Quaranteam Ch. 42

Andy and Niko headed back into the house after their little tryst, and as always, the house was in serious motion. His return didn't even merit much notice, as all the girls were working on their individual projects, although Nicolette did meet him in the hallway and let him know that Tala had asked him to swing by the poolhouse when he had a minute.

He'd been giving it some serious thought, and had sent Whitney an email asking her to set up some sort of app so that he could talk to all the girls or just a handful of them without a constant barrage of text messages. It wasn't vital now, but whenever the quarantine died, it would be, especially if he wasn't in the same area as some of the women in his family. She told him she had some thoughts on the matter and would do some investigating as to what would work best - WhatsApp, Discord or maybe even some proprietary software solution.

Andy had been so focused on the day-to-day for so long now that it was odd starting to consider what things would look like after the pandemic had ended, or at least morphed into a thing where they could regularly go outside the house again. It hadn't even been a year, but already he felt like they'd acclimated to their new position far too quickly for his own liking. He needed to remind himself, and the others, that while parts of their new reality were going to be with them for a long time, not all of them would be.

Sooner or later, they'd be able to see the world again.

He headed through the manor and into the back yard, the loud clanging and clattering from the poolhouse unmistakable, as he chuckled, shaking his head. He knew that Tala had planned on doing some work to it, but she might have undersold the amount of work she'd been intending to do.

The door was open, allowing sawdust to fly out every now and then, and as he approached the doorway, he laughed and shouted "Cease fire! Cease fire! Friendly coming in!" The heavy clattering died down and when he poked his head in, he found that Tala, Jade and Sheridan were all in overalls, mostly covered in dust, and that the interior of the poolhouse had gone through a rather sizable metamorphosis.

When they'd first moved into the house, the poolhouse had seemed like a little getaway spot, with two bedrooms, a living room, a kitchen and a bathroom, as well as the pool communal showers attached to it. Now, the main living room had converted into a woodworking studio, with all sorts of tools and spare lumber strewn about the place, although some basic organizational structures seemed to be falling into place.

The heavy saws and sanders had been slowly trickling in since Tala's arrival, and each time a new piece of equipment arrived, she'd done more shifting and adjusting, making sure she had access to all of her tools while giving everything a nice and proper home.

Today's project, it seemed, had been affixing sound dampening pads along the walls, doing everything she could to try and keep the noise from spilling out. The whole space would eventually become Tala's main workroom, but the process of converting it from luxury living room to woodworking shop wasn't going to be done overnight.

"Heya babes," Tala said to him with a grin, climbing down off the ladder she'd been on when he'd walked into the room. "What do you think? Looking pretty sharp, right?"

"Sharp, as in I could cut myself open and die of tetanus, maybe," he chuckled. "It looks like a bomb went off at ground zero of a lumber mill."

"Yeah, well," Tala sighed, "it's gonna take a bit to get everything into its proper place, but it's getting there, and it's way better than it was yesterday. You should've seen what a nightmare it was then. I think there's only one more delivery with power tools showing up, and once it's here, then I'll be able to ensure everything is where it needs to be, and that it stays there."

"I figured you'd do your bedroom first and get to all this stuff after that," he said.

"Why?" Sheridan asked. "The only time she's really in her bedroom is when she's sleeping, so she doesn't much care what it looks like. It's got her bed in it and that's all that matters."

"Oh, I'll care eventually," Tala said, wiping sweat off her face with the back of one of her hands. "It's fun having other girls to play with, but I'm going to want to have some one-on-one time with the big man himself at least every now and again. And I figured if I wanted that, I'd want to have a nice little bedroom we can share that experience in. So I'll build real furniture for that room a little bit at a time. And that's why I asked you to swing by, Andy. Is there any furniture you need me to build for the house? I mean, I'm still going to do a writer's desk for you eventually, but that's a much bigger project, and is going to take some serious planning."

"Tala, you don't-"

"Ah ah ah. I know what I do and don't have to do, and I know what I want to do and am going to do, and I thought Sher explained to you what a bad idea it is to try and talk me out of something."

"She did, but I like to check these things for myself, you know?"

"Well, now you know," she said, kissing his cheek. "So, you got any minor woodworking projects I can do around the house, just as a sort of test for my tools? Other than the soundproofing of the room, which we're starting in on now. I know it's hella loud, but by the end of the week, I should be able to be running power saws in here any time day or night and you'll be completely unaware even if you're in the pool, so I need a project after that one."

"Actually," he said. "Why don't you talk to Whitney? I like the idea of there being a big status board near the entryway of the house, but that's going to be some combination of furniture and electronics. The little iPad for the Need board is great, and it's nice that she's got a phone app to go with it, but having like a big screen version of that in the house that anyone can check when they come in seems like it could be very useful, especially if it's got everyone's location. That way, when people are spending time away from the house, we're ready for it."

"Is that likely to happen any time soon?" Jade asked. She'd pulled her blonde hair back into a ponytail that poked out through the hole in a black and orange SF Giants baseball cap.

"Not entirely sure," Andy replied. "But I know both Sarah and Em have been getting a lot more calls over the past few days, people trying to hammer down schedules and figure out when they can get enough people to bubble and shoot something, because lord knows, companies are running out of entertainment to try and satiate the masses. They need to start generating new content and they need to start doing it yesterday."

"Not enough bread and circuses means the peasants are revolting," Sheridan said.

"They certainly are," Tala joked.

"All of it means it's possible that one or both of them is going to start shooting a movie at some point in the next few months, and if that happens, I need to know how to schedule things, what with me needing to go to them and tend to their needs on set."

"You should probably just buy a private jet," Sheridan said. "Especially since you've got all that money that Nate Watkins gave you."

"Who the hell would fly it?"

"Niko?" Jade suggested.

"Lexi?" Tala countered.

"Can either of them fly a plane?" Andy asked.

"I'm pretty sure both of them can, Andy," Sheridan told him. "It sounds like a skill each of them would've picked up somewhere along the line."

"I can't believe I'm casually just talking about buying my own private jet," he sighed. "My life's gotten too weird even for my liking."

"We can start building a list of who's joined the Mile High Club and who hasn't," Tala teased. "I know I'm certainly game for it."

"I bet most of us are," Sheridan giggled before both women looked a little nervously at Jade, who also started giggling.

"I'm not going to be a virgin forever, you guys, jeez," she said with a bright smile. "And that sounds like a thing I'd want to do at some point."

"Then I guess I'll just add that to my to-do list. Let's see. 'Finish 1^st wave revisions. Take cats to vet. Buy private jet.' There we go," he laughed, rolling his eyes. "I don't even know how one goes about buying a jet. Is there a catalog? Am I supposed to get a guy for it to get me the hook up? Where does one even get a jet guy?"

"These days it's likely to be a jet girl, but I bet either Sarah or Em would know," Jade said.

"I guess I could ask them."

"Hey," Tala said, snapping her fingers, as if she'd just had an idea. "I bet you could ask them."

"Very funny," he said. "Oh, I can think of one other thing we could probably use your woodworking skills for."

"Sure, shoot."

"Can you build us a large, multi-chambered dirty clothes hamper for the master bedroom?" he asked. "I know Nicolette hasn't complained yet about having to sort through and identify everyone's clothes post wash, but if we could make her job just a little bit easier, I think it would probably be welcome. Maybe you can make them interlocking, so they stay in place when they're connected, and you could even put each person's name on the edge of them in relief.

Tala nodded. "Yeah, that actually sounds like the perfect project for me to give the shop a test run with. Not too complicated, but with a little bit of planning, and I can even make it so it's expandable, in case any of the other girls want to stay in the master bedroom for extended stays, they can just move their hamper over and attach it to the big one. So who's always sleeping in the master bedroom, at least for the time being?"

"Me, Ash, Niko, Sarah, Emily, Fiona and Moira, although I wouldn't be surprised if Alexis decided she could keep me safer if she was closer."

"I think she sort of trusts Niko for that for the time being right now, hon," Tala said. "I've only talked to her a little bit, but she seems a sweetheart, y'know, for an ex-spy."

"Anyway, you should probably just make an individual hamper for everybody, and then people can move them at will, but those seven are the best place to start."

The Persian woman nodded. "I'll head up there and take some measurements of the space this afternoon and start doing some planning before I start carving tomorrow. They shouldn't take too long to do, actually."

"Well, keep in mind tomorrow evening we're going to be having a poker party over here to watch the President's speech and the 60 Minutes story."

Tala grinned up at him, reaching to pat his cheek with her fingertips. "You thought I somehow forgot that tomorrow was the day that the entire world gets to see my O face? You're adorable, Andy."

He felt all the color drain from his face in embarrassment and mortification. "Oh my god, you're right. I'm so sorry. I wasn't even thinking. Do you want me to call off the party?"

The curviest of his partners laughed, rolling her eyes at him. "Good lord, Andy, I told you a dozen times I wasn't bothered by it. Do you think I suddenly changed my mind because some of your friends are going to be around to see it when it first airs? I'm way less worried about fucking Phil or Xander seeing it than I am the call I'm going to get from my mother after it airs, but I'll deal with it."

"Is... is your mom going to be pissed?"

"Oh, she'll huff and she'll puff, but she'll get over it in time, especially after the President's speech. I think people are going to be in total shock over just how bad it is out there, so a lot of this is just going to roll off people's backs."

He nodded. "I guess that's true. I just want to make sure you're cool with it."

"I'm cool, baby," she teased. "I'm cold as ice."

The three women suddenly hummed the bass opening from 'Vanilla Ice' in unison before he shot them a dirty look and all three started furiously giggling.

"Anyway, it'll be fine," Tala reiterated. "I'll call her right after the piece airs. I told her yesterday that it was coming, and she was a bit mad then, but I think she's mostly just happy that I have a man in my life now. I didn't detail my little fetish to her, and she didn't ask."

"I'm surprised you didn't want to introduce me to her yet."

"I want her to watch the speech and the news story first, Andy. That way she can get angry about a dozen things all at once and then just have to pick one to yell at me over, if she even yells at all. She might just be glad I'm still alive, once she hears about how bad it is out there."

"How are you doing, Jade?" Andy asked. "Any word from your father?"

"If there was," the blonde said with a sniff, "I'm never, ever going to know about it. I asked Nicolette to just throw any messages from him into the trash. Same for any mail from him. I had Whitney get me a new cellphone with a new number. I don't want to hear from him ever again. In fact, I hope he saw the footage we sent him and he had a fucking heart attack and died."

Even with Sarah's coaching, Jade didn't naturally swear very often, so Andy was able to spot exactly how angry the cheerleader was, and moved over to give her a hug. "Yeah, well, you may feel differently after he's gone, but whatever you want is fine with me," he told her.

Jade sniffed back a tear, but hugged Andy close nonetheless. "He's a prick, Andy. He's always been a prick."

"But he's still your father," Andy replied, "which complicates things a bunch, I know. But we will make sure we do our best to respect your wishes, whatever they are."

"Thanks." She kissed him on the cheek. "Anyway, you should let us get back to it. We don't have that much left to do, and if we can get it done before dinner, that'd be for the best."

"Sure sure," he said. "Don't work too hard."

"We won't," Tala said.

"And don't forget your appointment with Team Taylor after dinner," Sheridan said. "Once is a mistake, twice is intentional."

"I hadn't forgotten," he told them, "but I'm sure they would've reminded me at dinner."

"And maybe check in on Maya, see if she's woken up yet," Jade said. "It's around the time she's supposed to be getting up."

"From one appointment to another," he chuckled. "You're right, though. Best to pop around and see if she's up. All of you three doing okay? Nobody in the far end of yellow yet?"

Sheridan gave his ass a little fondle. "As long as you hit me up in the next week or so, we're all good here, my dude."

"You like calling him that, don't you?" Tala giggled.

"I really do," Sheridan said with a mischievous smile.

"On that note," Andy said, "I'll take my exit, stage left."

He headed out of the pool house, and as soon as he was out of the door, he could hear the sounds of power tools starting up again behind him. Them getting the workshop soundproofed couldn't happen too soon.

He decided to make Maya his next step, mainly because her room was on the ground floor, which meant it was a short little walk over to it and didn't involve him going upstairs. He'd always considered owning stairs in California a sign of middle-to-upper class, but now that he had three stories in his home, he wondered if maybe it should've gone the other way.

Andy found the door to Maya's room open, so he peeked his head in, seeing nobody inside of it, not even her dogs. He suspected he knew where to find her if she wasn't in her room, so he headed back down the hall and towards the stairs, making his way up and over to Sarah and Emily's little studio space. The door was closed, but the "do not open" sign wasn't hanging on the door handle, so Andy felt safe in slowly opening it up.

As he'd suspected, Emily, Maya and Sarah were in the process of getting caught up, the three of them sitting around a small table in the corner, sipping from drinks, telling stories, as Sarah pet a dog sitting on her lap, and the other lay at Maya's feet.

He stepped into the room and closed the door behind him, so that the dogs couldn't get out. "Evening, ladies," he said. "Hopefully I'm not interrupting anything?"

"Nah, c'mere you," Sarah said, motioning for him to move over. He stepped close and bent down so he could kiss each of them in turn, Sarah first, then Em and finally Maya, simply because he wasn't sure what kind of kiss he should give Maya, but she made the decision for him, pressing her lips against his just as hard as Sarah and Em had. "We were just talking about, like, how your cum changed Maya's voice."

"It..." he said, starting, stopping then starting again. "I'm sorry, it whatnow?"

"It's true Andy," Maya said to him, and sure enough, he could hear the sound of her voice was less scratchy and gravelly than it had been before. "I used to be a terrible smoker in my youth, and so I sort of had a smoker's voice. Quit several years back, but my voice still had that frog in it, but I woke up this afternoon and came to see Em, we all noticed how that it was much smoother."

"It's different enough that I was quite startled, Andrew!" Emily said to him with a youthful smile. "But she assures me she feels excellent, so who am I to question?"

"Lexi got a lot more fucking changes," Sarah said, "but this sort of strange regeneration didn't happen to most of us."

"Yeah, it's only like 10-20% or so, Niko told me," Andy told them. "So I guess we'd been running under the norm until now and saved them all up for the end."

"So I know you've got loads of women to take care of, Andy," Maya said to him, "but I meant what I said about intending to fuck the shit out of you very soon, so you best make sure we have time sometime over the next few days, or I'll ambush you and take what I want."

"She'll do it, Andrew," Emily warned. "She did so love a practical joke on the set, and she was a fight choreographer before she was directing, so I wouldn't put it past her to put you onto your bottom and then drag you into the nearest bedroom."

"Message received and understood, Maya," Andy laughed. "We'll make a point of it at some point in the next couple of days. That soon enough? Don't need to do it right now?"

"Oh, I could do it right now, but I don't want to anger the coed hive," she said with a grin. "I ran into Hannah in the hallway earlier, and those girls have a plan cooked up for you, so the last thing I want to do is get in the way of all that."

"Anything I should know in advance?"

"Wait until after dinner," Maya told him. "You're going to want to have at them on a full stomach. Lots of fuel to keep up with them."

"If you even can," Sarah teased.

"They did seem quite... eager," Emily said, winking at him.

"Then I'd better make sure I get everything else I need to do today before dinner. So, I have a weird question for you, Em."

"Anything, my love. Simply ask it."

"...do you have a plane guy?"

"A whatnow?"

"I know you and Sarah have been talking about going back to work soon, and while I'm all for that, I need to be able to get to you to make sure you don't go too long without..."

"Without getting fucked," Sarah interjected helpfully.

"Yeah, exactly," Andy said. "So rather than flying commercial, or asking the studio to do it, I figured since I've got all this money that Nathaniel gave me, so maybe I should... y'know... just buy a jet, maybe?"

"Actually Andrew, let us take a walk, shall we?" Emily said, standing up, taking his hand in hers.

"Don't tell me you have a fucking jet guy and you've been fucking holding out on me, Em," Sarah said, her tone somewhere between teasing and genuine offense.

"No, I don't, but the person we were talking about earlier? They're likely to, so Andrew and I will walk and talk..." Emily pulled him over to the door, opening it.

"Don't bother fucking arguing with her, Andy," Sarah said, blowing him a kiss. "You know she always wins out in the end."