Kyle

[nola_lucy]

Hazel hadn't been to Kyle's place before, and she was looking forward to seeing it. Well, she was looking forward to seeing him most, but she was really enjoying getting to know him better, and you could learn a lot about someone in their own space.

Also there was the benefit of getting to kiss him without anyone else around, which was definitely a plus.

She'd changed out of the painting clothes she'd still been hanging out in when she'd been poking around on the journals and into a colorful knit top and her favorite pair of jeans. Impulsively she stopped and got a small bunch of gerbera daisies for Kyle - red and orange and yellow - which she was holding with a grin when he opened the door.

"Hi."

Sam

[nola_eleanor]

Elspeth hadn't really seen Oliver since he and Sam had gotten together. She'd mostly been waiting for him to come to her, to apologize for spending all his time obsessing over his weirdo roommate-slash-boyfriend and abandoning her. He hadn't, and she hadn't changed her mind about being annoyed by the whole thing, but they'd made Oliver's favorite at the restaurant, and she hadn't brought him food and swapped catty stories with him in a while, and Elspeth really was a softer touch than she liked to make herself out to be.

So she ended up at Oliver's door with enough food for both of them (meaning enough for four normal people), having no idea that he wasn't actually home.

Gavin

[nola_sirius]

Dominic could not ever seem to get enough of Gavin. He wasn't looking too closely at this -- their seeming need to be near each other, within sight of each other (preferably within arms' reach) -- but it was there, nad it was real, and Dominic had to acknowledge and honour it and act in accordance with it. He'd never believed in concealing his feelings, particularly, and he wasn't making it a secret that he would prefer that every moment of his days and nights would be spent with Gavin.

All of this to say: when Gavin arrived at Dominic's apartment, Dominic threw open the door with a giddy grin and wrapped both arms around him, tightly, and held him close -- the kind of long, intentional hug that's in no hurry to end. "There's my Gavin," he said by way of greeting, and the relief he felt at being reunited (yes, even after several hours) was immense.

Too immense? No comment.

Caleb

[nola_cyclops]

Sam was not doing well this week. Migraines, cluster headaches, bad dreams -- that was his reality right now, and he hated it. He hadn't been able to work, because no one wants a fatigued, pained pilot, least of all Sam. And he hadn't been able to do any of the things he liked doing: thoroughly cleaning the apartment, making dinners for himself and Oliver, even shaving was too hard when he felt like looking at something too closely was going to make his head explode.

Sam wasn't thrilled about leaving the house in his stubble and with his slow, deliberate movements, but Oliver was working and Sam needed new painkillers, and the closest drugstore honestly wasn't that far from their home; it wouldn't be the most fun trip in his life, but Sam could make it easily enough.

He wasn't dressed crisply, as usual. Instead, he was dressed for comfort, in old jeans and threadbare sweater, and his hair wasn't sitting neatly and precisely; he looked disheveled.

Still, Sam barely cared. Just get what you need and get home, right? Straightforward enough -- except for how he slammed into the chest of another man in his path. Way to pay attention, Sam.

Cora

[nola_catra]

The only good part of Alex's life -- the only uncomplicated, correct, completely exactly right part -- was Cora. And especially nights where Alex could flirt with Cora hard enough that she fumbled in front of her family and arrived at Alex's apartment ready to fall into her arms.

Yes, it was love, and it was the best love, but it was also passion that they shared. And there was a curious, try-anything-once bent to their passion that Alex was obsessed with. And that was why she'd ditched old scarves and spent a month of tips on actual bed restraints designed for exactly the purpose of strapping a beautiful woman to her bed, and she'd made a playlist so that Jordan wouldn't have to hear, you know, half of the noise, because it wasn't a soundproofing playlist but it would have to do, and she'd lit candles, because Cora loved them, and she'd found ones that purported to smell like cotton candy, and that seemed appropriate.

Alex met Cora at the door in one of Cora's own summery maxi dresses -- no shoes, no underwear -- her hair loose and hanging a little over her face. "Come to my room," was her greeting, and it was laced with urgency.

Nori

[nola_buffy]

Sometimes Carrie really wanted pancakes at 11pm and she didn't like people to know this about herself, so there was a diner she went to that wasn't, like, pretty or instagrammable, but made good food and served breakfast all day and all night, and the people there were nice, and it was kinda dark, and sometimes she brought a book and sometimes she scrolled through her socials and sometimes she studied and sometimes she just daydreamed.


Tonight, she was sitting in a booth and drinking a glass of cheap, awful wine and online shopping on her phone. She was looking at new clothes for her morning runs -- now that she had a friend to run with, she could stand to look cuter. She was thumbing through leggings options, actually pretty content in the world, feeling pretty free in that kind of weird, late night, solitary way. Sure, there were other people in the diner, but they didn't matter. She didn't know them. She could just be chill.

Dani

[nola_quicksilver]

Normally Oliver would have taken a few minutes to admire the mural that was being added to the alleyway outside Phoenix Effect, but today it just wasn't possible. He was exhausted from nights of insomnia, worrying about Sam's headaches and surreptitiously googling scary stuff about brain tumors and MRIs. When he did nod off, he was usually startled awake by one of Sam's nightmares, which seemed so terrifying he'd have had a tough time getting back to sleep even if he didn't try to talk Sam back down.

It wasn't Sam's fault, and Oliver didn't blame him. He knew it had to be a million times worse for Sam than him. It was just a lot, though, and it was starting to affect him outside of home. He'd just been cut loose way early because he couldn't get his hands to stop shaking, which was a problem, needless to say, for a tattoo artist.

The smart thing to do would be to go home and try to sleep as much as possible so he could work a full day tomorrow. The thing Oliver was going to do, though, was get a massive espresso so he could try cleaning the apartment and doing some laundry while he took care of Sam. That was more important right now.

There was no line at this off-hour, which was good, because the second he stood still to wait for his order, the exhaustion set in so strongly that he felt in danger of nodding off on his feet. Nope, that was not going to work. As soon as he had his drink in hand, he tossed some change into the tip jar and headed to the milk/cream/sugar station, because he was going to need a lot of that last one.

But after a few steps a woman's feet were suddenly in his path, and God, Oliver was too tired to walk over them or even look up. "Excuse me," he said dully, the weight of stopping heavy on him again. He just needed to keep going and everything would be fine.