Morningstar Manor

The Mocha was, as usual for a Saturday early morning, full of people either grabbing something caffeine-laden to-go on their way through, or lounging watching the harried folk.

Bethan was sitting at a table near the windows, half-reading her latest copy of Contemporary Pediatrics, and drinking a cup of karma chai. There was a muffin sitting on a plate next to her cup, white chocolate and cranberry, and she was trying to ignore it's siren call.

Cam had bagged himself a chair in a corner from which he could watch people come and go over the top of his black coffee, which he held before his nose, enjoying the armoa almost more than the taste. Not that is wasn't good - for all her attitude, Joy certainly made a good cup of coffee.

Jos and Toby were sharing a cafetiere and bickering good-naturedly over whose DS had flat batteries and whose was fully charged - they could never seem to convince anyone not to get them matching things - and here was the reason! How were they to know which belonged to which of them? The idea of stickers was obviously foreign to them.

Sasha was sitting on a coach, Morgan's car seat next to her. The baby was napping after a tiring shopping trip, and Sasha was taking the time to kick back and relax with hot chocolate before heading back up to the apartment.

Savannah grunted as she dropped yet another box of her crap into her new living room. The movers had finished bringing everything upstairs, setting up her furnitures, but she was on her own for the plethora of boxes piled outside of her open apartment door and scattered all over her home. It was going to take her forever to get all these things unpacked. The only room that was already completely set up was her work room. She had personally brought all of her equipment, not trusting the moving company with such expensive, delicate items and set that up first thing in the morning while they were setting up her furniture. Now she had to worry about the rest of her apartment.

The Streets played from her stereo as she took a drink of water from the bottle on her kitchen counter. She tapped her foot to it as she tried to think of a way to organize everything. Nothing came to her and she shrugged, putting down the bottle and heading back out into the hallway to grab another box.

Saturday at 11 am, and the Mocha was really busy. Among them were:

• Andras, who had visitors. One of them was his brother Lajos, in the City again for lawyerly business, even though he no longer kept a flat here; the other was a bloke he brought along to sleep on the sofa, some researcher from Cambridge whose cousin apparently was Ilona's best and most high-strung graphics designer, here to briefly consult something arcane that was kept at Rutherford. Andras had no hope of even understanding what it was, except that it was Historical; so the bloke was most likely a historian, right? Funnily, though, he was from the same area of Old Blighty originally where Charlie had that farm Andras visited once; so there was something to talk about, at least.
• Charlotte James, who had just been to an early morning visit to the new spa, and was discussing the relative merits of that versus the Michael's Brothers spa with Maude Temminck (whose character had much improved, Charlotte thought, since she was widowed, dried out, and had a grandkid) while her son Manny was sitting peacefully by, as if the chatter of women was no more meaningful than the waves of the ocean, and just as calming. On his lap, little Morgan Temminck was fast asleep. Theoretically, he was waiting for his wife, but Charlotte got the impression that he was content to just sit there.
• Cindy was sitting a few tables on (having said hello to Charlotte and her lot, but still uneasy about the Temmincks, so she hadn't joined them), talking to the Indian woman, Chandika, and her adorable kid whose dog Hanu was most likely the illegitimate son of Axminster, but nobody minded any more, not even the owner of the mother, because Hanu was such a great dog, and while not pedigree, still an indubitable lurcher. They were talking about spas as well -- in particular, the one where Chandika worked. Cindy was very cautiously trying to work out whether it would be all right for her to go there, and Chandika was doing her best to gently reassure her that of course it was. The dogs were both under the table in classic Axminster pose, fast asleep.
  
• Ricky had his earbuds in, surfing MySpace on his netbook; he was sharing his table with some tall stranger with lanky hair and a large nose who was also working away at his notebook -- a rather larger and posher one. They were both drinking chai latte, and any attentive observer might have realised that they were each drinking distractedly from both cups and totally not noticing. Unless one of them had the swine flu, it probably didn't matter.
• By the door to the conservatory, two ghosts were lurking, mostly unseen by the rest of the Mocha. "Just listen to them!" Marek was saying. "They're totally superficial! All they ever talk about are spas." Manny shrugged. "I've spent my life talking about business; spas are a nice break. And I don't like women for their conversation, you know. More for their curves." Marek laughed.

[[OOC: Brief visit of Lajos Toth and Edgar Cobham to justify the icon and make sure that all twelve are really there!]]

Andras had set up two Macs for picture editing, each on a desk with a chair and everything, and had put the kettle on, because he was sure that his helpers would want tea or coffee.

And then, they'd do the monkey work while he could do the really interesting stuff.

Jos and Toby were sitting in the little park in Vine Square horsing around and generally goofing off, although technically they should have been in class. Whatever. The subject up for debate was, as usual, digital versus film. Today, Jos was for digital, and Toby was for film. They traded off each time.

They weren't putting much energy into their argument now, though - they'd tired themselves out 'arguing', as evidenced by the fact that Toby had ice-cream stains down his front, and Jos was wearing half a tree in his hair.

Jos and Toby hadn't had their own place before, so they didn't have all that much to move in. In fact, everything they owned fit into one large taxi, and that was mostly clothes and electronics. They were going to go shopping for appliances the next day, but they wanted to get settles in first. So, they were going to order in that night, or maybe go out to eat.

The Manor staff had kindly supplied a porters cart and offered help getting their things up to the eleventh floor, but they said they could manage - and had been spending an amused few hours carting things up in the elevator, shoving each other and falling over their luggage. They certainly looked and acted severl years younger than their actual age - one wouldn't think they could afford to move into such a prestigious address. But years of sponging off various sugar mommies (and the odd daddy) had meant their savings account was quite well-padded.

They were looking forward to the independance! It would be so much fun to do everything when (and if) they wanted to!

[ooc: Kids in school means time to play!!!]


He'd finally conceeded that sleep and food and a shower were in order so late last night Erik had drug himself back to the Manor. He'd slept like the dead and woke up just after dawn feeling much refreshed. Visiting hours were still a ways off so he took the time to shower and then busy himself in his work room putting together a few infusions that he hoped might aid Angela (provided he could get it past the doctors). With an hour still to go he dressed slightly more casual than usual - jeans instead of slacks, though he still wore his black button up and glossy shoes - and headed for the Mocha, small vials of infusions tucked into the pocket of the jacket over his arm.

He'd get some tea - or coffee depending on who was working the counter - and then head for the hospital.

****


Jason sat behind the security desk, writing up the schedule for the next few weeks. Kids were going back to school which meant lots of coming and going and drop offs and with the recent shooting he was upping security - a lot. Owens had been by a few times and likely would be again which meant more work and more paperwork.

Which made Jason grumpy.

****

Jack was wandering the Manor, clipboard in hand, and doing a general check of the lighting, making notes on which bulbs needed to be changed and anything else he happened to notice. He'd be back later to replace them.

****

Demitri was in the Mocha as well - and annoyed though he might not show it. He sipped his coffee and flipped through the paper. And if one happened to look one might see that he was not wearing his wedding ring.