Nataliaflcres:

nataliaflcres‌:

Starter for: Anyone Location: Siren’s Song @maywoodstarters​

It wasn’t until later that afternoon that her shift would start, but that left her with enough time to quickly make her way over to the Siren’s Song to get herself some coffee. She was going to need a lot of it, like with every shift. Never had Natalia regretted her choice of becoming a surgeon and follow in her father’s footsteps. But that did not mean that it was hard work and that coffee would help a lot with that.

“I want to change things up for once and go for a different kind of coffee. Do you have any advice?”

While Olivia wasn’t sure if she was drinking to much after work, she could safely say that she was drinking too much coffee. A mean headache had a way of blooming behind her eyes if she went too long without another cup. She kept meaning to go back to the doctor’s to get looked at, but there was only so much time in the day, and she wasn’t a good planner. That was the excuse she gave herself as she slipped into Siren’s Song for the second time that day. She was debating on one or two shots of espresso when a familiar voice peeked over her shoulder. Olivia turned a little with an easy smile at the sight of Nat. “I like iced Americanos, but I don’t know what your usual is,” Olivia said, “I think they have some new flavor option too, that might be worth a shot.”

leo-rojas‌:

“Honestly, I’m not trying to be an asshole here but if I had a working mute button, don’t you think I would have tried that?”  Honestly, if he was sitting there, freaking out about the noise but hadn’t tried the mute button before she suggested it, he would’ve punched himself in the face.  He shoved the laptop away from himself slightly in frustration before dragging his hands down his face.

“This is what I get for constantly repairing a 8 year old lap top.  It was going to turn on me eventually.” he sighed.  The things hadn’t even been new when he had gotten it in school, a hand-me-down from a sibling from their time in college.  At this point, so many parts had been replaced, Leo felt very much like Frankenstein, and it his monster.  The thought did occur to him that all the money he had spent repairing it could have probably bought him a new laptop, but he didn’t want to dwell on that thought, for fear of frustrating himself even further.

“Sorry I snapped.” he apologized, knowing that he had practically bitten the head off a stranger who for all intents and purposes had just been trying to help.  “–Can I…I don’t know, buy you a coffee or something?”  Did he really want to?  No, but it was hard to go against the binary his mother had coded in him in the form of manners.

A wry smile crossed Olivia’s face as soon as the word “honestly,” left his mouth. Anytime someone began a sentence with that word it was to try to soften whatever they were going to say. To his credit, the ad finally must have reached its time limit after all the time he spent grouching at her. In the process of tuning out his rhetorical questions, Olivia recognized his voice. Her neighbor. The one that Tabby Cat made it a mission to bother on a regular basis. This made the entire situation all the more amusing. 

Olivia rested her chin in her hand as her neighbor rambled about an eight year old laptop. She could probably come up with a joke to say, but thought better of it, pausing to sip on her coffee to hide her grin. At least he seemed distracted from the embarrassment his laptop caused, that was something. 

“It’s alright, can’t say I would have acted differently.” she shrugged. It was a lie, but she wasn’t looking for an argument. He did always return Tabby Cat to her, and she wasn’t trying to light a fire under him out of fear he’d change his mind about being a decent neighbor. Olivia looked towards the bakery counter, eyes looking down the little pastry trays. “A scone would be nice. Haven’t had breakfast, yet.” 

sfordbaileys‌:

Starter for: anyone Location: Deep Swells (Crescent Cove) @maywoodstarters​

Staring down his mug of black coffee, probably cold by now, Ford willed himself to find something to do. Fingers held the handle tight enough to feel secure there wouldn’t be a drop. Dragging his feet, he looked around his empty shop. It was still early enough that he didn’t mind. Ford wasn’t the biggest fan of busy hours, so he’d tried to take full advantage of the peace and quiet. A quiet jangle broke his focus on the framed black and white photo of back in the day Maywood. Stifling a yawn, Ford hid his face behind the mug, hair flying as he shook off the tiny sigh that his throat made as he exhaled. “Mornin’,” he tilted his chin up. He didn’t bother with the niceties. Nobody cared for them, especially him. Five minutes of mindless wandering and constant yawning, his heart jumped before his brain could comprehend what was happening. “The fuc—what was that?” He asked nobody in particular as he walked towards the vicinity of the crash. Surfboards were lopsided and the offender, though probably accidental, seemed to be half buried. Murder by surfboards. That would’ve made a good headline for the press. A snort escaped his nose as he extended a hand towards the hopeful patron. “Ya know, there’s a thing called customer service.”

How Olivia got tasked with watching her nephews was beyond her. As it stood, her tolerance for children was low. Her tolerance for bad children? Non-existent. Allie’s brood of five was a handful, so when she lost the eldest three to the shoreline Olivia was more than happy to watch them from the inside of the surf shop as the youngest two looked for surf wax. 

Olivia should have known that trusting the youngest two to go through the aisles was a mistake, though. At the sound of a crash, Olivia begrudgingly looked away from the window and turned to scowl at her nephews. As a snort came from her side, she glanced over. Her nephews at least had the courtesy to look sheepish at the shop’s owner. “Sorry, they’re climbers,” she explained, placing one of the surfboards on the rack, “Can you point them in the direction of the surf wax while I help?”

lucieoconnor‌:

Lucie was a night owl, that was for sure. Once the sun had set and she had had a drink or a smoke, that’s when her muse came out to play. And tonight was no exception. It was 3am, not that she noticed and she was hammering away at her piano keys, lost in the melody and singing at the top of her lungs. Music was her therapy. Plus, she also had a setlist to learn for an upcoming gig and some of the songs were trickier to play than others. Yes, she could use a backing track but that wasn’t her style.

“Fuck!” She cursed as she made the same mistake on the same part of the song that she had made at least twenty times in a row. Taking a deep breath and a swig of her drink, she attempted it again, determined to nail it.

“Once upon a time in a faraway kingdom, man made up a story, said that I should believe him –– go and tell your white knight that he’s handsome in hindsight, but I don’t want the next best thing, so I sing––”

Just as she was about to hit the section she had messed up so many times, Lucie heard three loud knocks at her door. She stopped and stood up from her piano, wondering who the hell was pounding on her door at this time. She pulled open her door fiercely, ready to yell at the person that was bothering her when she was met with Olivia, the girl who used to babysit her. 

“It’s three?” Was the first thing the brunette said, raising her eyebrows. “Shit.” Even though Lucie was a fraction taller than the other girl, in this moment, she felt like Liv towered over her, especially with the daggers being shot in her direction. 

Tabby Cat jumped in Olivia’s arms as a curse broke through the silence. When the door opened, she braced herself for an argument. Instead, Lucie surprised her and paused. The surprise on her neighbor’s face was made evident by the arch of her brows. Olivia mirrored Lucie’s expression before nodding. It was definitely three a.m., since she laid in bed for the past hour listening to Lucie sing and hammer away on her piano. Just like old times. 

“Yes. It’s three, and you’re lucky it’s me and not the cops coming over for a noise complaint,” she nagged. Tabby Cat meowed his agreement. They weren’t the only people in the building, and one of their neighbors worked at the hospital. Truthfully, Olivia was surprised he hadn’t stalked down the hallway to complain. “What the hell are you practicing for that you’re up at three a.m?” Olivia asked, curiosity outweighing her annoyance -- at least Lucie was surprised by the time rather than ambivalent. 

lucieoconnor‌:

“You’re not going to take my power cable away are you?” Lucie smirked, remembering what Liv used to do in the past when they were much younger and Lucie should have been sleeping. Truthfully, she hadn’t even noticed that it was so late, but now she mentioned it, she was beginning to grow tired. “To be honest, I’m glad it’s you and not the cops. I’m sorry, Liv.” She offered, smiling sheepishly. It might not always seem like it, but Lucie was never intentionally trying to be a dick. It just sometimes happened.

“I’m singing at an event in a few days and they have –– rather last minute –– requested some covers as well as my original songs. So I’m learning them, or trying to.” She explained, already forming a rather bad relationship with the song she was currently trying to learn.

“Seeing as I’m not looking to get arrested for petty theft: not tonight,” Olivia said with a smirk of her own. She could have added that taking the power cable away hadn’t put a stop to Lucie’s nightly practicing. In fact, at some point Lucie started to get around her by using headphones. Then, Olivia flipped the breaker to her room at random intervals throughout the night. There were no breakers that she could access now, so this would have to do. 

“It’s alright. I sleep like shit anyways,” Olivia shrugged. She nodded towards the keyboard peeking out in the background. It wasn’t the one she remembered, which meant this one was louder. “What event and what covers? It’s not like Bob Dylan songs is it?” she asked, her distaste apparent in her voice; Bob Dylan may have been a great, but Olivia’s experience with him was recent and his voice was not what it once was. 

jhernandezlewis‌:

“If it makes you feel better it’s because it’s my favorite too, and not a lot of people order it.  So I wonder what that says about our tastes.” he offered with a light shrug  “Although, I make it so I’m biased and I think it renders us to be those blessed with mature palettes.”  The last bit was accompanied by a crack of a smile, a sign that he didn’t take it that seriously.  “But Joseph, Joe, J, pretty much anything other than Joey or JJ.”  He had sworn once he heard her name it would’ve clicked for him but there was nothing, synapses firing blank on all cylinders.

It was slow enough that everyone else had been taken care of, so he figured he could spare a few more moments in an attempt to see if he could find out something else that might help make sense of her identity.

“What do you do that’s got you out here drinking alone after work?” he questioned with a raised brow, clocking the scrubs.  “Doctor?  Vet?  Nurse?  Something else incredibly stressful?”  

“I like the way you think, Joe. I’m going to include ‘mature palette’ in the ‘other’ section of my resume,” Olivia said before taking a sip of her drink. He truly had remembered her order. Half the time, she couldn’t even remember her own order beyond vaguely describing some of its tastes. Luckily for her, the bartenders could put two and two together. 

Olivia laid her glass down at the question. As he guessed, she regarded him with a grin. ‘Doctor? Vet? Nurse? Something else incredibly stressful?’ Her mother wished, Olivia thought. With a shake of her head, Olivia shrugged off the left side of her cardigan to flash the embroidered “Spaology” and her name tag underneath. “Not quite as fancy, or loaded with student debt,” she said, lightly shimmying the cardigan back into place, “I’m a massage therapist and a certified esthetician. It’s only stressful if you consider taking away the aches, and wrinkles from the House Wives of Hopewell to be a noble pursuit.”