Morningstar Manor

Jane had done the kitchen, and moved on to the lounge before she heard signs of life from the occupants of the Avery Residence. Ignoring the sounds though she carried on dusting and cleaning in the lounge, doing her job, just the way she should be doing it. Thoroughly.

It was hard though to ignore the fact that someone who normally did nothing but snipe at you was about to appear, and in god alone knew what kind of mood. For once, she thought to herself, let him be in a good mood?

She hadn't done anything except pop into work for a few hours today, but Jazz was tired. She wanted nothing more than to go home and sleep for the next several days. Forget work, forget people, forget the sense of loneliness and depression that seemed to creep closer each and every day.... She frowned and rubbed her forehead with the heel of one hand as she jabbed at the button for her floor with the other.

The door dinged shut and she took to rubbing her eyes with both hands as she waited, and waited, and waited. Lowering her hands, she blinked blurrily first at the doors, which were resolutely closed, then above to the little light up numbers. 14? She hadn't hit 14. Or at least she didn't think she'd hit 14. She reached out again and carefully, taking time to make sure she absolutely had it right, pushed the button for 2. For a moment nothing happened, then the elevator slowly started moving again and she nodded decisively.

That's more like it.

She didn't have long to feel smug though, for out of nowhere the elevator gave an almighty lurch, heavy grinding noises flowing into the car, and then stopped dead.

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She landed in a heap on the stairwell landing, but thankfully didn't seem break anything. She clambored to her feet, looking around wildly before giving in to instinct and bolting down the stairs. Little beads of red dotted the floor behind her as she lept the last few steps and threw herself at the door. She didn't look, she just pulled and tried to go through, slamming into someone on the otherside trying also to get through.

She cried out and tried to wrench away, immediately thinking she was back. That'd she'd turned back to that dark, nightmare place she'd thought she'd escaped.

Travis had decided to go lounge around the pool today. As he kicked back in a lounge chair, he wondered briefly if Memphis was out on another date with that little redhead maid. Maybe if the dates continued, Travis would get told to not come home one night. Then maybe Memphis wouldn't be so crabby.

~*~
Crabby or not, laundry still had to be done. Which was where Memphis was, fishing the laundry out of the washing machine and chucking it into the dryers. His fingers closed over something not made of cloth and his expression turned confused. Picking the object out of the machine, he'd pulled out a condom.

*~*
Erin was in the mail room, sorting the junk from her Cosmo magazine, her cell bill and a letter from her Grams.

~*~
Roxy was in the lobby, trying to figure out what she'd been thinking, upping the wedding by a whole year. Then trying to fit a vacation in the middle of that? She still needed to talk to Andras too. Scribbling on a paper in Spencer's project planner she made that a top priority.

*~*
Logan and Chad were both outside in the gardens. Logan was tending to a small patch of garden as Chad watched, unable to do much more. He was frustrated and despising this whole meniscus thing in it's entirety.

~*~
Tristan needed coffee. His day had started out a disaster, after having a shrieking Anabella Winters on the phone for nearly three hours. Somehow, she'd found out about that tattoo of his and decided she needed to voice her opinion. At seven a-m, which was when Tristan had been peacefully dreaming of screwing a hot brunette.

The walls had been made good, a new bathroom area installed and decorated and the walls painted in pleasant pastel shades in washable paint. The carpet, also fully washable, was laid and now it was time to bring in the furniture.

It could have been a nightmare but Ms Pascuale, the manager, was a very sensible woman and had made a floor plan so all they had to do was carry the pieces in and, in some cases, assemble them.

Sunday was technically Nick's day off but helping out was fun especially when Seth and Charlie were along to get involved.

"Pass me that allen key," Nick said. "No that one. The little one. yeah, that one."

Phin needed a blue print from the apartment in the Manor. That's what he'd called on Friday morning to tell Bridget anyway. Really, he just wanted to go over there to get a chance to talk to her. He'd agreed to come over after the kids were asleep, though, to avoid getting them all wound up and having them ask that he stay for dinner or bath time or bed time or all of those. That part had been rough to agree to, but it was a sacrifice he was willing to make. He'd almost expected to get an angry call or voice mail from her after leaving that present for her on her birthday but he hadn't heard from her. Now, standing in the hallway facing the door to the apartment which held his family, he was zoning out.

He had already knocked on the door, loud enough to be heard but not enough to disturbed the kids since they were no doubt asleep by now. But now he was staring at the numbers on the door and thinking about how much he missed being near her. Her missed touching her, kissing her, hell he missed fighting with her in the sense that he knew he'd wind up sleeping on the couch for a night or two but eventually they'd figure it out. Now it was just him, alone in his shitty temporary apartment most nights except for when she let him have the kids for a night here or there. Carter was pissed at him because he kept clocking in overtime shifts. He had nothing else to do why not work? They received bonuses for being ahead of schedule and he knew that some of the workers were struggling financially so he figured it was a win-win situation. The bonuses and payments were starting to pile up in their joint bank account, and Phin figured it hadn't gone unnoticed to Bridget since she'd gone on a birthday buying spree. His mind was roaming through a random batch of memories from their first few months of dating as he continued to zone out.

Emma had taken Lily out for a long walk, and they were due up at Ang and Alec's for dinner later, but right now she was thirsty, and Lily was too. So she stopped in at the Mocha to pick up some drinks and snacks. Yes she ached a little today, in places that hadn't ached before, but she felt good, and had that little extra swing of confidence to her hips as she walked up to the counter and joined the short line of people queuing for service.

Lily sat by the conservatory doors, her tongue lolling out the side of her mouth, a distinctly doggy grin on her face, and her tail swishing across an arc of already clean floor. Emma picked out a couple of cookies, nothing too heavy, and three bottles of water, put it on account, and then picked everything up. She was happy, smiling at most everyone in the room, and then heading out to the conservatory where at least grumpy Joy couldn't glare at them quite so nastily. Emma was settling down to daydreaming, Lily having already drunk most of a bottle of water and eaten half a cookie, when she heard someone else coming into the conservatory and sat up a little. Sprawling all over the bench just, wasn't her thing normally, but she hadn't bought a sketchpad or anything and it was nice to just, relax and let the thoughts flow through her mind. She hoped Niles was alright, he hadn't seemed to be too cheerful this morning.

Niles had a lot to think about as  he climbed into bed on Sunday night.
He'd done a lot of stuff in the past week. Correction, he'd done a lot of women in the past week. Some he cared to remember, some he didn't, and some that were bound to have serious consequences. 
His eyes shut surprisingly easy for someone with such a troubled conscience, but he still couldn't sleep.