Chapter 133

As with Ekaterina, Irena was gone by the time Adam emerged from the shower. The site owner was happy with the scene and Adam and Karlie went on their way.

"What a weird set up," Karlie remarked on the drive home.

"What do you mean?" Adam asked.

"The translator is Irena's aunt," Karlie said. "I mean, that's just odd, don't you think?"

"She's probably part chaperone, too," Adam guessed. "That part makes sense. But I'm not sure I would be cool with my aunt coming to a shoot."

"Do you have any relatives?" Karlie asked. She knew of his sister but she had never heard Adam mention any other family.

"Sort of," he admitted. "I have an aunt on my dad's side and an uncle on my mother's side. It's sort of a long story. But neither of them got along with my folks. My uncle got pissed off at something long before I was born. He turned 18 and hit the road. I don't know if my Mom ever heard from him again. My aunt got mad about the farm. I think that land is cursed. My grandparents left it to both of their children, just like my folks did.

"My aunt wanted the money so my Dad bought her out. They agreed to a price and everyone was happy – or at least that's what I've been told. That was in the 1970s, I guess. Farms weren't very profitable back then, I'm not sure why, probably because of the economy and inflation and stuff. But in the 80s, it got better. The farm became better situated, mostly because of Dad's management. My aunt came back when I was 6 or 7 and tried to get more money. Dad told her he would hire her to work there or she could hit the road. She didn't even come back for the funeral. Her attorney inquired if there was a will and when she found out there was, I didn't hear anything more from her."

"Damn," Karlie said. "I thought my family was fucked up. You know, as pissed as I am, I would still go home for my parents' funerals. Has your attorney heard from you sister?"

Adam shook his head.

"I don't think so," Adam said. "I halfway expected her to call by now. I'm sure I might be well known among the group she runs with. News of my profession has migrated back to Missouri by now."

"I know mine has made it to Elliott," Karlie said. "I got an e-mail a few weeks ago from a girl I knew in high school. I guess it further validated how my parents had painted me. Oh, well, screw them."

"Why didn't you say something?" Adam asked.

"It doesn't bother me," Karlie said with a shrug. "I knew it would get back there and I knew what they would say. I'm actually relieved it happened so soon. I don't have to worry about it coming up later. I'm sure my father and uncle feel a little guilty but I'm OK with that, too."

"If you're sure," Adam said. "You know, it amazes me that Sarah and some of them are still close to their parents. I'm not sure how mine would react if they were still around."

"I think, purely from what I've heard about them, that they might not like what you were doing but they would respect why and how you were doing it," Karlie answered after thinking for a moment. "They seemed to support you, whatever you were doing."

"They did," Adam admitted. "I guess if I got the chance to explain it, it would probably be OK. Do you think we're doing the right thing?"

"What do you mean?" Karlie asked

"We don't have to do this stuff anymore," Adam pointed out. "We have enough money to last us forever if we're smart. We have enough other interests to drop out completely and to take Katey and the rest of them with us."

"True," Karlie admitted. "But we've talked about this before. Could you look at yourself in a month or a year when we're goofing around on the web and see that some porn starlet jumped off a balcony when you know you could have prevented it?"

"I can't prevent it," Adam said with frustration. "It's going to happen, Karls. We might slow it down some but we can't stop it. This is too big for us to stop completely. I'm not sure we can even slow it down. What happens if we do our best and we fail?"

"Then we tried," Karlie said softly. "Adam, you've already succeeded. You saved me. You've helped at least a dozen people in just a couple of months. You've kept Tyanna and Cameron from falling prey to their ethnicity. Jason and Timm have learned to do things the right way. You're letting Leslie and Rebecca live their dreams. In the process, you've allowed Mary and Walt to do things they've always wanted to do and put Sean and Rachelle in position to do what they've always wanted to do. We won't even discuss Veronica and Ekaterina. All that in just a couple of months, Adam. Wait until 'Dragon Lore' comes out. That is going to be amazing. I'm talking a 4-to-1 profit ratio at the very least. No one sees a 4-to-1 profit ratio on a feature. Most hope for 2-to-1 but settle for a slight profit."

"I hope it comes out to 4-to-1," Adam said. "But that doesn't answer the question."

"It's fun for all of us," Karlie said, again hesitating for a moment to consider her response. "In 2 or 3 years, it might not be. But for now, we're all enjoying this."

"Not all of us," Adam said.

"True," Karlie said. "If you want out no one will stop you. We'll probably be able to muddle along without you in the business. But Allie would leave and so would I. Sarah and Shelly wouldn't stay in and Rebecca would leave it, too. We'd probably keep our web sites but we would end the other parts. I don't say that to put pressure on you. We would all follow you. The reason it's so much fun for us is because it's with you. It's fun because this is something, I don't know, illicit, that we share."

"I'll give it a few more months," Adam said. "But things have to slow down some. When I start back to classes next month, I'm going to start to say 'no' to things. I'm going to stop being available anytime Tate or Jerry or Judy need someone. They're going to have to find other people. Five Friends is going to have use Timm, Jason and Cameron to evaluate new talent. I'll still visit with the guys and talk them through stuff. Most of my work will be with you guys."

"See, I think it should be the opposite," Karlie said. "I think you should work with us occasionally but do at least half of your work with newcomers. We're all making a killing on the web sites. Sure, the subscriptions will go down each month until they level out at about 75 or 80 percent of what we have now. But, Jesus, Adam, we're talking each of us walking away with $30,000 a month after taxes. Sarah might make $40,000. It's ridiculous. Rebecca has always pulled in a good gross but her net was crap because of how much she paid to host the site and how much she paid in card fees.

"The server farm cuts our hosting fees in half from what she was paying. Throw in the extra 23 percent she gets from credit card and you're talking a real score. It's part of why she wants to sell her assets to us. She is seeing a ton of revenue and she wants to give something back."

"She is already giving things back," Adam pointed out.

"I mean more than sexual favors," Karlie joked.

"I did, too," Adam said, grimacing at Karlie's joke. "How many additional subscriptions have you seen since she and Leslie joined?"

"I knew what you were saying," Karlie replied. "You're right. We've seen about a 30 percent increase across the board. The biggest jump is in the higher-priced packages. Of course, those make us less money each than an individual subscription but it's OK. It's not like it's keeping us from being able to afford food."

Allie's anger was almost completely assuaged by the time Adam and Karlie returned home. The house seemed somewhat empty without Rebecca, Trinity and Erin.

Sarah told them Rebecca's group had arrived safely in Las Vegas and were expecting to return Saturday evening. Then Shelly gave them the schedule for 'Dragon Lore'. Adam wasn't particularly enthused about another full weekend of work but he was resigned to the fact that the quicker the movie was shot, the quicker it would be released.

"I need to get started memorizing my lines," Adam said with a sigh. The girls had been running lines periodically for weeks.

"Thankfully, you're the strong, silent type in the movie," Sarah giggled. "You'll do fine. You're a natural."

"I'm a natural because I've always been playing myself," Adam pointed out.

"Better than playing with yourself," Shelly said with a laugh.

"But he's right," Allie said. "In all the scenes he's done we've asked him to be either clueless and harmless or sweet and caring. That's who he really is."

"You've seen him happy and pissed off," Sarah said. "He can do that, too. That's the two basic motivations for Sir Apsan. He is a courtier in the opening scene, tasked with transporting the princess. In the second major scene, he is angered by the loss of his charge but gratified for the assistance of the two scouts he meets. In the scene with the princess he has to be caring because of her bewitchment. Then it's party time for all of us. The intermediate scenes are where you'll have to work, but it's mostly conversation with people you already know and like."

"I guess," Adam said. His biggest fear was that his performance would be so lackluster that it doomed the production. They couldn't really replace him without replacing a majority of the cast. He didn't think Ashley, Sahara or Michelle would work with someone else even for the feature. "Still, I hope we can plan to work on it together as soon as possible."

"We will," Allie assured him.

It was still early for a Friday night – only just after 9 p.m. – so the group settled in to watch a movie and catch up on what was going on in everyone's life. It was then that missing three people from the group hit hardest. It just wasn't the same with Rebecca, Trinity and Erin gone.

It felt as though a portion of the group's collective personality was gone.

Trinity wasn't around to make rude comments about every actor and actress. Rebecca wasn't there to speculate on what the producer or director was really trying to say with a particular sequence. Erin didn't offer her dead-on impersonations of the actors playing the characters in the movie. Erin usually only had to listen to a person for a few minutes before she could mimic their speech patterns. Rebecca said there was a comedian in Las Vegas who did impersonations and, with a little work, Erin could be on that guy's level.

"It's like the old apartment only bigger," Karlie remarked. "You know, I thought that was coolest thing, living with you guys, having a decent place to call home. It got even better once we came here. I wish we would have just waited and all gone up together tomorrow."

"Yeah," Sarah said. "I didn't really think about how much I'd miss them when they told us they were going to be going up there. I just got used to having Erin here all the time."

"Let's just turn this off and go to bed," Allie suggested. The group agreed, but it wasn't much better there. There was no playing around. They just went to sleep – eventually.

Sean and Walt were already sitting at the table when Adam walked over for breakfast. It was unusual because Walt wasn't known to be an early riser unless he had something he wanted to get done.

"We did some talking yesterday," Walt said when Adam had poured a glass of juice and a bowl of cereal. "Do you really think we should do the apartments first?"

Adam shrugged. His suggestion made sense to him but he was open to any ideas the others might have...

"Dad has an opening in his schedule toward the end of the month," Walt explained. "He has already hired a crew for a project that got delayed by a legal issue. He said he thought he could build what we wanted over there in about 10 weeks if they work Saturdays, assuming we can get the permits. Celina has already started on that. We were going to need them anyway, so she started putting them together yesterday."

"I'm OK with whatever the rest of the group wants," Adam said. "But it seems like a haul for your Dad and his guys to come up here every day. That's what, four hours each way."

"We might have to shift around some," Walt advised Adam. "The crew will likely look for a place to rent about an hour out if it comes to that. Dad and the foreman will probably stay here. They'll bring a trailer up. He has eight guys hired so they might just bring a couple of RVs. They will be able to use the area behind the apartments for parking if we let them use our showers and stuff."

"That would OK," Adam said, "So long as they aren't, you know, rowdy or rude or anything."

"Dad understands that," Walt assured him. "He or the foreman will make certain the guys do. Most of them have worked with Dad before. The plans call for an outer structure that's 60 foot wide by 30 foot deep. It will allow us to create six apartments that are 20-by-30. They'll be one bedroom, a combined living and dining room, a bath and a kitchen."

"Small," Adam said.

"A little bigger than the typical one bedroom in L.A.," Sean pointed out. "This will be 600 square feet. Our three-bedroom apartment was only 1,100. The reason we want to move quickly is so they can be ready for the start of school. The three at UCLA are paying a hell of a lot more for room-and-board on campus. I spoke to Tyanna yesterday while she was here. They're paying about $1,500 a month for a dorm that is smaller than that."

"But that includes meals," Adam reminded Sean.

"So will this, most likely," Sean said. "Rebecca is going to start chipping in on the mortgage here when we buy Looker Lass. Meredith and Leslie will still do their part but I thought we could charge $550 for rent and $75 for what is being called the 724 Meal Plan."