Sapphire Manor

Mary looked with uncertainty at the granite statue placed between a pair of stars on either side. It was of an ancient Greek queen with a Sapphire and gold necklace built into the granite statue. Mary mused that it might be the goddess Hera or Athena from the gold wreath crown on her head. She looked around at the historical opulence of her surroundings, and just as the Estate Lawyer had said, the place was fully furnished. The thought of her conversation took her back to the meeting.

*

Mary stood five ten in her six-inch heels as she walked off the elevator of New York City office building. The door to the law office was open, with the lawyer standing with a cluster of other lawyer, paralegals and secretaries next to a reception desk. True to the picture on his website, he was about five foot ten, thinning brown hair, thick glasses, a little chubby and wearing a trim brown suit. Overall, he looked like he belonged in an heartburn product commercial. Mary stepped in throw the doorframe, the man turned and looked at her with a gleam of interest and a commercial smile. She followed his eyes as they wondered over her body. Taking in her blonde should length hair, black button-down blouse and suit jacket, coupled with a black knee long pencil skirt, and black pumps. She watched his gaze creep back up her body. Mary gave him a bit of credit in that he met her hazel eyes with his blue eyes once he had given her the once over.

“Can I help you miss?” the lawyer asked the clearly well-rehearsed greeting.

“I am Mary Cullens,” Mary said forcing herself to smile, “I am here to meet with William Shultz esquire.”

“Ah, yes,” the man smiled as he walked over and held out his hand, “I am William Shultz, this is my office, did you want a coffee, some water?”

“No I am fine,” Mary said walking into the room.

Mary took a seat in front of the desk. The room was neat, clean, a number of closed file bins were around the shelves to the side. The lawyer came around his desk and pulled a bin off his shelf and put it on his desk. He moved things around and Mary noticed him placing the box of tissues in front of her.

“My condolences about your uncle Johnathan Miss Cullens,” Shultz started.

“It’s Ms Cullens,” Mary said, “I was not close with my uncle, but I know he is in a better place now.”

“My apologies,” Shultz said as he shuffled throw a series of papers from the box, “I am sorry you weren’t available during the reading of the will. But, well, here we are. Your uncle left you Sapphire Manor. In addition, there was a tax endowment to pay the property and inheritance taxes for the estate and manor. I will need your identification and for you to sign for the Title.”

“Very well,” Mary replied calmly at the news, “No keys?”

“The local realtor has the keys,” Shultz said passing some papers and a pen across the desk, “Sign here.”

“What do you know about the place?” Kelly asked as she signed and handed the forms back across the desk.

“Just that it is upstate and dates back before the revolutionary war,” Shultz said, “The Realtor would have a better idea, “Here is his card.”

*

Mary looked around as the realtor agent stood behind her. She had been assured that the manor had been redone in the late 1980’s, the realtor even brought up video clips from the home improvement show that had done the restoration and modernization, and true to his word the place looked like it had in the 1750’s when it was built but with modern power plugs and phone jacks in the wall like a museum. The front door had opened into a main hallway with a set of stairs to the second and third floor in the back. On the left was a set of double doors and on the right was two single doors.

“So, to the Left are the Ball room and behind it is the library with a spiral staircase to the bedrooms on the second floor. All the bedrooms upstairs have a full bath in each,” the realtor said, “Over to the right we have a Dinning room, next to it is the kitchen a spiral stair case in the back corner and there is a pantry at the end of the wing.”

Mary looked around as the man pointed to the different areas. She noticed her personal assistant coming in the main entrance behind them.

“Above the Kitchen and Dinning room is the servant dorms,” the realtor continued, “It is a point of pride that this manor never had any slaves, Irish or Black.”

“Irish slaves?” Kelly asked as she struggled to brought in her heavy roller bags.

“A lot of places around here were built or staffed by Irish sentenced to slavery in the new world by their English lords,” the realtor cited the long forgotten history, “they predate the Black Slaves in the English colonies. Some of the Women suffered being to marry their masters to make their children legit while still being slaves,” the Realtor noted.

“Noted,” Mary said, “What can you tell me about the statue?”

Mary pointed at the massive statue and stair cases that took up the back of the main hall as Kelly lugged her bags down the hall from the entrance to the pair at the center of the main hall.

“It is pretty,” Kelly said looked ahead at the statue.

“The statue was a chunk of Granite that was there, so the builders just turned the top into a statue,” the Realtor shrugged, “Under that area is nothing but rock, the Spiral stairs at either side go down to the finished cellars on either side.”

“Finished cellars?” Emiko asked as she walked in.

Mary turned back and looked at the IT specialist from the investment firm that was moving in with them.

“They were originally dirt cellars,” the Realtor said, “The master bedroom is over the Carriage arch. You get to it on the second floor and there is a section of the attic above there that is walled off and turned into a private study for the master bedroom with a spiral staircase connecting them.”

“That will of course be my area,” Mary noted.

“All the utilities come in under the kitchen,” the Realtor said as he fished a key ring out of his pocket, “Here are the rest of the keys.”

“Thank you,” Mary smiled.

The Realtor tipped his hat and turned to leave. Mary looked at the two women who had come with her from the corporate offices in New York City. Kelly had a short page boy hair cut with the left side of her head shaved and all dyed blue, but she made up for it with the Armani skirt suit that Mary had sent her to get. Emiko looked right at home in little Tokyo with her cherry red dyed long hair and slightly gothic pants suit (complete with platform rave boots).

*

Mary brought her roller suitcase in the main hallway and back to the stairwell. She picked it up and started up the stairs. Fortunately for her she had the wide long stairwell to go up and not try to maneuver around the narrow spiral stairs for the servant’s apartments. Mary sighed as she got to the top of the second floor and looked around. The wall to her left was sealed off since behind it was the servant’s apartments and there was a large farm scene painted on to the wall. To her right was the ball room side of the house with the guest and family rooms, while right ahead of her, at the end of the second floor’s long hall, was the master bedroom. Along the right and back walls were old fashion wallpapers and cabinets built into the walls. Mary looked at the farm scene to her left as she walked by. It started as a winter and after a few steps was clearly planting in the spring then progressing to a summer cookout half way down the hall and moving on the fall harvest and finishing with another winter scene. Mary noted that the painting had run the entire length of the wall as she reached for the door to the master bedroom right over where the front door was down stairs.

Mary smiled at the painting, it was a nice classic scene of colonial Americana…

Mary went into the master bedroom and whistled at the room that was before her. Parts of it was very much colonial Georgian Architecture. To the left and right walls were cabinets and fireplaces. The four-post bed was massive and either a real antique or a very faithful recreation of the frame of a old four post bed. Mary walked over and put her hand on the mattress, it was new, maybe never even used, and bare of sheets. The very modern parts were the first-generation flat screen TV above the door and the wireless phones on the table next to the fireplace on the ball room side of the room. A few steps and she picked up the phone, not surprised to find it was dead, as she looked down and saw it was unplugged and covered in dust.

“Lord knows when the last time it was charged,” Mary muttered to herself, “This must be the master bath…”

The onyx black door slide sideways into it’s self like elevator. Along the outer wall was the length of the bathtub and shower, the toilet against the wall to the interior of the house and a vanity with sink that curved around the corner and along the interior wall. Mary reached out and ran her hand over the counter… Under the layer of dust, it was clear that the counters and flat surfaces were onyx black as well while the vertical surfaces were all pure white. She reached over and turned on the closest sink. They were gleaming silver under the dust. Mary walked around and looked and noticed something odd. There was an odd fixture over the edge of the bathtub between the bathtub and the toilet with a squeeze grip next to it. It looked like something was supposed to plug into it. Mary looked in the drawers and didn’t see anything in any of them. She shrugged and left the mystery for another time. She felt the urge to use the toilet, but was smart enough to know she needed to get toilet paper first.

*

“You have the keyboards?” Emiko asked as Kelly brought in the armful of boxes from the van.

“Yeah,” Kelly said.

“Great,” Mary added as she walked in behind Kelly, “Which desk will be mine?”

“I have you set up here in the corner,” Emiko said, “I put Kelly by the door and I am over in the other corner.”

“Good, looks like we still have room to dance,” Mary said looking around the ball room.

“I doubt anyone has danced here in a very long time,” Kelly said, “This place has a haunted house vibe.”

“Maybe,” Mary said looking at a painting of two angels over the door way to the library, “Why didn’t we set up in the library?”

“Too narrow with the book cases,” Emiko said, “Besides there is a desk in there I can set up with an all in one for private meetings for you.”

“That is good to hear,” Mary said as she went to the door and walked into the library and was enveloped in a cloud of grey, “Man does this place need to be dusted.

In the library there was a metal spiral stair case in front of the door and at either end there was a fireplace with a dusty electric fake fire set up inside. She saw three seats and two reading desks.

“Emiko,” Mary called out to ball room, “put the all in one on the reading desk to the left.”

“Will do,” Emiko’s reply echoed in the open rooms.

Mary walked over to the book case in front of her. She picked one of the dust covered books off the shelf and opened it. I was an old print of poetry. Mary opened the book to a random page and read a few poems. It was very romantic in its flowery terms about how the woman it was written to was the perfect companion. Mary felt a tug at her heart since it had been so long since she had anyone to write poetry like this for her, or she had someone to write love poems too. Mary flipped the page and looked at print of two women in 1700’s dress sitting together talking and holding a book and hands together.

“Eighteenth Century lesbians,” Mary mused for a second before closing it and putting the book back on the shelf, “Right.”

*

The three women went out to have dinner at a local restaurant. While they had brought in materials, they had only basics of food and needed to figure out a common accepted menu for the three of them living together out here.

Many hours later, Mary sighed as she put the box on the floor in the attic area over her bedroom. She looked around and her eyes fell on the windows dotting the wall. The small windows over-looking the driveway was the only things of note in the room. The room was finished and barren, all that she could find was the dust bunnies all over the floor. Looking back at the wall separating her private area from the rest of the attic space, Mary noticed that the wall had paneling like it had cabinets built into it. Mary walked over as the as a case of curiosity overtook her. There were no handles or key holes, but a closer inspection allowed her to realize why it was done that way. Under the layers of dust each framed panel was a different portrait of a person, many were old and faded and based on the dress, they dated back to the construction of the house. Some were couples, a few were just a man while others were just a woman. These paintings were a record…

“Note to self, see about hiring an artist to add me to the wall. Oh hay Uncle,” Mary said seeing the most recent addition over to the side.

Looking around Mary muttered her realization, “It will be a pain in the butt to get any furniture up here…”

Mary yawned as she went downstairs. Mary found herself looked around her new bedroom as she changed and crawled into the freshly made bed.

“I wonder if any of those old souls are still around…” Mary muttered as she rolled over and hugged her pillow and closed her eyes surrendering to the sleep.

*

Mary looked around the ball room and it was a ball scene from a Jane Austin movie really, except as Mary floated among the crowd, she noticed there were no men, just women dancing with women in their old-fashioned dresses. As Mary looked around, she noticed that she wasn’t in some fancy set or palace location, but in the ball room of Sapphire Manor. It was like some weird Youtube video… as she walked around, she was surrounded by women in the old-fashioned gowns and make up. All the women dancing their formal dance while around her she heard Katy Perry singing about how she liked kissing a girl… It was twisted, and while it was all very PG, there was still something absolutely unnerving and insidious about it, like she was somewhere she was not meant to be or had invaded into someone else’s’ dream…

As the song finished a woman came up to Mary in a fancy gown and smiled. An image appeared next to here of a couple dancing and a question mark. Like a video game her ex-husband would play a “X” and a “O” appeared under it. Mary watched as her hand moved by itself and reach over and tap the X completely detached from her own will power. Like a passenger watching her own actions Mary followed the woman on to the dance floor. As they took their place in the center of the dance floor, T.A.T.U. started playing in the background and Mary found herself dancing a mid the room of women as the two singers sang about their love for another woman… Mary couldn’t help but notice how pretty each and every woman around her was in their old-fashioned gowns and long gloves. As she did her gaze shifted from one woman’s arms to another’s as she danced. A thought kept running in her mind as she did. As the song ended the women on the dance floor all stopped and clapped. Mary focused on the gloved the women all wore. It occurred to her what was wrong, they were much too shiny to be old fashioned…

*

Mary woke to the klaxon of her phone’s alarm on the night stand next to her bed. With a groan she reached over and picked up the device. She pushed the snooze icon on the screen and put the phone down on the bed next to her. Mary ran her hands over her face and yawned. She felt as if she had been dancing all night and not just dreaming of dancing. The still exhausted woman brushed her blonde hair out of her face and sighed. Just about then the klaxon on the phone started up again. Turning off the alarm, Mary got up to face the day. She started with a trip to the toilet, tossed her night cloths in a hamper and standing on the scale.

“Guess I burned a lot of calories yesterday,” Mary said to herself as she read the numbers below her, “Well I do have a few pounds to lose.”

Mary went about showering and noticed that she didn’t need to shave today. She looked at the mystery nozzle and wondered what it was for. She finished up and dried herself off. Searching the suitcase finally produced a set of underwear. Her morning routine screeched to a halt when she had tried to dress only to find that her bra didn’t fit…

“Why doesn’t my bra fit?” The annoyed Mary rhetorically asked, “Did it shrink?”

Mary got dressed in a blouse and slack set.

“Thank good we installed the K-Kup machine first thing yesterday,” Kelly muttered as she stood over the coffee machine.

“This place is creepy as hell,” Emiko said from the window.

“Why do you say that?” Mary asked as she looked for her #1 Boss coffee mug.

“Look at that…” Emiko said.

Mary walked over to the window over the sink of the kitchen. Outside there was a scarecrow right next to the garden. A gentle breeze came was coming down the hill along with a fog bank that enveloped the faded jeans of the scarecrow.

“Ok that is really creepy,” Mary agreed, “Remind me to hire a priest with a flamethrower to get rid of that thing.”

“I don’t think we need to go that far,” Kelly said, “Just need to be covered with a shotgun.”

“Right… Do we have the number for the internet provider? I need to get this place connected as soon as possible,” Mary interrupted to quickly change topics.

“They said they would be here around noon,” Emiko said, “But we needed to figure how we were connecting and which boxes to hook up. They made it sound like this place has like five different circuits.”

*

The day went by quickly until noon, then it seemed to grind to a halt. When the technicians got there, they explained the place was set up with three cable wiring networks and three for the phones. She had private lines for cable and telephones that went straight to the master bedroom and the office area above her bedroom, a cable and telephone line for the servant’s quarters and a cable and telephone line for the whole house. She had both sets of phone and cable lines running into her bedroom so she connected the internet to the general house hold cable line. Setting up the cable modems and wifi routers took the rest of the day for them. That completed, the three ladies went out for dinner and then went about unpacking their things and moving in. Sleep was dreamless for Mary that night, but walking down for breakfast, she was shocked.

“What is this?” Mary asked as she looked at a shiny maid dress on a hanger, “Where did you find this?”

“It was in one of the spare closets in the staff rooms,” Kelly said unsure of how to continue.

“Ok…” Mary said, also unnerved by the item.

“Please tell me that your uncle had a young lady working for him here, or at least a drag queen,” Emiko said.

“No, as far as I know he didn’t live here,” Mary said.

“Then that makes the question of ‘Where did this come from?’ even more creepy and scarry,” Emiko said.

“How so?” Mary asked

“Tell her what you told me,” Kelly said looking at Emiko.

“This is latex,” Emiko said, “I have encountered it while at the clubs and it is lubed… but no dust on it… So, it means that someone recently was hanging out here.”

“Shit...” Mary said.

*

The third day was then consumed with searching the house and getting a locksmith to change the locks on the building. They also managed to get the locksmith to check for other ways into the building. Once All of that was settled, the three went to the grocery store and checked the house again when they got back. Satisfied, they went about making dinner. Having their fill of Kelly’s attempt to make spaghetti and meat balls, the three went about unpacking their personal things. Mary kept an eye out for anything out of place. She didn’t see anything, but when she went to lay out her clothes for the next day, she noticed that all her bras were too small once again. She was too old to just get a ‘growth spurt,’ and she hadn’t suddenly become pregnant. That came from a memory of her time with her husband that also had been source of disappointment and friction between them.

“Any weirdness?” Mary asked as she walked into the kitchen.

“Scarecrow is still creepy as hell…” Emiko said from the window looking out over the back window.

“NYC wants us to have the contracts for the Madison Accounts done by Close today,” Kelly read off her phone.

“Well we will get right on it then,” Mary smiled.

*

Mary ate her sandwich in the kitchen. They had finished the contracts and gotten them approved a half an hour ago. She had emailed them over to be printed out and signed by the client in Los Angeles. The older blonde boss arched an eyebrow as Kelly seemed to make a scene out of getting a can of diet soda from the refrigerator. She bent at the waist and stuck her butt out as if she was showing it off for a boyfriend. Mary went about eating her sandwich, but something made her eyes and mind linger on her personal assistant’s rear end.

“How are the bandwidths in your bedroom?” Emiko asked as she came up the spiral stairs from the basement.

“I haven’t really checked it. I just have been working either down here or unpacking,” Mary said, “And at the end of the night I just crash.”

“Well if you are having trouble,” Emiko sighed, “We are going to have to run a repeater or hire a contractor to run the wires.”

“I thought you came with your own power tools,” Mary noted.

“You were complaining about lugging them up the stairs,” Kelly said as she closed the refrigerator and sat at the table.

“This place is just weird beyond anything I have delt with before, miss Stud,” Emiko rolled her eyes.

“Miss Stud?” Mary asked.

“I went to try and hang a picture last night and someone used my stud finder to prove she was a stud,” Emiko glared at Kelly.

“Every boyfriend I have ever had did that same joke so I figured someone had too,” Kelly said, “Besides, you said it yourself, the thing must be broken since it couldn’t find the wall studs.”

“I will try check the signal in my bedroom after lunch,” Mary said, “How is the signal in your rooms?”

“The signal gets wonky at times,” Kelly said, “for some reason it went weird when I wanted to watch a video last night, but five minutes later it was working fine.”

“That might be someone else in the area hogging the data line,” Mary shrugged.

“That doesn’t make me feel better after finding the dress,” Emiko said.

*

Mary showered after dinner. She had spent the after-noon unpacking. Emiko tried to make dinner but ended up smoking everyone out of the kitchen. So, they had driven into to town for pizza. As she exited the shower, she picked up a pair of leggings and a tee-shirt off the counter. She put the towels back on the rack and got dressed. She didn’t mind not wearing underwear in this outfit. She smiled as she looked in the mirror, she could swear that years had just washed off of her in the shower. But her hair was slightly dark at the roots. And looking closer, she noticed more of her iris were emerald green than normal in her hazel eyes. Mary shook her head dismissing the nonsense thought as her being tired as she crossed the room to the antique desk in her bedroom. She picked up her personal laptop and started checking email, her social media accounts, even looked up a few videos. Everything seemed to be fine. She noticed an extra tab on her browser was open, she clicked on it. It was a website selling lingerie. Mary shook her head, she hadn’t searched for new bras, had she? She must have, there was no one else here and she was the one using the laptop. Her mind drifted to her packing up the apartment in New York City. She must have been the one to shrink them so she would have to get new ones to replace the one that were too small.

“Guess I really am tired,” Mary shook her head, “Still, the models are real pretty.”

*

Mary found herself walking to the double doors of the Ballroom with the music of a woman sings a love song to a mysterious woman bleed out the doors and walls. As Mary got to the door an “X” icon appeared and she watched her arm reach out and open the door. She hadn’t time to think of the action, but was watching herself do so. When her hands grasped the door handles and pulled them open, she wanted to scream in terror and panic at the sight, beg the gods above for mercy, flee from the madness in front of her! The ball room was packed with women in shiny satin blouses, vests, hotpants, and chaps line dancing in a massive country western line dance.

It was it a scene from an early color film Musical Comedy, a western line dance scene with dozens of cowgirls.

An Icon for the choice to dance or leave came up. Mary tried to scream in horror as the icon for dance lit up and her body betrayed her by taking a spot in the center of the dancing girls. For song after song Mary watched as a passenger as her body danced in time and tune with the other women. Each song was a cover of a love song meant for a cowboy to swoon a cowgirl, but each case she listened to a woman pinning and declaring her love for “The woman of my life” and “My perfect bride.”

As they danced, Mary started to notice things out of place about some of the other dancers, one woman’s pink hot pants were too tight, shiny and clearly not made of satin or leather. Another woman right next to her had a very shiny pair of flared cowgirl gloves and its fringe didn’t behave like leather.

“Don’t they all look so sexy,” A voice came from nowhere as if whispered in her ear by a person who wasn’t there, “So pretty and limber…”

As the song ended Mary saw the girl next to her with the strange shiny gloves move towards her and reached out with her gloved hands for Mary’s neck and shoulder like the stranger was going to pull Mary in for a kiss.

*

The next week and a half seemed to fly by with out much in the way of oddness. While it seemed a bit boring at times, they had their streaming accounts and work to keep themselves busy. Mary was somewhat anxious when the manager of the investment firm called telling her that he wanted a speaker phone meeting with her and her team. All three of them had a feeling of dread waiting for the manager to call back. The ringing of the conference phone at Mary’s desk in the ball room shattered the silence like a shotgun blast. Mary hit the speaker button.

“Mary Cullens speaking,” Mary answered.

“Yes, it Miss Williams and Miss Itoh with you?” the manager’s voice didn’t need to be introduced.

“Yes sir,” Emiko said.

“Of course sir,” Kelly chirped.

“Very well,” the manager’s voice said, “As you know we approved this remote work on a provisional basis as long as the team continued to produce results. We have been looking at your teams productivity numbers and comparing them with the rest of our staff here in NYC, San-Fran, LA, HK, London and Munich… It seems the fresh air has gotten to you…”

The stern tone made Kelly bite her lip and Emiko look down.

“And you have been knocking it out of the park!” the Manager said, “You have the best numbers, the shortest turn arounds, and least errors of all of our legal teams. And Miss Itoh, a special thanks to you for detecting that network breach attempt and shutting it down early. I am not the most tech savvy person here, but I can understand the relief on the IT’s department’s faces at your quick and overwhelming response. Now, have some fun! Take the rest of the day and tomorrow off. Make it a four day weekend. Go out and have a few drinks on me.”

All three sighed as quietly as they could.

“Thank you, Mister Bancroft,” Mary spoke up, “I had no idea we were that far ahead.”

“Now, now, don’t get complacent,” Bancroft said, “You raised the bar for everyone else as well. I think you all deserve a drink.”

*

Friday night was a party! They had ordered catering and laid it out on carts from the dining room and kitchen. One cart was dedicated to making vodka and gin martinis. Mary was sipping the Porn Star Martini that Kelly had made for her. Emiko had pulled out a digital projector and hooked it up to her super-laptop and was playing movies on a screen they rigged from a white bed sheet. They had set up the system to cycle down a list of women’s films. The first one had been a straight forward romantic comedy, but since then they had three separate lesbian movies. This one had a dominatrix falling in love with her lesbian submissive.

“Oh come on,” Emiko said, “One unexpected kiss and she is her sex ?”

“I wish it worked like that,” Mary mused.

“Oh?” Kelly asked confused.

“Think about how much money the company would save if you two were lesbian slaves instead of employees,” Mary giggled.

“Oh yeah? Try it,” Kelly hiccupped.

“First you are drunk,” Emiko snickered, “Second it has to be at random…”

Mary’s giggle turned to open laughter. Kelly made a sour face.

*

It was a half hour later as the movie finished and the credits started that Mary started to get up. She quickly turned and leaned in kissing Kelly then turned and did the same to Emiko.

“Well?” Mary asked.

“Sorry, I will still be taking that pay check at the end of the week…” Emiko giggled.

“Yeah,” Kelly agreed, “I am still going to need to get paid by the regular means.”

“It was worth a shot,” Mary giggled, “I got to say, you are both better kissers than my ex.”

Mary got up and wobbled over to one of the carts and got some chocolates from the desert platter.

“Can I get one?” Kelly asked.

Mary tossed a chocolate to Kelly.

“If you don’t mind me asking, why did you marry him to begin with?” Emiko asked.

“On the second date he was a foot long jack hammer pumping my brains out for over an hour. It was great for a long time…” Mary shrugged.

“So what happened?” Kelly asked.

“By year five of being married,” Mary sighed, “When he was in the mood, he spent a minute in the bathroom and was done for the week.”

“And you?” Emiko asked.

Mary held up two fingers.

“Ouch,” Kelly said.

“So what is next on the play list?” Mary asked.