Megan and Sophia sat in slack-jawed silence across from Andrea and Lea trying to process what Lea had just told them.
"So let me get this straight. You own this place," Sophia said slowly as she looked around the living room, as if to make it extra clear which place she meant.
"Yeahuh" Lea said nodding her head quickly forcing her to push her black rimmed glasses back up.
"And you got the money by selling the software you've been using to torment us all month," Sophia continued, letting her eyebrows convey her disbelief. "And how are you not more freaked out about this Andrea?"
"Cause I.. kind of saw it two weeks ago?" Andrea sheepishly replied, her voice trailing off at the end.
"So is that what happened? You two have been like, well joined at the hip is understating it." Megan finally chimed in.
"Well I have been helping her move in, you should have seen how barran it was when she first got the place." Andrea said, looking back behind her and remembering how empty the living room used to be.
"Sure that explains where you two disappear to after school, but it's not just that. I don't think I've seen one of you without the other in... yeah just about two weeks now." Sophia said in an ever so slightly accusatory tone.
"We're just friends who've had a lot to do. This place came well equipped in some ways but it was still missing some of the more basic stuff. That's meant we've been off on our own a bunch, and this place is so far away it means we try and get it all done quick and minimize our trips out. That's where I've been but there's nothing nefarious about that."
Andrea said the words, three words she'd been chanting to herself more and more. We're just friends. She believed them, but it shook her some that she had to keep saying it to herself. Truth was somewhere between getting tied up, often naked, going down on each other, and cuddling in bed together after, not a lot of people would call them "just friends" anymore. But everyone comes to realizations at their own speed, and Andrea was not being very quick.
"Ok, slow down, I didn't mean anything by it. Hell, if it were me fixing up a secret cabin, I'd probably be 24/7 about it too," Sophia said, marveling at the strangeness of the topic as it left her mouth.
"So how about a tour Mrs. I-have-my-own-cabin-in-the-woods?" Megan butted in, not so much to defuse tension as out of genuine curiosity.
"That is not my name, that's a ridiculous last name, you're ridiculous, but sure lets start. You got the deck out there, the hot tub works now so that'll be awesome. Then, going clockwise around the hallway starting with first door you got the bathroom, and the wooden door next to it is the sauna. Past that you got doors to two guest bedrooms. The door at the end of the hall is is my room. Past that on the other side you have the laundry room which also leads outside to the carport, and finally the big ass room over there taking up the rest of the space we've come to calling the lounge." Lea explained pointing out the doors from the mouth of the hallway.
"And what are some of those small doors at either edge of the living room?" Megan asked.
"Just, uh, what do you call it, utility room." Lea stammered out. Andrea turned away as she began to grin. Andrea was terrible at poker.
"So Sophia, that room by mine is yours, Megan that one's yours and Andrea will just have the couch." Lea explained as she headed back to the car. "Why don't you go check out the room, Andrea and I'll go get your bags." Andrea soon began to follow.
The two pairs of friends headed off in their various directions. Andrea and Lea waited just outside, watching the screen on her phone as it played one of the hallway's cameras showing them each enter their rooms. Flipping back to the commands, Lea hit the button locking down both rooms like she had with Andrea. The two watching were a little giddy that it worked and turned back to head inside. "Hey where do you think you're going?" Lea asked as she turned back to Andrea and clicking the car unlocked at the same time. " Someone's got to bring the bags in. Put them in my room would you?"
"Yes Mistress." Andrea said with a wave of anticipation, the weekend's events were finally starting.
****
When Megan heard the door close and lock behind her she was already sitting on the bed getting situated. She gave the lock a quick lookover from where she sat and could tell even at that distance that there was no getting around it. She simply collapsed back in the bed and mumbled out loud "Damn you Lea, and your damn surprises. Would it be so hard to give a girl a heads up every once in a while about when things are starting?"
Sophia one soundproofed room over was not being nearly as blasΓ© about it. She darted over to the sliding glass door that had bars in front of it. The bars looked like they could slide to one side just like some kind of high security screen door, but she also saw a very serious clamp on one side and a kind of metal ramp raised up to prevent it from sliding even if the clamp was gone. She tried pulling on the bars but nothing happened. She tried reaching behind the bars for the sliding glass door itself, but not only was it too locked, the metal handle gave her a slight shock. She moved over and tried pulling on the small door right next to the glass. While there was no serious lock, at least on the side that she could see, that handle shocked her too. More cautiously, she examined the front door and found that not only could she not do anything about the deadbolt, but that doorknob shocked her as well. She let out a scream of frustration, she would have thrown something but beyond the drawer and bedframe which were bolted to the floor there was nothing. She thought about flipping the mattress but decided to lay down on it instead and give the bed a few good punches.
"Wow, I'm actually a little surprised," Lea said laying flat on her stomach in the middle of her bed, looking at her laptop as Andrea entered overloaded with baggage. "Sophia gave up a little easier than I thought. I guess the shocks really do something."
"Well," Andrea said as she climbed onto the bed beside her friend to see the screen. "Having been on the receiving end I also can't stress just how little options you have and how quickly you realize that. Sophia's probably just come to the same conclusion."
"Yeah, but after some of our last talks I assumed she would put up more of a resistance." Lea said cautiously and quietly.
"What's that?" Andrea asked as she pointed to a colored bar dancing up and down beside the camera feed.
"Oh, that's the sound, I didn't have it on since I was switching between both rooms. This place has always got all the mics turned on and listening, but I didn't want two audio streams playing at once," Lea said before hitting the right keys to turn the sound on in Sophia's room.
"...ecret, I mean who does that? You bet your ass I'd tell you if I suddenly got rich. You better not have driven off, cause that right there would be the fucking line. I mean..."
"Wow, so she might be just a tad pissed," Andrea quipped. "Should we say something?"
"No, I think she probably needs to vent, let's see how Megan's doing." Lea said as she switched to make Megan's camera the main screen and the one producing audio. Presumably producing audio at least, since no sounds were actually coming from Megan or that room. She had gotten herself up onto the bed and was intent on staring at the ceiling, almost literally twiddling her thumbs. "And don't you have something you should be doing?" Lea asked Andrea who then silently got up went to work.
"Megan?" Lea said into her computer, causing Megan to sit up a bit.
"Lea? What's going on," Megan asked inquisitively and seemingly without resentment.
"Sorry for the ruse, but I thought this would be a good way to start things off. Like diving off the dock into the cold lake rather than slowly wading in from shore. I told you what we'd be doing this weekend, and that starts now. Strip down, and place all your cloths in the top drawer but do not close it yet." Lea said calmly, before switching over to another menu to unlock the top drawer.
Megan sat up and looked around, "are those cameras in the corners?"
"Well how else can I know what you're doing in there?" Lea asked, giving a rhetorical answer that seemed to be enough for Megan. She began to strip down when Lea switched focus back to Sophia.
"...ucker, I'm going to get you back for this some day. I mean, you clearly got a bag of tricks here that's all very impressive, but that can't save you forever. I'll get you back." Sophia's tone was much more subdued, calmer, though still slightly resentful. She finished in a pout and crossing her arms as she stopped talking altogether.