Morningstar Manor

It wasn't hard to admit she had cabin fever, and rather than go outside, even though it appeared spring might actually be coming in, Ang had opted to take her new daughter down to the Mocha. Alec had taken Gavin and Faith outside, but Ang was not going out there with her ten day old baby girl, not for anything. So here she sat, the baby in one arm, and sipping tea with the other. She knew Alec might not be long, but she'd got juice for Gavin and some cookies and muffins, and of course her tea, a bottle of water for Faith and Alec's coffee was on order for when he came in. In the meantime, she was feeling very sociable, and rather pleased with herself.

Hiding out? Cleo? Not a chance, but the pile of study books and notebooks on one lounger, while she lay on the one next to it did sort of indicate she'd been there a while. Which even if that hadn't given it away, the cooler full of empty soda's and a bowl that looked suspiciously like it might have held fruit salad did anyway. Yes, with Jazz still doing her heartbroken best to be as miserable as possible, Cleo was revising like crazy up at the pool house. Well, mostly revising, with a slap she closed the text and huffed as she added it to the other lounger, before twisting lithely and getting up off the one she'd been lying on. A few steps and she was diving into the pool to swim a few more laps in an effort to break up the monotony of Business Ethics, Economic Forecasting, and what she called "stockmarket one-oh-none" in trading practices.

Those few laps done, and at a fast pace besides, she lifted herself out onto the side and padded back to the lounger, eyeing the hot tub as she did so, maybe in a bit she'd go bubble away the terrible thoughts she was having about quitting school and taking up some brainlessly fluffy career option. She sighed as she settled back on her lounger, pulling a towel over her to help her dry off a bit, still arguing with herself, but not realising she'd spoken out loud.... "Yes, but brainless and fluffy you are not, however hard you try, so give that one up and keep studying."

The mailbox always seemed to get fuller after a chocolate style holiday, and not only did Gregori have to bring post home from work, but deal with the stuffed box here too! He almost cursed as a load of cards and envelopes fell out of the box and slid across the counter to glide towards the floor, but he resisted, just. Which was probably a good thing, because he was down on his hands and knees picking them up when he heard footsteps, and looked up, to see who else was checking the mail... "Um, hi, I would say be careful, but I think it has stopped attacking me now."

He grinned, both hands full of mail, and stood back up again, although there were several pieces still on the floor.

Ang had been shopping, very briefly, she felt increasingly like she was not just going to have a baby, but a baby elephant, and it was most uncomfortable to walk far, but, she had wanted some new things for the baby, and for herself. A taxi to Michael's Bros and back, easy, but she'd been a little too energetic and now sat, at least half asleep, in the Mocha, stirring a cup of tea, while contemplating the possibilities of getting help up to the apartment... for her, never mind the bags!

She was happy though, the baby was kicking well but not on anything particularly tender, and it felt strange, but she thought the head might have dropped down, which would explain that lumbering waddle much better... of course that had other implications too... She looked up as people came and went, half hoping to see Emma, or Alec, or well, anybody who might lend her a hand, or at least some conversation!

Tristan was grumpy. He hadn't gotten much sleep and the weather didn't help at all. It was supposed to be spring for crying out loud and it had snowed. He loved living here in the City, but on days like this he could go for a tropical island too.

His demeanor matched Joy's, though he'd learned long ago that mutual ignoring was the best way to handle her. At least, the best way for him. He'd also learned to tolerate different types of coffee which he hadn't ordered. Taking a seat at a table by the door he lifted his cup and sighed. "And even plain black is an unreal expectation..." Inside his cup the coffee was brown, not black as he'd asked for.

Travis had classes in the morning but he didn't care. It was St. Patrick's Day and he was going to celebrate. Plus, as an added bonus this year, he was legal for once. Car bombs were starting to grow on him, though he did keep laughing over trivial things. As he picked up the glass off the bar he left the change as a tip and promptly bumped into the person behind him, then laughed again.

"Holy shit dude, sorry..." He said not realizing that dude was his default term when drunk.

Leena was on the desk today so Charlie was out in the body of the gallery tidying a wall up after taking down a load of pictures. He was filling the screw holes at the moment and would paint it later.

Because it was a boring job he was listening to music and singing along.

Ang waddled (literally these days) into the Mocha, grabbing a paper from the rack as she did so, in search of a cup of tea and some light snack-age. Preferably of the muffin or cookie variety, nothing too healthy! She felt in the need of a bit of company, but no way was she going outside, too cold and besides, there were usually more people in here!

She got a pot of tea, and a plate of muffins, and settled down at a table where she could be comfy and still accommodate 'the bump', and started idly browsing through the City News. The japanese earthquake and tsunamis featured heavily of course, and she sighed a little, the world seemed to be in complete flux right now. A thought that made her exclaim out loud as she read the next article, "The north pole is moving to where?"

The day had been long and somewhat boring, filled with meetings and reports. He'd arrived home to find Roxy was working late, so he'd left her a note in return saying where he was - the new whiteboard and pens system seemed to work so well - and headed up to the pool. A good number of laps later he was now relaxing and enjoying the newly restored view of the sky through the roof. Clouds scudded across, driven by the wind, but inside the poolhouse it was still warm and balmy.

He looked over as people came in, went out, and waved occasionally to those he knew as the place emptied out and filled up, it was very pleasant, and when someone came over to where he was laying on the lounger, he was feeling much better than he had been, and grinned up at them, "Hi, how's it going? The water is lovely today."

Why don't I do this more often, was the question that circled through Jazz's head as she flashed a ten at the bartender and waited for him to produce another bottle for her.

An irritable day had turned into a frustrating night - pissy customers, complicated homework, another round of "thanks, but no thanks" text messages from Tom....

Alcohol made it all seem so much less important.

Grinning, she traded with the bartender (booze for cash) and nodded at the patron next to her as she brought her third Guinness in just over an hour to her mouth.

"And I don't even like Guinness," she laughed.

"No, that won't work."

Urquhart had been in his workshop/garage, door up to let in the greyish natural light of a rainy afternoon, kneeling on a scrap of canvas and lovingly applying grease to recalcitrant screws on his Harley's innards, when the call came.

A client, and one with very bad ideas, at that.

"I'm quite willing to wait for my fee until you've liquidated some of the assets you are expecting from the transaction..." he ventured, then listened to his phone with a deepening scowl.

"You're entirely mistaken, sir," he said, calmly. "If that is your last word -- well. Yes, for expenses occurred, and necessary cancellations, and so forth."

That's why it was a 'non-refundable advance', for pete's sake! Idiotic Americans.

"I'll recommend somebody else free of charge."

Ivan, Dmitri, or one of their countless 'cousins' would pick it up gladly and make it look really nasty, and never worry about the inelegant solution.

"Of course, discretion is always guaranteed, independent of payment. Goodbye."

Insurance fraud -- of all the stupid ideas he had heard in his career! Urquhart was having none of it. He had to live here -- unlike the Ukrainians, who'd fly in goons and fly out the slightly iffy Monets, no problem.

He shook his head, picked up the oil can, and forgot all about the call for the time being, pleasantly lost in the Zen of motorcycle maintenance.

The walk home from the shop had been cold, but rather than fill up on chocolate and hot food, Gregori had come down to the gym to work out. He'd get plenty warm that way, and besides, with all the chocolate he was eating lately he kind of needed to, otherwise he'd be putting on weight wholesale! In between short sessions on the treadmill, he was lifting weights, and after a while he got into the rhythm and was therefore surprised when the door opened behind him and someone else came in. He smiled, the treadmill wasn't that interesting, and even lifted a hand, "Hi, cold out tonight isn't it, is it still snowing?"

Cleo was sitting in the conservatory, sipping on a soda, and trying to finish the assignment she had to hand in tomorrow. She wasn't happy with it, and this was her third rewrite after telling Jazz it was done, which was why she was down here and not in the apartment!She muttered something under her breath, then looked up, blushing slightly, swearing in French was all right, so long as nobody heard. All she heard in return was the rustling of the plants as the fan turned lazily overhead in a hint of breeze from somewhere.

With a sigh Cleo put her head back down into her books, only a couple of paragraphs left to go now! Then, she heard footsteps, and looked up again, who else was in the conservatory?

Tristan knew there was no mail delivery on Sunday, but he hadn't really been down here since Wednesday anyway so their box was full. And by full he meant FULL. There were several magazines, a handful of catalogs boasting Christmas specials and a smattering of envelopes. One of them a pale purple color that made him scowl. Like usual he shifted that to the bottom of the stack then started chucking the junk before taking it upstairs.

Ash had spent her holiday alone, ordered in some pizza and worked on some sound tracks. It wasn't hard for her to be on her own; just lonely sometimes. With her work finished now she decided to go off to the Mocha and find out if their delicious peppermint coffee was back in stock yet.

Logan had gotten home from school, taken care of Appa and took his homework to the Mocha tonight. He also had an ulterior motive though. Besides his homework he was compiling a list of things to get for Thanksgiving dinner. For six this year. He was scheming and though he didn't need Olivia's help yet, he probably would by the end of the week with potentially convincing Asia this was a good idea. Then he started wondering if anybody was allergic to anything as far as food or Appa was involved.

After dealing with clients this morning, reworking the song that she'd felt was perfectly fine this afternoon and re-presenting to the clients early this evening, Ashlynn was feeling drained. She grabbed a few candles from her apartment after she changed into her bathing suit and grabbed her towel, then headed for the pool. Candles and hot water with jets seemed like just the medicine she needed tonight.

She was careful to keep the candles a safe enough distance away from the sides of the hot tub, but close enough to extinguish them if need be. With them lit, the scent of sandalwood filled the air. Ashlynn sunk down into the water of the hot tub with a soft sigh.

Sunday nights meant scrambling to do his ASL homework. Currently, he sat in the back of the Mocha, watching the video lessons and trying to remember the difference between some similarly signed words. The good news was he didn't have to use his earphones to do the lessons. Nobody talked during them... The bad news was they were boring. And he was out of coffee, he concluded, picking up an empty cup.

Jazz was hard at work in the Mocha, trying to - not so much finish, as start - her Technical Writing term paper. The term paper that was due on Monday.

Yes, she had known about it for a month, and no, she honestly hadn't meant to put it off, but well...things happen.

So here she was, up to her elbows in coffee and muffins and hoping working in the Mocha would be easier than at home where Cleo kept breathing disappointment all over her.

Loudly.

Erin was walking out in the garden, leash in one hand and phone in the other. She'd let Amelia go wandering off, but within sight, as she talked to her father.

"Yes, Dad, I know. But I didn't want you to think I forgot about you. Especially not with tomorrow so close." She said, knowing it was always tradition for her to call her father for Veteran's Day. He might not wear the uniform any more, but he'd worn it long enough.

There was a long pause on Erin's end and should somebody be standing close, she'd be concerned about them overhearing. A quick glance around revealed that nobody else was out. Probably because it was freezing and if she wasn't walking the dog, she wouldn't be out here either. Then he said something that made her stomp her foot, completely offended by what was said. "No Daddy. I love him and it doesn't matter." Then she bit her lip to fight back tears as the voice on the other end of the line raised. "He makes me happy, that's all that should matter to you."

Amelia ran off, chasing something, but Erin didn't see. She plopped down on one of the benches on the path, feeling like absolute shit again. "Yes, Sir. I understand. Goodnight." She said, hand dropping as she pressed the end button on her phone. If it weren't a new one, she'd chuck it, she thought. Then she realized Amelia had run off where she couldn't see and got up to go after the pup, tear streaked face, sniffling nose and all.