83. Big ideas
83
BIG IDEAS
Neil
“Hi, Nate. Is Daire around?”
The alpha pointed up and said, “Tending to his babies.”
I wondered how my grizzly friend would act if he ever had real life babies.
“Hey.”
Daire was at the other end of the roof deadheading flowers. “Did Nate send you to remind me this was date night and I should get ready?”
“No. But maybe this isn’t the best time to talk.”
He stopped what he was doing and peered at me. “We can talk. What is it?” He plonked himself on a bench and patted it. “Something wrong?”
“Not at all.” While Martin and Toby moving from the manor was the best decision for them, if we wanted to spend the night together, I went over there. Now that Toby had his own bedroom, I wouldn’t make him sleep on my sofa.
But that was me thinking selfishly. Father and son were so happy in their new place and that in turn had improved my relationship with Martin. Turned out, giving one another a little space was good for us, though I grumbled when I walked over there on a cold night.
While Archer had offered to have Toby sleep in their guest room if Martin came to my place, both Martin and I agreed we shouldn’t impose on Archer and Micah when we wanted to sleep together, especially as Archer had a toddler and was also pregnant.
“The opposite. I’d like to rent 2A?”
My friend furrowed his brow. “You want to move from 2B across the landing to 2A which is identical to 2B? ”
“No. I have no intention of leaving 2B. I want the other apartment to use as an office.” Though I used my bedroom for filming, I had a lot of equipment that needed to be put away and dragged out each day. And my closet space wasn’t adequate for the wigs, dresses, shoes and makeup I’d acquired.
“Okay. That’s doable. 2B becomes just your home and 2A is your work space.”
I debated whether to tell Daire the plan that was formulating in my head to start my own company. Instead of giving a percentage of my income to the company I worked for, I’d be working for me. My decision wasn’t based solely on not wanting someone else to benefit from my hard work.
I’d become friends with a lot of the alphas and omegas who worked from home under the company umbrella offering similar services to what I did, in addition to what I used to do before Martin and I reached an agreement. My reasoning wasn’t that I wanted to profit off my friends, though I would charge them a small monthly fee to cover the admin costs.
The idea behind starting a company was because some of my co-workers had been doxed. Their names and addresses had been published by people online who had somehow ferreted out the details, probably by searching social media posts and picking up clues.
I laid out my plan to Daire because he was my friend and he was a seasoned entrepreneur now that he and Micah had successfully built up and sold their business. “Look at you! Up and coming business person of the year.” He lifted my arm in the air. “Must be something in the water.”
“Huh?”
“Micah and I start a company and with Archer helping us, it grows, we sell and make a huge profit. And I have my gardening videos. Ryder and Ivor have their app and now you, Neil. Gods, I’m proud of my Sunshine Manor extended family.”
I shrugged. “I don’t expect to make a lot of money from it.”
Daire was serious for a moment. “Money isn’t everything. Plenty of people succeed in life without making huge amounts of money.”
That was true, though it was easy for him to say as his family was wealthy, and now he was too.
He got up. “I should go. Nate and I are trying the new Ethiopian restaurant that opened near Ryder’s office.”
I jumped up. “One more thing. My friend Anthony was one of the guys who was doxed and he’d like to rent 3A now that Martin has moved out. He works from home like I do.”
“Sounds good. Have him call me and I’ll show him around.”
“There’s just one little thing.”
“Which is?” He turned on his heel, one brow raised.
“He’s human who has no idea?—”
Daire finished my sentence. “That shifters exist.”
“Please, Daire. He’s scared to stay in his current apartment. ”
“Fine. What could go wrong?” My grizzly friend sighed. “But if he sees or hears anything and needs CPR, that’s on you. ”
Daire
I waved a printout in front of Micah’s face. “This.” My friend and former business partner—though technically he owned part of Sunshine Manor so we were still partners—was changing his daughter’s diaper and I scrunched up my nose at the smell. Considering Elune was tiny, her poop sure packed a powerful aroma.
“What am I looking at?” After putting a clean diaper on Elune, he gave her to me and washed his hands.
“Our next big project.” It was a motel with twenty rooms in town. The owner had recently passed away and his kids were looking to sell. I drove past and it was in good condition and had been in use until a few weeks ago when the owner was taken to hospital.
I’d pressed my face against a few windows and it was typical 1970s style based on the carpet and wallpaper and my guess the bathrooms would be decked out in avocado green. Though for some consumers, the 70s was the in thing—or never went out of fashion—but the place needed a huge renovation.
Micah sat in his favorite armchair and put his daughter on his lap while he studied what I’d printed out and then went online to check out the site. “I don’t want to run a motel so we’d have to get a manager and be hands off. Or we renovate and sell for a huge profit. And we’d need our accountant to go through the books.” He rubbed his chin. “But renovating is such a pain.”
Running a motel wasn’t on my bucket list either. “Here’s my big idea. We get people to renovate it for free.”
He tilted his head. “And how are we going to do that?”
Grabbing the remote, I turned on the TV and ran through the reality shows. Micah wasn’t a fan but I loved this stuff. “We get a couple or maybe three friends to renovate one room. We do half the rooms so ten groups at once, and they can live in the ten unrenovated rooms while they’re doing the work. We give them a certain amount of money and a time frame, and they fix up the rooms, within guidelines.” I didn’t want dinosaur-themed rooms which I had seen on one program. “Then we judge the winner and that group gets a pile of money.”
“And the point is what?”
I scrolled through more reality programs. There were cooking, sewing, traveling, escape rooms, gardening and renovating ones among others. “We sell the idea to a producer or TV production company and make big bucks. If it’s a success, we can do another similar project. ”
“I don’t know, Daire.”
“How about me, you, and Archer go and look at the motel. I’ll call the owner and make an appointment.” During my time making the gardening videos, I’d been in touch with a lot of people who had connections in the world of TV production. I was sure I could find someone or a group of someones to pitch to.
“Okay, but I’m not making any promises.”
I got us an appointment for the afternoon and we met with the late owner’s son and daughter. They showed us the office, the kitchen where breakfast was prepared and the laundry, and unlocked the doors to each of the twenty rooms.
“No obvious water damage or rotting wood,” Micah noted, though we’d have to hire a building inspector.
“The rooms are in good condition,” Archer said as he poked his head into a bathroom. “But you’re right, Daire, the whole place needs bringing into the twenty-first century.”
Micah wasn’t convinced on the idea of a reality TV show. He wanted to buy the motel for a fair price, do it up and sell for a profit, but Archer was into them. He used to watch them late at night when he was feeding newborn Elune. So we agreed to buy it after the building inspector had checked it out and we’d done a cost estimate.
It was my job to find someone willing to buy the idea from us. We had no experience in anything TV related but if the sale went through we’d have a building and a proposal.
We bought the motel no problem but after two weeks, I’d exhausted my list of contacts and was reduced to cold calling producers. Ninety percent of the time I didn’t get past the receptionist.
My big idea was a bust. Except I wasn’t willing to give up just yet. There had to be a way to make it happen.