yeah, alright," Andy answered, as the waitress handed him the credit card receipt and his card. Andy filled in the tip amount at 25% of the bill, then signed the slip and pocketed the card back into his wallet. As soon as he stood up, Eric hugged him hard.

"Thanks again, Andy," Eric said. "It's good to have friends in this place."

"I always promised you that if I got success, I wouldn't let it turn me into an asshole, Eric," Andy laughed, as his friend finally released him from the bear hug. "I just thought it would've been from my own doing rather than the generosity of some random guy I played poker with."

"If you think all of this isn't of your own doing, Andy," Lily said, giving him a quick hug, "then you haven't been paying attention."